Advertisement
Published: February 5th 2013
The Seven Dwarves!
Fun at Disney on Ice :-)Hello!
I decided I had better fit a blog in before I jet off to Thailand on Friday so I can dedicate an entire one to that when I get back, without all this Seoul / Shanghai stuff tagged onto the beginning! It's not very long, or very exciting, but there's still some bits worth a blog! :-)
So basically after arriving back in Seoul and going straight back to work, my life during the week has pretty much been work, eat, sleep, work, eat, sleep, with the occasional meal out or trip to chiropracter! 13 hour days became the norm for the last 4 weeks unfortunately, but I did have some fun weekends, which are much more interesting to blog about!
After the second week back at work we went out on the Friday night and both Katharine and I were feeling the strain of the long days. This inevitably ended up with us both getting absolutely hammered.... we started off with other work people in one of our frequent bars, then off we went to Gold Bar, met a guy who had bought (and was quite willing to share) a botte of tequila, and the rest
speaks for itself! Of course, we hadn't thought this through as we were getting up early on the Saturday morning to go and watch Disney on Ice. We were the only people there without children and we were quite horrendously hungover, but we pulled ourselves through and shrieked with glee as all of the different characters skated amazingly! It was a particularly exciting moment when one of the children we teach appeared on the rink in a carriage pulled by some mermaids as it turns out his Mum is one of the backing dancers (skaters?? - whatever you would call her!) Anyway, it was great and we had a wonderful time. My favourite was Ariel and Sebastian's little duet! :-)
We then left the ice rink to see a load of people lined up in suits doing some sort of chant / dance routine in the middle of the Olympic Stadium. We were a little confused, but luckily we were with Joanne, who speaks Korean fluently, and she explained that it was part of the initiation for the people who had just got a job at the bank (the headquarters of which is at this stadium). To be honest,
I would be highly mythed if I was asked to do a bizarre dance in public in order to be allowed to work at a bank!! But I just have to accept that I'm still getting used to Korea, and Joanne herself was pretty confused before she understood what they were talking about so I don't think it was all that normal anyway! There is a video of this amazing event on facebook - if you stalk me you can see it!
Obviously not satisifed with one early start in a weekend, I was up at 5.30am on the Sunday to go skiing! We had to get up so early as we were a group of beginners and knew that we would definitely need to book a few hours of lessons! We boarded the subway, had a little ride on a free bus, and within 2 hours were at a ski resort! This cost the grand total of £1.20 (£2.40 return!!) We got guided round the resort getting all of our equipment and they even dressed us in our ski gear as we looked that stupid and unsure of ourselves! We all had bibs that said 'family' on as
we had got a deal by booknig the fanily package!! Of course, as soon as we were all geared up we all decided we in fact needed a wee so had to traipse over to the toilets and relieve ourselves, much to the instructors amusement! Eventually we were ready to go...... on the baby slope! I fell over, even on this tiny slope, on my first ever skiing attempt, after careering straight into a fence and Mr.Han our instructor had to put his arms under my armpits to hoist me back onto my feet! This was the first of only 2 falls though, so all in all I was actually quite impressed with myself! The second came right at the very end when he decided to up the ante and try us on a slightly steeper slope......bad idea Mr.Han! We all ended up on our bottoms apart from Katharine! :-) Anyway, a 2 hour lesson had the result that I can now go down a slightly inclined slope in snow plough position, without falling over! I must go back before the season ends just to clarify that this wasn't luck! 2 hours was definitely enough skiing for my first time
The Little Mermaid
With the kids in the carriage :-) and when the lesson ended we ate loads of breaded chicken in the cafe and then made the return journey on the free bus and subway. It still feels quite surreal that you can just pop to the ski resort on a sunday morning for a quick session, and then pop back again, all for a very small amount of money!
The following weekend I had to do a fair bit of work ready for my trip to Shanghai, although there are still a couple of things worht mentioning. Firstly, I had a great dinner at Macaroni Market (the one with the French Onion soup) on the Friday evening straight from work. On Saturday night we went out for a friends birthday and had fondue at another great restaurant! I'd never had fondue before but I must say, it's pretty great! I also had a few drinks that evening for good measure. Excitingly, I did go to Homeplus (Tesco) and was very excitied to find the Tesco own brand of Rice Krispies, which I ate all of the time in England. I now quite enjoy my breakfast in the morning again.....if only the milk was real!! :-) the rest
of the weekend was spent making a powerpoint about 'Innovative Science Curriculum Design' - what a hoot!
Which brings me to the weekend just passed! On Thursday night Rachel, Katharine and I went out for dinner at La Bocca to celebrate Katharine's birthday. Her actual birthday was Sunday but because I was going to be away we had a lovely meal on the Thursday instead. The food was great, the wine was great, and the cupcakes we surprised Katharine with were great! There was a pig (Rachel's - she won't eat pork as she things pigs are too clever!), an owl (mine - obvs!) and a lamb (Katharine's - her family and friends from home all call her lamby). Whilst she was at the toilet we whipped them out and put candles in them so she could blow them out when she got back to the table. It didn't go particularly smoothly as the waiter told us we couldn't have our own desserts in the restaurant to which I just said rather curtly - 'we're not going to eat them!'. I mean how rude when we'd all had 2 courses and wine! Then Katharine just didn't notice them for
The Finale
A view of the whole ice rink. about 10 seconds and was asking us why we were smirking, until she looked down and saw them! How she missed them first time round I will never know! Anyway, she loved it and the rudeness of the waier (who alos told us to "turn the volume down" at one point) was masked by the delicious-ness of the food!
