Political Report

June 4 is Election Day here in South Korea. The campaigns are in full swing and signs and volunteers are everywhere. Hye-Jeong has even been receiving robocalls.

This candidate's wife was greeting churchgoers on Sunday morning, with someone from the opposite party right there to make the case for his candidate.

Happy Meals

Dear Cole,

On Monday, we ate lunch in the food court on the roof of the Shinsegae department store in Seoul. It was a fun place to eat that had beautiful views and a lot of different things to eat.

Shinsegae Roof Garden

Here are some of the meals that are popular with children in Seoul:

Korean Make-Up Lesson

We are on a vacation within a vacation! It's an all girls getaway for Mom, Hye-Jeong, Hye-Joo and me. More on our destination later, but I thought I'd sneak in this little report on make-up here in South Korea.

Liz, Hye-Joo, Mom, Hye-Jeong

When I started preparing for this trip, I discovered that make-up is a really big deal in Korea. I came across several blogs dedicated to Korean make-up and saw that a lot of visitors to South Korea were saying that Korean-brand make-up was a popular thing to bring back to the states.

Myeong-Dong Shopping

Here's another glimpse of a shopping area in Seoul. We took the subway to get to Myeong-Dong to have a look around. I'm told the subway is super easy to use but I'm glad my cousin Oogie was willing to be our tour guide!

Keun-Jeol

In Korea, there is a long tradition of bowing. For example, children typically wish their elders (grandparents, aunts and uncles, parents) a happy new year by performing one deep traditional bow, the “keun-jeol” (deep bow). Other bows take place during other major life events like a marriage or at ancestral rites. Here's a quick tutorial from a fun website I discovered while preparing for my trip: http://seoulistic.com/korean-culture/when-and-how-to-bow-in-korea/

We walked in the door of my cousin's home and after the initial hellos, they insisted on honoring my mother with a traditional bow:

What a welcome!

 

We were joining four of my cousins, their spouses, and most of their children for the welcome party. My mother has one older brother here in Korea and one younger brother. Her older brother has four children that all live here in Seoul and it was their families we met with on Saturday evening. I met all my first cousins in 1985. The eldest, Hye-Jeong, her husband, "Mr. Park", and her children, visited us in the US on separate occasions. (We are staying with Hye-Jeong and Mr. Park.) Her brother, "Oogie" has visited as well. But it has been 30-years since I'd seen her two younger sisters. And now the family has grown and there are seven second cousins! Two live in Toronto and one was unable to join us, but what a joy to meet four more of my second cousins on Saturday night.

 

Mr. Shim, Cousin Amy, and Daughters (Our hosts for dinner)

 

And what a party it was! Enough with the formalities, on to the food! We dined together Korean-style, which means low tables and seating on the floor. And, it also means lots and lots of tasty small dishes (pan chan) with rice, seaweed soup, kimchi, and other delicacies from beef stew to fresh seafood (crab, squid, and grilled eel). Dessert included an "American-style" cake and sliced fresh fruit.

 

R2L: Mom, Amy, Mr. Shim, Mr. Kim, Oogie, Hye-Jeong, Hye-Joo

 

 

And drink! My choice of beverage was makgeolli, a Korean rice-based alcohol.

 

 

And, of course, gifts were exchanged! Apparently, not only are selfies just as popular here, but gift recipients like to show off their new goods with a "proof photo". So, here are some "proof photos" for you:

 

 

 

 

 

 

The festivities went on until midnight, with a lot of good food, laughter, catching-up. I certainly didn't understand everything, but it was definitely family.

 

PS: Note to my DC colleagues...if you thought trying to explain to your families what you do for a living wasn't always easy, just imagine trying to explain it to family members in another country!

Note to followers in Liberty: Did you know the Golden Swan in Swan Lake specializes in Korean-style grilled eel and that it is a destination restaurant for many NYC-area Korean Americans?

 

Posted with Blogsy

Sunday Morning Stroll

I want to do right by my family, so this next post is a little out of order. Here's a quick dispatch on our walk through the neighborhood this morning. I'll follow-up with a post later on the family gathering we had last night, or as my cousins called it, the "Welcome Party". There are tons and tons of pics and so much to share. So in the meantime, here's a snapshot of the neighborhood.

Here's a video to get us started:

 

 

And We Can Be Royals

Our first full-day here in Seoul is only half-over and already it's been impressive. There is so much I want to write about~ I can already tell I'm going to have a hard time covering it all in this blog. We caught up on some sleep and before we headed out, we chatted, via Facetime, with Cole and Andy on the iPad. Thirty years ago, the idea of video chatting, for free no less, was barely something you could imagine possible. The time difference works because just as Cole was getting ready for bed around 7:30PM DC time (on Friday), we were finishing breakfast and getting ready to head out at 8:30AM Seoul time (on Saturday). A perfect start to our day!

