Making Songpyon

This trip took place near the beginning of my stay here in Korea. A group of us foreigners visited a temple in Busan near the edge of town. Each weekend this temple invites foreigners to visit and experience a new Korean tradition. On this weekend we learned how to make traditional rice cake known as Songpyon, which is often made during the Korean thanksgiving named Chusok.


After learning how to shape the little cakes, we walked down to the cooking area.


The Korean women working the cookers told us that our rice cakes looked “even better then we can make”. They were being sarcastic however, since most of our cakes looked mangled.

Here we are choking down our songpyon!

They also grew lots of hot peppers outside the temple. Hot peppers are found in a lot of food in Korea. Doesn’t it look delicious?

Taejongdae

I visited a great waterfront park about a month ago called Taejongdae. It's a very popular tourist area in Busan. The views were breathtaking.




Fantastic!

APEC BUSAN!

This year's Asia Pacific Trade Cooperation meeting was hosted in my city of residence, Busan. It was a well-known fact that President George W. Bush was making an appearance at the talks, which made many people nervous of possible terror attacks. This resulted in the closure of most public schools and hogwans. Since we had the day off, Drew, Zach, and I made the trip down to the APEC meeting locations to visit the madness.

Zach and Drew standing beside the Bexco building where a lot of APEC "stuff" was going on.

Armed guards lined all the streets around the building. You can even see people on the top of that building.


Here is a large group of people in riot gear. They were expecting large riots. We didn't see any violence whatsoever.

This subway station was completly shut down.

One of the locations hosting meetings was near Haeundae Beach. We expected to see more armed guards or protestors. Instead, we found a beautiful empty beach and a man making a sand dragon.

The waters were teaming with police ships. Far off in the distance are some military ships.

The Gwangan bridge is beautiful at night.

It was impressive to see how many armed guards were on call for this event. I later read that there were some protests, but we missed that. We didn't get to see George Bush, or any of the other leaders. Security was too tight as you can see.

Visiting Yeosu

Last weekend I visited a couple neighboring towns to Busan. It was a great experience. I got to meet some new foreigners and experience the foreigner life outside of Busan.

First, we visited Suncheon, the location of a great hiking mountain. Very remarkable temples are found at the base of the mountain as well as on top. We met up with some friends of Zach’s who lives in another town called Yeosu.


Here they are: Zach (my neighbor in Busan), Christy, and Amanda.
There is a huge drum inside that temple. At nightfall the monks supposedly play it. Unfortunately, it was raining hard by the time we got there so there was no drumming.

Bamboo!


Here I am at a temple somewhere in the mountain. From where I am sitting I can see these amazing trees…

Then, we visited Yeosu. The population is around 300,000. Compared to Busan’s 4 million, it is considered a town.

Here is the cool bridge in Yeosu.

Here I am posing as Admiral Yi, Sun Shin. Yeosu is the birthplace of the legendary Turtle Ship invented by Yi, Sun Shin. Admiral Yi used the Turtle Ships to beat off the invading Japanese naval forces during the 7 year war. That is an actual Turtle Ship behind me! Read more about the Turtle Ships here.

Thanks to Christy and Amanda for the wonderful time in Yeosu!

My So Called Korean Life

Many people have asked me questions about what my life in Korea is like. So here are a few quick pics of things I see on a daily basis. Enjoy!

Here are some of my co-workers: Alice, Ale, Suzie. Don't they look fun to work with? They are awesome.

This is the school I teach at. I took this picture from the roof of my building which is accross the street.

This is my apartment building. It's tall and narrow.

When I enter the building I walk through this strange garage with a green floor. This is where I park my...

...scooter. I don't have a name for it yet. Any ideas? It's fun to go exploring around the town on this thing. Beats walking!
Next, let's have a look inside my apartment.

It's not the biggest place but it works for what I need. It has a gas range, small fridge, washing machine, and a nice flat screen TV.