Korean Folk Village

Our Social committee put together a trip to the Korean Folk Village just in time for us to experience the blooming of the cherry and plumb trees.  It was a wonderful experience.

Hike to Happy Hour!

The people of the Woomi and Good Morning Apartments of which I am a part of, finally had our very first ever, happy hour in the neighborhood.  It was a major event for us tragically suburban dwellers to get a crew of people to come to our neighborhood to spend their Friday night.  I think the 2 hour hike from school to the bar was a major draw for at least 15 people and the others who showed up are just great spirits, ready to party in any "dong."  So here's some pics to commemorate the event. 

Strolling

This Saturday Loren and I took a leisurely stroll through our neighborhood and into another that many KIS teachers live in called Daedok.  I brought the camera to document to arrival of spring and to make sure when we move on to other countries, we don't forget the sights we used to see so often in Korea.  We walked along the bike path we ride to school some mornings and ended our tour in one of the many cafes in Daedok that us Woomians envy so much.

My home, Korea

I was looking through all my blog posts and noticed, not many focus on our host country.  So, here is a post dedicated to the wonderfulness that is Korea.  I will present to you this wonderfulness through some photos I've taken but not bothered to post. 

  This giant crab is a very important symbol for me and Loren.  On the way to our apartment the very first night we arrived in Korea,  our bus driver got lost and did a U turn in front of this crab at least 3 times.

  Ahh, the red express buses that shoot us into Seoul.  Our favorites are the 5500 and the 6900.  For a mere 1800w, ($1.50) we can go to Itaewon when we are craving some good non Korean food, Insadong for some art and culture, Myeongdong for the shopping, Yongson for our electronics and wii games, Sincheon for a great night out, Coex Mall for the mall experience...  If you can manage to get a seat, the ride to and from Seoul is quite enjoyable!

 

In its cute bearish bowels, this fancy looking building named Bear Castle houses our main supply of food; a store called Home Plus.   They used to have a pet store right outside the Home Plus.   I used to love to look at the hedgehogs, bunnies, and mice and dream of holding and loving them like I used to with my wonderful cats in Vegas.  Now they moved the pet store some where not quite as noticeable from the produce isles. 

Apparently you can get married in the Bear Castle.   It is a popular place for it.  I think there is something lost in translation here because this would not have been my first pick when Loren and I were planning our wedding, but maybe it makes sense for a building to have a name like Bear Castle that houses many different types of stores with one of them being a wedding parlor...  I still don't get it.

Around the corner from this building is also our favorite movie theater where we've seen many exciting English language movies on Sunday afternoons. 

 

Loren my have embraced Korean food, but he doesn't enjoy the pickled daicon root that is in almost all Kimbap, a kind of rice and seaweed roll that you can get everywhere.  

We chose this restaurant one Saturday afternoon because it looked like the easiest Korean restaurant to order from.  It had pictures on the walls of foods we recognized so we could point and grunt. 

This picture shows typical Korean living spaces in the Bundang area.  Apartments seem to be the only place to live and they all pretty much look the same.  They are tall, beige or gray with lots of little windows and with fancy names painted on the sides often in English such as Good Morning Hill, or Paragon or Houseville. The apartments are very different when you get inside though. 

The buildings struck me the most when I got to Korea.  They are so tall and every floor is festooned with advertising and blinking lights.  Many buildings have restaurants on the 3rd, or 4th and 5th floors or all the way up to the roof, which may not cap off the building after 20 floors!  Maybe on in-between floors there will be a screen golfing room, or a noribong, (karioke room), or a business.  Oh and the Hagwons are not to be forgotten.  In many building you can learn how to play the guitar, take jazz dance lessons, improve your English skills, learn algebra or get tutoring in any subject you are struggling in right upstairs from your favorite cafe or bar or who knows what. There doesn't seem to be any order to what they allow to occupy space in the same building.  It's kind of fun though because you are always surprised by what's just up stairs.

More Korea love to come.

Just waiting...

We are in an unsettling time of the school year when we still have a lot of days left of work, but the end is fast approaching.  This year it's not just the end of the school year, but the end of our time in Korea.  We're moving to Shanghai.  At this point we are starting to feel certain questions bubbling up to the surface.  Do we start to plan for the summer, the move to Shanghai, start packing?  Who knows what Shanghai will be like.  Will we like our new home, our new jobs, colleagues?  What will we have wished we had brought with us this time?  Hangers like when we got here to Korea?  What will we miss from Korea besides our wonderful group of friends? 
In the mean time, work continues.  We are still grading, creating new lessons, hopefully engaging our students.  Social life continues with hanging out with friends, planning out our weekends, training for a sprint triathlon in May.  Somehow it still feels like we are waiting. 

The future is more present at the moment then the here and now. 

