Wax Museum & Trick Eye Museum

March was a bit of a whirlwind, lots of events, changes of plans, and some misfortune.

The weekend after the Jindo Sea Parting festival, Alison, Maynah, Chris and I decided we would rent bikes and ride along the Han River. This is something that I have wanted to do since I got here in Korea last year. We met at the subway station and headed to Yeouido park together. The plan was to have a picnic then get bikes. Unfortunately things did not quite work out that way. Finding food that we wanted ended up being a bit of a challenge. But what I think is very cool is that we were able to order chicken and have it delivered to us in the park! I feel like this should be a service offered in Vancouver, especially for events like the Celebration of Lights. People who work for various companies stand in the park handing out flyers, you call in and order, pay the man in the park and then return to him after however long and a delivery car has dropped off your order with him. It was very cool. Unfortunately the day got very cold and windy so our picnic was short. We were joined by Ben who suggested going to 63 Building which was nearby and has an aquarium and wax museum.

Chris, Maynah, Alison and I having lunch and wine in the park. 

Maynah and I with the cherry blossoms! I didn't realize we were so privileged to have so many in Vancouver. They are such a big deal over here. 

While most of the sculptures were not very realistic looking, the eyes were!

There was a section of Halloween stuff and even a mini haunted house which I loved. 

We all posed with Obama, Ellen style. 

Sunset walk in the park

That night, I went out dancing with Ben, Chris, Sy and his girlfriend. The majority of the night was awesome, until I lost both my phone and wallet. It was probably the worst day experience I have had here. Not to mention I was devastated as I have never lost anything important in my life before. I was supposed to meet a friend the next day which did not happen and having no way to communicate made things more frustrating. So that didn't happen, but my amazing friend Chris spent the day with me and it was nice to have her support as well as the support of those other people who were there for me - you know who you are and I appreciate it. Luckily and still to my amazement I managed to get both my phone and wallet back the following Tuesday night - while I know I am extremely lucky this is a bit of a testament to just how honest people can be here. The only thing missing was my Korean ID card, which is a pain (and getting a new one is proving to be a bit of a pain) but I really can't complain. So while I am a bit embarrassed by this fiasco, it is still a part of my adventure and I will definitely be locking everything up in lockers in the future!

We celebrated Isla's birthday at school!

The following weekend was a bit more relaxed. As I am still running a board game meetup group here, I hosted an event on the Friday night. We played games at a beer cooler which was fantastic. I ordered a new game called Saboteur and was excited to finally play it. Below we are playing Phase10.

Saturday I relaxed at home before going to a BBQ at Reid's house. He is super lucky and has a huge deck so we enjoyed some barbecued hot dogs and hamburgers. Instead of heading out for drinks afterwards, Chris and I went and saw The Grand Budapest Hotel, which was not as funny as we thought it would be but still very quirky. 

Sunday I met up with Matt and we checked out the Trick Eye Museum. The pictures and lighting are set up to create illusions and it was a fun day of picture taking and just being outgoing. 

There was also a separate smaller ice museum that we checked out and enjoyed a ride down the ice slide.

I'm still checking out new places, and checking things off my bucket list which is exciting!

<3 

Jindo Sea Parting Festival

Many of you have probably heard already that there was a very tragic ferry accident here in Korea recently. I have received several messages from people asking if I am okay, and I am, thank you for your thoughts and concern. Honestly this accident is heartbreaking for everyone in Korea. Something that I have learned about Korean culture though this is their solidarity as a country. Everyone - directly affected or not - comes together to mourn. All entertainment events (concerts, performances), field trips etc. have been cancelled out of respect to those who have lost their lives. I even read today that even movie theatre attendance has dropped by 40%. While some may say that this is a band-aid solution to prevent future tragedies, this is one country's way of dealing with loss and I am in no place to judge that. This has been in the news non-stop and is broadcast on almost every TV channel. How the situation was handled makes me feel angry and being in a country where something devastating has happened makes the reality of it so much more real. I just hope that everyone will be able to find peace. It's also crazy to think that I myself was on a ferry only a few short months ago going to Jeju myself, although not the same ferry. 

