Thomas Birke

Hello,

as you may have known I have been to seoul for a week to shoot the city on large format and add footage to my 100 Cities project.

Here are my top and bad 3 about the city:

TOP

1. The air is super clean, I suspect this is due to the massive amount of trees spread all over the city - there are so many forests, you just need to take a quick stroll and you feel like there is no megacity around. When there are no or only light clouds, the sky has an awesome blue and the far sight must be at least 50km. There is no smog in the air and this is of course perfect for photography!
2. The subway system. It is the most efficient I have ever seen! And it is dead cheap at 50 cents a ride. The trains were crowded most of the times, but never as fully packed as it is the case in Tokyo or Paris, where you sometimes have to wait for the next train to take the ride. I suspect they have a very good crowd management system. All the tracks on every station are walled, so no one can fall on the tracks - the doors only open when the trains arrive. The best thing: in every station there are map stations with huge touch sensitive plasma screens, where you can scroll and zoom the google earth like map with the touch of a finger - they even have street view. This is by far the best orientation system I have ever seen, called daum digital view! http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4061/4449540861_af4dc2c3e6_b.jpg
3. Family Mart or 7/11 - this is existing in every asian megacity, but it still is the coolest thing to be able to grab a snack or a beer anytime you want - perfect for jetlagged europeans!

BAD

1. The North Korea Situation. Basically, they are still at war with only a cease fire in place for 50 years. You notice this on every corner, especially as a photographer with heavy equipment. I have been told several times to pack and go away, apperantly because there were some military installations around and they were afraid of spying. This is so stupid! When I would like to spy, I’ll check google earth or walk around with a pen camera - not with a ton of equipment that takes 10 minutes to assemble. Climbing a mountain, totally wasted and full with sweat - and then beeing told to not take pictures there is such a bad experience…
2. Noone really seems to speak english - it had been a great problem for me to communicate, especially to security guards and bus drivers.
3. The trees. I know, they are good, but for photographers they are a pain in the ass! Seoul has a lot of great hills with fantastic views, but most views are shaded by a gazillion of trees - it is so hard to get a good view without trees blocking the way. They should at least crop the trees at some viewpoints!

All in all Seoul is a very enjoyable megacity and a great place to live I think. Close to the quality of Tokyo - they know how megacities can do it right!

I hope some of my pictures show it - currently I am uploading them into my Seoul flickr set, so check it out from time to time: http://www.flickr.com/photos/move_lachine/sets/72157624187670400/