Bongeunsa Temple

How's it hanging, Buddah?! One tourist activity that I really wanted to participate in Korea was the "Temple Stay Program" . In this program, you can spend one to three days experiencing what it is like to live in a Buddhist temple in Korea. We opted for just the one day experience (not too keen on waking up at 3am to do 108 postures and meditate, plus the temples aren't heated too well!). I am really interested in learning about the Buddhist religion so I thought this was a great opportunity. It also kind of reminded me of the "pray" aspect of Eat, Pray, Love (the AMAZING book, not the horrible Julia Roberts movie). We got to the temple and were very surprised to see how traditional it looked even though it was right in downtown Seoul, surrounded by office towers and a stones throw away from the COEX Mall. It was pretty gorgeous.



Our tour was led by a volunteer who practices at the temple. She was super nice and her English was pretty good! We started off with a temple tour, learning about the different kinds of offerings to Buddha and what different types of candles meant (depending on if the candle was pink or white it was either in memory of someone who has passed away or an offering about someone who is living). Then we went to a prayer room where people were doing the 108 Postures (each bow represents a wish / prayer). It was so beautiful. Lotus lanterns donned the ceiling, golden Buddhas surrounded us as we sat on mats and gaped around with open mouths.



After the prayer, we toured more of the temple and went to the "meditation center". This was a more modern building where they do a lot of the educational programs. We experienced a Buddhist tea ceremony. They explained that serving tea has a very specific meditative quality to it and everything is done in a calm and meditative manner. The tea was delicious, we tried two different kinds. One was chrysanthemum, which really did taste like flowers. We also tried some small snacks. One was a powdered pine needles (BLAGH!!!) and the other was lotus root and sweet potato crisps (yum!).



After the tea ceremony, a Buddhist monk came in and led us in a short meditation. They hit sticks together to signify when the practice begins and ends. We sat on mats, crossed legged, and practiced meditation. I have so much respect for those monks, he said that sometimes he meditates for 10 plus hours!!! You really are in-tune with yourself then!

Our final activity was making lotus flowers. It was a very simple activity (a lot of gluing and pasting) but it resulted in a beautiful flower to hang in my room! They also gave us these small brown bracelets that we could take home to remember our stay. They are mini versions of the prayer beads that the Buddhists use in their prayers (108 beads for 108 wishes). Ours only have 26 beads, but I haven't taken mine off since. :)

When we were leaving we visited the prayer tree at the entrance to the temple. They believe that if you put your wish / prayer on a piece of paper and tie it to the tree, the wind will blow the words and make your prayer come true. Mom and I tied ours to the tree. It was beautiful with the different colours flapping in the winds.

Day Trips With Mom!

So during last week while Jaclyn was working, Mom and I explored Seoul on our own. I'll highlight the more exciting things we did (I dont think you'll care too much for a description of the last Friday where we watched hotel movies and shopped in Nowon because I had a rotten cold)...

N Seoul Tower
We went to Seouls equivalent of the CN tower to see a birds eye view of the city. It was an adventure getting there! It was our first time navigating the subway on our own and even though I've had many experiences travelling on non-English metros during my travels, it's a lot harder when the maps use characters instead of letters! I found very detailed directions and somehow (combo luck and internal compass), we found our way through a windy backstreet to where the cable car was. We were glad we found it! When Jac went to the tower in the summer, they couldn't find the cable car and hiked up the mountain. Ha, can you imagine us doing that? I'm far too lazy.



We took the Namsan cable car up and had a great view of Seoul. We had burgers for lunch and then took the elevator up to the observation deck. The coolest part we're the locks of love. People put their names on lock and chain them to the fence surrounding the tower. There were thousands of them! We couldn't find jaclyns and sarahs that they put up in the summer though.



Traditional Folk Village
Ha, our adventure to get to the village about an hour outside Seoul was interesting! We lost the directions that jac gave us to get to the bus, but figured it out with dumb luck. Then we just showed the driver the brochure of the folk village, he nodded and we got on - not sure if the nod was a confirmation or a hello. But we got there!

