50-cent Melted Sugar Cookie

How to feel like a foreigner in Korea...

Go to NANTA - a nonverbal performance incorporating traditional Korean samulnori - and realize that despite being of Korean ethnicity, your sense of humor lies outside the parameters of Korean comedy.


Feel this sense of foreignness reinforced as hundreds of Japanese tourists laugh wildly throughout the show.

"Time Look" - Kwon Sunhan

Silver Poinsettia

Lotus Flower Lantern

Cheonggyecheon

From wastewater repository to concrete-clogged highway foundation,
the Cheonggyecheon was purified and transformed into a central public space by current president Lee Myung-Bak in 2005.

Inwangsan - Shaman Spotting

Inwangsan Mountain in northern Seoul is considered a sacred area where many shamanists pilgrim to visit the city's most famous shamanist shrine, Guksadang, and create makeshift altars among the eroded rocks of the mountain. The sounds of shamanist ceremonies called gut --- chanting accompanied by rhythmic strikes on a bronze jing --- filter through the trees on the rocky hillside, to create an enchanting, spiritual atmosphere.

Rock altar.

Foliage along an Inwangsan path.

Shamanists in prayer.

Flinty mountain surface.

Plastic shelter over makeshift altar.

Underground altar.

Deoksugung Sun Dial

Dancheong Roof at Changdeokgung

Million Dollar Views

Yangjae-cheon in Gangnam alongside some of the most expensive apartments in Korea.

Overwired Seoul

Dominique Perrault at Ewha

Washington Post Endorsement of Barack Obama

Must read:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/16/AR2008101603436.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

August in Chuncheon

This past month, I...

...celebrated Chuseok with family in Korea for the first time,

...hosted my mama for a weekend with her siblings,

...went to my first Korean baseball game--- Samsung Lions vs. Doosan Bears,

...visited the DMZ,

...stopped by the Chinatown of Incheon,

...toured an Incheon waterway on a giant boat...

...with some friends,

...visited Seodaemun Prison, where many Korean nationalists were imprisoned and tortured during the Japanese occupation,

...had an article featured on the cover of my magazine,

...and quit both my jobs...

...to become a full-time freelance writer.