Cross-border train between North and South Korea

I can’t really fathom yet the wider implications of this piece of news beyond what the article states:

If and when the rail link finally opens, there are obvious advantages for both sides.

For South Korea, it would mean that goods produced using cheap North Korean labour, in a joint industrialised zone to the north of the border, could be more easily transported out of the country.

For the North, it would boost the tourist trade, providing a link to a mountain resort on the east coast popular with South Koreans.

– Via BBC News via Seppo.

I hold out hope that I will see the Koreas reunify within my lifetime, even as I fear the problems they will face in integration the two now-disparate cultures, which grew up for generations hating/fearing/disparaging/pitying each other.

When it rains, it pours

Not only did I recently get in touch with some long lost family, I just got an email today from a dear, dear old friend of mine! I am so happy to hear from him! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!

*claps*

Update: He and I are apparently both wearing red chucks today, so I had to take a pic to post it. Because, you know… I don’t know.