Mom and I went here on a freezing cold day where it felt like we were wandering through the ruins of a old Korean town as there were maybe like 40 people in the entire park.



It was very interesting though. We saw how they made their houses, heated their floors, various celebrations and festivals and even some traditional dancing and horse aerobatics! We saw an area that they used for traditional films and pretended we were in historical dramas. :)

A lady showed me how to tie my hair using a chopstick (which I had previously deemed impossible due to my thin hair), we ate what tasted like rubber corn on the cob (no way was whatever we were eating real food) and checked out the amusement park area (think of a mini Centre Island haha).

The Aquarium & COEX Mall
Wednesday found us at the COEX Mall & Aquarium! The COEX mall is Seoul's largest underground (i.e. inside where its not FREEZING) mall. It even had a food court, complete with our lunch of KFC. :) We shopped along our way to the Aquarium which was at the end of the mall.

The Aquarium tour started off with different kinds of fish that are common in Korea (in the small lakes / marshes) which to be honest, wasn't all too exciting. THEN we got to the "fun zone" where they showcased a variety of different kinds of fish tanks! This included things like a fire hydrant, a toilet, a pop machine, an electronic harp (every time a fish passed through it, it would make a ding noise), and even a refrigerator. It was cute, creative and so very Korean. I loved it.



After the crazy fish tank display, we entered the "Amazon" area... which for some reason included spider monkeys (in an Aquarium? Yeah....). There were piranhas (I kept thinking of Piranha 3D!), sharks, eels, etc. I don't know if you know this but along with moths, I am terrified of eels. That's why I don't really ever want to go snorkeling, I keep thinking they will pop out with their dead eyes and sharp teeth!! Along our way (I believe we were out of the "Amazon" section by this point, we saw seals, a beaver, sleeping otters and even some Manatees eating lettuce! Then we came to shark tank area. There was a conveyor belt that took you under a ceiling where the sharks would swim above you. It was pretty neat, but there were no great whites or anything too crazy.



One thing that was hilarious though was that at one area, they had three scuba divers dressed up in Santa costumes doing tricks with fish. It was bizarre, I had no idea what was really going on, but at least it was unique!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from South Korea!

So I know I'm about a week behind in these posts and we've done SO much since then, but since we have half an hour left on Christmas, I thought I'd post about our Christmas eve and day in Seoul. I'll blog about the other adventures tomorrow. :)

Christmas Eve began SUPER early with a trip to the DMZ. Honestly, what could be more Christmasy than visiting soliders and "stepping" into North Korea! :P I will talk so much more about the DMZ in another post, but needless to say it was a long day beginning at 5:30 am and getting back to Jac's apartment at 4pm.

For Christmas Eve dinner, the four of us (Myself, Mom, Jaclyn and her friend Sarah) wanted a "western style" meal (or at least I did!). We tried TGIFridays but it was almost a two hour wait!! We switched our plan to Outback Steakhouse because even though its Australian, its more westernized than bulgogi or bibimpbap! Jaclyn, Sarah and Mom all had steaks but I of course had chicken. It was amazing... covered in bacon, mushrooms and SO MUCH CHEESE. Plus a side of mashed potatoes (which they called "smashed potatoes" hehehe).

After we gorged ourselves, we came back to Jac's hotel with our food babies and digested infront of the TV. I brought It's a Wonderful Life with me as is our annual christmas eve tradition. We watched about half of it and then went to the "Jazz bar" (mostly named so because of the saxophone I saw on the wall there, not so much for the jazz music) to meet some of her friends. We ordered drinks (mine while sounding exciting, was not very tasty) and chatted with her friends. Finally the early morning caught up with us and we crashed around 1.

Christmas Morning found us up and talking to our family back home on skype. The girl twins (meg, hailey and eowyn) preformed karaoke for us ("la la la everybody... la la la... There's a party on the rooftop top of the world" song). They are gonna be rock stars. Max had enough forsight to just pop his head in, wish us Merry Christmas and run off. :) Then Sarah came up and her and Jacyln opened up their presents. Mom and I are opening up ours with Dad when we get back. It kinda felt more like Jaclyns birthday! lol. She loved all her presents though and thanks you all.

