Blogs from Kunsan, Jeollabuk-do, South Korea, Asia

We wanted to wish everybody a Happy New Year and share some pictures from the first month of the year. So far January has been a very cold and snowy month, right before New Year’s Day we received about 16” of snow and the temperature has not been above freezing the entire month, last weekend another 6” of snow fell, I know for many of you this is not very much snow, but for the lack of snow removal equipment and the style of removal, it is a lot here. For removal they plow the farthest lane from the highway on-ramp, so if it is a three lane expressway, you have to drive over two lanes of deep snow to get on or off the highway. We have taken a few hikes in the snow, one ... read more

Well, as I mentioned in an earlier blog I was thinking of going to China to see the total eclipse, I did not make it, couple of reasons 1) It is still monsoon season and I did not want to buy a ticket to Singapore and it ends up being a cloudy day, 2) Which is the main reason, I procrastinated and forgot I needed a China visa. So I stayed in Korea and saw an almost 90% eclipse on what turned out to be a very clear day. One of my co-workers (Korean) had never seen an eclipse, so we watched together, I showed him how to look at the event with a some binoculars and a piece of cardboard, later we borrowed a "Welding Hood" with a dark green lens, I was able to ... read more

Well it is the monsoon season here so when you have a nice weekend you have to make the best of it, and that is just what we did. Saturday morning started off with a little house work and cleaning around the apartment, and Pearl helping me with my Korean. Later in the day we had our downstairs neighbors up for a cocktail, introduced them the the greatness of the "Mai Tai", after our drink we all went across the street to Eunpa park for a cook out. Pearl and I made sandwiches, strips of chicken breast marinated in a great Lime Chipotle sauce my mom sent me. On the sandwiches we added grilled onions, grilled mushrooms, cheese, marinated peppers, it was very good. Our neighbors grilled pork, and brought Cabbage Kimchi, Onion Kimchi, and ... read more

Spring time in Korea Well last weekend I was suppose to go with the Kunsan hiking club on their continuing trek along the Bek Do De Gan trail, the group was leaving Saturday night at 9:00 pm to start the hike at 3:00 am Sunday morning, the hiking club uses two big buses to carry all the hikers. I had to go up to Seoul for a meeting on Friday and visit with my girlfriend on Saturday. When I went to work on Monday I was told by my friend that the club did not do their hike, seems like there was an accident. The back bus ran into the front bus, which left the front bus stuck, so the hiking club had a party and drank. So this weekend was kinda the peak for the ... read more