Day 2: Busy day in Beijing

 

Our second day was packed with fun things to do from 8am-8:30pm. First stop for the day was a jade factory. There were a lot of beautiful pieces.

He is using a diamond "blade" to cut the jade.

One of the impressive pieces of jade

Fuzzy picture but you can see our group within the group. We went with our friends and it made the trip more fun for all the kids and crazier for everyone else :).

Our next stop is really why I wanted to go to China, to walk on the Great Wall. Unfortunately the day was rainy and misty but it did not deter us from walking as far as we could in our limited time. It did make taking pictures a little more difficult. The hike was a killer for me, I was really slow and for once I did not have a kid attached to me. I was too slow for everyone in our group and trudged a long by myself for a bit. One of the other ladies in the group walked with me for a bit and was encouraging. She took this picture for me.

Concuring the wall

Sophie continued onward with our friends but Andrew, Charlotte (she had no choice since she was hitching a ride) and Elanor walked with me to our top of the wall.

Doesn't it look like we are going to be walking up a hill with no stairs but once you got closer you could see all those miserable stairs that must be climbed.

We made it to the top. We stopped Sophie before she headed back down.

Elanor and Mom...this big building was at the top of our stopping point.

It had snowed earlier in the week and this was the leftovers. We can say we stepped in snow at the Great Wall while it rained.

Close up of the stairs, very uneven. I don't know what was worse, going up or going down.

Steps, the handrail was helpful but so low

Finished!

Funy sign before we started hiking



You are here in many places at once

 

After a filling lunch we went to the Summer Palace. Charlotte fell asleep on the bus on our way over and since it was drizzly and she really needed a nap, she and I stayed on the bus. I handed the camera off to Andrew and he documented the palace. This was a place the royal family came to during the summer months. There is a big lake and it looks lovely from pictures:) and I am sure it is even more beautiful in the summer. The girls enjoyed running around the outdoor hallways through the maze of the court yards. The tour guide told a story about a "crown prince" who was essentially a prisoner of the palace for many years because the dragon lady was ruling in his stead when he was too young and continued when he got older (or at least that is what Andrew remembers, he remembers thinking it was a luxury prison).

Elanor, Sophie and Sam

  

Our next stop was a freshwater pearl factory.

Pretend my picture is crystal clear and you would see about 25 little tiny pearls. Sometimes it was hard taking pictures one handed with a squirmy 2 year-old in my arms

Pretty pearl  necklaces. The fresh water pearls could be found in 4 colors: pink, lavendar, black and white.

 After the pearl factory we had dinner. It was the usual fair of foods. The kids had there fill of sprite and rice. Then we went to a famous street that sold crazy foods. This time Elanor zonked on the bus so I stayed with her while Andrew toured the street for 20 minutes.

Andrew ended up buying a stick of glazed green grapes. They were interested.

And finally we headed back to the hotel to get some rest and wake up to another long day.

 

 

Family Trip to CHINA- day 1

When a flight to Beijing is only an hour and a half, it landed on our bucket list of places to visit while living in Korea. And when friends are wanting to go also, you plan a trip together. It was a fun, exhausting, cold, wet, exciting, noisy, awesome we experienced. Between the two families there were 7 kids 8 and under. Basically the ages were 8,7,6,5,4,2,1 and only one boy in the bunch. And lucky for the people on the plane, we did not sit anywhere near each other:). The flight over was over before we knew it. The plane was a super huge one with 2 levels, each row was 3-4-3 and each seat had its own TV (lifesaver). For our hour and a half flight we were fed a full hot meal. It was okay; the girls ate the rolls:). The rest of the meal was fish and rice, salad with shrimp, green tea cake and a roll. Asiana is an awesome airline! Landing and going through immigration and customs wasn't too bad. We had a group visa so no stamp in our passports, boo! This was a planned trip through the travel office on base and had our tour guide there helping get through several of the steps. After luggage pickup, a bus was waiting for our group. The first thing I did was claim the back of the bus, I think all the other passengers thanked us for that.

Our flight was late getting in, so our itinerary was switched a little and we went to have dinner first. Dinner was at a restaurant with nice large round tables and a large glass lazy susan in the middle to hold all the dishes (there will be pictures of this in later posts). All 11 of us sat at the table and enjoyed our dinner. The kids ate rice and sprite, some chicken nuggets, Elanor ate duck and of course dessert of watermelon. The food was good and filling.

After dinner a fun acrobatic show was on the schedule.

I think my favorite part of the show was when the motorcycles came out and went into a big cage ball. The final count of motorcycles in the ball was 4. I took a video cause a still picture wouldn't work. It is a pretty awesome video.

 

Then it was time to check into our hotel. This hotel was super nice, one of the nicest hotels I've ever stayed in. We had 2 adjoining rooms. One with a king bed and a huge office space, the other with 2 beds. The best part was the beds were really comfy, no aches and pains from sleeping in a hard bed. HOORAY!!! for comfy beds. The bathrooms were really nice too, seperate bath and tub. We were warned before we got to the hotel to not drink the tap water. Bonus was in the bathrooms there was a special spigot for drinking water plus the hotel left 2 complimentary water bottles in each room, each day. And the breakfast buffet was amazing, there was food there to make any international guest happy. Our cereal loving girls were happy with frosted flakes every morning. Some of the other foods were pastries/danishes, fruit, eggs, toast of many kinds, yogurt, juice, noodles, green salad, sausage, bacon, dumplings, soups, cheeses, meats, etc. It was great.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wedding

A Korean wedding is rather unique, they merge the Western style and their traditions together. The wedding was held at a wedding hall, with one area for the wedding, then another for a buffet meal. The start of the wedding was a minister saying stuff. I'm sure it was lovely but I have no clue we just people watched. Then the bride and groom in their tux and white wedding dress turned to the side while some nephews seranaded them in a song, then some other guy sang a song. While the singing was going on, there was a big screen showing engagement pictures and bridal pictures. The fun part was that she wore different wedding dresses in the pictures, it would be fun for a bride who couldn't make up her mind :). The most randomness then occurred, a magician came out and entertained us for 10 minutes or so. It was just bizzare-o. Then they cut the cake and drank some wine, walked back down the aisle and finally kissed. Then pictures were taken, we were even in some (the bride is one of Andrew's employees and there was a work picture with both sides co-workers/bosses).

