The Songdo Province of Incheon, South Korea is like a plot from ZooTycoon;”CityTycoon.” Everything is so particular, mapped out, fresh. We walked by a wilting flower bed today in the middle of the big park in the central part of the city. I hadn’t seen any gardeners around and thereforeI asked one of my friends I met this past week how often the plants get watered. “They tend to not water the flowers here” she noted, “they just replace them.” “They do the same thing with whole trees.” A little haunting, but I guess that is why most of the park looks brand new, like it was plucked out of a magazine. Pagoda’s are placed right at the water’s edge, flower beds are in perfect squares, benches are evenly spaced along a straight lined lake, there’s even an island that is the home to a little bunny farm. Someone put a lot of effort into designing that park, not to mention the remarkably unique architecture that surrounds it.

I really do feel like I have left 2017 and entered 2030 being here, a sort of Tomorrowland.  Every day there is something new to discover. In all of the parks there is exercise equipment for public use and canoes with clear bottoms, in the malls there is virtual golf and indoor archery, restaurants and shops are staked in buildings and can be entered through side doorways that have elevators up, even at the school I am working at the students have whiteboard desks they can draw directly on. I couldn’t figure out where the microwave in my apartment was at first because the oven has a second setting that is the microwave. And these are just what comes directly to my head when I think about everything I have seen over the past week that has made me take a second glance. I have been in awe so many times with this city, and this statement extends further than just the modern developments.