2014 in Review

I can't explain why I quit blogging this year. It was not a concious decision and it was not because I was too busy, that's for sure. Maybe I've just been in Korea too long and even the really exciting things that I did just didn't seem that exciting. Who knows? So, I'm going to sum up my year in one post, and hopefully I'll get around to actually finishing it and posting it. Maybe in the new year I'll start blogging again. Maybe. I do miss it sometimes.

All of these points need at least 1 blog post, some of them need at least 3. This is the best I can do for now, who knows, maybe I'll find some motivation in the future...

From Jan 10-Feb 24th I was in India teaching at a Buddhist monastery in northern India. It was a really interesting time and I learned a lot as a teacher, and a person.  I also learned about the importance of health, as I came down with hepatitis shortly after I came home and was basically incapacitated for a few days and really needed more than a month to recover properly.

After returning from India (and just around the time I came down with hep) I started work a university here in Seoul. I won't say the name for privacy reasons, but it's a really great school to work for. The location is not the best, but it's manageable, and when you're only teaching 14 hours a week 45min-1hr commute is not TOO bad. I'm not quite sure why, but the administration seems to like me at this school and not only have they renewed my contract for the next year, but they are promoting me to level coordinator. I worry I will be a huge disappointment, but we'll see what the next semester brings...

In May we rode our bikes following the 4 rivers bike path. Our original plan was to get to Busan, but bike problems + laziness + out of shapeness only brought us to Andong. It was still a fantastic ride and conquring the Saejae bike path through the mountains was probably one of the proudest moments of my life.

Also in May, two of my good friends got married. I really liked their wedding because they took all the western and Korean traditions and mixed them all up together in their own way. And my friend got spanked on the feet with a dried fish. 

 

 I tried a bit harder this year to study more 'academic' Korean. I found this fantastic leveled reader series of Korean books and I've now read three of them. they're not long, and they're not hard, but they give you confidence to try harder things. I also read 1/3 of The Diary of Anne Frank and am now reading/translating a book on Korean culture.

I also took 1 semester of intensive Korean (level 4) at Sungkyunkwan Univeristy over the summer, and then discovered that the university where I work offers intensive Korean classes at 70% discount, so in the fall and winter semesters, I continued with level 5 and 6. Considering I was working at the same time, it was kind of a disaster, and I can't say that I have learned much, but it's better than nothing, and the price was too good to turn down. This weekend I will take the TOPIK exam again. I'm hoping for level 4 (cross fingers). 

In June we did a 3 night trip around Ganghwado by bike. It was really fantastic, though I regret a little veering off to another smaller island for 1 night. It was more expencive and there was no good food to be found. Ganghwado is big enough and exciting enough, it's not really necessary to go to other islands on such a short trip. 

At the end of June I went to visit my friends in Hong Kong. They've been living there for 2 years and I have never managed to find time to visit. I finally made it. Besides being very hot fun to see Hong Kong in the summer, and good to see my friends, it was also some of the best time I've ever had to practice Korean. I literally spent 5 days only speaking Korean. I was really starting to function in Korean. As an English teacher here, even though I speak Korean fairly well, I'm always using English for this or that, if not for work than with friends, if not with friends than with my husband. etc. etc. In Hong Kong, staying with two Koreans, there was almost no reason to use English. Finally on the last day we met a friend of my friend and had to switch to English since he was British. We both laughed because we thought the sound of our English speaking was too strange.

In early July I bought my first smartphone. Sometimes I wish I hadn't, but sometimes it really is handy. I do miss daydreaming sometimes. I try to remember to do it sometimes, but the NPR articles that keep popping up on my Facebook newsfeed are just too interesting ㅠㅠ.

In early August we took a few nights trip to Qingtao (now my 2nd time to visit, but I haven't blogged about either time) to visit the husband's sister and brother-in-law. The Koreans went and played a lot of golf, and I explored the city. Qingtao is a really fantastic city, but since I'd already been there once I had already seen all the cool stuff. I just tried my best to enjoy the good food. Here is the family at the Tsingtao Brewery.

