DMZ / JSA

James went on a small tour up to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) with a few other people for work. Since it was only three people in the tour they were allowed to move slower and ask tons of questions. I wanted to show some pictures of his trip. We both went 10 years ago and plan on just the two of us going again (since they do not allow anyone under the age of 10 on the tour). Besides I don’t think I could trust my two to not run straight over to the other side...

He visited the Joint Security Area (JSA) as well as Observation Point Dora (next to the Dora-san train station that services the train line that connects the North and the South) and Infiltration Tunnel #3. These photos are all from the JSA.

Observation tower and the Freedom House on the South Korean side of the JSA.

Panmungak on the North Korean side, as seen from UN Row.

Interior of main conference room on UN Row with South Korean Military Police escort standing at the ready position.

The small blue building in the center of the photo is OP #3 which was the location of the famous Axe Murder Incident in 1976. In addition the road leading away from the OP towards the right goes directly to the Bridge of No Return.

Gijeong-dong, the Propaganda Village on the North Korean side of the border. Notice the enormous flagpole in the center of the photo. This is the largest flagpole in the world standing at 160 meters tall (525 feet) and flies a flag that weighs 270 kg (600 lbs).

The Bridge of No Return from the South Korean side. The small rusted sign to the left of the bridge is one of the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) signs that are located all along the entire length of the border.

If you are interested in learning more about the JSA, the links above all go to their respective Wikipedia entries. In addition, there's a good Korean movie entitled "JSA" that you can usually find in the States (Netflix has it too) that describes a fictional incident occurring at this location.

Gyeongbok Palace

It is James’ ambition in life to see all of the National Treasures of Korea while we are here. I think there are a couple hundred that are located throughout the country, many of them at various museums.

Heungryemun, the gate leading into the main palace grounds.

So we let James have another turn at picking what were going to do on the weekend. He chose the largest of the five palaces in Seoul to visit. The kids were not too thrilled at walking around and looking at the beautiful architecture of the buildings. Ben got a little more excited once I let him start videotaping everything. If anyone wants a copy let us know, however, be aware that it may cause motion sickness. We were able to see three of the National Treasures while we were there. Yes, that’s right, we were lucky enough to knock three off the list in one day. We really did have fun and are looking forward to seeing the other four palaces.

Guards in front of Heungryemun

Interior of Gangnyeongjeon, the king's living quarters

Hyangwonjeong on a small islet in the middle of a pond. This pond is located in front of Geoncheonggung, site of the assassination of Empress Myeongseong by the Japanese in 1895.

Seoul Grand Zoo

After the sore legs we got from walking so much while enjoying James’ choice for weekend travel, I decided that the family would spend the day at the Seoul Grand Zoo. We packed a lunch and got a late start heading out. Since the traffic was a little backed up on the way there, we didn’t arrive into the parking lot until almost 11:30, so we ate our lunch in the car and then headed inside. The cherry blossoms were in full bloom so it was beautiful walking to the gate.

The Cherry Blossoms along the road leading to the Grand Park Zoo

One of the giraffes must have seen us taking pictures, so it stuck its tongue out at us.

For the whole family, it only cost 8000 won to get in (what a steal). We let the kids lead the way and take their time looking around. The most interesting thing was the bathroom near the giraffe exhibit. Each stall had their own window (one-way, I assume) facing into the giraffe area. It felt like they could sense you in there and would come walking up. The zoo was fun and the kids especially enjoyed the playground area they had there. It had a lot of dinosaur slides and climbing walls, as well as an elephant slide where you came out through the trunk. Everybody enjoyed themselves and we definitely plan to go back again.

Here's the kids sliding through a crocodile's mouth.

Ashley the Meerkat

Kudos definitely have to go out to the Koreans for their ice creams. We bought some while we were at the zoo and found even more varieties than we thought they had. I could probably do a whole blog entry on their desserts (and might...), but here's a picture of a particular favorite; doesn't it look delicious?

Buddha's Birthday

We were able to spend last Sunday night attending the Lotus Parade. We got there a little early, walked around and saw what was left of the tables where you could make your own paper lotus flowers. Since it was starting to rain, all the vendors were packing up and we had to resort to buying the kids their own lotus flowers on a plastic stick that lights up.

The kids posing in front of the festival mascot.

Some of the parade participants getting ready to start.

About half an hour before the parade started, we wandered over to the parade route and saw that you could sit down in chairs they had lined up. Of course, we chose to sit in the front row and then waited for the parade to start. The children were very patient, with a few M&Ms to keep them happy. Once the parade was underway it was exciting. We noticed that we must have been as entertaining as the parade, since a large number of camera men came up to take our pictures. We clapped and cheered and really enjoyed ourselves. There were even two different people from within the parade that stopped to give us the lanterns that they were carrying. The children got souvenirs and we had a great family night out. We are hoping we can attend next year and be able to do much more of the actual events. Happy Birthday to Buddha.

