Ok, plan B. It turned out that my mom had a friend who was teaching in a small suburb of Seoul, and who was willing to put me up. Having never been to Korea, I decided that this was a pretty good plan, and discovered that it was amply possible for me to see Thailand on the same ticket.

So off I went to parts unknown, knowing that Josh had been pretty unimpressed with Korea, but also knowing that it was someplace new for me to see. As it turned out, I loved my stay there. Being able to stay with great people certainly helped, and our hosts were far more gracious and helpful than they should have been, considering that we were complete strangers imposing ourselves on them. It was really quite wonderful.

It was cold in Seoul in December, which would contrast sharply with the intense heat of Thailand. We spent a lot of time outside, taking advantage of the brisk weather, which made walking quite comfortable.

We saw many beautiful temples and palaces in Seoul, which provided a fascinating contrast to the sprawling, intensely modern city surrounding them. (The city was surreally populated by enormous televisions on top of skyscrapers (sort of like the Times Square Jumbotron, but bigger) which gave a vague big-brotheresque feel to the place, even moreso than Tokyo when I was there.)

In addition to exploring Seoul, we took a train down to the south of the country, to the ancient capitol of Kyongju, which had many beautiful sights - huge burial mounds, gorgeous temples, a massive stone buddah in a cave... In Kyongju we stayed in an odd little hostel (The Hanjin Hostel, recommended by many travel books, but I personally wouldn't go back.) which felt like it would fall down if we sneezed - I was also put off by the hostel owner insisting that we eat in a specific restaurant, and pre-ordering our food there (we assumed he was getting a kickback from them.)

We only spent one day in Kyongju, and then returned to Seoul in order to go on a tour of the DMZ with North Korea the following morning. This was a _scary_ but also fascinating experience, which reminded me of visiting the Lebanese border with Israel many years ago. I was quite uncomfortable with the intense military presence, and with signing a document stating that I understood I was entering a dangerous zone where I might die, but the experience of seeing the zone first hand was amazing.