1.11

Oh hello 2011! You have been so good to me so far!

The new year has brought with it a wonderful few weeks of Korean firsts. I experienced Korean snowboarding for the first time. Played poker and actually won money, not bad for my first time ever gambling. I saw my first homeless Koreans =(. Went to my first restaurant where you take off your shoes and sit on the floor. And peed in my first squatter toilet.

More details on that later, but first I would like to say that I love and miss you all very much. I love traveling and meeting new people, but I always seem to realize the same thing while I am gone: I already have the most amazing people in the world in my life. No matter where I go, or who I meet I feel so lucky to have you all to call my friends and family. You all mean so much to me, and I just wanted to let you know how important you are to me! I am truly incredibly lucky.

Ok with that said let me continue with the update-ness:

Last weekend was very fun. I have been spending a lot more time with my co-workers lately and it has been really nice. A few co-workers and I went out to dinner last Thursday. We had to take off our shoes and sit on heated floors. We ate a dish called Shabu Shabu. A large bowl of

spicy broth is placed on a burner in the middle of the table and you add vegetables and ramen noodles and wait for it to boil. Once the soup starts to boil, using your chopsticks, you pick up pieces of froze beef and hold them in the broth till the meat cooks. You also eat the rest of the soup. Once almost all the soup is gone the waitress brings a bowl of rice with a raw egg on top. This is added to the remaining soup and its all cooked up together. Then you eat this. So much food, but so good. Also at this restaurant, I had my first encounter with a squatting toilet, yes pretty much just a porcelain drain. I had heard they existed but was still slightly hopeful I would never have to use one, especially after having drank a few shots of soju. It really wasn't a big deal, just a funny thing to say I've done.

Last Friday my co-workers and I had a pizza and poker night. Korean pizza is very different. It resembles traditional pizza in appearance but definitely not taste. Although it taste very different, it is still good. It is very hard to find a pizza that uses tomato sauce, most have a potato paste. Toppings range from corn to sweet beef to shrimp, and sometimes they top it off with a sauce that taste something like honey mustard. However, Friday night we ordered pizza from a place that makes pizzas very much like you find back home!! As far a poker goes I had never really played before, nor had I EVER gambled. But I stretched the truth a little, said I had played a few times before, and googled how to play beforehand, haha. It actually went really well. I was surprised how fun it actually is. We played all night, and in the end I walked away with a little over double what I had originally started out with. I was just happy not too lose anything.

Sunday I decided to do some more exploring. There is still so, so much in this city alone that I have not seen. The cold can be very intimidating. But I decided to brave the freezing temps and go out to see an area called Insadong. This district has many antique shops and its alleyways are closed to traffic most days. The streets are lined with vendors selling food, antiques, spices, ceramics, art and common touristy items. I went to a really interesting little tea museum, saw some really beautiful, traditional Korean architecture and mostly just wondered around. I would really love to return to explore more when it is not so freezing outside.

This weekend has been great also! I went snowboarding!!! It was so exciting to try the Korean version of one of my favorite things in the world! It was so different, but pretty close to what I had imagined. We went a place called Phoenix Resort in Pyeongchang. We got up super early, caught the first subway to our bus, and bused a little over 2 hours to the resort. Once at the resort we were picked up by a guy from a local rental shop. He drove us into the nearest town, a tiny little Korean ski town, in a rickety old van that was missing most of its seats and doors that really didn't shut. We rented all of our equipment, pants, coats, boards, boats and headed back up to the mountain. Luckily one of my co-workers brought along a Korean friend of his, a really fun and sweet girl who translated all of this for us. The resort only had a few runs to chose from and there was very little difference between them. They were all wide, straight runs. No options, no tree trails, no variety of any sort, just wide and straight. They had speakers installed everywhere, so no matter where you were you could hear Korean pop music. The chairlift situation was very interesting. They unstrap from their boards every time and carry them on the lifts and walk off. Getting on the lifts is much like getting on the subway here. Everyone crowds into a mass group and pushes their way through. I think most of our time was actually spent in line. There were so many people. With the majority of the people still learning how to snowboard or ski, most of the runs were like a game of dodging unpredictable beginners, or newbies on their cell phones! I think it was mostly fun just because it was so different, but not because it was a good day of boarding. And I can honestly say I have never, ever been so cold in my entire life. I swear Korean cold is like no other cold I have experienced EVER! Overall though it was a great experience, so different, so fun!

So there are the highlights of my last two weeks. I hope you all are doing well and that 2011 has been good to you as well.

LOVE LOVE LOVE!

-oh, and p.s. I have been adding a little more of my soul to this lovely world wide web. This is still definitely a work in progress. Hoping to get some better pictures and more pictures up soon. I would love some feedback. But most of all just check it out, just some shameless self promotion of stuff I have been working on lately.

http://brionnahughes.com/