Lunar New Year

I'm a bit late in posting (three weeks, ahhh!) but I thought I'd let you all know what we were up to during Seolnal. This year was extra special since it fell on a Thursday, so we had three days off of work and a five day weekend! We originally thought we would go skiing during this vacation, but we backed out. Somehow, the price of skiing is just intimidating to me. Every week we get closer to our impending unemployment and I feel like a real tightwad, wanting to save up every last bit of the money we are making so we don't end up squatting with family members for the rest of our lives.

We did have some fun though. On Wednesday, we headed to Seoul and enjoyed burgers at Crazy Burger. Then we stopped at the Foreign Food Mart for salsa. This is the only place in Korea where we have been able to find decent salsa.

Our director suggested visiting the Hanok Village in the middle of Seoul which sounded interesting enough. We ended up getting lost and wandering through Namsam Park, which is the mountain that N. Seoul Tower rests on. We had a great view of the city below and got some exercise, so it wasn't a total loss.

Walking back to the station, we stumbled upon pet central with dozens of pet stores. We cooed over the adorable puppies and kittens before heading to Yongsan. This was probably our 6th stop to Yongsan in the course of a year - the electronics market has pretty much everything!

On Thursday we just stayed in. Many shops we closed.

Friday, we went to VIPS, a popular restaurant chain in Korea. They are known for their steaks and for the salad bar, which is essentially a buffet. We were both very impressed with the selection of fresh food and will be going back before we leave. This is a pricy restaurant, between 20 and 50 dollars a piece.

Saturday we headed back to Seoul because Michael's power cord on his laptop stopped working. Once again, we were back in Yongsan at the electronics market. Success! A storekeeper was able to locate a power cord in only about 10 minutes. We ate at a basic Korean fast food place and had some basic food - pork cutlet and seafood rice bowl.

We decided to see a movie and were desperate enough to watch Gulliver's Travels. I remember my sis reading this as a kid and her loving it. Well, the Jack Black version is a modern take and was not so great. Michael and I felt dumber after seeing it and our wallets felt slimmer as well after spending more than 20 USD to see it.

Sunday we went for a hike and did our weekly shopping at HomePlus. Strawberries are in season and are delicious!

All in all it was a delightful break, but I was happy to be going back to work on Monday. I'm having a hard time keeping busy during time off. I spend too much time in front of the TV and letting my brain turn to mush.