Thank God it's Friday

So I know I have mentioned the price of watermelon of Facebook before but they can be quite expensive here.  One of the highest I saw was roughly 22,000 won which is about $17.53 with the current exchange rate.  I have been wanting watermelon sooooo bad but I couldn't justify my cravings for one.

Well today was my lucky day.  We went to get a few things from the mart and saw the watermelons on the way out.  The puppy below was 10,000 won which is roughly $8.76 and they provided delivery for free!

In general fruit can be a little pricey here.  Cantaloupes are about 12,000 won.  I think it is because of property value of the farm lands not much space here in Korea.  Watermelons and Cantaloupes take more space to grow.  They could fit a better producing produce on the land.  Simon told me it depends on weather and the green houses that they sometimes grow in.  They are more in season in July and August so hopefully the price comes down a little more.

I have never been so happy to throw down with this watermelon... and boy was it delicious!  Watermelons here are sweet all the way to rind!

Simon and I ate half a watermelon for an evening snack!  Here is what I figure... an average ice cream sundae cost around $5.00  and half this watermelon cost around the same price!  So basically I just ate a really delicious watermelon sundae!  

I am definitely thankful on this Friday for some precious(expensive) watermelon!

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It's a Bug's Life

 Sorry it has taken me so long to post.  Life here has gotten a lot busier than I had planned.  Anyways on to what I really wanted to talk about...

Have you ever wondered what the plagues in Bible were like??  Well I feel like we have been experiencing one of them here... well kind of...  We have been taken over by the Mayflies here.  I have never seen so many in my life.

They spend most of their lives as larva and only actually live as an adult for a day, basically only long enough to reproduce.

I heard the sound of Rice Krispes in milk as we walked home one night and I was wondering where the sound came from.  Then I realized it was from the cars driving over the millions of bugs on the road.  I wish I could record the sound because it is super loud (I won't describe the noise).

Here is a big pile of live ones gathered by the lights.  I was so scared I was going to get swarmed by them.

Sorry this video is sideways.  You can see all the mayflies gathered around the lights and in the air.

In this video the restaurant owner was using a blow torch to burn the bugs off his windows.  They are very difficult to get rid of.  Businesses were actually losing business because no one could get in the places with out getting stormed by the bugs.

Here is a closer view of the front of a store covered in bugs.  

I hoping we are finally to the end of all the bugs!  Anyways I hope you enjoy seeing the life of these little buggers...

In da club...

Hey everyone sorry we haven’t been around much… we have been really busy.  This a little update about what has been going on here. 

We took on teaching a couple more classes at our house.  We have kids ranging from learning the alphabet to high school students.   It looks like we may start a discussion class for some adults on Saturday.  Teaching requires energy but Teaching English requires a lot of energy.  After our students leave we just want to chill in silence!

Simon does some exporting of Korean products to other countries.  We have picked up some more clients to do business with.  We are both excited about the prospect of some business travel in the future.  It can be a lot of work at times but sometimes the pieces seem to be fitting together perfectly.

Lastly here in Namyangju City the government started a committee called Rainbow Harmony!  Here in Korea “Rainbow” means diversity, combining cultures, or Intercultural marriage.  This group of people is going to be coming up with ideas how to bring other countries together with ours.  From my understanding it will be kind of like having sister cities.  Anyways there were some requirements for applying to be one of the members.  Simon applied and we were accepted together.  We had the first meeting a few weeks ago; there are about 40 people in this group.  It looks like Simon is going to be the President of this committee which he is really excited about.   We will hopefully be doing some travel to English speaking countries (aka AMERICA, Britian, Australia).

I am pretty excited because tomorrow we are having lunch with the Mayor of Namyangju City to talk about Rainbow Harmony.  Also in a few weeks we will be meeting an Ambassador from Cambodia!   I will try to post pictures and update everyone. 

Life has been happening so fast and I hoping to post more blog stuff.  I have tons of stuff to post but seem to have a hard time to finding minutes to post on here.

