Memory Timeline

Hurricane Park, an old-timer of Sindang-dong's tteokbokki alley: dakbal (chicken feet) stew and fried rice. Add steamed egg; cheese rice cakes are a must.

At university I received a scholarship from the Seoul Scholarship Foundation, now the Seoul Future Foundation. This September I went back as a mentor in its alumni programme, Volun-Career: a wooden birdhouse with younger students, then an aspiring IT engineer's résumé.

A Monday team lunch at Pancone near Sinyongsan Station: a pasta spot, but the lamb steak is the best thing here. Focaccia to French rack, then gelato, in order.

Weekend74, a cafe on a friends' trip to Hongcheon: a good menu, huge grounds with a forest path, a sidecar, a red Benz, then lunch at Dongmakgol.

Lau Pa Sat in Yongsan, Seoul, serves Singaporean food and nothing else. The satay and shrimp noodles taste genuinely local. Plus desserts from COMMCOMM.

The last of my lunch breaks by the Han. Back on Nodeul Island: takeout lunch, then a coworker brought out a tea set. A little chilly, and all the better.

A sujebi (hand-torn noodle soup) shop on the ground floor of the Brownstone arcade on Sangdo-ro, Dongjak-gu, Seoul: a whole small octopus in every bowl for ₩12,000, barley rice first, and easy parking.

A hidden tuna omakase near Gangbyeon Station: fair prices, tuna until you're stuffed, and gopchang grilled on the side. A Saturday-night course in order.

Working late, so dinner with a coworker at Crystal Jade, Yongsan I'Park Mall: seafood jjamppong, jajangmyeon, six xiaolongbao and a coupon sojwabing.

Part 2 of my lunch breaks by the Han. A packed lunch on Nodeul Island under a cloudless sky, a cool breeze, a freshly renovated island and a cup of black tea.

Huizinga argued in Homo Ludens that culture arises in and as play. What play's features mean for work and onboarding, and gamification beyond points and badges.

A New Zealand-themed spot in Apgujeong Rodeo: a Wednesday lunch of fish and chips, Kiwi Brekkie, minute steak and fisherman's pasta. Get the fish and chips.

Plenty of onboarding docs, yet new members still get lost. Why reading doesn't stick, and the four things good onboarding needs instead.

Part 1 of my Yongsan lunch breaks by the Han. An açaí bowl from Jamba Juice at Yongsan I'Park Mall, a public bike toward Oksu, a riverside bench, and back.

People join projects all the time. A PM's look at repeated explanations, slow ramp-up and context-free decisions, and why onboarding is project management work.

A family birthday dinner for seven in an Itaewon alley: a hanwoo (Korean beef) course in a private room, beef seared at the table, pot rice, purple ice cream.

After a morning health check-up the weather was gorgeous. A jambon sandwich and coffee to go from NOT BAD COFFEE & SANDWICH, then by bike to the Han River.

Tennis with a friend, takeout tteokbokki by the Han, a 6 km run to Oksu, pull-ups, a Seoul Bike ride back and a 63 Building sunset. A perfect Saturday.

A small ramen counter near Yaksu Station where customers keep coming in: two bowls printed 'きょうも', chashu rice, karaage and a Sapporo. Deep flavour.

Bâton, a meal cafe in a slate-roofed one-story building behind Yongsan Station. A Wednesday lunch: fried-egg burger, shrimp avocado toast, iced tea and juice.

Worried Chiikawa, upbeat Hachiware and act-first Usagi sit the PMP exam. Seven study styles and three original situational questions show how PMs make the call.

Free entry to Frieze Seoul 2026 via a KB Kookmin Card Amex event. Work left me only closing day, but three hours and Do Ho Suh's thread house were enough.

October 8–11, 2025: by bus to Guanajuato, a day trip to San Miguel de Allende, a last day on Mexico City's Calle Bolívar and a 6 a.m. departure.

October 7, 2025: a tequila tour from Guadalajara. Chewing agave, blue agave fields, piñas in the José Cuervo distillery yard and the centro at night.

Bali's last three days, December 2024: a dawn jeep up Mount Batur for sunrise and luwak coffee, Blue Lagoon snorkeling nearly rained out, and Canggu.

October 5–6, 2025: Puebla's Palafoxiana Library and Talavera streets, Xochimilco at night, a first intro video in Parque México, Guadalupe and the Zócalo.

Ubud, December 2024: rainy Tegallalang and Saraswati Temple, a workday of meetings over a coconut bowl, and a rice-field villa with a tub and mangosteens.

Mexico City, October 3–4, 2025: a night taco stand under a pink tent, the Niños Héroes monument, Chapultepec Castle and its Siqueiros mural, the zoo.

Three days of a Jakarta business trip, December 2024: touring empty offices, pepper crab picked from the tank at Bandar Djakarta, two Airbnbs and local food.

October 1–2, 2025: Air Canada via Vancouver, Mexico City at 10:50 p.m., check-in at midnight, then a dawn Teotihuacan balloon and the Pyramid of the Moon.

