Korean Cuisine

I have really enjoyed Korean Cuisine. If you like spicy, seafood and vegetables, you will enjoy it as well. It was tough at first because I could barely pronounce Korean let alone did I know what I was ordering, but after a few trial and errors I have found some favorite dishes.

This is my favorite dish, it is called "Ojino Duck Bop", it is Squid, with vegetables cooked in cayenne pepper and grape seed oil.

With every meal you get appetizers, they will change a little from meal to meal, but these are some of the most common. In the middle is the famous Kimchi - its cabbage pickled in vinegar and cayenne pepper. Above it are some kind of anchovies, to the left is some kind of spinach either cooked or pickled. Then we have cucumber pickled with vinegar and cayenne pepper and next to that is radish, also pickled. The soup is anchovy broth with green onions, which is Excellent.

My Apartment 2

Since everyone seems to be infatuated with my apartment, I decided to snap a few more pics. My apartment is fairly small, but I am only one man and I don't own a lot of stuff (as you can see) so it works out just fine. Hopefully, this will clear up any questions.

My porchish thing is through the sliding doors, its really more of a 3.5 season porch. It isn't heated, but it is totally enclosed with windows - like a green house. I keep my dresser, hanging rack and washer out their. And yes, I am watching some movie with Kristen Dunst in it, they show a lot of American films on tv.

I do have a shower, the entire bathroom is tile and there is a shower head on the wall above the door.

My kitchen is sufficient. Koreans don't use ovens, but I do have a toaster oven and lots of chopsticks.

Namhansanseong

Some friends and I went for a hike at Namhansanseong provincial park located southwest of Seoul. There is a Buddhist temple located on the side of the mountain. The park itself is very beautiful and has small areas of exercise equipment scattered throughout.

*The swastika, which appears in many of the following pics, is a symbol that was used long before WWII, in fact several thousand years before. In Sanskrit, the language of the Indo-Europeans and one of the official languages of India, it translates as "little thing being associated with well-being" or "lucky charm." It has been found around the world in almost every culture, but since WWII, it is usually found in a reverse rotation as compared to the Nazi symbol.

This pic was taken from the entrance of the park. The temple is in the center.

This area is used to burn incense and ask for the good fortune of others.

Great view overlooking part of Seoul.

A pic looking at the main room used for meditation.

This is the ceiling of an area used for meditation.

Around My Apartment

Here are some more pics from around my apartment building.

Here are what my apartment building looks like. There are about 25 of these buildings in the complex.

There is a little park right outside my apartment.

This is a pic of climbing up to the viewing area in the park.

If you look close you can see some exercise equipment around and under the viewing area. There are little park/exercise areas on almost every block in my part of town.

Here is a pic of Seoul, facing north, from the viewing area.

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine’s Day All. Yes the Koreans do celebrate many of the same holidays as we do back in the States. However, there are some differences, for example: generally only the men receive gifts on Valentine’s Day. And yes, I did receive quite a lot of candy from my female students. It was very nice. Don’t worry ladies; you have a day as well, its called White Day. This is the day that women receive gifts from men. Also, we can’t forget about those of us that are single, we celebrate Black Day. Basically, this is where we go home by ourselves and eat 5 gallons of ice cream while sitting on our couches, but, if it happens to fall on a weekend it's usually one of the biggest bar nights of the year. Everything is still going well and I hope to get outside of Seoul a little this weekend. Talk to you soon.