So after arriving at work at the beginning of last week completely exhausted and dreading the week ahead, I decided that this last weekend would need to be a slightly more relaxing affair. And so, on Saturday I headed out to Shinae - the city centre - to look around with the Canadian that I met earlier in the week. The pictures that follow are evidence of our excursions on Saturday and Sunday.

This is the CGV - a three storey movie theatre that shows a lot of English movies with Korean subtitles, which I was very excited to discover was showing Alice in Wonderland in 3D. And so I dragged a slightly reluctant Patrick to the theatre and forced him to watch what we ended up agreeing was a pretty good movie. I will be keeping CGV in mind the next time a movie that I am dying to see comes out on circuit!

This is the main street downtown. I am fairly sure that it doesn't look like this during the week, but on weekends you suddenly find carts popping up everywhere selling food and drink, scarves and socks and other various odds and ends that I have no need for, but find myself wanting to have regardless.

These are the dreaded silkworms that I have heard are a delicacy here. I didn't try any, but decided to take a picture as evidence of how popular they are These were only three of the bags that the lady was selling.

At about 1 pm, the street went ridiculously dark as clouds came in and the thunderstorm began. This was just before the storm started when Patrick and I were staring at the lights, hoping that they would spring to life, since I had seen them on a couple of weeks before and they are beautiful when they are lit.

This is a fishtank that we found in the underground mall. Surrounding the tank itself are a number of seats and a number of screens, that I can only assume were televisions.

This kind of random building that doesn't seem to fit in anywhere in a modern city is quite a common occurence in Cheongju (I can't speak for the rest of South Korea.) It is definitely a modern building, but it's almost like they see this kind of style as being modern, which I find quite amusing.

So, after a day in Shinae, Patrick and I decided to head out to Chungjae jungmun and meet some more Westerners. It was St. Patrick's day after all, so we expected there to be many many people out. After stopping at all but one of the bars, we were almost ready to give up on our night out because everywhere was dead. But we decided to give the last bar a chance, and it was here that we found everyone huddled into one space.

My travel companion and I was the shamrock stickers plastered on our faces. They wouldn't let us in without one.

The first people I met when I got inside were some randoms who were sitting by the bar. We started chatting, and it turned out that one of them was from Durbanville! I decided that I needed evidence of this coincidence. He is the one in the middle. I went on to meet two more South Africans at the pub that night.


On Sunday, Patrick and I were supposed to go touring the city by bus. But Patrick (poor lad) was far too hungover, and so we decided to go on a hike in the hills next to his building instead. And I am glad that I did, because it gave me a completely different perception of Cheongju. From my area, all that you can see are buildings in every direction. It was nice to learn that there is some nature out there as well.

This is the view from the foot of one of the hills, and was the only place where I could get a good shot of the city without the hundreds of trees getting in the way.

When I took pictures of this, I honestly had no idea what it was, but I was impressed by whatever it was. I later found out that this is a tombstone. I hum'd and haw'd about whether to put the picture up at all once I found out what it was, but I ended up deciding to put it up because I think that it is a beautiful tribute to a life once lived.