Alex woz ere......

Alex has gone back home to sober up!

Our son, Alex, came over a couple of weeks ago for a 2 week holiday. I don’t think he knew what hit him, in terms of the culture, or our Canadian friend from across the block. I managed to get some time off with him from work, and probably just as well, as we were out on the town several nights until the wee hours. We needed to long lie-in’s to recover from alcohol poisoning.

Most nights would start of quite sombrely, with dinner at one of the many hundred of restaurants dotted in and around Ansan. We tried to make sure Alex got a taste of most things, including Sushi at the tuna bar restaurant, where he bravely swallowed down a tuna eye-ball shot. This involves a frozen tuna fish eye-ball dropped into a shot of Soju and some red food colouring added for dramatic effect. I didn’t have the heart to tell him the red wasn’t actually blood, I just looked at this face when it arrived! Fair enough, both him and our Canadian friend downed them with style – I passed on this, no way am I drinking something that’s going to eye me up before I swallow it! It was bad enough trying to force live octopus down my neck!

Several times during the holiday meant a slightly green looking Alex appearing from behind the bedroom door. On one occasion, it also happened which we were on the subway into Seoul to do some shopping – the poor lad had to run to chuck up his chips into a squatty potty at the station loo! We took him home to get a nap and brighten up a bit – he swore he wasn’t drinking ever again, until the next night at least.

One trip out took us to a bar called Gonadil, where the women can be counted on for company – I’m not saying I’m corrupting the wee lad, but he is 23, and knows how to handle these kind of things. The evening was spent in good company chatting, having a few drinks, and then Karaoke time! Even I got up to sing a bit (or was it cry like an alley cat?) along with my Canadian friend, who seems to let on he only knows 3 or 4 songs – Hotel California, Creep, Wonderwall, but to be fair, he does a good rendition of them. Alex, however, declined to display his vocal talents this time.

One night we went out to a bar called Manhattan, where all the local English teachers tend to gather, especially after 10:00 at night, after all the Hagwon classes have ended. We made the mistake of getting a bottle of scotch for the table, and paid the price next day.

Alex say’s he’s coming back next year for 3 weeks this time – poor boy won’t know what’s hit him!

Thanksgiving in Ansan....

We had our very first Thanksgiving dinner last Saturday! We had never experienced one before, and I have to say, it felt a bit Christmassy!

We first knew about it from one of our American English teacher friends over here who initially invited us over to a thanksgiving “feast” via Facebook The event to take place wasn’t exactly on the proper day, November 26th, but was arranged last weekend so lots of people could attend. The event was to be held in the teachers apart-uh which as previous readers know, isn’t usually such a big space for these kind of things, especially in the cooking department. Usual cooking appliance tends to be a small worktop toaster over, which unless is a big one, wont take kindly to a 16lb turkey being stuffed into it for 5 hours.

We thought about her dilemma, and offered up our apart-uh space and it’s larger than usual cooking facilities including a full size under hob gas oven big enough for turkey and all the trimmings. The event was scheduled to host around 20 or so guests, all friends of our friend. Feeding that many hungry American, English (1 Scottish) and Canadian gobs would require more than one turkey. We got the task of sticking the big bird (16lb) in our oven, while the smaller 8lb basked in the heat of the toaster oven back at the teachers apart-uh. Saturday morning was spent basting this huge bird, which had been pre-stuffed with a nice herby bread stuffing sticking out it’s bum. Time spent on the sofa waiting between bastes felt just like a typical Christmas morning back home. We intend to spend actual Christmas day over here probably in Seoul taking in the turkey dinner at one of the international hotels like the Hilton or Ritz-Carlton, to avoid having to do such a thing. But here I was, basting waiting, then basting again! All we were missing was the crumpled up wrapping paper strewn across the floor, and the inevitable pairs of socks for gifts or gloves because we can never think what to get each other for

gifts!

Our American friend came over at about 11:30 bring with her, loads of Tupperware dishes full of cooked and uncooked goodies, such as devilled eggs, pumpkin pies, salad vegetables etc, all fit for the feast! We had told her that we would leave all the cooking and preparation to her to sort out, but as usual, I couldn’t keep out of the kitchen, and had to help rattle up some chopped this and that, cooked bits and bob’s and other such things. The turkey came out after 5 ½ hours and was done to a treat – it took a whole load of will power not to start picking at the meat or roast potatoes on the side (OK – I admit it, I did pick but only a wee bit!)

Folks started arriving at around 5:00pm, and our friend was a busy beaver in the kitchen, mixing this, stirring that, and at this point I left her to it – this was her party after all, and I didn’t want to take any of glory. The house was full of chatter in between gob-stuffing, and everyone had plenty of room to move about, and eat till their hearts content. Drinks were available, such as the local retard juice Soju and plenty of Mecju (beer) but the invite did say if you wanted something else, then bring your own. Some folks brought more beer, some wine and one even brought a bottle of Bacardi Rum – I didn’t get the chance to sample some, as it seemed to go very quickly!

Much chatting was done, and we made a whole lot of new friends that night, some having now exchanged Facebook details with us. We think we might now recognize a whole new bunch of people when we go out on the town at night.

We might even host our own Thanksgiving party next year….make sure you’re free!

Find of the year!

On the way home in the dark to our apart-uh (Korean phonic translation of apartment) the other night, I spied a couple of unlikely pieces of wood which had been propped up against our little security hut on the complex where we live. I gave them a second glance, not quite believing what I saw. It was a queen sized sleigh bed in bits, neatly stacked and looked in great condition. I knew I was in for a bargain!

In Korea, when people move from their apartment, they tend to use this as an opportunity to get rid of anything with slight scratches or dents. Second hand furniture gets left on sidewalks (sorry, pavements!) or by security huts on complexes such as ours. They get picked up by second hand dealers, or more likely, waste disposal merchants. There are few Koreans who buy second-hand, and scorn this practice, hence the frequent dumping of these kinds of items. This bed was such a case.

I tapped the window of the security hut, and asked the guard about the bed – he speaks reasonable English, and when I mentioned the bed, he looked around the office expecting to see if one had been delivered. Bulky items tend to be dropped off here, if you are not at home. He then cottoned onto the fact that I was on about the “dumped” one outside the hut. He appeared a little incredulous that I should want such an item, as Korean’s don’t tend to do this kind of thing. The stereotypical Scotsman in me was doing a jig, getting a ”freebie” which would easily cost around 1 million KRW (about £500) new.

He consented that I could take it if I wanted, so I grabbed the end piece and made my way up to our floor. I shot inside and immediately told Sue to get her shoes on, as I had found a gem for the spare bedroom. Even she was a bit shocked at what I was trying to get for nothing. Let me explain – the bed is like an old fashioned Santa’s sleigh type bed, one which would probably sell for over £1000 back home. It has solid wood features, and has 2 box sections, also wood for the base. The top headboard is also mainly made of solid wood, (at least it seems to weigh as if it does) and is finished of with a nice varnish – see pic!

We lugged all the pieces upstairs, with the main headboard having to be carried by us both with a good few rest stops between the hut and the front door – it was really heavy!

I got in, manoeuvred into position in the spare bedroom, and started to put it together – alas! It had no fixing screws, so had to wait until I got into work the following days and find some M10 bolts to make sure it didn’t fall apart when someone laid down on it. All I need to do is buy a mattress for it.

We’re pretty chuffed with our “find! and can't wait until someone chucks good furniture out! I’m also on the lookout for a late model Hyundai 4 door saloon, or similar……

Speaking of Johnny Cab....

So, me and Johnny Cab have become firm friends – He no longer stalks me, as he has caught his prize….. a regular fare to work in the morning. He charges KRW1000 (about 50p) more than the usual meter fare, but I allow this extravagance due to the fact he is almost always waiting for me outside the complex where we live. I also allow this, because I don’t have to repeat myself over and over to newly acquired drivers at the taxi rank and who have either no clue where I want to go, or simply refuse to try and understand my pronunciation of the place name where I work. I also get to lie back in the seat, and close my eyes if required (especially after a hard night drinking with the boys! – see earlier posts relating to this subject) and not worry about being taken on an expensive mystery tour around the industrial complex before I arrive at work.

I say he is almost always there, because he has let me down on occasion to pick up lucrative fares elsewhere in the city to places which will not let him get back to my pick-up within the prescribed time. To be fair, however, he does call me on my mobile to advise of this fact within a minute or so, of the allocated pick-up time. He tries his broken English, and I reply in broken Hangul, but we both get the message through, and I start making my way towards to rank to harangue an unwitting cab driver.

Basically, there are two types of cab available here in Ansan, much the same as elsewhere in Korea, especially Seoul. There are the standard grey cabs, some of which can be white but most are silver. These run at basic fare of KRW2,300 as soon as you get in, then add KRW for each Kilometre or minute for your trip. They are all comfy, most are new-ish, but with plenty of K’s on the clock. Theses are the most common types to be found. The other type is what they call Black cabs, or limousine taxis. They are described in brochures and tourist guides as the high-end of taxi riding, and are supposed to be luxurious, and offer a better class of ride. These claims are ridiculous, as most I have seen 9and been in) are little better than old sheds on wheels. They also have the nerve to charge a stunning KRW4000 as the starter fare! It is simple wonder, that when approaching a taxi rank to pick up a cab, if there is a black cab in front, then this usually gets ignored and the grey one taken instead. I have noticed that this is also normal practice for Koreans too.

The only down-side to getting Johnny cab in the mornings, is that I miss the “Pimp-my-ride” varieties!

Service!.....

