Dancing Liquor

They're dancing to one of the more popular K-pop songs....a classic that everyone in the country has probably heard 150 times, willingly or otherwise.

East Sea II

A big Korean soju (Korean rice liquor) company put on a little festival at the beach. Including carnival games where the prize was a bottle of soju or a fancy cooler pack. These dancing bottles and their friends the merry bears were the main attraction.

A pillbox left over from the Korean war. The beach we went to on the East Coast was relatively close to the border and the area had experienced several episodes of North Korean espionage.

Two Korean women strapped inside a metal ball seconds before being slingshotted into the air. I wish you could hear the screams that came 7 seconds later.

A guy jumping from the local bungee tower after being egged on by his friends and the crowd below for ten minutes. I despised the guy after holding my camera on him for all those minutes, waiting for him to actually jump.

The tower and the crowd of onlookers below.

The East Sea

The crew, minus me, as we checked in at out beachside hotel. The Asian man in the middle came and fetched us from the bus terminal. He told us about all the pretty Asian women in bikinis we'd see, despite the presence of our three female friends.

Tom, Justin, and HJ laying out under our umbrella. Flashing the requisite peace sign. Apparently Justin is an anarchist.

Justin and I before our dash to the water. It was cold.

Umbrellas as far as the eye can see. Its a full service set up. An old Korean man tends to your umbrella, taking away your trash when it piles up. Restauranteurs come by with menus of food that they'll deliver to you at your umbrella, via ATVs. We returned at night to drink soju and fire off batteries of roman candles.

Of all the cute Asian kids around this girl was probably the cutest. The Hello Kitty poncho towel helped out her case tremendously.

Insadong, Seoul

11,074 km to New York.....

Insadong is an artsy neighborhood in the heart of Seoul. This large gold buddha is in one of the largest Buddhist temples in Seoul. Its hard to see but the man sitting just below the pedestal is a monk reading out prayers to all the worshippers inside.

One of the cooler looking/weirder buildings in Seoul.

A three-story coffee shop that looked cool lit up at night. There isn't a lot of brick architecture here, good to come across it whenever I do.
The royal banquet hall on the grounds of the Korean Royal Palace. One of the neater buildings to see there, and one of the dozen that wasn't destroyed by the Japanese during their decades long occupation of Korea.

August Sun

Me showing off one of my parents' birthday gifts (the CA Republic shirt). I tell my students about how the CA state flag was actually designed in my hometown but it doesn't tend to be a crowd pleaser.

Laying out with friends on the grounds of the art college across the street from my apartment (the closest green grass around). The college is back in session and all of sudden the small street I live on is crowded with moody looking art students.

One of the few pictures of me catching, as opposed to dropping, the frisbee.