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20260423

Buster

Just one picture I took when I brought Buster out onto the roof. He used to really like it out here, but doesn't anymore. Maybe from when the garden was removed.

20260423

Food

Some Dance! Extrem.

20260421

RAS Korea

Another night at RAS Korea, and more shaman bar cocktails.

20260421

Night Shift

Just some pictures on the night shift. Venture into the break room fridge.

20260420

Transactions 99

The latest Transactions is done, finally.

20260419

Rux Mask

I found this old Rux mask I got sometime in the mid-2000s.

20260418

Buster

Buster hasn't been doing great lately. He's pulling through, but it involves somewhat frequent trips to the vet.

20260417

Hannam 2

I stopped by the day after YongsanCats was scheduled to move out. The cats were all gone, but all the stuff hadn't been moved out yet. There were still a few other people in the area too.

20260417

Focal Point

I was shown this meat pie restaurant, which looks good, but is also suspiciously big. Some rich person's pet project? The meat pies were fine, most notably for their bold experiments. Some looked like bad ideas, but the minced lamb pie was phenomenal. It was like yangkkochi in pie form.

Maybe I'll review it at some point, but I'm still feeling cautious about it.

20260415

Buster

Hanging out with Buster.

20260413

Night

Just a few photos at night.

20260410

Jeongneung Spring Blossoms

After my previous trip before the spring blossoms took off, I came back after they had peaked. Still, I saw quite a lot. I couldn't name most of them, however.

20260410

Weird Concrete Structure

Coming out of a tunnel, I noticed a door left open in this big concrete structure at the side of the road. I pulled over to investigate. I suppose it was probably a facility and storage for tending to the mountain around the tunnel entrance, but it was imposing enough to make me wonder if it might have had military uses as well.

20260409

Angel Shot

There's an order you're supposed to make at a bar if you want to signal to the bartender that you're in danger, an "angel shot." I was trying to remember the name for it, while also being dry-humped by a random girl. Before I could figure it out, the bartender got her to go home.

When Chris and I showed up at Social Haven, this girl said she knew Chris, and had seen him over the years in the neighbourhood. Nothing about that is weird. She started getting really physical with him, but also, that is not weird either. The bartender working that night has also shown similar tendencies in the past, and when she does it it's harmless and endearing.

Chris and this girl went out to smoke, and when they came back, he was clearly getting irritated. He sat back down next to me, and she started grinding on him. He left to go to the washroom, and she immediately moved over and started doing the same thing to me.

Sure, he and I are probably the two ugliest, oldest people there whenever we stop by, and she was attractive and young, but we have our limits. If she was just looking for a one-night stand, she did not do that right. Instead, we felt harassed.

If the genders were swapped, this would have been a serious incident, and maybe the police would have been called. Neither of us ever felt like we were in real danger, even when she smacked me in the face. But still, it was an uncontrollable situation, and she could have done a number of things that could have caused trouble for us: get out of control, accuse us of something, or just make it look like we're creeps.

Finally, the bartender saw what was going on, and suggested kindly but firmly that she go home. I don't think she was as drunk as others estimated. Maybe low inhibition of someone who doesn't drink much? Psychological problem, possibly involving meds that don't mix with alcohol? I have a feeling if I ever see her again, she might remember Chris but not me, and I doubt she'll remember having done anything wrong.

20260407

Namsan Deli

I'm working on a review of this place. It's perfectly situated along my way to work, at least the most standard one when I don't feel like going up over the mountain. It took me a while to warm up to it, and there have been some hints at some of the worse tendencies when it comes to localising foreign food. But the last few things I've tried there have all been surprisingly good. They're especially good for bread.

20260406

Taco Stand

I went to Taco Stand, which we already covered in 2023. I like their chorizo but I'm not sold on the rest of the menu. These days of course this place often has a huge line in front of it during weekends.

We were in the process of putting together that article about animals in restaurants, and Taco Stand seemed defiant of it, or maybe ignorant. If there was a threat, I'm sure there would have been a complaint soon. Instead, I think everyone has backed off on the whole law thing.

