IN A TRADITIONAL WAY

I arrived late tonight into downtown Seoul, South Korea after being met at the airport by Global Network board member Sung-Hee Choi. We took a long bus ride into the city and she brought me to a traditional Korean boarding house that looks much like the photo above. My simple room is just beautiful and lucky for me it has Internet connection.

Yesterday I had a day off as a wonderful man named Kouichi Toyoshima, who teaches physics at a nearby university, took me for a swim in the ocean and then to a spa hotel. Koichi came to our Global Network conference last April in South Korea and was instrumental in helping to set up some of my talks in Hiroshima with different groups.

The natural spa was just beyond my wildest dreams as we sat in a couple different outdoor baths as they are called and then went inside two different steam rooms. By the time we were done we both spread out on a mat looking up into a full tree canopy above us. I found that after three weeks on being "on" near full-time, and delivering a dozen speeches (of varying lengths) and numerous media interviews, my body was on over-drive. The spa bath just took all the road weariness right out of me and I found that I was so relaxed that I could not get up when it was time for us to leave. I had trouble walking back into the locker room at the spa.

After the spa was over Kouichi left and said he'd be back today to pick me up. This morning I did the spa bath-steam room again before going to breakfast. Kouichi arrived about 10am and drove me to visit a Buddhist temple and then a Shinto shrine where we had lunch before he took me to the airport in Fukuoka for my flight to Korea.

Sung-Hee has organized a full schedule for me over the next week here where I will be meeting with leaders from different unions, peace groups, and reunification organizations. In the morning I start with a media interview and then will be heading out of town for an overnight visit with folks in another location....don't remember all the exact details. I'll do two formal talks before leaving South Korea on August 21 to return to Japan for two more days and then back home.

Needless to say I will be well taken care of while I am here as my "agent" Sung-Hee will ensure that my old bones move from one place to the other on time.