Waygooks Wandering

It's been a really relaxed few weekends since coming back from our vacation home. It's also been pretty surreal. It's strange to think that it's already been a year in Korea. We're participating in some of the same activities that we did last year and starting a new semester at school. But this year is totally different! We came back to Korea knowing exactly where we were living and working and with our lives here already established. I can't believe that it's already been a year and that it's only been a year and things are so different for us. Different in a good way. It's weird and wonderful to be doing some of the same things but with a totally new mindset. There is a whole new crop of English teachers that came to Daegu last week, and it's strange to think that they were us only a year ago!

Gianni has started at his new school, which is even closer to our house. He just takes a different bus every morning. We got to meet the new girl working at his old school, and she's very nice. We've been kind of lazy and kind of trying to get ourselves back to our normal schedules, so we haven't been going to taekwondo for the last two weeks. That ends today, we plan on going a lot this week and starting back up. Also, we start a new Korean class this week, so that will be fun. Daegu's heat and humidity are finally starting to break for fall. It was this exact weekend last year when I noticed the humidity was waning a bit. Strange that it was the exact same time as last year.

Our first weekend back in Daegu, Gianni entertained my whims by going to some more places in the Korean stamp book. It was a long, hot day of walking. We went to Suseong Lake first. Suseong Lake has a small amusement park next to it, but it's for children. We went inside just to check it out, and it seemed like it was kind of dilapidated actually. Maybe that was just because it was during the day, so the lights that usually come on at night were off, but it didn't look like the nicest amusement park ever. Gianni and I walked all the way around the lake. It's a really pretty path with a boardwalk all around it. There's even a fountain in the middle of the lake. They use it to put on light and water shows at night. Unfortunately, the duck boats were closed! Suseong Lake has paddle boats in the shape of ducks that I really wanted to ride in, but for some reason they weren't operating on a Saturday afternoon! Instead, we finished off our walk around by getting bingsu from a cafe that is built into the body of an old airplane! It was really awesome. The inside had bright white walls and was decorated with Hawaiian shirts. I guess it's a franchise that came from Hawaii or something. After that, I decided to make Gianni come to Momyeongjae Shrine. I thought it was way closer on the map than it was. Actually, it's pretty close to the National Museum, so I should have gone there when I went to the museum by myself last month. Oh well. We made it there anyway. It was a traditional Korean-style building, and it was made as a memorial to a Chinese general named Du Shizhong, who came to Korea  to help the Koreans fight against the Japanese Invasion of 1592. He was then naturalized under the Joseon Dynasty in Korea. Gianni and I were dying of heat stroke by the time we were finished there, so we took a break at starbucks before heading downtown to meet our friends. Gianni and Matthew were hungry, so they grabbed some chicken from a cart in the subway station that is always busy. Now we know that it was busy because it was actually really delicious chicken! We then met up with Serena and Max as well, and the 6 of us walked around, browsing hiking stores.

We were too exhausted to do anything elaborate on Sunday, so we just slept in and tried to get rid of the jet lag. I impressed myself though because I had no jet lag whatsoever when I came home for the two weeks, and barely anything when we came back to Korea. I woke up earlier than I normally would that first weekend, I was getting tired by like 7pm, and I woke up one morning at 5:30am, but aside from that it was fairly manageable.


This past weekend we saw Matthew and Maria everyday. Starting on Friday with a trip to the board game cafe with Thomas as well. I got the highest score in Ticket to Ride that I have ever gotten. On Saturday, Gianni and Matthew took part in a hilarious TV appearance. I'll see if I can get him to talk more about the day itself. But it turns out that Korea actually invented the printing press, not Gutenberg! There's a professor in Seoul who is writing/wrote a book about this, and there's actually a lot of evidence proving it. One of the big networks in Korea, MBC, is making a TV documentary, and Gianni and Matthew were extras! They played Gutenberg's friends, and they had costumes and fake beards and everything! The pictures were hilarous! They left in the morning and did the filming at a printing museum near the DMZ, and they weren't back until 5am. Another hilarious TV appearance for the books. While they were doing that, Maria and I went to the Daegu International Body Painting Festival. Gianni and  I went last year, and I enjoyed it, so I wanted to go again. I took some more good pictures, and it seemed like it was way more English-friendly this year. The announcer was interpreting for the artists after each painted person came on stage. I guess they noticed how many foreigners came last year, and decided to change things. It was really nice. After the show, Maria and I headed to my house for some pizza and ice cream. We watched some TLC shows and hung out. Sunday, we met Maria and Matthew again for a short trip to Seomun Market. We are all going to Jeju together next weekend, and we are looking at doing a long hike of a volcano! It should be really cool, but we needed some gear. I wanted to get a new backpack for travelling. Gianni and I have been working with my LL Bean bag, which is great, but I wanted the kind of bag that takes the weight off your back. I got a nice, new backpack with all kinds of pockets and clips, so I can use it for travelling and for hiking. After Seomun, we walked downtown and grabbed some food and made one more stop at another discount backpack shop before heading home.

