Having to leave the country once again for my visa I found myself in Seoul, South Korea. Technically this post doesn’t belong in my blog since I was not in ‘The Middle Kingdom’ but I think you’ll forgive me. 🙂

My trip began with a quick (less than two hours) flight from the capital to Incheon, South Korea. The flight was in the middle of the day which is nice because I didn’t have to get up early but also isn’t nice because by the time I got to Korea, traveled to the hostel, and found some supper, the day was pretty much shot. I can’t decide which way is better. 

If you recall, back in November I had to go to Hong Kong for similar reasons.  That was by myself but I felt like I had way too much help.  The trip to Korea was a different story.  I got to experience ordering a ticket and having it delivered to my door and paying for it in cash!  That was fun.  I found a place to stay in Seoul called the “Happy House”.  It was highly rated on the internet and, let’s face it, it’s called “happy”.  How can you go wrong?  I arrived at the airport, exchanged some money, and found myself on the airport express heading into Seoul.  My ticket for the express train cost 3400W!  I made it to the subway station that was near my hostel and followed the directions. (Thanks to my handy iPod Touch I didn’t have to write anything down.) 🙂  I managed to find the hiding hostel.  It was in an interesting part of town.  I’m glad the directions included certain ‘landmarks’ along the way or I never would have thought to go that way. 

After checking in, I found some supper at a nearby Chinese 🙂 restaurant.  I guess I can’t avoid them!  I was informed (through charades once again) that I was to take off my shoes if I wanted to eat at that table. Okay. Check.  I pointed to something at the menu because, even though I feel comfortable ordering for myself in China, I find myself in Korea…at a Chinese restaurant…with a waitress that speaks Korean. I’m starting over again. Back at square one. The food was enjoyed while watching pairs figure skating on the huge TV right in front of me.

I headed back to the hostel after supper and met my roommate and her three-year-old child. Funny thing…when I met them I said, ‘she’s cute!’  To which the woman replied, ‘He’s a boy.’ 🙂 In my defense, he had longish curly dark brown hair and the longest eyelashes.  He really did look like a little girl.  They were from England and it was fun to listen to the little boy speak to his mother with an English accent. It reminded me of the commercial that comes on in the Subway here in Beijing with a little English boy. ‘Mummy! ….’  

The interesting thing about hostels is that you get to meet a varied group of people.  I didn’t really get to know any of them well (I mean, how can you in a week?) but it feels like you are immediately connected to them simply by being foreign.  This woman and her son were there just as long as I was and each night we told each other about our activities of the day.  There was a group of girls that I didn’t meet because they were only there for one night.  Two men from Spain, Charles and the other guy whose name I didn’t catch.  I chatted with Charles for quite a while one morning.  Oliver, who said he was from England but didn’t really sound like it. I made small talk with each of these people in the mornings before I left and at night when I came back.  I exchanged email addresses with two of them!

The Church, Olympic Park, Insa-dong Market, Namsan Tower

The next morning I woke up and made my way to the ELS mi**ion congregation.  I met with the teachers there and the Shepherd of the Flock also.  One of the teachers gave me some pointers for what to see and what not to see.  I was looking forward to exploring on my own.  About 10 min into our conversation, a Korean man (Sean) comes into the office and just stands there. The teacher introduced him to me and then he left.  Later, I learned what the exchange was with Sean and the teacher’s wife (who is his English tutor).  It went something like this: 

            Sean: Do you think she wants someone to show her around?

            Teacher’s Wife: I don’t know. You could ask her.

            Sean: No, that’s okay.

            TW: Okay.

            (five mintues later)

            Sean: (stands up abruptly) I’m going to go ask her.

So, he came back upstairs to ask me if I wanted someone to show me around. I said sure. Really, he wanted someone to practice his English with.  He wasn’t available until later in the afternoon so he wanted my phone number to give me a call when he was done with work.  I told him I didn’t have a phone. He was confused as to how he would contact me.  So he went back downstairs with his teacher.  I figured something out and then wrote where he should meet me and at what time and took it down to the room where they were studying.  It is interesting to not have a phone where I can just text someone where I am.  I had lunch at the school—a delicious soup-like dish—and then left to explore a little on my own.