 

 

 

no smiling in this picture, but there were some smiles in other pictures

 From this point the majority of the guests went upstairs to the banquet hall for the buffet lunch, but we stayed to see them in their traditional Hanbok and to honor their parents and grandparents. It is a lovely tradition where they bow to their parents and serve tea.

close up of the table

beautiful room

girls being cute while waiting

part of the ceremony, she couldn't do much without someone's help, the dress was beautiful though

The last part of the wedding was the buffet lunch and to get in you needed a ticket per adult. And to get said ticket you needed to "pay" your wedding present which is almost always money in Korea. When you first arrive, there is a table with 2 or more attendants that record how much you brought then they give you a meal ticket. It is kind of a smart system. We also shared some of our favorite recipes and the girls decorated a cute envelope (I am known in Andrew's office for my baking, they are amazed that I grind my own wheat). The buffet was nice and it was a lovely wedding.

Halloween in Korea

Halloween in a country that does not celebrate halloween has been overly compensated in the party department:). I think we had been invited to more halloween parties here than we ever were in the US. I've been terrible at taking pictures and I have no excuse since I take most of my pictures on my phone but oh well. I at least have 1 picture of each girl in their costume :). We started off our partying at a friend from church's house. The party was a blast with lots of scary food, games for the kids and lots of socializing. Next we had a dilema of two parties on one day at the exact same time. The stomach bug helped decide for Elanor, Charlotte and myself, Andrew needed to go to the church party so it was Sophie who had a decision to make. Andrew helped her out though, he dropped her off at her friend's house and then he went to the church. Fun fun for them.

On Halloween, Sophie and Elanor had a storybook character parade at school. To be able to dress up, you had to carry a book your character could be found in. Easy peasy for my pioneer girls.

 

Elanor aka "Laura Ingalls"



Sophie aka "Mary Ingalls"

 

Charlotte and I went to storytime and she dressed up too


Chef Charlotte

What to do for trick or treating? We do not trick or treat off base but on base it is little America and we had 2 options for this. 1. go to family housing which is 3 high rises along with hundreds of other kids or 2. go to one of the gyms where the onpost chapel was putting together a "biblical alternative" to trick or treating. It was interested; a lot of games where put together with a biblical theme, the kids played the game, then received candy. We did not get a lot of candy but it was enough to make the girls happy. Maybe next year we will be brave and go to family housing. Or we will do what our friends do, let the kids pick out favorite candy, carve pumpkins, eat out and watch a movie. Hmmm, we will think about it in a year:).

Charlotte is in Peter's prison



 

School!

Summer vacation has ended and it took 3 weeks to get all 3 girls in school but we are in school!
Sophie was the first to start. My signs did not work as well this year, oh well. Sophie is in 3rd grade and is so happy to be back in school (even though her homework is hard sometimes). Sophie's teacher, Ms Aubel, is really nice. Sophie actually had her last year for language arts (Ms Aubel was a 2nd grade teacher and offered to let Sophie go to her class for that one subject before Sophie was advanced).
Sophie's second day of school was canceled due to a typhoon, crazy!

Sophie looking cute on her first day of school

Walking in to class.

Kindergarten starts a week after everyone else. This gives the kindergarten teachers a chance to do a home visit and to learn a little bit more about who their students are (school classes are decided at the last minute due to all the changes that come and parents can't register until in country). Elanor was selected to be in a Korean immersion kindergarten class. Around week 6 or 7 her teacher will introduce Korean and she will learn to read and write it and do at least some science in Korean. I am excited for this challenge. Elanor will still have all the same specials as the other students and will actually get some Spanish also. I am hoping this will help her not be bored when the other students are learning to read.

First day cuteness.



Andrew takes the girls to school and got a glimpse of her class

And last of all was our cute Charlotte, she is going to preschool twice a week. We are doing a co-op with 4 friends from church. Each of us takes a turn being the teacher and hosting preschool at our house. After the first day of school Charlotte declared it too short. The next day she was ready to go again but she had to wait a few more days. She loves preschool, loves her friends and loves learning. 

Preschool cheese!

Days 6 and 7: Gyeongju and the drive home

Andrew has some good connections, we were able to stay in a nice resort for 2 nights and it came with 6 passes to their water park/spa. Plus the price was pretty cheap. His connection was also trying to get us on a bus tour of Gyeongju to see all the main historical sites. The nice thing would be we wouldn't have to drive but the downer was we wouldn't be able to understand anything since it is all in Korean. We opted to cancel our reservations on the bus tour and just figure everything out using google maps on my phone and a print out map of the area. We succeeded and had a great day. We were able to call it quits when we were ready. The main attractions were Bulguksa temple and Seokguram grotto. We also did some shopping and purchased some serving platters.

drinking the water to "add years to my life"

cool fish

lanterns

 



the hills are burial tombs



 

The last day we stopped at one last stop to see some burial mounds. Then we had a leisurely drive home. Our vacation was fun and full of right decisions.