20260404

YongsanCats

As demolition of Hannam New Town 3 proceeds, Hannam New Town Zone 2 is being cleared out. I wanted to write an article about that, but couldn't find a single human willing to go on the record. The only person who would talk was Julie at YongsanCats, and she talked a lot.

We met in the alley outside her cat shelter, and she talked for about an hour about her situation. Then she gave me a tour of the shelter, which was down to about 15 cats. She was killing time before someone else was coming to visit, so I suggested we walk around the area.

Later that night, I went to a fundraiser at Uplift for YongsanCats. As she was talking, she started to lose her voice, saying she's had to do so much talking that day.

20260404

Iran Embassy

On my way to Hannam New Town, I passed by this embassy. Last time, cops stopped me from taking pictures. This time they didn't seem to be out, so I stopped and did this.

20260403

Buster Goes to the Vet

Buster went to the vet, something he's had to do a lot lately. While I was waiting, I drove around a bit and visited a few sites.

Also, you can see what happens when I try to drug him by lacing his food.

20260401

Around

It seems like there are dogs everywhere. The image shown here made it into a news article

20260331

666

My odometer hit 16660, which gave me 10 kilometers of going through Hell, finished off by a Hell-69. It's meaningless to photograph my odometer, yet I will still do it.

20260331

Do Cats Eat Lasagna?

The answer is yes.

20260330

Ethiopian Food

Bereket stopped by the office with a big haul of homemade vegetarian Ethiopian food, marking his third year writing for the paper.

20260329

Bird

There was a bird on my roof, probably a crow, similar to one I spotted four years earlier.

20260328

Jeongneung

After iGoBart visited Jeongneung-dong in the late winter, I figured it would be best to wait until spring when the blossoms started coming out. I went on this day, but it was just a little too early. Next weekend would be the optimal time, but I couldn't make it then, although I did make it back the week after when it was still pretty good.

Not sure if this will be around next year.

20260328

Dogs

Hot dogs, live dogs, another PBick K-hot dog.

20260327

AustCham Event

A month or two earlier, I contacted AustCham, asking them basically for comment about how probably the best-known thing about their country was based on a lie.

We talked a bit, and they revealed they had a big food event coming up. So I suggested I write an article that makes a joke about Toowoomba, and rather than analysis instead promotes the event. Then we did a second one for good measure.

20260326

Towel Collection

I decided to gather up my punk towels and photograph them. It came as a mild surprise that almost all of them were actually ska towels. Two of them are very old, and the rest are from the 2010s.

20260325

Driving Around

Just a few photos from driving around downtown Seoul.

20260323

K-Hot Dog

I already had K-hot dog on the K-Iceberg, but not from this. I've been curious for a while about what the hell PBick is, and it just seems to be a private brand, or "PB," for CU.

20260319

Work

Just a few pictures from around work, which includes getting food, delivering papers, and researching for articles.

20260318

Hongdae's Fabulous New Drawing Village

I stopped by Hongdae Playground, now "Drawing Village," and it still wasn't looking good. The next visit in a few weeks, it would be a little better.

20260317

Namdaemun

I guess they were gussying up Namdaemun for the BTS concert. Plans were made so I wouldn't be anywhere near that.

20260315

Xen

Here are some views from the usual places around HBC, including with a singer I'm going to spotlight soon.

20260313

New Seoul Hotel

I went to an event at New Seoul Hotel.

20260312

Dragon Turtle

There is a block of old buildings next to my office that will go soon. All the entry points had been fenced off for months, but then all of a sudden workers took all that down, seemingly as an intermediary step before putting up a more serious fence. I made entry during this period.

20260308

HBC

Some views around HBC on a weekend, when the place fills up with domestic tourists. The new big lineup place is now Taco Stand.

20260306

Food

A few photos from my time reviewing restaurants. This led to a review of Phillydog.

20260303

Hospital Day

I had a day off to go to the hospital. I think these photos are from two days, possibly the one where I went to give a blood sample, and the one right after for the appointment.

I also got a photo of a car crash in HBC that held up traffic all day, and may have resulted in the total reconstruction of the balcony outside the former Hair of the Dog, whatever that place is called now.

