International Food & Wine Festival (and more)

We've been living in South Korea for almost 7 months now! These last couple of weeks have been crazy busy & the craziness shall continue throughout October. But we're very excited about this because it mostly has to do with Halloween!

Birthday boy!

Yummy cake!

A couple of weeks ago we celebrated John's 27th birthday. He mostly celebrated by eating copious amounts of meat. Nicole made him delicious burgers on the day of his birthday & we went out with a few friends to one of our favorite Korean barbecue buffet restaurants. Our friends also got him a yummy chocolatey ice cream cake. That was a nice surprise. We all enjoyed devouring it in our own private room at a bar. It was a great 27th. Also, special thanks to John's family for sending 2 giant bags of gummy bears!! :)

GUMMY BEARS!

Food display... don't touch!

Exactly one week after John's birthday was a Korean holiday: National Foundation Day (개천절 - Gaecheonjeol). Because it was a holiday we got the day off! Also on this day began the 4-day long International Food & Wine Festival. That Thursday it was open from 1pm to 6pm. We arrived just after one o'clock. When we got there we got wine glasses for the both of us, $3 each, & then entered into the glorious madness. Inside there were booths set up for each country to display & serve wine. We first saw Australia & New Zealand. Only managed to get a couple of Australian samples because the lines for New Zealand were already 5 minutes long. We walked around some more & tasted wines from Germany, Japan, Italy, Austria, France, Hungary, Czech Republic, & more. Our favorite wines came from Germany & Japan. We tried a Mozelwein from Germany. It was very crisp & sweet. We also really enjoyed the rice wine we tasted from Japan. Later in the day we went back to both of those booths but they were closed.

So many Australian booths!

Much love for the Kiwi wine!

Christmas wine!

More food display

After going around to all of the booths, we went to another section. It was a large area full of shelves with wine. It was self-serve. Nicole found a Spanish wine she absolutely loved: Estrella Frizzante Vino de Aguja. We remember this because the bottle ended up coming home with us. Around 3:30 we decided to get some food. There were many choices but the food wasn't free. We ended up eating a whole deep fried (twice) chicken. It was worth the 20 minute wait. After that, we ventured back into the self-serve wine area & drank some more. We ran into a few more friends & by 4:30 it was packed with people. It was impossible to move without touching someone. We ran into some more friends & sort of made new ones. At 6:00 it was time to leave. We left the building but were talking with people in the parking lot for almost another half hour. When we left that, someone was selling some light-up toys that caught our eyes. John got a sword & Nicole got a wand. Then we had to ride our bikes for 25 minutes to home. It was an interesting ride. It was a fantastic day. Probably one of the best days we've had!

Nicole's favorite

Beautiful wine display, Japan.

Bike riding over the bridge after work

Soju, Beer, Whisky, & BODKA?

We don't understand... these
signs were EVERYWHERE.

Nicole's kids on Sports Day. Go Red Team!

Such a beautiful day.

A couple of days later (on Saturday), Nicole's school had "sports day". It's a big event every year. This year it was in a large grassy area right next to the river. From 1-5 the kids were playing. There were a couple of people there to coordinate games & activities for the kids & their parents. We were even in a race for our team. There was red team & white team. One of the last events was a team race. For each team there were 2 male students, 2 female students, a male teacher, a female teacher, a mom, & a dad. We both ran for our red team. It was a long, but fun day. After it was over we all went to dinner at Shabu Cook (paid for by the owner of the school). We weren't very hungry after all of the food that was given to us from snack time but it was a free dinner... & a delicious one!

At H&M in Cheonan. It took a few
looks before we saw the first 'S'

Burger King logo on the
ceiling. It changed colors too.

This past week Korea had another holiday on the 9th - Hangul (한글) Day, celebrating their language. We spent the day shopping with a few of Nicole's coworkers so that we could get John some clothes! He was in desperate need of new pants. At the end of the day he had 2 new pairs of jeans, a pair of workout shorts, a nice button up shirt, & 2 long sleeve shirts. Nicole got a couple of shirts too & part of her Halloween costume for work. It was a successful day of shopping.

