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Soohyun Chang
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It was in the very last hours of the year 2010. Maybe eight hours to go. Year 2010? Was it a good year? What did you do? We were standing at the offspring of the artificial river Cheonggyecheon in Seoul. It was unbearably cold. Soohyun explained her native city to me. I tried to listen, but I was hardly breathing. Soohyun didn’t seem to care much about the cold. Then we met Sae, we went for some Samgetyang, chicken soup with rice. The old serving ladies laughed at us (laughed on us?), and we laughed back. And then we separated and the year had maybe four hours to go and I got lost in the night, in the cold, in Seoul. Soohyun tells you about her projects and the houses she is going to build and she connects you to all these people in Seoul and you try to absorb everything but fail, as she is bursting with energy and you are freezing. And then you meet her in Zurich, but Zurich was too small for her, so now it’s London. And you remember that the first time was in Basel. You were introduced by a common architect friend, and you realize how amazingly globalised the architect’s world is. Go to Cargo Bar in Basel on a Thursday night and it’s full of Herzog & de Meuron architects from all over the world and you are exotic because, yes, you actually were born in this small city. And Soohyun is all globalised, all Korean, all over the world, all energy.

People
Soohyun Chang