June 8th 2008 - Youngae & Imy

June 8th 2008

Visit from Seoul/Malmö

The early rainy season continues .... ! All week has been raining heavily and only this weekend has it cleared up a little. We had planned a night ride on the mountain bikes for Wednesday, but we had to cancel. But the rain can not keep us away from the squash court, although we only made it down there 3 times this week. Isobel and Jake came over for dinner Tuesday. They will soon be leaving for Japan, where they will stay for about 4 months until Jake retires. So now we have another reason to go back to Japan ... Paula is happy !!!

Friday was a holiday in Korea (Memorial Day). Of course our yard worked through the holiday, but at least we got the day off. As opposed to Saturday, when I had to go to work only to reject the inspections due to poor safety. It was hardly possible to find the ship under all the dirt and hanging hoses. Sometimes it can be very difficult to accept the way they work here. They break every procedure in sight and then they come to us and beg for cooperation and ask us not to break their schedule. The problem is just that whoever made the work schedule has never set foot on a ship !!! I wonder if the Danish yards could have survived if the ship owners had accepted the same quality as we get here ?!? And I am curious to see how the standard is on other Korean ship yards compared to where we work...

Friday and Saturday we had visitors from Seoul/Malmö. Youngae and Imy flew down from Seoul, where they live for 4 months. They are both Korean but live in Malmö normally. We had a great time with them here, showing them a bit of their own country. You can read more about it here.

This week three of Paulas good friends returned to Ulsan. Susana returned from Argentina after 5 months absence, Stephanie and Jerome returned after 7 months and Marilyn and Flemming got back after three weeks holiday. Friday we went out for Korean Seafood barbeque with Stephanie, Jerome, Youngae and Imy, followed by a stroll along Ilsan Beach.

Sunday morning I got up early to beat the heat and went for a bike ride with Ingo at eight o'clock. It may be a good time to ride with regards to the heat and the sun, but I think this is the most active time for the locals. The roads/trails were packed with trekkers and when we reached the top, all the exercise toys were busy. The Koreans get up early in the morning to climb a mountain and when they reach the top, they immediately climb on to the machines and work out ! Every mountain top in Korea has exercise machines, I think ! We had a good ride still and Ingo improved his crash statistic by 50%. He came off only once and again on an uphill stretch ! No blood this time.

A quick repair and then we are off again

Not all parts of the trails are possible to ride ... at least not if you don't posses a strong death wish !

Ulsan is full of these small "kolonihaver" - small veggie gardens. You find them on any undeveloped lot in the city but you also find them well hidden in the furthest reaches of the mountain.

After the ride Paula and I went for a drive up along the coast. We were just cruising without much purpose and found some really nice small farms and agricultural areas. Once you get away from Ulsan and into the mountains it gets very pretty. The problem is when you get hungry and crave for a western style lunch ! This is when we tur on the GPS navigator and lets it guide us home. It is just too difficult to find an agreeable restaurant away from the town (if you have your head set on western food).

After uploading this, we will be going down to the gym for a game of squash. And so ended another week in the house of P's !

Peo LOVES her basket with view of the ocean !

The Turkish soccer ground. This is the Turkish soccer team from the 2002 World Cup. I heard they lost their first match in this years Euro Cup just yesterday.

The rice has now been planted and is starting to show on the paddies

One of the small farms we came across - maybe not common but very tipical.

Paula at the dam that supplies the rice paddies with water

The other side of the dam with one of the water gates for the rice paddies