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ryan headed back to thailand just after chuseok. ryan was one of my favourite photography partners. we managed to get to a few cool places while we were in korea. it looks like i’m going to have to head to thailand and catch up with him again soon!

big weekends are coming thick and fast. i’ve been quite busy lately, but the upside is that i’m doing lots of photography. i’ve already shot over 400 shots this month (and today is only the 10th).

yesterday ryan came into town. he wanted to see the magnum exhibition so we headed there first. the exhibition had a few good photos, but generally i didn’t think the quality was very high. it was definitely good inspiration though, so we headed out to brave the fierce summer weather.

we headed to cheungmuro, i printed my film and we drank coffee at a cool little second hand store. we ate kimchi mandoo for lunch, met up with the leica club members (we spent some time drooling over a $30,000 collector’s camera). then we headed off to dongjak station to get some photos of the sunset.

we arrived early, but had some beer and set up while we waited for the sun to get lower. originally we were off to the left side, but moved closer to the middle of the bridge later, to get a better position. i got a bunch of great photos, partly in thanks to my new cokin flw filter … it’s designed as a fluorescent correction filter, but the upshot is that it produces amazing colours during sunsets. it’s a very nice little investment.

the photography went well, and we were forced to give up thanks to a sudden downpour of rain. we drank some beer at the local pub and headed home to argue about focal lengths. LOL

this morning we got up at the ridiculous hour of 6am to head to chenonan. we wanted to take advantage of the weather and photograph the buddha. however, the sun was behind it and the photos didn’t come out very well. i have one or two usable shots.

this afternoon i came home, feeling tired from a long weekend, had a small sleep and have been editing photos.

back to work tomorrow, but i’m not feeling too worried about the long day, because tuesday i start my holidays. i still need to go to the office in the afternoon. but for a whole week i can sleep in!

got a hella busy weekend coming up … tonight i’m trying to finish angie’s photos (which i’m 3 weeks behind on) and update natalya’s site (which i’m months behind on)

ryan gets here in the morning. we’re gonna check out the magnum photography exhibition, go to cheungmuro and look around, then head to dongjak and do some photography on the bridge. the plan is to photograph the han river at sunset (here’s hoping for clear weather). the view from the bridge is probably the best location in korea. we can see the sunset, the han river, lots of buildings and a motorway on the right, and the 63 building on the left.

however, tonight’s work is progressing well. i’ve upgraded my site and fixed the permalink error. i’m running wordpress 2.6.1 which has a few error fixes from the wordpress 2.6 release. i also fixed some small cosmetic issues and uploaded a different smilie pack

i’m a bit hungry, so i might head out soon and get some food. actually, i’ve been a good boy lately. my diet has consisted of kimbab (lots), bibimbab, ramyeon, neng myon and dongass. it’s been a 95% korean diet … with the occasional sandwich thrown in … usually on the way to work.

but, i have beer … so i’ll grab a snack and have a few drinks while i do some editing.

oh, i almost forgot, i’ve started listening to last.fm. these days my regular music has been getting a bit dull, and i’m tired of changing playlists. so i figured it’s time to explore and find some new music … it’s working out well.

another big buddhist weekend … i headed to cheongju to meet ryand and his girlfriend. i got there friday night and headed into town to meet a girl from model mayhem. her name is brittany and she’s going to model for me this month or next month (depending on when we can organise our schedules). i stayed at a motel and next morning i headed out with ryan to check the local temples.

the temples were pretty cool, one had a medium size stone buddha. the other was on top of the huge hill and had a good view of the city. both temples were decorated with lanterns and preparing for another weekend of buddhist birthday festivities. we got lots of photos at both temples … but the best part was when we left the temples we walked a little ways and stopped at a cafe. the cafe was a ‘photo and coffee’ cafe, owned by a guy who studied photography in america. the cafe was freaking huge, it was about 4 stories tall (built on the side of a hill) had a fabulous view of the city, and there were a million rooms and spiral staircases. the owner was great. he gave us a tour of the building and showed us his lecture room, studio and other small rooms used for shooting photos in. it was really quite a find! he even told us that we can rent parts of the building to photograph in … and it’s rather cheap, which is great. i anticipate heading down there in the future and making use of his great rooms and spaces.