Throughout the summer, the husband and I worked on a DMZ bike trip project. We never had enough time to do it straight through, so we had to do it in 3 parts. There's no bike paths up there, and there are a ton of pretty big mountains. But, the nice thing is that there are not many people/ cars and you can see a lot of military bases. It's hard to follow maps up there because even if you look at the map and you see a road, that doesn't mean that non-military/residents are allowed to use it. Sometimes we would ride along a road for 10 km only to be told somewhere in the middle that we could not pass and we had to turn back and find another road. It's truly an adventure. A frustrating, wonderful adventure.

In October I bought a new bike and we took our bikes down to Jeju Island for a bike tour. We did the whole island in 4 days. The first day was fantastic, the second day was ok but a little windy with sunny skies. The third day was cloudy and overcast with serious headwinds and a few bike issues. The fourth day was full on typhoon winds and some rain from a big typhoon hitting Japan at the time. It was hard, but certainly an accomplishment. I just wish that the salt water hadn't rusted my brand new bike up... 

Two weeks later we went with the husband's little brother and sister to Tokyo for a 2 night, 3 day trip. It was a fun trip, maybe more fun because we were with two high school kids, one of which is a total otaku who could speak Japanese fairly well. The most fun/interesting/strange experience was going to a maid cafe. We new it would be expencive, but $80 for 4 people was a little rough. We realized that the table fee for our seats was much higher... if we had sat on the other side of the room at a counter style table, the table fee would have been much cheaper. I'm not sure what to make of the whole maid cafe thing, but at least I can say I've seen/done it, whether it's a good thing or not I don't know. 

Two more friends got married in November. Two weeks before the wedding we delivered a 함. This is a Korean wedding tradition which is quickly disappearing, at least partially due to the fact that most Koreans live in apartments and delivering a 'ham' is a very noisy affair which involves a lot of fighting and negotiating and singing and drinking etc. I really need to write a long blog post about this, since there's not much information on the internet in English, but in the meantime, watch this video and ask your Korean friends about what 함 is. 

Then they got married a few weeks later. Traditional weddings mean more excuses for me to wear my hanbok. It was a really nice wedding and they were really fortunate because despite being the end of November, it was not cold at all.

In December we started the new ski season. So far for this season we've already put in 12 or 13 days of skiing thanks to two 4 day weekends with Christmas and New Years. My skiing is getting better and better, but I've still got a long way to go to look as graceful as some other skiers on the mountain. 

What is in store for 2015? In the very immediate future, I'm leaving for a 3 week trip home to Boston and I've planned a mother-daughter trip to the Florida Keys for a week. After ski season is done I hope to do even more bike trips this year. I'd like to do a little more world travel next summer... maybe with the bike? But, beyond that trying not to over-plan because my schedule has been busy enough these days.

White Day Dinner

White Day, Korea's other valentine's day is a day for the guys to treat the girls. It's celebrated on March 14th, one month after traditional Valentine's Day, which here is a day for the girls to do something special for their guys. On White Day I got two packages of candies from two of my boys. One of which (who's in 6th grade) had to point out that it was really from his mother since he felt a little embarrassed giving it to me in front of all his friends.

For dinner the boyfriend decided to take me out to a Japanese bar in our neighborhood that we've been eyeing for a while.

We got ourselves a seat at the bar so we could check out all the food they were cooking. We got some Asahi and ordered some 꼬치 and you can see some of what we ate below. 

As we sat there munching on our grilled meat and veggies we saw them preparing up something else that caught the boyfriend's eye. Some sort of raw, preserved  octopus with wasabi. The boyfriend couldn't pass up trying it. I thought it was ok, but not something I could eat a whole plate of... but he thought it was the best thing since sliced bread and ate up the whole plate.

Anyway, it was a lovely evening and I'm happy I have a boyfriend that likes to try all kinds of food with me. The only problem with eating Japanese food is the price. It always tastes great, but portions are small and it's significantly higher than eating Korean food and drinking Korean beer. But, I guess that's what holidays are for.

