blet blet blet

in lieu of explaining why it's taken months to post, a pic from gangwon province's daegwalleong sheep ranch to sum it up. thanks to dan phan et al for the prompt!

oh, and i got me a one-eyed pup! more to come... sooon? xo

happy new year!

hark! it's the first sunrise of the year! the decade!

a few days on korea's southeastern coast without a rental car or kaopectate proved a disastrous combo. that said, highlights included taking in a very pretty 1st sunrise with his majesty just south of gampo, and lots of good historic sights and one good meal in gyeongju...

on that note, while they can take credit for being the first to unite the korean peninsula, the home of korea's shilla dynasty cannot claim the land's finest cuisine. geesh.

oh, happy new year to you and yours!

snapshot #20: flying over gyeonggi province

fun in flight

filming for an arirang tv travel show included flying a ULM over some fields in gyeonggi province and over the west sea in anmyeondo. despite a horrible producer, it was fun.

exodus pix #4: germama

cooler here than how it really looks!

it's so painful. the more i recall my european travels the more i'm glad i'm no longer there. but germany was a (the?) highlight. i appreciated berlin's grit, and essen's manfriends. enough already. pics to follow.

oh, one more thing. i wrote a post on the korean diaspora in berlin on my korean travel blog. see it hurr.

the cologne cathedral and i are in love. i haven't seen anything as impressive of late. i don't even like god!

the crazier than thou tascheles building 'n grounds is trying really really hard to make a statement.

the cool part about staying in a hostel that was formerly part of the north korean embassy is the snapshots of the dear leader in his jump suits and chanel shades. i'm way too old to be staying in hostels.

this day o' domestic bliss at jonstoph haus seemed more appropriate than snapshots taken moments after i arrived, parked my ass on their chair, and we finished off more than one bottle of chivas. i still have an 8 inch scar on my arm from what followed.

exodus pix #3: stockholm

"nesta... stockholm!"

since i'm such a shitty blogger, and thanks to impatient transplant germaphiles, all i can assemble is exodus pics encore. but before allemagne, here's stockholm and vicinity. it was really cold. really dark. but still a lovely city with smart and pretty people.

hot.

winter recess in stockhom. no, really. those are children playing outside in reflective vests at 3 pm.

the moderna museet displays an impressive collection of modern art in simple exhibits that don't try too hard. the adjoining architecture museum had great exhibits on local design as well as photos of gaudi's cathedral in barcelona, not to mention a great gift shop.

the lil island of gamla stan was fun. disneyland x2 in what already looked a bit like disneyland. sorry, i know this is why people hate americans.

gorge door.

as luck would have it, i met a swede for a hot second in korea and invited him to my birthday dinner. 2 months later i'm staying at his home, no matter that he was traveling at the time. his house was way out west. and like my london couchsurfing experience, it was great to see life outside perfectville downtown. the tram was filled mostly with middle eastern and african immigrants. totally not the aryan swedes i had expected.

another snapshot from the hood.

mmmm jeju

a magical (and secret?) place near the darangshi oreum on jeju island.

just got back from jeju island. i admit that years of korean gushing about the place... "it's korea's hawaii! it's korea's bali! it's paradise!" had me rolling my eyes. of course it's none of those, but rather a spectacular place on its own merit. can't wait to post trip pix (and go back) soon!

exodus pix #2: londontown

st. paul. strikingly large. sandblasted?

to be honest, london was my least favorite exodus pit stop, but i did enjoy some remarkable jerk chicken and was thankful for the cheap internet cafés. pix pix pix.

the ubiquitous surveillance was creepy.

mmmm urban planning! a highlight was the (expensive) transport museum. did you know the word "bus" was first used in london? an abbreviation of the latin "omnibus", meaning "for everyone."

compared to paris's seine, the thames is a real river.

no british napoleon means poor city planning. downtown london is nutz.

met these fine specimens~ a malaysian studying at the london school of economics and two aussie lassies. here we are on a really cold night sitting on big wooden benches outside on the street. it seemed like a curious place to drink a pint. so we did.

snapshot #17: snookered snow dude

spent today at the taebaek snow festival in gangwon province.