After presents, we watched the last bit of Its a Wonderful Life (yes, i cried) and then slowly got ready to go to Jaclyn's coworkers potluck dinner/lunch. We brought the dessert (apple pie and a Baskin Robbins Cake). It was a great Christmas dinner. We had chicken, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing (but not great because it wasnt made with bread), sausages, gravy and carrots. We played a game called "fishbowl" where you had to get your team to guess the name of a famous person (written down by everyone else). It was a lot of fun! Her coworkers are super nice and very friendly. Jaclyn is in good hands.

We came back to Jaclyn's apartment and we watched "A Muppets Christmas Carol" (another staple). Sarah left right after to go to bed and we lounged around until we talked to dad (which was Christmas morning in Toronto). Now we are heading to bed! Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night! :)

25 June 1950 – Present...

Jaclyn can sometimes read my mind. She really wanted to go to The War Memorial of Korea (albiet for a different piece of history than I am interested in) and I enjoyed it just as much as she did. Maybe my love of history has rubbed off on her a bit? ;)

She was really intersted in seeing a full size model of a Turtle Ship because she had to teach a lesson on them and knew all about them. They were large warships that were used by the Koreans to fight against the Japanease in the Joesan dynasty (15th - 19th century).



There were 5 different kinds of cannons on the ship, on every side and on each end there was a big dragon head that could launch cannons or shoot flames out of its mouth. On the top of the boat, there were metal spikes sticking up on the roof. Since the Japanease were very adept at hand to hand combat, they would often jump on ships and take them over that way. However, when they jumped onto a turtle ship, thier feet would be impaled. Preeeeeety smart, Korea!

The museum also had a lot of things from the Joesan Dynasty and ancient fighting tactics, but the part that I was interseted in was the Korea War section. Obviously, this is a huge part of thier history - considering it is still going on - and they had an entire floor dedicated to it. I surprisngly know very little about this war, even though my favourite part of history to study is 20th century American history! I learned all about the timeline of events, US/UN involvement (including the name of a fallen Canadian solider - Andrew George Howse - hmmm... any relation??), and the creation of the DMZ (which we will be touring later this week!).

They had a "modern" warfare section with displays on the current South Korean military and tensions with North Korea. Mom and I even went on a simulation flight of a Korean fighter jet (but unfortuently, was not very good...). Around the outside of the museum, while under construction (of course), there were a lot of really beautiful and touching statues and memorials. My favourite one was the Peace Clock Tower. There were two girls in this staute holding up two clocks.


One clock displays the current time whlie the other has the date and time of when the Korean War began. There is a "bullet" hole on the glass and the clock is frozen. There is a separate clock located on the ground beside the statue and a sign saying that whenever Korea reunifies and the war is over, then this clock will go up and replace the stopped clock. I thought it was such a thought provoking and beautiful scuplture.

If "Stomp" met the inside of a Korean kitchen...

... then you would witness an event similar to the theatrical show we saw on Sunday... Nanta. :) It is the longest running show in Korean history.

This hilarious show has been my highlight so far. It is a musical drumming show, where the actors drum with everyday items you would find in a kitchen. The storyline is about three cooks who must prepare a wedding feast on a strict time line (6 o'clock!!). The manager of the restaurant/venue brings along his nephew (who isn't very swift) to add mayhem into the kitchen life. There was amazing musical performances, hilarious pantomime (they spoke a mixture of English / Korean, but you didn't need to know what they were saying to understand the story), and even some fighting scenes!

They had audience participation twice. One time they asked volunteers to come up and try the soup they made and the other time, they got volunteers to help them prepare a meal. There was cabbage flying around and at one point the whole floor was filled up with cut up vegetables!

Here is a clip advertising Nanta. The man in the green scarf was the same actor we had in our performance and he was AMAZING. The funniest actor in the show for sure. I was actually laughing out loud a lot throughout the performance.



