Thanks to the foodie eye and the tasty review by ZenKimchi, we are able to shamelessly plug this W180,000 burger at the W Seoul Walkerhill Hotel. Truffles on burgers? What’s next, stocks and Treasury notes? Oh, right, that would make the burger worthless.

In a much welcomed plan, the city is investing heavily on bicycle lending and bike path infrastructure, reportedly costing the city $22-million toward building 45 bike-only lanes across five areas of Seoul.

The goal is to have nearly 80,000 public bikes available at 5,000 stations (or every 300 meters), with safe lanes linking the north and south sides of the river and major points across the entire city.

By the looks of it, there’s plenty of fake Vuitton, Rolex, Viagra, and yellow pills (anti malaria?). Sounds like the police stopped quite a party from happening in Itaewon this weekend.

Look inside and join our discussion on fake bags and dangerous pills.

The Harvard Univeristy Extension School (HES) offers graduate programs for the Master of Liberal Arts (A.L.M) in a wide variety of areas including Biotechnology, Mathematics for Teaching, and Educational Technology. Through distance learning in select programs, students are able to take courses and follow lectures entirely online. They can complete their degree requirements by spending at least two semesters at Cambridge, Massachusetts for capstone or final seminars.

Thanks to the Marmot’s Hole for this week’s North Korea compilation. First, in the Boston Globe, a stunning, rare look into North Korea, by photojournalists working for Yonhap and REUTERS.

This also brings us to the question whether some day soon, in light of Kim Jong Il’s stroke (reported here in MSNBC) the North will open up or close even further in the event of his death. Here is an interesting article about Kim Jong Il, featured in this month’s Atlantic Monthly about what might be coming next.

In Korea, coffee talk at establishments like Starbucks or Coffee Bean is a social must, especially if you are a coed with afternoons free. Likewise, coffee in its many forms, is the mental crutch that millions of office workers, professionals, and educators like me desperately rely on between the hours of 6am to 6pm (booze usually takes over after six).

In my short year since becoming a caffeine dependent, I’ve made a few observations about coffee and people. I’ve noticed that people who imbibe coffee select a coffee preparation method that reveals their personality. Look around your home. Look in the faculty lounge or office. How do you drink your coffee?

Since 1996, after the hot summer nights and star-studded Mediterranean film extravaganzas at Cannes have packed up for the year, the Busan Korean International Film Festival has quietly become a giant influence in Asian film. Not quite the Riviera, the port city of Busan at Haeundae Beach, nevertheless transforms into a star-studded festival full of directors, producers, filmmakers, stars, and fans as they celebrate and recognize over 300 films from throughout Asia and developing countries.

Just last week, while staring out the window of my stationary taxi on the eastbound Gangbyeon Parking Lot (”highway” only in name), I spotted a pair of white boats whizzing by the bridges of the Hangang River. They were moving urgently off to some important destination, and in my imagination, its passengers were a jet-set couple in tuxedo and gown sipping champagne on their way to the opening of an art show while mocking the moribund and wheelbound.

But wait! It turns out those waterborne limos are actually water taxis and are part of a growing fleet in Seoul’s newest public transporation! Short of helicopters appearing on the horizon this is nothing short of a miracle.