saturday night we hung around at ryan’s house. we dranks some beers and felt really lazy. one of ryan’s noisy neighbours came around and brought angju (alcohol) with him. this stuff was incredibly expensive and really potent. it’s basically a big jar of alcohol with fermented mushrooms in it. the stuff is potent as all hell and is more suited to stripping oil off a garage floor, than drinking.

this morning we headed out of town, bearing east, towards beopjusa. i’d already visited the temple once before, but was keen to get back there before my time in korea ends. we arrived at the temple just after 10am and had a good look around. i took a lot of photos and made the most of the great weather (clear blue skies). although, i was kicking myself for forgetting my polarisers (i’ve lived in seoul too long, where i get no chances to use them). however, i still got a lot of good photos.

after we left the temple, ryan and i headed towards the town and got some lunch. then we walked back to the bus stop to get a ticket to cheonan. this is where our awesome plans went horribly wrong! there were no busses to cheonan. we either had to go back to cheongju, seoul or daejon, and get a bus to cheonan from there. we decided that it would take too long and we’d miss the remaining daylight. so we walked back into town, got some pa-jon and kimchi-jon, dong dong ju (rice wine) … we spent the afternoon drinking and talking. at about 5.30 we jumped on a bus back to cheongju, and there i switched busses and came back to seoul.

overall, it was a great weekend. i’m a bit tired, to be expected, but i had fun wandering aroundall weekend. ryan and i plan on getting to cheonan one weekend in the next month or two … if the weather is good, we’ll just do an afternoon trip and head out to see the buddha, then have dinner and return home. it’s the only black buddha that i know of in korea, and i’m determined to see it this summer.

had a marvelous weekend with my mate ryan. he arrived in town on saturday afternoon and we immediately headed to namdaemun. he was going to buy a lens, but decided not to. i spent a little bit of money on a flash unit. after that we headed to coex and straight across to bong eun temple. ryan and i spent the late afternoon and evening at the temple, capturing lots of great photographs.

ryan’s lens broke, so he dropped big money on a new lens … then that night we went back to my neighbourhood and drank some really nice dark beer.

sunday we got going early and headed straight to insadong. the buddhist festival began at midday but we wanted to catch the monks before the crowds arrived. we photographed the monks during prayer and even saw the young monks, who only made a brief appearance. i didn’t get any good photos of them though!

we noticed that the lanterns were set out in the shape of a lotus flower, so i had the idea to get a photograph from a higher angle (to capture the roof and lanterns). so ryan and i went into a nearby building, got the elevator to the roof, and took some great shots. the view was pretty sweet, since the blue house (korea’s presidential house), gyoungbok palace and jogye temple were all in view.

we bumped into an american girl who was in seoul for the day, and was lucky enough to have found herself in insadong to catch the festival. we also met another girl who is an israeli journalist doing a month long story on south korea. i caught up with a few other friends and members of my photography club.

ryan and i wandered up and down the street for most of the day, looking for photos … at about 6pm the rain started and we took it as our cue to head home. although we missed the night parade, i wasn’t particularly worried. i saw it last year with steve!

back in my neighbourhood, again, we had samguypsal for dinner and drank more dark beer at the same bar. after the two of us knocked back 5 litres of beer, it was time to wander home and get some rest.

on monday morning ryan headed home. my internet died, so i did some editing and went to a pc room to play warrock all afternoon. i went home, watched golden compass (which isn’t a bad movie) and got some needed sleep.

the last two days are the most active i have been in a long time. it felt good to get out and stretch the legs. i wasn’t as tired as i thought i’d be either. so it gives me hope for my pathetic fitness levels.

i have a bunch of photos. i posted some to flickr and i’ll post some to my blog tonight when i get home.