I found myself at the Olympic Park.  I imagine that the park would be much more beautiful in the spring or summer (as any park is) but it was still beautiful.  I loved the mountain backdrop behind the large buildings.  I wandered around the hiking area for a while. Then I walked along the little river that runs through the park.  I wanted to be on the other side of the river and I had already passed up one bridge.  I figured there must be another way to cross a little ways down.  I found the crossing point and with it found a little outdoor ‘sculpture’ gallery.  For the ’88 Olympics sculptors from all over the world were asked to create sculptures to display in the park.  It was fun to see which part of the world they were all from.  Eventually I found the subway station and I was off to meet Sean.

A bridge across the river that goes through Olympic Park

One of the outdoor sculptures in the 'gallery' inside Olympic Park

Peace Gate near the entrance to the Olympic Park

Sean met me at the subway station near Insa-dong market.  This is a place where you can buy chintzy Korean souvenirs.  It was fun to walk around the market and look at stuff though.  There were many foreigners at the market. Actually, there were many foreigners in Seoul period.  After the market, we went back to my part of town so I could get my tripod. (a must for nighttime pictures)  We ate some supper and then headed on a bus up the large hill in the center of the city. On top of this large hill is a tower. Usually when you see a picture of Seoul it will have Namsan Tower in it! The tower was pretty neat. On the windows surrounding the tower there were city names in the appropriate direction with the estimated distance to each city.  The South Pole is over 14,000 km away!  The area around the tower was also pretty cool.  There were a bunch of these wire sculptures of men that were illuminated by a beam of light. Very neat. I included a picture of one of them below!

A view from Namsan Hill. We weren't in the tower yet.

One of the illuminated wire sculptures near the entrance to the tower.

The lights illuminating the tower changed every so often. Here is the red version.

Namdaemun Market, Hanyang University, Korean barbecue, 76ers bar

The next day we met for lunch at the previously mentioned Chinese restaurant. Sean wanted me to try a certain Korean food that was made by a Chinese person that you can only find in Korea…or something like that. Hmm… I didn’t really understand.  The food was delicious and after lunch we were off to the market. 

Namdaemun market is the biggest traditional market in Korea.  It sells tons of clothes and miscellaneous items.  It was pretty crazy at this market.  I heard that over 40,000 people visit the market each day.  My favorite part of the market was the flower shops. It smelled wonderful in all of the flower shops.

Namdaemun Market on a weekday. It's busier on the weekends!

After visiting the market, we were planning to go to Yeouido Island but thought that might be better during the warmer part of the day.  We ended up visiting Hanyang University where Sean studied Law.  The campus was beautiful and is known for its cherry blossom trees. Unfortunately, I was there in the winter and did not get to see the cherry blossom trees. After wandering around and taking pictures for a while we went to a restaurant where we had Korean barbecue.  We then walked around in the university area.  We visited a bar called 76ers. Hehehe  It was back to the hostel after that.

Traditional Korean Barbecue. Yum!

Itaewon, Yeouido Island, the small island, bridges, 63 Building

The morning was spent by myself exploring Itaewon area.  Itaewon is the foreigner part of town.  There are many many foreign shops and restaurants.  After walking along the street and window shopping I went to Starbucks 🙂 and had some coffee while sifting through my pictures. I then left to go visit the island.  When we got to the island we rented bikes and rode around the island for an hour.  During our bike ride I was able to take some pictures of the bridges we saw.  We took the bikes back and then walked (quite a distance) to the 63 building.  Then we decided it would probably be neater to see it at night.  So we walked back to the subway so that we could go to a different, smaller island.  This island was only accessible by foot.  We picked up some chicken on a stick on the way to the island because we were hungry and didn’t have enough time for a sit down meal.  The chicken was delicious!  On the island there are many plants, but again, it isn’t springtime and I’m sure it would have been much more beautiful if the plants would have been in bloom.  There was a good deal of bamboo growing there.  We stayed on the island until sunset so that I could take some sunset pictures.  Then, we headed back to the 63 building via bus.

