(For some reason my Tokyo pictures wanted to be placed at the top of my blog post- thanks Blogger!)
Hi everyone!
Apologies for not posting lately.
A lot has happened since my last post- I have been to Japan and back, have became an official Alien in Korea, and I have sat my first batch of exams!
I went to Tokyo, Japan on Thursday 26th September until Monday 30th- it was an amazing weekend. It was a really buzzing place, and I feel extremely lucky to have seen the amount that I did in the short space of time I was there. Arriving in Tokyo was an experience in itself. It was really turbulent coming into land and the plane was pretty much coming into land sideways to the runway at quite a speed. The passenger beside me who I had befriended on the plane (from Washington DC) went into the brace position, so I proceeded to do the same. The wheels touched the runway and after two 'bounces' it felt like the Captain had gained control of the plane again. The guy beside me let out a sigh of relief and gave me a high 5. With this, I knew that Tokyo was going to be a bigger adventure than I had anticipated. We stayed at an internationally recognised hostel in an area called Asakusa. It 's an older area of Tokyo, an hour from the airport, but it was very central and had a lot of things to see in the area including the Tokyo Skytree, the 2nd tallest building in the world.
We packed a lot into the few days we were in Tokyo, and I managed to take a lot of pictures. I think the pictures give more justice to just how amazing the sights of Tokyo were. We went to: The Sensoji Temple, Fujifilm HQ, Mori Tower, Shibuya crossing, Imperial Palace, Menji Shrine, Pokemon Centre, Mt. Fuji and many more awesome places.
It was an incredible place and I really recommend going if you are ever in Asia. I found myself trying to draw comparisons between there and Seoul, along with the pros and cons. Overall, I felt that Tokyo was more Metropolitan and had lost some of it's Asian traditional culture and architecture. I felt in some areas that I could have been walking on a street in New York. I also found that the Japanese are a lot smaller than the Koreans, so their subway system is a lot more claustrophobic, and it doesn't help with the amount of people that live there!
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| Kachi Yama Yama National park: Best views of Mt.Fuji and surrounding lakes- breathtaking! |
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| Tokyo Skytree |
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| Mori Tower- Tokyo City view. |
I was happy to return to Seoul (my comfort zone)- I've really settled well here and I like it's cleanliness and safety. The Subway is also so much easier to use than Tokyo's! Tokyo has a Private and a public line, whereas Seoul's subway is just all one company. I've met a lot of good people here, and hopefully some friends for life. Life here is easy and everyone is really nice. I am now an official registered 'alien' in Korea after receiving my 'Alien registration card' which means I can be here for longer than 90 days, and can exit and re-enter the country as I please...which brings me onto my next bit of news...I AM GOING TO CHINA!!! That's right, I will grace Beijing with my presence from the 14th November for another long weekend. The flight offer was too good to turn down, and I'm never going to get the opportunity to fly to China return for £160 again. I've spoken to a lot of Chinese people in my classes and they are all very fascinated that I'm going to China in November- I think because it's the off-season and it will be cold. I looked up the temperatures for Beijing for November and it will be 0-5 degrees most days. FREEZING! However, Seoul is starting to get a bit more chilly. Rarely wearing my shorts now, and it's a must to have a jumper if you are out at nights. Today it's probably the coldest it's been during the day at 10 degrees, and at nights it's dropping to around 6 degrees. I was warned by many Koreans that the Winter will come fast here. It's currently Autumn and it usually only lasts 2-3 weeks. I best look out my Winter jacket that I took from home- a lot of people haven't brought theirs- crazy! A former exchange student at Hanyang posted pictures on our Facebook page of snow around campus at the beginning of December. Something I'm not looking forward to as the campus is built onto the side of a hill! Garthdee Road is nothing compared to this!!
Overall, I'm really enjoying my experience here and am making the most of it. I think it really is life changing, being able to live in a completely foreign place, and get to meet people from all over the world. It's something I'd recommend for anyone back home if they get this opportunity. People must really be getting sick of me back home as I keep posting on Facebook daily and weekly about all the things I've been doing. I can't believe that I've now been here 60 days. It sounds short, but I really have done so much, and settled into my new home. I don't think I've become overly homesick once since I arrived. There are small things that you begin to miss such as some home comfort food/treats (to me this would probably be Irn Bru and Haribo!) Also just hearing about events going on back home that I'd have definitely gone to if I was there. I think what has made me the happiest this week was getting to meet up with a fellow RGU student, here in Seoul!! My childhood friend Stacey, who studies Sports Science at RGU was here in Korea this week with her martial arts team- she is also friends with my cousin Kim who is on the same course! I met her for dinner last night, and it was so refreshing to hear an accent from home, and I didn't have to slow or dumb down my speech so she could understand. It was great seeing her, and I think this really highlights that the world is becoming a much smaller place. Who'd have thought two RGU students unrelated to the same trip would be in South Korea at the same time?! (Picture of us coming soon)
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Korean friend, Soon-Wook and I having a beer at our 'local'
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On positive note, I've also managed to download a VPN, so I can watch all my UK shows (trash tv) such as X-Factor and The Jonathan Ross Show...sounds really sad, but it's so good to watch some British TV to try and stay in touch with the home culture and keep up with what is going on. I've had my Mid-term exams over the past couple of weeks. I had 4 in total out of the 5 classes I have registered for. The 5th class I am working on a documentary at the moment so we got off with not having a mid-term. It's strange having exams only 7-8 weeks into the semester. They are worth 20-30% of our final grade. I've only had one result back so far, which was for Broadcasting Production and I got 97%, so I was stoked! A cause for a celebration this weekend!!
I recently climbed one of Seoul's tallest mountains at the Bukhansan National Park- it was incredible! It's a really good time of year to go hiking because the weather is less humid and also the trees are all changing colour with Autumn being here. I also went to the Seoul Fireworks Festival which is an annual event where Korea, Japan, France and Canada put on individual fireworks displays worth around $3.3 million for over 1 million spectators! The amount of people there was crazy. (pictures below)
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| Seoul City from the top of the mountain |
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| Watch your feet! |
Well, that concludes a rather long blog post. I hope I won't leave it so long next time between posts. As ever, I'm extremely thankful to all the views I'm still receiving during this period of inactivity. I'm hoping to get into a routine again and post weekly. I've also had a request to add some videos into my blogs too, so hopefully I'll get some good videos whilst in China next month!!
Thanks,
Ben :)