Say the word “Service” in the UK, and you conjure up ideas of your wallet being taken to the cleaners by the local garage who’s just had a deep intake of breath and told you the car needs a complete exhaust system, new brakes, oil change fuel pump etc etc. At no point would you expect it to actually mean that you get good service when purchasing items, or when out shopping.

It means such a great deal more here in Korea. It’s one of the really nice and unexpected things we found when we came over.

We have a little corner shop here on our housing complex, which does the usual corner shop type stuff, bread, milk, pop, biscuits etc, and can be relied upon to be open from 6:30 in the morning until gone midnight, ran solely by a wife and husband team. Sue pops in regularly for her Coke Zero and my pomegranate juice (along with the occasional bottle of Soju!) Most times with a carrier bag full of pop bottles, the shop keeper drops in a chocolate bar free of charge. That’s what I call service!

We also have a little fruit and vegetable store next door to the corner shop, and Mr Shop owner sees Sue coming and will always get the best fresh veg out from the back which has just been delivered. Service here is usually a couple of free freshly washed plums or peaches.

Service here isn’t just isolated to freebies! We were at the point of bursting a blood vessel with the heat and humidity in the apartment on Saturday last week, and decided to go look at air conditioning units. We had planned on a simple unit which was floor standing and could be wheeled into various rooms including the bedroom for comfortable night time sleeping. We asked for help from one of my factory guys, to give some assistance in speaking with the shop keepers. We headed into town, and made our way to the supermarket with an electrical goods floor so we could get an idea of prices for comparison. We then headed off to the local LG store to check prices, then into Samsung for another check. About an hour later, we had decided on a full blown installed system, and worked out the best place with best price. 7:00pm Saturday night we made the deal after some discount haggling, and got some free drinking glasses for our trouble (Service!) I enquired when they would be able to deliver and install the system, and was utterly gob-smacked when they told me it would be next day between 5 and 6pm – on a Sunday! We departed the shop quite amazed at the level of service we had been given. It was even more astounding when our helper decided to call and see if he could get them in any earlier – He did! They were coming round at 10:00am the next morning to deliver and fit the units.

We had a similar experience when we ordered all our new apartment furniture – we ordered on the Sunday, and it arrived on the Monday!

Delivery and installation are always free! No hidden charges anywhere.

The service we can get here puts the UK to shame – the best the likes of Curry’s or Comet can ever do is usually 7-10 days, and “we don’t know what time we’ll be round!” It means taking the whole day off work, just for them to show up at 5:15 pm because yours was the last lot on the van! Blighty – pull yer socks up! You’ve got a lot to learn.

Taxi drivers again...

Previous subjects of this on-going blog have been on the continuing wonderment of the way Korean taxi drivers behave, or rather, don’t on the roads over here. From watching TV while-u-drive, racing through red lights, or break-neck speeds over pot holes and causing bodily harm to parts of passengers anatomies have been note-worthy material. I can now report, that they are saints of the road in comparison to those gentlemen of the road in Shanghai!

Let’s start with the cars themselves:

In Korea, you can usually depend on a typical Hyundai 4 door salon, Samsung SM3 or if lucky, a plush new SM5. Most cars have seen at least ¼ million km’s or so, but are nice and clean inside and out. The owner/drivers take pride in their vehicles; even to the point of pimping them out with blue LED lighting and Chesterfield couch trim. Suspension is very much dependant on how the vehicle has been driven – these wear down very quickly in Korea, due to pot holes and uneven road surfaces (It wont help if a couple of portly Europeans have been in the back either!)

Shanghai has only one taxi type: A grubby old Volkswagen Santana. I don’t know how old this model is, but each one on the road must have clocked up at least 1million km at least! The body work inside and out has seen better days, the interior trim has all but fallen of and replaced with stapled on plastic. I’m sure we ended up in one that had holes in the floor, so we could pretend to be the Flintstones! The driver is surrounded by a Perspex shield to protect him from god only knows what, and it has more gaps and holes than a British MP’s expenses return. Air conditioning is considered extra fare! You want air? Open the window and catch bugs in your teeth!

Driving style in Korea is either on or off! The driver either has genes from a racing thoroughbred, or a snail. In the case of Mr Snail, this is also usually accompanied with a heavy right foot on the brakes, causing severe whiplash as he jolts back and forward with each alternating press on the gas and brake. Mr Schumacer has no idea where the brake is, and has probably had it disconnected to save weight. He barrels around corners with little or no regard for the passengers, or their shopping from Tesco’s in the boot along with the dozen or so, now scrambled eggs. Occasional red lights are noticed but again, with little regards to passenger safety. If the path is clear, they will go.

Shanghai drivers are always full on! Each square millimetre of available road space is considered fair game, and if another car or lorry gets in the way, they lay on the horn and push in. Three marked lanes of traffic CAN hold 6 vehicles abreast – try telling that to the UK road authorities who want to add extra lanes to reduce congestion! Break-down lanes, Slip roads and anything with chevron marking are treated like the fast lane. If a long line of traffic is queued, then hold tight – it’s going to be ride of your life! Be warned! - Shanghainese taxi drivers take no prisoners.

In a nutshell, I shall say no more wrong about the Korean taxi driver, for he is a shining example of how to get from A to B in a most entertaining, but now, not in a scary way!

Konglish...You gotta to love it!

Korean weman dont put out easily then!

Think bubbles....

The wet season is here. The South East Asian monsoon is upon us with a vengeance! Each year, this event gets reported on in the local newspapers and forecast when it will start and end. Not so this year, due to global warming, the event has become somewhat unpredictable. As a result, of “will it/wont it/not being so sure”, the papers had declined to comment. I can replace all those tabloids and radio news stations, for I can predict when it’s going to start and end!

It’s really easy! I get up in the morning, I have a shower. I dry myself with a towel. I put my clothes on ready for work. I make my way over to the taxi rank to meet up with Johnny-Cab. I get in said taxi. I am wet again! Ergo, the rainy season has started. At the end of rainy season, the process is similar but I find I am dry!

Another little give-away, is that the wallpaper in our apartment has developed pretty bubbles! I have poked at these bubbles, concerned that we may have developed a water feature without the aid of Gorund Force’s Charlie Dimmock and her ever pertinent nipples. Alas, no – these bubbles are the result of 100% humidity, and seem to be part of the alert indication system to show we are indeed in rainy season. Liken these bubbles to that of the humble pine cone – open when wet, closed when dry.

It’s a warm rain however, which adds to the “feels like….” type of thinking. It “feels” like your clothes are soaking wet, and all you need is a splash of Persil and the clothes will wash themselves. It feels like everything is clinging to you, and you need to peel them off. It feels like you need to carry around a can of deodorant every time you stop and rest up somewhere. It feels like crap.

The bubbles are however, for the benefit of OCD people out there, balanced! The balance comes from where the paper is joined every 800mm or so, right at the top of the wall, and looks like they are a design feature - meant to be there. We won’t win any awards for the design, nor will the problem get any worse, and I am assured that they disappear when the dry season kicks back in, and the paper contracts.

I wonder if the same can be said for my saggy skin?

I survived the raw fish restaurant....

....I think!

It was rather odd, that the night before I went there, we watched a programme on Youtube called "Travel Sick" with Grub Smith. The general plot of this programme is to visit different countries, and partake in the most vile and disgusting activities which are common practice in that particular country. In the case of South Korea, it was to eat a live octopus, eat dog, break a plank of wood with your bare hand and find the most disgusting public toilet. If he was to fail at any of the country challenges, then a forfeit had to be paid at the end of the show.

When he tried eating the octopus, it was whole, and still alive, trying as it might, to escape his clutches and make it back to the comfort of the briny water in the tank from whence it was plucked. Even we squirmed when he tried to force it into his mouth, and tentacles were stuck firmly to his face with the head being chewed upon. Several attempts at peeling the suckers off his face had little effect, and you could see it was going to be a wretched experience all round. He gave up after nearly honking up, and got rather annoyed at the producer who insisted that he finish his dinner! Challenge failed!

I was a tad nervous then, when I was invited out by my engineers for a dinner party last night in Ansan, to a raw sliced fish restaurant complete with said octopus on the menu! Don’t get these places confused with Japanese Sushi restaurants, which are a very much more sanitised experience compared with Korean raw fish dining. Firstly, in Japan, the fish has already been selected by the chef at the local fish market earlier in the day, killed, mostly prepared and sitting in the fridge – ready for slicing and plating up. Korea has a different slant on the same operation. Tanks of live fish and other such marine beasties bathing in buckets festoon the pavement outside, giving the punter the option of pointing to the one that smiles at him, and saying “I’ll have that one!” Said octopus is scooped out with a kiddies fishing net and taken to the kitchen. 5 minutes later, one octopus on a plate, fortunately chopped up into smaller pieces thus avoiding the tentacles on the face incident as described above, but none-the-less still very much alive and squirming on the plate. It should be noted that the generous use of salt and sesame seed oil over chopped remains probably hurts a bit, and makes for the understandable movements!

Removing a piece of animated octopus appendage with chopsticks from a plate it is clinging to for the remainder of its dear life is a job in it’s self! Suckers are firmly attached to the base of the plate, and liberal use of a spoon as a fulcrum point seems to do the trick. With the wriggling mass of tentacle beginning to wrap itself around the chopstick, the appropriate thing to do was stick it in my mouth. It was at this point, that I suddenly noticed that about 11 pairs of Korean eyes were staring in my direction. “Would he/wouldn’t he” was the question going through each of their minds at this point. There was only one thing to do – do a Grub Smith and hope the thing wouldn’t stick on the way in! I popped the little fellow in, and started to chew. A couple of times, suckers firmly attached themselves to my tongue, and after a bit of in-mouth fighting, these soon gave up and surrendered. I made sure I had chewed enough for the little blighter to be devoid of all life, and swallowed it back. The taste was ok I guess, but the texture was like trying to gulp down soggy inner tubes from a bicycle tyre! The sesame seed oil coating helps it slip down easily, so I am told.

