long lost blog....

Dear blog readers- I know I have not posted anything of too much excitement recently. However, life has been pretty normal lately. It's really like anywhere else, it starts to become a routine. I go to work and out to eat and walk around and do normal everyday things.

This weekend I am going on a hiking trip, so I should have some pictures to post. Here is a description of the hike. I am a little afraid of these "suspension bridges" at the top, but they say they are perfectly safe, so I'm sure they are....

"There will be a trip to Mt. Daedun this Saturday 5th December. This mountain in the Jeollabuk province is one of the most spectacular mountains in Korea. The scenery here is breathtaking. We will be taking a cable car most of the way up the mountain. Then the peak is only a couple of bridges away.

Be warned that these bridges look scary, but they are perfectly safe. The best part of the trip will be reaching the peak of the mountain. An incredible 360 degree view makes it all worth it! On the way down, you may either take the cable car or hike it. The hike down takes 2 fun hours. The cable car takes 7 minutes. So if you don't like hiking, you can spend those extra two hours enjoying the many markets and restaurants in the area.

There are the great variety of things to see and the scenic views, the strangely shaped rocks in almost every corner of the valleys would be examples.

The mountain houses the eighty meter height bridge, and one can see faraway the West Sea when the sky is clear from the bridge. The long, beautiful yet steep hike includes crossing two hair-raising suspension bridges over deep cliffs."

This past weekend, I did enjoy a Thanksgiving potluck. It was delicious. There was a turkey with mashed potatoes and gravy! I made home made stuffing which was the hit of the dinner I think. I plan on making it again for the Christmas dinner.

Korea, Korea

It snowed! If you look very, very closely, you can see a snow flake!



For less than 5 bucks, I got this cute little tree and ornaments to hang on. I am hoping to get a slightly larger one soon, but for now, this will do.



Do you suppose 'Thousand Ireland Dressing' is the same as Thousand Island?? Sure tastes the same. This is some typical, bad translation.

TIK.... this is Korea

So this blog has mostly been about the things I have done or seen in Korea, but I think I need to talk more about Korea itself. Korea is like no other place I have experienced. The culture is completely different from what I am used to, and sometimes hard to understand, but can be appreciated all the same.

1) There is never a lack of customer service. At the grocery store, the mall, anywhere you go, the minute it seems like you might look at an item, someone is right there to assist you. Now remember, you don't speak the same language, so the help is not always useful, but they are there none the less. In every aisle at the grocery store, a nice lady is standing waiting for the next customer to approach. I was once trying to find laundry detergent (detergent and fabric softener look strikingly similar when you can't read the package, and mind you, they have a way larger selection of these two products then they do cereal - cereal: maybe 8 types, laundry detergent and fabric softener- at least 30 types. I don't get it... but then again TIK), and the woman approached and pointed to one bottle and started talking about it. All I could do was smile and nod.

2)Koreans stay to the left. They drive to the right, but walk to the left. The government is trying to change this. In the subway, there are little arrows on the ground showing you which side to walk to. Some people have made the change, and some can't be bothered. This makes for mass confusion in a crowded subway tunnel. Walking up the stairs turns into a blob of confusion. Some people are staying to the left, some are staying to the right, and some are just pushing up the middle. The same goes for walking down the road. I stay to the right, but when someone is walking towards me and they are on their left, we are marked to run right into each other and it turns into a game of chicken. Who will move out of the way first? It has been my experience, than Koreans don't move out of the way for anything, so I end up dodging them at the last second.

3)FOOD. Anyone who knows me, knows that I love food. Korea does not fall short. There is food everywhere! Street vendors galore, selling everything from dried squid to silkworms to fried spiral-sliced potatoes to waffles with whip cream to hot dogs wrapped in bacon to fried pancakes filled with honey and cinnamon to fresh fruit smoothies to ttoekbokki(delicious rice cakes covered in spicy red pepper sauce, sounds odd, but it's one of my favorites) t0 gyros to corn dogs with french fires in the batter to various meats on a stick... you get my point. Korea loves to eat, and for that, I love Korea.

4)Street vendors- this time not for food, but for anything else you could possibly need. People drive around in trucks and park at random corners and set up shop. These trucks sell things like socks, fruit, leggings, and other various goods.

This will be an ongoing list of things I like about Korea, or just things about Korea in general.

Dipfhy anyone?

This thing about translating Korean to English is that they sometimes just sound it out and pick letters that make similar sounds. I suppose 'Dip- fhy' kind of sounds like 'deep fry', which is what this section of the menu is.

