Our First Photos in South Korea

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We've been in Korea for three weeks now. There's a lot to tell about these three weeks, so I will just write a summary for now. In the future, I will try to write more details on a daily basis.

Keon really enjoyed seeing his country of origin again. He enjoyed spending time with his family and, especially, eating the food! He was able to relax and travel around the city by himself by bus just for fun. He helped Julie a lot with connecting with other people. Keon just left for Minneapolis today. We miss him already!

Julie has been busy meeting and tutoring Korean students in English language skills. She has enjoyed volunteering at the children's 유치원 (preschool) once a week to teach the older children English. It is a challenge going back to working with children, but she loves it when the kids tell her, "I love you, teacher!" at the end of her sessions with them. Julie has been busy helping her mother-in-law cook meals and clean, and is enjoying learning to cook new foods. She also enjoys eating out and singing at the local karaoke room. Julie has also been receiving acupuncture treatments for her knees and allergies. Her knees feel better already. Julie, Sabyl and Devinn remain in Keon's family's house until further notice; probably late July or early August.

Sabyl and Devinn are now both fully potty (and poop) trained during the day. They are often dry at night, but we don't risk it; they still wear diapers at night. They're really picking up Korean and are able to communicate better with their family here. They are becoming more and more independent and are showing their stuff every day. Sabyl still can't get enough pink. Devinn talks much less about poop, so that's wonderful.

During first week: we traveled to an island about two hours from Seoul. On our way, we saw hang gliders, kites and rollerbladers. You can see some pictures of those. We walked around a park and then we went out to eat at a seafood restaurant where we cooked fresh mussels, clams, squid and octopus on the table. Actually, we did this quite often during these three weeks, not just on this occasion. The kids entered preschool this week, and Julie met her students. We ate a lot of our favorite foods and tried to get over our jet lag. Keon got a cold on the airplane, and was stuffy most of the vacation, but he still managed to have a good time. Julie, Keon and his sister went out to a "nite" (night club) which was really quite lame, but we ended up finding a better place to hang out and had a nice time talking and drinking soju (a Korean liquor much like vodka).

During the second week: we mostly relaxed, ate out, ate in, watched videos, and Julie had her first tutoring sessions. We renewed our visas after two trips to the immigration office. Yes, Julie was the one to forget to renew the visas, but everything turned out alright. On Saturday night, we put the kids to bed early , and Keon's sister and her husband and Keon's brother and the two of us went out for dinner, drinks, dancing and Karaoke.

During the third week, which went by really fast, Julie and Keon traveled to two satellite cities near Seoul. The air was really fresh and the city roads were really organized. On the way home from Ilsan, the first satellite city we visited, we stopped by the "N Tower" of Seoul. It's a very tall tower where people can go to the top to view the city and also eat dinner in a revolving restaurant on the top. Unfortunately, it was a cloudy day, so we couldn't see very far. View pictures. Wednesday was a holiday and Keon's sister and father did not have to work, so we all went to a park with a small river flowing through it in the middle of the city. We ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant and bought souvenirs at a local market that is really large and famous in Seoul. Finally, we went home, knocked out and Keon got on the airplane this morning. Julie took the bus home from the airport and stopped at the clinic for acupuncture. The kids have a zillion mosquito bites, so Julie went to the pharmacy and asked (by herself in Korean) what kind of medicine she needed to help her kids stop scratching themselves all through the night, which kept them (and their parents) awake. They gave her some liquid to dab on them (like a liquid itch cream). Good job for Julie! Then, she picked up the kids from the preschool bus stop and became a member of travel blog, so this is their story.

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