I looked around the room, half expecting a round of applause, but as these guys eat this stuff every week, to them it was no biggie, but I did see some money changing hands!

My tummies rumbling now – what’s that all about? Is it tapping the walls of my stomach looking for an escape hatch?

At the dentist!...

I've just witnessed first hand, the dental system over here, as I ended up with vertical fracture of one of my molars - it became quite painful, and decided I had to go and see someone quick-style - Rolling about in pain, after eating something hot followed by something cold is not my scene.

I ended up in a practice just across the road from our block, on the 4th floor of one of the service blocks which contain small grocery shops, hairdressers, Taikwondo classes to name but a few and a dentist! The service, as expected did not speak any English, but armed with a helpful scrap of paper which translated into "dont touch me unless you give me a numbing injection first!" and pointing at the offending tooth with much theatrical moaning seemed to do the trick.

I was whisked into the dentists chair, and given an X-ray by two lovely looking girls in matching uniforms and face masks. This X-Ray was no hand-me-down piece of kit from the local hospital, but a state of the art dinky little thing that was hand held and needed no lead aprons or protection whatsoever. The image appeared immediately onto a PC screen next to the chair! A fracture was very clear, and with some pointing and Konglish, the dentist made his case for a crown clear. Several numbing jags later, and lots of drilling, I was very gappy and a bit sore after the reaming to dig out the nerve. This was packed until then next day for a second reaming of the nerve endings. This went on for 3 sessions, and I now have a lump of acrylic as a temporary crown until I get bling this Friday. I plumped for the gold crown, as I was told that a porcelain crown could easily crack, given the molar's position and work it has to do. The cost for the gold crown? 470,000 KRW which is about £225 - around half the cost it would be back in UK. The best bit about it? I get bling, and my insurance company picks up the tab! You'll see my sparkle everytime I talk from now on. However, I'm not keen to do it again soon..

Today is not a good news day...

With Sue back in the UK, it meant that she would get to see all her family members, including our dog, Tara, who was enjoying the life of luxury being pampered by Sue's Mum at her house. Tara could want for nothing, especially when it came to enjoying the left-overs of a traditional Sunday roast complete with a splash of gravy over some mashed potato remains. A walk meant "Snowy" - Sue's Dad, taking her up the woods for a nicely paced walk, then wandering back home to sprawl out in front of the sofa with little care in the world, and dream of chasing cats.

Tara was beginning to show her age. 11 years is a long time in Cavalier King Charels spaniel terms. Normally, the average age is around 8-9 years. We decided early on, that a life in Korea would have been too much for her, and the thought of her being cooped up in an apartment was not the life for any dog, regardless of how mobile they were. A big back garden with grass and plenty of dickie birds to chase round would be much more fun, along with a loving couple who would look after her in her golden years.

Sue arrived back in the UK to find Tara was starting to lose her fur a bit on her back. I suggested taking her to the vets to see if she maybe had a skin condition, that could be easily sorted with some medicated shampoo etc. The vets took bloods etc to find the cause, but over the weekend, she started going downhill fast. She had some sort of fit, and lolled around for a bit before recovering. The resulting call to the vets on Monday told us the worst. She had some disease of the blood, started to have kidney failure, had wobbly teeth, and was bit unsteady on her paws. The inevitable decision had to be made, and it was made with all the right reasons - even the vet agreed it would be the best thing. Any treatment would lead to other complications, and would not have been in the best interests for Tara.

Sue stayed with Tara until the end, making sure her last moments were with someone who loved her, and was sure the love was returned. She went very peacefully, and is no doubt enjoying running amock in doggy heaven chasing as many dickie birds and barking at the waves by the seaside to her hearts content.

I wish I was there for Sue, and to have been able to hold her hand when she gave Tara a peaceful end Alex was there - thanks kiddo. Thanks also to Joyce and Wlf (Snowy) for looking after her for us - she loved you too.

We'll miss you Tara (Bark Bark, Woof Grrr - good girl!)

Missing home.....

We are apart for a couple of weeks, and I have to tell you, it's hard going!
I used to be away from home for several as part of one of my previous jobs on technical support, but was always back after a mx of one week. I found that difficult at the best of times.

Sue is in the UK, visiting her family, while I am in Austria on a training and conference routine. The worst part of it is having to be in a hotel at the weekend - It's not nice, even if there is something to do, or somewhere to visit, it's not with my beloved!

The only good thing to do here is to go shopping. I know, I said previously that my ppet hate is to go shopping, but in Korea, there are certain things you CANNOT get that are easily available in European countries. I name XL clothing as one particular item, or items. The Koreans are small people, by that I mean they might be abloe to dodge the VAT on clothing if they ever decided to shop in the UK, as no VAT is payable on childrens clothes. The majority of Koreans are all stick-thin, and could fit in kid's clothes. Hence, the presence of XL sized clothing is rare, unless you live near to a US airbase. Other items of interest, are food items. These as simple staples in the UK products like vinegar, brown sauce and gravy granules! Sure, they have vinegar in Korea, but it's a weak variety, that they like to drink! They also have brown sauce, but it looks nothing like, or tastes like the good old British variety. Oh well, guess the case may be a few kilo's overweight for the trip back home. I am going to look for a European food site on the Interweb that will deliver to Korea and hope they dont kill me on the delivery charges.

Did I mention that we're in Korea? Ahhhhh..... I guess that's what might be the problem is then!

I’m a lucky person to be around….

It has happened on several occasions, but I think I’m a lucky kind of guy. We flew back west yesterday from Korea, me to a business trip to Austria, and Sue back home in UK for the 2 weeks to visit family. We later heard that an Air France plane disappeared on a flight from Brazil to France somewhere over the Atlantic while we were in the air on our flight. Poor souls.

We were in Bali a week after the horrendous bombing in the nightclub in Sanur, where we might have gone one evening.

We were in Bali, Southern Indonesia, when the earthquake struck sending out a devastating tsunami wiping out lives and destroying towns and villages along the coastline of Indonesia and Sri Lanka. We only experienced what they called a small “freak wave” which took out a few beach front restaurant windows.

I was in New York the 2 days before the terrible attack on 9-11.

We have a habit of just missing things like this and we could so easily have been involved in any of the above incidents, had the timings or circumstances been different – I’m not complaining about it, but fate is a strange thing, and unavoidable. Make the most of what is a short life. Enjoy it!

My Gran had a saying: “you’re a long time dead”

Korean advertsing...

I'm sorry, but someone really ought to have thought this one through a little more when they sent it to press....LMAO Picture is real, and taken at a pattiserie in a South Korean holiday resort hotel I visited recently.

@copyright colandsue_uk@yahoo.co.uk

Johnny Cab

I have a new best friend……

My journey to work has taken a new twist – I am being stalked! Not by some weirdo in a grey mac, or love smitten bimbo (chance would be a fine thing!) but by a taxi driver!

It all started some time last week, when waiting patiently at the taxi rank, waiting for a ride to work, that my new mate rolled up and I got in. I gave my usual Konglish directions and pointed the way, just in case he was one of those “I don’t go South of the river, mate!” kind of guys. Off we went, and he started to jabber away to me in Korean. I pointed out I didn’t speak much Korean, but this fact was clearly lost on him. He carried on rattling away about something or other, and I just kept nodding in agreement and saying “yeah” every so often as if I knew what he was on about. This went on for the whole ride. I decided to call him Johnny Cab.

It is usual practice to pay a little extra 1000KRW, about 50p in English, as the ride out to the complex has few return passengers. I duly paid up my cash, and got out the cab. He headed off into the morning sun, I headed into the plant thinking nothing of it.

Next morning, I was walking towards the taxi stand to collect my morning ride, and I heard a horn blip a few times behind me. It was Johnny Cab! For those who don’t know who Johnny Cab is, he is a robotic taxi driver from the Arnold Schwarzenegger film, Total Recall. This character, talks inanely about everything and anything, and doesn’t shut up. It seemed that this was a good description of this guy.

We headed of for the plant, and sure enough, the chatter started up and carried on for the whole ride. I could understand if he wanted to try and practice English, or perhaps try and teach me a bit of Korean, but no, this was events such as what he had for dinner last night, what was on the telly tonight, and where he was going at the weekend, or so it seemed, as I didn’t have a clue what he was on about. Even then numerous time I gestured I didn’t understand what he was saying, or made a small gap between my thumb and fore-finger and said “Aneyo Korean”, which means no Korean, it made no difference whatsoever. I paid for the ride and got out, thinking I must have met the strangest taxi driver in Korea.

Next morning, I headed once again down to the rank. Once again, I heard a blip-blip of a car horn. He was behind me again.

Dear Agony Aunt, I think he’s lying in wait for me now, and I’m getting worried! What should I do?

House warming party...

We threw a much overdue and expected party on Saturday night. It was overdue in the main, due to the focus and pressure of getting the plant approved to the quality system for automotive products. It was expected, as it seems to be Korean tradition, that as soon as you move into a new place, it has to be blessed with Soju and Mecju. We have the same traditions back in the UK, but there is never pressure to make sure it happens. The pressure is subtle, with comments from your work colleagues such as “are you having a party then?” Subtle as a brick!