One of the bridges we saw while biking

Same bridge, different view, color version

We went to the 60th floor of the 63 building (which is actually the top floor because three of the floors are underground).  On the 60th floor there is a Pop Art gallery.  The art gallery was pretty cool but the view out the windows was even cooler.  I probably would not recommend paying the price to go up the building because you can go up Namsan Tower for almost half the price and see a cool view also.  After the 63 building we walked along the river so that I could take some more night photos before we found some supper at a nearby restaurant.  It was also delicious.

A view from the 63 building.

One of the many bridges over the Han River

Same bridge, different view. Namsan Tower in the background

Ch*rch, The National Theater, The Yoduk Story, COEX

The next morning was Sunday and I made my way across the city for w*rship.  There were about 20 people for the English service and about 200 or so for the Korean service!  After ch*rch I went to a Communicating Chr*st Class.  Then everyone was invited to join for lunch.  Lunch was delicious, again, and after lunch the P*stor said that he had some tickets for a musical in the afternoon.  I only had a small idea of what the musical was going to be about.  So, one of the members drove me and another American (who is teaching in Korea) to the National Theater for this musical.  The musical was about one of the North Korean prison camps.  It was a great musical and very well done! 

ELS Ch*rch

Inside of the ch*rch

After the musical, the American and I met up with Sean at COEX which is basically a really busy shopping mall.  We had supper together at Sbarro where I ate Bulgogi pizza.  Pretend it is meat lover’s pizza and don’t ask what kind of meat it is! 🙂  The American left us after supper and Sean and I had ice cream at Baskin Robbins.  (Korea is so American)

Insa-dong (take two), Gyeongbokgung Palace, Palace Museum, Cheonggyecheon

I was intending to visit the DMZ (demilitarized zone) with a friend of mine from Beijing (who was going to be in Seoul for a few days).  The DMZ is basically a strip of land that’s kind of a buffer between North and South Korea.  We didn’t end up going to the DMZ because they had a rule about wearing jeans.  So I ended up in Insa-dong once more to try to find some sort of souvenir from Korea. All of the stuff I could buy there looked just like the stuff I could buy in China.  So, I didn’t get anything except a magnet. 

After Insa-dong, I went to Gyeongbokgung Palace which is almost in the middle of the city.  It was fun to see the similarities between the Chinese temples and the Korean ones.  The Korean temple had much more green space than the Chinese ones.  Below are some pictures of the palace and of the museum that was connected to the palace.

Inside the 'throne' room

Mountains in the background

This is actually a pine tree.

Some cool statues in the outdoor part of the Palace Museum

Where should my next trip take me?

After the palace and the museum I went to Cheonggyecheon. This is an area in Seoul that has this man-made river/stream.  It was beautiful for taking pictures, especially at night.  I also got to witness a protest and see hundreds of police officers!  I took a video of part of the chaos but the file is too huge to upload. Below are some of the photos I got from Cheonggyecheon. 

One view of the stream

This was kind of cool. A little further down there was an outdoor photography exhibit. Very neat!

🙂

To go along with the man-made river, there was a man-made waterfall. If you look closely in the background you will see a few of the police officers. On the bridge behind me is where the protest was happening.

This was the best picture of the protest of the ones I tried to take.

It was a wonderful trip!  I’m looking forward to the next journey I get to take.  🙂

FIREWORKS!! These fireworks were right outside my apartment. Notice how high (or should I say low) they are! Craziness!

