Taipei Typhoon Weekend

Old Jeju Pics from the Disposable - so 1990's

EMBARRASSING STORY MOMENT: This is one of the humorous tales Jake's parents told me (prior to marriage and a few wine glasses in). It began like so....

Are you sure you want to marry him??? When he was 8, he begged to go to camp just like his big sister Johanna. So, we sent him packing with a disposable camera and underwear. When he returned, Jake raved about all of the awesome photos he took. We anxiously asked, "Well, where is your camera?" Jake innocently replied, "Uh, you said it was disposable so I threw it in the big garbage can, duh!"

Ha, ha, ha, the jokes on him!

The Breakfast for Dinner Party

Michael Teacher threw a Breakfast for Dinner Party after work this Friday. A handful of the Korean teachers joined us. It was low key, but entertaining nevertheless.

After a tasty meal, the games began. An interesting Korean drinking game is translated as "The Good Sense Game". Everyone starts in squating positions on the floor. You count the number of people in the room (Friday = 12). Then, the goal is to pop up and say the next consecutive number without being last. The real kicker is that if you shout a number simultaneously with another player, you have to take a shot. When two people fumble, everyone heckles and chants, "love shot, love shot, love shot or one shot, one shot, one shot." Now the two losers have to wrap their beverage hand around the other player's neck and hug while gulping down their shot along with their dignity...ha, ha, ha. The hilarious part is, we only made it to 12 once or twice. A good strategy is to not even move until 9 or so. Then you just laugh at everyone else.

Another comedic moment came when we were all just chatting. Kim jokingly blurted, "You Suck!" to the Korean teacher Joy. Joy promptly retorted, "Ha, ha...YU Suk...that's my father's name." Classic.

The true highlight of the night came much later when Jesse had disappeared for a while. The rest of us were still casually talking when we heard a breathless plea coming through the window, "I fell, I'm okay, I fell." We all stormed towards the window to find Jesse sprawled on the cement pavement holding his ankle with a suction cup towel rack in hand. What's going on??? Cue Jesse, "I was there (pointing to the building wall which he attempted to scale), and now I'm here (gesturing towards his humble abode on the sidewalk), with a such and such (nodding towards the flimsy suction cup towel rack)." Apparently, he had always talked smack about reaching the ledge above our building entry way and hollaring in the second floor apartment. Too bad our building is slick marble. P.S. Jesse, that towel rack probably can't withstand the weight of a towel, much less a human. But you just entered into the Korea's Most Memorable Moments Hall of Fame for awesomeness.

The next day was low key until we decided to venture to Gungdong, the college drag near our house. Of course, we stumbled onto a Korean battle of the bands event on the newly revamped Rodeo Drive. The first hip hop band got low to, "I want a jail girl, uh, uh, uh." At least we think that is what they said. We had a debate about possibilities and ended because that seemed the most humourous.

Next, Michael got sassy when he predicted the following boy band of four was surely going to belt out Boyz to Men. And they did. Their follow up song was a slightly altered version of R Kelly's, "I Believe I can Fly, I Believe I can touch A sky." Note "a" sky instead of "the sky." Oh, it is just the little things that keep us entertained. For example, the slightly crazy old man in front of us who kept raising his hand relentlessly to go on the stage. He finally won a Miney Mouse doll for all his hard work. He walked proudly away with his doll and bag of kimchi.

Then, there was the 12 year old girl who got to hug an attractive band member in mysterious aviator shades. She screamed bloody murder as she half embrassed him before fleeing the stage in embarassed bliss. Comedy. All night long comedy.

Signing off.

Good Evening From Seoul

This weekend Jake and I splurged for a trip to Seoul. We left around 3 p.m. on Saturday for the bustling city. The day went smooth with some tasty meditteranean food, shoe shopping in the foreigner "big feet" district, and a cruise along the Han River.

The boat cruise left from Yeouido park. This is a pleasant, sprawling park along the river front of the small island in the city. Unfortunately, there was a bit of construction from revamping the park walks. Yet another accent of Korea that will be beautiful in 3 years. Jake and I find ourselves saying that more often than not.

The boat cruise was hard to capture on our jankity digital camera. All the night settings led to blurring and the speed setting was pitch black. Nevertheless, we hope you enjoy the few panaramas we managed to capture at dusk.