wanna see more pics? i uploaded a picasa album here.

exodus pix #1: paris

underneath the arc de triomphe.

paris was stop #1 on my exodus from oriental jesusland holiday travel retinue. per brian's request, some (not awesome) snapshots.

clichés can be pretty, too.

my friend's friend ky invited me to a recording of her arts program on france culture (radio).

the view from the 2nd level of the tour d'eiffel (click here for larger).

the korean cultural center was awfully disappointing.

some marbles in the tulieres, near the louvre.

gayville (marais). 

i like paris.

my secret slob friend

a better guest.

since i would be in occidental jesusland for 6 weeks i thought it a nice and mostly harmless gesture to offer my apartment to a fellow homo half-breed ko-am whose lease was expiring a month before his return to the usa. i did the same thing last year and my friend appreciated the respite from his parents' marriage inquiries. sure, he neglected my tree to death, but lots of people kill plants.

but on this go around, something felt amiss when i didn't receive correspondence from my temp-tenant. no "hi, i've arrived!" email, no "kaching! found your japanese porn stash while snooping on your computer, sicko!" memo. more remarkable was seeing the words "back in the usa" next to his name on msn messenger on jan. 2. nope, i never got a "thanks. i left your key (specify location)."

upon my return, what i did receive reminded me of a dirty person's home just prior to a modern pompeii. massive calamity... no time to clean... must escape! or, perhaps i should view what remained as prizes.

a top 10 list of my free goodies:

#10. a dvd player. shockingly useful!
#9. two big dirty blankets i get to dispose of!
#8. wall-to-wall tumble weed-esque dust bunnies!
#7. a box of heating pads for muscle pain!
#6. new grey bathroom tiles and pink grout. oh wait, that's just bacteria in bloom!
#5. butter!
#4. one pair of dirty superman underwear!
#3. a full load of wet laundry left marinating for 2 weeks!
#2. a piece of toilet paper stuck to toilet seat with a little brown sumthin sumthin!

and, my favorite:

#1. a loofa, because i can't wait to combine my dead skin cells with yours!

had i offered my place to a testicled dog, there may have been musty crotch spray marking strategic corners. but at least dogs don't use loofas or washing machines. furthermore, i find it hard to believe that even a golden retriever in mid-molt could have shed more pubic hair on my floor. i guess that's not fair. i don't think dogs have bonafide pubic hair.

in summary, i don't think it's right that people can be secret slobs. filth should not be a secret, cleanliness mustn't be a scam. much like my floor, his skin should be covered in snowfall-like layer of dust and he should smell like rotting laundry. if so, in this righteous world of my fantasies, i'd know better than to lend him my keys. 

mean spirited, you tsk? not so! if society's scorn made him too sad, he could then clean his home (and mine), and his body would cleanse in tandem! everybody wins in my world.

but until then, thanks for the loofa!! henceforth, i'm going to make a habit of leaving a used one every place i spend the night. thanks, kenny!

travel somewhere else

while lucky was sleeping, i hadn't totally divorced myself from blogging. for work purposes, in september i created a travel and culture blog called www.DiscoveringKorea.com, which just happens to be the name of my paltry radio show on kbs. it's funny what happens when your blog doesn't talk obsessively about homosexuality and pretend interns who die in your refrigerator...

like job offers!

some of y'all will no doubt recognize the new blog's precursor- yup, it was nice day's very own "field trip" posts. so if you liked the soko travel shiz, head o'er yonder cuz from here on out, my nice day is out with the travel content in pursuit of full-time campy ramblin'.

exodus from oriental jesusland

good lawd, indeed!

after a 6-week exodus from oriental jesusland (koko), daddy came back to seoul last friday and promptly fell ill. traveling is hard! 

but thanks to in-home convalescence care by a much-improved intern, i'm on the mend. in fact, he's making some sort of honey pear juice concoction as i type. lucky never made me honey pear juice!

most importantly, traveling always reminds me of jesus. and to that end, i think a look back at prior jesusland tributes is apopro:

teasing jesus: the summer 2008 tour (05/08)

jesusland redux (12/07)

jesus: i'm coming home. (08/2007)

it's indulgent, but a holiday overview feels necessary. 