A little side note.  We just had elections for political positions here in Korea.  America is definitely different than here.  In America most campaigning is done via TV, and here it is done on the streets of Seoul.  I will try to post more information about politics here in Korea in a later post.  Below is a video that some Expats made showing what you hear for about 2 weeks straight.  Everyday all day everywhere you go!  It is noisy at times we could hear it outside our apartment.  This is a glimpse of what we saw every day.  

thank God its friday

This week ends (ha ha weekends) on very a positive note.  I feel thankful for my family and my new nephew.  Simon and I became an aunt and uncle again this morning.  In Korea the terms aunt and uncle are a little different because there are different ways to say them.  Depending on how you say aunt actually specifies which side of the family you referring to mothers or fathers.   If you are referring to the maternal side of the family you would say 이모 which is pronounced Ee-mo.  For the paternal side of the family you would say 고모 which is pronounced Go-mo.  The same also applies to uncle the maternal side being 삼촌 pronounced Sam-chon and paternal uncle would be 숙부 that is pronounced Suek-bu.  There are some other technical rules which really confused me about the uncle-in-laws name and I won’t attempt to confuse you.

 A little information about childbirth here in Korea

~typically you get an ultrasound every month of pregnancy your first one being when you initially find out your pregnant which can be as early at 4 to 5 weeks. 

~typically the man is not in the room for ultrasounds and typically not present for the birth.  Until the 1970’s men were not usually present during birth in America.  I think this is slowly changing here in Korea.  Foreign women usually can have their husband present as he can serve as a translator.

~some hospitals keep your baby in the nursery for the first 24 hours after birth so the mom can rest, it is part of the recovery process

~typically the mom should restrict her movement for the first 2 weeks after giving birth they actually have mommy hotels where moms with their newborns can stay.  Some people stay one to two months or more. The people that work there help you with the baby while you recover, and teach you how to care for the baby.

~usually the mother has seaweed soup for several meals a day for a month.  Seaweed is high in iron so it is probably to help your iron gets back to normal levels.

~usually you do not get a private room once you give birth, unless you request one which cost more money

~for the first month after birth if you choose not to stay at a mommy hotel, traditionally you stay with your mother or mother-in-law.  If you have a boy your mother-in-law may pamper you because it is someone to carry on the family name.

There are lots of other culture differences during pregnancy and childbirth.  I have spent a lot of time reading online about Korean births so basically this is information I have gathered from what I read.  I just wanted to a little bit of what I read with you.  I don’t think any of these things are wrong they are just different then the way that we know. 

   

Anyways back to the thing I am thankful for this Friday… and that being life!  The life that was born at 5:30 this morning and weighing 9 pounds and 2 oz and 22inches long.  Here is a picture of Philip Colton Hartman the newest addition to my brother’s family.  Have a great weekend everyone.

my green day...

Yesterday was pretty eventful!  We had our first American Culture Day.  Let me preface that by saying we celebrated an Irish holiday the way most Americans children celebrate it.

I am pretty sure I went a little over board with the green but I wanted the kids to have fun.  I made Spinach Carrot Banana Coconut Cupcakes and Spinach Oatmeal Cookies.  I had the most difficult time finding food coloring so I decided Spinach would have to do the job!  So I made these recipes up and they turned out great I think.

In the cupcakes I randomly put a slice of carrot in 2 cupcakes that were like golden coins.  Who ever had the golden coin in their cupcake received a prize.

The Spinach oatmeal cookies looked like no bake cookies but they were pretty moist on top and kind of cakey.

Simon told the kids before they ate the cookies that they had spinach in them so most the kids refused to eat them.  Lesson learned… Don’t tell Simon what’s in the cookies!

Here is a tour of the decorations.  We don’t hang much on the walls because its cement and wall paper over it.

Like I said I went a little crazy with the decorations… but it was so much fun.

We only had so many kids in each class and as you can see we had fun.

Simon shared about the original history of St Patrick’s day which the kids really seem to enjoy learning about. 

We had a couple of different activities.  We taught the older kids how to make Irish knots they really enjoyed it.

We had a great time with all of our kids.  We are trying to have a culture day once a month and invite all the kids into our home.  We have about 12 kids in our lil school and that keeps us busy.  We hope your St. Patrick’s Day was as fun filled as ours.

that hankerin'

So sometimes when you are away from home you get a hankering for some good old American food.  Here in Korea that can be difficult sometimes.  There are something things that are just plain tough to find.  You find that there are something’s you can do without, but there are those few things which you just have to have.  For everyone it is different.  Because food is imported from America, after all the shipping and taxes, is expensive. 

When Simon and I get a hankering for something different we head to Itaewon.  Itaewon is close to the center of Seoul and is really close to the American military base.   There are a lot of foreigners there and interracially married couples.  Where we live I very rarely see any foreigners and I have yet to see an interracially married couple.  Anyways we usually head to Itaewon when there is something we just can’t live without. 