Anyway, we relented and decided we would throw one after the approval. We thought about how we would pick some foody stuff with European slants along with Korean traditions etc etc, then thought to hell with it, lets get the caterers in! We used a local company who our neighbours used on their party back in November. They offered menu A-D with varying types and quantity of foods, hot and cold. We were told they would come into the apartment, set up all the tables, linen, supply all plates, utensils, tables and cutlery etc. They then came back the next day and cleared up after you, including disposal of all food remains and rubbish etc. All we had to do was scrape the plates into a bag, and chuck away the wooden chop-sticks etc. Easy!

We ordered a suitable menu, exchanged a few dishes for ones we liked the look of, and named the day. Bear in mind we booked the caterer only 3 days in advance of the do itself, something that would not have been possible back in UK – these things usually take weeks of notice! Come the day, the van turns up, and I get a call from the guys in the van – “we are at the apartment, can you let us in please” In they come, and start to beaver away. 4 trellis tables, a bit like wallpaper pasting tables are set up by the big picture window, which are then dressed with linen and wrapped with a valance. On these are set up hot Ban-Marie’s for the hot food items, and next to these, big sliver platters crammed with the cold items. 6 smaller version tables, about coffee table height, are placed in the middle of the floor. These get the linen treatment too, and are the traditional Korean dining tables, where they sit on the floor and eat. I considered sitting on the floor too, but decided that my back would not allow me to get back up after a prolonged period of cross-legging it. The sofa would do fine for me.

6:30, and all was prepared. The door bell rang, and a couple of plants arrived – not just a small potted plant, oh-no! This was a tree! In a pot! It had a Korean banner on it, which I learned later said, “From the company COO - be lucky!” The other plant was a rubber tree affair, which was a little smaller. We just had to wait on our guests arriving. Again, in the UK, no-one ever turns up on time. How surprised were we to find the door bell ringing away at dead on 7:00pm. Apart from the plants, we found out it is Korean tradition that a typical house warming gift is either boxes of clothes detergent, tissues or toilet roll! We now have enough tissue to fight the world’s cases of swine flu, and wipe it’s bum too.

The typical thing when you invite the work colleagues is that they generally come alone. I had to specifically ask them to bring their families along with them. Several were taken aback by this suggestion, but brought them nonetheless. Food was tucked into straight away, and the women and children went into our spare room, where we had set up a table especially for the children with lots of brightly coloured E numbered foods and pizza slices. We bought 4 lar-gee size pizzas from our local pizza guy, as we thought the kids would like these. It turned out that most of the guys tucked into it as well!

Food was well underway, and much Soju was being consumed with Mecju chasers. A couple of bottle of white wine were on hand for the ladies. Following traditions, the Soju was poured by the person next to the drinker, and then the drinker poured the servers drink. No-one ever pours their own drink here while in formal gatherings. We had the I-pod on the go, playing through the TV for background noise, and at about 8:00pm, the requests came in. Not for music of a certain genre, or favourite track – Oh-no, they wanted to watch the footie on the TV! In particular, they wanted to watch Man U play Arsenal in the premier league. Who was I to deny them watching one of their sporting hero’s Kim JiSung playing for Manchester united. Korean’s are footie daft! Once the game was over, it was back to normality? I-Pod tinkling away in background, and clinking of many Soju bottles, it was time for the Korean bachelors club to turn on the charm with our invited USA English teachers Gena and Samantha. These girls met up with Sue on a girls night out a couple of weeks ago who were friends with our Canadian neighbours. It was only right Sue should have a couple of girls who she could relate to on the night. It got a bit confusing who was actually trying to chat who up, as I guess the girls get a lot of attention in Korea, and are used to playing them back at their own game. Some of the chat up lines were very familiar, such as I have money, or property, and I am a good catch yadda-yadda! But one line did make me smile! “I have insurance!” piped up one guy, who is already married. I pointed out his wedding band on his finger, and this was quickly removed with him muttering to me “oh – mistake!” He didn’t get very far anyway, as the girls were switched on and bounced them all back.
Our COO joined us for the party, and seemed to have a good time. He left around 11:00pm, and said his farewells. After he left, all the other Korean guys were making moves to leave, but I told them it was too early, and they all sat back down again. It turns out that parties held at homes, don’t go on for very long, and they all tend to leave early – they were about to get a bit of European culture this time. They all looked at each other, something was said about all the available Soju on offer, and sat back down again. The party went on for about another hour or so, then they all started to make moves. I didn’t try to stop them a second time. Our Western friends stayed on to party for about another hour or so, then headed of, as some children were ready for bed. We tidied up a bit, then hit the sack ourselves. It wasn’t through too much drink, but rather the fact that it was all over, and we had gotten ourselves hyped up for the party.

We are looking forward to the next party!

Out with the boys.....

It is usual practice to take your fellow employees out on occasion for a bit of a knees-up, and I have been found guilty of not performing this task during the 3 months we have been here. Apparently, I am told this is written into my job description in invisible ink.

I could blame this on being focused on gaining the much sought after quality approval for the group, of which we were the last, and it all depended on us getting it for the group as a whole, or I could just say it’s the short-armed, long-pocketed aspect of my Scottishness coming out. I’ll go for the former.

A typical Korean night out, usually starts of with a late working night leaving at around 7:00pm and heading straight to the barbeque restaurant. These can either be benches with chairs around, or low tables where you sit on the floor with legs crossed and tuck in. I prefer the benches and chairs type – I might be able to get down on the floor and cross my legs, but would need someone to pick me up and carry me home with legs still crossed.

Food on the table is usually all ready prepared, and features such tasty treats such as Kimchi (the spicy pickled cabbage), a small plate with onions and vinegar, some dipping sauces, salad leaves and almost certainly, whole green chillies. A tub of hot coals is brought to the table, usually placed into a hole inset into the table. On top of this is placed a wire mesh, and the cooking can begin. It can be a little unnerving to have a plate of raw meat at your table, which is thrown onto the mesh in a large slab to sizzle away in front of you. If you are big into home barbeques, then this will not present any issues whatsoever. Any smoke from the BBQ (remember, this is indoors in a restaurant!) is taken away through a tube above the pot, connected to a chimney system – all the table have one above the pot hole. This can be raised and lowered during the cooking process to allow access to the meat which is cut into chunks during the process by some scissor wielding maniac who looks after your table. Is really is an experience!

During the cook time, drinking of Soju is compulsory, as is the practice of making toasts to whatever you might fancy. Pouring Soju is a very strict and sombre practice, which involves much deference to your superior, or elders, and reciprocation when receiving the drink from them. One of the first questions you get asked when you arrive in Korea, is “How old are you?” This is not them practicing their English skills on you, but a means of determining where you might be in the pecking order of things. Once this order is known and understood, then it becomes usual practice for the juniors to pour the seniors drink with one hand on the bottle, and the other either cupping the imaginary sleeve of the pouring arm, or placed onto the right breast. You never pour your own drink, but have another member of the party do this for you. If a senior pours your drink, then the glass has to be cupped with both hands to show respect, if an equal or junior pours, then its hand out and fill the glass. If you empty the glass, then the drink will be poured for you again. This will go on until you get very, very drunk, or if you’re a bit wise to the practice, then leave a bit in the bottom of the glass, and generally you get left alone. This works fine in theory unless you are out with a bunch of party animals, and they just keep topping you up.

Beware of the following practice though, as it can lead to stupid-ness, but does deliver a laugh if someone has a low tolerance of alcohol. Beer over here is called Mecju and served the usual way in a beer glass, the sweet potato drink Soju is delivered in a shot glass. Combine these two together in the same glass, called a dive bomber back home is called a SoMec here. Not for the faint hearted, it tastes of nothing other than a watered down beer, but the punch it packs and subsequent headaches the next morning makes you regret being stupid the night before. I keep telling myself I will learn. I like our Canadian neighbours description of Soju – Retard Juice!

After the meal, when more Mecju’s Soju’s and SoMec’s are consumed it’s time to pay. Whoever does the inviting out for the evening usually pays, and on this occasion it was me. Fortunately, I was able to convince my boss that the evening was to be a part celebration, part morale boosting and part team-bonding session, and got presented with the corporate card – Result!

The down side with a load of drunken rowdy Koreans, a Canadian and a Scottish person, is they don’t know when to stop, and session 1 becomes session 2 in one of the plethora of bars and clubs in and around Ansan. Session 2 can quickly degenerate into session 3 and you see how it goes. It’s not uncommon to stagger out of a taxi in the very wee hours of the morning just to change and head straight back into work. I’ve done this a couple of times now, and it’s not healthy!

The downside to all this? Pickled livers, garlic breath (which doesn’t go down well when cuddling up to your wife who hasn’t had any, and she complains you stink!) headaches and hangovers!

I’m never going out again! (Until the next time)

Pink eared dogs!

We've been busy over the holiday weekend. Friday was Bhudda's birthday, and it turns out to be a Korean public holiday. Holidays are a bit like red traffic lights though, as they tend not to be compulsory. I got called into the plant due to a spot-visit by one of our major customers. I headed into the plant having arranged for one of my English speaking colleagues to be present. Unfortunately, he had another meeting arranged with a motorcycle on the way into work, and ended up scraping the guy off the road and taking him to hospital. I hung around feeling as useful as a chocolate fireguard, as I had no clue as to what they were on about. I lasted for about 2 hours and decided to head back to the apartment. I would pick up what went on when I went back to work on the following Wednesday.