My Chinese New Year celebration began with a visit to my friend Gretl’s hometown, Tianjin.  I left shortly after my class at Nong Da finished.  (And after a lovely pizza lunch with a few of the other foreign teachers.)  The train ride to Tianjin was exactly 30 min.  We left at 4:30 and the train stopped at 5:00.  This was the fastest train ride I had ever been on.  Literally.  The train is one of the fast trains in China.  It topped out at 330+ km/hr.  When I arrived at the train station in Tianjin, Gretl was there waiting for me so that we could take the bus back to her place.  It actually took longer to get to her home than to get from Beijing to Tianjin!  I had a lovely supper with her family and then taught her a couple card games while we ate M&Ms and watched some Chinese TV! 

The next morning, we headed to an antiques market with Gretl’s father.  Having conversations through a translator is a little difficult.  I wish my Chinese was better!  I was impressed with Gretl’s patience with me and her ability to go back and forth between English and Chinese.  She was amazing!  We were able to have a ‘conversation’ over lunch about hunting in Wyoming.  Her dad wanted to know how much it cost to hunt and what kind of animals could be hunted.  He was really nice and very patient. 

After our lovely lunch together, we headed to Gretl’s grandmother’s home.  The plan for the day was to teach me how to play Ma Jiang 麻將 (the real game, not the lame ‘windows-matching-tile’ game on the computer).  Her grandma explained the game to me (with Gretl translating again) and then we decided it would be best to learn as we go!  Those who know me well will know that this was a highlight of the visit because of my love of games!  I caught on quickly and even got three ‘dragons!’  Apparently, a dragon is not something that is too common to get. Gretl told me that she has only ever gotten one!  I told her it was beginner’s luck!  We played for quite a while with her aunt, uncle, dad, mom, and grandma taking turns and all of them letting me play every game.  I think they wanted to make sure that I knew what I was doing by the time we were finished playing.  They also told me to practice saying the names of the tiles when I discarded them so I could practice my Chinese.  Gretl keeps telling me how awesome my tones are!  🙂  Must be the music background. Now if only I knew more words, especially verbs.  I really liked that I could understand a lot of what her grandma was saying even though I didn’t understand the full meaning.  I don’t know if that makes sense to you at all. 

After playing Ma Jiang 麻將, we cleared the table and began the dumpling making.  This is a tradition in China.  Families get together, make dumplings (jiaozi) and then spend time consuming them.  I was learning how to make dumplings from the master: Gretl’s grandmother.  It was hilarious that I was the only one in an apron…an apron that they insisted that I wear…an apron made for a Chinese sized person!  I was really bad at making dumplings.  I had one or two that looked like they were supposed to look.  The rest were edible but not the best looking dumplings!  Gretl took many pictures of my time with her family but I haven’t gotten them from her yet.  When I get them, I will share them with you.  Her family also wanted me to play piano for them.  I’m not the greatest when it comes to memorized piano repertoire so I was glad that Gretl brought along some music.  I played and Gretl and I sang and everyone loved it!  Her grandma and I were instant friends! 

We hung out for a while and then Gretl, her cousin, and I left to go visit a coffee shop.  Her cousin could understand almost all of what I was saying but lacked the confidence to respond to me in English.  The three of us sat there drinking coffee and chatting for a while.  Gretl wanted me to teach her cousin some card games.  So I taught her a new one that they both liked.  Actually, I think Gretl might be addicted to it!  Any time we had some down time she wanted to play it!  🙂  She’s like the Chinese version of me when it comes to games and being competitive! 

The next morning we walked around the ‘European’ part of Tianjin.  I always seem to find the non-Chinese parts of Chinese cities.  They tried to explain to me why there is so much European architecture in the city.  I didn’t really understand what they meant.  We ended up eating at an Italian place for lunch and then visiting the “Tianjin Eye”.  This wheel is 120 meters tall.  It is surpassed in height by the Singapore Flyer, the Star of Nanchang (in China), the London Eye, and the Great Berlin Wheel.  There is a bigger one being constructed in Beijing on the east side of the city.  Beijing’s will be the tallest in the world at 208 meters.  The Tianjin Eye took 35 minutes to make one revolution.  It also claims that it is the only wheel of it’s type to be constructed on a bridge.  We enjoyed the ride but I was a tad uneasy since I am a bit afraid of heights. 

