This past weekend

We did a little shopping in Seoul this past weekend. We were looking for a new camera lens with a longer zoom on it than our what the shop keeper called a "cheap" kit lens. We didn't buy anything as they were all quite pricey and we decided to do a little more research before making such a steep purchase. The area of town that is known for camera shops is called Namdaemun. Korea has this interesting concept with shopping. When you need to buy something specific you go to a particular area of town where every vendor specializing in that product can be found. In Namdaemun, if you aren't shopping for cameras, camera lenses or extra camera products, I don't why else you would really be in the area. Every other shop literally for blocks and blocks is nothing but camera shops. And it is the same in Yongsan, which is called the electronics market. The strange thing about this is that they are all selling the EXACT SAME things without competitive prices nor are they ever really willing to bargain. The setup seems so strange to me. I don't understand how any of them stay in business this way.

Either way, it was a fun outing. The downfall to outings into Seoul, however are that the travel time often sucks up so much of the day, I never want to make the effort. Public transportation is awesome in Seoul, but we are not exactly in Seoul. We are countrified Seoul, meaning that we are urban enough to warrant the last subway stop on the line, but our subway only comes twice, sometimes three times an hour if we are lucky. And then, you have to get into Seoul, add on another hour to two hours for that. Plus you have to take into consideration the return trip because for some strange reasons the trains stop running around midnight, which means we have to be back on a train no later than 10:30pm. Blah bla, bla. All that to say, going into Seoul for a little outing is more hassle than it's worth most of the time.

But we have been working A LOT, 6-7 days a week for the past two weeks, so we needed to get our before we went absolutely stir crazy. And while we were out, we took some interesting photos of this little country we live in, I thought you might enjoy.

Kids were playing in this river. Seoul is basically a sauna the entire summer.

Namdaemun away from the camera shops.

Fruit displayed in an interesting fashion

Old men passing away the time.

I am pretty sure this is ginseng

Koreans love their ginseng