Sesan Elementary Field Trip to Ulsan City

Ulsan is a neighboring city to Busan, where I live. My school took all the kids on an outing to visit some caves, a butterfly garden, and a zoo.

We visited an enormous cave that had many sections and went off in all directions like a maze. Inside the cave were installations, like a museum of Korean artifacts, as well as statues and exhibits of precious stones.

One sections of the cave had these ancient petroglyphs. They were created over hundreds of years from about 6,000 B.C. to 1,000B.C. and are considered a Korean national treasure.

While inside the cave we also witnessed a traditional Korean drumming show...

...followed by a very impressive Chinese acrobatics show.

Hiking During Cherry Blossom Season

The cherry blossom season is in full swing here in Korea. There are lots of beautiful trees and flowers to see. On Saturday I climbed the mountain behind my apartment to get a good look from above. I definitely did get a nice view. The hike up was also very beautiful.

Here are some old ladies walking by some cherry blossom trees. The mountain you see at the end of the video is the one I hiked up.

On the way up I saw some of these nice azaleas.

When I made it to the top (about 500m) I got a really nice view of one side of the city. This is the area I live in, called Saha-gu. I live near the bridge area, on the right side. My apartment is beside a university area called Dong-A. The river you see is called the Nakdong river. I cross it everyday on my way to work.

The next day I went hiking up another mountain that I hoped would reveal the other side of the city. Here is what I saw going up.

It's a bit hard to see in the video. There is a canopy of bright pink cherry blossoms covering a stream and waterfall. This is also where I took the picture at the beginning of this post.

I wonder what could be behind this little wooden hut? Click on "view video" and find out...

This is Nampo-dong, one of the city "downtown" areas. You can't make it out in the video, but you can see as far as the Gwangali bridge from this view point. If I kept panning right, and there were no mountains in the way, you would see Saha-gu again.

The city is built along the ocean, so it stretches out pretty far. In total, about 4 million people live in Busan.

See more videos of my hike to the top of Busan

New Job, New Apartment

Welcome to Sesan Elementary!

The school is surounded by these great cherry blossom trees...


...and statues.

Here is a picture of my new apartment building.

The sign reads "Haundea Castle". That's right, I live in a castle.

Fukuoka, Japan part2

I decided to put some more pictures of my trip to Japan! I didn't want to leave out Ohuri Park. This large park is located near the center of the city. It boasts a nice lake and is next to the remains of the former Fukuoka Castle.

The park is lined at parts by these great moats and stone walls. The moats and some of the walls are part of the former castle.

I enjoyed this courtyard and the interesting trees. To bad they weren't in bloom yet when I was there.

This was some sort of observation building, or so I read on the sign. But, to observe what?

I enjoyed this vine garden. I can imagine that it is beautiful when the flowers bloom.

Today, the castle is nothing more than a gate, a turret, and rubble. Mostly rubble. There is a nice view of the city from the former main citadel.

This was an interesting fountain. The water jets actually tell the time.

Old Videos

I found some funny video clips of my last day at the old school. Man, those kids are so funny.


"Good bye Denny
-from
Dragon"
He almost spelled it right :)

The Birth of Machine

While attending University in New Brunswick a friend of mine called Mark Cameron, and I, teamed up to make a short animated movie named The Birth of Machine. Mark and I had a really good time making this. We even won some government art grants and got to travel around and show it in other provinces.
So have a look. The video quality isn't perfect, but you can still get an idea.

Click ->The Birth of Machine