This was the view from below the Eye.

After our ride on the Eye, we wandered around for a little while longer before I had to catch my train home.  Another 30 min. train ride back to Beijing and then about an hour on the Subway.  The subway ride was pretty surreal.  There were almost no people riding the subway.  The city has died down because people have gone to their hometowns for the festival.  One would think that in a city of over 14 million people there would be more than 10 people in my subway car.  Not so. 

My plan for the evening was to meet a Chinese friend for a movie.  He said he would find one that was either in English or had English subtitles so that I could understand it too!  I got a message from him saying that there were no good movies playing and that maybe we should just meet somewhere for a drink.  I suggested just watching a movie at my place and he agreed that it was a good idea!  So, I figured I had enough time to get home, take a shower and go grab some supper.  As I was getting supper to go he came into the restaurant and asked what I was doing.  I told him that I hadn’t had a chance to eat and was just grabbing some supper.  He then told me that he brought supper!  Ok.  So, we walked back to my apartment and I put my supper in the fridge.  Then he informed me that he needed to use my kitchen so that he could MAKE supper. 🙂  Thankfully I had the sense to do my dishes before I left for Tianjin and the kitchen wasn’t too bad.  He made–you guessed it!–dumplings.  We also had some chuar and spicy bamboo with peppers.  The food was good and the company was great!  We ended up watching the replay of the olympic opening ceremonies in Chinese with him translating!  All in all, it was a really fun, totally unexpected night!

After he left, I thought I would end up going to bed fairly early.  I putzed around for a bit while listening to the constant sound of explosions outside.  Even though the city had much fewer people, there were still millions shooting off fireworks. (Hey, when you start out with more than 14 million people, missing a few million still leaves you with a few million.)  🙂  I think that almost everyone in the city had to be shooting off fireworks at the same time.  It is difficult to describe the magnitude of the noise.  You know when you see footage of a war-zone on TV? Yeah…kind of like that, but possibly louder.  Imagine your typical Fourth of July fireworks display. Pretend it took some steroids and then multiply that by about 100 and you might be getting close to the chaos that was occuring in Beijing from about 8:30 pm to about 2:30 am.  Granted, it was a little more tame during the hours before midnight but still a constant din.  It died down a bit after 2:30 when I went to bed.  Either that or I slept really well through it.  I woke up the next morning and people were back at it again.  Sunday during the day was much quieter.  In the evening it started again and I wondered if we would have another show that evening.  Fortunately, it was not nearly as crazy as the previous night.  And now, the city sleeps. 

I will leave you with some pictures of my time in Tianjin.  This coming Wednesday I will travel to Seoul, South Korea.  Look for a blog update sometime when I return from that trip.  HIS blessings to you always!

This was part of the market that Gretl and I visited with her dad. Here, people are buying a bunch of decorations for their homes. It was pretty crazy there.

This was a crazy Chinese restaurant that we walked by. There were many 'sculptures' like this made out of chunks of pottery. The dragons were pretty cool!

Another part of the market. Notice the red lanterns. This is a popular and significant decoration for the festival. I'm not sure why. I should research.

This was part of the temple that was near the market. Along this wall are many 'plaques' with different styles of Chinese calligraphy. It was pretty cool.

More of the red lanterns

People hung red decorations on their windows and on their doorframes.

This dog was dyed by his owner to look like a panda.

Anyone want to go to the 'Outlandish Tourist Area'? I'm sad that I didn't get this one straight on.

And this one is only because it is Valentine's Day

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes but in having new eyes.” –Marcel Proust

This quote is appropriate in how I am currently feeling.  The past few weeks have been a huge blessing to me.  It is difficult to describe my experience to people and to express emotions that I feel.  I’ll give it a shot but I still believe that some parts of it are indescribable. 

