Weekend in Seoul (Part 2)

Welcome back, sports fans, to the recap of our first trip to Seoul. On today's episode, we'll continue where we left off last time and jump straight into Sunday.

We rose early Sunday morning for breakfast before making our way down the street to Yoido Full Gospel Church, the largest Christian church in the world. The church has over 830,000 members in congregations spread out all over Seoul and beyond, but the main church building that we went to holds 26,000 people each service for seven services each Sunday. The services are held in Korean, by they offer simultaneous translation into at least nine different languages at the different services. It was definitely a new experience, especially during the singing times, where the lyrics were posted in four different languages, and everyone sang in their native tongue. And I must say, the sound of 26,000 people all singing the same song in their own language is one I won't soon forget. I personally still can't get over that number...that's the population of a small city all inside one building, all singing together!

Anyway, after the service, we headed out looking for lunch, and made our way to Itaewon (이태원), the foreigner neighbourhood. Basically, we left Korea for lunch - that's how large the foreigner population is in this part of Seoul. Lorie and Laura had a hankerin' for Indian food, so we found a restaurant that had a buffet, and got to try all kinds of different dishes. The thing that most impressed me, however, wasn't the main dishes - it was naan (Indian flatbread). It was absolutely delicious, especially when dipped in the butter chicken sauce!

After lunch, it was time to go to the place Shan was most excited for: the Bau House dog cafe. To answer the question that's already on your mind, no it's not a cafe with dog on the menu. Instead, it's a cafe that just happens to have a couple dozen dogs living there, and when you order your drinks, you get treats to feed the dogs, and you can play with them for your stay there. It's definitely not a place for everyone, as the dogs have the run of the place (the majority of the staff are solely on cleanup patrol), but if you're a dog person, it's definitely a unique experience. And the dogs were REALLY cute, too!

From there, it was about time to head back to the train station, as Lorie and Laura wanted to stop at E-mart before heading back to Hong Seong. From there, it was just a hop, skip and a jump back to Daejeon and our little bunnies!

It was a fantastic weekend, and we definitely can't wait to go to Seoul again and check out some more of the sights, especially when we won't have a lot on our minds during the trip. You see, an unfortunate byproduct of the global economic crisis is that there has been a severe dropoff in enrollent at the private schools, and ours has been no exception. As a result, our hagwon is going to be closing.

Fortunately, our boss runs two hagwons, and we were offered positions there, which we accepted because we love our boss, and really enjoy working with her. The only catch is that the other school is across town, so we're going to have to move, and that's not going to be a lot of fun.

So, as we look ahead to this rather significant change in our lives, your prayers would be much appreciated.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPod touch]

Weekend in Seoul (Part 1)

Okay, so I'm a little later than I had planned with the results of our weekend in Seoul, but that's because Shan and I have been sick basically since we got back. Now, without any further ado, here's a recap of Day 1 of our trip:

First things first - Seoul is HUGE!!!!! In the two days we were there, we stayed only in the center part of the city, and at times it still took us a half hour or more on the subway to get where we wanted to go.

We traveled to Seoul via the high-speed train (which was everything I expected it to be and more), and met up with Lorie and Laura at the train station. From there, we headed on over to Gyeongbok Palace (경복국), where we arrived just in time to witness the changing of the guard. This involved traditional Korean costumes, weapons, musical instruments, and a LOT of spectators! It was pretty awesome, especially for our first experience in Seoul.

After exploring the palace grounds, we made our way to Insa-dong, where we had lunch at an awesome mandu (만두) shop, where the dumplings are so big that you've actually got to cut them apart with your spoon to eat them - and they were delicious! We wandered around the market for a little while and did a little shopping before going to Namdaemun (남대문) market where I did in fact get to check out the camera market area, which was cool, but not nearly as big as the internets made it out to be. Don't get me wrong, there were a lot of shops, and they all had LOTS of awesome stuff, but I was expecting a long street with both sides lined with shops of awesomeness. Instead it was one side of a short stretch of street that had said awesome-filled shops. It took me a little bit of searching, but I found what I had come for: a TTL cord for my flash, and a good, solid tripod.

It was starting to get on toward supper time by this point, so we decided it was time for a little riverboat cruise. Laura had been on this cruise a few times before with some of her students, so we followed her lead in getting to the docks, but it turns out we got off at the wrong subway stop, because we had to walk a LOT farther than anyone had anticipated to get there. Fortunately, the cruise was well worth the walk, and we got to enjoy a nice relaxing trip up and down the river, and even found out that we were really close to the church we were planning to go to the next day, and that there was a hotel right next to it that we could stay at. Oh, and did I mention that the riverboat was a pirate ship? Pure awesome!After the cruise, it was getting pretty late, so we found our way to the hotel and packed it in for the night, intending to get up for an early service at the church and another full day of exploring.

Coming up soon, Day 2 of our Seoul Adventure, which will be spread out over this blog and mine, as I'll post a recap of the service at Yoido Full Gospel Church there, as well as my impressions of the largest church in the world.

Bunnies!!!

Okay, so now the whole world will know that we're suckers for cute faces.

Since leaving Canada, Shannon has had a hard time adjusting to not having a pet (namely a puppy) nearby for her to play with. So, for her birthday, I agreed that she could get a pet, but not a puppy, because the logistics of transporting a dog back to Canada when we're done our time in Korea were simply more than was reasonable to deal with. She settled on the two little guys in the picture. The little one is Gizmo, and the bigger one is Ozy (named for Ozymandias, because we watched the Watchmen on her birthday, too).

We got them a nicely sized cage and all the accessories, and then we brought the little guys home. This was Wednesday morning when they were introduced to their new habitat. Thursday, I had to run home to pick up something I forgot, and I checked on the little guys, and Ozy was just sitting in the cage and shaking. After awhile, we figured out that he was shaking because he was REALLY hungry, but wouldn't eat the rabbit food that we got him. He would eat the dried vegetables and hay in the food, but not the food pellets themselves. When we gave him some of the stuff he liked, he and Gizmo gobbled it down instantly (even getting into a fight over one of the carrot pieces), and was back to his old self in no time.

Or at least, mostly back to his old self. As I type this, I've got him sitting in my lap, wrapped in a towel because he needed a bath this morning (I'll leave it to your imagination as to why he might need a bath after having a food problem). But he is definitely far more energetic than he was yesterday, so I'm pretty sure his digestive tract is still recovering from his bout of not eating.

Anyway, the great thing is that these guys are quite possibly the cutest little bunnies on the face of the earth, and while we don't know how big they're going to get (the label said they were 'lion head rabbits' but they look different from each other, so we don't know for sure), I'm terribly amused by the fact that Gizmo sits quite comfortably in the palm of my hand.

'We're taking the TRAIN!'

Pardon the Big Bang Theory reference in the title, but that's exactly how I feel about our upcoming weekend. After four months here in Korea, we're finally making our first trip to Seoul, and (to quote Sheldon Cooper once again) 'we're taking the train!'

Now, this isn't just some 'scenic tour about the countryside' kind of train ride (which would have me excited enough as it is). No, this is a 'barreling down the tracks faster than your average NASCAR' kind of train ride, which offers a whole new category of excitement when it comes to over-land public transportation. In fact, if We were going to Seoul JUST for the chance to ride the high-speed train, I'd consider it a successful trip.

This trip, however, is actually for more than indulging my inner speed-demon. We're actually going to do some touristy stuff in Seoul, which also appeases my inner photographer, and hanging out with there with some friends for the weekend, too. Who knows? I might even get to indulge my inner geek by taking a walk around the famed electronics market (if I can convince three decidedly UNgeeky ladies that such a venture would be an efficient use of our time in the city).

All in all, though, I don't really know what to expect on this trip. It's really hard to know where to begin in a city of 14 million people, so I'm definitely glad we're travelling with experienced folk on this first voyage up north. Realistically, we could probably get by quite reasonably on our own, but it would likely take us a lot longer to do anything if we went with just a travel guide, a subway map and a pocket full of cheer. This way we can benefit from the experience of those who have gone before, of which I am always a strong proponent.

We'll keep you updated about how our voyage goes, and if you're following me on Twitter (or Facebook, even), I'll be giving more up-to-the-minute updates as often as I have a wifi connection.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPod touch]