Where the streets have no names...

I think Bono was talking about Korea (the streets really don't have names here). In fact, I think this song is about the frustration the singer felt as he wandered the unnamed streets of Seoul for hours looking for the Chinese Embassy, and how, once he finally found the embassy, read a sign that said "for Chinese Visa must to go to Chinese Consulate," and then how, after more wandering and eventually finding this consulate, he is told that the consulate no longer gives visas to foreigners so he must find a travel agent, and then, in the second verse the singer finds this travel agent who then informs him that as of July 1, 2010 it is impossible for foreigners in Korea to get a visa but luckily, the song's resolution comes in the last verse when the singer's former ticket to Beijing is rerouted to Hong Kong, where visitors don't need visas. This is the only correct interpretation of this song.

Interestingly enough, my travels have paralleled this song perfectly. Anyways, everything is all set now. I have a flight to Hong Kong on Monday where I should be able to get my visa for China without a problem. Oh, I also have a passport!

Page 51: a reminder not to be an idiot.

Two reasons for shortening the Korea portion of my trip. The main one is that I am not going to be able to get a job tutoring, which is what I had originally wanted to do as a way to replenish some of the money I spent in Japan. The second is that I am really excited for China, and want to go somewhere BIG where I can do some camping. So far my trip has been exclusively to islands and I'm ready for some mainland roaming (okay, Korea isn't really an island, but travel-wise it is. The North Koreans are stingy with visas).

But the place I'm staying in is cool. My couchsurfing host lives right on top of the US base here, which means wake up marches at 6am everyday.

The view from my host's balcony: US humvees and barbed wire.

This area of Seoul is an interesting little example of cultural positive feedback. What started (I'm guessing) as a small army base brought a small number of shops and restaurants catering to US citizens, which brought some tourists, which brought more shops... Now, anywhere within a 1-2 mile radius of this base you see as many white people as you do Koreans, even though only a very small percentage are with the army. From the little cultural seed of a small army base, a gigantic tree of whiteness has sprouted in the middle of Seoul. I don't know how I feel about this sort of cultural homogenization. Part of me wants to say its awful and we need to preserve all these cultural differences that make travel such an interesting thing to do, but I think I'm only saying that because I have the luxury to. For a Korean guy with a family, he is probably quite happy to open an English language bookstore if it means he and his family can live a bit more comfortably. I don't know, but it is still kinda sad, and it is this sort of thing that makes me prefer visiting the (so far) untouched smaller towns.

Anyways! My host is really into tattoos and I am going with her now to talk to the woman who has been named "The best tattoo artist in Korea" by some magazine that knows about tattoos. She is planning on spending $1000 on a custom-designed, full arm tattoo (called a sleeve, for those who are as unhip as I was yesterday).