Exploring Chiang Mai

My first full day in Chiang Mai! I got up for breakfast and it was decent. I did so much walking! I just wandered and decided where to go by what looked interesting to me. I stumbled upon at least 10, if not more, temples and stopped briefly in most of them. For lunch I went to a cafe restaurant and sat outside. I ordered pad thai and egg rolls. It was delicious and so filling I was stuffed! After lunch I continued my wandering and came across a street food vendor. I'm not sure what he was making but it smelled really delicious. It was like a sweet fried dough stuffed with maybe mango or sweet potato filling. It was pretty delicious.

First of many temples for the day

Another temple

I liked this one with 4 elephants on each corner

Reclining Buddha 

The snacks that smelled so good!

Some pretty lanterns in a temple

A delicious and cheap lunch!

I kept walking and found a museum. When I entered they said the cost for one or I could do 3 museums. As they were all next to each other I decided why not?! So I walked through the 3 museums. It was a lot of information and I'm not sure how much information sunk in and stuck with me unfortunately. There was one more temple I had wanted to get to so after the museums I made my way there. Then, I wanted to see the Saturday Night Market. I got there and it was pretty crowded-vendors lined the sides of the street and musicians (most of them were handicapped) sat in the middle of the street playing or singing. I tried a few other street food dishes (and wasn't too impressed) and picked up a few souvenirs.

Making friends

In the museum

Famous statue inf front of museum

Another favorite temple

Street market

Sticky rice--just ok

Arrival to Chiang Mai

Last day of camp! Today we just did wrap up, games and a pizza party with the kids. I lead the activities. The first one was a choose your own adventure style story. So I followed a powerpoint and told a story. The students were in 2 groups and asked to answer different questions to earn points or see if they survived in different situations. The second game was a kind of tag game combined with having to collect "gems" and not get tagged by the "monsters". The only problem was that the room we were going to play in was being used to hold material to do renovations and no room to run around. Instead, we went into one of the classrooms but even moving the desks around it wasn't enough space. The kids all complained and said it would be too easy to catch them so we made blindfolds out of toilet paper but it still didn't turn out the way I envisioned unfortunately.

After playing the tag game twice, the pizza arrived and we had the kids eat. My kiddos had been watching the movie "Up" during our breaks and we were able to finish the movie with our pizza. When the movie was done they all took off.

Finally it was time to head out and I made my way to the airport. I checked in and got a smoothie before boarding the plane. I sat next to 2 ajumas that were Christian missionaries. They chatted with me a little bit and finally asked me if I had a place to stay when we arrived in Chiang Mai. I said yes, but they were concerned because we were landing at 10pm and offered to have me stay with them. So sweet. Jin Air gave us a small meal that was not too bad. After eating I slept most of the way. As we got closer to our destination, I enjoyed looking at the lights of the cities below us.

Awesome sunset

Cities below

We touched down in Chiang Mai and I went to the taxi stand in the airport to grab a taxi. I had to wait a few minutes and then was off to my hotel. When we arrived I was so excited and in awe-the trees in the resort all had lights and lanterns hanging from them and it was absolutely beautiful. I checked in and then walked to my room. It felt so refreshing and peaceful there. I was in a shared room with another young woman. We didn't really talk much as it was quite late and I was tired.

My welcome to the resort in Chaing Mai!

Sign in the resort

Safe and sound in Chaing Mai!

Bohye

Today was the last day of teaching for camp. It felt good to know just one more day stands between me and vacation! I left a little bit early so I could meet Bohye for lunch. I haven't seen her in quite some time now.

First we did a few errands for me. I had to transfer money at an international bank so she went along with that. The other day I broke one of my T-Money cards (transit card); I placed it on the scanner and it snapped in half. What a bummer. The worst part was that I had just reloaded money on it. Bohye thought we could get the money off of it at a convenience store, but it didn't work. We went for lunch next. We got shabu shabu (soup) and it was delicious as always. After lunch we got dessert at a cafe I had seen a long time ago. We ordered their Dutch Baby Pancake and juice. It was...okay, not as good as I was hoping, but still good.

Bohye had to split and head back home. I stuck around Hongdae a little bit longer before returning home myself. I did more research and finally completed all my plans! I also did the rest of my packing and cleaned up my room.

Our dessert

Uneventful Day

Nothing too exciting today. I spent a lot of time doing research and trying to square away plans for my trip in a few weeks as well as last minute details for Thailand. I ended up going to a few of the big bookstores downtown to look at their Lonely Planet tour guide books to write down some information. I had kimbap for dinner-who knew something so simple could win my heart so easily. I still remember the first time trying it. It was in 2000 when my Mom and I came to Korea with the Ties Program. We were at an orphanage or some kind of function and we were served it. I remember sitting on the floor with the short table looking at the rolls wondering what in the world it was and not liking the taste or texture. I peeled the rice away from the seaweed, not liking the seaweed at all and picking out the tiny strips of carrot and cucumber avoiding the yellow sweet and sour radish, fish cake, imitation crab and unrecognizable brown long stringy vegetable/roots. Of course today I still don't like the fishcake or crab and will poke it out if I get it, but the rest...I could eat kimbap every day.

