Wednesday, January 28, 2009

"????" is to "Sam" as "The Great Wall" is to "Alison"

Can you tell I have been studying up for the GRE?

Well, when we went to China Alison fulfilled her lifelong dream of seeing and walking The Great Wall.  Japan was my opportunity to fulfill my lifelong dream of seeing the snow monkeys(or Japanese Macaque, if you want to be technical) I can't tell you when I saw my first documentary blurb on the snow monkeys, but I remember being fascinated.  There was just something about them that really caught my eye.  I have always loved monkeys, my very first "Animal Report" is Mrs. Hortzman's 3rd grade class was about Jane Goodall and her chimpanzees.  The monkeys are always a must see when I go to the zoo, and I still secretly look for jobs in Africa where you live and work on a chimpanzee orphanage and care for abandoned monkeys(shhhh don't tell Alison)  But I digress.  The snow monkeys are my favorite, and I have psychoanalyzed why, I will now explain.....  I love childhood/children/all that fun stuff.  I don't long for a lost childhood or anything, but man!!! being a kid was fun!!! My friends and I would just run around, go to the pool, play in the creek, dig around for animals in the ground, go fishing in a pond, every once in a while get in a little fight.  It was just good times, and nothing takes me back to being a kid more than seeing monkeys run around in the snow, chase each other, wrestle with each other, and swim around in a pool.  I mean seriously, MONKEYS and SNOW!!!  God has taken two of the most fun and endlessly entertaining things on the entire Earth and put them in one place!  WOW!!!  haha, ok, settle down Sam.  Alison will blog more about the rest of the Japan trip, but here are the links to the snow monkey pictures.



Friday, January 23, 2009

Hitting the Slopes

Well, I haven't done it since 9th grade (and we won't mention how many years ago that was, because some of you are all together too good at math) but last weekend Sam and I hit the slopes. Overall it was a good time. I might have cried a little bit once, but that was only from the humiliation of having to haul my skis back up the slope while a large group of Korean children laughed at me. But other than THAT :) Sam was an excellent ski-er and tore up every slope on the mountain along with Jordan on snowboard. David tried snowboarding for the first time and was such a trooper. He didn't cry at all!
Skiing here is actually a really sweet deal. 50,000 won got us a bus ticket there and back and an all day lift ticket. Then it was only about 14,000 won for the ski rentals. We went to Phoenix Park, which I can in no way tell you where it was geographically, but there were ummm... mountains... and snow... so, north? It wasn't too crowded and we got about 3 inches of snow over the course of the morning. So that was fun, but made seeing a bit of a challenge!
All suited up and ready to go! (What is wrong with my face??)

The mountain's many slopes.

Snowboarders just look cooler. Even if they do fall down more.



The cutest ski-er of all.

Aaaand to contine the trend of posting the most flattering pictures of myself as possible, me awkwardly holding Sam's skis and attempting to look "tough". I'll probably photo shop this face onto all the wedding photos... hott!




We plan on getting out at least one more time before we leave... in just 4 weeks... Ahhhhh!!! Also, our trip to Japan is this weekend, so instead of snow bunnies we'll be seeing snow monkeys. Hopefully I won't get my face eaten off! Have a good weekend and happy Solnal (Chinese/Korean new year) to you!

Monday, January 12, 2009

Food for Thought

If you're here for the pictures you may want to skip over this post :)

For those of you that don't know that me that well, I will let you in on a little secret. I am kind of a blog stalker (with the "kind of" being maybe the understatement of the year). My Google Reader regularly logs over 100 blog entries with the posts varying from weddings to cooking and healthy living to travel and photography to religion to motherhood to travel. It pretty much runs the gamut, and now, looking at it, pretty much sums up who I am pretty succinctly. (Well, except for the motherhood part... that's just more of a preperation for the very distant future!)

Wait, why am I writing about blogs on a... blog, you might ask. Well, in reading these blogs about other people's thoughts and other people's lives I find myself thinking, "Wow, that's amazing! I want to do that!" Some of these people, including people who are my actual real-life friends and not just people I stalk... errrr follow on-line, are doing amazing things and having amazing adventures. Today as I was reading one of their entries I got a bit jealous of their life and the places it is taking them, and then I got to thinking...

I am truly excited about my own life and where it is taking ME as well! It might be taking me in a different direction, and in some ways not the exact direction that I might have thought, or even picked, several years ago, but yet I am content. There is adventure in front of me including a marriage and reunions with family and friends, and yes, travel and food (and hopefully healthy living!). And the best part is that just as 2 years ago I never would have predicted that on this night I would be sitting in a TGIFriday's in Seoul celebrating the birthday of a friend from Canada there is no telling where I (we) will be in another 2 years.

What adventures are on your horizon right now?

Friday, January 9, 2009

A Blast From the Past

Are you ready for a seriously RANDOM post?? Good! I finally brought my crappy old camera home from school (where I angrily tossed it into my desk drawer on the last day of the semester because the stupid batteries died after I was able to take only TWO pictures of my classes, some of my favorites ever!! Single rolling tear.) Anyway, there were some real gems on the memory card, so I figured I'll cram them all into one post, because, well, why not?

First up: Classes Last Semester

The two measely pictures from last semester's classes. (Let's not mention the fact that it may or may not be my fault for waiting until the LAST day of the semester to take my camera to class... shhhhh... just look at the pictures of cute Korean kids!!!)