Ahhhh.... KIMCHI

Kimchi is a traditional Korean pickled dish made of vegetables with varied seasonings and is fermented for several months. It is very spicy and sometimes has a sweet taste. The most common form is the spicy cabbage variety. Kimchi is the most common side dish in Korea. It is served with EVERY meal- breakfast, lunch, dinner. Kimchi is also a common ingredient and combined with other ingredients to make dishes such as kimchi stew and kimchi fried rice. It is said to help prevent disease and even cure cancer. The dish produces a bacteria, lactobacillus, during its fermentation that aids in digestion, similar to the bacteria that yogurt contains.
The magazine Health named kimchi in its list of top five "World's Healthiest Foods" for being rich in vitamins, aiding digestion, and even possibly reducing cancer growth.

Just around the corner from where I live lies the Kimchi Field Museum, whose mission is to inform the world about Kimchi. I went to this museum recently. For a mere 3000 won, just over 2 bucks, you can learn all you ever wanted to know about kimchi in less than 10 minutes. The museum was tiny. I really had to strectch my photo ops to make it seem like there was a lot to see. The best part of the museum may have been the tasting room.... as if I have not already eaten enough kimchi in the past three months.


A display of kimchi.


Thank you nice lady for the kimchi.


Kimchi is cool.


Here are fermented foods from around the world. You can see just how Kimchi is similar to several other foods.


MMM.... the tasting room. Every 30 minutes they stock it with fresh kimchi. It's funny, in Korea there really are no food regulations. They can just leave a plate of kimchi out and people are welcome to try at their own will. No one is there to make sure it does not get sneezed on or touched or such.....


Here are some various pots you may want to store your kimchi in.


Hmm.. look at those types of kimchi. So many to choose from.


A display of several kimchi storage pots. It sits in these pots for months fermenting.

Halloween Celebrations and the Da Vinci exhibit

Halloween is not celebrated in Korea. At the grocery store, I found a heap of random Halloween supplies in one corner, and that's it. It was really strange actually. I am used to Halloween stores set up on every corner and every store being filled with Halloween things. My school celebrated by having the kids (and teachers) dress up and bring candy. I must say, the kids were so adorable.




This is Hyung Joon. One of my favorites. He makes the cutest frog I have ever seen. Here he is holding up the words 'today is' that he spelled during activity time.


My kids in the their costumes.



There was definitely not a lack of princesses in my room. Whoa, princess overload. Each one came with wand and a tiara of sorts. It was cute, but come on.... does every 5 year old HAVE to be a princess??


This is a clip of my kids doing the months of the year song to the macarena, monster style.


My kids love to do the chicken dance. I normally help guide them along, but I didn't want to be talking over the video, so this is what you get when you leave them to their own devices..... Watch all the way to the end and look for the child spinning on the carpet. This is Mickey. He can be found spinning this way any time he gets too excited. This child has so much energy, he doesn't know what to do with it. The girl next to him notices, but keeps on dancing. Good for you, Cindy. At the end, she proceeds to say "Mickey stand up" and taps him with her wand. Hilarious.


I dressed up as Batman again. Here I am wearing Mario gloves.


Mario and Batman. And Amanda in the background....


My co-workers after work. Aimee, me, Chrissie, Mel, Amanda. That's a zombie, gypsy, and a spider web.


Amanda and me on Halloween night.



NOVEMBER 1- There is a Da Vinci exhibit in town right now. I went with some friends today to check it out. The exhibit was really neat. They had models of a lot of Da Vinci's inventions and art work. I was pretty impressed by his work. I really had no idea he did so much.


However, the best part of the museum may be the fact that mirrors were hung on almost every wall. I suppose you need to make sure you always look good while viewing the exhibit. Koreans love mirrors. In fact, mirrors are hung all over Korea. There are mirrors on the back of public bathroom doors, in subway stations, at the bus stop, inside almost every elevator. The elevator doors are usually mirrored as well. When no mirror is available, Koreans can be seen using the screen of their phone to see their reflection. It is really quite an obsession.


Robot, Da Vinci style. The movable parts were made to imitate the movement of a human. These motions included sitting up, moving its arms, neck, and an anatomically correct jaw.


Korea is so trusting that the Mona Lisa was hung right out there where anyone could take it. Only a small red rope separated the prized painting from the hands of eager tourists like Amanda. (** please note that I realize it is not the real painting.... it's a joke.)


Da Vinci designed a hook thingy that was meant to fit in the spaces between the bricks on an enemy's wall. This way, no need for a rope ladder which could easily be cut by enemy forces on top of the wall. Here is a model of how it looks compared to the outdated rope ladder. Modern day ice picks use this design.


This is Da Vinci's underwater invention. The helmet is attached to a hose that pumps air in. The suit was only meant for shallow water because the helmet was not prepared to handle the pressure of being in deep water. Looks totally waterproof right???


In the middle of the museum was a 360 mirror.... I mean really Korea. Must we check out all angles of ourselves while in a museum? Or did Da Vinci also invent the 360???


After the exhausting trip through the museum, they offer some cool water. Very refreshing after looking at myself in the mirror for the past hour.