This place has a lot to take in

Today I took Robin and Ashley downtown Uijeongbu to show them all the shopping and point out the bars and restaurants we enjoy going to here. Within the area there is a marketplace where they have vendors set up selling fish, fruit and vegetables, various korean dishes such as kimchi and sushi. Also they had vendors set up selling clothes and souveniers. They had an area where they sold all sorts of imported items from the states like candy, liquor, canned food items. We walked around this area for a good 45 min-1 hour. After we saw everything I took them to the underground mall which is also downtown. It's just this huge area underground near the subway station that has a ton of vendors set up selling shoes, purses, jewelry, clothes and they also have several cellphone shops. We didn't spend much time down there though, there just wasn't much down there that we were looking for.
We're about to go to beef n' leaf so that Robin can try it(Ashley was here last year so she's eaten it before). So I need to get going! More later.

Our family is here!

Robin and Ashley arrived safely, Tim and I got to the airport around 8 to pick them up. We had to wait 2 hours for the bus, so we just hung out, got some mcdonalds breakfast. We made it back to our apartment around 11:30am, and have just been hanging out and playing rockband. I think today will just be a chill day and relax. Tomorrow we will probably walk around and show them the area near our apartment and possibly take them to a beef n' leaf to try out some korean cuisine.
It's so nice having them here, it makes this place feel a little like home.
Time to get back to hanging out with the fam.

This day just keeps going

I feel like this day has been really long....since I have pretty much been awake since monday afternoon(Its now wednesday night). I've only been able to take naps since monday, I've slept a total of 6 hours and that was in like 2 hour intervals.
Besides that, this day has just been long anyways. I had to wake up from my sleep around 11am to meet Tim on post at ACS to get my visa extended. We got to ACS and filled out the form and gave her the memorandum and everything just to find out that they wouldn't have it done until the 25th! Not good considering we leave for Hawaii on the 24th, and I wouldn't be able to enter Hawaii without a passport, or re-enter Korea. Sooo...she told us if I want it done before then I would have to go to the immigration office myself, which is what I thought we had to do in the first place anyways before someone told us ACS did it for us. Tim was NOT thrilled about going to immigration since that involved a 20 min walk to the subway, a 15 min wait for the train, a 3-4 min taxi ride to immigration, then back again. So a total of approximately 80 minutes of traveling. To top all that off, we waited TWO HOURS until our number was called, just to do something that took a total of 2 minutes! I'm not even kidding. Waited 2 hours, then all he did was glanced at our paperwork, circled 2 things, printed off the visa sticker, stuck it in my passport, handed it back to me and said thankyou. 2 minutes.
Anyways, we got back home around 5 o'clock and Tim had a softball game at 7, so we ate dinner and he left for that. I stayed back home and cleaned...which I need to get back to, just wanted to take a break and figured I would update my blog.
Oh, another thing. Tim found out while we were waiting at immigrations that he doesn't have to go to the range of friday, and that they are most likely going to move his soldier of the month board to a later day. So he should be able to go with me to pick up his family from the airport! And then we'll all be able to hang out tomorrow until he has to go to work nightshift. So that's really exciting that he'll be here tomorrow. It just sucks he'll be on nights though, it would've been nice to be able to do things during the day. Oh well.
Anyways, gotta get some cleaning done and go to bed!

Sleep deprivation failed to work

Well. I almost succeeded in switching back to my normal schedule and sleeping at night. I managed to stay awake until 3pm before going to sleep, and probably could have slept until 3am since I had been awake for 24 hours. But...then our landlord called me around 5 wanting to come at 7 for rent. = So, I fell back asleep for about an hour then woke up to get stuff together for her, and have been awake ever since. It's now 4:30am. So in the last....36+ hours I have gotten.. 3 hours of interrupted sleep. I'm going to end up falling asleep in a few hours here and probably not be able to wake up until this afternoon...and then be awake all night again. urgh. Maybe I can get Tim to drag me out of bed no later than noon and keep me busy all day so I can go to sleep at night tonight. I'm gonna have to...I have to leave to pick Robin and Ashley up at the airport at 6:30, which means I'll wake up at 5:30. These next couple days are going to be long....lucky me gets to ride an hour long bus ride twice tomorrow morning.
Well, since I am awake right now, might as well get the last of the cleaning done. Oh, joy.
I'll write more later, and try to make it happy. =) My next one should be happy, will probably be after Robin and Ashley are here!! I am so excited to hang out with them!

