Hey, wanna come over?

Here it is! Sorry for the long delay. Our brand new home in all it's square footage. It may be small, but it's got spunk, and class.

This is an apartment for one person, but Brian gets paid a housing stipend (about 300 USD) to live in it instead of his own apartment. The place is free for us, we just have to pay utilities and a 30 USD maintenance fee for 2 in a 1 person. It's well worth it for the setup we have. Our landlords, Mr. and Mrs. Lee, live in the floor above us and they're such honey pies. Our washing machine broke down when we first got here, so we were walking around with our laundry when Mr. Lee saw us and showed us the laundry machine in the garage of our building. He explained how to use it and we told him we'd try it another day because we were spending the night at David and Duck's. But he wouldn't hear of it. He told us to go ahead and do the laundry (he speaks a little English, but we sherade a lot with each other) and that he'd hang it up on the lines on the roof for us. What landlord have you ever known to do something like that for a tennant? They take great pride in the cleanliness of their building too, which is very nice for us because the buildings nearby are sick. There's recycling and food waste all over the entrance ways.

We're also in an ideal location. It's about a 20 minute bus ride for Brian and I to get to our schools - a necessary buffer judging from what we've heard about kids following teachers home (not in a creepy way, just because they LOVE their English teachers, which depending on your disposition, could still be creepy). The area near our apartment is a lot of fun. We're about a 5 minute walk from 2 universities (where there's a subway stop), so there's a ton of cheap, delicious restaurants and bars and kareoke rooms nearby. There's always a party if you want it, but we're just far enough away from the relentless nightlife that it's quiet. 5 minutes walking in the other direction there's the UN Peace Park, a large green area where we can run and people watch. The UN cemetary is also there. There's also the Busan Cultural Center (ballets, symphonies, etc.) and Busan Metropolitan Museum (30 cents fee, haven't been in yet but we hear it's good). Near the universities there's a street market where we buy all our produce, including the best dubu (tofu) I've ever tasted. I feel that I could say more, but I think I've tantalized you all enough into coming to visit. You can get an idea of the lay out from these google earth images. If you want the interactive version, email me (jessbartels@gmail.com) and I'll send it to you. I couldn't figure out how to embed it here.


Here's the grand view.

Zoomed in on our apartment, Kyungsung area, and our schools.


A close up of the house and park.

Same view scooted up to the Kyungsung area.

A close up of our schools.

And one of David and Duck's place.

Jess

A Korean Thanksgiving and other tales

Last week we celebrated Thanksgiving in Korea. I was worried I'd be feeling homesick. I've spent a Thanksgiving abroad before, but Baby Bartels and Mom came to Spain so I still had family at hand. This year though, we adopted some surrogates. We invited Yun Jae, Sa Jin, and Mi Yeun to experience a "traditional" Thanksgiving dinner at our apartment.

Brian and I started cooking Tuesday to manage all the food in our tiny kitchen, and the results were delicious. We had rosemary garlic bread, stuffed acorn squash, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, some wasabi rice (a meal's not a meal in Korea without rice), fruit salad, apple pie with vanilla ice cream, and some of Dad's snickerdoodles that came just in time. Yun Jae brought his 5 year old son, Yae Dam, and David came bearing red wine so that we had a cozy little house full. Poor Duck was home sick and missed the festivities. Like any good Thanksgiving, the eating never ended until everyone went home, but unlike other Thanksgivings, this one involved a who's-the-wimpiest-girl-arm-wrestling-extravaganza! I have a new perspective on my strength now that Sa Jin (not quite 5 ft tall, not quite 100 lbs) beat me with ease - she was laughing in fact, and Mi Yeun (looks frail as cotton candy) and I tied. Yae Dam was too busy playing the wii to condescend to our competition, but I think I could have taken him.


Brian, Mi Yeun, Sa Jin, Yae Dam, me, and our Thanksgiving dinner.


The Koreans loved Thanksgiving dinner, but they liked the rosemary garlic bread and apple pie the best. They'd never eaten rosemary before and Yae Dam said it tasted like flowers. Well said my boy.

Friday night we continued the feasting by going to the Brewery. This is a brew house in Seomyeon that has an all you can eat and drink (in beer) special for only 16,000 won per person (that's less than 14 USD right now!). From 6 to 9 you can eat your heart out and you can continue to get drinks til 9:30. The beer was delicious for Korean beer, but only passable for a brew house by American standards. The food included sushi, spaghetti, a salad bar, wings, a yogurt and coffee bar, and a meat smorgasbord that you cook at your table. This will probably become a Friday night tradition.

Saturday we went ice skating! It was easy to find the rink because ice skating in Korea is ice skating. It's only 6k won for skates and you can stay on the ice as long as you want. We skated for over 3 hours and I definitely won most improved. The skates here don't have the grooves on the toe of the blade, which is what I've always used to grip the ice to go. So at first I couldn't move at all while the others were skating laps around me. But I gradually picked it up and by the end I was skating backwards and doing spins and the hockey stop. Shannon's school took all of the kids skating there that Saturday too, and all the 3rd graders learned "can you ____?" the week before. One of the examples was "can you skate?" so all the kids were coming up to us and asking if we could skate and they were so excited to be able to talk to us. Oh, another thing about Korean skating rinks - you have to wear a helmet. They had skates that almost fit Brian and David, but the helmets didn't come close. See for yourself.

Sunday Brian and I decorated the apartment for Christmas. It only took 5 minutes, but we still did it justice with Christmas music, red wine, and then The Nightmare Before Christmas. It's the dinkiest little Christmas job I've ever seen, but it's ours and I love it. Don't judge our tree to harshly, it was only 2,000 won at the dollar store.

Our lovely poinsettia

tiny stockings



tree and poinsettia

Jess