It is really hard to find Mexican food here in Korea.   I think it has something to do with the different type of spices they use that I don’t think most people care for here.  There are a couple of Mexican restaurants in Itaewon.  We actually tried one the last time we were there.  One of our friends Sarah Holman, an expat from Illinois (not the Chicago part), referred us to Tome Tila and it is similar to Chipotle or Qdoba.  I have to say it was pretty tasty.  We both ordered tacos and we shared a chili fries, which were SUPER spicy.  Did I mention that Simon loves chili it is pretty obvious because he cleaned the basket out in the picture below.

After that we headed to High Market, which is an actual legal international market.  There are some illegal markets where people sale illegally imported products from American and other countries.  The prices are about the same although the illegal market has harder to find items or can request items.  Either way imported items are definitely more expensive so we don’t regularly purchase them. 

Nachos Chips $4.20

Tortillas 10pk $5.00

Salsa $5.00

Dr. Pepper $1.00

Cheese $2.50 (it was a pretty small amount 150g)

Popcorn 1 pk $1.00

Thai seasoning $3.00

I can’t believe it’s not butter 2pk $5.40 (normally 4 sticks of butter at a regular grocery store is about $8.00)

It can be a hit and miss catching things on sale and things being crazily over priced.  Honestly I don’t mind too much.  I really enjoy eating Korean food and learning how to make all kinds of fun new dishes.  Simon is always surprised when I make some Korean dish.  He will say “how did you know that?”  My reply is always “I’m almost Korean remember?”

There is no free in freedom

Ok so the word “free” is in the word “freedom” but it has been said “Freedom is not Free.”  That statement is actually engraved into the wall at Korean War Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C.  Here in Korea, March 1st is Independence Movement Day.  I will try to give a short history of March 1^st.


In the early 1900’s Japan oppressed Korea.  There was a Korean girl by the name of Yu Gwan Sun who wanted Korea to have freedom from Japan.  Because of her deep faith in God she had courage to act boldly.  In 1919, at the age of around 17 or 18 she started planning a peaceful demonstration March 1^st in her town and the surrounding area.  She planned to walk from the mountain through the city with a Korean flag, during that time it was not allowed to have a Korean flag.  What started as one girl proclaiming “Long live Korean Independence!” grew to over 2000 people alongside her.   During the demonstration her parents were killed by the Japanese and she was arrested.  She was taking to Seodaemun prison where she endured harsh beatings and torture.  She reportedly died during torture and her last words were “Japan shall fall... my finger nails may fall off, my nose and ears cut off, my hands and legs broken.  I can bear the pain.  But the pain of losing my country, I cannot bear.  That I only have one life to give for my country, it is my only sadness!"  She was only 19!  What happened that day started a stirring in Koreans hearts to fight for their freedom,  which did come for them.

Simon and I visited Seodaemun Prison to participate in the holiday celebration.   As we came into the prison there were a group of children and adults holding Korean flags chanting “Long live Korean Independence!”  I am pretty sure at that moment my eyes filled with tears.  I realized why I get so emotional when it comes to our military in America.  It moves me knowing what the people did before me so that I can have my freedom.  Being there in the prison seeing what people endured before me made me appreciate the history and freedom in Korea that much more.  It was such an amazing day.

Below are the pictures that we took while we were there.

The Seodaemun Prison Museum

prison shackle

This is Yu Gwan Sun mug shot photo the day she was arrested.

Simon looking at the walls covered with pictures.

This room was a Memorial for all the prisoners that had been imprisoned and tortured here in the prison.  They prison mugshots of everyone.  It was so amazing to be in that room.

The theme through out the prison is that the prisoners refused to give up while in being imprisoned.

This was the actual prison were we walked through and saw the actual cells where they were imprisoned.

This is the prisoners playground.  The Japanese could keep a watchful eye on the prisoners as they were able to exercise.

Here is Simon showing about how wide the area was.

Simon stood in the area where the soldiers stood to keep a eye on all the prisoners. 

This was a bullet whole from the Korean War.  The side of some of the prisons were covered in bullet holes.

Another view of the prison.

Another view of the prison.

This is were they kept prisoners with leprosy. 

There were holes in the cells where they could use the restroom.  These holes on the outside are where the excrement came out.

This is one of the watch towers around the outside of the prison.

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I hope you all enjoyed a little bit of Korean history.  See you soon.