say hey boke mani bah de say yo

새해 복 많이 받으세요 !

happy new year !

my 친구 and i all went to the district Governor`s home for a celebration in our traditional 한복 dresses.

we also did a fancy bow saying the above phrase, and got the money below:

so epic for a 10 second bow !

the photos below are from the ceremony

enjoy !

just had to.

cassandra does christmas in korealand and posts about it 2 weeks later

so.

Christmas.

the thing that i was dreading the most since starting the entire exchange process. i knew that it was going to be the hardest time during the actual exchange for me, but for some reason, it was not!

i am so confused about this (believe me)

but i have a theory on why this was so:

#1 - KOREANS DON'T CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS

I didn't feel as if I was "someplace else but home during Christmas"

#2 - BECAUSE OF #1, NOTHING FESTIVE

This means that, when i looked around me, I didn't see decorations, carolers, apple cider and gingerbread houses, or Christmas trees ! My brain didn't switch to

OMG IT'S CHRISTMAS. LET'S BUY SHIT AND WRITE LETTERS TO SANTA AND MAKE JELLO

#3 - STICKING TO THE BRAIN SWITCH THING--> NO SNOW !

How can i feel christmasy with no snow to make it magical ! I'M CANADIAN I CAN'T HELP IT.

So with all of this said, this is how my South Korean Christmas went:

~ Get up at 8am (just like in canada) because I can't wait to open presents and stuff.

~ automatically go to the $1 stocking I bought myself 3 weeks previously

~ Realize that i am in Korea and Santa must have lost his way when trying to find my apartment

~ wallow in self pity for a minute

~ go out into the kitchen to look for food that i can pretend is christmasesque

~ find pancakes. o k

after i eat

~get dressed in awesome tacky christmas sweater (a find in korea ! woah !)

~ eat birthday cake with my host grandmother while she stares at me and says 'WOAH 예쁘다' (her birthday is December 25th. What a coincidence!)

~ leave the house, meet my friend Ai Chun 李愛群

~ EAT A MCDONALDS QUARTER POUNDER WITH CHEESE MEAL BECAUSE IT IS THE MOST CANADIAN/WESTERN THING AVAILABLE. HEHE

~ meet friends at nampo dong.

~ look at all of the christmas decorations (the only place in busan with christmas decorations ! so awesome ~!)

~come home at 1am.

o k a y

so yeah. that was my chirstmas.

yippee

but not as bad as i first anticipated !

at least i was with friends :-)

i hope all of you had a great christmas as well. just remember, christmas is a SEASON, not just one day. that's why we get more than one day off school !

xxoo cass

hello i disappeared

hellllo folllllks

yes, i have returned from the grave.

what has been up with me, you ask?

-cambodia and vietnam trip.

^woah, amazing^

-sadly, from all the amazingness above, i kind of came home and was really sick.

^well, at least no school^

-and this brings us to tonight. i moved host families !

i went from this;

my beautiful host mother, i love you.

to this;

such a cute, quaint house !

i can not wait for my new adventures with my new family !

i will miss you, family #1.

love you guys !

f-f-f-f-four s-s-s-s-seoul

On the fourth, and final full-day of our Seoul trip, we went to DMZ -- the border between North and South Korea. It was an unreal experience unlike anything I have ever experienced before. The fact that North and South Korea are technically still at war is not prevelant until you go to the border.

It's eerie, it's a little too quite, and it's a little too close for comfort.

"brand new" toys from noth korean children's collections.

these were actually made 1985-1990ish

a typical north korean house.

these can have anywhere between 3 and 7 people living in them,

a north korean schoolhouse replica.

notice how there are photos of Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-Il above the blackboard?

it's like this everywhere, it is illegal to not have both the portraits in at least one room in a building.

it was so foggy! :-(

but if you look closely, you can see the land mass (picture one)

and the same land, zoomed up on (picture two)

THATS NORTH KOREA !

wow..

1 year ago, i never would have imagined seeing it in person.

and there i was.

it's just a little too close for comfort.

traditional music festival!

below -- getting a beauty treatment with acupuncture !

scary, right? -_-

crazy icecream for one dollar!

this was a traditional chicken soup that started in seoul.

we had to wait for 2 hours to get a seat, but it was SO worth it!

mmm

^^ all above: a traditional lantern festival^^

all in all, a great trip !

i love seoul!

lets go back again soon..

seoul three

all of the above photos are from the Korean War memorial museum.

it was a really interesting place, made the war move into reality

at another palace!

had a few people come up to me and ask if they could take my picture...

chicken soup with a whole chicken in it..

and let this final gift show how much i love this traditional korea candy:

BYEBYE!