Mama Joy comes to Korea!

By a stroke of luck, our Buddha’s birthday bank holiday coincided with Mum’s business trip to Thailand and Seoul. This meant we got to spend three full days together. We had such a great time, and fair play to Mum who embraced all we threw at her. We had anticipated an emotional Hollywood style hello, but our first encounter didn’t quite go as planned. We had been given directions from the subway station to the hotel, where we had planned to meet Mum at 10.30am. However, we got ridiculously lost (although at one point we were within 50 meters of the hotel without realising), and ended up in a café buying a muffin purely to use their wifi to get some directions! By this point it was 11.15am and Mum had come to try and find us. Finally, our paths crossed just walking along the street, Mum basically tapped us on the shoulder and saying “hey”. 

After some catch up time over a coffee (one of many coffee breaks over the weekend) we headed out to show Mum some of the sights of Seoul. We visited one of the main palaces called Changdeokgung and explored the ‘secret’ (everyone knows) garden behind the complex. It was nice to see a defrosted version of the secret garden as when we visited Seoul in January it was -6'C! We then wondered around the traditional Bukchon village and the quirky shopping area of Insadong where Mum bought a few souvenirs. For dinner we wanted to show her some real Korean food and we found a small place in Insadong that served a variety of Korean classics. We ordered a rice dish called Bibimbap along with some chicken and pork. By accident we got the octopus bibimbap which came as quite a surprise! The night was ended with a few rounds of cards, Ed learnt how to play ‘hearts’ and beat both myself and Mum. After the day’s festivities, Ed having enjoyed the day, without thinking commented, “Thank God it’s Buddha’s birthday!” Here are some photos of our first day:

The second day, we started by visiting the Gyeongbokgung palace guards. We got some good pictures, Mum nearly put her arm around one of the guards, which was very funny to watch. Afterwards, we wondered through a cultural exhibition and a rather eccentric Korean man came up to us and talked at us quickly in English. We think he was attempting to use every single English word he knew within a 30 second time frame. To our amazement, the next day we actually bumped into him again! He didn't remember us and did the same English splurge all over again while we politely smiled and nodded....again!

In the afternoon, we walked along a stream that runs throught the centre of Seoul. The stream has been built into a peaceful oasis designed for locals to come and escape the bustle of Seoul. It cost $384,000,000 to build- they must have been seriously desperate for some peace. As it was Buddha's birthday the area was decorated with lanterns and scuptures. We had wanted to visit a market place on our walk but unfortunately it was closed.

 In the evening, we ventured up Namsan tower for a panoramic view of Seoul. It being the holidays, the queue for the cable car was huge but we managed to pass the time with an epic game of 'quiz'. Questions included: name 6 active volcanos, name all the football teams in this year's premier league, and name all the Harry Potter books. Shamefully Mum and I could not remember the 5th book all night and had to look it up on the internet when we got home. 

The final day with mama was spent exploring Gyeongbokgung palace. Luckily we arrived in time to watch the changing of the guard ceremony which involved a lot of Korean men with fake facial hair and big drums. The pond in the palace was particularly beautiful as the lotus flowers had started to blossom. We followed this with a final coffee break to say goodbye and then jumped on a train back home to Jinyeong. It was a fantastic weekend!

Lotte Giants Baseball Game

Today we went to watch a baseball game with our co-worker Iris and her boyfriend. Iris kindly bought the tickets for Ed's birthday. The game was The Lotte Giants vs. The Kia Tigers. The best thing about Korean baseball teams is that they are all backed by huge Korean corporations so they all have great names like 'The Samsung Lions' and 'The LG Twins'. We were supporting our Busan team the Lotte Giants. To get into the spirit of things, and look the part, before the game started we headed to the Lotte Giants merchandise store and Nina purchased a cap and Ed a baseball shirt. The game was really fun to watch, we had looked up the rules beforehand so understood pretty much what was going on! The crowd really got involved, with many mexican waves- and even a slo-mo one which looked awesome. The chants for the Lotte Giants were sung to the tune of classic western songs such as Donna Summer's Hot Stuff which we found quite amusing. At one point everyone blew up bin bags and put them on their heads, still not quite sure why but we joined in anyway. The game came down to the wire but thankfully Lotte Giants won! Hooray Go Lotte!

Ed's Birthday

Last week was Ed's birthday, somehow he managed to make it into a four day affair! On Thursday (his official birthday), Nina prepared the finest fry up Korean ingredients could offer. We had also saved a can of Heinz beans that Ed's Dad had given us for Christmas! It was a great success although the sausages turned out to be frankfurters. Ed was greeted at work with a big fresh cream birthday cake and then in the evening we went out to our favourite barbecue restaurant in Jinyeong. Nina told the restaurant owner that it was Ed's birthday and he presented us at the end of the meal with yet more frankfurters on the house!

The second day of Ed's birthday, we invited the foreign crew of Jinyeong and some other friends to come over to our apartment for some celebratory drinks. We had a really great time. The night finished in a Noraebang which is a Korean 'singing room' where we had our own room with a TV and microphones to sing the night away.

Despite going to bed at 5am, we managed to get up and out of the apartment by 11 30 on saturday morning (day 3 of Ed's birthday!) to head down to the coast. We took the bus to the city of Tongyeong, then jumped on a ferry to visit the island of Hansan-do. The island is entirely dedicated to the memory of a famous Korean admiral who defeated the Japanese in 1592. The island was very nice and peaceful and the perfect cure for our slightly sore heads! While looking around, we were approached by a Korean man who introduced himself as 'Pastor Lee'. Within about 5 minutes of talking to him about where we were from and what we were doing in Korea, he insisted on swapping phone numbers with the idea that we could go and visit him. We were a bit perplexed and became even more so when he said goodbye, turned around and literally ran away. We saw him another 3 times and in each situation he would stop, say hello, and then run away. We still don't know what he was running from.
For lunch on sunday we brought the celebrations to an end with a trip to Outback Steakhouse for a delicious steak. All in all it was a great and memorable birthday!