Since coming back to Korea, we've just tried to do a lot of relaxing and easing our way back into our routines. We'll see how it goes this week, and we're very excited to go to Jeju this coming long weekend for Chuseok, "Korean Thanksgiving." It should be an excellent trip.

Gianni and I hit a milestone today: it has been one full year since we came to Korea. There have been so many amazing experiences, and I couldn't ask for better friends. Thank you so much to everyone for making this year wonderful. I can't wait to see what's next for us in this coming year.

That being said, it was still hard coming back here after getting to spend some quality time with our families for the last 2 weeks. I hardly felt like I relaxed at all during that time, but we accomplished a lot. It was incredible to get to see a lot of my wonderful friends from home as well as the bulk of my family. I'm also very glad that I got to attend the beautiful wedding of my cousin, Emily, and her husband, Leo.

Here's to ONE more year!

Daegu's Second Annual Chicken and Beer Festival happened last week at Duryu Park. We went with Serena, Max, and Matthew on Friday night. Unfortunately, the free chicken and beer was only from 4 to 6, so we had to pay, but it wasn't too expensive anyway. We say on the bleachers in the baseball stadium at the park and ate our chicken. I got to talk to Niall for a bit, and Serena and Max bought me an awesome glowy light stick! We walked around the festival area, checking out the booths and the other foods, and we even caught a bit of a performance by the Kpop group Orange Caramel. It was really awesome to hear them play some songs in person that I actually knew! Matthew left a bit early to catch the last bus home, but Serena, Max, and Gianni and I walked around outside the stadium a bit more. Max tried his hand at the balloons and darts game and won another glowing thing. There was an animals tent as well with parrots and snakes on display. Gianni decided to pay to take some pictures with the massive snake around his neck! It was a really fun night.

This past weekend we took part in another Enjoy Korea trip and went off to the Boryeong Mud Festival. Apparently, it's one of the biggest mud festivals in the world. Boryeong is about 4 hours from Daegu, so it was quite a long ride. We left at 9 am on Saturday morning and arrive at around 1 pm. This trip wasn't like other Enjoy Korea trips. There were no planned events or anything. Instead, we could just do as we pleased for the entire time we were in Boryeong. We all checked into our hostel to drop our things off. All our friends were in a room together, so there were around 12 of us sharing a room. Our room was kind of small for that amount of people, and it only had one bathroom! Crazy. The mats for sleeping were also not as cushioned as they usually are at hostels like this, so that was a bummer. We were in the basement too, so no balcony like some of the other people. The hostel did have a really nice canopied picnic table area outside of it though. This was definitely a beach town. All the hostels looked like places you might see at home by the beach.

Marie and Ben and us after we went down the slide

Boryeong Mud Festival!