If this ever comes to Canada (it was touring off Broadway at one point), I really recommend it. But if you ever come to Seoul, it is a MUST.

Shopping & Puppies!

On Saturday, we headed out to the Myeong-dong area to do some shopping with Jaclyn and her friend Sarah (that she came over to Korea with from Canada). The area is full of shops and then they also have small vendors on the sides of the streets that sell things like socks (I got Cute ninetendo Mushroom ones that say "Get a Life" ha), hats/scarves (I got a loopy scarf, everyone else got new hats), and shoes. Jac and Sarah had a christmas party that night so they went to Forever 21 (yes, even in Korea, they have a Forever 21!) while Mom and I shopped some more.

The best part of the day though? The PUPPY CAFE. No, I don't mean a place where you eat dogs but a place where there are about 15 puppies running around and you drink coffee and play with them. Yes, it exisits and yes, it was AWESOME.



They had attendents there to clean up any messes and a whole bunch of different dogs. My favourite was this cute Jack Russel mix that let me cuddle him. There were pugs, a bulldog, a border collie, daschunds, a lab, a golden retriever, an Afgan, those little white dogs and so many more. Jac, Sarah and Mom didn't seem to enjoy it as much as I did. Man, I miss dogs. :) We stayed there for about an hour.

I really want to run one of these in Toronto! Such a cool gimmick cafe. :)

Gimme some Kimchi!

We were all about expanding our Korean pallet today! Jaclyn booked us on a food tour in Insadong through a company called O'ngo. When we got there, a chef showed us how to make Korean pancakes "Jeon" that they like to eat as appitizers. It was a pancake full of shrimp, squid, green onions and mushrooms. We also got a really good sauce to dip it in (half soya sauce, half rice vinegar and red chili peppers). I am not a huge seafood fan as most of you know, but I tried it! The pancake and sauce were good, mom got my extra shrimps. ;)

After the cooking demonstration, our tour guide, an adorable Korean-Japanaese girl, showed us a food market. Pointing out different kinds of soya sauce, how they make red pepper paste, and loads of squids and fish! We also saw pig heads..... I was NOT impressed... And kept thinking of the film "Contagion".

Our first food stop was to try some rice cakes. They are Korean desserts that... aren't sweet at all! Mom and Jac seemed to tolerate them, but I was not a fan. Desserts are supposed to be sweet, not bland! Wierd cultural differences for sure!

Then we went to a restaurant where we sat by a hot flame and cooked a seafood stew (what was with all the seafood bleah!). Inside the stew were squid, fish cakes, glass noodles, thick rice noodles, mussels and it was not tooooo spicey (mom could handle it!)

Next stop was a dumpling steet vendor! We ordered them deep fried (you could also steam them but come on, who would choose that!). This was the first thing I really liked so I devoured it in like 30 seconds. As well as half of Jaclyns.

Korea has a lot of street vendors selling crazy foods. We also tried this dessert made out of honey that they mix with corn starch and stretch it so it turns into little strands. They then wrap the strands around some almonds. They were tasty but I didn't like the almonds! We bought some to bring home for my Dad.



Next stop on our food tour was a place that had a million side plates (including a delicious tofu hot pot and of course Kimchi). We ordered a beef stew called "Bulgogi" that was very tasty and because I wanted to try Bibimbap, they made some for me. Jaclyn says it wasn't a "real" bibimbap because there was no egg in it, but it was still tasty. Loads of rice, veggies and red pepper taste.

Our final stop on the food tour was to have these delicious Korean style donughts from another street vendor. Inside the fried dough were sugar and honey and some sort of seed. It was AMAZING. :)



After we were full of food, we walked through Insadong where we window shopped and bought souveniers for friends back home. We stopped off at the "Beautiful Tea Museum" to have some tea. I tried a traditional boring Black tea (I was craving some regularilty), Jaclyn got a "5 taste tea" and Mom got something that tasted Apple Cider. It was a cute little cafe and the tea hit the spot.

The tour was definitly an eye opener and something daring for plain old Chicken lover Susan. But, that's what experiencing new cultures is all about!!!