tintiiin

The waiting is finally over. Or, at least the waiting for things to get started is over. Waiting is part of travelling, so, inevitably here I am waiting even after the waiting period of the adventure is over. At the time, I’m sitting in a busy transit hall at London Heathrow airport – the trip to Seoul has started. We have about 3 hours until our next flight, which will take us to Hong Kong. In Hong Kong more waiting awaits, namely 8 hours until the last connecting flight to Seoul. However, waiting can be perceived and experienced in different ways. As with the waiting before the trip started one can choose to do well with the excess of time, in this case we have decided to make use of it. Simply, we’ve decided to visit Hong Kong. According to various blogs it should be easy enough to do in a couple of hours. For the moment though we’re waiting (a bit more) for a reply from our friend living in HK. Dinner with him would suit us perfectly fine when we get there. However, if he, on such short notice as our lack of planning has brought with us, cannot see us, there will be a decision to make. The decision composes one main consideration; adjusting to the time difference. As a matter of fact, we should be fast asleep at the moment (6pm + 9 hours makes 3 am in Seoul), but we’re not. And if everything goes according to plan tonight’s flight will be carried through awake. Landing in HK local time tomorrow afternoon, translates into a few (I don’t know how many) hours of not sleeping. Then, we spend a night out in HK before the flight leaves at 1 am, yes here my plan is to SLEEP, and arrives in Seoul 5.30 am (local time), which leaves us with the whole day ahead of us! I don’t have to emphasize the sensed lack of sleep we face. So, to sleep on the flight to HK or not? To visit HK or not? (YEEES! on the last one I believe)

 

London, England brings back memories of other adventures on the islands of Britain. My first one was conducted in high school as a project with some friends in my class. Together we travelled to London to find out more about tea, the interview with a tea sommelier and kids in a drama class highlights the trip together with a tea tasting with an eccentric man owning a tea shop in the city center. I remember him telling us about tea, his sister and their experiences of WWII, and tea again. My second time in Britain was with another dear friend, to Scotland. When typing this I sit facing a Boots pharmacy, and I clearly remember my and my friend’s search for gas to our camping equipment. We were in Edinburgh and was heading out camping the same day, our research had showed us that the gas was easily found in the city and since it was impossible to bring on the flight we had no choice but finding it on site. However, there was none to be found anywhere! Luckily, after hours of searching, someone suggested that we would check with Boots, and the pharmacy had three bottles left hidden away. Lucky us! The trip was fabulous and we cooked our food in gratefulness (thanks to the gas…)! Not Britain, but close enough (not really no), was my and my mum’s trip to Dublin one and a half year ago. I think of Guinness and a lovely time!

 

It’s interesting how a place, or rather the perception and view of the place can bring back memories without actually being the same geographic place. I mean, I am in London, but I haven’t been here before, at Heathrow. But, just by knowing I’m in the very same city as I’ve been before makes me think of these previous experiences connected to the place. And, Boots will forever be related to that Scotland trip, for sure.

 

I guess waiting should never be underestimated time. One never knows what will happen.

 

The waiting continues. This time with a hurting arm. The coffee machine (yes, a real fancy one, and yes, I’ve had a luxurious coffee every day the last couple of months in my temporary free-time off-studying holiday place all-inclusive on the countryside with horses around, a constantly full fridge and good company) burnt me! My forearm has a reddish swollen triangle that burns! I’ve melted four ice cubes on the mark already. Feel sorry for me! Good coffee costs a lot.

 

In the waiting process of going to Seoul and start packing (which I really should get started with) I entertain myself with diverse activities. The kind of stuff you want to do but you always have too much other must-dos that come in the way. Sad thing is though, those things are seldom as fun and entertaining when they are the only things you do. Anyhow, I try to enjoy myself and appreciate the excess of time. One question that brings to mind is the (recurrent) one – why can’t humans hoard stuff like time, energy, company etc.? Why not? It would be so cool, and save us so much trouble!

 

But I guess, evolution takes its time. Our future generations might get lucky. Speaking of future generations it comes to mind that one thing I miss having time to do while being busy studying is engage in political discussions and keep myself updated of the political game. Hence, today’s entertainment was partly to watch the foreign affairs debate in the parliament, and a lot more interesting, watch one of the interviews in the show Nyfiken på Partiledaren on SVT Play. Today the choice fell on Åsa Romson, speaker for the Green Party. For you who haven’t seen the program, have a look; it’s a different portrait of the leaders of the parties in parliament as it covers a more personal angle of the politicians. There is no focus on what the party thinks and argues in certain political questions but rather their outlook on mankind, and what ideology means to them. Another important distinction to other attempts to cover politics and politicians take on issues is that it is not an interview per se, but a conversation between the politician and the guy leading the conversation (in this case a doctor and therapist).