Noryangjin Fish Market

Yesterday a large group of us went to the Noryangjin Fish Market, the largest fish market in Seoul.  We perused the merchandise, then Danielle our East Coast expert selected some scallops, clams, a sea bass, prawns and a flounder to be bought and carried to a restaurant at the end of market that will cook up all your freshly purchased fish to perfection.  It was rediculiously cheep and quite tasty.  These are the experiences that I love in Korea and I know Loren and I are interested in packing in as many of them in as possible.  We would still love some visitors to show around this cool city.  Any takers?

Valentines Adventures in Seoul

 

For Valentines we decided to be tourists in our own city for a change. We booked a room at the Hill House Hotel and ventured out into the great big city. Our first day in Seoul we visited the Changdeokgung Palace which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

 

It was incredible to see how a huge palace complex could hide so quietly in the presence of the concrete giants that surround it. 

 

Once through the giant gate, the palace grounds were serene and spacious.

They engulfed my imagination entirely.  I could imagine the last emperor, Emperor Sunjeong padding softly to his wife's chambers while wearing his Hanbok attire and soft slippers on his feet.

 

 

The Hanbok imagery was probably enhanced by the few Korean tourists wearing their Hanbok, traditional Korean dress, to honor the Lunar New Year holiday.

 

 Loren commented that he'd much rather live in a Korean palace than in a cold European castle. I'd have to agree.  The palace buildings are made mostly of wood with stone forming the foundations.  Many palace buildings have airy doors and windows covered in lattice work and a whitish paper material covering that I imagine lets in a beautifully diffused light.

After the palace, we walked through Samcheongdonggil a cute neighborhood full of boutiques, restaurants, galleries, and coffee shops.  We stopped for some tea and cheese cake right across the street from the President's residence.

One thing Korea really does well is cafes. There are tons of little cafes with that hard to manufacture Ma and Pa feeling, and yet, they are all manufactured to cozy perfection.

Feeling full and warmed up from our tea and cake we confidently struck out again in hopes of finding our hotel since it was getting late and we still hadn't checked in yet. After living in Seoul for one and a half years we thought we'd be able to find it on foot. We knew it was close to Myeongdong which I was certain was in the vicinity of City Hall. We started to walk in the direction we thought it'd be in and instead found a Lunar New Year festival taking place on a busy intersection that was closed down for the purpose. People were flying kites, ice-skating, and listening to a traditional Korean drum performance.

 

  

 

We absorbed the cultural experience while still heading in the direction of our hotel. Unfortunately I also started absorbing the unforgiving winter cold along with an impatience for the milling masses who were constantly meandering in my path. We started to try and find the hotel more in earnest.

We realized that even though we've lived in Korea for one and a half years, we are not experts on the Seoul area seeing as we live in the burbs.   We called the hotel for directions then jumped on the subway and popped out at Hoehyeon station.  From there, the hotel was just a short taxi ride away.   Looks like we need more than just time in the burbs with in frequent trips into the big city to figure Seoul out.

 

Our room was very warm from the ondol flooring and comfy even in spite of the questionable art work above the bed. 

 

It was so tempting to drift off to sleep instead of trying to find a nice place to eat dinner but we forced ourselves back out into the cold, crowded streets. We headed to Myeongdong, a shopper's Mecca, where it is said over one million people pass through on a daily basis, to find the location of our romantic Valentines dinner.

Loren, joining the milling masses in Myeongdong for the first time, was mesmerized by the lights and crowds. I've been there more than a couple of times because it houses the only sure bet for western women to find clothing that won't break the bank and will also fit our amazonian proportions, Forever 21. Yes, I know, it's not really p.c. to shop there but until I can find an alternative, I guiltily patronize the mega 3 story Forever 21 when I'm desperately, and I mean desperately, in need of some retail therapy.

Our stomachs told us there was no time for shopping so we found a lovely Italian restaurant called Spannew to fit the bill for a romantic dinner to be accompanied by a glass of wine.  After our long day and filling dinner, we decided to call it a night.

When we awoke, we put two things on the agenda for our day after v-day: watch shopping, and movie watching. Loren promised me a new watch for my 30th b-day and we've had a bit of trouble finding one. So, we hit Myeongdong again and scoured the shops for the perfect watch. The watch shopping was a success. 
The only English movie we hadn't seen yet was Wolfman, so up to the 10th floor cinema of another massive shopping mall we went.  I don't think either of us were prepared for the carnage that was to unfold before our eyes.   Nothing says romance like a bloody gore fest.  (I'm not sure I needed to see handsome Benicio Del Toro covered in fur and even worse, covered in bloody entrails!)  We survived the movie, admired my new watch, had a nice Indian lunch and headed back home to Bundang. 

Loren and I agree there is still a ton to see in Seoul before we leave it for Shanghai next year.  We hope to be able to check out all of it's sites before we leave.  Our Valentines weekend was a good start.

Happy Valentines day to all and a happy Lunar New Year as well.