The Amazing Seoul Trick Eye Museum
This post may resemble more of a "photo essay," rather than one of my more traditional posts. Although, I'm not entirely sure what a "traditional" post of mine might constitute, but I thought I'd give you a kindly heads up anyhow. I assume this particular blog will take a unique form because today I'll be writing about the Trick Eye Museum located in Seoul's spunky Hongdae area (near exit 9 at Hongik University Station, Line 2, for interested parties). I should mention that almost all my blogs exceed the length that I anticipate, so perhaps I'll manage to sneak quite a bit of text on here after all. I never really know what to expect of myself. Life's better that way.
Before I attach a barrage of pictures from the Trick Eye Museum to my blog, let me first tell you about another wonderful phenomenon in the Hongdae area that we visited first. I'm referring to the Hongdae Free Market, which runs from 1pm until 6pm every Saturday (March to November). This artistic initiative sprouted when the World Cup rolled through Korea in 2002, and it was largely an effort to showcase some local talent. There's some fairly priceless speculation that it was actually meant to be called the "Hongdae Flea Market," but the difficulty that Koreans have pronouncing "R" and "L" led to its current name. I can so easily imagine this scenario after being an English teacher here for about ten months. Oh so easily.
The market itself is situated in the "playground" of Hongdae where I've spent many wild nights. It was refreshing to be in Hongdae in the daytime actually, without the glaring neon lights and drunken mayhem. The Hongdae Free Market was an intriguing and dynamic display of local artists who all had a unique product to bring to the table/put on a table. I ended up purchasing a used copy ofFyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment (for about four dollars), a bizarre clock that will look great adorning my walls at home, and a nifty little leather bracelet. The vibes were excellent there, and this certainly wasn't hurt by the fact that there was live music playing in the background. It was a great way to spend an afternoon, as if all weekend afternoons weren't already great enough.
After getting our fix of youthful artistic vitality we began the short ten minute walk to the Trick Eye Museum. There were innumerable photo opportunities there, which will become even more evident to you in a moment when you scroll down. There's not really much room for narration, so I think I'll just let the pictures speak more or less for themselves. It would probably come off as quite unnecessary if I narrated the experience - ie. "We turned left and took a photo, which was followed with a quick left and another photo!" I hope you enjoy browsing some of these photos as much as Bri and I enjoyed taking them. That seems unlikely, but here's to hoping!
Let's start the photo parade with glimpses of Bri and I causing mischief together. I tell ya, we're a match made in heaven. I believe it was the infallible Dr. Seuss who said, “We are all a little weird and life’s a little weird, and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love.”
Bri and I then tried to understand each others perspectives a little better. For a moment there, she was much taller than me. Korea does strange things to your body.
Well, I've run out of witty things to say, so here are the rest of the fantastic photographs. If you don't get a smile out of these, then your heart is made of ice. Looks like I had one more witty comment left in me after all.
It's small, random adventures like these that I'll miss most when I leave Korea, but for now I'm aiming to make my last two months count.
Well, I'd better sign off for the night seeing as it's getting nice and late. As the famous English poet, John Gay, said, "We only part to meet again." Thus, I'll see you again soon.