Snow in Seoul Seoul saw the heaviest snowfall in recorded history today. Make you realize how short “recorded history” actually is. We got about 24-25cm of snow. Tried for a couple of hours to make it to work on this first working day of 2010, but public transportation was a mess. Gave up after a…
Category: korea / tourist at home
Green roof sightings in Seoul
Green roof tops Daum Communications / Ilshin Building, Seoul, Korea Seoul is not known for it eco-friendly building designs, but a couple of buildings I encountered recently, which have significant green roofs, have made me thinks that there may be hope yet for this city. A Green roof according the Wikipedia: A green roof is…
Culture gap: no 4th floor
F(ourth) floor is 4th floor in Korea No 13th floor (photo credit: eggrollstan) The 4th floor in Korea has the same status as the 13th floor does in the US. The pronunciation for “4” is “sa” which is the same as the Chinese character for “death”, hence the “F” (for Fourth) instead of “4” in…
Seoul, 15 years ago
Click image to view slideshow of Mapo redevelopment, 1994 Digging through some old photos, I found this set I took in 1994, of Mapo area, in Seoul. This area had been home to many informal settlers (so called “moon village” or 달동네) but had been “condemned” to be redeveloped and replaced by more of Seoul’s…
The dilemma of content sharing for universities
Republished from UXforGood.org. Recently I’ve participated in brainstorming session for a premier university in Korea on how to make its lectures available online. Ever since MIT started offering its lectures through its OpenCourseWare (website) initiative in late 2002, many higher education institutions have been offering lectures online through various channels: YouTube and iTunes just to…
Korean government offers generous loan terms for poor college students
In a followup to a previous post, Breaking the Cycle of Poverty in Korea through Education: A Social Business Proposal I saw some very exciting news that the Korean government will move to provide long-term full tuition coverage student loans for poor students starting 2010. It even stipulates that the students are only required to…
The Geography of UX: Why web user experience in Korea is not about the searchbox
Korean internet culture is unique. Or the internet culture of Northern America is not universal.1 User Experience: my definition If you do an Amazon search for User Experience (UX) you get mostly web design related books. The web has grown so dramatically in the past decade that it is sometimes hard to imagine a time…
Farewell to “Foolish President” Roh Moo-hyun
Koreans paying their last respects before motorcade leaves Seoul. (Photo credit: ohmynews.com) Former president of Korea Roh Moo-hyun (2003-2007) died of severe head injuries suffered in a suicide attempt on May 23. Today (May 29) saw his national funeral and cremation. Thousands gathered in the city center to pay their last respects. I was no…
Autumn Colors of Korea
Autumn in Namhan-San-Seong Autumn is by far the most spectacular season in Korea, in my opinion. Since the 70% of Korea is mountainous, the transformation of color is quite dramatic. These photos were taken in Namhan-San-Seong Park, located about half-an-hour from Bundang where I live. Growing up in Korea, going to visit Namhan-San-Seong always seemed…
Thoughts on Sustainability or How to Grow Vegetables in the City
Community Garden in Bundang, KoreaThe sign reads: No gardening. The land is owned by Korea Land Corporation and will soon be sold and developed, therefore any cultivation is forbidden. No compensation shall be made for any damages to illegally cultivated goods. May 2005. – Korea Land Corporation It is said that what is everybody’s is…