It's hard to transition from discussing the accident to my adventures over the past month, so I hope sharing my times of joy and fun doesn't come across as insensitive. 

It's been awhile since I last posted! In my last post I mentioned going away the upcoming weekend (end of March) which I did. My friend Mel (from the UK) and I went to the Sea Parting Festival in Jindo. We were getting picked up early Saturday morning, so we had a sleepover at my place on Friday night. This lead to us staying up late and booking the first flights for our trip to Malaysia in July! 

Saturday morning, Mel and I got onto the WINK (When In Korea - organizer) bus and we all headed to Jindo. Once we arrived we grabbed lunch and then headed to a traditional performance. Unfortunately there were so many people there that most people could not get a seat to enjoy the performance. But afterwards, many of the performers came outside and we all danced together as they drummed. It was so amazing to be a part of this huge happy crowd of people. Mel and  I were grabbed by the hands by another person and we started a circle chain of dancing and jumping around the drummers. These are a few photos taken from the group Adventure Korea - can you spot me in the second one?

From here, we went to a dog show. Jindo is famous for their Jindo dogs, both smart and beautiful. I'm not sure how I feel about the dog show as they had the dogs jumping through multiple rings of fire which just seems cruel. What was funny though is that some of the dogs just wouldn't do the trick if they didn't want to.

After this, we were dropped off at the hostel. We shared a room with our friend Martin, my friend Emmalee, her friend Tina and about five other people. Most people when down to the festival area for the live stage performance, but as I had started to get a cold the previous Thursday, I wasn't feeling so great and decided to stay in. Besides, we were getting up for the sea parting at 4am anyways - and it came quickly!

So this is a festival that occurs every year and I believe it is based on the cycle of the moon and the tide? But in this specific area, the sea parts so that you can walk to what would normally be an island in the sea. In previous years the parting doesn't happen until the afternoon, but this year it was super early in the morning. So at 4am we got up, dressed and headed down to the sea. We were warned in advance that the water may not part fully so we were prepared with thigh high rubber boots! We were also given torches to help us see when walking in the water.

Mel, Martin and I walking down to the festival

Martin and I with our torches and the mass of people entering the water behind us. 

Thankfully for the boots, we couldn't feel how cold the water was. For others, who decided to do the walk without shoes or in sandals, were quite cold. We joined the masses of people walking across the sea until the water came up to an inch below our boots. At this point, the lady on the microphone was telling everyone to come back out of the water because the tide was coming back in quickly. It was a bit unfortunate to not be able to do the walk completely but it was still a fun, unforgettable experience. Here is a shot of the three of us when we got out:

 You can see the boots more clearly in this photo. 

As we were getting out of the water, there was a fireworks show to top things off. Mel has a bit of a fear of fireworks, but she did well! We returned our torches after several more pictures then headed back to bed! Here is a photo from previous years to get a better idea of what we were doing:

After getting some more sleep we enjoyed the rest of the festival. There were a lot of food stands, you could try playing a traditional Korean drum, we wrote wishes, and we painted. 

Enjoying some Turkish ice cream

This is where we were standing in the rocks and sand just earlier that morning. The water rose high and quickly.

Putting up my banner of my wish

Mel and Martin trying out the drums. 

Jindo!

Painting on a banner - while I was doing this, a Korean man from some media source came up and took several shots of me painting. 

Martin and a Jindo puppy.

There was also a parade scheduled. Before the parade started, I found my friend Robin, and Mel and I were talking to him. Out of nowhere, we had three men with cameras approach and they started to take pictures of us chatting. We though they wanted a posed photo, but he said no and told us to put on our sunglasses and keep talking to one another. We were photographed for a good ten minutes by several people, it was a very odd experience. 

Here are a few photos from the parade, which was a community effort. We were even invited to take part!

 Probably the most memorable part of the parade - older Korean man dancing and behind him is a man dressed as Moses for the sea parting.

We represented the water.

Group shot of some of us who went on the WINK trip.

Finally, there was a performance on the stage and then they released a bunch of balloons that we were supposed to wish on. Afterwards it was back on the bus heading to home to Seoul.

<3