this time around i used frequent flier miles to fly seoul to new york with a stopover in paris. it seemed like a good time to take advantage of 10 quid ryan air flights and spend a coupla weeks in northern europe... despite it being the coldest and darkest months of the year. did you know it gets dark after lunch in stockholm these days? kinda puts a damper on sightseeing. other quick stays in paris, london, berlin and amsterdam were nice (yup, still like asia better), but the old continent's highlight was a few days in essen/cologne with judy-on-meds, jonstoph. 

since i seem to treat relationships like most people approach unpaid internships, it's always nice to see sexy, high-functioning homo couples who've made the transition to domestic stability... and who wouldn't like to see the half-filipina lady of the house's kitchen chalk board to-do list accented with flower sketches? elsewhere in europe... despite the bad rap, parisians are lovely, londoners (with the exception of my wonderful couchsurfing host) make me glad i'm american, and berlin is my new favorite white city.

onward to american jesusland (aka Jesusland) where i had 8 more chances to experience heinous u.s. airlines during the worst season to navigate the airspaces between chicago, seattle, portland and new york. my favorite 24-hour slog involved seattle's epic snow storm, which cancelled chi to sea. after spending the whole day in dallas on standby, a late final flight pulled into sea-tac at 1 am. i talked about lahore with a sikh cabbie, got stuck in the snow for an hour and missed the 2:10 am (last) ferry to mama's house. spending the next 3 hours outside the terminal was cold, but the last 30 minutes included learning the obvious: of course a late 40s, iraq vet, aspiring truck driver and full-time practical lesbian would like mesh crosstrainers!

pear juice dude, mom and momspouse got to know each other during my 24-hour seattle delay. afterwards, seattle was lovely. new york was a bit stressful, turks and caicos was thank jesus warm. then back to koko the long way. the end.

i need travel questions

hey y'all. wow. 2 months without posts. who knew?

on another note, i'm pitching an expanded travel show for kbs world radio. it's all about traveling in korea. the expanded show would include a q+a section.

so, i'd be grateful if any of you have travel-related questions about korea that i could air on the show. better yet, if you could send me an audio clip of you asking it, that would be fun. plus, the strange brew that listens to us via shortwave radios and npr stations at 3 am could hear your pretty voice.

if you're so inclined:

1. state your name and location ("hello, i'm mary lee from mexico" or "i'm mary magdalena lee-morales from 562 rua des noches, tijuana, mexico" works, too)

2. state your question.

3. send me the mp3 file.

if the rigamarole is too much, an emailed question will work too.

for this you can be certain: you will be FAMOUS.

thanks for your help!

discovering korea #15: summer festivals

ya ya i know i spelled "peach" wrong.

transcript from my kbs world radio show, discovering korea.

a change of pace for this week's discovering korea... if you like puppets or peaches, why not take a break this month and check out one of korea's late summer festivals? (read it here).

discovering korea #14: gangwondo road trip, day 3

take three days anywhere in koko and you're bound to find lots of kook. here's proof!

transcript from my kbs world radio show, discovering korea.

abby, hoon and i took 3-days to explore gorgeous gangwon province. day 1 was spent in the mountains, day 2 was spent on the beach, and day three was spent investigating the weird (read it here).

soko's wacky budget airline bonanza

jin air, a subsidiary of korean air, is one of korea's most promising new budget airlines, but i can't handle the turned hats.

back in september of 2006, i booked a $19 (+tax) roundtrip ticket on malaysia's air asia. the prospect of being airborne for so little was intriguing. sure, i was flying from kuala lumpur to the very unpopular destination of kota bharu (local slogan: the islamic city!), but c'mon, $19?

i was struck by how inexpensively one can fly in southeast asia... especially when originating out of KL or bangkok. this just ain't the case in pricey northeast asia, where 2-hour trips between seoul and tokyo still run $600+ this time of year.

a glut of budget airlines is coming to korea. an asterisk means future projections.