 

However, what I wanted to comment on is how the different political leaders handle the unusual situation differently. Åsa seems a bit uncomfortable of talking about herself and her childhood as she tries to generalize her experiences. The conversation with the leaders is followed up in a studio with two commentators (one of them lectured on my Political Science basic course). The commentators lifted Åsa’s work with their interpretations of her performance. For my untrained eye I saw a pretty uncomfortable and grey person sitting in the chair, all the other leaders I’ve watched in the same show had caught my attention and become someone, a person and I felt I’d got to know them a bit. Åsa was still very vague, not as she avoided questions but rather as she didn’t have those great personal and attention-grabbing answers. The commentators’ analysis of this though came to a rather different conclusion than I had done in my quick judgment. The very “un-prominent” leader was in itself a formation of the party’s structure, ideology and ideas. The Green Party is about the ideas, not the social ties, it’s about the democratic organization not the leader, it’s about the joint conviction of including more people (read younger, not yet born etc.) not about who the people are. I hope the commentators interpreted Åsa fairly and correctly and in that case they did a great effort of helping the Greens to communicate their philosophy. Watch the show and judge for yourself.  

 

Now, let's do some more of those activites that I actually have time for - yoga.

 

 

 

 

 

Here we are, waiting and preparing. Hoping, with one half of my heart and mind that time would fly by, or at least that one week would fly by really quickly. The other half on the other hand demands a slowly development, in order to realize and grasp what will come. Personally, I believe that the second option here is potentially the most logical one, but at the same time very unrealistic. Truth is, you hardly will understand what’s going on until you’re in the middle of it, if even at that time.

 

What will happen in a week is that I go to Seoul, South Korea. Luckily not alone, but with my boyfriend. We’ll study there for a couple of months and then go on with exploring the rest of the country, and most likely also Japan. It’s really hard to grasp. I am surrounded with papers and documents, recently sorted in different piles; insurances, grades transcripts, admission papers, miscellaneous. Fun thing is, I also have copies of those documents on my folders in the computer. And the most important ones are also saved in the e-cloud. While the anxiety is growing, my organizing grows more frequent, and structured, and notorious. Poor BF. He is basically the opposite, keeping calm and relaxed. Good for him I say.

 

So, Seoul, what do we know about it? Let’s see the trends I’ve spotted so far:

• It’s hot, trendy. Everywhere I look (read Swedish newspapers and magazines) more and more attention is directed on the food, the culture, the innovation, the school system etc. in South Korea, namely Seoul.
• The country is in the forefront of innovation and technical solutions in order to create a sustainable urban life. They have road-powered buses, very efficient public transport, electronic solutions to a lot, and more. Plus, the UN office for sustainable development is situated in Incheon, just next to Seoul.
• There is (in my opinion) a very interesting combination of development, innovation and fresh thinking and hierarchy. The peninsula is home to the Confucianism tradition, which entails, among other ideas, a strong hierarchy. Elder people, people with different positions, people you know or not, they all are entitled different greetings ant different ways of paying respect. How does that work with innovation and new thinking? Let me come back to you on that one.
• Koreans work a lot. They do ore hours a week than most of us, spare time does not exist.
• They are genuinely helpful, and apparently they appreciate whenever foreigners try to speak Korean, hence the very structured and diverse rules of the languages deriving from their hierarchal traditions seem not to be applicable for non-Koreans. (Pew!)
• Their alphabet (based on characters just as Mandarin and Japanese) is supposedly easy to learn. I have started to explore the characters and the way they construct words (or rather syllables). I wouldn’t say it’s easy but, no, not as hard as I imagined. Lacking skills in other character-based languages I cannot argue how Hangul (the name of the Korean alphabet) is more or less easy than any other alphabet of the kind. Whenever I’ve learnt Korean and, let’s say Mandarin, I get back to you on that one too (yeah, riiiight!).

 

More or less, let’s evaluate and experience, handle the stress and keep sorting paper ‘til time’s up and flight’s leaving!