Birds, Flowers and Sushi (Day 2 in Kobe)

We woke up rather leisurely on my last full day in Japan. As it was New Year's Eve, there wasn't a whole lot we could do for the day. Nori managed to find the one thing that was open, and that was the Bird and Flower Park. Basically, a greenhouse full of flowers and ponds with lily pads with an area to see tropical birds up close. Personally, I hate to see these creatures living in such conditions... people gawking at them, feeding them... many of them not flying  around, saying to me they must have their wings clipped. But, at the same time, it's also a rare experience to see these creatures up close and personal (sometimes too close and personal)

I had some fun taking photos in the flower garden.... 

Penguins! 

I love the colors on these ducks!! 

Then it was on to a dinner of sushi. I made a point to get one more taste of sushi since I'm guessing this could be my last trip to Japan (I've been 3 times now). We wondered around and found a decent looking place which turned out to be much better and nicer and cheaper than I expected. 

Nori sure does know how to order food. He went all out, ordering salad, tempura.... 

Sashimi....

And finally the sushi.... and even after we ate all that, he ordered more fried fish and fried potatoes.. I think I didn't walk out but more like rolled out of the restaurant. And amazingly, all this food, plus a little sake to drink came to about 10,000 yen. Yes, it's expencive, but we ordered a lot of food in a nice ambiance and great service from waitresses in kimonos. The more he ordered the more I imagined the bill racking up. But, anyway, you only live once, right?

New Year's Celebrations in Japan

Selling door ornaments called shimekazari, made with oranges, paper and tree branches in a local market in Osaka. 

New Year's is probably the best and worst time to visit Japan. Best time, because you can see the traditional culture of Japan. People visiting temples and shrines, people preparing their homes for the holiday, and just a sense of general excitement and anticipation that is in the air, similar to being in America around Christmastime.  Worst time, because museums are closed, the locals are busy and visiting families and temples may be packed with visitors, making for less than attractive photos and difficulties seeing the sights.

I was fortunate enough to get a chance to ring this big bell. Japanese ring a bell and make a wish for the new year. Small bells can be seen all around various temples, but not everyone gets to ring one like this! It pays to make friends with the local monk ^^.

In the homes, moochi (Japanese rice cake ... kind of like 떡) is placed in the home. I asked what the meaning of this was, but no one knew. I guess I don't know what the meaning of a Christmas tree is either. It's just something that belongs there.

Here is Nori's front door, adorned with a shimekazari. This is made of shimenawa (rice straw), tree branches and an orange. It is placed there to ward off evil spirits. This blog has a good, simple explanation.

Temples are a hubbub of action. We came to this major temple in Kobe a little earlier than most and missed the evening crowd. Japanese like to visit the temple at midnight on New Year's to hear the monks ring the bell 108 times.

Passageways are lined with vendors selling anything imaginable, but more than anything else was lots and lots of food.

In the morning, we came back to the same temple and found it packed. We pushed our way through the crowd and followed the police directing foot traffic into the temple to make our New Year's wishes.

The Kobe Beef Experience

As I was in Kobe, I figured I had to try Kobe beef. It's the one thing (other than the earthquake) that is world famous about Kobe and I figured someone, someday will ask me... "so, did you eat real Kobe beef in Kobe?" And if I were to answer "no." to that question I would be really lame and disappointed with myself, so, that's how I found myself in a steak house getting a a crazy expensive meal and trying to savor every moment.

While the cows are not massaged daily and fed beer as it is commonly thought, there are strict criteria that must be followed in order beef to be called Kobe beef. 1) the cow must be raised in Hyogo prefecture in Japan by designated producers. 2) The cows must be slaughtered at particular slaughterhouses and examined closely. 3) The fat marbling, firmness, texture and color are graded on a scale (BMS- Beef Marbling Score) and must achieve a certain amount of points.

Since there are such high standards, the cows are raised in a "stress-free" environment, according to the pamphlet I received. They are only fed fresh water, the best feed and allowed to "grow at their leisure to maturity". So, I guess for those vegetarians who are concerned about animal rights, you might not feel so guilty eating Kobe beef as opposed to some of the other varieties out there.