On the Friday I had a normal day at school but then got a taxi to the airport at 5pm ready to go to Shanghai! The flight was short but involved food, which is always great! We got a taxi from the airport, the driver of which tried to rip us off, of course! The hotel was great (apart from the man vomiting into a bicket into reception as we arrived - he'd had a bit too much to drink!) and I went pretty much straight to bed as I was really exhausted! I got up the next day and stuffed my face with a mixture of breakfast delights - toast, croissants, pain au chocolat, omelette, melon and copius amounts of tea! Great! We then headed off to the school for the conference, which I won't speak much about because
Tinkerbell
In Cinderella's carriage it was basically work! I gave my presentation, which went fine, and got some useful ideas from other people's presentations too :-) Lunch was good and after walking back to the hotel (discussing work all the way as it turns out my work colleagues are keeno's like me!) there was about an hour to get ready before being whisked away to dinner in a minibus.
So after the driver tried to tell us that out dinner was in the 'Global Finance Centre', we finally found that it was actually across the road in a rather posh establishment. We went to the upstairs area for drinks, and I had a Hendricks gin and tonic with cucumber (I know this will impress one of my friends in particular!) We then went into the restaurant for dinner and were plied with endless dishes of not-so-authentic chinese cuisine! It was great and the dishes just kept on coming! I drank more gin and had a very merry time. There was a small shock when we went to the toilet (which were a huge waste of space incidentally - there were only 2 toilets in a room the size of a house) and as
you go to wash your hands you find yourself staring into the 'mirror' and it actually being the men's toilets. Basically, the area above the sinks is just a hole and you can chat to the men who are also washing their hands - very bizarre and slightly unnerving when I looked up to see Ian on the other side and I was expecting my reflection! We then retired back to the bar for further drinks! We were soon treated to some people watching when this guy came to set up hos own birthday and he had made his own 'powerpoint' of himself to go on the wall behind the DJ. His party was named 'Cirque de Leo' after himself and the powerpoint included pictures of him 'jumping' in various outfits! The friends that came to the party were rather niche it has to be said! :-) We left the bar fairly early due to increased tiredness but went back out to near the hotel and met one of Ian's friends who works in Shanghai for a quick drink before bed. He stayed at the hotel ready for some tourist sightseeing the next day....
On the Sunday, I again
Skiing
They thought we were so special that they dressed us! stuffed myself with the breakfast! I really do enjoy having a pain au chocolat as 'pudding' during a good breakfast session! We packed up our suitcases and decided to go an be proper touristy over on the 'bund'. This is basically a lovely paved area that you walk along to look at the sky line. We saw the 'bottle opener', 'pearl tower' and this new one they are bulding that makes everything else look miniscule! Apparently they won't say how tall it is going to be so that Dubai don't out-do them before it's even built! We also took some very tourist like photos! One of my favourite things though was actually getting there. You have to go over the river and there is this really cool bridge that is basically as tall as the skyscrapers so you are on the same level as the tops of the buildings and you get a fab view! :-) After exhausting ourselves with such exciting activities we retired to a Starbucks for a bit of Western comfort and a nice toilet! We went from there to another food establishment soon after, which was a little more authentic than the night before in that
we had no real idea what we were ordering and the plates were, quite frankly, a bit dirty! It was really good food though and after my experiences in Thailand I think it's safe to say that my stomach is pretty much made of steel! ;-) The other thing we did in Shanghai was to walk around the local park.....a lovely stroll you would think! Well, not really, because it is weirdly filled with lots of old people 'matchmaking' their sons and daughters. Basically, everywhere in the park there are posters with the details of young people on (made by their parents) and then other parents come along and look at the posters and contact each other to arrange for their children to meet up, and hopefully get married! It's internet dating on a whole new level. I swear I would actually disown my Mum if she 'advertised' me in a park (sorry Mum, but I would!) Some of them even had them stuck on an umbrella - they didn't make the washing line with the others!! This was one of the most bizarre things I have EVER seen, especially as there were thousands of posters! Some of them looked
a bit dog-eared as well - I mean you would just give up if it had got to that stage right?!
Anyway, we then had to head towards the airport, so after saying goodbye to Pete we boarded the subway and headed on our merry way. It ended up being a longer journey than expected due to a slightly delayed flight, then a 40 minute cruise around Incheon airport after landing and before parking up! I think it was because of the snow, but either way, we spent just as long rolling around there as we did in the air! We then spent the entire train journey praying that it would be a snow day the next day - I convinced myself it would be as taxi drivers had their hazard lights on as they drove, and this never happens! We also spoke about how useless we would be in school the next day if there was no snow day as we were all so 'out of it' from tiredness! So I got in, went over to see Katharine because it was her actual birthday, called Mum and Dad on skype and then finally went to bed at 1.15am
Mr. Han and Rachel
At the bottom of the slope after a successful run! with everything crossed that the snow would keep falling....
And then yesterday my dreams came true as I received a text informing me that school was indeed closed because of the snow! I went straight back to bed at 6am and had a lovely lie in until 10am :-) We then went shopping for clothes for Thailand and in the evening we went out for Katharine's school people birthday celebration - we like to celebrate a birthday good and proper! Which brings me to the now! :-) I'm about to head to bed as the prospect of packing for my holiday does not appeal to me, and there's nothing else left to organise as Katharine and I have decided to opt for the 'see when we get there' attitude! We have somewhere to stay for the first 2 nights and we will just go from there! :-)
Looking forward to blogging about my next adventure (although not as much as I'm looking forward to experiencing it!)
Lots of love,
Claire xxxx
Advertisement
Tot: 0.134s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 12; qc: 51; dbt: 0.0663s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Claire
non-member comment
Congrats on the Hendricks and cucumber! (I assume you were referring to me...!)