I am finally a grown up woman......

But before I tell you why, I must tell everyone. I am getting excited and sad to be leaving Korea so soon. 20 days until I will be in Missouri!!!! I heard that my last few weeks in Korea would be torturous, humid, sticky and a never ending cycle of shower-step outside-sweat, repeat. But sadly, the monsoon season has gone on for longer than anticipated and I have seen rain almost everyday for the past two months. I have seen more umbrellas then I ever though possible, and yes, some Korea women have so many umbrellas they match them to their outfits. That is how much it rains here!

Being from Victoria I am used to rain. But this isn't the pleasant drizzle on a windy afternoon. This is torrential, downpour, flip your umbrella inside out, wet from head to toe, warm rain. Never will I ever complain about the rain in Victoria again. Some areas are getting hit with 19-24 INCHES of rain a day. Truly is is scary, and sadly more have 30 people have died. Lucky I live south of Seoul, and haven't had to trek to school knee deep in water.

Usually a little rain won't stop me from any plans I have. A lot of rain? Nah. I've learned that wearing flip flops and Capri pants is the easiest way to navigate the roads and puddles when its raining. After my first outing with tennis shoes, completely soaked, that I had to walk around in for the next 4 hours, I learned my lesson.

This weekend the rain held off while we went into Seoul.

 A few of us went out for lunch and walked around a fairly touristy area. Behind us is "The Blue House". Sound familiar to anything? 10 points to you if you guessed "The White House". The Blue House is where Lee Myung Bak, the South Korean President lives. We didn't sign up for a tour, so we could only look from a distance.


On Sunday, I met Minjae in Sinseol-dong, which is about an hour and a half away from Ansan by subway. We went to the Seoul Folk Flea Market. This is a yardsalers dream! Its like a typical flea market at home, except with Korean goods!  Annnnnddd.... you can bargain bargain bargain! Luckily I had Minjae with me, because my Korean is not good enough to haggle with the ajishis about prices! I bought a gift for one of my girlfriends back home, and Minjae talked the stall owner down from 35,000won to 20,000won! Whoop!

Outside of the flea market is an arts center. Minjae and I signed up to make traditional Korea crafts.

Hard at work

Our finished products were pretty spectacular! And really, who doesn't like doing arts and crafts! It was a blasty blast!

Usually, when it is not a torrential downpour, the flea market and surrounding streets are filled with vendors, and tent restaurants but because of the rain, only the vendors inside were open.


The best part of my weekend though, came Sunday night. Minjae and I went to COSTCO!!!! For those of you who know my family, you know that we love Costco!!!! And let me tell you, Costco in Korea is one of the mot entertaining things I have ever witnessed!

By the time me and Minjae had got there we were starving, so we went to get food before we did some shopping. The menu was almost the same as a Costco back home. Pizza, fruit Sundays, churros, hot dogs, and clam chowder. Normally if I get a hot dog at home, I go to the condiment stand, put on some ketchup and a few tablespoons of onions (occasionally mustard if I am feeling really crazy). Korean people seem to think that the onions are a separate meal. They piled on cups and cups of onions onto their plate, and loaded on mustard and ketchup. And if you can believe it or not, they were eating this with a fork!

My photography skills were not as great as they could have been, and I felt bad because I was blatantly pointing my camera at these people, but really! Hilarious!!!!

And finally.... I am now officially a proud member of Costco Wholesale! Despite celebrating my 25th birthday, buying my own car, living on my own, and surviving a move to a foreign country, this small white and red card in my wallet has made me cross the line from the in between post adolescent phase and real grown up. Bring on Adulthood!!!!!!

And watch out Costco's across the world!!!!

Boryeoung Mud Festival 2011!!!

This past Saturday produced one of the best memories I will take with me from Korea. I went to Boryeoung Mud Festival in Daechon Beach. And it was dirty, wet, and all together fantastic.

The Mud Festival started a few years ago in Korea, and since then is the largest event for foreigners in Korea. It has become so huge that one week of muddy debauchery on a beach produces enough revenue for the entire city of Daechon to live off of for an entire year. Seriously, that is a lot of beer sold.

Aaron, Minjae, Will, Dave, Jessica and myself started the long trip down to Daechon early Saturday morning. We had an hour subway trip, where we caught the train. The festival itself is free, but the train tickets, and bus transportation sells out, so we bought our tickets almost a month ago. You can opt for cheaper train tickets, but that means you have to sit on the floor, in the aisle. Sitting on the floor for a whole three hours while people trying to get to the restroom every ten minutes, because they have had a liquid breakfast of champagne or beer, while stepping on your fingers?? I said, no thank you... I will pay the extra money for a seat. Our train ticket was only 22,000won which works out to about $20. A free festival and widow seating on a train? Life was good!

Arriving in Daechon.. Ah. So fresh and so clean clean.

We got to the train station and had to take a crowded bus to the actual beach. None of us really new what to expect once we got there. And, as usually, it was nothing like I expected! Daechon beach was beautiful, even with the threat of rain, but the mud was actually not on the actual beach, like I was imagining.

We had to walk down some very large stairs to get to the actual beach, but at the top, the festival really took place. There were mud "buckets" where you went to paint yourself with mud, slides, food tents, and of course, thousands of people, drinking beer, and getting dirty!

Getting Dave nice and dirty!

Cleaning off in the water!

The water was surprisingly warm. We went in there when we were too hot, our mud was caked on, or if someone had to pee. I know.... gross.. But, if I had to bet.... the majority of people reading this have peed in an ocean or pool at leats once.  No wonder the water was so warm.

Really our entire day consisted of listening to a live band, throwing mud on each other, going swimming in the water, drinking beer, and repeating the cycle! We ran into some other foreign teaches from Ansan, which is surprising considering how many people were there!

Seriously, anytime I can roll around in mud with good friends, I am down! And, apparently the mud is good for your skin, so that is just an added bonus! By the end of the day I had mud on EVERY part of my body. I am still scooping out bits of dry mud from my ears, and haven't been able to get a brush through my hair quite yet, but those are small prices to pay for an extraordinary day!