5 June 2022
The earlier rain was but a fine mist
Heavy rain in Busan
Streets are now flooded. I had to stick completely to the underground subway malls to go to the department store to get omurice.
The photos are crap and just here to fill a place.
It has rained so much that even if it has stopped by the morning I am not sure if I will be able to swing off any mountains again tomorrow.
Tomorrow is a holiday, and a Monday, so I wonder what will and won't be open as far as museums and other indoor type places go, so it might yet be a day of sitting in cafe's and my hotel room, or potentially, do a load of washing somewhere.
After that however, no more rain
That's enough about the weather.
Now I will talk about the hotel cat. When I checked in there was a sign warning about the cat. It had some English warning that the cat my startle you when you come in at night etc. but he does not have rabies. Good to know.
I have seen the cat a few times, one time he ran out the front of the hotel and around the corner towards the fish markets. This is not a small hotel in a quaint village, it has 15 levels with at least 20 rooms per level, on probably the busiest street in Busan.
Then when I went out before, a girl was playing with the cat with a piece of string. I wanted to take a photo, but the girl was wearing a very short skirt, and Korea has warnings posted absolutely everywhere warning you that you will go to jail if you take any 'upskirt' photos.
So, the cat has so far escaped my camera's gaze. I am now on a mission though.
Now for a tour of the underground subway mall. It connects 4 stations together, possibly 5 but to get to the 5th you have to go outside or go through a paid area. Parts of it are busy and filled with more regular sorts of stores, parts of it are abandoned, and parts of it have weird stores like this.
There are 10 stores in a row selling clocks, and tiny fold out camping chairs (not pictured). The clocks are mainly the weird digital kind seen on the left. I have so many questions. Why are all these shops selling things no one would ever buy grouped together? What are they really a front for? If I buy a clock what does that mean?
Abandoned section.
This pattern, popular on scarves all around the world for a decade or more, is THE pattern to put on everything in Korea. Clothes, umbrellas, shoes, bags, the side of your house, but the best one was last night when I passed the adult shop, condoms. Now I will find out what this pattern is and who invented it....
It is the Burberry check, sometimes referred to as Haymarket, but owned by Burberry, and when I googled for it, all the things that came up about it are copyright disputes. Burberry has won lawsuits against everyone, including big companies like Target. So there you go, the auntie selling the shirt from her shop in the subway mall and the adult shop selling selling Burberry condoms better look out!
The other day in Daegu I ordered omurice and got hamburger and chips. Tonight I ordered omurice and got omurice. Although the rice was filled with prawns which was a surprise. It was nice enough, but looked a lot nicer in the plastified version that caught my eye. The flaked crunchy things on top are not almonds, it is dried garlic. Lots of it.
On my way back to the hotel for another early night, I sat at the fountain and enjoyed the dazzling blue light for a while.
And then as I came back up to the street, 30 or more fire trucks arrived right over the road from my hotel. Some of them are still there now but I do not know what for. At first I thought there was a subway accident but now they seem to be mainly wandering around at street level.