20260301

Buster's Bar Hopping

It was the first day of a new law that was said to allow dogs and cats into restaurants. I brought Buster to Biggie's, where he didn't have a very good time. Meanwhile, I looked more into the law, and saw that the establishments themselves also had to apply to have the law work for them. Later, it would turn out that this was just the first of many new hoops they would have to jump through. In the end, the law would backfire, doing the opposite of what it offered, making it a lot harder to bring dogs to places where they were allowed before.

But on this first day, before all that became serious, at least Buster got to go to a sports bar.

20260226

Hilto

The Hilto has been demolished almost all the way down. There's still some parts remaining, as it is built on a slope and there are levels not visible from my usual perch on the mountain.

Now that it's reached this point, I stitched together my photos to animate the building's disappearance over the last couple years. Two views of this are visible in this gallery.

20260225

Around

Just a few photos from around, including one where you have to wonder what happened to the angel that sits on Chris' other shoulder.

20260223

Redevelopment Project

There's a massive apartment complex construction project going on at the former UNC compound. It's called "Parkside," and it will have luxury retail space coming out the wazoo.

I caught a glimpse of it while driving past, and made a point of coming back so I could get a better look at it. While the conceptual images look utopian, the current state of it is pretty grim.

20260222

Spin and Grind

I stopped by Victor's new shop and ended up buying a lot of self-published materials, then getting one photo of Victor holding my purchases, which made it into an article.

It's nice having a physical place in Seoul where people looking for any information, shopping, or connections related to one of a number of communities can just show up, unannounced, and it's not just a place where you're supposed to drink or that's only open during shows.

The main thing that makes me feel bad about it is that Sinchon's gain is Cheonan's loss.

20260221

Hoi Polloi

I finally made it out to a show at Hoi Polloi in Nowon-gu, arriving just in time to see the last band, Monkey Gang War. I've been working on an article about this place for several months already, but my plan is a bit too ambitious, requiring blank space for three articles to publish all at once.

20260221

Cat Butt Towel

I was having an argument with Buster. I can't remember about what, but probably about him sitting on my arm or something.

I told him "Not everything's about cat butts, you know."

Then I unfurled a big towel I bought recently, and it displayed a big array of, yep, cat butts.

Buster hadn't said a word, but he knew he'd won this argument. He looked up at me like I was an idiot.

20260220

Guryong Village

A few months after a major fire, but about a month before it made its way back into the headlines again, I paid a visit to Guryong Village. Visiting this area is never a good time. The conditions there are miserable, and this time there were a lot of workers covering up the damage. Looking at later coverage, they just laid blue tarps down over it.

20260217

Underground

This northeastern subway tunnel is reaching the right point for trespassing. I scouted along much of its length, and chose a place to go down.

There's another place where I'd descended before, but the tunnel was much deeper underground there, so I was happy for a place where I wouldn't have to go down so far -- or more accurately, climb back up so high.

20260217

Parking Garage

There were two vehicles parked in the parking garage of my building that had been there so long that they picked up a lot of cat traffic. I took a few photos to record the damage, which shows not just paw prints but also what appear to be spots where a cat or cats just laid down. All the power to them.

20260217

Texas Jones and the Temple of Womb

I had a conversation with a historian friend who lamented the total destruction of Miari Texas. He asked if I'd ever been inside this Buddhist temple on site, and I told him I wasn't familiar with it. Then I thought more, and realised I'd seen a building that looked sort of templish, which he confirmed was what he was thinking of. And then, I drove past the place shortly before this date and confirmed that this temple building wasn't in the section that had been knocked down. So I went in.

What I found had very little to do with Buddhism. It seemed more like yet another brothel.

20260216

Shucos

An intern suggested we ROTW this Guatemalan restaurant, and I was interested so I paid it a visit over the holiday.

It took me longer than I would have liked to realise that this was the former location of The Royal. I knew from talking to the owners of that place that they wanted to get out of there, adn they had dreams of reopening in Gyeongju.

While I liked the food at Shucos, I quickly realised that what they called "hot dogs" weren't actually hot dogs, and that was probably more of a euphemism, like how you might call jeon "Korean pancakes" or makgeolli "Korean wine." It then became a bit of an issue to explain to the intern that she couldn't actually call these hot dogs in a review to be read by non-Guatemalans.