After we got changed, we headed down to the festival area. In the main area, there were some mud fountains where people were coating themselves in mud. There was also a fenced in area that you had to buy tickets to enter. They had blow up obstacle courses, slides, and pools for mud-related activities. We tried to get tickets, but they had sold out! They had a really horrible system for ticket sales. I don't understand how they can sell out since people were going in and out of the fenced area all the time. They could have just continued to admit people. Whatever. There were tons of booths selling mud products and t-shirts (the only festival in Korea that sells    T-shirts with the festival mascot and name on it!). They had a DJ playing music on a large stage right on the beach as well. It was a pretty cool event. After a while, we met up with some of our friends who also didn't have tickets. Ben and I got the brilliant idea to sneak into the fenced area. Tons of people were doing it, so we did. Once we got in, I decided to tell the staff members inside that my bracelet fell off to see if they'd give me a new one. They told me they couldn't, but as long as I stayed in the fenced area, it wouldn't be a problem. I then found a bracelet on the ground, which we used to get everyone else in. We played around in the mud pools and mud games. It was really fun, and I'm

Brown Eyed Girl performing at the Mud Festival

The clouds made the fireworks look kind of cool

glad we got in, but it wasn't something I feel like people would want to spend the whole day doing. There was a small area for children and families, and another part for adults. But there were only so many rides to do. We played a game in a mud pool where you had to chase the tail of another line. The team that lost got covered in mud by the other team, and we were the losers! After that, there was a game where two people competed against another two people. The objective was to do a mud hug and ring the bell in the center. Gianni and I lost to two Korean girls. Womp womp! Gianni and I then competed against each other in a race on a blow up thing. It wasn't like an obstacle course. It was basically just a long slide where you had to slide to the end, touch, and race back. I won, so I got to toss mud all over Gianni! There were a few ways to exit the fenced in area, all by doing fun mud things. One was an obstacle course and then two were big slides. We opted for the slide although I was told that the obstacle course was excellent. Since we didn't have a bracelet, we could only exit once. It was a really fun and awesome time. After we got rinsed off in the ocean with our friends, we headed back to the hostel to get showered. It took about 3 hours for everyone in our group to get showered off because there were 12 of us and one shower. We got some ramen from the convenience store for dinner, and headed back down to the festival area. The front of the stage was packed with audience members. A famous KPop group called Brown Eyed Girls was performing and after another famous Korean singer, Kim Jong Hun, also performed. There was a fireworks display after the performances that was enhanced by the clouds and fog in the sky. We hung out on the beach with friends for a while and headed to bed.

The next day, the plan was for the buses to leave around 3pm. We didn't realize how many hours we had on the beach, so we didn't think we'd need sunscreen. We ended up buying some, but it was too little too late, and Gianni and I both got burned. We didn't swim because we didn't want to get dirty for the bus ride home, but we walked along the beach and bought some mud products that were on sale. I got a t-shirt and some mud soap, and they gave me some mud toothpaste, which I am assured doesn't taste like mud. I collected a few seashells on the beach too. As we were walking around, we got to see an air show! It was spectacular. They were going behind the clouds to change formation and coming out with all kinds of spins and things. They even let out some colored dust in the sky behind them at different points. It was really neat. I don't remember ever having been to an air show before.

It was a really excellent weekend spent with our lovely friends before we leave for the US to just two weeks!!!

This weekend, Gianni and I had some serious time apart. Not in a bad kind of way, but I had a busy schedule of things he wasn't interested in. So it was the first time we've done different things in a while. I think it worked out better for him that it did for me though! He got to hang out at home, playing video games and sleeping in. I on the other hand got up early both days (extremely early on Saturday) and didn't get to relax very much at all.

