Geondam mountain

The idea itself was really good. Spend Saturday morning in the mountain, have a good lunch in a nice korean style restaurant and come back to get ready for the next.

What I didn't expect is that two days later is still so hard to walk downstairs. I can feel all my muscles in my legs, and half of my back, arms,... everywhere. I didn't really know the amount of muscles that we have.

But, maybe is better to explain the whole story, it seem a kind of torture but it was not really like that. Was a nice trip, and a good night...

Once upon a time in witch the prof. responsible of us, let's call him prof. C, decided to go hiking in the mountain, with all the members of the department, and some other professors and friends. The schedule was basically go to the base of the mountain departing at 8 in the morning (oh yes, you know I like it!) to start hiking at 10:00. Walk for 3 hours, go to have a good lunch and come back to the university.

It was 7 in the morning when the clock rang. It was a beautiful morning, the sun was shining, the weather invited to think about a warm day, so i decided to sleep 5 minutes more. Thanks good day... late... but it was ok, just a few minutes. The departure point was 15 minutes by bus far from the university. Thanks to me (again) we took the wrong bus (at 7:50 sorry again...), but the driver, nice guy, was going really slow. 5 minutes later he stopped the, and, suddenly, the correct bus stopped close to us, changing it's route (a bit) to pick us up (thanks nice people who drive in the morning). So we finally arrive on time (+- 5 minutes) to greet all the amount of people who was waiting for us. Let's go!!

That's the people arriving late (my face is saying like: it wasn't me at all, it was my bed...sorry...jeje)

Thats the people excited to go to the mountain:

We get there fast, about 10:00. So we packed all the stuff (cucumbers, snacks, cherry tomatoes, makoli (see food section), dried fish, some water,....),

and we started to walk. Only 3 hours going uphill where between the top an us... this was the complete team:

After 30 minutes half of the people were exhausted (I was still alive, oh yeah!), so we did a technical stop, to get a bit of air, water and a delicious and nutritive cucumber. Why are you laughting Sophie?

The next 45 minutes were... well, what I should tell? you can't imagine the slope of the mountain, the quantity of stairs...

even though the landscape was awesome. Maybe a bit estrange, but beautiful. The weather in korea is dry all year, only in summer is wet (people told me that, but in the last 3 weeks had been raining (in Incheon) every 3 days, at least), so it looks as a ghost forest, small rivers, and some purple flowers... there are many diferent routes to get to the top of this mountain, and it was nice becouse maybe was one of the most difficult ones, but there were not many people. So we could really enjoy nature..

Second stop. Please water, a shadow, a bit of fresh wind, an oxigen mask,... o yeah, something to eat, oh yeah something to drink! makoli? yes sure!

I think that I can't tell exactly how was the feeling after this stop. The distance to the top was getting shorter. And it arrived this moment in witch you are not tired, but neither good, you just don't feel, only walk. Thinking, some jokes, people going downhill, a bit of water, another colleague a bit more destroyed than you, more people going downhill... Oh look!! is there!!! only 15 minutes aprox.!! only 15 minutes???!! what means only?? it looks still 1 hour far!!! up there??

Buas, just the last 100 stairs... and to the top!! ice cream fight!!!, and nice views...

I don't have the group picture in the top, neither pictures of the other side of the mountain. the city in the picture above is Seoul, with the typical fog of these days (?).

I will tell you something. Sometimes, I smoke. And when I go hikking (not very often) I like to smoke one in the top, just to feel as the end of something hard and/or nice, do you know what I mean?? always getting my trash downhill. But in Korea is forbiden to smoke there. I understand cos there were a lot, a lot of people there on the top.

So I decided don't break the rules (I never use to do it), and wait till arrive down the mountain. In the other hand, cos I felt really good, I decided to go down running, to do a bit more of sport is this healthy day, if it was possible. So I did, well, some of we did.

Going downhill, the view over the Han river was spectacular...

So all that goes up must go down, but it doesn't mean that all goes at the same time, so we were trying to get energy from somewhere, just holding the head (good job Jean), or smoking a cigarette (I'm not gonna say it).

When the last lost people arrived (iBen, "Soyo", and a couple more, jeje) we jump in to the bus and go directly to have lunch, bieeeeeeeeeen! vamooooos!

The location of the restaurant near the Han river, is really nice, and the restaurant itself, at open air, and made in wood, was the ideal place to go. We went in a bit after the other people after smoke the obligatory cigarette before lunch.

So the spacial table was waiting for us. Ji Eun (pink one), the man that I don't really know who is, another good boy that we'd never seen before (and I forgot his name :(), iBen and me.

The menu?? BBQ, pork meat and duck (sorry, you said "duck" or "dog"? jeje), with all the kinds of kimshi that you can imagine, a bit of salad and something to drink :).
We really enjoyed the lunch, and the people was really nice, I mean the professors and the other members of the uni. Was a good experience.

So after some pictures near the river, a coffee and a cigarette, we get into the bus to come back to Incheon. It was a hard day (you can guess it in next pictures), but also a really good one. I felt really happy and in harmony with nature, I don't really have enough words in english to describe it, but you know, is was a kind of challenge, and the result was ok. It was also exciting discover that there is something else than city in here...

Bye bye, have a good rest! See you on monday!... maybe

PD: iBen, Sophie & Big Seb thx for the pictures :)

Water Resources: Impacts of climate change & adaption (23/04/2010)

Maybe you think that I am here just to enjoy life with really nice girls, and have fun celebrating things with friends, but it is not really true. Most of my time here in Korea I am studying. Either Korean language (practising), at class (more than 24 h per week in unusual schedules from monday to saturday), doing homework (is most of the part of the evaluation) or going to "recommended" events.