In the evening, we met up with one of our friends from Portland and grabbed some drinks at local bars in Itaewon. We hit up an Irish pub (to feel like home), The Bungalow (for sand and hammock swings), and Brickx (for an underground Masquerade ball). The evening was exciting, but we called it quits around 1 a.m. in preparation for our early departure to Everland Sunday.

Everland is Korea's Disneyland, but in my opinion, it was a different caliber all together...and I mean a lower caliber. We started off the morning cranky from lack of sleep and caffeine and then kept running into predicaments. We ignorantly waited at the wrong bus for at least 45 minutes just to find out that the correct vestibule was in the center of the 10 lanes. Then, we bitterly relocated to the middle for 20 minutes to get scowled at by a bus driver frantically gesturing a u-turn. Oh yes, we were then again at the wrong middle bus stop. Question: How many bus stops can be located outside of one subway exit? Why are no route maps posted to indicate direction? And why is there zero English in such an English focused country...ahhhhhhhhh?

Merely minutes before we almost decided to head back home, we landed on the right bus and took a deep breath. Despite some nasty lunch and the first ride, that I nearly died on, the rest of the park cheered us up. It was cheesily decorated for Halloween and park goers proudly sported different variety of animal ears about the park. All the grown men wore black kitty ears and ladies rocked everything from bats to giraffes. Why do so many people where the animal ears you ask? Well why do so many people need to buy Mikey Mouse gloves? Jake and I decided the accessible price point of Korea encourages customers to go all out. Don't worry, Jake bought a bat cape for Halloween with a full on face mask and I got some adorable panda slippers...great success!

The most eventful part of the day was the T-Express, a roller coaster with the steepest incline in the world at a 77 degree angle. Jake literally was freaking out on the way up and his legs were still shaking at the end. We are complete opposites with roller coaster fears...I get nervous only when it goes upside down and Jake believes wooden coasters are death omens. Oh buddy! What a weekend.

Miss you all.

Slideshow of Beth & Brendan's Visit

The BP'S do Korea

Yes, oh yes! Palmer and Purkapile trekked to our little peninsula in Asia for a summer retreat. The week zoomed by and I can hardly believe it is over. What fun it was to have some familiar faces to share good times with!

It would be a bit tedious to recount the weeks mischief in detail. Plus, I am positive that even this blurb will be utter nonsense to any people who were not actually involved...but here are some highlights just for kicks.

-Singing our hearts out at the ludicrous ALIEN themed norae bang (Karaoke room). We stayed in our "pod" for hours endlessly entertained by the ultimate renditions of "Gangsters Paradise" and "Chop Suey." Be very jealous or glad you were not there to pop your ear drums.

-Seeing a freak-sized fish flea from his capturers at the fish market and flop free (for the moment) on the tile floor below.

-Watching a brigade of people storm the street in a mass exodus from the seats of our restaurant. Were they running from a tidal wave?Is it a bomb? Is it a fight? Is it a wild animal on the streets? No, but it was a massive gas fire blazing up a building. Insane!

-Playing the street crane games for at least an hour just to acquire broken, pleather, oversized watches for Beth and Jake. Despite my initial rage in frivolously wasting won, the crew managed to scoop up loads of goods. Jake's famous words of the night were, "I feel like a whole new man." He also inquired as to why I got him a wedding ring instead of a life-affirming watch. If I only knew. Classy times!

-Hysterically laughing at Jake trying to make Korean's of all ages dance at the beach "rap concert." Looks like it's just you tonight champ.

- Breaking the rules and storming into the sea around 3 am just to get the coast guard lights beamed on us full blast -- Whoopsies! (Way to go Bethy for starting the movement).


Thanks for the laughs and fun, friends! More pictures to come.

dAjEOn CiTiZEns

Nothing implies settling into a town like adopting their local sports team and rooting for them like you've religiously watched them your entire life. So, have no fear, the true dAjEOn CiTiZEn fans are here. You will notice from the photo that my male counterparts have taken on this crazed role with conviction. Of course, when the team loses, consistently I might add, Jake is convinced that he would in fact make a better denfense player than the fools on the field. Oh, all on a lazy Sunday ; )