Walking down Saemukol

I feel very cold, I was reaching out for a bit more of that shared blanket. It was still dark and I was lying on my side facing the wall of a container house. I press the light botton of my "Ironman" wristwatch, it reads 6:20 AM.
Back in Seoul, yesterday, after I get out of my work, Im busy packing up the things I should bring in my little journey. I put them on my backpack. An extra t-shirt, a towel, electronic tools, recorded cd's(computer programs), and of course my MP3 player. Checked my mobile phone, extra battery, keys, glasses. They are all ready. Now Im wondering what should I wear? What I mean is- should I wear pants or shorts? This is a common situation when the season changes. Its late spring but the its like mid summer here in this huge city. The temperature can go up to 22C, but its still cold in the mornings. I decided to wear my cargo shorts. I'm going to a friend to assemble his "do-it-yourself"PC and install the programs on it.

Kwangtan-myon is a small county about 15 miles (24.3 Kms)away from central Seoul. It's part of the administration of Paju City of the Kyeonggi Province. Its topagraphy varies from mountinous to rolling hills with some inconsiredable plains planted with rice and veges. It was about mid-noon when we (with Ian)arrived in Seong Hong Industrials-the company where he work with another friend Rudy. Rudy was'nt there when we arrived, he called me that morning that he's going to attend church and be back at 2:00.
I was'nt really thinking that Im going to spend the night there, but the odds forced me to. After we arrived, I started my mission right away, I have to finish everything before dark and go home. So I rushed and open my tools, mount the PC mainboard to the case and set up everything. But alas! The main motherboard power cord is short! Cant make its way to the boards 24pin connector.It was not really a problem if Im in Seoul, but Im here in the mountains, and its still hard to find PC parts in Kwangtan as well. So in short, we have to go back in Seoul and wasted at least 4 hours in rides. We are finally back in Seong Hong 6:30PM and Rudy was already there.I spent another 3 hours setting up and installing windows vista, it was about 9:00PM.
Feeling the morming cold, I cant go back to sleep. Its too early in the mountains to get up at 6AM but I have to. I put on my socks to ease the cold, the two are still asleep. Thirty minutes later we are dialing a call taxi to bring me to Kwangtan bus station but we fail.The taxi's are not answering and long before we realised that its a holiday and probably the taxis are on holiday too. So we have no other option but to walk down the hill from Seong Hong to the nearest hi-way.
Saemukol (샘우컬) is a single lane road winding down the hill of Majang-ri where the company was. It streches some 800m down the road where I can catch a taxi (if lucky enough) or wait a bus for Kwangtan. So the three of us start walking down. It was cold and foggy. As we walked, I can smell the fresh scent of the mountains, we pass by some residents cultivating the field very early in the morning. I have seen farm equipments left on the fiels all night,no woories on theives, there's none. Walking down, I've experienced something new, I cant describe it, its a sneer joy that I was out from a busy congested world to a simple free open space of nature.
After we reached the hi-way, we waited for anothe 30 minutes before the bus arrived, I said goodbye to my friends who have to walk back all the way to their factory. I finally arrive in my home in Seoul at 10:20 AM.
Photos:(above-down) 1)Rudy and Ian walking down, Seong Hong Ind. at the background. 2)Central Kwangtan. 3) Dolmens( like a cemetery, thats the way they bury their dead)scatters around the low hills. 4)Seamukol road. 5) The main hi-way where I catch the bus going to Kwangtan.
PS. Many thanks to my Friends in Seamukol. Ian and Rudy

Alaska experiment

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CNN on mobile phone?

Yes! Is'nt that Andrew Stevens? CNN Hong Kong?

When I first came to this country, one of the most evident influence of technology in South Korea's culture is the use of mobile phones. When you roam around Seoul, you can seldom find a person without it. As I stayed in this country, I also witness the swift evolution of this very useful mobile handset. After the short popularity of mobile pagers, cellular phones took over, and within a short period of time, Korea now produces/uses one of the most sophisticated models in the world.
In 2005, While Europe and the U.S. are trying to sort out technology standards and spectrum availability for mobile TV, a digitally advanced South Korea is watching soap operas, sitcoms, and news programs on the go. Some 7 million consumers (or one in every seven residents) regularly watch mobile TV programming just two years after Korea became the world's first country to broadcast such content to cell phones. Pretty soon, phones doubling as TVs will be as ubiquitous as camera phones now.
Indeed, the small cell-phone screen hasn't hampered mobile TV's spread in Korea. Fast technological progress has improved the quality of the video. And although more than half of mobile TV viewers use handsets, a growing number of people are watching programs through personal multimedia players, music players, handheld PCs, and increasingly, navigation systems mounted on cars.

To experience this techno-cultural wave, I decided to acquire a DMB capable mobile phone. For me, it is not an easy thing to decide. Buying a new phone means throwing away my old one. This phone will be my 4th mobile phone in Korea. All of the past 3

handsets have thier own different story, but have something in common- all of them are second-hand (slightly used) phones, lols.... The first one was changed because nobody will dare to show it on public places like on subways coz it is already considered antique. I can even remember that Im always setting it to vibrate mode for incomming calls because Im embarrassed of its monophonic ringtune. Almost all cells at that time uses 3D melodies and musics. The second one simply ceased to function maybe because of age, and the last one have already dived into the toilet bowl one time, he he he...

Samsung Anycall SCH-B750 got my power. It has a 3 Megapixel camera, Bluetooth ready, video/music player, and DBM phone. Mobile TV is very significant to me especially when travelling alone.It is an effective time killer on the subway, or when waiting for someone.