Once I got back, we decided to head over to Ansan station, where there was a indoor market around the entrance. We needed to top up Sue's mobile phone with minutes, and as we had no clue how to do this, we went back to the place where we bought it. A short while later, we were topped up, and armed with a card which purported to give an extra 180 minutes later, but agaon, something was lost in translation, and we have no clue how to use it! We'll attempt that one when the minutes run out later!. We wandered around the shops in Ansan station, which seems to be a mini Phillipines, as this is where a lot of the migrant workforce seem to live. The shops were full of mobile phones, and pigs faces, not all in the same place I might add. The rest of the day was spent lazily, and enjoying our time together.

Saturday brought lots of warm sunshine and a load of light aircraft, due to a festival of leisure flight on at the local aerodrome right next to the apartment complex. This started off with parachuters jumping out of a helicopter down to the airfiled. I can never understand why anyone would want to jump out of a perfectly good functioning aircraft, regardless of how good it might look or feel! Lots of fly-pasts with pipers, cessnas and other aircraft I dont have a clue about, making lots of noise and no doubt enthralling the locals with expensive 5 minute trips around the marshland then back onto terra-firma. This festival is on for a few days, coinciding with the Ansan street art festival taking place in Ansan lake park and city centre. It's here we had our encounter with the pink-eared dogs. Not one but several could be spotted following behind their owners, probably wondering why they being the centre of attention. I felt sorry for the poor things, as they know not of the ridicule of which they are subject!

Did I mention taxi's?

The magic’s wearing off.

I must point out that’s only the case with my daily taxi ride INTO work in the mornings.

Take this morning as an example - I got the typical Agussi (Grumpy Old Man) driver who, when greeted when I got into the cab, asks me where I’m going. “Industrial complex” I reply. He groans, and mumbles under his breath, and the usual thing happens – He points to the cab waiting in line behind us, and mutters the equivalent of “Sorry mate, I don’t go South of the river!” He gets insistent and continues pointing to the cab at the back. If I get out now, then who’s to say his mates not from the same club.

I sit tight, and continue repeating the address, as if he didn’t get it first time. It’s the only thing I can do, as I don’t have enough Korean to start a full blown argument. He protests. I sit tight. Eventually he gets the message – he’s got someone as stubborn as him in the back of his cab, and either way, he’s lost. We head off, and he kids on he doesn’t know the way, and tries to go the long way round to make it really worth his while. I’ve made this trip a hundred times now, and know the way. The little Korean I have picked up, has probably been the most critical – how to tell a taxi which way to go. Arruncho (right), Wencho (left) and Chic-Chin (straight on). When you finally get to your destination, it’s Yugio! (here). Works wonders!

The reluctance to take me to the industrial complex? – simple, he has real trouble finding a fare to take him back to the city in the mornings. He’d much rather do the local shopping trip, or take the kids to school. I’m hard work.

Keep arms and legs in the cab at all times….

The taxi trip has been discussed a number of time in previous blogs, but the one home from work is especially noteworthy! I think it has something to do with getting near to tea-time for the driver, and his unwavering compulsion to get down to the local noodle shop for a hit of rammen noodle, or whatever takes his fancy.

Usually the ride starts off well, with little indication of his need to feed. When we get on the straights, it’s a different story. It’s Hold tight and here we go! Pot holes and undulations in the road are disregarded, and the suspension takes a right beating. I half expect a camera half way down the road to flash and capture our fearful expressions and then have the option of us buying a copy for $2 at the end of the ride!

If you have never seen a cab going round the corners on 2 wheels then come to Korea. It’s much cheaper than some fairground rides back home, and way more fun!

On medical matters….

Sue has been suffering the last 2 ½ weeks with a really annoying and sometimes painful cough. We thought it was just a carry on from my cold that I caught a few weeks ago, and took about a week to get rid of. We were under the impression not to go near a doctors until we had received our medical insurance cards, as the fees they would charge would be very high. It turns out, that we only had to show our ID cards, and this got us local prices, and the fact we were covered on our insurance from the day we got here. It got to the point on Saturday morning that I had to get her to the doctors – she was coughing so hard, it was really starting to get her down.

We first called our friends to ask where they went and how to go about it. It turns out, we have a local clinic on site right at the apartment complex (is there nothing this complex doesn’t offer?). They were walking right past the clinic at the time, and gave us the number. I called our executive assistant for help in how to get to the doctors. Kristine called the doctors for us, and let us know that it was a walk-in surgery, and just to go right along as they was an English speaking doctor on site. We headed out, with poor Sue coughing like a drain.

At the surgery, we handed over our ID cards, and Sue was immediately triaged with a digital thermometer stuck in her ear. No fever, thank goodness. We were asked to sit until the doctor could see us. In about 5 minutes, we heard a couple of phone calls going on in the background. I then got a call from Kristine who said the doctor would prefer of we would go an see a buddy of his, who spoke better English, and had all the facilities on-site. The receptionist gave us a piece of paper with the surgery’s details on it, and told us to get a cab. We headed outside and picked a cab right from the stand outside the complex. 5 minutes later, we were at the second surgery, and again, it was just a walk-in affair (how many surgeries back in the UK can you just casually walk into on a Saturday morning?) We were greeted and again, the ID card details taken. The doctor was very polite, and asked Sue what the symptoms were – communication was fair, and we both got our points across. This was one occasion, where Sue insisted I accompany her into the consultation!

Strange that he never shut to door to the consultation room.

After a few more questions, the doctor said he would examine her, and asked her to take the obligatory deep breaths. He said that he would like to take some X-rays of her chest just to check it out. At this point I could feel a long day coming on, what with traipsing over to the hospital, waiting for consultants to pore over the images, then get back to the clinic for a follow-up. I was very surprised to find that the X-ray dept was in the next room! The doctor could see the look of surprise when he told us this, and reckoned the look was more of “how much was this going to cost?” He said it was not expensive. I wasn’t really bothered about the cost, as it was going to be covered on the medical insurance anyway.

Sue was whisked into a little cubicle and made to wear the usual sexy open backed gown, which I came to love 18 months ago, when I ended up in hospital for the week with my dodgy guts. 5 minutes later she emerged having had her photographs taken. The images were checked over by the receptionist, who I think doubled up as chief radiographer. We noted during the time that all the consultations being made by the doctor was with an open door! Sue said she had read this is normal practice on the expat forums.

We were ushered into the doctors room again to discuss the results of the images, and were glad to find that the possible Pneumonia was ruled out, but a touch of bronchitis was the culprit this time. A course of antibiotics and a shot should sort her out. Sue was taken to another little room, and the jab administered directly to her bum. I hate shots, regardless of where they happen to be aimed. 2 minutes later, and we were being escorted to the pharmacy on the ground floor, and the medicines handed over. Great service I thought, and the princely sum we paid for all this attention?

Doctors consultation fees, examination, X-rays, injections, prescribed medicines = 2400KRW (£12) Amazing! ....and all done within 2 hours on a Saturday morning.

The downside? (there is always one!) Sue’s going to rattle for the next 3 days. 6 different pills 3 times per day lol :)

Yellow dust

Back in the UK, we used to see the occasional day when the car was covered with a fine layer of dust after a rainy night. We were told that this was sand from the Sahara desert which had got drawn up into the atmosphere, and had blown across Europe and dropped down by precipitation. It was a rare occurrence, but an interesting one.

We have the same phenomenon here in Korea. Same mechanism - different desert. This comes from China’s Gobi desert, but is exacerbated by collection of airborne pollutants and deadly toxins, much if which is from China’s industrial centres. It gets carried along high in the atmosphere by the jet stream, and settles over the Korean peninsula and Japan for a few days, before being blown onwards.

It’s apparently seasonal too. Millions of tonnes of dust gets picked up from late February to May each year from dry winter weather conditions combined with the winds, and it’s getting worse each year.

Most of the time here, the visibility is usually poor at best, but gets much worse during one of these “storms” We have a river runs past the apartment, and the views are fantastic, given a nice clear day, but these are rare, due to the amount of dust in the air. I though it was just humidity, fog and weather conditions which were the reasons for the visibility, but it seems we are breathing this in most of the time. A lot of Korean folk’s wear surgical masks while out and about. I originally thought this was because it was considered impolite to spread your germs if you were sick with flu or something, but now I know different. Looking like Michael Jackson on a road trip might just keep you healthy! Schools are ordered to be closed during heaviest storms, as the children have low immunity to infections, and people are advised to keep all doors and windows shut. My earlier post about dust in the apartment now has nothing to do with us shedding our skin!

Korean Times has reported that to clean a jumbo jet took 6,000 gallons of water, 6 hours and at a cost of 3M Won (£1500)!

But we think we have it bad? I spoke to some of my colleagues in Shanghai, and they reckon we have good clean air here! They reported an air quality index of 500! The US considers 300 hazardous, and anything over 200 is unhealthy!

We’ll see how it improves after May is over and done with

Watched the telly this morning

I took an interest in some of the TV news stories coming into work this morning, not for the content, but for the fact that my taxi driver had his eyes pinned to the small screen in front of him whilst driving along. This made for a few brown trouser moments avoiding near-misses and bouncing into obviously unseen pot holes in the road. This is very common practice, and there are no laws regarding what you can and cannot do inside the privacy of your own vehicle (one exception – drink driving, not the actual practice of drinking in the vehicle, or having open canisters, but being under the influence and over the limit. They take a dim view of this). The screen they watch is actually a 9” LCD which doubles up as a Sat-Nav system, radio and a TV. I have even seen one doing a light and sound show to the beat of music. The trouble is they prefer to have it do anything other than show the way to the destination.