Interesting art

Later that evening we had dance practice. Yes, dance practice. We are both going to be participating in the Thriller dance for the 5k Zombie Run happening on October 19th. Nicole had never been to any of the practices before so she had to learn the dance all in one day! But she managed & that night we all did the whole dance together! It was pretty awesome. Now we just have to keep practicing until we get it down. Now less than a week until the run! We will also be doing it for the Halloween party at one of the foreigner bars & possibly again on Halloween night. We're having a lot of fun.

He had a great day.

Happy Birthday to this
awesome student!

Went to watch the sunrise on Expo Bridge. This is Smart City.
Oct. 12

Panoramic

Hello, sun!

Yesterday we went & discovered new territory - a beautiful place called Techno Valley. It's just north of the city we currently live in. We've discussed working & living there next year. (Don't worry, we still plan on returning to the states before we sign on for another year of teaching). There are several English schools there & it's a smaller community, thus a much cleaner one. We walked around for a couple of hours & enjoyed everything we saw. We are going to actively try to make connections there & see what we can find.

Thanks for reading!

Chew Sock; Daedunsan

Back into the swing of things here in Korea... The lack of posts have been due to stress-related events that are piling up high above our heads. But now we can see again!

Free bottle of wine
with the purchase of
our phones. Awesome!

About a week after our vacation in Thailand we got phones! Finally! Nicole has downloaded an app where she can make calls to U.S.A. for free. However, we have a limited amount of minutes so we can't call all the time. Skype is still 100% free though. Let us know when you want to talk! Sure, the time difference is tricky but we can always work something out. Anyways, if you happen to get a call from either of us our numbers are:
John: +82-010-7685-2324
Nicole: +82-010-7686-2324
Country code, area code, 8-digit number. By the way, our phones are ridiculously large. Two times the size of our old phones. Other apps you can use to talk to us (if you have smart phones): Tango and Kakao Talk. We both have both of those apps. Kakao talk is a much better app for calling than Tango is. But again, Skype still works!

Testing out our cameras - this is our apt

No, not Ricky Martin...
Ricky AND Martin

View from a top floor at the Dong-bu Bus Terminal

No... it's not a real DQ.
(major sad face)

In August we did our best to save our money after spending most of it on Thailand & our phones so we didn't do much of anything. We had some celebration dinners with friends - one birthday & one going away. We also went exploring around a very large bus terminal that has a lot of good shops in it. And Nicole managed to slice the tip of her finger off one day at school. No worries, it's almost 100% healed now.

Door on the floor... anyone
want?

Hanging out with friends
one night & this is what we
were entertained with...

New overhead contraption in Eunhangdong
(old downtown); more pics below

Mad skills with pizza dough

Oops...

The beach we went to hosts the Mud
Festival every year.

By the end of August, we were getting antsy again & decided to go to a beach. Daecheon Beach in Boryeong. It was a little less than a 2 hour bus ride away. It was such a beautiful day. And we met a new friend. She has been teaching in that area for almost 3 years now. She also introduced us to a fantastic restaurant on the beach with breakfast items. We enjoyed a nice lunch & then spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach. It was probably the best day both of us had in a long time.

All kinds of interesting
seating here.

Yummy food from Orange!

Fun water fountains

Yay, beach!

A panoramic view

Laying down & looking up at the sun

Toes in the sand

Playing in the sand

We would've stayed for all of the sunset but
then we would've missed the bus.

...Then we had to go back to work. So what did we do the next weekend...? We went back to the beach. This was the first weekend of September. We knew the weather wasn't going to stay very warm for too much longer so we went again. Actually, the weather even this weekend has been pretty hot. No complaints though! Neither of us is ready for winter. Hopefully autumn will last very long.