Yay Cleaning

Can't tell you just how much I despise cleaning... I've been cleaning and cleaning and cleaning the last few days, and it really sucks.
We're getting ready for family to come visit. Tim's mom Robin and sister Ashley arrive Thursday morning, and will be staying with us here in korea for 2 weeks. Then on the 24th, the four of us will be flying to Honolulu to meet up with some more family: Vicki, Granny, Lindsey and Traci. This month will be AWESOME. We are so excited and absolutely dying for a vacation right now...work has been extremely stressful these past couple months. We need a break from the army. Even if it is only for 14 days. We'll be in Hawaii from June 24-July 6. =D
So, sorry if I dont' make it back on here very often this next month. I'm really going to try my best to blog, especially while in hawaii so that I can remember everything we do there for forever and ever! =) But, if I do not make it on here very often, I apologize.
This week is going to be pretty busy...today, when Tim gets off work(at 6am), we have to go on post once the offices open up and get some things done. My visa is about to expire, oops, totally didn't realize this until yesterday and we have exactly 1 week until it is expired. I don't know what happens if it's not renewed by then...they arrest me? or deport me back to the states..who knows. Anyways, it can't be good. So, today we have to get a memorandem stating we have 1 year left on Tim's orders, get that memo signed by the commander. Take this Memo, Tim's orders, and my passport downtown here in Uijeongbu to the embassy, wait in line, and have my passport stamped. Then I'll be good to go. I'm not sure, but I think I actually have a month after my visa expires to get it done. We really don't want to risk it though. Oh and here's a fun fact, we found out today, people visiting korea can actually stay up to 90 days without a visa. One of our friends here, his brother is living with them for 3 months and didn't have to get a visa because of this. I always thought it was only 30 days, but I was wrong. That doesn't really happen often(me being wrong). Anyways, after we get the memorandum, we have to get our rent money out from the bank, return some library books, go grocery shopping, and Tim needs to get a haircut. That might seem like not a lot, but without a car...that will all take atleast 2-3 hours. It takes 20 min just to walk to post, then 20 min to walk back, and walking around post can take 10 min from one end to the other. It's very tiring.
After we get back we'll either be going to sleep(since Tim just pulled a 12 hour night shift and then spending all morning running errands, we'll have been up for about 24 hours). Or we will stay up awhile longer and get some more cleaning done, then sleep at night. It's going to be a long day regardless. I've already been awake a full "day", and Tim's not even home yet...we won't even be leaving to run errands for a few hours now... ughhh *sigh*
So besides today being busy, tomorrow we'll be doing last minute cleaning and preparing for our visitors. Running some errands, paying rent.. Then on Thursday, I will be going to Incheon airport around 7am to pick up Robin and Ashley. The bus leaves here at 7 and takes an hour to get there so I won't see them until atleast 8am, and their plane lands at 5:30am so they will actually be waiting on me. But they know where to go for the bus to come back, hopefuly, I hope Tim gave them good enough directions. =/ Anyways, the bus leaves from the airport at 10, so we should be back to our apartment around 11:30. Tim can't go to pick them up because he has a board to go to for soldier of the month. He also has to go to the range on Friday....even though he litteraly JUST went LAST WEEK. *sigh* They're only required to go to the range once every 6 months, but for some reason this will be the 5th time in the last 6 months for Tim. Some idiot NCO keeps sending him for no reason. Anyways. So, the first two days his mom and sis are here, he won't even be able to spend much time with him since he'll be gone doing all that. But the good thing about it is it'll put him on day shift, so he'll have a better chance seeing them then if he were pulling night shift, because the board might just be in the morning and then he could come home and spend all afternoon/evening with them, but if its in the afternoon he'll only see them that evening. The range will be all day friday though, so he will only see them that evening. But that's better then pulling night shift and getting off at 6am while they'll be sleeping and not getting to see them until 4pm for an hour when he wakes up for work. So I guess that gives him a better chance of being able to hang out with them. There's always the chance that, that idiot NCO I spoke of earlier, will make him work thursday afternoon after his board and not let him go home.
Anyways, guess I'll just have to wait and see how everything plays out.
Well, I need to get back to cleaning again. =(

Korean Galbi House and Radio Clock bar

Had an awesome time this weekend! Tim had Thursday and Friday night off, so we had a date on Thursday and then Friday we went out seperately with our friends.

Thursday started out around 5 o'clock, we left our apartment and caught a cab to go downtown.

Tim ready to go out, looking all sexy. =)

When we arrived downtown we decided to walk around for a bit and see if we could find a place to eat we'd never been to. We ended up finding a "beef n' leaf" (known as "galbi houses" to koreans, we americans call it beaf n' leaf though).