Well, beginning from these hypothesis, I want to tell you my first experience in a international workshop, and the second in climate change.

My first experience in that was in Valencia. The conclusions, in general, were that nobody really knows what is gonna happen (in terms of water resources and rainfall) is spain. So I was really interested if somebody of the guest could know how it is going in their countries.

The workshop was in the Seoul National University, in Seoul (a si?jeje). The university itself is really huge. Well, Seoul metropolitan area is the 2nd biggest in the world (25 million people), but the city it is not that big, only 10 million people, so the university has the same scalar dimension.

I wanted to attach a link to the workshop but I don't really know where to find it. Anyway here it is the order of the day:

In general the speakers were telling their projects in their different countries. (Ojo!) technically speaking their explained the different downscaling techniques applied to their local climate change models, to estimate the rainfall tendency in the next decades (using CGS global models). Others explained about detailed studies, as for example the korean one (with 35 years of data), and more detailed (and more technical and advanced) the US's one.

Even if their conclusions were that some of them detected some trends, and that these trends were because of the climate change, I think that (personal opinion) the amount of data used in the studies (about 30 to 60 years), the sensibility of the models (huge variation of estimations if the data was from 1960 to 1996 and 1960 to 2000) and the uncertainness shown in the results (in the range of more than 16 climate models) is enough to say that nobody really knows what is gonna happen in the next decades (even in the next decade).

Anyway a lot of brains are working on that so I hope that the uncertainness will be reduced soon.

The common sensed US's guy was telling his thesis about the integration of the opinion of the decision maker in the technical process. Really interesting vision: knowing that the decision makers (normally politicians) are gonna promise something not always smart (ehm...) the formulation include this "pre decision" to look for a solution to fix it.

The funny moment was when the Japanese guy was talking about something that was not really climate change. But he was happy to could explain it. In general...??? interesting, jeje.

Fatima's birthday! 19 april

There are weeks, and weekends, in witch there is no plans, boring days in witch people don't know what to do, and don't join really good plans, well maybe not really good, but at least plans. And weeks in witch there are so many plans, so many good, and also not that good plans.

That is happening since last friday. Lot of people celebrating their birthday, and I felt really bad coz I wanted to go with all them. But because it is impossible to stay in 2 different places at the same time, I like to break physical rules, and if they tell me that matter cannot be created or destroyed, I just create new events from nothing! this is the theorem of the conservation of partyness (flaca!).

Basically, after class, we just wanted to go for a beer and a bit of chicken to eat (sometimes the mind more than the stomach need something known (see introduction to korean food)).

So we just went:

There was cream for everyone! well, i don't really like the cream...

And the beer was enough to get a good birthday party. Is next picture you will see how happy is the people when they wear my hat (only possible in special days).

There was a lot of love in the party, and also, of course, korean people. Without them is not the same (basically is like a party in another part of the world):

It exist the video (with the audio) in witch we are singing happy birthday in korean. I promise to upload it!!!

Mexican party! Alicia's birthday 17 april

Let's go to the korean night culture... in mexican. Lian was the host of the party. It was my first time in a Korean flat. Well, I have to say that he live in the new city, in Songdo, so I suppose (I don't really know) that the traditional ones are different. Anyway, his unipersonal flat is very modern, and spacious, and very automatic (it's a shanme that I don't have a picture of the WC). I introduced him before, but not like that jeje ;)

When you are invited to a party, or a kind of, I think that is different in every culture what it is supposed to bring. So I thought that I should bring some drinks and maybe something for the host,... anyway, I spend saturday afternoon for that. A pineapple, a bottle of Catalan wine ( for Alicia), some bottles of soju (my plan was one for each, and a bit more), some beer and my special present for Alicia. Now I can follow the sentence as mastercard advertisement, but I won't... jeje.

The party was at 8 pm. As a responsable and motivated man as I am, I went there an hour before, just to check if it was all ready (and warm up before the game. "mecshu"!!). I help to make some quesadillas ,mmmm.. rico. Mexican food! in korea! good... :')

(you can see the quesadillas in fornt of me, and the nchos in the table, the sauces were really spicy, mexican style).

As usual korean people was still working (I use to do it also on saturdays), so they were coming during the party. Well, one was there soon: (I was not perverting her, she asked me for the beer). Ah!, is not the same picture as before, look for the differences.

When you are in a country in which the language is very different, the culture is (sometimes) hard to understand and the people is very carefull about you, it is quite important to listen, learn, and repeat. Then you will see how suprised are they when you do it. For example, in 3 weeks you can easyly introduce yourself in korean (12 hours of class per week), ask for food and drink, and go shopping. Next step is learn the language and behaviour of the real people, to know what is going on in every moment (lots of nights studying korean culture). So when I am in Barcelona and somebody says something like "Que tal tio? nem a fer una canya i una de callos?", (well maybe the sentences is not the best example, but I can say that in korean...) then a big smile grows deep in me, and I fell happy that someone is talking the language of my country and now what to do! well, all that is just to tell that yes, I learn some things about korean night culture, and I like and understand what happens when I say something as pok tan ju! then and smile is coming and I understand why. jeje.

By the way, Alicia:

Here it is an original present:

In a koream party is done as the other parties. Drink (a bit):

Play (in the playstation):

Drink:

And take funny pictures:

dance a bit:

And then, to a karaoke!!! I'm sorry but I don't have pictures about that, my camera is not really working in the darkness. But I also think that karaoke needs an special chapter... an entire one, jeje.