Butterflies and Paper

When I got back from the Butterfly Festival I had every intention of blogging about it right away. I had a good start since I had scribbled down several details of the weekend while I was still down there and the day after I got home I faithfully uploaded all of my pictures … but that’s where it stopped. *Sigh* I am a procrastinator to the core – even with things I want to do! So, without even further ado, here’s what I did 2 weeks ago:

Friday April 30^th I packed my bag in the morning and took it to work with me. I was logged out of the system and my computer was turned off at 9:55. I had my last class lined up and ready to walk out the door the moment the bell rang. As soon as they left I grabbed my stuff and raced down to the taxi that my friend June had waiting. Why? I get off of work at 10pm and we had to get to the bus station for our bus leaving at 10:30. We made it in perfect time and soon we were loaded on along with June’s friend (my soon to be friend), Natalie.

We arrived in Gwangju at 1:30am and after a little searching found a decently priced “love motel” with a bed just big enough for the three of us to squeeze into providing no one moved too much. We were all pretty hungry so we ventured out and soon found a happening sushi restaurant. Nothing like a little raw fish at 3am!

Saturday we slept in and caught a 2pm bus to Hampyeong, the home of the world’s only butterfly festival. The bus was, of course, oversold so Natalie and I sat on the floor of the aisle and I thanked the Lord I was wearing leggings under my dress! We got there around 3 and across the street from the Expo Park there were several vendors where we left our heavy overnight bags with a nice man selling silkworm larva, snails, and corn on a stick. On our way in I had two Jehovah’s Witness ladies try to convert me while Natalie and June were taking pictures with the Bull. Then there was a booth where some police officers asked us to sign something saying we wouldn’t drink and drive. We tried to explain that we came by bus, but it wasn’t worth it, so we just signed.

This big guy is right outside the Butterfly Expo Park. Why? I have no idea, but pictures were required.

I think this might be my favorite from the whole weekend!

Butterfly Festival - Every little girl's dream come true.

These boys were fishing... yes, fishing. They waded around and caught them with their chubby little hands and dropped them in jars of murky water. Yum?

You might not be able to tell, but this is painted on cardboard.

We finally made it into the park and had a fun afternoon of face paint, strange statues, interesting exhibits, a cute gift shop, and … NO BUTTERFLIES!!! The sun was going down and we were leaving a little disappointed when we ran into some foreigners we had met on the bus who pointed us in the right direction. When we got there the butterflies were all sleeping on the flowers, but we figured we had better see them. Unfortunately, we got there about closing time and were shooed out. We took pictures as quickly as we could joking that we would just snap pictures of everything and look at it later.

Aren't we sweet?

We then caught the 8:10 bus up to Jeonju where we stayed the night at a wonderful “love motel” with two, count them – two beds! Sunday we slept in again then had lunch at the Hanok Village where we discovered there was a Hanji (traditional Korean paper) festival. (If you aren’t aware of this yet, Korea is ALL about festivals) Jeondong Catholic Cathedral was nearby and had some booths up to participate in the festival. We bought some crafts from a Nun to support earthquake victims in Chile and she kindly let us leave our bags at her booth.

The inscription on the book says that this is a holy place because it is where the first Korean Christians were martyred in 1791.

This was not at the church, but was nearby.

A paper festival may not sound very interesting, but really was amazing. There was jewelry made with paper, a parade of clothes made from paper, even usable furniture made from paper! And of course there was lots of just plain paper.

We ended the day with some delicious bibimbap and caught a late bus home. When I crawled into my own bed at 3am my feet were swollen and tired from so much walking but it was worth it for a wonderful weekend.

(I took 350 pictures, so if you'd like to see more of the trip you can check them out here http://www.flickr.com/photos/scribbledjourneys/.)

Settling

I changed the time-zone on my computer last week. Until then it had still been on Oregon time, but at almost 4 months it seemed like the time to make the switch. This was just the first sign that the settling process was beginning. One year is an awkward amount of time. Just how settled should one get?

Saturday I bought two orchids. They brighten up my little white box of an apartment and make me very happy. It’s nice to make it look a little more like a home.

Then today I completely surprised myself. With a little pressure from my dear friend June I took the plunge and became the proud momma of two adorable hamsters! It was love at first sight and even though the cage was full of the little critters I knew exactly which two I wanted. The dark one was laying sprawled out on top of a wooden house, his cheeks stuffed full of food. He was such a chub! The light one was sleeping along the edge with a bunch of others, but he was turned completely upside down with all four legs up in the air. The man said that if I bought the cage, bedding, and food he would give me the two hamsters for free. *Sigh* okay….. So he set up the cage, checked to make sure the two I wanted were both boys, and plopped them in.

They have a nice loft apartment with an upstairs gym and it didn’t take the dark one long to find his way up to the running ball. He’s all tuckered out now from running so much. Aren’t they so cute sleeping? ^_^

I do have one problem though – they need names. While ‘dark one’ and ‘light one’ are quite descriptive I think we can do better. I’ve been reading The Princess Bride so my first thought was to name the dark one Fezzik, and the light one Inigo, but I thought it would be fun to hear some of your suggestions. So, what do you think?

Adventures In Cooking: Part 3 - You Won't Like Me When I'm Hungry...

So, after three months in Korea my culinary adventures are teaching me two things: 1) I can be VERY creative when needed; 2) I am AMAZING. This may sound vain, but come over for dinner sometime and you will understand. No really, please come over. Here are a few of my experiments some of which you may have already read about:

1. Kimchi soup – kimchi, onion, carrot, potato, chicken, rice. Verdict: Tasty, but gets boring after 7 days of lunch and dinner – Make less next time.