Saturday was Serena's black belt test. Serena's husband, Max, is in the military, and they started doing taekwondo at our gym a few months before we started. They're really great, and you've probably already heard a lot about them on this blog. Serena's mom and sister and Max's daughter were visiting from the States, so they got to see her black belt test also. I really wanted to go and support Serena and also see what the black belt test is going to be like for when I take my own, which will probably be in October. The test started at 9, but Master Hwang wanted us to meet at the gym at 8, so I had to get up at 6:30 and catch the 7am bus to get to the gym on time. It was the second earliest day I've had since coming to Korea! Not the most fun thing ever. We got to the stadium where the test was being held and waited around for stuff to get started. The "opening ceremony" was pretty cool. A demonstration team did a taekwondo skit where a mother and son get harassed by some guys at night, so the little son starts taking taekwondo. It was pretty funny, and he did all kinds of cool tricks and broke boards and stuff by the end of it. The belt test itself took a while. It was like being at a swim meet again. The little kids went through their tests first, and then the adult black belts. For the black belt test, you have to know 8 forms. You will always perform the 8th one, but the other two are random. The second on you have to perform is chosen at the start of the event, so everyone ends up doing two of the same. The last one is totally random and changes for each group. In the center of the stadium, there were 4 different blue areas. You move from one area to the next doing all 3 form demonstration and then one minute of sparring where you can only kick. Each blue area was divided in half and each half had one judge, so the judges look at groups of 6 people, but the people in one half are doing the same thing as those in the other half. It seemed really nerve-wracking because you get no feedback as soon as you're finished. You do the belt test, but you only find out 6 weeks later whether you passed or not! It's crazy! Serena did a wonderful job anyway. After their test, we all went out for kal guk su. We had the seafood version of this when we went to seonyudo, but we got the chicken version this time. It was basically Korean chicken noodle soup, and it was delicious. I went back to the gym with Master Hwang where I practiced my forms for a while before testing for my red belt. We were supposed to do it Friday, but we didn't pass, and I didn't feel like thinking about it all weekend. I knew the forms, but there were too many people around Friday, and I couldn't think. I performed the forms Master Hwang wanted me to, and I passed the test! Gianni and I were both given our red  belts on Tuesday (Gianni retook the test Monday), so our next belt test is black! We will be practicing for the next several months, so that's a relief.

On Sunday, I had to wake up a bit earlier than usual to meet a friend in her area of Daegu. She and her other friend had been raving about a salon that does permanent straightening. All the salons in Korea do it, but I didn't want to go somewhere untested for as big a thing as this. Korean hair is stronger than Western hair, and if they did something wrong, I could have lost my hair! So Colette and her friend had said this place was great, and they made me an appointment there. I do like my curly hair, don't get me wrong, but with the summer humidity in Daegu, straightening my hair with a flat iron is out of the question. As soon as I walk outside, my hair goes curly and frizzy again. Getting my hair permanent straightened is basically the only way to make it functional this summer. I took the bus to Colette's neighborhood and waited for her at the stop for a while. I didn't know, but she had gotten really sick the night before with some sort of flu. She felt okay enough to walk me to the salon, Bobo's, and get me set up. Colette's hair took about three hours to get finished, so that's how much time I had planned for. But I found out that my hair is almost as stubborn as I am! I had to get two treatments, and it took almost 5 hours to do! The stylists were really nice and helpful though. I think the stylists are very concerned about being precise here in Korea. Even Gianni's cuts seem to take longer than they do at home. The day basically went: wash, treatment, set, rinse, blow dry, wet, treatment (because it wasn't shiny enough after the first time, I guess), set, rinse, blow dry, super hard core straighten with flat irons (seriously! it took forever for them to finish this part), wash, blow dry, cut dead ends, straighten just a bit more. I got so hungry that my hands were shaking, and I had to ask the staff for food. They were really nice and got me some food in the area to eat while my hair set the second time. When I was done, they gave me a deep conditioner for free also! The were really sweet and definitely knew what they were doing. The woman who did most of the work spoke limited English, and I think she was the only one in the salon with any English at all, but they were still really great. My hair looks fabulous still, and it should stay straight for about 6 months!

So that was my Gianni-less, busy weekend. Not the most fun weekend I've ever had, but good nonetheless. This weekend, Gianni and I are going to finish the English stamp book by going to a place called Herb Hillz. And Happy July 4th to all those back home! We're going to watch the fireworks at Camp Walker on our South African friend's roof and have a BBQ tonight!

This past weekend, I spent some time visiting more of the stamp locations. I now only have one more spot in the English stamp book, and I'm at 18/30 in the Korean book.

On Saturday, Gianni and I checked out the two spots I

The artist studios

still had to visit in the downtown section of the Korean book:
Hyanggyo Confucian Academy and the Art Factory. The places themselves were a bit outside downtown, so we did a lot of walking that day. The Confucian Academy has been rebuilt a few times as well as moved from one location to another. It now stands on the exact location where it was first built in 1398. It was burned down in an invasion by the Japanese in 1592. It went back and forth between two locations for a while but was moved back to it's original location in 1932. It is an extremely old and important place. Confucianism, for those of you who do not know, is not a religion. Confucianism is a set of philosophical beliefs that many Asian culture believed should be used to create a better society. Rulers used Confucian principles to govern, and family members followed Confucian ideals to create better family life. This is an academy where students learn these Confucian beliefs. Unfortunately, Gianni and I went to the academy when there was a traditional wedding happening! Because it's such an old place, weddings are really popular there I guess. In one respect, it was cool. We saw the bride in her beautiful dress and face ornaments. She even had a box for her to be carried down the aisle by four men! What a classy entrance! On the other hand, we were both extremely uncomfortable because everyone there for the wedding was dressed nicely, and we really weren't. I basically just rushed around taking pictures and ran out of there. We walked downtown from

