Thursday – A couple of hours on the bus again this morning, heading to the Kia car factory in Pyeongtaek which is by the sea. Wow – what an amazing place. Our bus was escorted onsite by a security guard and then we were given a short talk about the Kia plant. It has 150,000 employees at this plant (only 1% of them women and they all work in admin). It produces 600,000 cars per year – five models at this plant. We were all given an English electronic guide device that automatically played a sound file about the particular section of the plant we were in at the time. We were all guided (or should I say shepherded) through an amazing factory floor. We were taken through the stamping plant (which stamps the panels and body out of metal). Then we watched the robotic welding and assembly lines, through to high pressure water testing, through to the end product. It was fascinating watching all the huge robots picked up whole car frames and zip them around the plant to the next job. There are 6000 components in any one car. At the end of the tour the kids were all given a toy Kia transformer robot/car. They were all wrapped!
Off to a Chinese restaurant for lunch still in Pyeongtaek (home city of many of our adopted children as ESWS has a large unwed mother’s home here.
Next we drove to Yongin University for a student Taekwondo demo. Yongin Uni is like our Canberra Institute of Sport. Several national level uni students put on an impressive demo of Taekwondo, high kicks, breaking four pieces of wood held at different levels with one kick, flips, twists and acrobats were the order of the day. Then they spent quite some time teaching our kids (and adults) some moves. The kids all had a great time (as did the adults).
Lastly our bus driver dropped us at Jamsil Stadium to watch the pro baseball series - the Doosan Bears (Seoul) vs the Samsung Lions (Daegu). Oh my goodness, what a spectacle. Cheerleeders (dressed up like American girls in short skirts, high heels) and a Lion mascot (for the Samsung Lions), were all up on a stage that was embedded in the audience. Everytime someone on their team hit the ball, or did something good, they would break out in a song and dance routine, often holding up placards (of Korean writing) of special songs or chants – often about the player concerned. Each side of the stadium had their own stage, mascot and cheerleaders leading the chants (so you need to be careful where you sit!).
Actually it was like one big norebang (Korean karoke) session. The crowd and what was happening on the stage was so entertaining, most of the time we kept forgetting to watch what was happening on the field. It was one noisy, chanting, but singing all together, song and dance. We were all blown away by the amazing atmosphere – it was great fun, and the kids all loved it. We all left on a high.
Our last stop of the day (at about 9pm) was the Lotte World complex for a little more shopping (well, it was on the way home). With Paul, Andrea and Jin, we browed through Toys r Us finding Sam some Korean lego (of a palace fortress), Lily a Mickey Mouse (which she has wanted the whole trip) and a few little things.
Home at 11.00pm, and a chat catching up on each other’s days (read Bill’s blog) with Bill and Liz. Bill & Liz were able to arrange our traditional jangu drums to be shipped to Australia today. An adult drum is hour-glassed shape and is about 40cms in diameter and 50cms high. A bit tricky to pack in our luggage. His website is all in Korean, but is www.urikukaksa.com. He is about 5 minutes walk from Chandeokgung palace for those interested. We tried in vain to find one in Insadong, but none of them would ship to Australia, so this was a bonus.
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