Update on my mom: She got the "all clear" after chest x-ray last week, and surgery is scheduled Jan. 12. It's been since Dec. 31 that I have talked to my parents, so I don't know much else.
We had a great time on our trip around Korea. (See a few pictures at bottom of page.) We drove about 2,300 kilometers over the 7 days with the longest drives out of and then back into Seoul. We were in a van with driver, guide, and 2 other tourists - a mom and son from Canada. I would guess their ages as 50 and 25. Her husband is working here, and they live in Seoul. The son is an MBA student at Univ. of Toronto. Spring and fall are high season for this tour, but it was kind of nice to see places in winter and not to have to deal with crowds and more people on the tour. Winter has its own beauty. I had hot packs for my feet, and used 2 per boot on most days, so I was ok. Michael wore a short sleeve shirt under his coat, baseball hat, and gloves. I cannot figure out where he got a "keeps warm" gene. We have adopted our tour guides (it's) "up to you," which he said a lot re: how to eat some of the food and how long to stay in some places. He was very kind-hearted though not great English speaking and listening skills.
We saw a few Buddhist temples (they seem to have secured many lovely mountain locations; many hiking locations bring one close to a temple; if you have seen one temple, you have seen them all!) and a few traditional/folk home areas (they start to look the same too and have rice stalk roofs or tile ... depending on whether the home was originally worker-class or nobility). We were outside a lot with the theme of culture and nature. During the driving in the country side, we could see many grave sites/small cemeteries. They are located on hills and have some markers and mounded graves. These mounds need care every year and sort of get built up to maintain their form and height. There was a lot of country side to see, and mountains make up a high percentage of the land. The population is very concentrated in 5 to 7 or so cities.
Most days there were 3 things/sites to see. A green tea farm on a snowy day was lovely. A fish market is a Korea must-see, and we visited one in an area where a lot of octopus are caught. We dressed up in traditional clothes (I could hardly believe Michael did; pictures are cute) and made taffy (rice-based). The cool thing about the taffy was that were in a very small village in someone's house/restaurant, so we could see their regular surroundings. Michael was very forgiving when it turned out that at the end of the day I put my hot packs in our backpack right next to the taffy ... we ended up with one big chunk because the pieces melted together.
The hotels were very nice - either seaside resorts or big city hotels. Every night seemed to be our new favorite. The hotel floors skip 4 and also skip 4 in room numbers - eastern culture bad luck number. We ate very well. Breakfast buffets had the full range from soup to salad to dim sum to western eggs and meat... and rice and kimchi, of course. Lunch varied from dried fish to bibimbap - in one case made with mountain vegetables (my favorite). Michael's favorite was gingseng chicken, so we are going to look for a restaurant around here that serves it. It's a pretty mild soup with a whole rice-stuffed chicken.
The guide and the Canadians more than once said how well-behaved Michael was (apparently in great contrast to the guide's 10 year old nephew). Michael had one rough day. He must have eaten or drunk something that disagreed with him. He had diarrhea and so just juice for breakfast. About 5 minutes are our first stop of the day, he vomited. He had stayed in the van to rest and got out in time. Later in the day, the guide dropped us off at the hotel upon arrival in town and then took the other 2 people on last day activity and to dinner. By the next morning (our last day), Michael felt fine though he didn't eat much but did want a Big Mac at the train station. I booked first class on KTX because he has wanted to see the difference (wider seats and more leg room). We got into bed at 10:00 p.m. Sunday, and he was up and on his way to school Monday. The tour really was a great, easy, comfortable way to see a lot of Korea.
I am trying to gear up to work on some research ... I had a big push before the holiday, but so far I seem to be a little slow getting back into it! I hope you and your loved ones are off to a good start in the new year. Please keep my parents in your prayers.
No comments:
Post a Comment