Daegu Art Museum

there, and I gathered pictures for my newest blog post for colorful daegu about bingsu places down there. After that, we walked a bit more to get to Daegu Art Factory. We had no idea what we were in for there, but it turned out to be a really awesome place. I guess Daegu is a really important place in Korea for art and culture, which is interesting considering Daegu is also the most conservative city in Korea. The Art Factory has 5 floors. On the third floor, there was a kids room and an information room about art in Daegu. The second floor was an art book shop. The two top floors are the most interesting. They are the studios for various artists. I'm not sure how they get a spot, but each room is a different studio. You get to see the artists as

Dancing and Art Performance

they create new works, and it is a really cool way to be able to see tons of different kinds of artists all in one space. In addition to getting to see some really cool, new art, they also hold performances in some of the spaces on those floors. While we were there, we heard an explanation of the paintings and works by a group of artists. It was all in Korea, so we couldn't understand, but the guy doing the explanation also performed a really great song he had written in Korean. He befriended us and talked to us for a little while. Apparently, his song was about getting over his mother's death. We were also lucky to get to see a really cool artist's performance. He painted as dancers danced to music. The small paintings he did were projected the wall in the back of the room. It was really cool. It was a really awesome experience, and it seems like the work and performances at the Art Factory are constantly rotating, so it's definitely a place to visit often



On Sunday, Gianni was too tired to indulge my whims, so he stayed home and relaxed. I was a woman on a mission. I went alone to the National Museum and the Art Museum, which are both pretty far away from our apartment. I went to the National Museum first. I got my stamp at the info desk and started to ask a question in English, and I was immediately directed to a woman at another info desk. The woman at the desk was Mrs. Park, and she and I became fast friends. She helped me buy tickets to the LIFE exhibit that is being held at the National Museum at the moment, and then basically walked me through it, discussing Korean and American life and politics. She kept asking me if I knew the famous people in the photographs, and I told her what I knew about

a very intricate design on a bride's gown

the history of certain time periods. She was a lovely woman, and I'm really glad to have met her. She, apparently, does tours around the city and works at other info booths in other parts of Daegu. She kept remarking about how I have "a great spirit." The LIFE exhibit was spectacular. I've seen so many of those famous pictures from history classes through the years, and getting to hear about them and see them in person was wonderful. So much of life and history encapsulated in three rooms. It was almost overwhelming. After the LIFE exhibit, Mrs. Park went back to man her station, and I went looking around the permanent section of the museum that you don't pay to see. The museum itself is not that impressive. It is comprised of three rooms: ancient history of Daegu, Medieval history of Daegu (and the influence of Buddhism and Confucianism in society), and textile history. As someone who is very interested in history, I did find these sections interesting, but I think I would have been a bit disappointed if that was all I had seen.

Here's a bit of history for you guys:
Daegu was developed as an administrative center for Korea because of it's convenient placement in the peninsula. In 1601, a government office was established to administer to the province. Daegu became an independent province in 1981. Archeologists have found remnants of Buddhism in the province dating back as far as 57 BCE. The Confucians scholars had more influence in the Gyeongsang-do province, which Daegu had been a part of, than in other provinces in Korea. This might be part of the reason Daegu is among the most conservative cities in the country even today. It was actually interesting to get to learn a bit about Confucianism after we visited a Confucian academy the day before. Seowon is the name for Confucian Academy in Korean. At Seowon, they are supposed to educate young Confucian students and honor great Confucian scholars in seasonal ceremonies. During the Joseon Dynasty, Confucianism truly flourished in Korea. In terms of textiles, the color of one's clothing was an indication of statues. During the Joseon period, a system of colors to correspond with principles of yin and yang and the five elements. These principles are all used in oriental medicine still today. The five colors are red, yellow, blue, white, and black. Hanbok, traditional Korean dress, was also developed during the Joseon Dynasty. The wedding ceremony was once seen as the most important ceremony in a person's life. It was so important, in fact, that commoners were even allowed to wear the royal style of dress to mark the occasion. The groom typically wore blue and the bride wore a red dress to symbolize the principles of yin and yang.

