Monday, June 25, 2007
Saying Goodbye...
This past week has been full of goodbyes and "lasts":
- our last Korean BBQ
- our last time in Seoul
- our last trip to church
- our last post-church meal at Dos Tacos (the best Mexican food this side of the Pacific)
- our last class (for some of our classes...we still have to teach today)
- our last hang-out session with David and Jerra
You get the idea...here are some pictures of some of those "lasts":
The best part about icecream parties: when you hand the kids their icecream, the room falls silent and for the 5 minutes that they're eating their treat, there's no screaming! It's a beautiful thing.
This is Sam's essay-writing class...they threw a little surprise party for him :0)
This is my favourite class...we had a great party on Friday night, complete with pizza, pop, icecream and games!
Our last lunch at Dos Tacos...Korean style Mexican food is delicious!
Sam's last meal that includes a "fat dish". We didn't really eat this, but a Korean friend told us they actually serve a plate of pig fat with this meal...gross!
- our last Korean BBQ
- our last time in Seoul
- our last trip to church
- our last post-church meal at Dos Tacos (the best Mexican food this side of the Pacific)
- our last class (for some of our classes...we still have to teach today)
- our last hang-out session with David and Jerra
You get the idea...here are some pictures of some of those "lasts":
The best part about icecream parties: when you hand the kids their icecream, the room falls silent and for the 5 minutes that they're eating their treat, there's no screaming! It's a beautiful thing.
This is Sam's essay-writing class...they threw a little surprise party for him :0)
This is my favourite class...we had a great party on Friday night, complete with pizza, pop, icecream and games!
Our last lunch at Dos Tacos...Korean style Mexican food is delicious!
Sam's last meal that includes a "fat dish". We didn't really eat this, but a Korean friend told us they actually serve a plate of pig fat with this meal...gross!
Our Last Weekend
As some of you know, this is our last full day in Korea. On June 26th, we'll be flying home to the great west! Since it was our last weekend here, we decided to go out in style and spend one last day sight-seeing in Seoul. We joined our partners-in-crime, David and Jerra, and headed to a beautiful palace. This palace is only accesible by tour, and we turned out to be quite the tour delinquents...we really wanted to get pictures and weren't in a rush, so we ended up WAY behind the tour group. Every time we got to a new spot, the lady was already finished her informational speal and was moving everyone off to the next site. Pretty funny! The palace highlight was the "Forbidden Gardens" (don't worry...no longer forbidden!), where we saw a beautiful pond that was full of lotus flower leaves and some blossoms. The blossoms weren't in full bloom, but the green leaves and occassional blossoms floating on the water was pretty cool to see!
After the palace, we headed over to the Han River. We wanted to go boating, but weren't able to find any reasonable places to do it. We found one dock owner that wanted to charge us $30 for a 5 minute boat ride...ummmm, NO! So, we contended ourselves with a nice walk along the river instead.
Our final destination was Seoul Tower...a space-needle/CN tower'ish structure on a small mountain in the middle of Seoul. We got to see the lights of the whole city one last time. It was really beautiful! Unfortunately, I accidentally left our camera on all day and the battery was drained by that time, so we have no pictures. You'll have to imagine it :0)
Here are some pictures from the earlier part of our day:
Sam and David with the main throne room in the distance. This was near the beginning of our tour, before we started to seriously lag behind.
Jerra and I in front of the throne room.
A pretty shot...I felt very artistic taking this.
Me with the lotus flower pond.
Sam and I outside of the concubine's quarters. No, I was not trying to seduce young Samuel ;0)
Our walk along the Han River.
After the palace, we headed over to the Han River. We wanted to go boating, but weren't able to find any reasonable places to do it. We found one dock owner that wanted to charge us $30 for a 5 minute boat ride...ummmm, NO! So, we contended ourselves with a nice walk along the river instead.