One thing Korean driver’s love, is blue LED lighting – it’s everywhere! It’s in the cab, on the dash, behind the door handles, and backlighting all the gauges and dials on the dashboard. They even have them mounted into the car maker emblems on the body work. We’re not talking your average boy-racer here, this is the average Joe in his regular day ride. I got into a taxi the other day, and this thing had been pimped to the max! It had leather upholstered roof lining and door pockets, that resembled a Chesterfield couch. It had the obligatory blue LED lighting, and had a sound system complete with dancing plasma display hooked up to an MP3 player. I half expected to pay extra for the ride, just for the entertainment value!

Show me blue LED’s and my eyes don’t work, especially at night – I tend to see ultraviolet ghost images for ages afterwards, and it screws up my focus for a while. I’m sure there is a name for my condition, if not, I’ll call it LEDopia

Burny-burny Cuisine

I don’t think there is a food we can’t have over here, in terms of international flavours. We have already given the local Pizza guy a mention, along with Korean dinner, BBQ style. We ventured out at the weekend to try Vietnamese food. All looked good, and I should have gone with my first choice, as regrettably the second hurt bad! I ordered a seafood mix on a bed of noodles, and it looked great, even the two small octopus the size of a golf ball looking at me from the plate didn’t put me off. I took a few bites, and munched down on the 8 legged creatures with gusto. Then it hit. My lips started to burn, then the tongue, then the throat. Chilli heat factor 9/10 Eowwwwww! Wiping lips, beads of sweat forming on brow, I was determined not to let it get the better of me, but it did. Sue even tried one little noodle, thinking I was a lightweight, but even she had to swig down a mouthful of pop to cool the burning sensations. I was beaten by a plate of seafood which had been chillied to death. Next time I’m sticking to chicken and rice, until I know how hot it is – let others take the pain. We might try the Italian next, in preparation for the folks coming over, just in case fiery hot Vietnamese isn’t their style.

Mobile at last

We bought a phone at the weekend, after both of us officially becoming “Aliens” Being an alien means we have our Korean ID cards, which shows our immigration and work status. These little gems also allow us to buy items over certain expense and also, mobile phones – you can’t register a number unless you are certified! We ended up with a snazzy little slide phone, with 1.3Megapixel camera. We got the stall guy to set it up for us in minutes with English menus and he also threw in a spare battery, charger and 30 minutes talk time for a total of about 25 GBP good value! We only expect to use it for one-to-one contact and when Sue’s out and about for emergencies. We have Skype of all our international calls (free of course)

High-rises and haircuts….

Our apartment is manky, don’t get me wrong, we love it. It just gets so dirty very fast. Even though we are 15 floors up, take our shoes off at the door, and have quadruple double glazing, it’s amazing how much dust actually gets in and settles on the floors, worktops, appliances, TV and glass top units. We have tried all sorts of contraptions including mops, static mops, cloths and wipes with little or no effect. Even damping down with spray bottles – all have little or no effect. All we seem to do is push the stuff around, or chase it back into the air to settle on some other surface. It’s done our heads in. I thought I might be able to blag a few tacky type cloths from work, as these are common in the electronics industry for use in clean-rooms. They are special wax impregnated cloths which make the dust stick to the cloth, rather than being pushed around. We didn’t have any! I’m worried about the infamous “Yellow dust storms” that threaten the peninsula on regular occasions. We saw an infomercial the other day which refers to them as natural disasters! Blimey! With that in mind, we made our way to Home-plus and bought a cyclone pull-along vacuum cleaner. Sue now has a new toy to play with in the apartment – she has deliberately left some parts of the apartment so she has something to do during the week!
Sue had her hair done before we left the UK, and hoped it would last for a while. Roots have no mercy! She had discussed the delicate issue with our Canadian neighbours and both had decided to bite the bullet and go to one of several local salons in the vicinity. We had found one on the second floor of the shopping block next to our apartment, and went in armed with a few words stripped out of the Korean survival book. “Colour, blonde, and how much?” was about all we needed. A young man of usual hairdressing persuasion approached from the clipping of a customers head, wanting to know what we required. A few points to roots, smattering of Korean, and bad renditions of “Blond-eru!” seemed to do the trick. What we didn’t expect, was to be seated and told it could be done next! We declined and made an appointment for the Monday. It seems that no appointments necessary – just walk in and wait. Great, how much? The guy brings out 3 x 10,000KRW notes for the till. 30,000KRW? Just under 15GBP, for a Colour, Trim, Wash & Blow dry? What kind of place was this? A great place actually, and a very good job too - another fine example of rip-off GB. Expect to pay about 50+ GBP back home. She’ll be back!

A visit to Songtan...

W e had planned to go to out around Ansan on Sunday, for a bit of a stroll, which would have led to more furniture shopping, and looking for the latest blockbusters on DVD at Ansan railroad station, so we suggested to our neighbours that if they were at a loose end, they could join us. It turned out that they were originally heading to Devil’s Island, near Oido on the coast, at the end of line 4 for a day at the seaside with some of their Korean friends; They got let down, and suggested to us that a trip into Songtan would be more fun. We dashed over to a little shop called VD (I cant remember the full name of the shop, but that’s how they call themselves short form). We bought a cracking big solid wood coffee table and two bedside drawers all for the princely sum of around 180GBP – delivered next day too! We headed back to meet up with our friends at the gap in the fence round the complex and headed off at 12 noon.
The trip to Songtan involved a bus, and two trains. I had not been on a bus in Korea until this point. We caught the bus and took it to Gojan station to pick up the train. The ride there cost 800KRW which is about 35p in English money. It turns out that if you take a bus ride, and then catch a train, the train ride is free until you get off to transfer. We used our T cards, which is like travel money loaded onto an RF card. This is swiped when you get on and off the bus, and through the gates at the rail stations. Transport is incredibly cheap in Korea, as previously mentioned and reliable too. The total cost for the day’s travel bearing in mind the train ride was about an hour each way? – about 2.50 GBP !

Songtan is centered around a joint Korean/USAF air base, and full of GI’s. All the local shops are also centered around this population, with lots of American brand cigarettes, eating places, large size clothes shops, and most if not all trading in the American Dollar! All we had with us was Korean Won, which drew some surprised looks at some stores we went into. Although the Dollar is king here, the price of goods is more expensive that that of shopping in Ansan, and the rate of exchange is lousy if trying to buy in Won, but I guess they have a captive market here, with most base personnel not wishing to venture out past the town limits.

We made our way to a store with blacked windows with writing which said “DVD, GAMES, CD’s” This was a little store which would have come with a special license back in the UK, and would have been off limits to anyone under the age of 21! Instead, inside, they had shelves of empty DVD and CD cases with colour copies of the latest cinema blockbuster movies, and ones which had just been released onto DVD in the regular stores. The difference? All of these movies were carefully copied onto bright new shiny re-writable DVD’s and came with more colour copies of the covers which were of dubious origins. 3 for 10,000KRW (about 4GBP). OK, I know it’s probably not right buying these things, but when in Rome right? Everyone’s bought a Rolex made from tin cans at some point.

We got back, exhausted but happy we had made the trip, even if just to see what it was like.

Korean story tellers

In business meetings, they way they are held is unique! Each individual, when asked about a particular customer or subject has to go through a full blown story telling process. It usually begins with how he was first involved with the project, what his responsibilities were, what was going on before, right now and what was going to happen. Now, I think that’s great, as it gives you a complete picture of what’s happening, and a whole story is better than none. But for them to repeat the same old thing every time you have an update meeting is wearing thin now, especially as it has to be translated to me by my assistant. I have suggested that we already know the facts, and want them to go for it Western style, but they insist that it is Korean custom and must be followed. Who am I to argue, I have all day for meetings like this don’t I?

Pen flipping and imaginary sums

Go to any Korean business meetings here, (I’ve now been to plenty!), and you will see that all of them are Cozy Powell wannabees (for those of you too young to remember good old Cozy, think Phil Collins on the drums!). They can do amazing little flips and twirls with their pens, and without looking at it too. I tried without success to flip my pen, and looked exceedingly embarrassed as I retrieved the thing from under the table. Needless to say, I don’t flip my pen anymore.

Another thing they do, when presented with a mathematical question, such as working out the percentage scrap, is that they use an imaginary pen like their forefinger, and work out the sum on the palm of the other hand. It is really quite a show, even doing the division and multiplying sings. Results usually get signed off with a full stop, I think this must be ingrained in the way they were taught at school, and I think it may have been a chalkboard they used.

Our ship has sailed.....

Literally. We had shipped some of our personal possessions onto a forwarding agent back on the 12th February for shipping over to Korea. The consignment was about 250Kg, based on a pallet with 8 boxes of goods on it. It was due to land on the 19th March in Busan, with a forward road transport up to Incheon near Seoul, where it would clear customs and then be delivered to the plant here in Ansan. If there were going to be any problems, we thought it would have been in Incheon, clearing Korean customs. How wrong as usual – it turns out UK customs did the dirty on our container, and seized it before it was loaded onto the boat. Boat then sailed off, minus our goods.

It turns out that the waybill for the container, which contains multiple loads destined for many places including Korea, had a box of scrap metal, which apparently “could” be used to make guns. It kind of reminded me of the Super gun affair some years ago, when Matrix-Churchill was accused of delivering a load of oil refinery pipe work to Iraq, and were told by customs, that if it was stuck together, it could be used as a big gun! Needless to say, it caused a huge furor and people got sent to jail, but got let our when other people came to their senses. I just hope that our boxes with all the stuff in still has most of it left. I had the PS3, HD-DVD and loads of DVD’s in there!