On to my Kobe beef experience....

Nori made reservations for us to eat at Nishimura which was close to his house. It's a teppanyaki style eatery where they cook the food on a grill in front of your eyes.

While they're not generous with the steak (you get about a fist size portion, which is probably the correct size... but I'm an American who is used to a steak more or less the size of a dinner plate), the meal itself is about 7 courses, so you won't leave feeling hungry by any means.

We started with soup and salad, western style.

Then, out came the meat. The big hunk with lots of fat was split between three of us. It looked a lot smaller on the plate after it was cooked though...

See?

On to the seafood

And a second course of meat, this time fried with bean sprouts. 

Finally, it was time for desert and tea or coffee. I found that Japanese really like western style black tea for some reason. 

And here we all are; me, Nori, Nori's friend and Nori's friend's mom. All of them were excited to practice English with me and I was happy to have great company for dinner! If you happen to stop by Kobe, make sure you get to taste Kobe beef!

Bonus! A video of the experience! Enjoy.. hope you're not hungry now!

Day One in Kobe

I arrived in Kobe on the morning of December 30th and was met by my friend from college, Nori, and his friend from his English class that wanted to meet me and practice English. Despite the rainy and cold weather, they gave me a whirlwind tour of the city. The first stop we made was the Disaster Reduction Museum, a museum dedicated to remembering the Kobe earthquake that struck in 1995 and preventing the same destruction from happening again by educating people about disaster preparedness. The museum was one of the highlights of this trip to Japan and a must see for anyone who stops by Kobe. Unfortunately, I couldn't take photos inside the museum, so I don't have anything to show here.

After the museum, we went to Chinatown for lunch. Since Kobe is a port city at some point a Chinese population was established here, but today it's more touristy and Japanese style Chinese food. But, anyway, it was fun to try and interesting to look around.

Nori's friend knew this woman serving up dumplings, so we popped into this restaurant for lunch.

Noodles, steamed buns, soup filled dumplings ... mmm....

Not Puma, but Pork and Panda.

From there we headed over to the waterfront area. We walked through Kobe Harborland, which is a fairly large shopping and entertainment complex complete with a small amusement park. While it's not really my thing, it was really nice to see the waterfront.

Nori here is trying hard to win one of those little Rillakuma thingamabobs... 200 yen later and nothing...

We were tired of walking around, so we stopped at a funny little "American" themed cafe for a cup of coffee (and tea for me). It was full of Southwestern Native American style prints and jewelery but it was cute. And, the thing that was most fun was the waitress who brought us some books to peruse while we sat around and relaxed. Here, Nori is reading our horoscopes and giving us insight into our nature.

From there it was on to eating Kobe beef, but I'll leave that for the next post.

Wednesday and Thursday in Kyoto

First stop on Wednesday was Sanjusangendo. Sanjusangendo literally means hall with 33 rooms, but it is most famous for it's 1001 statues of Kannon. Unfortunately, there are no photos allowed in the sanctuary so I can't show you what it looked like inside, but if you're curious, it seems many other people broke that rule. Sanjusangendo was probably the most expencive temple I visited, at 600 Yen, but it's easy to guess why the price is so high when you have to figure in the maitanance of over a 1000 historic statues.

I hopped on the bus for about two stops before getting out and walking up the hill to Kiyomizu-dera. I opted not to pay to go in the sanctuary here, but I'm fine with that decision. You're free to walk around the outside without paying and it's quite spectacular. This pagoda was really something else.

I walked away from the main tourist area down a little side path in Kiyomizu-dera and found this lovely bunch of stone statues. I think they are called dosojin (if you have any details about these things, please post them here! I really want to know what the deal is with these guys). There were no tourists at all down here so I spent a while photographing them from different angles.

I walked along some of the side streets unknowingly finding myself on a well beaten tourist path lined with cute little botiques and restaurants.

