Waegwan

The area where we live is called Waegwan. Town? County? No idea.

The section of Waegwan I see on my walks to Camp Carroll was, I guess, developed because of the Army base. Shops and restaurants along the route have English signage. For part of the way, the sidewalk runs right next to the Camp's cinderblock & barbed-wire fence. This section of the wall along the sidewalk has been painted with swans and Asian-looking plants and leaves.

Down at the very end of the wall in this picture, before the gate with the red cross on it, you can see a blue trashbag leaning against the wall. It's full of leaves. The sidewalks are kept swept of leaves and debris by the people who own the shops along the sidewalks; take a five-minute stroll, and you're almost guaranteed to see a Korean bent over a broom with a handle half the length of the ones we're used to, sweeping the sidewalk and picking up garbage.

In this more recent picture, there's white fabric on the ground that has the texture of cotton batting, and the stones for the sidewalk are stacked in a pile. They've been working on some system of pipes for the past few months, section by section, and every week a new area of the road or sidewalk is torn up. The white fabricky stuff goes down to cover the dirt. They put the sidewalk back when they're done.

Here's a picture of some souvenir shops, a shoe shop, and a bar. At Silk Road (the one with the orange sign,) you can buy huge mediocre oil paintings of Korean landscapes for only 35,000 won (about $35.)

The second two pictures are of the same area. I don't know where either of those roads go.

The woman in the doorway of Oasis Club is just hanging out, sorting dried peppers. I had forgotten about this picture when I took the following one.

Here, it's late afternoon. She's just hanging out again, cutting vegetables into a pot. In the window of the shop next to her, the one with MONEY EXCHANGE, there are blue and yellow number signs advertising the exchange rate for the day.

Walking everywhere isn't nearly as fun now that it's always freezing outside, but at least it's never boring.