Korea/Japan part 2 - Seoul, Busan, Pyeongtaek

On Thursday Oct. 1st, after the home stay in Cheongju was over I took a bus to Pyeongtaek where my friend lives. That weekend was Chuseok, (it's like Korean Thanksgiving), so my friend didn't work Friday. Since there's not a whole lot to do in Pyeongtaek, as soon as I got there we went to Seoul for the weekend.




We didn't eat here, but I liked the restaurant's sign in the photo below. I like how they did the character 鳥, it means bird or chicken, but one could probably tell what kind of food they serve even if one doesn't know any Chinese characters.


Bongwonsa Temple in Seoul:




Monday my friend had to go back to work, so I went to Busan. I liked Busan because of it's beaches. I spent most of my time there in Haeundae (below)

Korea/Japan part 1 - Cheongju

The first week I was in Korea I did a home stay with a family of six in Cheongju. I went to the Cheongju International Craft Biennale, which was good, but not as much fun as two years ago because I wasn't getting any award this time. I knew before I went there that my necklace only got Honorable Mention, which is what every piece gets that makes it to the second round of judging but does not win an award.

Cheongju really promotes the Biennale. Coming into the city by bus I saw these flags on all the street lights along the road:


The Biennale was at the same site as two years ago, except this year the Competition was at the same location as the rest of the Biennale.






Since I didn't tell the curator I would be there I didn't get my special ID badge. Because I didn't have the special ID I wasn't supposed to take any photos inside the exhibitions. My host mother and I talked to one of the people there about the badge, but she couldn't get it for me. I think she said it would be ok for me to take a photo of my necklace, but I wasn't sure cause her English wasn't very good. It didn't matter cause I was going to take a pic of my necklace whether they liked it or not, so I just waited till no one was looking to take this pic:


We also went to the Cheongju National Museum and saw a Korean metals exhibition.


While there I got to play with some clay in a hands-on workshop with three of the host family's children. It was the first time I have worked with clay in about 10 years. But since the workshop is for kids, not adults, I was too big to use the kick wheel.

I'm home

I got home from Japan Wednesday morning. The trip was good. Right now all of my photos are on my netbook, which doesn't have Photoshop, so I need to wait till I move my photos to my other computer so I can crop and resize them to post on this blog.

Korea and Japan trip

I got my plane tickets to Korea last week. I'm leaving Sept. 23rd, and returning Oct. 14th.

The first week I will be doing the home stay in Cheongju. The next week I will be visiting my friend in Pyeongtaek, and I will also be going to Seoul for sightseeing.

The last 5 days of the trip I will be in Japan, in or around Tokyo. I have been to Japan several times, but this will be my first time in Tokyo. I'll be meeting a Japanese friend from grade school who I haven't seen in over 20 years. I will also meet a friend from GIA who I haven't seen in 8 or 9 years.

I still have some orders I need to finish before I go. They are causing me a little bit of stress.

birthday

Today is my birthday. I'm not too happy about it. I never thought I would live to be this age, and I never wanted to. I have been feeling like this for the past 4 years.

initial pendants

Right now I am finishing up a commission for 10 pendants. They are calligraphic letters, cut out of 1/4" aluminum. Sawing out the first letter or two was kind of a bitch cause the metal is so thick. But after I changed the saw blade size I was using and got some practice I started to enjoy it. I started out with a #8 saw blade, I thought I should use it cause the metal was so thick. #8 blades are good for cutting straight lines, but they are too fat to cut all the curves and corners of these letters. So I switched to the next smallest size saw blades I had, #2. The #2 worked much better, it was much more maneuverable and still cut through the metal fast enough.

Iceland and Sweden trip

I got back from my trip to Reykjavik, Iceland and Stockholm, Sweden the other day. It was good, but I wish we had spent less time in Stockholm and gone to one more place.

My favorite thing in Iceland was going on Langjokull glacier. This photo is near the edge of the glacier:


Once we were farther on to the glacier everything was pretty much gray, so I don't really have any good photos of it, but it was a cool experience.


I also liked Gullfoss waterfall:


Drottningholm Palace was my favorite thing in Sweden:


Stockholm: