We're on a Trip, not a Vacation!

After a 12 hour flight from SF to Seoul, we arrived on Saturday afternoon. After attempting to get cash and buy metro cards, we gave up when the "global" ATM refused to accept our cards and took the airport bus, for which could purchase tickets with our credit card. We are staying at a hotel in the Mapo area. It is close to a subway stop, and there are lots of restaurants around. For dinner, we went to get kim chi jigae (pork, tofu and cabbage stew) nearby. We got egg sandwiches on the first morning and then took the metro to the apartment where Kyusik and his family lived until they left for Malawi when he was three. We then hosted a Korean buffet lunch for Kyusik’s 3 maternal uncles and their spouses, kids, and new son-in-law. In the late afternoon the boys went swimming in the hotel pool with my MIL while Kyusik and I shopped but didn’t buy anything except for some crispy sweet rice snack. For dinner we walked and waited for an hour for a cold beef noodle soup called nangm...

Bryce is on the SFS middle school trip led by Outward Bound Korea. Although we haven’t heard from him, a mom at Acadian’s bus stop who I befriended told me about the camp’s Instagram account. Bryce has been rafting, kayaking, and cooking his own meals in Hongcheon. He's attending the camp with his MCDS friend Benji, who is also half Korean. On Monday we saw photos of them learning how to set up a tent. Bryce won’t be back until Friday afternoon. We miss him, especially because he would really appreciate all of the yummy food we’ve been eating. In the third photo, he is cooking mushrooms! You can also see the school bus that he took there. SFS has a whole fleet of them, as Acadian takes a similar bus, and they run a total of 6 different routes throughout Seoul to pick up and drop off campers. 

 Today we went to Changdeok Palace. We went to the same playground and played for a long time and we went to the bus to go to the palace. At the palace we saw lots of cool things like where the Crown prince lived and the place where they had ceremonies. We walked around for a really long time and then went to go have lunch. The lunch was Korean fried pork cutlet with some yummy sauce, rice, corn, and some other thing I didn’t know the name of. Then, everyone who was done could walk to the bus to go make arts and crafts. We got off the bus and walked to a store and the counselors were getting something to eat for snack. It turns out they were getting ice cream for everyone and I got bubblegum flavor. Then, we walked while eating ice cream to the place to make arts and crafts. We sat down on this big platform while eating. The counselors said that it was Johnathan’s birthday, who is Benji’s brother who is Bryce’s friend. Then, we went on another platform which had a roof. We had to s...

 Today we went to One Mount Water park. I got on the bus to go to SFS and got there in about 5 to 10 minutes. When we got there, I got off the bus and walked up levels of stairs. We walked all the way to this big playground that  I had not seen earlier. I played a lot and after a little bit, I went to get my bag and get on the bus. The bus ride took less than an hour and we got there in no time. We got off the bus and walked to the water park. The counselors split us into two groups, boys, and girls. We all went to the changing room and changed into our swim trunks. Then, we walked to the place to get PFDs. Then, we went down to where the water park is. I went into this pool that sometimes has waves, and then went to this big water playground with lots of water cannons built into the structure. It also had three water slides: a red one, two small blue ones, and a big yellow one. I played there for a long time and then went back to the pool, and it had waves, but they turned of...

We went to the Hangeul Museum and had to do this worksheet. When we left the museum, we got tteokbokki (Korean spicy rice cake). It was really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, good.