Seoul, Korea

Today I finished the last of my meetings with our bearing suppliers.  Due to strict security, I was not allowed to take pictures inside the factories, so I will just comment on Seoul alone tonight, I will have separate articles soon on KBC and Iljin, our two top bearing suppliers (both Korean).

Seoul is a huge city, the population of Seoul is around 16,000,000 people.  By comparison, the METRO areas of NYC and Los Angeles are both around 20 million and Chicagoland is about 10 million.  The first three pictures I took entering the city from Incheon Airport.  The first one shows the first of the skyscrapers I saw, there are tall buildings everywhere in Seoul...

Mile after mile after mile:

after mile after mile (the river is called the Big River):

The view from my hotel in the Gangnam-Gu area (first night):

After spending a night each in Kyungju and Changwon I arrived back in Seoul last night.  I took the below pictures today, the first is in central Seoul, "almost" a pedestrian mall like in Europe:

The below picture I took of a booth (with a cross in red) sponsoring Christianity here in Korea.  You would have to look very hard to see the "666" business written there, evidently there are people here who do not like "Goldman Sachs 666" either (you know, CEO Lloyd Blankfein saying he's just doing "God's Work" after all...).  But, I remained a moment, and the tiny lady in front of the booth (just to the right in a white coat) began to sing.  She sang beautifully...  I recognized the song, but she was singing in Korean.  I thought and I thought, but it would not come to me...  She sang like an angel.  After I walked on, it came to me: "Amazing Grace".  I walked back and gave her a contribution.  She made my day!  Ma'am, I do not know who you are, but at least I have a picture for the world to see you.

Later, I dropped by a place serving Guinness on tap, Happy Hour!  The kind waiter took the picture of me with my beer and the munchies they gave me (Korean vegetables, they eat LOTS of vegetables over here).  And, yes, I am beginning to learn how to eat with chopsticks...

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I wish to thank my two main hosts here in Korea (pictures of them and their assistants in other articles coming soon), Juno Yoon (Iljin) and Sung-Su Kim (KBC).

Kahm-S'Ahm-Ni-Da, my two great friends in Korea!