Hayden. The cutest nug of a kid you've ever seen. (This picture does not capture his tiny-ness)Sam stole him this semester, but is nice enough to share him when we combine our English Village intensive class on Tuesday/Thursday. (Yes, Sam and I are co-teaching a class. We're pretty awesome at it, I'm not going to lie. Or I just like doing less work. No, it's probably because we're awesome.)
Brian2 and Kai. Sam has Kai this semester, too. Ohhhh Kai. He's kind of a turd, but he sounds like a Muppet when he talks, soooo I heart Kai, too. I was also upset that Brian2 did not wear his bright red jacket and then claim to be cold and zip it alllll the way up with the hood on so you could only see 2 inches of his face. It annoys me whenever other kids do it (or when Sam does it to me in my hoodie sweatshirts) but for some reason he was super cute.
Topic 2: A-mazing Waffles
Before Kendra left we went to Cafe ImA in Gwangwhamun to have their famous ice cream waffles. There is ALWAYS a wait there, but it is TOTALLY worth it. Seriously, if you are in Seoul, I cannot stress this enough. Eat. These. Waffles.


Can you say holy yum? I mean, I don't even like waffles that much, but these were de-li-cious. You get to choose your two flavors of ice cream, or you can get fruit on top (which I'm sure is also good, but the ice cream seemed more appealing this day). We shared the waffle and had some really good soup before and were stuffed afterwards!

And finally: The Kimchi Museum!
The Kimchi Museum is quite tiny and located in Coex Mall (which means that you are practically obligated to have lunch at On the Border while you're there) and only costs 3000 won. It's quite informative, but I would recommend it towards the end of your time in Korea, because, well, I personally feel that it takes awhile to truly TRULY appreciate the gloriousness that is kimchi.
So many kinds of kimchi!
But cucumber kimchi is my favorite, hands down!
Did I mention that the museum is informative? It even has an entire hallway dedicated to how kimchi is good for your health! Here we have a depiction of how it cleans out your digestive system. (I would point out the pile of d-d-o-n-g, but I'm not 12 years old.)

Kendra learning about how kimchi is pretty much the same (but still different!) all over Korea.Different kinds of kimchi pots.
And now for quite possibly the least flattering picture ever taken of me. Obviously I had to post it on the internet. We watched a small child sit so that the woman was feeding her just before we got there. It turns out when you are full grown you have to sprawl across the scene, which I'm pretty sure is not what it's meant for, but when a wax figure wants to feed me a piece of delicious kimchi, who am I to say no??
It's official. I have no shame.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Seodeamun Prison

This weekend we continued on our quest to check more things off of our "must see" list in Seoul. We met up with several other teachers to visit Seodeamun Prison which is one of the more somber places we have visited to date. Seodaemun Prison was used by the Japanese as a place to detain and torture Korean resistance fighters during their occupation in the early 1900s. I actually don't have too many pictures, because in many areas of the museum they are not allowed, and honestly many of the vignettes they have set up to depict what happened to the resistance fighters were so graphic that I understand why they have the "no photo" signs everywhere. I found it strange as well that there were so many small children running around.

Anyway, here is a view of the prison from above. Most of the buildings were under construction while we were there, so a picture of a picture will give you the best idea of the layout.


Front gate.

The first building that you enter is an exhibition hall, where all of the vignettes are set up, to give you an idea of what prison life was actually like. It still amazes me that South Korea is what it is today with so much oppression and utter destruction in the very recent past.

We then entered the prison buildings themselves. Looking down a hallway that was under construction, with all of the cell doors standing ajar but deserted was eerie.
Such small cells.
Sometimes the human capacity for evil is more than I can take.

Overall it was a very interesting trip and reminded me again of what a resiliant nation South Korea truly is!

Saturday, January 3, 2009

Happy New Year!

We hope you all enjoyed your New Year's Eve! Word is my parents actually managed to stay awake until 12pm this year... woowee! We decided to head downtown for the general melee, because, well, why not?

Do I look chunkier than normal? That's because I am wearing EIGHTEEN pieces of clothing. Literally. Have I mention I really don't like the cold?
The riot police were out. As usual. It's funny because we were with some people who are newer to Korea and they were a bit freaked out by their presence while we didn't feel like it was too unordinary! The girls were walking a little slower than the guys at the beginning and got cut off when they formed a line. There were a few tense moments but we managed to use our ninja skills to get through to reunite. (Or we might have just snuck through where an break opened up, but that's not really as exciting, is it?)


Laurie, Tom and Steve, do you remember this cow?? He was making the rounds again for NYE, but repurposed because 2009 is the year of the, you guessed it, cow! There were lots of hats shaped like cows, too.
The sign reads "Lee Myung Bak OUT". A lot of people still don't like the President.

Braving the cold and the crowds.

LOTS of people.

And as the clock struck midnight it was time to light the fireworks. In a crowd! Nothing makes the New Year more exciting than the possibility of being accidentally lit on fire!
Later we headed to Mike's Cabin in Sinchon to warm up. Can you tell I have 4 shirts on??? We didn't stay out too late as we're both still a tad under the weather, but overall it was a fun way to ring in 2009, a year that is going to be very eventful! Just 7 weeks 'til we bid "aneyang" to Korea... ahhhh!

Happy New Year everyone!