I was preparing my own hot dog stand review, which would also run up against this issue.

20260216

Abandoned School

After waiting for the appropriate time, I decided to jump the fence. I wore canvas shoes that would have helped me climb over the fence if I needed to get out. I also grabbed some broom handles that I could insert in the lattice of the fence to give myself something to climb on. Then I got on something high and dead-dropped over the fence, onto the soft soil on the other side. And only at that point did I see that there was one corner where the fence didn't reach the end, and I could just walk out like a normal pedestrian crossing the street.

This huge dirt lot with one brick school building in it used to belong to the US Army Corps of Engineers, but they moved out sometime in the 2010s, and everything was destroyed except for this one historic building. I got up nice and close, then I got closer, then I got out of there quickly.

20260215

Spin and Grind Soft Opening

Victor gave me quite a surprise when he announced he was closing his Cheonan shop and opening a new one in Sinchon. He orchestrated a soft open involving a hardcore show headlined by the Montreal band Desecrate, and I was on board for that.

I interviewed Desecrate, and it's always great to support any Canadian bands that make their way here, and also I did that for the later article about the new shop.

20260215

Donuimun Museum Village

I confirmed that the kink in this closed museum village's armour would not trigger any audible alarms. More than a month later and they still haven't caught me. I went in as far as I could, until I would likely be on camera. It seemed not worth the effort to go further, especially since the state of the site hadn't changed significantly since the last time I'd wandered through.

I've already UEed this area, the first time it was evicted, and there's not much left for me to discover.

What do I think of the end of the area as a "museum village"? It's less tragic than the end of a real neighbourhood, and maybe that's the sneaky point.

20260214

HBC

Once we were done prowling around Hannam New Town, we headed over to HBC for food and rinks. Even if most Koreans were off to their hometowns or just on vacation, there were still plenty of establishments open, and lots of mostly foreigner people in them.

20260214

Hannam New Town from Above

After exiting the redevelopment zone, we went up onto a nearby roof that gives a very good view of the area.

20260214

Hannam New Town

These photos mark roughly the time when we started to descend on the western face of the Hannam New Town ridge, into Bogwang-dong. Things did not go according to plan. We had intended to get into the tallest building down there and get onto the roof, which would have resulted in excellent photos of the area. There was one problem though: we ran into the one worker in the entire zone. Fortunately he didn't see us, and we were able to escape safely.

20260214

Hannam New Town

We slipped through the fence and started having a look around Hannam New Town.

20260214

Hidden Space

I made a quick stop at the Hidden Space under Seoul Plaza, just curious if it had been left unlocked for the long weekend like I'd seen before. Turns out, they'd actually fixed up the area. I didn't get more information on it, and left quickly because people were waiting for me and possibly cameras were looking for me.

20260212

Northeastern Seoul

I had to run an errand to northeastern Seoul, so I made sure to check in on Miari Texas as well as Jeongneung.

I'd seen a post by a friend recently commenting on how all of Miari Texas was now gone, including a Buddhist temple. I was able to verify that the temple, if that's what it was, still existed. Also, that I had a pretty good idea of how to get into it, which I would attempt to do during the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday.

20260210

Demolition Area

This gallery shows a few demolition areas. It appears there are lights on inside Hannam New Town, though I can't tell if it is a nail house or a hangout for workers. Going to assume the latter.

20260208

Golpe in Seendosi

I had to work on Sunday, but I slipped away to see part of Golpe's show at Seendosi.

20260204

Christmas in February

I've been seeing Christmas decorations everywhere lately.

20260203

Food

Here are several food trips I did, including to Philly Dog, Philly Philly, Magpie Euljiro, and Double Happiness.

20260202

HBC

A few pictures along HBC, particularly around Social Haven, Life, and Biggie's.

20260201

Hilto

That's about it for the Hilto.

20260131

Uplift

I showed up at Uplift for another open mic/folk performance.

20260131

HBC

While wandering around, I saw this church was undergoing renovations. Unfortunately not demolition.

20260131

Boxes

A contact sent me a delivery, presumably within the Kim Young-ran limit, but when I looked around I couldn't find it anywhere. The last chance was it was in this mail room in the lobby. I took this photo, and sent it to him, and he was able to spot his package.

