Week 3

One photo is Songdo 송도 central park during the day. The other is a different nearby park in Songdo.

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and I will be in Korea far from my family in Montana. Luckily, I got to see them less than one month ago and I'll see them again in March. For Christmas Day, a company holiday, I may go to Seoul to see the lights. Christmas is a bigger deal in Korea than I thought and widely celebrated.

Based on a question I received, I thought I'd mention something about my Kimchee refrigerator: Kimchee is traditionally made in the winter by burying clay pots filled with the prepared ingredients for slow, cold fermentation. A kimchee refrigerator (2-8C) is designed to mimic the cold temperatures necessary to allow proper fermentation. Kimchee does not ferment when frozen and if fermented at elevated temperatures, bad tasting microbial flora can flourish and ruin the batch. I believe the main microbe is a lactobacteria. It's so cool how people utilized microbiology thousands of years ago without even understanding what a microbe was.

Earlier this week we had the office holiday party and it was lots of fun! We ate at a buffet place called Sea House... king crab legs, raw fish, exotic fresh fruits, pizza, pumpkin porridge and all sorts of other Korean style things to eat. We had Suntory whisky which I had never tried before. It was very smooth... a really nice texture on the tongue. Then a group of us went off to the 노래방 norebang (kareoke). An even smaller group stayed out for 소주 and broiled eel. Didn't make it home that night and paid for it the next day! Good thing it was Korean national election day and a company holiday for me. The winner of the election, Lee Myun-bak 이면박 won by a wide margin. His ads were definitely best and hopefully he is successful.

Speaking of success, this week featured a notable success for a local company. Celltrion announced they got US FDA OK to make Bristol-Myers' Orencia.

Something I discovered with the voltage change between the US (110V) and Korea (220V) is that my shaver that had become sluggish in the US now buzzes away happily with the new voltage. Hmmmm....

Correction from an earlier blog: I overestimated 송도 construction details. Only one of the new towers being constructed will be 65 stories tall. The others will be large, but less.