When I left you last I was being a tourist in my own town.  I haven’t done too much ‘touring’ but I have been doing a good deal of living. I even took some time to paint my bedroom so my walls are not dirty white anymore.  One wall is dark purple and the other three are clean white! 🙂  If you remember from a previous post, I had agreed to teach English for a winter camp at Nong Da. I wasn’t really looking forward to it but thought it would a good way to make some extra money. 

This particular group of students is studying there on a government scholarship.  They are being trained to be future leaders in their country.  Most of my students are from the far western Chinese province of Xinjiang.  I also had a few that were from Beijing. The students from Xinjiang are minorities…Uygher and not of Han descent like the majority of the Chinese population.  They were chosen to attend high school in Beijing.  The downside to this honor is that they only get to see their families 2-4 weeks out of the year in the summertime.  They don’t even get to go home for the largest of all Chinese festivals, The Spring Festival.  🙁  Even though they have many hardships in their lives, they have made the most of their individual situations.  I have never taught a nicer group of students.  They were very respectful, friendly and lots of fun!  I also thought it was interesting and also ironic that the future communist leaders were being trained by democratic/capitalist Americans! 🙂 

On the last day of the camp I was required to give them an oral exam.  Basically, they had to visit with me for five or so minutes, one-on-one, so that I could evaluate their grammar, pronunciation, and fluency.  I took it as an opportunity to learn more about their backgrounds, their families, their goals and their feelings about life.  This was probably my favorite part of the class.  I wish I could have done it on the first day.  Although with a small class it was pretty easy to get to know them.  I had them for three hours each day and we had some break time so that I could chat with them. 

Teachers don’t have favorite students 😉 but if we did mine might be Tom. He is from a family of five.  He has two older siblings and one of them is married and has a child.  All of them live in the same house and his parents are farmers.  I asked him if he could change one thing about his life what it would be.  His response was that his family could have more food.  They are happy that he is studying in Beijing, not only because it is a great opportunity for him to further his education, but also so that they don’t have to feed him. 🙁 Or maybe it would be Sophia, one of the sweetest Chinese girls I’ve ever met.  She is intelligent, kind, caring, and beautiful.  She would be good at whatever career she wants in life.  But I have a feeling she is already feeling the pressure of getting married and having children.  She is only 17.  I hope that she is able to reach some of her dreams in life.  She really wants to work in finance. It could also very well be Owen.  (Actually, it would be pretty tough to have a favorite in this bunch.  They were all really awesome!)  Owen is the one who disagrees with education in his country.  He would like to see changes in the way children are educated in the future.  Maybe it is a good thing he will be some sort of leader in his country.  🙂  I asked him what he disagreed with.  His response was that he didn’t think Chinese students were allowed to develop their creativity enough. 

I’m really glad that I agreed to do the camp.  At first I was not super excited about it but it ended up being very worthwhile. I won’t forget these kids. 🙂

The members of the class that were there the for the last day. A couple of the Beijing students had left already to travel with their families for the festival. This bunch was awesome!

During my teaching at Nong Da, I was also able to meet quite a few foreigners who were also pretty awesome!  Below is a picture of the foreign teachers.  One of them is not foreign but her oral English was really good so Mr. Wang had her lie and say she was from the states.  Two of the teachers were British, one was Canadian, one was Chinese, one was from Latvia, and the rest were American.

A group of some pretty awesome people! Our bus rides in the morning were never lacking entertainment. I'm happy that I met these people. One of them will be in Seoul at the same time as me and he and I are going to hang out one day! From L-R back row: Jasper (GB), Vincent, Gordon, Rebecca, Danielle (Chinese), George (GB), Deke, Landon, Sigmund, Mike, Graham, Benny. From L-R front row: Vivian (Mr. Wang's assistant--hilarious that Chinese people pick this name because Vs are really hard to say for them), Sebastian, Mary, Barrett, Laura 1, Laura 2, Amber, Ona (who is actually from Lativia but speaks perfect English and also really good Chinese!)

 After my teaching ended on Thursday last week, I headed to the city of Tianjin.  My next post will be about my time in Tianjin. Enjoy!