Our final destination was Seoul Tower...a space-needle/CN tower'ish structure on a small mountain in the middle of Seoul. We got to see the lights of the whole city one last time. It was really beautiful! Unfortunately, I accidentally left our camera on all day and the battery was drained by that time, so we have no pictures. You'll have to imagine it :0)
Here are some pictures from the earlier part of our day:
Sam and David with the main throne room in the distance. This was near the beginning of our tour, before we started to seriously lag behind.
Jerra and I in front of the throne room.
A pretty shot...I felt very artistic taking this.
Me with the lotus flower pond.
Sam and I outside of the concubine's quarters. No, I was not trying to seduce young Samuel ;0)Our walk along the Han River.Monday, June 11, 2007
Baekundae
This past Thursday was a holiday in Korea - the equivalent of Memorial (if you're Canadian)/Veteran's (if you're American) Day. Seeing as we had the day off, we decided the best way to spend it was hiking. We headed into Seoul, met up with David and Jerra, and...proceeded to wander the streets aimlessly for 20 minutes looking for our bus. We decided to ask someone where we should go, and chose a sporty looking man with white running shoes on. He was so nice - hummed and hawwed, asked store owners and finally led us to the correct bus stop. That's when he proceeded to tell us that he was going to come with us and be our guide that day (he probably figured that if our luck navigating the mountain corresponded to our luck navigating the bus system, we would be goners out there). And that's what he did. We found out that our new friend's English name was David, and get this - he hikes barefoot! He's been doing it for a year, and says it helps with blood circulation. Let me just say that this was not an easy, barefoot-able hike! The last 30 minutes of it was up a cliff face, where we had to pull ourselves up with a wire cable...he was still barefooted. Extremely hardcore!
Here are some pictures from our day:
A pretty guard post we came across.
You might want to click on this picture to make it bigger. Can you see the little black line that looks like a bunch of ants marching single file? Those are people! You're looking at the final part of the hike...up the cliff face to the top. I have never before had to wait in a line of people for my turn to reach the top!
Sam on his way up the crazy rock part of this hike.
Sam and David...our fabulous guide (this guy even shared his food with us and taught us some history of the mountain).
Heading back down the scary rock face...extremely steep!
Enjoying a little snack on our way down. (Notice that David is still barefooted).
Sidenote: this is a fabulous new dessert we've discovered. It's called bing-su, and it's basically crushed ice with frozen yogurt and fruit on it. You mash it all up and then enjoy. It's so good and addictive. The traditional Korean stuff comes with red beans and rice cakes in it...also delicious, but the fruit is my favorite!
Here are some pictures from our day:
A pretty guard post we came across.
You might want to click on this picture to make it bigger. Can you see the little black line that looks like a bunch of ants marching single file? Those are people! You're looking at the final part of the hike...up the cliff face to the top. I have never before had to wait in a line of people for my turn to reach the top!
Sam on his way up the crazy rock part of this hike.
Sam and David...our fabulous guide (this guy even shared his food with us and taught us some history of the mountain).
Heading back down the scary rock face...extremely steep!
Enjoying a little snack on our way down. (Notice that David is still barefooted).
Sidenote: this is a fabulous new dessert we've discovered. It's called bing-su, and it's basically crushed ice with frozen yogurt and fruit on it. You mash it all up and then enjoy. It's so good and addictive. The traditional Korean stuff comes with red beans and rice cakes in it...also delicious, but the fruit is my favorite!Saturday, June 02, 2007
Happy Birthday Sam!
Tomorrow (June 3rd) is Sam's 27th birthday, so today I decided to surprise him with a trip to a water themepark called "Caribbean Bay".