but 2008 promises to fill korea's air with a glut of new budget carriers. a total of 5 new airlines are launching this year, with two already in operation. last week, the busan-based yeongnam air launched its inaugural flight between seoul's gimpo (mostly domestic) international airport and the lovely jeju island. by the end of the year, they plan to service four domestic routes that concentrate on yeongnam, which is korea's southeastern region. in fact, bonafide yeongnam residents receive a 5-10% discount... which is kinda weird.

a week prior, jin air, the budget arm of tiffany-blue korean air, had their own maiden voyage on a 189-seat boeing 737-800. jin is so easy breezy cool that their flight attendants, called "jinis" (yes, from the lamp) wear t-shirts and jeans and their check-in counter features a dj. although initial plans were to call the airline air korea, they switched to "jin," whose chinese character can mean "true" or "genuine", or, it can sound like how koreans pronounce "jeans", which is appropriate since they wear them. which came first, the outfits or the name? regardless, what's even better is their slogan: "fly, better fly - jin air." oh, wait... their logo looks like a butterfly... which sounds a lot like "better fly". clever! painful! starting late next year, jin plans to fly to japan as well as to china and southeast asian destinations.

sure hansung airlines has had some safety issues, but i'm liking the professionalism. can you imagine how bad it would look if jin air's nickelodeon rugrats get associated with some kind of (god forbid) mishap?

hansung airlines is korea's oldest budget carrier (inaugural flight in 2005). the cheongju-based airline has offered the popular seoul (gimpo) to jeju route at half the typical $200+ cost of the major airlines. although hansung experienced early popularity, it suspended service for a coupla months in 2005-06 to search for additional funding. adding literal injuries to that insult was an accident in november 2006 that broke off their plane's nose and caused six minor cuts and bruises.

i think that's a kitty kat peace sign.

i wish every pilot had a rose, a gun, and kitty paws. thanks chang-bin!

if safety concerns has you second-guessing hansung, please don't. who else's website has a "cabin interview" feature that tells you your flight attendant's hobbies and blood type. for example, now i know that yea-ji shon really likes balloons and that chang-bin lee likes to pretend he's holding a gun while wearing his pilot's uniform. safety!

not to be left out, korea's other major carrier, asiana airlines, will also launch a subsidiary airline this fall. air busan, as it will be called, will start operations in october. two other low-cost carriers are also planned before year's end. in november, eastar jet is scheduled to start service, with incheon-tiger (co-owned by the city of incheon and singapore airlines) to kick off in december, eventually hoping to serve japan, china, mongolia and the russian far east. a few others, like purple jet, daeyang air, pocheon air, kostar airlines and seoul airlines have all been knocked about though it's unclear which (if any) will materialize. good lawd. how about some consolidation already.

the seagull looks very stuffed.

korean aviation restrictions require new carriers to have at least 2 years of domestic test-runs before going international. the new companies are eager to go abroad since that's where the real profits lie. jeju air, which has operated since 2006, already qualifies and offers service to three japanese cities (unfortunately, tokyo ain't one of them).

let's hope some of them get to run some int'l flights before high oil prices push them under!

discovering korea #13: gangwondo road trip, day 2

a hot hot hot day 2 on the beach (photoshop alert: check out hoon's gimpy hand... i had to erase the sunglasses when i swapped another pic's head to replace the original).

transcript from my kbs world radio show, discovering korea.

abby, hoon and i took 3-days to explore gorgeous gangwon province. day 1 was spent in the mountains. day 2 was spent on the beach (read it here).

discovering korea #12: gangwondo road trip, day 1

a very easily-accessed peak on seoraksan... no, we didn't make it to the summit.

transcript from my kbs world radio show, discovering korea.

last week, abby, hoon and i took a road trip in gangwon province. we spent a day in the mountains, a day at the beach and a day hugging giant penises. this is a retrospective on day 1 (read it here).

snapshot #10: why i love korea

just got back last night from a 3-day trip around gangwon province. this was a highlight. details to come.

discovering korea #11: incheon: gateway to northeast asia

crazy and delicious junkfood... oh, and a huge port city, urban planning megaprojects, korea's oldest chinatown, etc. await you here!

transcript from my kbs world radio show, discovering korea.

today we hop on seoul metro and go west to the port city of incheon: the city that's striving to be the gateway to northeast asia (read it here).