South Korea Travel

South Korea

South Korea is one of the nicest and safest countries in Asia and it has a rich history like most countries in the Orient do. What makes
Korea unique is that it has technically been at war with North Korea for over 50 years. The two countries were divided after world war 2
with the US occupying the south making it a democracy while the Soviets took the North making it a communist nation. The two countries
have the largest fortified border in the world; together they have hundreds of thousands of troops between the two Koreas, each side
prepared for war at anytime.

South Korea - George Kashouh Across The DMZ Line

I went to Korea twice, once with the Marines and the second time on my
own to do things that I wasn't allowed to do before. While I was there for
the Marines we worked everyday for a month, and basically were kept
prisoners in our camp which you can see on the upper right. The exception
was a single day off when we were allowed to get to the city Osan but had
to be back before 9pm. At the end of our exercise, I was able to convince
our Sergeant Major to let me and some other guys go out the capital, we
were the only ones out of hundreds of Marines there who were allowed to
go so we were pretty lucky. On the left is me playing pool in a Korean
military base during a gas mask drill. The upper left is one of my jets
returning from a training mission in Yechon.

This is what I really wanted to see in Korea, the DMZ tour. There are actually tours that go to the DMZ where you
get to see the border between the two Koreas, and you get to even go inside one of the negotiation rooms and step
over the borderline, so you're officially in North Korea. To the left is a South Korean government building along the
DMZ. On the right is me across the line in North Korea.

These are two random pictures from Korea. The right is of the city Osan which is next to a large Air Force Base. On
the left is in the town of Yechon. I was with a friend and we saw a small mountain and decided to climb it. Once on
top there was a man by himself doing a ceremony that lasted about 25 minutes.

Here are pictures of palaces that I visited in Seoul after I returned to Korea on my own. There are dozens of palaces
here in Seoul, and if you go very early in the morning when they first open they will be completely empty and all
yours to explore. Some of them you can only go with a guide. The right picture is of the inside of one the palaces.

On the left is a memorial
for the Korean War in
Seoul. It represents two
soldiers from the north
and the south who were
fighting each other and
then realized they were
brothers. When the two
Korea's split it
immediately separated
families, most of them
never saw each other
again. On the right is
Seoul Tower.

South Korea Links