Sunday, 06 July 2008

• Monday July 7th

  Happy belated 4th of July everyone.  We had a wonderful Independence Day celebration in Seoul with some American Friends.  We started out at On the Border - and it was fantastic.  Granted, it wasn't Mexican food from San Antonio, but nonetheless it was something different from rice and fermented veggies.  We spent friday night in Seoul and took a tour to the DMZ (demilitarized zone) on Saturday morning.  This was really interesting as we got to look over the wall and see North Korea (which looks surprisingly like South Korea) and view a museum. North Korea has drilled an estimated 20 tunnels under the DMZ in the past trying to launch an invasion on South Korea.  South Korea has found 4 of the tunnels and we were able to walk through one of them - it was very steep and quite a work out!  The other aspect we found interesting was that the land around the DMZ is all roped off as in the past North Korea placed land mines there and they are still in the process of neutralizing them all.  Our guide advised that they believe they have found and neutralized 30% of the mines. After the DMZ our guide dropped us off at The Hard Rock Cafe which was great because we didn't even know there was one in the country.  We indulged in our second American meal for the weekend.  We took the train back on Saturday evening and spent Sunday just resting.

  We also got to see the thousands of protestors marching the streets rallying against the importation of American beef.  They are concerned about Mad Cow disease and despite scientific evidence to show otherwise, they continue to protest.  At this point however, it would appear the issue centers more around their anger towards their government than the actual beef issue.  However, we were warned by the American embassy here in Korea to avoid protestors and especially not to provoke them.  (Like we needed to be reminded of this...)

  I say resting, but really we were trying to keep cool as it hit 91 degrees yesterday.  We woke up sweating on Sunday morning and went out to try and find an inexpensive air conditioning.  We couldn't find anything less than $400 bucks that didn't include the installation fee.  So we're determined to build perseverance and stick it out.  We did purchase another fan and stuck that one in the bed with us. 

  

  

  On the Border

   

  The DMZ

  

  Can you see N.K?

  

  Hard Rock Cafe

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