We had a great time. The sun was out, the lines weren't too bad, and the slides were really fun! Also, we found out something new about Korea - at waterslide parks it's imperative that everybody wears a swimming cap. We had just made our way to our first slide, grabbed inner tubes, and were about to head up the stairs when a lifeguard blocked us, pointed at his head and said "cap". Our response: "huh?". After more gestures and a quick look around, we realized that every single person was wearing either a ball cap, a doo-rag (I'm sure I didn't spell that right), a towel, or a swimming cap on their head. We still have no idea why. We don't think it was to keep hair out of the water, because people didn't tuck their hair into the caps. We don't think it was for sun-stroke, because the water kept everybody cool. We don't think it was for fashion, because we all looked ridiculous. It's just one of those things that we've come to terms with never understanding. We had to run down to the nearest souvenir shop and buy two of the most fashionable swimming caps that we could find (see pictures below).
We had a great time in the wave pool...the waves were so powerful that there was an actual "danger zone" where noone was allowed to stand because that was where the wave crashed over. It was very fun! Extreme body surfing.
Another funny thing: everyone (not just kids...everyone) wore life jackets...everywhere. Even if they were sitting in a hot-tub, they wore a lifejacket. Even if they were only up to their knees in the wave pool, they wore a lifejacket. Even if they were going on a slide, where it would be absolutely impossible to drown unless someone knocked them out and held their face in the 1 inch of water that flowed down the tube...even then, they wore a lifejacket. Hmmm...
Anyways, enjoy the pictures of our funny, fun-filled day...
Sam enjoying his pre-waterpark breakfast of bacon, eggs, scones, fruit salad, orange juice, and green tea...we knew we'd need lots of energy for a day on the slides!
This is Sam outside of the entrance to Caribbean Bay.
The birthday boy in the lunch-line. We ordered burgers and fries from one of the snack shops.
Here we are in front of the wave-pool.
This was the Adventure Park. That huge skull in the background would fill with water and then tip over and dump galloons of water on whoever was standing below...very fun!
Sam with his ultra-hot swimming cap.
As you can see, I picked a cap that went with my outfit.
We had a great time. The sun was out, the lines weren't too bad, and the slides were really fun! Also, we found out something new about Korea - at waterslide parks it's imperative that everybody wears a swimming cap. We had just made our way to our first slide, grabbed inner tubes, and were about to head up the stairs when a lifeguard blocked us, pointed at his head and said "cap". Our response: "huh?". After more gestures and a quick look around, we realized that every single person was wearing either a ball cap, a doo-rag (I'm sure I didn't spell that right), a towel, or a swimming cap on their head. We still have no idea why. We don't think it was to keep hair out of the water, because people didn't tuck their hair into the caps. We don't think it was for sun-stroke, because the water kept everybody cool. We don't think it was for fashion, because we all looked ridiculous. It's just one of those things that we've come to terms with never understanding. We had to run down to the nearest souvenir shop and buy two of the most fashionable swimming caps that we could find (see pictures below).
We had a great time in the wave pool...the waves were so powerful that there was an actual "danger zone" where noone was allowed to stand because that was where the wave crashed over. It was very fun! Extreme body surfing.
Another funny thing: everyone (not just kids...everyone) wore life jackets...everywhere. Even if they were sitting in a hot-tub, they wore a lifejacket. Even if they were only up to their knees in the wave pool, they wore a lifejacket. Even if they were going on a slide, where it would be absolutely impossible to drown unless someone knocked them out and held their face in the 1 inch of water that flowed down the tube...even then, they wore a lifejacket. Hmmm...
Anyways, enjoy the pictures of our funny, fun-filled day...
Sam enjoying his pre-waterpark breakfast of bacon, eggs, scones, fruit salad, orange juice, and green tea...we knew we'd need lots of energy for a day on the slides!
This is Sam outside of the entrance to Caribbean Bay.
The birthday boy in the lunch-line. We ordered burgers and fries from one of the snack shops.
Here we are in front of the wave-pool.
This was the Adventure Park. That huge skull in the background would fill with water and then tip over and dump galloons of water on whoever was standing below...very fun!
Sam with his ultra-hot swimming cap.
As you can see, I picked a cap that went with my outfit.