I was happy to find a Miyazaki store and spent a little time wandering around in there but too reluctant to buy anything because it's all so expencive!

I passed by Krozen Kwannon Temple. Though I didn't stop here, there was a great view of the giant Kannon from the outside.

Next I found myself at Kodaiji Temple and I entered. I got a 100 yen discount here on the entrance with my subway pass.

Here was another zen garden and some rather lovely old temple buildings.

Here is the cemetery at what I believe is Higashi Otani Mausoleum. This place was quite nice because there were very few tourist around. I'm not sure why that is, since it was on the main path, but anyway, I always love visiting cemeteries for some reason. They always look really beautiful to me. When I arrived here, though, I realized that I had lost my map and kind of freaked out because I had written all the bus numbers that I needed on there and didn't really know where I was. I was really frustrated so I just walked out of the temple area (I was coming to the end anyway) and wandered into town looking for a subway that would take me to Kyoto station where I knew there was a tourist information center with free maps.

As I was leaving the temple area, though, I stumbled across one last shrine; Yasaka-jinja shrine. Here, they were starting to get ready for the new years celebrations. There were closed stalls set up everywhere that I wished would open up because they looked really interesting.

Then I wondered around town for a while looking for food and a subway. I found the Gion Post Office. I thought it looked cool.

Here is the Kamo-Gawa River which goes through the center of Kyoto.

I stumbled into this shopping area and finally found myself some reasonably priced udon for lunch. I continued wandering until I found the right subway to get to Kyoto station. I got there, wondered all around forever looking for the tourist info place. Found it, and got directions to the Funaoka Public Bath since I heard it was famous.

I noticed that on the way to the public bath was the Nijojo castle. I think that I had read somewhere that it was closed for the holiday, but maybe in my rather frustrated mind after having lost my map and wandered around lost for a long time trying to get to Kyoto station and feeling as though I had rather wasted my time I decided I would stop there and hope that I could get there before closing time. I hopped off the bus, walked 15 minutes from the bus station (it looked much closer on the map) only to find out it was closed for the holiday. I walked dejectedly back to the bus stop and headed back to find the public bath.

Being a "tourist destination" I expected it to be on a main street, maybe really big and impressive. I was not expecting the unassuming location on a small side street that didn't even have a sidewalk. After  a bit of reading later, after the fact, I learned that the bath was built in 1923 and is one of the few public baths that have not been updated or changed much over the years. Coming from Korea, it's hard to scoff at it's simplicity compared to even the simplest Korean jjimjilbang. But, I think here, it's more about the historic nature of the location more than the amenities.

As you go in, you'll see these shoe lockers. Those who have spent time in Korea will recognise these easily, but the key is wooden. I wouldn't be surprised if they dated back to the foundation of the bath house. The fee to use the bath is incredibly low. I don't remember how much but it was less than 500 yen. I didn't have a towel, but they gave me one for free and let me buy soap for 30 yen or something like that. I only wished I had planned ahead and had brought my shampoo...

From there you can go into the changing room, get naked and head into the baths. Just like Korea, shower off before getting into the baths. There were a total of 7 or 8 baths. One was blood red, I wish I knew what it was, but I sat in there for a while. Others were nice, one was an extra hot one, another had massage jets, another pine. My favorite was the outdoor bath. It wasn't really outdoor-outdoor where people could see you, but it was built with an open roof. It was also a useful place to splash cold water on myself every time I went into the (only) sauna which was very hot and made me feel lightheaded every time I went in for more than 2 minutes. But, after the baths and the one sauna.. that was it. I was a little sad since I'm used to more luxury from Korean public baths, but I tried to appreciate it for what it was. After that I headed back to the couch surfer's house for a feast for dinner and sleep early to leave for Kobe in the morning.

Before getting on the subway the next morning I stopped by Heian-Jingu Shrine which was only 10 minutes walk from the couchsurfer's house. It was early in the morning and there was no one around.

It was not huge, but it was quite beautiful and photogenic with so few people around. From here I caught the train to Kobe and that will be the last segement of my Japan story. Stay tuned!