Day #1: LAX-South Korea-DMZ Zone-Beijing

In less than 26 hours, we went from LAX to South Korea to a 5-hour DMZ Zone tour then to Beijing, China. It was packed but amazing.

The DMZ Zone is the border between South and North Korea. For more information about the DMZ Zone, here's a post that I've did recently. The tour was a very quick tour, but it was well worth it.

First major stop was to The Freedom Bridge. Here are some pictures:

Hope of reunification between the two countries are always in the talks.

On the way to the Freedom Bridge, the surrounding fences are filled with ribbons from South Korean families to their North Korea Families. It was a very emotional walk.

Add the end of the bridge, were more messages. These were much more personal. Some had pictures of their loved ones that were left behind when North Korea closed its border.

I cannot even imagine what these people are feeling. To know that they have families across the border, but they have no access to them, not even via phone or email. Currently South Koreans are not allow to enter North Korea.

The second major stop was to the 3rd Infiltration Tunnel. This tunnel was first discovered by Kim Bu-seong, a North Korean who defected in 1975. It is 2 meters wide and 1,635 meters long, and has the capacity to infiltrate 10,000 armed soldiers into the South in an hour. There are 3 other infiltration tunnels that has been found, each to different parts of South Korea. Sorry no pictures because we weren't allow to take anything besides our passport into the tunnel. You can see some pictures here. Going down the tunnel was easy. Coming back up...well...let's just say we all felt very out of shape.

The last major stop of the was to Dorasan train station. This train station was built solely to take passengers from South Korea to Pyongyang, North Korea and vice versa. It's not functioning yet since North Korea has closed off its border. However, the train station is ready to function whenever North Korea is ready to open its border.

"Not the last station from the South. But the first station toward the North."

Here's a 360 view of the station. All the people in there are tourists. :)

Those were the 3 major stops on the 5-hours tour. After this, we headed back to the airport and boarded our flight to Beijing. The day was packed and emotional. I had so many thoughts and feelings going through me while visiting these places. I'm already planning for the opening day of the train station. I will be there and I will board on that train to take a historical ride of a life time. :)

More of the trip to come!

THE TEAM. :)

Well, it's not professionally done or anything, but here's the team. :) We leave in 10 DAYS!!!!

NORTH KOREA ARTICLE.

THE PARADOX OF NORTH KOREA (BBC NEWS)

PURE GENIUS.

I've been looking at different things on YouTube for work regarding North Korea and I found the clip below by Hanvoice. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE it. Whoever came up with it is a PURE GENIUS!!!! I still get goosebumps everytime I watch this. So amazing!!!!!!

Plus, this is why I am doing what I can and able to do to raise awareness about the situation in North Korea. For more information about North Korea and how you can help/do, please visit:

Open Doors USA's website::www.opendoorsusa.org and

Open Doors Blog:: www.spiritualcourage.wordpress.com.

PUBLISHED. CHECK.

So...I wrote a book review for Open Doors USA's blog. It's about North Korea. Of course, my friend Ange had to edit it for me so that I actually sound good. :) You should read it and then order the book HERE or Amazon.com. After you read it, you should really recommend it to someone. :)

Anyway, I've never had anything published. Although one of my grad professor did tell me that my paper on the Dutch family structure for my anthropolgy class should be published in an Anthropology magazine. (Because so many people read that!) Of course, she said it again when I used the same paper for her other Anthropology class. (Don't worry, she gave me permission to use it and I had to add more to it.)

Enjoy!!!!!