After I was done at the museum, I went and ate my the sandwich I had brought along with Mrs. Park, and she gave me some coffee. She was so surprised I was doing the stamp book and really impressed with home much I had finished. We talked for a while before I finally excused myself to get to the art museum.


Gianni and I went to the art museum before, and the view was even more stunning that I remembered. It's built on a hill, and you can see layers and layers of mountains. I say layers because there are mountains close to the museum as well as those far away, so it really is a lovely spot for a museum. I found the exhibits the first time we went more interesting than this time. The last time we visited was for an exhibit by a Japanese woman. She had created fabulous and interactive installations that let viewers into her brain, in a way. She is a woman in her 80's who has suffered from mental problems throughout her life, which she encapsulates in her art. You could really see it in all of her work, so she really made me feel what it was like to be her. The exhibits in the museum,

The really cool communication project

abstracts

and the featured artists, change quite frequently. There are only ever about 4 exhibits on display at one time, and the main one is always on the first floor of the museum. The artist on display this time was Zhang Xiao Gang. He did a lot of his work during the 1990's, which was during the Tiananmen Square protests. His work is about his opinions of modern China. He paints a lot of pictures of faces with oversized featured and blank expressions. There were other artists on display on the upper floor. One was a really cool communications project. They had two people holding the same pen answer questions like their age, gender, job, etc. Both had to fight the other's force on the pen to write their own answer. It was really cool to try to make out both of the works in the pictures. Another large room featured sections by 4 artists, each with a pretty different style. I really enjoyed the colored in some of the abstract paintings by one of the artists.

I only spent about a half hour at the art museum, actually. Then it was time to head home because I was beat!

This past weekend, we went to Daegu Food Expo over at EXCO, a big conference center near Costco. We went with our friends Matthew, Maria, Sian, Thomas, Kat, and Alec. I registered early, so we got in for free. It was a relief because, even though I registered, I didn't know it had really gone through. The EXPO has various sections, but the best part was the tasting. At the back of one hall, there were samples of all kinds of Korean food and drinks. The EXPO was also selling restaurant appliances and things of that nature. There were a few places to buy food. One was an "international" section. It was only about 6 booths with what Korea thinks is food from those countries. The American booth had lemonade and coconuts to drink from. It kind of bothers me that Koreans who organize these big events don't just do a quick google search for "what is ______ food?" They put it the smallest amount of effort possible to figure out what food, especially western food, is. They had decent sections from Japan and China, but most of the other ones made no sense to me. The other section where you could purchase food was a bunch of booths for 

all the teas at the Food Expo

restaurants in Daegu. Daegu does have a nice array of all kinds of 

Cupcakes made to look like ice cream!

food. There were also experience areas where you could make different foods, but those cost extra. We tried to decorate cupcakes, but it was full. Our friend, Kat, stuffed a sausage though. When you first entered the room, there were displays of all kinds of food and teas. The food was from restaurants in Daegu and was all plastic wrapped. It was just to look at and drool over :) There were some really impressive creations made of sugar and cakes though. The tea booth reminded me of a witches cabin. There were different herbs and teas in all kinds of glass jars. It was really beautiful.