After my kimbap dinner I headed to class. Class was nothing special. I still struggle and feel embarrassed a lot, but I'm glad it forces me to practice it in some capacity once a week.

Camp Lunch

Nothing too exciting at camp. It's a little bit of a struggle with the lower kids because they don't understand much of what I say so we try our best with my broken Korean and their English and lots of body language!

After working, my COT and I headed to Noksapyeong for a late lunch. I suggested Linus' BBQ-I had never been there, but know lots of Americans raving about it and had always wanted to try it. We ordered a platter to share and everything was delicious! The best part was it was paid for out of our camp budget! Then we went to Sugar Daddy's for dessert. We both ordered a cake-Sophie got pumpkin cheesecake and I tried the apple pie with ice cream. It was pretty good, but the crust was not as good as my Mom's. I'll have to try something else the next time I go there! When we finished eating, we took a walk around the neighborhood and looked at some of the antiques.

We headed back towards our side of town. I did more research for all of my upcoming trips and that kept me busy for the rest of the evening.

Playing twister

Yummy lunch!

Jenna!

Today was my first day with the 3rd and 4th graders at camp. There are only 2 girls and 6 boys which makes it a lot of work! Fun, but a lot of energy. My COT mentioned it's like dealing with puppies.

After camp I went to Hongdae to do a little bit of shopping. Around dinnertime I met up with Jenna again finally. I think it's been November since we saw each other last?! We went for bbq and it was delicious! We went to a chain called Mapo and they put a metal ring around the grill and fill it with egg and cheese. It bakes and then is a nice addition to the meat and sides. We had a good time catching up again. Next we did a little bit of shopping for Jenna. As we wandered Hongdae we decided coffee and dessert. Since we were on the backside near a chocolate dessert place that we've been to before, Jenna suggested that. We ordered a chocolate molten cake and shared that. We stayed and talked for a long time!

Delicious BBQ

Blessed with friends Part 2

This morning I woke up relatively early, especially considering the late night we had had. Shortly after I awoke, Mike also woke up. The 3 Koreans were all still sleeping. I suggested we go out and get breakfast for everyone since they had been so kind and feeding us well. So Mike and I suited up and armed with our phones set on maps went to look for something to bring back. We ended up going to Mc Donald's and getting some breakfast sandwiches and walked back. While we were walking back Ahyoung asked where we were. We told her not to worry about it.

They were all so surprised with breakfast and I felt happy to treat them. We hung out for a little bit more and then it was time for me to head out for my next appointment. They walked me to the bus and after a 40 minute ride I arrived back at Dongdaegu Station. I waited a few minutes and then met Bumsik. We went for a short walk to a restaurant he had in mind for lunch. It was right next to the hospital he works at, so it was nice to see where he works. We ordered a kind of soup dish and also got tons of sides-noodles, steamed pork, and some spicy root vegetables. After lunch we went in search of a coffee shop. It was funny because all the ones he knew were closed. We finally found one that looked open but when we walked in the ajuma scowled at us and said that we were too young to be in her shop. Um, okay then! We finally found one that was open and ordered some drinks and chatted. I always enjoy talking with him-he has a very open, bright and optimistic outlook. He always looks for the good and tries to be happy with his situation even though it's not ideal all the time.

He walked me back to the train station and down to the tracks. We said our goodbyes and I promised to return in March. It seems so far away, but with all the traveling I'll be doing I'm sure it will go fast. It's hard to believe time sometimes.

Back on the train headed towards Seoul, I slept for almost the whole time. It was about 2 hours. Once in Seoul, I collected my soccer stuff-I had put it in a locker in the subway station and was surprised to see an extra charge for taking out my stuff. It cost 10,000W for a day and a half! Oh well, it was definitely worth it storing it there-I would have hated lugging it around Busan and Daegu. I hopped the subway and headed to World Cup. I arrived a few minutes late and ran into Jon on the way. He hasn't been there since October or so; he said it was because it's been so cold and today was warmer, but I didn't think it was that much warmer. Anyway, we only met Stefano and 5 high school boys at the pitch. I think John is still in Hawaii and I'm not sure where anyone else was. Stefano being Mr. Friendly went and found 2 other people to join us to play. We had to borrow 3 different sets of people to play with us during the whole 2 hours. It felt good to be back at soccer, but I was rusty and slow. After soccer, Stefano and I walked and talked back to the subway station. He asked me about traveling to different countries and I gave him some advice.

Bumsik and me