................Taking Flight...............: Hwa Sun and Jaebin

I hung around the guesthouse long enough to get lunch. We had bibimbap and my eyes were bigger than my stomach. I was so excited to see all the vegetables that I really loaded up and then couldn't finish everything. (I put lots of mushroom, onion, carrots and cucumber/zucchini in my dish.)

After lunch I went to Gwanghwamun Plaza again to take pictures of all the Korean flower-trees. While I was taking a picture, an older Korean man (ajushi) spoke to me in Korean, saying, "aren't they pretty?" and I agreed. Then he talked about the weather too. He was dressed in traditional royal clothes and was carrying a Korean flag, a fancy hat, a sign and a bag of other traditional clothing items. It looked like he had come from Gyeongbok Palace (which is right behind the plaza) but I don't think he was with them. Anyway, he put his hat on me and took a picture of me. I always love these random meetings that give me an opportunity to practice my Korean.

I walked on to Myeongdong to do a little shopping, but didn't see anything. Then it was time to head to Hwa Sun's house! I arrived at her apartment and as usual, I lucked out and someone was leaving as I was arriving so I was able to get into her building. When she opened the door a small white ball of fur came flying out and yapped at me. They are dogsitting her parent's dog, Hanuel (sky, heaven) for a few days. She is so tiny, Toby could eat her for breakfast! We visited a little and I gave Jaebin his Ninjago lego present. Right away he started putting it together--he was also very excited because apparently there are 5 characters and this was the last one he needed to complete the 'set' and have all 5! After he finished putting the lego thing together, we went for "patbingsu" which is shaved ice with red beans. Well Jaebin doesn't like red beans (and I'm actually not crazy about them either) so we all basically had shaved ice. :) Hwa Sun also ordered a cheesecake as well. We returned to their house and visited a little. Her husband came home from work; he's had some stomach pain so he didn't visit long and didn't come to dinner with us. We had jjimdak (which is the chicken stew Bohye's mom made for me) and it was soo good!

When I got back to the guesthouse, there were many of the adoptees hanging out and talking in the lounge. I decided I would join them and stayed up very late talking with everyone. It was such a unique experience; I really enjoyed it.