Month: October 2007

Here in Korea they have their own way of solving the lack of parking space issue. They wildly double park. But this is commonly accepted and also understood that you should leave your car in neutral and with no breaks on. This way the poor person that wants to get passed the double parked cars can just push them away. This of course happened to my colleague with whom I was going to lunch. We ended up pushing about 10 cars (or actually he was pushing and I was taking photos 🙂 )before a small space opened up in front of his car. The car owners that get their cars pushed around also have to accept that they get smashed together since you don’t always managed to get the car to stop before it hits the next one in line. Is this not a very creative way of solving the problem?

This week work brings me to Korea again. When you arrive at immigration at Incheon Airport outside of Seoul you are greeted with a big KISS. On the numerous Samsung flat screens and on signs everywhere is says KISS. It also says that here at immigration is where Korea greets the world. That’s nice, but aren’t they going a bit too far here?? I know that Koreans are sometimes very friendly… As you come closer though, you see that KISS is short for Korea Immigration Smart Service. Aha, I thought, and immediately tried to figure out what this really means. I still do not know. You still have to stand in line forever and have your passport stamped by a grumpy immigration officer. So what is the smart service? Are the officers extra smart? Have the Koreans come up with a revolutionary immigration system that is supposed to be extremely efficient? In any case it is invisible enough for the common traveller and is that why they need all the signs…?