Journey to Korea - Day 11

Wow.  It's almost been a month since I last blogged.  My sister, Gina has been asking me when I am going to finish.  I guess after I completed the orphanage post, I lost a little steam.   Back on track now though.

Day 11 is Sunday, June 3.  Gina had woken up at 4:30 a.m because she's crazy like that.  She took her shower, got ready and was reading her email by 6:30 a.m.  I woke up when she left the room.  I got up and took a quick shower.  I didn't want to flood the bathroom on the last day.  I packed my stuff and left to check my email around 7:40 a.m.  Mistie came down to breakfast around 8 a.m.

Breakfast wasn't fantastic the last day.  There were no green leafy veggies.  I just ate toast, rice, pears, a few sad french fries, and some bacon.  I did; however, drink maybe two - or three - of the little yogurt drinks.

After breakfast, we finished up with the last minute packing.  Mistie and I went to the GS25 to purchase some Cokes.  When we came back to the hotel, the hotel man waved me over.  He told me I had a phone call.  Strange.  I picked up the phone and heard my brother-in-law, Glenn, say "Hello?"  It was Gina's husband.  I guess when Glenn called for Gina, the hotel man told him she left.  When I walked in, he thought I was Gina.  I guess we Asians look all alike.  I told the hotel man he had the wrong person and to transfer the call up to our room, but I guess he couldn't do that.  He told me to tell Glenn to call back in five minutes.

We left around 9 a.m. My mom and Gina took one taxi back to Illmagwon Orphange.  My mom wanted to give them some other things.  Mistie and I wanted to take a taxi to the police station.  We asked the hotel man to tell the taxi driver we wanted to go to the police station.  The hotel man laughed. I wonder what he thought.

Even though the police station is not the one I was left at, it was the only one in Gunsan so I wanted a picture on the steps.  The taxi driver just parked quickly by the curb.  We got out and took a few pictures and hopped back into the taxi. 

On the way to the train station, I saw these two little boys riding their bicycles waiting to cross the street.  I was struck by how young they were.  There were not parents around. 

 

We arrived at the Gunsan Station about five minutes before my sister and mom.n  We had about a 40 minute wait until our train departed.  We partook in a little bit of Korean television game shows.  We never did figure out what the objective was for the game show.  There was a lot of being splashed with big, blue bowls of water.

I loved all the flowers that were everywhere in Korea.

My mom insisted I go see/take a picture of the squatter potty.  They had regular toilets but I suppose they wanted you to have options.  I did not use it.

  

With about 10 minutes left, we went outside to the platform to wait for the train.  We were taking first class back to Incheon.

 

First class meant red seat and more leg room, not that it mattered to me.  My feet still didn't touch the floor.  I'm sure it's helpful to people who are taller than 5 ft. 3 in.  

 

After being in Korea for 10 days, we are finally getting the hang of giving the "peace" sign in our pictures. 

 

I kept seeing passengers come back with food and drinks.  I wanted to find out where they were getting it.  I walked back out of our car to the next car.  It had this sign on the door.  "Free Space:  Enjoy! Delicious time!"  I love their descriptions.

And this is delicious time......

Just to the left of the food counter, there were arcade games.  I had not idea what any of the food was.  They would microwave food for you, but I didn't know what any of it was except the Pringles, so I didn't purchase anything.

The train ride isn't bad.  It's a 3 1/2 hour train ride with stops a long the way.  However, it went relatively quickly.  We saw many of the same beautiful countryside.  This time I saw several people out working in the rice fields.  I wondered what they did.  Do they work it all by hand?  I never saw any machinery.  You know they are hard workers. 

 

I can't remember where I saw this.  Mistie took this picture.  I am pretty sure it was at the Yongsun Station.  It says "We Trust You.  (Only paid customers can cross this line)".  It was on the floor right before you enter the platform area.  I wonder how this would fly in New York.

  

We arrived at the Yongsun Station and met Daniel.  He was going to escort us to the airport, where we would take a shuttle to our hotel by the airport.  As we were walking through the airport, we saw an ice skating rink.  There were little kids ice skating with little walkers.  Loved it.

We took the subway for an hour to the airport. Then we got into a shuttle to the Hotel Sky.  This hotel had a completely different look than the other two we had stayed at.  Mistie and I shared a room and mom and Gina were in the other room.  This is what our bathroom looked like.  My mom's bathroom was exactly like this but in green. 

We dropped off our luggage and asked the hotel staff for a recommendation for a restaurant.  We walked to the restaurant.

This food was so good.  Gina ordered bimbimbap.  Noodles with veggies and topped with a fried egg. 

We had some great sides.  My favorite was the zucchini in sesame oil.  Daniel told us the brown jello substance we had seen at the orphanage was acorn jelly.  I tried it.  It didn't really taste like anything.  It was just gelatinous.  

The rest of us ordered a beef bulgogi hot pot.  It had clear noodles, onions, long, skinny mushrooms and beef.  This was Mistie's favorite food of the trip.  I loved the bulgogi too.  I was surprised I like the long, skinny white mushrooms.  I am not a mushroom person, but it's more about the texture of the mushrooms than the taste.

Mistie tried her hand at using chopsticks.  She did pretty good.  I never mastered it.

It's been almost two months since we've been back and I miss this food!

 

It was good to eat with Daniel one last time.  I love this picture of us.  We are actually all smiling - big - even my mom.  Love it.  Great memories.

As we walked out of the restaurant we noticed this completely random brown recliner set just inside the door.  I have no idea why it was there.  Maybe it's a smoking room. 

After dinner, it has dawned on us that we have not eaten kimbobs once.  We look for a place that sells kimbobs.  Daniel find a restaurant that sells them.  We are all very excited!  There was a lady that just made made-to-order kimbobs.  They were $1.50 each.  

 

My mom and I purchase some kimbobs.  We will eat them for a bedtime snack and for breakfast the next morning. :)

We walk around a little bit more.  It always feels good to walk off the meal.

  

We found a grocery store.  We wanted to get some snacks and spend some of our last wons.  I loved all the noodles they had.

 

I have no idea what this is.  I don't know if it is a vegetable or fruit, but I thought it looked cool!  I also took a picture of the mushrooms I ate at dinner.

However, my favorite was the huge green onions.  Actually they were probably leeks.  Don't care, they were huge and I got goosebumps just looking at them.  If I could have purchased them, and gotten them through customs I would have.

While we were shopping, we kept hearing someone yelling over the loud speaker.  It sounded like an auction.  I found out he was just trying to sell meat.  They really work it in the meat department.  I purchased some cup of ice for my coke.  It was .50.

On the way back to the hotel, we stopped by Dunkin Donuts.  I got an iced caramel latte.  Mistie got an apple coco coolatta.  We made plans to come back and eat breakfast Dunkin Donuts on our last morning in Korea.  We said good-bye to Daniel.  He made so much of our trip easy and comfortable.  Won't ever forget him.

We went back to our hotel.  Mistie and I watched the rest of Armageddon and fell asleep pretty quickly.