One of the many cameramen that wanted to take our photos during the parade.

Some images from the parade with participants and floats.

Two of our favorite floats: the dragons moved and made lots of noise. The kids didn't like them as much as we did...

Random things

I figured I would make this post a hodge podge of things. We finally got all the camera memory sticks from several cameras, the camcorder, and even my phone and moved all the pictures to the computer. So it was like Christmas (the ones from the camcorder were quite literally Christmas!). I wanted to post a few with the kids for the family to see.

Benjamin tested for his yellow belt in Taekwondo class

Ashley started part day preschool and here is the first day of school

Ashley, wearing a cool Korean hair accessory. You can tell by the picture she does not like it.

This is Ben getting a haircut. For a few extra dollars you can have a massage, which is what he really wanted.

James tried to kill us (aka, this looks like fun)

We thought that since Ben had Spring Break and James had Thursday and Friday off from school, we would do something fun since the Korean children were all still in school. So James wanted to take us to a place called Gangwha Island. We drove a little over an hour just to get to the bridge that went from mainland Korea across to the island. Next, we drove across the island to a small port on the other side to get onto a ferry and then went across the water (about a 10 minute boat ride) to another island (Seokmo Island) then we had to drive another 20 minutes to get to Bomunsa, the temple that James wanted to see. While on the boat Ashley decided she had to use the bathroom. After she saw the one available, she decided to wait. The traditional bathrooms here are affectionately called “squatters” by Westerners.

After we got off the boat and arrived at the temple’s parking lot, I took Ashley back to the bathroom. However, it was also a squatter; she did try to use it, but I guess it was not ladylike enough for her. We then ate lunch at a small restaurant, eating Korean style (sitting on the floor). James and his friend from school, Ryan (who is from Taiwan and decided to accompany us on our adventure) ordered for us. The kids and I stuck with good, old-fashioned Ramen which was a little spicy. The banchan, which are the little bowls of various items they serve you with your meal, were quite interesting. We did try more than normal, but still shied away from certain things. There was even a bowl of tiny shrimp as shown below that, except for Ben, we all tried. They didn’t have much of a taste and were a little crunchy.

After eating, we headed up the hill to the temple and quickly discovered how steep it really was. It actually felt like someone had a hand on your body, pushing you back while you walked. After that minor obstacle, we finally arrived at some flat land where we could rest, complain and rehydrate. We looked around at the temple and saw a very big Buddha lying down.

Next came the part where James tried to kill us. His main focus for this trip was to get to the top of the hill where they had a large Buddha image carved into the side of the mountain. It was on a Korean TV show that he is watching and thought it would be great to see it in person. The first warning sign we had was literally a sign: it stated that it was 419 steps to climb to get to the top. Thankfully, there were a number of switchbacks so there were places to rest on the way up. Ben was the first one to get to the top and was very proud of this fact; I was the last one up and was happy I didn’t stop and turn around part way up. The view was spectacular and the Buddha carving was pretty interesting to see. I guess the story goes that if you make the effort to get to the top, you can make a wish and your wish would come true (since you made such a big sacrifice). We’ll just say that my wish was a big one.

On the way back down, several older Korean ladies that were resting talked to us and congratulated us (at least that is what James told us; of course, when we first got here and he was practicing his Korean, he told a cab a driver he was assigned to the library instead of the Embassy). The boys decided to look in the gift shop and Ashley and I decided we needed water and a snack so we headed over to a bench. While we were sitting there, we (or should I say Ashley) were approached by several Koreans that wanted to take her picture. Once they started to take photos of her, then more came over. Now I know what Brittany Spears feels like with the paparazzi around here. I bet there were at least 9 people taking photos. The boys finally came out of the gift shop and we went back down the hill. After the hike down, we thought we deserved ice cream so we each got our own, then drove back to the ferry and headed home.

The view from the top of the mountain. You can see the stairs (with the paper lantern decorations) in the bottom left corner, Bomunsa temple is in the center of the photo (the slight clearing halfway down the mountain), and you can also see the island's coastline in the top right corner of the photo.

What an experience!

This past weekend we went out another outing…this time it was for me. I saw somewhere that you can let your feet soak in a tub with these special fish that only eat dead skin. So I thought, “Why not?” After all, I had to try it once to say that I did it.

Here's a photo of the front of the building. The spa was on the fifth floor (you can see where it says "Bread Dr Fish Spa Books").

