Six in Seoul

While my sisters were here we packed in as much as we could - a few of the other things we did were:

Took a nice walk along the Han River.

If you live here or are just visiting the Seoul City Bus Tour is something I think everyone should do!!  (No, I don't work for the city of Seoul.)   The tour is only 10,000 won per person.  It runs from 9AM-9PM and there are something like 35 stop on the tour, there is NO WAY you can do everything on this tour in one day.  If you want to take the tour, you can catch the bus anywhere you see this bus stop.....

...enough said.

I am officially 5 days behind on this blog...let's see if I can catch up, speed racer style...

Friday - we headed out to Seoul Grand Park (SGP).  I have always taken the subway to get to SGP, but this time I took a chance and drove.  It paid off!  It was super easy to get there.  Exit post through the commissary gate, take a right - go over the Bampo Bridge, continue straight.  Go through  a HUGE intersection - after the intersection the street spits 3 ways, go STRAIGHT.  Go through the tunnel...after the tunnel you will see your first sign to SGP, then there will be a toll booth...you pay 2,000 won here - get in the right hand lane and follow the signs...you will be exiting to the right, then it is a straight shot - go until you hit the parking lots, you cannot miss it.

SGP was a quite a fun day.  When we arrived we realized it was a very sunny day, and I did not bring hats for anyone, so we bought a few beauties...K's hat was especially nice....

My Sisters arrived in Seoul a week ago today, and we have been non-stop every day since!  They arrived around 7PM, which in my opinion is perfect - arriving here at night, then going straight to bed.  They haven't really had much jet lag (this will be a different story on the way home!). On Tuesday I took it easy on them...first to Camp Kim to have temporary ID cards made, then off to the Flying Pan Blue for breakfast (they read about this on my blog and HAD to try it!)  Notice the plate sitting in front of Boy 3?  Yummy.....

See that little yellow truck just below Justin Bar?  Run, don't walk to it!  The smell coming from that little truck was enough to make me stop and look for it....not in a bad way like many of the smells that come from the streets here, this was an amazingly delicious smell, one that I haven't smelt in over a year.  As I sniffed, I knew something great was cooking, and it was in the Mexican food category!  Oh God, I thought I might be dreaming when I approached this yellow truck/taco stand.  As I stood in the long line, everyone seemed very happy, but as I was watching the guys make the tacos, I was a little scared when I saw them squirt white and red stuff on the tacos.  You never know what white or red stuff might be here in Korea.  I mean sometimes there is white stuff on pizza...and that white stuff is a bit nasty.  So, I was talking to my friend T while in line and said that I didn't think I wanted the white or red stuff on my taco. When Johnny, the owner heard me he said in perfect English "sour cream and hot sauce".  Well, forgive me....of course I want sour cream and hot sauce on my taco!  Here is Johnny- he calls himself the Naked Chef, I don't know why, he has clothes on.

OK folks I know my blogging has been sporadic, but I have lots of excuses...First off, I'm busy, today was the last day of school - HOOAH!  I love summer with the kids, but that is for a different blog.  Also, my sisters are here visiting from the US, so whenever I have visitors I feel like I shouldn't be on the computer too much. 

So today I am blogging about last Saturday night out with friends, what a great time we had!  The first place we went was to Los Amigos -  always a fun place, the music starts early so it is a good place to start the night, plus one of the guys in the band is a friend of ours...the guys from Los Amigos will be playing at our 4th (3rd) of July party this year!  Be here or be square. 

After Los Amigos, we headed to Woodstock....

Written by: Hubby

Bears – Giants; a classic NFC matchup, right? Not this time! On Friday night we went to see the Doosan Bears play the Busan Lotte Giants in Jamsil Stadium, Seoul.  Let me just say up front that I had high expectations for the game. The South Koreans won the last Olympics in Baseball, and came in second to Japan in the World Baseball Classic. These guys can play ball, and this game was every bit as good as the MLB games I’ve seen. We all chose a team to support, so we had Bears and Giants fans. I chose ‘da bears’.   It looked like it was going to be a blowout until the Bears scored six in the bottom of the seventh to take the lead. The Giants scored to tie the game in the eighth. And, then out of fear of a swamped subway with the little ones, we left before the ninth. Too bad, because after nearly an hour searching the internet for the score, I discovered that the Bears won in extra innings! Yeah, Doosan!

A couple of funny notes. First, we really had a hard time figuring out who Doosan was actually playing. We didn’t figure out it was the Giants until the 3rd inning or so. Our friend Mike had seen the schedule that led us to the game, but he wasn’t sure who was actually playing. And, everything was in Korean. But, we finally figured it out! Also, I was expecting hotdogs and beer at the stadium. No such luck. There was a lot of beer (Cass, Hite and OB) but no dogs. No matter, there was plenty of dried squid. Also, there was bulgogi burgers from BK and chicken from KC. The kids also had ice cream.  We also discovered that you can bring any food or drinks into the stadium. So, next time maybe I’ll bring my own dogs.

So, for those of you interested in going to see baseball in Seoul, I highly recommend it. We took the subway to the game: line 2, stop 218 - exit 5, which is the Olympic Sports Complex. This took us right to Jamsil Stadium. The subway exit is also very close to the ticket office. So, it was an easy trip. We ended up walking the entire perimeter of the stadium because we didn’t ask for directions to our gate, but it was still pretty easy to find seats. We were in the outfield, so our seats were not reserved. The game was also really cheap. We had four adults and six kids, and outfield tickets for all ten of us were 46,000 won. That’s only about $40! Here is the official website, but good luck figuring it out.

Postscript: The day after the game, Girl and Boy2 had baseball games. Girl went 2 for 2 and hit a homerun, and boy 2 also hit a homerun! Both of them were wearing their new Doosan Bears hats. Coincidence? I don’t think so!

Pictures by me, Trish

3 Men in a Tub
3 Bears
3 Caballeros
3 Little Pigs
3 Billy Goats Gruff
3 Graduates
3 Little Maids From School
AND
3 Blind Mice!

Summer is here and so are summer 'blue park' parties!  If you missed the whole 'blue park' thing, blue park is the park behind our house.  Before the parks were remodeled, they were color coded, this was easy for all parents and kids since there are 4 parks in our small neighborhood...the one behind our house was 'blue', so the name has stuck, blue park, even though blue is not the primary color of the park anymore.

If you are walking though on a Friday night and see a group gathered, come join the fun.  It is BYOE (bring your own everything).