Around the World in 110 Days!

I have been traveling a lot in New Zealand, so I have not had time to update. Once I get to Hawaii where I will be in one spot, I should be able to update then!

Okay, here is my Singapore post which I am posting on the same day as my South Korea post, so look for that under this post.

Right, so I was only in Singapore for two days, so I did not see much. I would say that the two things that stood out to me was the diversity and Singapore fast rise in living stands. There are three distinct ethnic quarters which seem to indicate diversity. They are the Little India, Muslim Quarter, and Chinatown. I have pictures below. As for Singapore’s fast rise, a local was telling me it was mainly architected by Lee Kuan Yew of the People’s Action Party. He runs a very tight ship however. Opponents tend to get exiled. Let’s see, I went salsa dancing a little here as well which was pretty good.

Okay, so anyway, here are the pics. You can see for the most part that Singapore looks pretty modern.

Little India

Muslim Quarter

Chinatown - Unfortunately, it was raining when I was in this section, so pics are not as good.

Here is a pic of the tall buildings area in Singapore.

And that is the end of this post. Next I will blog about Australia and I actually leave for New Zealand this Wednesday. My trip is actually starting to come closer to the end…

Well, I arrived in Seoul in the early evening and made it without much trouble to my hostel. Navigating the streets in Seoul can be tricky. The main streets are labeled well, but then the small streets and the millions of narrow walkways are not really labeled. For instance, my guide book just had a map with this small “roads” with no labels. To get to a place, directions might be take the second right after this major street or after a certain landmark. Buildings are numbered by when they are built in a district, so the house numbers are not very usefull either.

That evening, I went to the Insadong shopping street / area and walked around. First, I will say that Seoul is big for shopping. I typically do not like to shop, but Seoul tempted me. There are at least 6 distinct shopping districts / markets. There is a huge market I did not even have a chance to get to that has everything from what I hear. There is another market for asian medicine that seems fairly large as well. There was a market for musical instruments! Everything from amps to drums to acoustic and electric guitars to violins, flutes, etc. See blurry picture.

There was a clothing district where they had custom tailors every 500 feet it seemed. In fact, I bought a custom tux with tails! It cost for pants, tailcoat, shirt, cumberbund, and bowtie and shipping to the US $400 dollars US which is more expensive than India or China, but I am guessing the quality is better. Lastly, there was an electronics market! I guess prices are fairly inexpensive, but you have to haggle. Someone was telling me that internet prices are now competitive with their prices, so they have suffered a little. I did not get a chance to go here either.

Okay, so anyway, back to talking about the first shopping street that I went to, Insadong. Especially during the early evenings, Insadong has a bit of a mysterious feel I thought. The shops are usually warmly decorated with lots of stained wood and warm incandescent lighting. There are more touristy things in this area. Fine pottery, traditional clothing and other things. Here are two pics and a video.

Apparently at one point, they were also giving out free hugs in this area as well.

So other things I did included visiting a famous reconstructed palace area,Gyeongbokgung, that also had a folk museum. Here are a couple of pics from that.

Old style military procession

Also went salsa dancing in the Hongik University area at a place called Dalia, I think, which was nice.

Also, went to hilltop with nice view of Seoul. Here is a pic.

Some thoughts on Seoul. People were generally quiet, but friendly. I guess this is because the people (more the older generation) have been very serious about building up their country which was devastated after WWII. In fact, they only recently went to a 5 day work week (I assume it was a 6 day work week before). That is how they have built up their economy so much.

Another fact is a lot of people follow Confucius‘ teachings. To very crudely summarize, he was for moral fiber and gave a hierarchy (husband head of family, etc). This has had an affect on Korean culture on where woman stand. It looks like the younger generation of women are starting to pursue careers, etc, but the older generation of men might disapprove of this… Here is a quote from Confucius to finish off this blog.

When A Country

When a country is well governed, poverty and a mean condition
are things to be ashamed of. When a country is ill governed,
riches and honor are things to be ashamed of

Well, that seems about right, I guess… Okay, see y’all in my Singapore post!

Ah China is a bit different then India. China is definitely not as conservative and not as poor (at least Shanghai compared to Bangalore). I can say that Shanghai was a great city except for the pollution which was not as bad as India, but was still bad.

Shanghai felt pretty safe except when I was trying to get a cab late at night from the airport. This one guy tried to get me in an unmarked “cab”. They may have delivered me to my location, but I pretty sure they were illegal cabbies. So, I said, no, I was going with a metered taxi. I managed to get said taxi which they ran ahead to “refer” me I believe to try to get a commision out of the cabbie (they argued a bit in Chinese which I could not understand). Since this cabbie was official and was willing to give me a ride, I took it since there was not another cabbie around. He delivered me to the hostel safe and sound (whew).

The next day, I slept in and then took a walk on the Bund, the waterfront area. Here are two pics looking to the other side.

Anyway, the next morning, this guy and I went to Fuxing Park where people do Tai Chi and other stuff in the morning! Here is a pic and a video of this.

This evening (Friday), some of us went out to a jazz club that was interesting, but ended shortly because it took forever to get everyone out. Large groups have much inertia. From there, it pretty much turned into taking taxies to various places and not finding this other club that we found out later had moved. Sigh, great fun….

Saturday, I went to the old town area of Shanghai with Ed (his picture is coming up). Here are some pics of the old town.

More touristy / renovated areas of Old town

More “real” area of Old town

Around that time, we ran into Tess (in upcoming picture) and we all went to see Yuyuan Gardens (great park) in Old town. Here are some pics.

Here is a semi-candid pic (haha) of Ed, from Ireland, (in forground) and Tess, from St. Louis teaching english in China (forget which city). I probably spent half of my time with them for a couple of days till they left town.

That night, people from the hostel went out again. We went to a different jazz bar. Then we ended up at this all Chinese club called K-Club that was playing what I want to say is typically Chinese techno music. It was quite a novelty and therefore, great fun.

Other stuff, visited Shanghai’s large shopping district. Here is a pic.

Here are some more pics.

Oh, and I went to Hangzhou, an area famous for its beauty about 3 1/2 hours from Shanghai. Here are some pics.

Famous temple there (forget name). There is a buddha inside that is 4-5 stories tall!

Here are are some pics of the famous West Lake in Hangzhou.

Lastly, I decided not to get a tuxedo in India because I read on the internet about dubious quality. It said China was better, but they needed a week. I did not have time to check right away, so I could not get a tuxedo…

So, that is all I have time to post. I just arrived in Australia and am still 2 countries behind in blogging! Sigh…

Until the next blog..