Camille’s Birthday/ Our Vacation

So of coarse, for a birthday we went to Seoul to party it up. Our plan was to find a place when we got there. A korean teacher from our school was coming with us and promised to help us find a place to stay. So we arrived around 6:30 pm ish maybe 7:00 and walked around to a number of hotels only to find that they were all full. Get this though, they were not full for the night (we were told to come back around 10:00 p.m.) they were full for the hour! Yep! Not that they were “love hotels” per se, but that is what they are used for. In a way I guess it makes sense there is little space when a family all lives together in a small place. Young adults usually live at home till they are married etc. etc. Anyway, this is what I tell myself because I try not to go to the latter assumption--- which is probably more accurate--- infidelity is at an all time high in Korea! Ha ha the hotel even takes the initiative to put a board up over the license plate of your parked car! And there are all these hanging towel things over the entrance to hotel parking lots. We asked Olive, the korean teacher, what these were for and she said so that no one recognizes the cheaters car! Now I think she might have bee joking but who’s to say cause the boarded license plates are not a joke!

Ok so we had no place to stay... and no place for me to try and get pretty--- so i wasn’t a happy camper. We headed to a pre- pre drinking place with all our luggage in tow. Not that I had a lot (only one backpack sized bag) but we were travelling for three more days from Seoul so it was decently heavy and I did not feel like carrying to a bar all night. So we ended up at this really cool place for pre-pre drinks. It was a smaller pub/restaurant that had all of this mushroom type of sculpture round the walls. (See picture) We also were served huge beer pitchers with dry ice in the middle so that it shot out. (It looked really cool). Anyway so laughs/drinks were had and then we moved on to the pre-drinking place-- “Carne Station.” It was all you can drink/eat from 8:30- 11:30. So we had bbq (Korean cook your own style), and even tortillas wraps (first time I have seen these here--- and if you know me I pretty much was in heaven). So anyway more laughs/ drinks were had--- and there ended up being about 15 of us there so it was great--- and Carne clearly stood for Carnage. And then as you can imagine after that we took the city of Seoul by storm and went to a club. Clubbing is similar all over the world... crowded lots of people bumping up against each other .. ha ha purposefully and accidentally. What I feel is worth mentioning is that instead of the usual pizza or McDonalds people often get after the bar... Bridgette and I got Kimbap--- which is Korean style California rolls off of a street vendor.... ohh Korea Korea... I loved it!
Yeah so in the end, Olive (the korean teacher) ditched us and we were left trying to figure out where we were going to stay. Luckily Camille just attracts Korean men... and I worked two of them to take us to a good place for the night. We spent too much money on it for the little time we were there... but it was a bed!

Danyang
The next day, we woke up way too early and took a taxi to the bus station where we met some more Korean teachers and Olive again. We all took the bus to this cute town called Danyang. Our plan was to go there to go hangliding and rafting. Well we got there and were in no mood to do either so instead we went on the “Pleasure Boat.” It was a really nice ride on this river surrounded by large green hills that some may call mountains. It was really beautiful and a perfect activity after a night out. We also found a great place to stay for the seven of us. There was one large king bed (for three Korean girls-- ha ha notice how this doesn’t include us... it’d probably only be two) and the rest of us slept on the floor.
The day after, we phoned the hangliding place only to find out that the run way had been flooded. (Boo) So we are flexible teachers and went to this AMAZING buddhist temple instead. It was built recently the (50’s) but was still incredible. The attention to detail with the paintings was breathtaking. It was all amazing to see but in some ways frustrating... as I had a million and one questions and there was no one who knew anything to translate for me. Yet... I believe; “ask and it will be given to you.” So it turns out that on our way home we all got split up (couldn’t sit together) and Bridgette and I sat beside a man from Seoul who had spent the previous night at the temple! So the temple is of the Buddhist Sect that chants when they pray. He chanted/prayed from 10:30 to 3:30 in the morning! The gold statues are of coarse of the Buddha. The center one being the almighty/all knowing Buddha, the one to the left the powerful Buddha (his words maybe the Buddha of action) and the one to the right the female Buddha-- the one of wisdom (umm of coarse! ;) The temple is home to monks both female and male, which apparently is uncommon. Both sexes pray/ practice together but sleep in separate dormitories. The temple grounds have many buildings and there is even another under construction because there are so many people who come to pray. When I asked what he prayed for he said that it is different for everyone-- the usual; health, children etc. He believed in reincarnation and that what he did in his past life is affecting this one and what he does now will affect the future. Needless to say he was a great man, who spoke great english, and offered to be our “Korean Cultural Mentor.” I hope we take him up on this offer.
Yeah so after the temple... on our drive back we saw the rafting. It was more like floating-- so we decided to put an x through that idea and instead we went to this cave. It was really cool looking.... and there was an amazing amount of stairs. I believe Roberta’s quote was “It is like a free drop in to the gym day.” That it was and just as refreshing! The night consisted of sitting by the water laughing and talking and the next day was the journey back home. Thank goodness we did decide to go home a day early. Because as I previously mentioned, Chuseok is a time when everyone travels homebound to their small towns... well apparently our Korean Head teacher was stuck in traffic for 11 hours!! AGHH and that is bumper to bumper cause Korea is I swear something like the size of Nova Scotia!

Ok well I think that is all for now--- but my goodness it is Thursday (Friday eve) which means tomorrow is the weekend of more adventures!

I’ll be in touch! I hope everyone is well-- and you know you can e-mail me whenever! (hint hint-- meirab@hotmail.com)