2. Chicken marinade composed of whatever was in my kitchen (soy sauce, mustard, apple cider vinegar, black pepper, brown sugar). Verdict: Tangy and delicious.

3. Sautéed onion and collection of Asian mushrooms whose names I don’t know tossed with one egg and served over a bed of white rice. Verdict: Yum!

4. Fried “ham” lunchmeat with steamed cabbage. Verdict: Super easy when I don’t feel like cooking and surprisingly yummy, but not very filling.

5. Mystery red pepper sauce that came with my package of mushrooms made into a soup with miscellaneous mushrooms, veggies, chicken, garlic, and soy sauce. Verdict: Not too bad. Better the second day with rice mixed in.

6. Fried Rice Snacks – Rice cooked till very soft, mashed to mush and mixed with salt, then fried in little patties in canola oil. Verdict: Delicious and, um, not so nutritious…

7. Apple sauce iced tea – After making applesauce (with a little too much cinnamon) I conserved some of the potent liquid and mixed it into a pitcher of iced tea. Verdict: It’s the little things… J

8. Banana and Peanut butter Pancakes: I sliced bananas down the middle, filled them with peanut butter and froze them. I meant them just for a snack, but mixed a few slices from one into pancake batter with chocolate chips (broken chocolate bar). Verdict: Mmmmm.

I have also started cooking soups that I can freeze in individual servings. Once the soup is made and cooled I line large paper cups with plastic wrap and ladle in a Melina sized portion of soup, cover with foil, and freeze. Once solid I remove the ice meals from the cups and place in freezer bags. This makes it possible for me to cook like a normal person without trying to figure out how to adapt recipes for one person or end up with spoiled food in the fridge. I realize this is probably kind of boring to read about, but I’m really quite proud of myself and now I can have AMAZING crème of spinach, Tex-Mex corn chowder, or southern chicken soup whenever I want (as long as I remember to take it out to thaw in time…)

Now to a recent cooking adventure: This evening Lizze was over and I announced that I would make pasta. I had angel hair pasta, chicken, garlic, herbs, and cans of diced tomatoes. Perfect. I cooked the pasta and set it aside (remember – one burner). I moved on to the chicken. It looked beautiful and smelled AMAZING. Then I opened the box containing the cans of tomatoes and I realized I had a problem. Do you see what I see?

Lizze ran down to 7-Eleven, but apparently they don’t sell can openers. My mind was racing – the pasta was sitting, the chicken was ready, and I was hungry. Oh no, this is NOT happening. I will not be stopped by this lack of a can opener. Well, let me show you a reenactment of what happened next…

"Melina, are you sure this is a good idea?"

"Stand back Lizze. This might get messy."

"Don't get in my way when I'm hungry."

Crisis averted. And guess what – it was AMAZING! ^_~

Easter: Korean Style!

First of all: Happy Easter!!! I love this wonderful day of celebrating the incomprehensible love of God and the freedom and joy that we have because Jesus. I also love the time with family and the traditions. This year I was away from family and the traditions were a little, um, different. So, without further ado, I would like to present - Easter: Korean Style!

I am blessed to have wonderful family and friends back in the States and received two Easter packages in the last couple weeks. Using what they sent (and a little creativity) I made an Easter… area, for myself. An empty Clinique bag made a perfect Easter basket to hold my yummy chocolates and my brown speckled eggs nestled quite nicely in an old mushroom container. (Just try to ignore the big ol’ TV they’re sitting on).

Sunday morning I got up early (ok, 6:30, but for my new life of working nights, that feels early) and Lizze and I went to the church to catch a shuttle bus to Suwon World Cup Stadium. For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been going to Global English Church (GEM) which is a part of Global Mission Church which is, as I have recently discovered, quite large. This Easter Service was one big meeting for all the sister churches and different services that at all part of Global. The service was mostly music, which is good because the English translation that was offered didn’t really work… we all had little headphones, but due to either faulty equipment, or the translators unfamiliarity with live translation, we got maybe every 50^th word. I don’t think anyone was using them by the time the sermon came around. Here are some pictures and amazing videos from the service. I can almost guarantee you’ve never seen an Easter service like this one… unless maybe you live in Korea…

People in each section were handed a different colored scarf as we went in. As they introduced each church group we held up the scarves to show where we were. Mine is grey.

Parade of flags

Yay USA! ^_^

Releasing the balloons from the arches.

Ok, here are a couple videos of really cute and talented kids who love Jesus.

And now... well, you'll just have to watch it... (and sorry for the shaky quality at times. This is definitely due to laughter - some of it mine, most Lizze's)

Ok, really, how can you follow that last video? However, my day was not over. After the service Lizze and I joined a group from GEM that went to the Hwaseong Fortress for a picnic and to walk to trails. Good thing I didn’t wear a cute little Easter dress this year! I did wear cute little Easter socks however (thanks Pakou!).

This way, guys!

Oh, hello!

How do you shoot this thing?

Out of the way Lizze. Let me show you how it's done...

Why are they always locked?

"We will rule over all this land, and we will call it... This Land."

I just want to see...

Gah! Bad idea!

The entire day was beautiful, which was such a blessing considering all the day’s events were outside and it had rained the first part of the week. The day was certainly different from what I’m used to, but it was a lot of fun and is certainly an Easter I will remember forever! Now I think I’m going to sit in my apartment, upload photos, and eat chocolate eggs until I pass out and dream of Easter egg hunts with Korean pop stars…