Weekend International Students Field Trip

Keimyung University sponsored a FREE field trip for the International Students this past Friday and Saturday. So of course you know that yours truly was there.  :o)

The field trip was to promote Korean Industrial Companies, POSCO (Pohang Steel Corporation) and Hyundai Motors, and also to tour historical Gyeongju.

Our first trip was to POSCO, Korea's largest Publicly Traded Steel Corporation. The mural below is made of photos of POSCO employees.

Throughout the entire company tour, they mentioned over and over again how they used the Japanese War Reparations money to help fund the building of the plant. How the "blood of their ancestors" (during Colonial Japan) will help the future generations of Koreans. This is sort of a trend that I have seen in Korean businesses, the use of emotions to promote sales and also to inspire workers. I think because of their use of nationalism to promote the company in nearly all ways, that this might be the reason why Korean Chopsticks are now made of stainless steel. (Japanese out of wood and Chinese out of Bamboo & longer in length).

The next stop on our industrial tour was a stop at Hyundai. They gave us their PR brochure, which will come in very handy for my marketing project due at the end of the semester, and also a model of the Hyundai Tucson. I rather enjoyed the look of the Tuscani, the new even more sporty version of the Tiburon.

The factory tour was interesting, but rather curious to see how Toyota's manufacturing process differs as they are considered the world's most efficient. There was a lot of things that I wondered why they were done the way they were, but hey that's what you get for seeing only one section of the production line.

Then after that tour, we went to our resort hotel, which apparently hosts the LPGA tour at their resort. Can you see the East Sea in the picture?

The rooms were interesting as there was one double bed in the room and the other people had to sleep Korean style (on the floor). I opted to sleep on the floor. I was afraid that if I slept in a nice comfortable bed that would just spoil my back and it would revolt against me when I slept in my hard dorm bed. ;o)

We had a really good meal, which the Chinese students really enjoyed, it reminded them of Chinese food. Then afterward, we had a bonfire and karaoke singing outside. Yes, that is a karaoke machine you are seeing.

Around 10, I went back to the room with Tea, took a shower and then went to sleep. The majority of the others went on to finish off their many, many, many bottles of soju and beer, until about 3 am. The Chinese girls got up around 5 am to watch the sun rise, which didn't rise until 6 am, so they were a bit exhausted at breakfast. Which breakfast was CEREAL and toast, and eggs, and bacon and sausage with orange juice. Oh you want to talk about being a happy camper! Ok so the yolk was runny but I just cut that part out and left it off to the side, the rest of it was heavenly.

Then it was off to Gyeongju, we stopped briefly to pick up our tour guide. I had fun telling people that this was where my parents had their honeymoon. :o) I bought some famous Gyeongju bread, which I'm sorry to say, I didn't like all that much. I love sweet beans but that was a bit too much.

Then we headed off to Seokguram Temple, where I got an awesome picture the Korean Mountains.

Unfortunately, we aren't allowed to take pictures of the Buddha statue. The statue apparently is the most perfectly made Buddha statue in the world (don't know if I believe that) that this statue is absolutely perfect in its proportions (similar to the statue of David). 

 

Lucky for us, there was a picture on the Internet of this statue. The statue has a crystal on his 3rd eye, which on the winter solstic, the sunlight enters the grotto and hits the crystal, which reflects the light to another Buddha's 3rd eye, this crystal is double refracted and it shines the sunlight behind Buddha to illuminate a female figure, Avalokitesvara (Kuan Yin).

We then made our way to Bulguksa, which I visited 2 years ago with my sister, mom and Aunt, so I didn't take as many pictures this time around. So it was a bit frustrating to have to stay with the group when I wanted to look at some other stuff. :oP I was hoping to see if I could find the temple dedicated to the San Shin (Mountain Spirit) or find the murals that had the original Buddha's pictorial history and the pictorial lesson for how to attain enlightenment. But, no such luck.

We then rushed to the next site to have a Traditional Korean lunch. It was ok, but I really was having a hard time sitting on the floor that day and it was really, really hot in that room so I excused myself from the room and sat outside. Don't know why I was feeling so claustrophobic in that room. So while I was outside, I took a picture of the other students eating in the other room.

I thought we were going to see the Tombs of the past Korean Kings and Queens but that wasn't even on the agenda. :o( I'm going to have to go to Gyeongju again just so I can tour the tomb area.

Our next stop was at the Gyeongju World Culture Expo Center. It is basically a huge amusement park where we had no freedom to walk around on our own. I think I don't like tours because of that. :oP So we saw the huge building that was cut in the same of a 9 story pagoda. The 9 levels represent the 9 kingdoms during some sort of time period maybe the Joeson period.

On the floor below the Observatory, they had Korea's Digital Heritage. So they had all these high technology stations that showed you 3-D images of various Korean historical items, like crowns, pagodas, clothing, etc. They also had a lot of videos of hair styles and historical stories that you could watch as well.

After that, we watched some Chinese fusion dancing that was suppose to represent multiculturalism in Shanghai. It was a mix between ballet and some other dancing.

After that, we went and visited the garden that had the 12 Chinese zodiacs. I naturally took a picture of my Chinese zodiac, the dragon.

On our way out of the park, we passed the Russian Ice Skaters who were doing a parade to get more people to come and watch their show. The Russian exchange students had fun shouting out some Russian to the performers. Just for you Teresa and Imo, here are the Russian belly dancers in the parade.

Passed out on the way back to campus. Everyone was so tired, especially the ones who were hung over still from Saturday night. hahaha I know I slept like a log! I didn't even hear my roommate come in after I went to bed! Scary!

MORE PICTURES!! I've changed the naming format a bit so hopefully everything will be in the correct order this time around. :o)