Walking to work is very easy and convenient when the Koreans are holding their monthly civil defense drills. At 2pm on certain Wednesdays (I haven't quite figured out the pattern, I confess - I used to think it was first Wednesdays but clearly today wasn't one of those), the sirens go off and all these volunteers and police go out and pretend we're being attacked by North Korea. Mostly this involves making everyone stop driving their cars. Everyone has to sit in their cars at intersections for 10 minutes or so, while the drill happens, emergency vehicles pretend to ciruculate, etc.
It makes walking to work very pleasant, because all the wide avenues in Ilsan are carless (well, moving-car-less - they're all pulled over or stopped at intersections). If you jaywalk at mid-block, you can stroll casually from block to block, avoiding the intersections, and never worry about a car.
For 10 minutes. Then it's back to psycho-driving-taxis... the usual.
[daily log: walking, 5 km]
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