Its currently on the Hyundai Mercury, sailing at a leisurely 8.25 Knots along the English channel, heading to Port Said to pick up the Suez canal. It’s due to arrive in Incheon on 19th April. At least my stuff is getting a nice sightseeing cruise out of it. I hope it’s got an outside cabin with balcony!

One Largee Pepperoni pizza man!

We have a little pizza shop on the complex where we stay. We were introduced to it by our Canadian friends who only like pepperoni pizza. We like to be a little more adventurous – we went into the shop one night, and looked at the menu. About 12 different pizzas were shown as pictures on the menu. We chose what looked to be a combination of toppings on a cheese bite base. This is little rolls of dough on the edge, which are filled with cheese. We’ve had similar back in the UK, at the likes of Pizza Hut, and we do enjoy it. I pointed to the pizza on the picture and motioned with my finger that I wanted “one of those please” The pizza guy rattled on in Korean, oblivious to the fact we could understand a word of what he said, but we did hear the word “Canadian” and him pointing towards the block where our friends live and then towards us. Oh! “Canadian?” No I said “Scottish!” (note: it’s easier to say we’re both Scottish that try to explain Sue’s English, and so am I in reality, but then try to explain why I have a different accent than English – oh you get the picture!) The pizza is hand thrown, and all ingredients are fresh, and tastes great! Until we bit into the cheesy bites! yuck – plastic processed cheese. You can’t buy a decent bit of cheese here, unless it’s the plastic tasting fully processed variety. We had to go to Costco to get a decent bit of Cheddar! Our next visit to the mad pizza man, who can’t shut up brought some disappointment from him. He expected us to order the cheesy bite variety again, but we wanted something different this time, and definitely no plastic cheesy bite this time. We got around this by pointing to other pictures of other pizzas and reciting different days to him one picture at a time. Much better with no yucky cheesy bites this time.

More things foody…..

Pass a market with food stalls and you may have an unpleasant surprise. Pig face anyone? Yes, all of the pig can be bought here, cheap as chips. Include the trotters, tail, face, intestines, eyes and brains. All for sale! - I’ll pass thanks! Give me a bacon butty any day, as long as it doesn’t look back up at me!

What’s with the booze here?

Koreans are known for their hard drinking habits, but why oh why can’t you buy any decent booze here – it’s enough to make you go tee-total! Sure, they’ve got beer and Soju, a drink made from fermented potatoes or rice, dependant on the price, a bit like watered down vodka, but it’s not the same. Go into a bar, and you can’t buy a single measure of whisky or brandy – you have to buy a whole bottle, they then mark this up for you and hold it behind the bar for your next visit. I guess it’s good marketing for the bar, and at least ensures repeat business until the bottle is empty, but the initial outlay is a hefty whack. You can buy wine at the supermarkets, anything from a 5GBP bottle of new world wine to a French Chablis at around 40GBP, Johnny Walker gut-rot whisky (It’s gut rot, coz I know where it’s bottled – Kilmarnock!) and some unknown makes like Whisky Blue and some other sweet sickly concoctions. Brandy can be bought here, but holy cow! you pay the price! A normal 70cl bottle of Hennesey, will set you back the best part of 40GBP! Visitors please note: Famous Grouse Scotch Whisky and Courvoisier Brandy duty free please!

Korenglish!

Translation of things Western can be funny over here. Take for instance, we found a fast food outlet called Popeye’s – the bootstrap line read, “Chicken and Biscuits” - We couldn’t find any biscuits! We did however note lots of baskets, and lots of chicken, so reckon it must have been a poor translation of “Chicken in Baskets”. It made us smile, for, oh, about 2 minutes!

On a trip to Emart, a store like Tesco’s, but with little Western style products, we found an energy drink called Pocari SWEAT! Much like the raw crab, I didn’t fancy that somehow!

There are many other instances of Korenglish around, and I’ll report these when I find them

Things on a stick….

We pass all sorts of street vendors here during our evening treks to the stores after work, and I keep asking Sue if she fancies “something on a stick”. These are wooden skewers which have items of dubious nature on them. We can’t tell what they are, as they are almost always covered with a bread crumb coating and deep fried, and we have no idea even if they told us what they were, as we don’t speak Korean. I do know, they are cheap!, and this is like a magnet to a Scotsman. I’m going to have to go in and tackle my curiosity and take a bite some day. Be prepared to fly me back should it all go a bit pear-shaped!

Korean BBQ tastes great! Except…….

Ok, so we’ve been here 3 weeks now, but I have already found a great restaurant where we will be taking all of our guests to when they come for visits. You have been warned! The restaurant in question is a Korean barbeque type, where you get to cook food and a wire mesh placed over a tub of hot coals right at your table. You are then presented with an abundance of side dishes, many that I cant tell you the Korean name right now, but things such as Sambay sauce, lettuce, pickled radish, pickled onion relish soup, scrambled egg, marinated tofu, mint leaves, more sauces, hot and sour soup, noodles and a plate of delicious looking crab in hot sauce!

The meat is brought to the table on a plate, and the server puts this on the grill for you. A few minutes later, they are back with a pair of scissors to cut the meat into strips, which then cooks until tender and browned. This is then placed to the side of the grill, and the next slab of meat put on. I think we had a tendency to overcook the meat, because they would hover in the background and turn up to turn our meat for us, and not carbonize it. You take the chunks of meat, and wrap it in a leaf of lettuce or mint, then apply some of the onions and sauce, then stick it in your mouth and chew. Wow! Tender and juicy! Yum. A variety of meats can be chosen, but we tend to start with beef, then pork, then sausage ending up with prawn. Delicious!

On the first couple of visits I tucked into the plate of crab covered with spicy hot sauce, and was congratulated on my technique and courage to eat the crab. No big deal, I thought. It was very tasty, although the spicy sauce didn’t really allow the flavour of the crab meat to come through very well. On the third visit to the restaurant, I found out why I was being praised. It turns out that the crabs are whisked out of a tank at the back, cleaved in half alive, then plonked onto a plate and smothered with spicy sauce. If they weren’t dead already, then the sauce would finish them off. It would seem I was munching on raw crab! Now, I have heard some horror stories about raw crustaceans and the nasties it can bring on. I just hope I haven’t fallen third time (un)lucky! I’m sticking to anything with 4 legs from now on – oh wait, don’t they eat dog here? Errrrrr… then it’s pig and cow I guess!

You can’t have that! – no alien card!

We could learn from countries like Korea back in the UK, with it’s attitude and control of immigrants legal or illegal. Sure, they still have illegal’s working over her, but they are a little more clandestine that the equivalent over in UK. Here, you can’t even buy a mobile phone, PAYG or contract without presenting an “alien” card. The same applies to buying the more expensive white goods at the department stores. This card is an id which identifies you as official immigrant status and allowed to be resident in the country. Working visa’s are another story altogether. I used to be anti-id card in the UK, but can see the benefits in mandatory requirement for non-residents.

It takes about 2-3 weeks to arrange an alien card, but when we get ours, then it’s off down to the local subway to buy a PAYG for Sue – communication is pretty difficult right now, as my laptop is blocked to almost the point of not working at all. Skype, MSN messenger and all that malarkey is verboten! The only way I can contact her right now is through the hidden chat feature of Facebook. I don’t think the Korean’s have cottoned onto the Western popularity of Facebook yet, so it’s not blocked by my admin yet! There was no point in getting a phone for the apartment, as it is an expensive item to install and to rent monthly.

Top tech items such as iPhone come with some hefty prices to match, so I think it will be a simple flip type camera phone with cheap calls and top-ups monthly.

Catch-up

OK, so it's not Wednesday, but we have been off-line for a few days until they connected us to broadband, so here's a catch-up!

Getting from one place to another is relatively easy. Just take a taxi. There are lots of taxi ranks around the place, and with a little amount of walking you can reach these within minutes. Taxis are inexpensive by UK standards. As soon as you get into one, the meter is set at 1900KRW (Korean Won, the national currency here). Each kilometer or part thereafter is charged at a 100KRW. This means that a similar £10 UK fare which would get us just a few miles into town costs around £2 here. We almost called one taxi driver a rob-dog yesterday, as we had checked out of our hotel, and moved into the apartment. The meter showed up as 4100KRW (about £2.05) but as we got out he wanted another 1000KRW. His English was as good as my Korean, and he made a gesture of using a phone, which we took to be kind of threatening, as if to call the police, or at the very least, get his mates round to sort me out. Koreans are kind of small in stature, so I knew I could have taken him on, and probably a few of his mates too. Guess how stupid we felt, when relating the tale to our Canadian friends, and found that the extra is added on in all cases where a taxi is called to pick-up which is what we did at the hotel – Doh! As previously mentioned, taxis are paid by the KM, but they also have a timer which counts down at traffic lights, which are known to be a taxi drivers friend. Some drivers act like Lewis Hamilton, but other are positive snails, and like nothing better than to sit at lights all day long, and then saunter along to the next set. A phrase we are getting used to using is Kup-Eyo which means hurry up!

We dropped off the cases, and started to decant the goods into wardrobes, and drawers etc. I have never seen an apartment with so much storage space. Each room has built-in storage, then there is more storage around the living room, off the balcony areas, and a shed load more by the front door! The apartment is a bit Tardis-like, Doesn't look much from the outside, but step beyond the door and you could get lost. An apartment tour movie is on www.youtube.com Do a search for “ansan apartment” and you will find it pop up.