"Galbi House"

Basically, a beef n' leaf is any of the korean restaurants that have the grills built into the tables and usually you cook your own meat, sometimes the servers will cook it for you.
The meat they have to choose from is usually marinated beef or pork, called galbi. Spicey beef or pork. Or bulgogi(barbequed sirloin) which they serve with salt and oil to dip in.

Galbi(beef)

Galbi(beef and pork)

The meat is occompanied by lettuce, perilla, and ssamjang(sauce made of fermented bean curd, red pepper paste, sesame oil, onion, garlic).

Ssamjang

They also serve banchan, which refers to small side dishes, most comonly consists of kimchi, Namul, bean sprouts, a salad made of sliced chives and green onions, and some others I haven't learned the names of.

Banchan

Banchan(Kimchi in front)

Also on their menu you can order Jigae(stew) and kongbap(rice). We like their doenjang jjigae stew, which is made of doenjang(soybean paste), vegetables, seafood, and sometimes tofu.

Doenjang Jjigae

Kongbap

After we ate, we went to one of our favorite bars, "radio clock", and played darts.

Tim talking to one of the bartenders. We play darts with him everytime we go here.

My favorite drink: Pink lemonade.

Starting our game of darts.

Tim playing darts. He's really good.

Tim and Me. Having a good time playing darts.

Went for a walk

Since Tim was still sleeping and I was borrred out of my mind! I decided to take a walk down to Paris Baguette, one of my favorite places to get coffee.

Pastries and Donuts
Pizza's and Hotdogs.

Up close on the hotdogs.

Cakes.

Yummy!

I forgot to take a picture of the cinnamon role I bought, I'll have to do that later and add it.

Korean Commercials

I thought you guys might enjoy seeing what korean commercials are like, they're all usually pretty crazy and make me scratch my head...

Commercial for banana milk:

Cash loan company:

Soap opera within a bottled water commercial:

Water heater commercial:

Mood: Disgusted, appalled

I just had another WTF moment tonight, brought on by yet another astonishing korean exhibit I have come across within my 2 years time here. First of all, I want to start out by saying I am very reluctant in even sharing this with anyone because of just how completely bizarre and repulsive this absolutely is. but... I want to share the bad experiences of this place along with the good, so that you all may see for yourself every aspect of this wonderful place.
Anyways, I was looking through someone's blog and came across these pictures of a park here in korea called "Haesindang Park", that is very "questionable". Here's the story behind the park that I found on a korea tourism site:

"Haesindang Park has the nation’s largest theater aquarium, exhibits of folk materials showing the lifestyle of fishermen of the East Sea, an arboretum, and a park of sexual sculptures. There is an interesting bronze statue about a legend of a nearby village.* Legend of Aebawi and Haesindang – There once lived a young maid who was engaged. One day, the maid took her husband’s boat out to sea to harvest seaweed. Her husband dropped her off at a rock that was at a distance from the beach. After promising to pick her up later, he returned to the beach to do his work. Later, the weather changed, and brought with it strong winds and pummeling waves. The man couldn’t rescue his wife and she ultimately drowned. Since then, the village people caught no fish and some said that it was because of the dead maid. To soothe the spirit of the dead maid, the village people made several wooden carvings and held religious ceremonies on her behalf. After a while, the fish slowly returned and the villagers were able to live comfortably again. The place where the maid died was named Aebawi Rock and the building where the religious ceremony is held twice a year was named Haesindang. The ceremony is still honored today as a traditional folk event."

From what pictures I saw, the sculptures are just a bunch of giant male genitals, all throughout the park. Yuck. Who sculps genitals to honor a dead person? And the most disgusting part looking through the pictures of these sculptures, there are little korean kids sitting on top of the genitals and touching them. What is wrong with these people? Do they not have morals? What are their parents teaching them? It is soo sad. Children are supposed to be all innocent and protected from things like pornographic images. Anyways, I just thought I might share that thought and if you are interested in seeing what this park looks like here are the pictures: http://www.justenoughkorean.com/blog/2009/11/haesindang-park-penis-forest/ They are only scultures, don't worry you won't be seeing anything TOO graphic, but it is still very grose.

Korean Cuisine

Might as well start with the best part about this place....the food.

The Ribs place: Don't know the name of the place since the sign was in hangul, but this was one of our top 3 restaurants to go to. Sadly this place is now closed =( and we don't know why...I hope they just moved and maybe we'll find them because it's SO good!