Finally! A pizza without corn!
Thank you Pizza Hut!

Overhead contraption in Eunhangdong
lit up at night

Children in their traditional Hanboks

Playing jeg-chagi

Other than our beach adventures, not too much has happened in September until this weekend. We had a 5-day vacation for Chuseok: Korean Thanksgiving, one of 3 major Korean holidays; we've been told it's the most important holiday for Koreans. On Tuesday, Nicole's school celebrated Chuseok (pronounced "chew sock"). All students & foreign teachers wore the traditional clothing, which is Hanboks. The foreign teachers were provided with theirs from some of the students parents. The day also included traditional games, such as tuho (throwing sticks into a bucket, aka, arrow throwing) & jeg-chagi (basically hacky-sack). The students also learned how to bow properly. It's different for boys & girls. The kids looked adorable. At the end of the day, Nicole & a couple other teachers decided to bring their classes together for another traditional game of chicken fighting. That's what the kids were looking forward to the most. It was highly entertaining.

He would rather be chicken fighting!

Boys learning how to bow

Girls learning how to bow

Nicole & 2 of her coworkers in traditional Hanboks too!

Nicole's class

We have enjoyed our holiday vacation. There's a different kind of feeling of having a holiday vacation when you don't also have all of the familial obligations & preparations that come with it. However, this holiday doesn't have any meaning to us; maybe we will feel different when Christmas time comes. Or maybe our American Thanksgiving when we are still working...

John's Chuseok gift from his bosses!

We were dropped off here. Had to walk
about 1 km to get to the cable car.

Ziplining where we were
dropped off.

During this vacation we went hiking for the first time since we arrived here in Korea. It was fantastic. We went to one of the steepest mountains to hike in Korea. It's called Daedunsan. 'San' means mountain, so it can also be called Mount Daedun or Daedun Mountain. Whatever floats your boat. Anyways, it was so much fun. We took a cable car about halfway up (saving us about 90+ minutes) & then climbed the rest of the way - all the way to the top! There was a suspension bridge (50meters long, 81meters high) & very steep stairs (angle approximately 70 degrees with 127 stairs). Those stairs were a tad frightening. Especially if you looked down below through the cracks. But we all made it (6 of us went). When we finally reached the top we were very excited & tired. Going down was slightly harder but we all made it in one piece. It was a long rewarding day.

Can you see the zipline?

Spiderman & Puumba in the same
picture.

Onward with our walking/hiking. That is Daedunsan.

View just after our cable car ride.

A small climb later from the cable car.

John & Joseph wondering when
the picture taking madness will end.

Okay, moving on...

Suspension bridge!

Can you see the stairs above the right of the bridge?

Waiting for the one Korean
guy to keep moving...

The bridge now below us.

Getting closer to the top! (center)

Steep stairs above us!

The bridge way down there now.

Enjoying the view before we go up the stairs.

Hello, steep stairs.

We made it up the stairs!

Amazing view... see the bridge still?

Almost to the summit!

Chris, the photo-bomber.

We have professional photo-bombing friends.

There it is... just a few more steps.

MADE IT!

So beautiful.

We started way down there.

It was a beautiful sunny day.

We have also gone out a couple of times with friends in our 5 day weekend, saw a 4D movie, & made a trip to Costco! We love Costco. So much food!

Though we are sad to see our short vacation end, we are thrilled that our Christmas vacation in Japan is 3 months away. And we have other plans in between that time for some adventures. First one, John's birthday! Now less than a week away.

In other news, we have decided on what we want to do after our first teaching experience is up here. Right now, our plan is to go back to the states in May & spend some significant time there. After that we plan to return to Korea for a new job. We believe that this job will probably start in late August. Most contracts begin in late August or late February. We will hopefully already have our jobs lined up before we return to America. Again, this is our plan as of right now. But most of you know that our plans usually change at the strangest times & nothing actually goes as planned. That's how we ended up here! When significant changes come around, we will do our best to keep you all updated.