Finally, I arrive in Cheongju and am off to the Arts Centre this morning. I had hoped to find an internet cafe but struggled yesterday evening to find one, despite the promises of the guidebook. So this morning I set out to find the tourist information centre and they have access here - although all the instructions on the screen and the interface is in Korea. It took about twenty hours of travelling to get here from the UK but really comfortable and smooth flights from Air France. They have a great and very French screen introduction where impossibly good looking flight attendances swish into action as if on a catwalk and look after perfect nuclear families on their travels. Clearly cultural diversity has not reached their employment practices except I suspect for the baggage handlers.
From an initial glance Korean cities feel very new - I've not seen a building older than 50 years and there is much building work happening. I'm looking forward to seeing more today and getting a wider perspective. It has its very challenging moments, not understanding the language, but I have been generally fortunate in that people have been friendly and helpful when I've stood in front of ticket machines looking nonplussed. Their are many English people who teach here, but it appears a very homogeonous society and I have only seen one person from another country, although when I return to Seoul Insadong is a popular area. The choice of food here is fantastic with many of the covered markets and streets having small food stalls and a huge vareity of cafes and restaurants and I ate traditional noodle broth last night with kimchi, the pickled cabbage - after much complicated pointed and communication with very patient waitresses.
A proper update tomorrow -I'm hugely relieved to find access here at the tourist information and its close to the bus station and not far from my motel - the Shangri-La, which I chose entirely on the basis of its name....
Andy
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