If the great Japanophile debate left you confused, Wikipedia provides some visual material.
Not, ahem, that there’s anything wrong with wearing indigenous clothing, of course.
(HT to Curzon)
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15 Comments
Kendou is cool, but please lose the IMPERIAL Japanese flag.
–Remort
Off topic, but whats a “Cheonggyecheon”?
“Not, ahem, that there’s anything wrong with wearing indigenous clothing, of course.”
Right, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar - when you’re smoking it yourself at any rate, eh?
This would be the Cheonggyecheon.
seems like a collosal waste of water and concrete to me.
Seems like that to a lot of people, but Seoul mayor Lee Myung-bak might might ride it to the presidency. Personally, while the project could have gone a lot better, it’s a huge improvement over what was there before, and in the end, at least he got something done.
that is an awesome picture.
After viewing that dork, I must say that you really look quite dashing in your hanbok Robert.
I wish the Korean government would stop calling the Cheonggyecheon a “stream” and instead start billing it for what it really is — the world’s longest water fountain.
The ‘restoration’ of cheonggyecheon is a VAST improvement over the nasty concrete jungle that was there before. And Korea has money to waste on stuff like this now, so why not? Better to waste it on something nice rather than yet another bridge or highway.
I love it. I only wish they had made it navigable so I could canoe my way to work.
Oh, the fountain is very nice. I quite like it. But it is a fountain, not a stream.
Anyhow, I really hope the government “encourages” all those annoying hardware stores around Cheonggye 4,5-ga to move elsewhere. It would be a great location for a bunch of cafes, jazz bars, pojang macha and the like. Like the canal area of Fukuoka.
Cheonggyecheon is pretty much the only respite from all the concrete and care exhaust if you’re in the heart of Downtown Seoul. Otherwise, you have to get out to the nearby mountains…Namsan, Inwangsan, Naktasan, or drive or take the subway to go further afield. It is a huge improvement over the overhead expressway that was there before.
Anyhow, Cheonggyecheon is actually a natural stream…except that I read somewhere the city has to pump extra water into it to keep it flowing….
That’s “car exhaust,” not “care exhaust”…. I guess “care exhaust” is what a nurse experiences at the end of a 16-hour shift.
Hear, hear, Boshintang and Sewing. Every downtown needs a little oasis, and Cheonggyecheon is unique.