Last Wednesday was election day in Korea, and Friday was memorial day. All the schools had Wednesday and Friday off, but some schools also gave Thursday off as well. I had Thursday off, but Gianni didn't. One of my coteacher asked me to go to a movie with her on Thursday, which was really nice. It's funny because I never really think that my coteachers want to hang out with me in a social way, so I'm always surprised when they ask me to do something. We say the new Tom Cruise movie called Edge of Tomorrow and went to a traditional Korean restaurant beforehand. It was a really nice afternoon, even though it was raining a bit. The movie was better than I expected it to be. Tom Cruise hasn't been making good movies for a while, but this one had a really cool story, and I like the lead actress in it also. After the movie, Mi-Sook helped me figure out where to get one of the stamps for my book. I have been hiking at Apsan twice now, and that's one of the locations, but I never can never go during the day, when the stamp booth is actually open, so I had to cheat a little on this stamp. I thought Thursday would be a perfect day to get it, and it's on my way home from downtown. Mi-Sook told me what to say to the taxi driver, and he got me to where I needed to be. I'm glad I asked her about it though because I never would have found this place on my own. I got the stamp in what looked like an office building at the base of the mountain, but the building was at another entrance to some of the other hiking trails, and I had never been there before. The hike I've done both times has been the steep one of the observatory, and it's around the other side of the mountain. This hiking trail entrance was in a really nice, forested area, and the trails looked like they'd be more of an enjoyable hike than the one I've done before. I'll have to go back.

Cliff Side by the Rice terraces

Gianni and I have been attending a lot of the tours and events hosted by Enjoy Korea, one of the many tour companies for foreigners in Korea. We went to Jindo and Jinhae already, and, this past long weekend, we took a trip with them to Namhae Island. Namhae is a big island on the southern coast of Korea in the East China Sea. There's a bridge that connects it to the mainland, so we didn't have to take a ferry or anything like that. This is our second island trip, and I though Namhae was more beautiful than Seonyudo. We went to Seonyudo when the weather was still a bit chilly, and it was really great

Rice growing in the terraces

getting to bike around the island, but Seonyudo had a lot of trash around. Namhae was pretty clean (at

 least the beach we stayed near was), and there were tons of rice paddies and fields for farming. It's about three hours outside of Daegu, although it took us longer to get there due to the holiday traffic. Gianni and I brought bagels for breakfast, peanut butter and jelly for lunch, and ground beef for burgers for one night's dinner. I think we were pretty well-prepared. I didn't even get too badly burned! Before checking in to our pension, we stopped at a small village on the island called Darengi Village. It's a really beautiful location on a steep cliff overlooking the ocean. Rice terraces are built into the cliff side, so we got a better understanding for how rice is grown. It's a really beautiful place, but the cliff is really steep, and it was very hot that day. I could never live on that cliff, but there were houses and

Sangju Beach

everything. I'm always astonished by the way that some people live here. I often feel like I'm transported back to the Korea from 70 years ago when I get out of the big cities. We spent a few hours at the rice terraces before heading to the pension that was located 5 minutes walk away from Sangju Beach. There was a camping option on this trip, but we opted for the pension. The pension was the best one I've stayed at in Korea so far. It was really clean and new-looking. We still had to sleep on the floor, but the sleeping mats were really comfortable. The pension even had a pool table and meeting room inside, and

BBQ with friends

barbecues and picnic tables for rent outside. They also had a few cats roaming around, and one cat had recently had a litter of kittens, so we got to play with them! We shared a room with our friends Marie, Ben, Sian, and Colette. Our room had a bedroom (no bed) and a main living space with a kitchen, TV, and porch. There were a few restaurants in the area, but also some convenience stores. It was really lovely and comfortable. The rest of the day we could do whatever we wanted, so most people decided to get some lunch and head down to the beach. Some people from our group, as well as a lot of Koreans, were camping out down by the beach. The Koreans definitely know how to camp. They come prepared! Although some people were definitely not "roughing it." We saw one family with a projector screen and TV playing! The tents were all really close to one another, packed in. It's really different than what camping is like at home, and another reminder that personal space is not a thing here. I collected sea

memorial day fireworks

 shells (found some nice pink ones with spotted patterns), and we hung out with our friends for a bit before dinner. We all decided to do some grilling on the first night, so we rented a barbecue from the pension. After dinner, we headed back to the beach and hung out there watching people shoot off fireworks. On Memorial Day in Korea, a lot of the major city have sirens that go off to signify a moment of silence. On the island though, the Koreans that were camping by the beach used fireworks to mark the occasion instead. They sell all kinds of fireworks at the convenience store, and they are really fun to play with.