20260128

Biggie's

It was time to put the finishing touches on my article about Biggie's, prior to things like the Winter Olympics and the American version of the Grey Cup.

20260127

Buster

A couple photos of the little guy, and a K-thing I already had, though not for this reason.

20260126

HBC

This motorcycle was parked in HBC for a few days, right in front of a bank.

20260123

Snow

A snowy night.

20260123

Milky

A milky night.

20260123

Hannam New Town

Here's a glimpse into Hannam New Town.

20260120

Work Surveillance

I spied from the washroom window into the construction site in the KORAIL property. I suspectthey may have uncovered stretches of Manchocheon there.

Also a look in the work fridge, where there has been a half bottle of Dr Pepper for at least half a year. Plus a Laoshan Cola that was half frozen. I ended up trying it later, and it was better than the North Korean version at least.

20260118

Reggae and Ska at Baby Doll

I stopped by Baby Doll during my night shift break to see Reseters play, and I decided I should stay long enough to see Kingston Rudieska. This was my first time seeing them live in a few years, not counting Uheeska. Then I rushed back to work.

20260117

HBC

I went to HBC a little earlier than usual on Saturday, and did a pub crawl from Social Haven to Life to Biggie's.

20260116

Cat's House

I came across this random abandoned house, and just as I was concluding I probably couldn't get inside, a friendly cat wandered over to me and then leapt up, brushing his back on the razorwire, and disappearing under the roof.

20260115

Hilto

The Hilto is looking very short these days, and you can see more of the buildings behind it. They've also changed the construction hoarding surrounding the perimeter, bringing it outward a fair bit.

20260112

Year of Red Hores

I had a few days off, and spent the time looking at bad English.

20260110

...Whatever That Means, Paul, and Blaster Kid

...Whatever That Means played, and they did invite Paul on stage for "This Wasteland." Diazable recorded the whole set, and you can skip to Paul actually performing here.

20260110

Beacon, Fail Fast

There was a contest to determine the order of bands playing (other than Social Club Hyangwu first and Blaster Kid last), and Beacon and Fail Fast were the final two to fall to ...Whatever That Means.

20260110

Monkey Gang War

I took a lot of photos of Monkey Gang War.

20260110

Social Club Hyangwu, Sweet Gasoline, Long Time No Shit

Here are the first three bands, right when I was warming up. By the time Long Time No Shit came on, I was probably at my peak of the night.

20260110

Hongdae

I met up with Paul and his girlfriend before the show, and we wandered around Hongdae for a while, sharing memories and seeing new developments. They'd already visited some of the more meaningful sites, such as the first two Skunk Hells and the playground.

20260109

Philly Dog

I randomly saw this hot dog shop while driving past. I doubled back later and gave it a try. Their philly dog was impressive, but the other things on the menu I tried weren't as great. Their regular hot dog was smothered in way too much relish, and the fries seem like they were seasoned with some kind of sugar rather than salt. But I'll be back to try more of their hot dogs.

20260109

Donuimun Museum Village

Mayor 5mb had threatened to cluse Donuimun Museum Village, and after my previous visit in September showed nothing out of the ordinary, I returned to find it in much different condition. It's locked up tight, and there are two shops that remain open and seem to be protesting.

This is my second time approaching it as an UE site, after its earlier time being abandoned about 10 years ago, when it was depopulated and then made into a "museum village."

20260109

Old School

I stopped by this historic school in Dongdaemun, curious to see if the construction hoarding had given up any entry points. It turned out that fencing had been removed, and there was now a flimsy mesh fence around the site. I didn't get closer, but...I could.

20260104

Palindrome

I hit 15251.

20260103

Birthday

Brother Anthony gave me an invite to his birthday this year. Wikipedia tells me he turned 84.

20260102

HBC

I spotted my first "Founded in 2026" of the year. Jeong Ho-seung is only 76.

20260102

Buster

Buster went back for another visit to the animal hospital. They've backed off on "It's terminal" to "This guy might actually live." We don't have a follow-up appointment, although I should probably check him in next month or something.