$11 Cheese

Happy Halloween to everyone back home!

I did not attend any Halloween parties this year here in Korea. Instead, Jason and I went to E-mart and decided to look around the rather large department store and get a few things.



When we got to E-mart and smelled the food in the food court we were hungry. The process for getting food in a food court here is a little different than at home...

Pick which one you want...

Tell the cashier which number you would like. She doesn't give you the food though... She gives you this...

Then you go sit down and wait. Every now and then you will hear some strange little bell go off. What that means is that someone's food is ready to eat. When you hear the bell you have to look for your number at the different places that make the food in the food court.

128 was our number. Woohoo!

Jason and I chose this because it had some veggies on it.
What we ended up getting was not quite what we expected...

It tasted okay despite the lack of red and green vegetables.

One big thing westerners will notice in a Korean food court is that there is no soda of any kind available to drink. You get hot or cold water. That's it. I personally like this because soda is not very good for you.

You get to use little metal cups too. It was strange at first but a cup is a cup. :)

After eating we walked around E-mart for a little while. We looked upstairs at electronics and toys (great place to get materials for teaching) and then went downstairs to the grocery part.

If you know me then you know my love of crab legs. I wish we could have had this for dinner instead...

To finally get to why the title of this blog is $11 cheese..........

I got to buy some cheese. :)

I'm sure my parents are thrilled that they did not raise me in South Korea. Growing up I would eat cheese and chicken all of the time. As you know now, cheese is not cheap. Can you imagine having a child who loves to eat cheese here? lol Chicken is somewhat expensive too but I don't think the price even compares to cheese. I love cheese.

Chuncheon Tourism Sites

So far in my three months in South Korea I have been able to see quite a few interesting things. When I first got here I spent time in Seoul. Jason showed me quite a bit of it and there is still plenty more to see. I spent a good chunk of my first month in Korea in Seoul. On the last day of orientation I found out that I would be living in Chuncheon for sure (yay!!!!).

I have been in Chuncheon for about two months at this point and I have seen a few of the tourist sites that surround this medium-sized city. Including this past weekend, I have been to Namiseom "Nami" Island (#8), Soyang Dam (#14), seen the Statue of the Soyang River maiden (#9), and have been to the Gangwon-do Provincial Arboretum (#12).

This past weekend Jason and I ventured to the Soyang River Maiden area on Saturday and to the Arboretum on Sunday. Before heading out on Saturday we looked at the maps above and decided that we wanted to go to #9. We weren't sure what was really there but we hopped in a taxi and about 10-15 minutes later this huge statue appeared.

This first picture is actually Jason's picture. :)

I really like the angle of this shot.
(I'm in the picture too, see my lovely shadow? :))

Very cool bridge shot.

oooooh... ahhhhhh.

I have no idea what the significance of this fish is but it was neat to take pictures of.

If you want to get a little leg exercise you can hop into one of these paddle boats and knock yourself out. Jason and I wanted to get into one but no one was around and we saw a stack of lifejackets. Neither of us are Korean size so we decided walking would be just fine.

It was a somewhat hazy evening but the lighting offered an interesting look at the moutains that surround Chuncheon.

All around Korea you will see these exercise machines set up. People use them frequently too! Taking a break from speed walking, this woman decided to work out her arms and legs in a different way. Go her!

Up and down, up and down... I was impressed.

These old bulldozer heads were just kind of sitting there. I thought it was interesting. There was also a small fire lit... no idea why.

Jason and I were not the only people out taking pictures this evening.

There was a beautiful sunset Jason and I got to watch for about twenty minutes. It was very romantic.

After the sunset Jason and I decided it was time to get something to eat. But, when we walked up the stairs we noticed a war memorial. Jason took a bunch of pictures, I took some. I really liked this picture because it shows the flags of the countries that fought in the Korean War.

On Sunday, Jason and I wanted to see something else new. So, we looked at the map and wanted to go find the Heron Nesting Grounds to take some pictures and see if there were any herons still hanging around (it's starting to get colder). Unfortunately our taxi driver did not have any idea where to take us so we could see if there were any herons left so we went up to a place we thought might be nice because it was supposed to be a lookout point of some kind. When we got there it was just okay so we took a few pictures and decided that we needed to go somewhere else.

Back into a taxi to . . .

The Gangwon-do Privincial Arboretum. It was so nice! There was some kind of festival thing going on.

We didn't get to spend much time there because we arrived around 5pm (it closed at 6). We looked at the map and I really wanted to see the rock garden so we headed that way.

It's Autumn! The colors of the leaves are gorgeous. I had a lot of fun taking pictures of all the trees on the way to the rock garden. :)

Buddhist Temple next to the rock garden.

I thought this flower was very interesting. I love orange flowers and this was the only one on the plant. I guess someone pushed the plant over but the flower was still turned towards the sky.

Jason being cute. "I have hair again!"

The Rock Garden! Woooo!

Some flowers in the rock garden

And a waterwheel to end our short stay at the arboretum

Will definitely be heading back here soon to take more pictures :)