On the next day, there were a few options. It's nice that we weren't forced to do anything that we didn't want to. It made the weekend more relaxing. We decided to get up early for a visit to a nearby temple, Boriam Temple. To get to the temple, we took our bus to the base of a mountain where we then got a shuttle bus up the mountain a bit. From there, it's still a 15 minute walk up the mountain to get to the temple. The hike wasn't quite as steep as Apsan is, so we handled it alright. Unfortunately, it was really foggy that morning, so we couldn't see anything when we actually got the temple. It would have been a beautiful view, I'm sure. The temple itself was built into the mountain, and when we arrived, there was some sort of service happening and a monk was chanting. It was interesting to listen to. We took some nice pictures and headed back down to get on the bus. At the base of the mountain, Gianni and I bought some fried seaweed snacks. They are basically seaweed chips, and they were so tasty! The bus went back to the hostel to pick up those who didn't want to go to the temple. The second stop was either another beach, Songjeong Beach, or German Village. German Village was built by a few Koreans who moved to Germany for a bit and really enjoyed living there.

The boys made a sandcastle

 when they came back to Korea, they built homes in the German-style, but they didn't expect it to be a tourist destination. It turned into one, and they sell German beers and some food. There's also an American Village on the island that was built because the German one got popular. We drove past it on the bus. It has a statue of liberty and everything! It
looked hilarious, actually. We decided not to go to the German Village because there isn't a whole lot to do there. Instead, we relaxed on the beach. The boys built a sand castle with the sand castle toy set Jake bought. I

Songjeong Beach

 forgot my book, unfortunately, but Gianni and I took a nice walk along the beach. The water was kind of cold, but not as cold as in Maine in the summer. I was a chicken though and didn't really swim. We were supposed to stay on the beach until sunset, but people were ready to go back to the pension early. Stacey Kim, the woman who runs the tour company, is really flexible with plans and very accommodating, so we took the bus back early. Songjeong Beach wasn't as nice as the beach we were staying near. There was a lot of trash along it. We got dinner with our friends at a barbecue restaurant near the pension and headed back to the pension. We meant to get up and go for a walk on the beach, but it had been a late night and an early morning, so we all ended up hanging out in the room and watching James Bond movies on TV before going to bed early. I had a headache too, so I wasn't really in the mood for going out.

kayaking champs

The last day of our trip was a bit more active. We got up semi-early to check out of the hostel. We were part of the second bus, so we had a few hours to wait after checking out before going kayaking. While the first bus was kayaking, we loaded our things on to the bus and played UNO for a bit. I don't think it's very easy for foreigners to arrange boating activities, like kayaking, on their own. This dock was kind of randomly placed with not much else in the area. We got our snorkel and flippers and hopped in our two-person kayaks. The kayaks were a little strange because there wasn't really a hole. you just sit on top of it in the seats. I think Gianni and I impressed some of our friends with our kayaking abilities--that's what a summer spent at Charles River Kayaking Camp does! The first part of the kayak was kind of lame. We were in a bay area, and it wasn't the nicest of spots. But when we got out to the nearby island, it got better. It wasn't a long kayak, but it was fun. We kayaked all around this rocky island that had a lot of inlets and cave-type things. We went into crack/cave in the island that was only wide

The cave we went into

enough to fit two boats. You couldn't even turn around inside it. It wasn't very long, but it was pretty cool. We stopped on a little, rocky beach on the island to try out our snorkels. Gianni couldn't get used to his, and the water was freezing. It was a chilly day already, so neither of us felt too much like swimming. Our friends tried for a little while, and they said they saw some cool things out by the rocks, but I didn't want to go without Gianni. Also, they said they saw a jelly fish, which made them turn around, and I didn't feel like encountering one of those by accident. We decided to get back in the kayak and keep paddling instead. When it was time to head back, we got together with our friends and went in together. The people who run the kayak rental were great because they even have showers you can use! We all rinsed off in the showers and got changed out of our bathing suits. Gianni and I ate our lunch, and the bus headed back to the pension to pick up the first bus of people and then go back to Daegu. We didn't run into too much traffic on the way home, which was great.

 It was both an active and relaxing long weekend, and it was much needed! We had a great time, and we can't wait for our next trip with Enjoy
Korea to a mud festival in July!