 

Wow. Sexy!

It took some convincing. I had to explain to my (notoriously late) mother that we had to leave by 8am to get to JFK for a 2pm flight. When you live 100 miles from the airport, have to cross the GW Bridge, pay $23.25 at four toll plazas along the way ($13 for the GWB if you haven't driven to NYC recently), need to return a rental car, take the Airtrain with 5 suitcases, check-in for an international flight, and get through TSA, you need 6 hours. Did I mention light rain and road construction?

We were on the road by 8:30. Not bad given Mom's track record. All things considered, getting to the airport would have been relatively stress free if Enterprise had said just to follow the signs at the airport instead of trying to give their own directions. Grr. 

So, what is Korean Air like? 

I wish I could describe the first/business class "Kosmo Suites" and fully reclining seats to you, but I cannot. I can only offer you a description of the (still not so) "cheap seats". 

You'll find these amenities at your seat when you get there:

Not too shabby! Slippers, headphones, a bottle of water, toothbrush, toothpaste, a blanket and an airline pillow (not in pic). There's a USB charger at every seat and a "remote control" for the seat back screen.

Yes, that's the screen and that's the view from the video camera on the tail of our plane (A380-800). That angle is just one of the THREE live video feeds available from external cameras on our plane. Andy and I saw this feature on the Air France A380 last fall. So cool! The are tons of additional video-on-demand  options, including some new releases.  I have to say it was prety cool watching the snowy geography of Russia and China slip by 38,000 feet below at 539 mph. 

The announced anticipated flight time: 13 hours 25 minutes. Incredible. When we flew to Seoul in 1985, most of our options required a refueling stop in Anchorage or Honolulu. We flew via Anchorage and total travel time, if I recall, was more than 20 hours. Innovators keep innovating! Progress is good!

Within 2 hours, we were offered peanuts, beverages, wine and dinner.  There were beef and chicken options, but I selected the Korean option, bibimbap.

For the uninitiated, bibimbap is sort of like a Korean version of fried rice. Basically, you take steamed white rice and mix it with steamed veggies (here with Korean bean sprouts, spinach & pickles), sesame oil and a Korean red pepper paste called Gochuljang. It is delicious. And, at least in DC, it has become popular food truck fare (you'll find a food cart on K Street b/w 14th and 15th serving a fine bibimbap every weekday). A good Korean restaurant will serve bibimbap in a hot stone bowl with an egg, either cracked in front of you to cook in the hot stone bowl or perhaps just over-easy. Stir and eat!

Dinner also came with hot seaweed soup. Not my favorite. This American girl prefers miso soup to seaweed soup.  I did my best to eat my fair share of the GIANT pot of seaweed soup Mom made after Cole was born. Apparently seaweed soup is good for recovering from childbirth, or so every Korean mother with tell you.

I gave it another try, but, meh.

Meal #2 included a cucumber salad with smoked salmon and a chicken & rice entree. 

The Korean Air flight staff has been very friendly. They arrived en masse in the terminal as we were checking our bags. Perfect hair, perfect make-up and pressed Tiffany blue attire. I have to admit they are stylin'. Mom, never one to mince her words simply said, "Wow. Sexy!"

Just like these two?

JFK Here We Come

Mom and I are headed to Seoul! It has been nearly 20 years since she has visited her family in South Korea. I'm joining her for the first part of her stay and look forward to sharing some of our adventures here with you~ friends, family and interested onlookers.

I made the trip with her in 1985, and we are headed back together again 29 years later. Here I am on that trip at a Korean Folk Village:

And at a temple:

That trip was the first time I had met most of my Korean family, and in some cases, it has been the only time. We spent a month exploring historic sites, tourist attractions, and visiting a lot of kin. US visits with my Korean aunts, uncles, cousins and other extended family members have been few and far between. Here we are with my aunt and 2 of my cousins in 1985:

It's hard to believe, but this is only Mom's fourth trip back to South Korea since she moved to Upstate New York in 1967. She describes the pace of change she witnessed on each of her visits (1975, 1985, 1995) as breathtaking, with many areas completely unrecognizable. On her first trip back in 1975, she asked a taxi driver in Daegu to take her to her home neighborhood, near the rices paddies in Daegu. To which he replied, "What rice paddies? There are no rice paddies here anymore."  I've been told by many that Seoul and other parts of the country will be unrecognizable to both of us.

In 1985, as a small-town American sixth-grader, who only spoke English, the culture shock upon arrival was pretty overwhelming. Let's just say there were tears, a lot of tears at the beginning of that visit. But, by the end of the trip, even as a 6th grader, I knew I wanted to return someday.  

No longer a sixth-grader, I'm guessing there will be fewer tears and more marveling, which is why I want to record my 10-day journey and share it here with you.

Our suitcases are packed and we are headed to JFK for the 14-hour nonstop flight tomorrow!