In the picture on top: bbq ribs on the grill, you can buy a rack of ribs for ₩10,000($8)with either regular bbq sauce or spicy bbq sauce. The spicy is REALLY spicy. Along with the ribs you get a variety of korean side dishes. On the left is doenjangchigae soup, the stock is made with this hot pepper paste and soy bean paste I believe, mixed with water. and then it has onions, zucchini, chilies, potato, garlic, and beef. It's REALLY GOOD! Believe me... they serve this soup at just about any korean restaurant, and depending on where you go it can be very spicy or mild. The plate in the middle has shredded cabbage with some funky sauce on top, I never tried that.. but next to it is this corn/maceroni/crab salad. That was my favorite but they stopped serving it awhile ago. =(

Picture on bottom: close up of the doenjangchigae soup. and you can kind of see in the top left corner, spicy bean sprouts that they seasoned the same way you make kimchi. Not pictured: kimchi.

2 years down, 1 more to go.......I hope

We've been in korea for almost 2 years now! Crazy....looking back now it doesn't feel like it's been that long, but from day to day it seems to draaaagg...

Anyways, this last month has been hard. Tim was sent to WLC which is a warrior leadership course for soldiers in an NCO possition. Anyone who wants to be promoted to E5 has to go, now he just has to go to his promotion board and he'll be promoted. In fact, he got a call from an NCO in his platoon today trying to get him to go to the board in 2 days....yeah..right.. that's not enough time to prepare. He'll most likely be going in August though. Which is a good thing...he wants to go, just not when he's told only 2 days in advance and given no time to study. Anyways, he was gone at WLC for 17 days, it was like basic training all over again. He wasn't allowed to use his phone all day so usually called me after 7 sometime to say goodnight.

That weekend after he came back he was given the weekend off to recover so we took advantage of that and went to a festival and Luau that was going on at Camp Casey. Which i was really excited to go to, until we got there... We went at about noon and were surprised to see that the only thing happening then was their "yard sale" which was just two little areas set up with peoples "junk" scattered on folding tables, and a tent in the middle selling beer and liquor. When we checked the schedule for the events nothing else started until 3:30, so we weren't about to just stand around for 3 hours doing nothing while we waited for the concert of some guy we'd never heard of, and a "luau" hosted by koreans.....no thanks. The Luau might've been alright, but nothing compared to a real one in Hawaii, which we are going to Honolulu in 3 weeks..so I would rather experience one there. So that was pretty disappointing... it would have been nice if they had advertised the schedule better so that we would have known to go later in the afternoon.

Tim on the company's softball team, though he left for WLC right when they started having games so he's only been able to go to 2-3 of them. I've make it to 2 of the games this week to watch him play. They were saying tonight was probably their last game though..I don't know why.I hope not though, I enjoy watching my man play. =)

Next week Tim's Mom and Sis get here, on thursday morning. We're planning on taking the early bus to meet them, we'll arrive like two hours after their plane lands. It's okay though because they'll be waiting on a bus that leaves at 10 so we'll still be there before that, so either way they would have been waiting.

We're really excited for them to get here =)) we'll have so much to do! I just hope Tim gets enough days off to spend with them. It just sucks because he is on night shift so when we do anything or go anywhere he'll have to pull an all nighter and just not get any sleep. And there is always the risk of being called in. EVERY TIME we try and leave Uijeongbu, especially when we try to go to Seoul he gets called in. I'm not exagerating in the least bit. Last time we went to Seoul, we were half way there on the train(which is an hour long ride incase you're wondering) and he got a call to come in to work. It never fails. So we'll be worrying about that anytime we go anywhere. It's not like he can put in a pass either, since he's "in system" it's the same as being "in the field" and they're not allowed to put in passes when they're in the field.

All day I've been looking at other people's blogs that are living or lived in the Seoul area to get ideas of places to go and things to see. I got to looking because I was trying to find how to get to Dobongsan Mountain and came across someone's blog that lives in Seoul. Then from there I just kept finding more and more blogs of people around here talking about the food and places they like to go. It's awesome! Made me realize I really should take pictures of seriously "everything" I see and do here, because I didn't realize til now how interesting it is... I forgot just how excited I was coming here and learning about their culture, now I'm so used to it, since it's now my LIFE...I forgot how interesting other people would find it. So from now on I am going to try my best to remember my camera and take pictures of my favorite places and things that we do from day to day. Maybe I will add some pictures to this post that I took when I first got here... I think I will. Actually I will make New posts specifically for those pictures since there are so many, but I will add a picture I found on someone's blog of the view from the top of Mt. Dobongsan.