Two days in Jakarta, December 2024: offering 5,000 rupiah at Istiqlal Mosque and getting a laugh, Jakarta Cathedral, Monas, and satay in rainy Kota Tua.

The final part of my 19 days after quitting: a rainy last night in Rome after Egypt, every Italian dish from Milan to the airport, and wonton noodles in Taipei.

A week of rain forecast in Rome. One search for a country with no rain, a flight to Sharm El Sheikh. A surprise visa fee, an ATM wad, the Red Sea, the desert.

From a night hike on Hoamsan straight to Qingdao Malatang Yangkkochi in Wongok-dong, Ansan. Thick, fresh lamb skewers, numbing mapo tofu rice, hearty onmyeon.

Deep in Namdaemun Market's hairtail alley, a dakgomtang shop with a SINCE 1962 sign. Clear broth, hand-pulled chicken, 10,000 won a bowl. At lunch, you queue.

The order I followed to prepare for the PMP in 7 weeks, rebuilt as a day-by-day calendar around four books. The four-book kit is $24.99 instead of $31.96.

The one-page summaries I wanted while studying: 16 landscape A4 sheets, one topic each, with EVM formulas, contract types, Scrum timeboxes and ECO 2026.

Two days out, I reviewed only my error log and the Mindset. This is what I wanted then: 56 keyword patterns, a 1-minute checklist and 10 practice questions.

Studying PMBOK 8, I wanted notes that showed the whole structure at a glance. These Word notes rebuild 6 principles, 7 domains and 40 processes for the exam.

The PMP word list I wished I'd had: 105 term clusters, each with a star priority, the right move and the trap answer, built on PMBOK 8 and ECO 2026.

April 2023, the second half of Italy: from Florence's Duomo to a Guinness on Piazzale Michelangelo, a flooded Alexander Mosaic in Pompeii and a grey Positano.

For seven weeks I only read other people's PMP stories. Three months after passing, I joined the PMI Korea Chapter's education committee. Here's what it does.

Three months after passing, I joined the chapter’s education committee.

What the PMP does at work, PMI's 17% median salary gap, the missing Korea data, real Korean job postings and the actual costs, three months after passing.

Scope, stakeholders, risk, change control, value: why the PMP mindset helps developers, designers, marketers and ops even more than PMs, and a realistic way in.

Venice, April 10–11, 2023: evening light on the Rialto Bridge, the view from San Giorgio Maggiore's bell tower, then Murano and color-switching Burano.

The work habits the PMP changed for a Global Tech PM: shared vocabulary, assessing before acting, change control, value over deliverables and tailoring.

How PMP renewal works (60 PDUs in three years, 35+ Education, Giving Back capped at 25), my first approved PDU, and my year-by-year plan by Talent Triangle.

Two minutes from Nakseongdae Station, a gopchang house makes a beef offal soup where every spoonful comes up loaded. Add a spoon of perilla powder and it gets even better.

April 2023, where the Italy stretch begins: the Duomo on Easter Sunday, Sforza Castle, aperitivo on the Navigli, and AC Milan vs Napoli at San Siro.

PMP, CAPM and PMI-ACP compared for 2026: eligibility, exam format, member and non-member fees, retakes, PDUs and recent changes, plus which one fits you.

The new 2026 PMP case-study questions: what PMI has published, a four-step way to read long scenarios, an original practice case with answers, and a time plan.

Short, frequent review beats rare marathons. How I used my commute for PMP review with audio and a word list, plus tricky term pairs and a 5-minute word loop.

April 2023, my first look at the Mediterranean. A first day in Nice spent bouncing between a pebble beach and Place Masséna, then Chagall's hilltop village.

How I used a ChatGPT project to re-check concepts and a 155-source NotebookLM notebook to make audio reviews for my commute, with prompts and setup steps.

A PMP error log isn't for copying questions. It's for building judgment rules: log misses and lucky guesses, tag the cause, and write 'If ___, first ___.'

April 5, up from Bournemouth to London after four years: a laughing halibut, swans and blossom in St James's Park, Big Ben, then Chinatown and a Soho pub.

The PMP exam that launched July 9, 2026, compared with the old one: questions, time, breaks, domain weights, eligibility, PMBOK 7 vs 8 and the AI Standard.

PMP eligibility under the 2026 rules, how to write experience entries PMI accepts, with a full sample, and how the audit works, from an 8-day approval.

April 2023: I quit my job, bought a ticket that day and flew that night. Emirates via Dubai, a Megabus, and the homestay where my English began.

Back at the foundation that gave me a scholarship, this time as a mentor in its alumni programme.

It took me 12 days to go from PMP application to a booked Pearson VUE exam. Here is every step, from PMI membership to booking, shown with my real emails.

