Traveling home

As my last deposits to my stay in korea I was going to write about suicides in Korea. There was an incident at my school, where two chinese girls hung themselves in the in the school library, because the teacher was unfair to the chinese students. Also apparently every year a few students die out of alcohol consumption at the university's campus parties, which take about 3 days at every university, and have big stages and concerts which is actually pretty cool. In any case these people are usually forced to drink, so it does not really count for suicide. Also a former president of Korea had commited suicide. He had his driver drive him up on a mountain, and he had a suit on and everything. He couldn't do it at the subway like any normal person, and of course for the normal people it would be problematic, since almost every subway station in the city center has walls and automatic doors into the train tracks. In the south there is also a famous suicide cliff into the sea, where it says "han bon do senkak he chuseyo" which stands for "think one more time". No safety nets, no fences. A sign will do!


No pain, No China!


In any case, it is not like finland does not hold a track record for people dying of alcohol abuse, and would not easily compete with korea and Japan at the top of the suicide rates.

People should not be left alone.


Train tracks to Russia


This is what I think when I am right now writing this on the Olkhon lake at Lake Baikal. I voyaged here (got that word from the book Robinson Crusoe! :D ) from Irkutsk, on my way to my home town in Finland. I'm going to be on the train tracks, from Shanghai to Kitee, every meter of the way. Why I am writing this is because I have stayed here, without having a real conversation with anyone. Nobody speaks English! Not even the lady at the tourist information spoke english. So I wandered around, asked a hotel where my hostel is. They knew and pointed the way. Then this delusional lady lead me a good way out to a hotel she knew was the one I was looking for. We end up there and I curse in my mind as I read the sign and she says "bla bla bla, nizhnaiyou.." Aaaarrgghghh!


Olkhon Island


In any case, this island is one of the most beatiful places I've been to! I won't stay here long enough to see everything, but maybe I will be back. Today I ventured on this excursion and tried swimming in the big side of lake Baikal. F"#%&&ng cold I say! Never have I felt such freezing water! Maybe the 3rd summer in about 38 degrees has something to do about changing my standards of what is warm or cold...




As I crawl back in time and memories, China was very interesting again. I visited my good friends Emily, Caroline, Tom, Paul and of course met my brother there! My friends were working at the World expo and it certainly was something to see. The different countries were mostly trying to sell their countries though, and of course, Finland's pavillion was most successfull by selling pancakes. I never thought pancakes could make such an impact on foreigners, but as Jack and Emily testified, it is really good!




In Beijing I stayed one night at Jack's relatives. The grey sky of Beijing was almost pushing me to travel away, and so I took the train to Ulaanbaator, Mongolia. There I stayed with a family for a few days in a rural town on the edge of the Gobi desert, and stayed at a nomad family for a few days, trying to milk some goats and eating the most terrible food in the world. Smoked lamb and mutton is not something I want to eat for a while! The country of mongolia is simple. Blue skys, green or brown flat grounds with mountains in the background. Vodka, potatos, beer, milk, sheep, goats, horses, archery and wrestling. Thats it!





Nomad family moving


Somehow I felt this country is not different, it's just stripped! Like they took all the good stuff away! But maybe I did not realize how much of a third world country this really is. The water for our hostel came from a well. This is in the capital of the country, with 1 million people, and the hostel was about a 20 minutes of a walk from the center of the city. I don't think I've came across something like that so far.


Our hostel had a Gher (a yurt).

Just now trying to wash myself with ice cold water in pitch dark shower I thought "why am I here?".. "why haven't I been to a warm shower for 10 days?" but then it occurs to me. Traveling is being in a different place. Being somewhere where you haven't been before. Getting to know things that you heard about, you saw on tv, you wanted to see. Seeing things that nobody talks about, nobody could talk about, nobody thought of talking about.


Starfish for eating at Beijing market

Well, I have to reside back to eating some more smoked and dried fish. This stuff is so good I CAN NOT express in words. You have to travel to Lake Baikal, because ..



-- If you don't try, you will never know! --

These and a few more pictures, click here.