Came alone, on September 13th, with one suitcase. I checked into a motel, I was in Asia by myself, the sun was bright, and most of the foreigners were talking sheer rubbish about Korea. I had jetlag, was focused on getting some work and thought I was leaving in less than a year. The next few months saw me teaching in some unusual places, drinking a lot, and every day thinking about my last few years in CZ & missing it like crazy. I discovered the Internet and e-mail. So many highs and lows during this time, most of them probably just from living in a far away country.
I'm drinking, going out, listening to music, meeting friends: Nicki Rhodes, Paul Hanley, Suzana Dudic all came from CZ, luckily. Nicki and I used to go to "Woodstock" in Shinchon all the time and get pissed, we thought we'd found one of the world's great pubs. When Paul came down to Seoul from his town, Kuri, it was perfect, hours and hours of drinking, walking, talking, shopping, drinking. I spent a nice Xmas with Paul & Suzana in their house, in the snow. And I met Rene Fejl, working at the Czech Embassy, or the Golden Cage as he called it.
What can you say about these first few months in Korea? Fortune was a slippery ball and I spent half my life on the subway. I didn't know a thing about Korea but I was meeting people. Things were a bit shocking at times but nothing too major. It was kind of an awesome place to show up in, I wanted to go home and think about it and then come back because it was quite a full-on experience.
What sort of Korea did I find in '95? The place was on the up and pretty impressive. People were walking around Jongno in suits lie their lives were on some kind of bull run. The girls all looked great to me: gorgeous, friendly, enigmatic, fanciable. It was an exciting place to be, but so different to Europe. As I wrote in a letter to my friend Zoran, it was like I'd entered a really big Chinese restaurant and stayed there for months. OK I was young. What I was meaning was, here I am in Korea, where I seem to have entered a different logic zone. Anyway, I was learning.
1996 ~ 1997 ~ 1998 ~ 1999 ~ 2000 ~ 2002 ~ 2003 ~ 2004 ~ 2005 ~ 2006 ~ world cup 2002 ~ korean personalities ~ korean places ~ the people ~ my own photos of korea from living there and visiting & revisiting it ~ it's quite a place you know, and well worth a visit ~ except you probably won't!