Jjamppong, ganjjajang, and an ambush nobody warned me about: cucumber salad. 7,900+ reviews, a 4.83 rating and genuinely kind staff at this Korean-Chinese spot in Yangjae. The cucumbers are not optional.

A clay pot of gang-doenjang that's half snails, half doenjang. A basket of leafy greens, with spicy pork and bulgogi on the table too. At this ssambap house in Seoksu-dong, Anyang, the snails are the real deal. Just go.

Walking under N Seoul Tower, I found a burger joint at the top of the Haebangchon hill. A tall burger crowned with a fried egg, and a terrace that takes in the whole city. Seriously good.

Dallat means 'market' in Thai. Under purple neon: pork backbones stacked into a tower (leng saap), shrimp pad thai, and basil stir-fry topped with a fried egg. A 4.89-rated Thai restaurant in Sinsa-dong.

Four minutes from Hongik Univ. Station, 5,000 reviews and a 4.84 rating. Gopchang, daechang and more on one pan, fried rice under a mountain of seaweed, and ramyeon to finish. The mixed gopchang is the best.

An izakaya under a ceiling of cherry blossoms, open until 2 a.m. The skewers are good, but the real kicker is a fluffy steamed egg topped with a whole chunk of pollock roe. Two visits in one month, and here's why.

After a day at Vivaldi Park's Ocean World, your stomach is basically touching your spine. This is where you go: spicy stir-fried baby octopus, wrapped in lettuce with a spoonful of snail doenjang, at Dongmakgol Sikdang in Hongcheon.

A bossam-and-noodle house that still serves kimchi jjigae at dinner. Barley rice is self-serve and unlimited, every side dish is made in-house, and it's rated 4.85 on Naver. The Yangjae branch is the best!

In Mullae-dong, Seoul's old metalworking neighborhood, a restaurant with 'iron' in its name gets everything right: Pyongyang naengmyeon, bibim naengmyeon, suyuk, dumplings. Over 2,500 reviews and still rated 4.9.

Tear off warm bread, drag it through hummus pooled with olive oil, and the Itaewon Middle Eastern rankings sort themselves out. PETRA: 5 minutes from Noksapyeong Station, with spices gentle enough for first-timers.

How I shifted from using AI as an answer machine to a cognitive partner, building a robust learning feedback loop for the PMP exam and future knowledge systems.

A practical process for using AI across research, planning, development, testing, and launch while keeping product judgment and responsibility human.

Facing hidden mocks, duplicate components, and silent database drops while building AttractiveWebAI and Shopify apps. Here are 8 hands-on verification principles for AI coding.

My PMP exam day in Korean at a Pearson VUE center in Seoul: the booking email, ID rules, 80 minutes on the first 60 questions, the breaks and my final review.

How I passed the PMP on July 3, 2026 after seven weeks: the full timeline, the $499.40 I paid for Study Hall and the exam, and mock scores of 66% and 65%.

After seven weeks of study, a PASS at a Pearson VUE test centre.

Smarter autocomplete was only the beginning. The shift to autonomous terminal-based AI agents has changed how I build, debug, and ship software.

An onboarding RPG that turns a new hire’s first weeks into quests. Playable at firstrun.fit.

In the past, launching a software product took months of engineering. Here is how I designed, built, and shipped three digital products in weeks using AI.

Having spent months building real software with both, here is a detailed breakdown of terminal-native Claude Code versus IDE-native Cursor.

Applied on 1 June, audit approved on 9 June, Pearson VUE exam booked on 13 June.

Product management is notorious for coordination overhead. By building lightweight AI automation pipelines, PMs can reclaim focus and build better products.

As models become more robust and developers transition to agentic workflows, the era of prompt hacking is ending. The future belongs to systems engineering.

In the fragmented landscape of LLM integrations, the Model Context Protocol (MCP) is emerging as the unifying open standard that links models to data sources and tools.

The first version of a tool that analyses a website from one URL and turns it into an IA spreadsheet. Live at attractiveweb.site.

“My Way of Logging Life”: why I keep a record of work, travel, food and thoughts.

An onboarding RPG for new hires and people joining a project. You join Make Feelbetter, a fictional IT company, pick one of five roles (developer, PMO, publisher, planner, designer) and make real work decisions in quests given by mentor NPCs. Free to play in the browser, no sign-up.

A website analysis tool: paste one URL and it reads the page’s metadata, links, structure, images and technology stack, then turns them into an IA (information architecture) spreadsheet you can hand to a client. DeepAnalyzer crawls several pages to map a whole site. Free to try without signing up.

Mexico City and a balloon over Teotihuacan, Puebla, Guadalajara and tequila, Guanajuato and San Miguel de Allende.

A business trip to Jakarta, then work carried on from a villa in Ubud and a jeep sunrise at Kintamani.

I left my job and bought the ticket on the day I flew. It started at my old homestay in Bournemouth and ended in Rome.

I document work, projects, travel, food, and my thoughts. This blog is a personal project notebook to organize past experiences and mistakes, helping to make the next choices slightly better.