Right, all in readiness then. Undersized Korean shirt: check; bachelor-bright gleam in my eyes: check; Australian sense of humour: long may it live.
The first step is to make it to the end of the lengthy and rather grim corridor waiting just outside of my door. If I make a left it will take me to HomePlus, the subway, and the bright lights of Yatap. A right-hand turn (pictured here) takes me down to the river (Springsteen-style) for exercise or the walk to school. School is 3.3 km south from my apartment and I walk beside the river all of the way.
Does it get any zanier than this? A self-portrait in an elevator, with the reflection in the background? Maybe if I'd had a spinning bowtie...
It just so happened that the day I'd designated as picture taking day was also clear and sunny - only the fourth time this has happened since my arrival. In the left of the picture you will see a zebra crossing. I am yet to figure out why Korean councils bother painting these stripes on the road as the cars have right of way in the case of pedestrians using it. Pedestrians stop cars by walking into the traffic and holding a palm towards the windshield of the oncoming vehicle. I assume this is where the oriental belief in chi comes from - "it is invisible energy originating from combination of old woman's palm and giant hat causing driver to brake so as not to interrupt flow of noble Korean life." Personally I am a rationalist who wants to get to work on time and so waits to cross with noble Korean. But in many ways I feel as if being a pedestrian here consititutes an extreme sport.
That's the outside of my building, this shot having been taken after I had made it across the road. As you can see, there are retailers on the first and second floors including a pool hall. In fact the entire first floor is made up of restaurants. I have made pals with the gimbap people just down from here. Maybe twice a week I eat at their fine establishment for a $3 dinner. Not bad eh?
Now, this is just before I walk down the stairs to the Tancheon. "Cheon" means stream, so technically it is the "Tan Stream." But coming from Australia, where we actually have water police due to water's scarcity, this looks very much like a river to me. Tancheon empties into "Hangang" in Seoul. Now "gang" means river, so technically it is the Han River. But to me, of course, it is an ocean.
The sign says "Bundang Cha Byeongwon." Byeongwon means hospital. This is where I get a mad deal on brand name medications - if I would only be so patient as to wait for all of the locals to be served before me.
If you look to the left you will see the Yatap stream. This originates in the hills beyond Bundang. I often walk past this point just as my good friend Stephen rounds the corner on his bike. He works at the next school down the line. It takes only 20 seconds to reach by car from mine and also has over 800 students, giving you an indication of the population density of this area.
This bridge over Tancheon dates back to the Lee Myung Bak era...
The apartment buildings are often named after the conglomerates. That one on the left is Chinese. Regardless, they all look pretty Soviet-like to me. Sometimes, at work, when no one else is in the staffroom, I look at illicit pictures of European, American and Australian buildings on my computer. Phwoar look at those curves! What a beauty! etc etc
The buildings in the distance are of Seohyun, which has a reasonable foreigners' scene, and a Korean busker with a pretty bloody good voice who loves his Britpop: "half a world away..."
Bundang is surrounded by low hills. Excellent for hiking. Most of Korea is hilly and they have only really developed the places of low altitude. But because they seem to love living close together, man have they developed it!
And then I duck into this subway 25 minutes after leaving home and become...
...Noble Teacher Slippers-Don't-Fit!
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