The name of the place we to was translated (somewhat awkwardly) to Restree. When we got there, we found out the rules were that you had to buy a drink in the café and then you could purchase the Doctor Fish treatment for an additional 2000 Won. We each got a drink. James and I went with Caramel Macchiatos, with the kids going for juices: strawberry for Ashley and kiwi for our normally not-so-adventurous son, Benjamin. We sat at a table and enjoyed some breads with butter and jelly while we waited.

Here is our tray with the drinks we ordered...the Caramel Macchiato tastes as good as it looks!

When we were finished with our refreshments, we walked over to the tub and rinsed our feet off and put them in the tanks. The kids kept pulling theirs out and you can imagine how much we were laughing. It tickled a lot! James discovered that if you only placed your heels in it was easier to take. I was brave and placed both feet in. It was kind of weird how the fish would follow your feet even when they weren’t in the water yet, they were definitely ready for it! Ashley refused to let the fish “kiss” her feet and Benjamin might have had a few fish nibble on his feet (he insisted that he did, but we didn’t actually witness it). On the other hand, I enjoyed it very much once I stopped laughing. I would definitely go back, but maybe next time without the kids.

Afterwards, we had lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. They had absolutely wonderful service and food. The afternoon kind of made us feel like being back in the States (except, of course, for paying money to have our feet chewed on by fish). For anyone that wants to visit us, I will be glad to pay the bill for the fish treatment.

A little about food

Wow…boy how we take things for granted. I went to the commissary craving Cracklin’ Oat Bran cereal and I was looking forward to having a bowl for lunch. I looked and looked but did not find it. How disappointing is that? I know my kids still ask to go to certain places to eat, like Olive Garden, Chick-fil-a, and Chuck E. Cheese to name a few. They have gotten used to eating at the Pizza Hut in Korea and have tried more types of juices, candy, and ice cream then I can count. They enjoy going down to the local Family Mart and picking out something new to try. All in all, I must say our kids have adapted quite well to living in Korea and I give them both kudos. James and I are also trying new things we had Kimbap (the Korean California Roll) with tuna fish. I was kind of afraid to try that since all I could think about was “food poisoning”. James ate half the roll; I guess he needed to get his $1.25 worth of it before seeing my point. We are looking forward to the weather warming up so we can venture out and eat at different places. Keep checking back and I will write about all the different juices and goodies that we have tried along with a few pictures I managed to get at local eating establishments.

COEX

I am a little behind on posting. The week before last, we visited the COEX mall. COEX is the Seoul Convention and Exhibition Center. The mall is underneath the Center and is the largest underground mall in Asia (I don't know what kind of competition it was up against to get this title). Since we have been here we (mostly Benjamin and I) having been anxious to get our hands on good Mexican food. We were not sure where to begin to get good tasty chips and salsa. So I asked Ben’s teacher and she suggestioned that we try “On the Border” at the COEX mall. We were all up for that. What’s 45 minutes on a subway, riding three different trains, to eat lunch? We had another couple join us with their two kids. We got off at the subway station and started walking toward it and it was like being in heaven. We went inside the mall and stood at the entryway for awhile so the kids could play with the touch screen info map. We quickly found “On the Border” and walked around some more before they opened up. As we were walking through the food court I noticed a Sbarro Pizza. See, I told you it was a true mall. We finally ate lunch and it was delicious. Ben ate several bowls of chips and salsa. It satisfied our Mexican craving, but I do truly miss Jose’s back in Seaside, California.

Since we were there we went ahead and went to the COEX Aquarium. It was really neat. We walked under an arch and James read it and it said “strange things”. We were surprised that it was not strange animals or fish, but strange exhibits. We had a wonderful time and would definitely do it again.

Here we are posing in front of a display made to look like a traditional Korean home:

These next few photos are part of the display of strange habitats

The first one shows you what happens to those fish when you flush them:

Here's the kids lying on a bed and looking at some strange, upright fish in the headboard:

As we were leaving, we actually saw a penny-pressing machine for the Aquarium. Instead of pennies, it just smashed round pieces of plain copper, but to the same effect:

Yellow Sand / Asian Dust

We noticed that the Koreans wear surgical masks over their mouths and noses so we decided to check into it. Apparently, Yellow Sand season is upon us in Korea. In the spring, dust from deserts in Mongolia is carried by winds across China, picking up their pollution, and is carried to Korea (as well as parts of Japan). An Air Quality Index of 100 of more starts to cause concern, and levels over 300 require changes in outdoor activity and you shouldn’t even go outside if it is over 800. Here’s a look at what it was one day in late February:


We went to a local pharmacy and bought masks for everyone in the family. Then we realized that they were way too big for the kids’ faces so we had to run to Emart to pick some more up. We have already had to wear them a couple of times. Luckily, just like weather forecasts, there are Yellow Sand forecasts available on the internet (click here if you want to see the current levels in Seoul), so we know when to expect higher levels a day or so before it happens.