Spring in Korea 2009 - WOW this is OLD!

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WOW I just logged on her to actually sort out my blog that hasn't been touched in YEARS and I found this saved blog! It was written in the moment so why not publish it?!
(FYI it was written in Spring 2009 during my first year teaching in Incheon, South Korea)

OK I realise it's been a few months since I wrote one of these and lots has happened and im sure to miss out an awful lot. But I will try to stick to the stuff you might want to know.
SPRING IS HERE!!!
Well actually it's almost summer now I think, Spring was very short, I almost didnt notice the weather slowly warming up and the new shoots on the trees.
Paddy's day was one of the first big events in a while, now I know I'm English but we Brits don't really do a good job of celebrating our own saints so I thought seeing as I have some close Irish mates I would jump on the band wagon and deck myself out in some green and turn up to a street party! Me and Catherine made t-shirts with Irish slogans (mine said" I'M DRUNK" in Irish) and popped off to Seoul to join a big outdoors event that the Koreans had organised, it had face painting and free guinness!!! Not a bad event really, beer pong, flip cup, a random leprechaun that popped up in photos!! It was truly random.
There were about 30 of us in the end and we all went to a bar and took over in true foreign teaher style. The night got a bit sloppy and we all got split up, one person ended up asleep in a very busy bar, I ended up losing all the girls and wondering round a bar trying to find someone, anyone!!
I wound up with the boys and thats a whole other story of madness!

We have experienced our first few sessions of sunbathing on the roof of our apartment, very nice it was too! We also had one very long night out that turned into singing in a noribang at 930am followed by a session of sleeping on the roof.
I finally found time to do some sightseeing in Seoul, Namsam tower = DONE! Palace = DONE!
I brought a wig too and enjoyed being a brunette for the day, liberating!
One weekend I went down south for a tea festival with Andrea and Selena my two lovely Canadian mates. It was great to leave Seoul behind us for two days even if it meant being on a bus for 7 hours due to crazy traffic. Mount Jiri (Jirisan) was great apart from the rain cloud that opened on us as soon as we got to the mountain. But hey, I'm hard core i can handle rain, I'm ENGLISH!!!

Ohh I went to my 1st jimjil bang (hot naked spa) too, quite an eye opener!!!! I saw sights I have never thought possible, one woman who I swear was technically a man sneeking into the jimjil bang - hairy arse! :0

The tea festival was fantastic and the scenery was amazing, just what I expected, plenty of lush green mountains with the clouds rolling down them. We spent some time trying to climb a mountain to get to a waterfall, we weren't really equiped for the hike - I was in ballet pumps!! Anyway it was great fun!

I really loved leaving Seoul behind me and seeing some of the countryside, its such a different side to Korea, lush and green. I'm glad I got to go with 2 of my best mates herem who knows when we will be together again after our contracts are up.

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