Home hardware shopping was next on the agenda, and off to Tesco's in the necessary taxi we went. This guy thought he was one of the Hamilton Lewis types mentioned earlier the way he careered through the traffic. Even I had to hang onto the roof handle! Collecting a trolley (100KRW which is 5 pence by the way, as opposed to the £1 coin need back in the UK) to release it from the grip of it's mates chain and we headed into territory unknown. Heading past bags of things which are best left unmentioned, live things which were still kicking on ice tray displays, past packets of dried whitebait, which the kids here eat like crisps for their lunch time break, and a mountain of dried seaweed, which is used in the making of sushi rolls. We found the aisles where the bedding was located. Koreans sleep mostly on the floor, relying on mats or palliases to get a nights kip. The reason for this, is the heating system, called Ondol, is based upon hot water pipes fed under the floor. Closer to the floor, means the warmer you are. Normal beds are unheard of except for us “Wayguks” (Foreigners) and better class hotels. We had bought a bed, so needed some bed linen and duvet covers. We had found a shop earlier which dealt only in bedding, but guess what, only mats and covers – no concept of what a duvet or fitted sheet was! We found a half decent duvet, which came complete with cover, and pooped it into the basket. We also found matching pillow cases, and a fitted sheet – I never thought I'd say this, but thank you Tesco! Piling in some more bits and pieces, including loo roll (very important!) milk, bottled water (Korea does have mains water, but it's not very good on the treatment aspects, so they recommend the bottled variety) pot noodles (lol) and rice we headed to the checkouts. Plastic bags are frowned upon here, and they supply a bench with rolls of tape, and encourage you to use their cardboard boxes the bulk items were supplied in to them. I guess this helps out on their waste recycling targets too. We had the forethought to bring our empty hold-alls with us to carry the goods back the apartment. Taxi for 2 please!

Back at the ranch, our Canadian friend offered to take Sue down to “Sang-Knock-Soo” it's probably not how you spell it, but it's how it sounds, and it works in a taxi to get you there. The mission? To get cutlery, dishes, knives, bowls, loo brushes etc. Oh, and flip top bins for the loo's too. Why? In Korea, they can't handle loo paper down the waste treatment plant, so into a bin and bag for disposal along with the general garbage (I don't envy the bin men round here). Mission completed, Sue returned victorious with the spoils of her crusade in plenty of bags. We now have a simple functioning kitchen and household. More items arriving in due course.

Korean Telly:

Korean TV, is, well, just that – Korean! Plenty of telly-selly channels, selling live molluscs to the usual ped-egg from JML! The cable channels installed in the apartment, is limited to say the least. Channel 32 is interesting however, in that the content would be taken straight off our screens in the UK. I know what you are thinking at this point, but you are completely wrong! Its a CCTV channel with a camera pointing directly at the kiddies playground, so that nervous parents can watch their kids play in safety without having to bear the elements, and actually watch them play. The reason this wouldn't make our screens over in the UK? Do-gooders worrying that a paedophile might be droolling over his TV set seeing the kids at play. In the UK, you cant even take pictures of your own kids at the annual sports-day, or Christmas nativity play any more. Makes another reason we got out of Britain when we did. Not that I'm a paedophile drooling over his telly you know! We did however catch the local “chavs” lighting up a sneaky one before heading home at dusk.

I have asked our local guy in the plant to arrange satellite TV for us, or rather Sue, as she misses Eastenders, along with other such “quality” programming. We are expecting to get broadband within the next few days too. Our DVD player and HDD disk in currently on the high seas, and we expect this to land around the 19th March. DVD's of current cinema blockbusters with a dubious copyright agreement can be found at most subway stations. 4 for 10,000KRW (around £5). I think we might pay them a visit soon.

Thursday: More shopping!

Are we shopped out yet? I feel like I couldn't look at another shop, but we have forced ourselves to do yet another trip into Dongjan-Do, where the upmarket shops are based along with a few prized “pound shop” places. These are great for bargains like cheese graters, tupperware, shoe horns, washing liquids etc. Another taxi required please! Back home, dump the stuff off, and then back to Tesco's for the big Grocery shop now we have the fridge/freezer. We found baked beans! Lovely on a bit of toast. We looked at the meat counter, and found what we reckoned was a beef joint, so we should be OK for traditional Sunday roast. We even found a Yorkshire pud mix. Shower gel can be bought here too, but the price? Wow – around £3 for a bottle. Deodorant is also scarce and very expensive. It seems that about 50% of Koreans don't have some kind of gland that produces body odour (Cronin gland I think) so don't need it like us sweaty Westerners.

What's with the towels here?

We have two showers here in the apartment, one en-suite and one in the main bath over the tub. Like anyone, I like to get a good soak under the shower, then rub down with a huge bath sheet until dry. Towels in the shops here including Tesco and E-mart are minuscule! I mean, I have seen bigger postage stamps. OK, not quite, but the biggest towel I have seen is about the size of a hand towel you find in the wash-room. Don't the Koreans get as wet as we do under the spray like us? I reckon they must get out of the shower and run round the room until dry, because they don't buy the towels. We are going to venture over to Costco at the weekend where the American military do their shop. That's got to be a good bet for my size of towel.

Friday: Introduction visit and tour of plant.

Today was a visit to the plant, and meeting with my co-workers, and reports. Big impressive plant some new, some old, but all in very clean condition, and well looked after. About all of the space is used for some machinery or another. There is a cap-ex plan in place, and on the Agenda is a new Dragon AOI machine. We need to shoehorn it in somewhere. The plant works on 2 x12 hour per day shifts, with blue collars pulling around 60+ hours per week. Weekends are usually worked to catch up on backlogs (no difference there then!) The one thing I will be changing with urgency, is the fact the whole place comes to a halt during lunchtime, and tea breaks. All 250 staff take lunches at the same time. This equates to a huge 22.5 hours downtime per week over the 2 shifts. Rotating breaks will get a a major part of this time back at no cost to the company! Let's see how the staff react to that. Most of my time today was taken up with HR, filling in several forms for alien cards, work visa's, bank accounts, dependant's etc. I also arranged the broadband and satellite TV for the apartment which will please Sue. We hope to have this all installed by Tuesday latest. I also met the COO and CFO, board directors of the plant and took a leaf out of the etiquette book, by bringing along a couple of boxes of Walker's shortbread for them. This is probably brown-nosing at it's worst in the UK, but is considered quite polite here, and shows that I have considered the local culture. I'm off out tonight with my team along with our Canadian Ops guy – should be quite a night, if I believe all I'm told!

Norae Bangs, and cats choir!

We met up around 7:30 and headed to town. The favourite restaurant is a Korean BBQ place, which required the removal of shoes at the door, and tables close to the floor. I was quite happy to find that there was a pit in which you could swing round and place your feet into. I didn't think my back or chunky Western frame could handle the sitting cross-legged for long! The usual practice of necking Soju with an accompanying toast was the order of the night. I was accosted several times by what I thought was street vendors plying their wares, but it turns out that they are giving out little gifts along with a business card to entice you into the hostess bars located by the barbers poles. Little sachets of mouth wash, or boiled sweets are the usual things to get. After dinner, we all headed up stairs to a bar, and more beers and Soju's later, we headed back out to the street. Next up was a Norae-Bang, which is a little Karaoke room, complete with tacky disco lights, and large screen projector. One of the Koreans was most apologetic, because he had brought us to an expensive one, where the service comes complete with hostesses for the evening. We ended up with 6 hostesses to the 10 of us. Our Canadian guy opened up with Hotel California by the Eagles, and I was soon coaxed into a dreadful rendition of Wonderwall by Oasis. I could feel the cat's in the back alley covering their ears! As soon as time was up, the room cleared, and we made our way the WA Bar, which is an ice bar, where all the beers are in a central ice box, and you just help yourselves. A barmaid notes down your consumption, and sticks it on your tab next the bar. We rolled out of there at about 3:00am. I smelt like a chimney, because EVERYONE smokes like one.

Sparklies!

The Koreans love sparkly things. Its everywhere, on fridges, clothes, shoes, ties, everything! We saw examples of this when we went furniture shopping yesterday (Sunday) Fridge freezers have daimante sparkles attached to the doors, and some are even lit up with blue LED's. If it were back in the UK, we could call it chav furniture. We held off buying the fridge freezer, not because it looked chav, but because we didn't know the exact gap it would fit into, until we get into the apartment. We have hoever, bought a shed load of other stuff, including a HD TV, 4 seater leather sofa with matching stool, marble top table and 4 dining chairs, top loading washing machine, Living room display unit, Queen size bed with mattress, combination microwave, toaster and kettle. The TV is almost similar to the one we had just bought back in the UK, but a slightly smaller screen size. You might think, why did we buy another one? The TV format over here is NTSC, UK is PAL which in not compatible with over here. I needed to get HD so we could use our HDD recorder and PS3 Playstation over here though. We ordered it all on Sunday, and it's getting delivered on Tuesday. The bed is solid wood with scroll headboard and ends. I tried to lift it but it weighs a ton! If we had tried to buy all this kit back in the UK, it would have required a small mortgage to cover the cost. I am astounded at the price we got it all for. It will be getting shipped back to the UK with us when (if) we leave. The method of delivery is also unique. Go to Youtube.com and type in “Moving Korea Style” and you'll see what I mean! Health and Safety people – look away now!
We need to go and do a serious shop on Wednesday to kit the apartment out for such things as cutlery, dishes, pots bed linen etc. It's going to be fun getting all this back in a taxi!