Last week in Seoul...

After having spent a nice relaxing weekend meditating, I begun my week by spending the day at Tamara's kindergarten school. There were kids everywhere! I visited the school again on Wednesday for the kindergarten graduation. It was kind of hilarious being the giant red head in a crowd of korean parents...all of them staring at me, trying to figure out which student was my kid.

The rest of the week was about experiencing as much korean cuisine as possible. From spicy chicken and brown sauce on Monday, wing night and Cass (korean beer) on Tuesday, shabu shabu on Wednesday, LOTS of soju drinks on Friday, potato pizza on Saturday, and galbi (korean bbq) on Sunday...my stomach is still adjusting...

Friday not only brought countless soju drinks, but also my first noribong experience. Noribong is korean karaoke, where you and a group of friends rent a room and request songs that you all sing to at the top of your lungs. After belting out Piano Man, Living on a Prayer, Tiny Dancer, Summer of 69, Bohemian Rhapsody, and many more, we tried to catch a cab home...only to find that alot of cabbies in downtown Seoul don't like to pick up foreigners. In the end, Lexi, a blonde, and I had to hide and let the brunettes flag down a cab...I still can't get used to how alien I am here.

It is now my last night here in Seoul, and as I pack, I can't help but stop and think about how I am in Seoul and leaving to travel to Norway! When did all this happen?! I am sure I will figure it all out on my 41 hour trip...Seoul to Beijing, Beijing to Hong Kong, Hong Kong to Heathrow, Heathrow to Torp, Torp to As, Norway! Here it goes...

My weekend as a monk...

Having finally recovered from my jet lag, I have started to venture out in Seoul. Seoul is full of bright lights, entertainment, and endless amount of foods to try. Last Thursday, Noelle and Tamara took me out to try galbi (korean bbq ribs). After cooking the meat on a grill, you would dip it in sauce, add some roasted garlic or onion, and then wrap it all in a leaf of lettuce, and shove it all inyour mouth. It was delicious!

On Friday, I went to a going away party with Tamara, for the Korean teachers at her school. It was a fun night, but the most amusing thing that happened had to be that the Korean teachers called me "Barbie"...supposedly I earned the name due to my height and weight... It is definitely interesting trying to get used to people staring at me in the streets because of my hair, and people calling me "Barbie" because of my height...I am starting to realize how different I am in this country.

On Saturday, Tamara, her co-teachers Lexi and Monica, and I took a 3 hour bus ride

to Geumje Jellabuk-do, South Korea to spend a weekend as monks at a Buddhist temple. After arriving, we changed into our monk robes, spent the day touring temples, meditating, making lotus lanterns, having traditional, vegetarian meals, and sleeping on the floor in traditional monk houses.

On Sunday, we woke up at 3am, and headed over to the temple to participate in a buddhist ceremoney with the monks. It was an amazing experience...standing in this temple in the mountains in South Korea, chanting and bowing with monks in front of 15 foot high Buddhas and Bodhisatvas at 3 in the morning.

At 4am, we went and meditated with our monk,

and then headed off to a traditional monk breakfast, where we had to eat in silence, and hold the bowls up so that they would cover our mouths while we ate. At the end, we filled one of our four bowls with drinking water, and then had to use a leftover radish to scrub our bowls clean. We would then pour the radish and the drinking water into the next bowl and clean it. Once all the bowls were clean, we had to eat the radish and drink the cleaning water.

After breakfast, we were taught how to make buddhist beads. You use 108 beads, and have to do an elaborate bow everytime you put on a bead. This elaborate bow is about 8 different steps, and we had to do it 108 times. It was quite the experience bowing in front of the Buddhas and Bodhisatvas 108 times while making buddhist beads...although, my legs are definitely killing me today. After making the beads, we went for a meditation walk in the mountains and then had a lunch of kimchi (pickled cabbage) and rice before returning home.

The weekend was absolutely amazing. I feel relaxed and well rested as I head into my final week in bustling Seoul...

Go!...Happy Chinese New Year

So I have finally started my trip. It has been quite the whirlwind leading up to it, and I did feel like I was on auto-pilot for the first few days, but now I feel like I am starting to settle into the travelling mode.

My parents drove me down to Montreal, then I flew to Paris, where I had a 6 hour lay-over, heard beautiful French, and had to find my way through the maze that is Charles de Gaulle airport (alot of walking back and forth, asking for help, and my first solo shuttle ride). After leaving Paris, I flew to Stockholm, where I had a very, very short connection. Everything was going smoothly till I boarded the plane, and found out that the cargo door wouldn't close, so we had to sit on the runway for 2 hours. We finally took off, and flew to Beijing, where I had my temperature tested 2 times to make sure I didn't have H1N1, and met my friend Tamara at baggage claim.

Beijing is hard to describe. You don't really feel like you are in Beijing when you are in the main area of town. I found I only started to experience Beijing when we tried to participate in the Chinese New Year ceremonies or when we went and saw the chinese sights, where I was constantly stared at, and people kept pointing and taking pictures of my red hair.

Another thing that was difficult to get used to, was the fireworks during Chinese New Year...they don't just happen at midnight. They were going off from when we arrived on Saturday at noon, and were still going off when we left Monday at 3pm. Even when I woke up at 5am and 6:30am due to jet lag, they were still going off. At night, the sky was constantly lit by fireworks.

After going out to drink Tsingtao (chinese beer) on Saturday night, we woke up early Sunday, and tried to visit the Lama Temple...there was a huge festival going on, and police were dividing the thousands of people (no joke, thousands)into groups, and hurding them into the temple (we didn't get in). We then went to the Great Wall of China, Tian'anmen Square and the Forbidden City, and later tried chinese foood for the first time in China...Chinese New Year is a very family oriented thing, so many restaurants were closed while we were there. The food was really good, but not as amazing as the Great Wall of China.

It is unbelieveable. It goes on for miles and is on such a steep and rocky terrain that you can't even imagine who hard it was to build. We found this hidden stairway on the Great Wall, so we decided to climb up, and found a platform where they shot bow and arrows. On all the stones, were written names of different countries. We found a piece of abandonned chalk, and added Canada to the group of names.

On Monday, we tried to go shopping for souvenirs, but everything was closed so we decided to head over to see the olympic Bird's Nest and Water Cube. The Bird's Nest was amazing. I could have stood there and looked at the structure for days. Before heading to the airport, we had wonton soup for lunch...the wontons were so delicate, they just melted in your mouth.

After getting to the airport to fly to Seoul, and finding out that once again, my plane was at a different terminal, I had an amusing plane ride sitting next to a 9 year old Korean girl, who really wanted to practice her English. I am told that I will run into alot of kids wanting to practice their English, as I start my adventures in Seoul..