Blogs from Jongno-gu, Seoul, South Korea, Asia - page 3

It's been more than 6 months since I've written my last blog and I want to apologize for being so terrible in keeping everyone up-to-date. Although I have been keeping notes and personal journals in order to write complete entries in the future I decided to write one at the moment as well. As most people may already know, my schooling experience at Yonsei University, South Korea has ended. It was a great experience and like most great experiences, are not realized to be great until they are already passed. It isn't necessarily the education which made this experience so special, but the people and the feeling of growth through times both good and bad. I guess travel really does educate a person, and although a year may not feel to be so long, a lot ... read more

Heeellllllloooooo, World! Yesterday was an AWESOME day! I went into the studio for a few hours to get acquainted with my surroundings, and it was a blastie-blast! I met everyone, and it was so nice to feel welcomed. After that, I walked around the city some more. Believe it or not, Seoul is about the size of New York and feels just as big! I decided against tackling the subway system at night and instead favored some food here. I had a dish made up of what I hope was beef and rice with some sauce and spices on it. Let me just be real here; I have no clue what it was called and I just pointed to the picture that looked the safest. It tasted good though. When I got back, I was greeted ... read more

Well kids, it was another eventful day here; left to my own devices again today, I wandered...and got lost. I mean, REALLY REALLY lost. Dunkin' Donuts, you let me down! Walking though turned out to be the best thing for me. I met some really cool people. First, I woke up, took a shower, and sat around for about an hour before deciding to go and get some grub. So I packed up my things, and off I went in search of a filling, yet safe looking meal. Cut to me, walking an hour and a half later, dripping in sweat, up a hill in a heavily wooded area with lots of roses completely lost. So naturally, I sat down and tried to decipher on my handy dandy tourist map (all in Korean by the way)where ... read more

These are photos from the all-day Lantern Festival that took up blocks in an already busy area of Seoul. There were crowds of people from various countries and the second I saw the diversity, I was in love. There's nothing that makes me happier than being surrounded by cultural hodgepodge. Beautiful women dressed in traditional clothes urged us to experience a 1-hr temple stay (my friend and I refused because we had both done more authentic temple-stays and wanted to see what else was going on). Lanterns decorated the Jogyesa Temple and the streets. As daylight faded, the lanterns glowed, illuminating all corners of the streets. Though we missed it, I recommend seeing the floating lanterns they place in Cheong Geh Cheon River. One of my fellow Incheon teachers posted photos of the floating lanterns and ... read more

Happy New Year everyone!! We hope that you all had a wonderful holiday season and welcomed the new year in style! A quick word about our Christmas in Korea. There's really not much to say-without our family and friends from home, it just wasn't the same - we even had taekwondo class on Christmas Eve, as if it were just any other day! We had a potluck dinner with all the other foreigners in Yangsan on Christmas Day, then Mike and I spent the weekend in Busan, enjoying the sunshine on the beach (we actually walked along the beach in just t-shirts it was so warm!) and exploring some new (to-us) areas of Busan. We walked down to a new beach, Seongjoeng Beach, along the way picking up some pretty seashells and being partly intrigued, partly ... read more