Rachel’s tears were making me more upset than I was used to being. I was emotional as well, I just didn’t show it as freely. Onlookers must have thought someone had died. Thankfully that wasn’t the case. We were saying goodbye to the people who had mattered most to us in...

Carrying on my interest in burnt out or abandoned buildings, Mike, a friend of mine in Iksan, offered to take me to an abandoned church in an extremely rural place just outside of the city. On the way back the plan was to stop off at a bar in town that had recently burned down. I realise that...

The ceiling supports felt weak. They would have supported my weight before the fire. Now, with burnt timber and ash covering the floor, I wasn’t confident. It was a strange feeling, standing in the loft of a roof-less house looking at a mountain. The residents were long-gone –...

Maybe this title is a little bit misleading. I’m sure Korean dentists are excellent at their job. There seems, however, to be a trend emerging amongst our friends who’ve visited the dentist in Korea. Last winter Rachel and I went to our local dentist. We were livid when she said we...

It isn’t that I believe in ghosts, or anything supernatural, there’s just something about the pedestrian tunnel that doesn’t seem right. Footsteps 500 meters away pound against your eardrums. The acoustics in the tunnel add a fantastical dimension to an already misshapen...

The streets of Newcastle were as busy as I’d remembered. Some of the shops weren’t as familiar. Strolling up and down my hometown, camera-in-hand, I looked at The Toon with new eyes. 2 years in Asia left me feeling distant. I knew these streets. I walked them more than most. Yet,...

For reasons long forgotten, Rachel and I went to Boseong Tea Fields and Yulpo beach again, for the fourth time. The idea of strolling along the beach on a crisp winter day was very appealing. Hiking the many steps up the tea fields was not. We’d heard there were some impressive Christmas...

For the first time in 2 years my principal has given me the entire winter vacation off. I’ve been asked to desk warm every other time. Having said that, every time I bumped into the principal during one of these vacations she seemed shocked to see me. I’m sure most of the time she...