Helllllooooo there my little blog audience. After many a week of hosting a variety of guests, an equal number of weeks spent procrastinating and a month of watching all of the World Cup matches, I have finally returned to the blogosphere to regale you all about the three weeks my Mom spent visiting me here in Korea! In this time, I probably did more touristy things than I did the entire year beforehand (well, maybe not quite but it’s close) so below will be a rundown of some of the highlights of my Mom’s trip/visit here.
As a small side note before we commence, in light of the fact that there’s three weeks of touristy content below, I’ll do my best to just briefly summarize the highlights of the trip and spare you from any of my long-winded soliloquies that accompany some of my other posts. Also, you’ll probably notice a nice camera hanging around my neck…my new Sony A6000 that I bought and Mom brought to Korea for me! Unfortunately, none of the pictures are from this camera because a) long story short they got deleted and b) I’m an idiot and bought a fixed camera lens which I have since replaced with a much nicer, more expensive zoom lens. Now that I have this camera, I’m hoping to do some more extensive, detailed posts in the future about many of these places, so keep an eye out for more frequent (fingers crossed, knock on wood), high quality content (pray for a miracle) in the upcoming months! Ok, now to the content!
On my Mom’s first full day in Seoul, she met me after work at my school and I decided to take her on a little nature hike leading to Montmarte Park – a nice, open area located not too far from Seorae Village (also known as “The French Village” due to the large number of French inhabitants of this area). My school takes our kids to play here sometimes and since it was a evening, I thought it would be a good area to take my Mom for a stroll!
As I do with all of my guests that I host when they visit, I took Mom for my favorite Korean dish, Dak-galbi and like everyone else, she was more than satisfied with her first Korean meal!
Fast forward to the weekend and we decided to have the first of what turned out to be many get-togethers with one of my former students, Michael and his father, Yoon-He. I’d met Yoon-He and his co-workers out for a dinner a few weeks prior as they wanted to practice their English and when I mentioned my Mom would be coming for three weeks, Yoon-He suggested showing us around as he would have the benefit of practicing his English and us the benefit of having a Korean tour guide!
For our first outing, Yoon-He and Michael took us to Lotte World Folk Village, a large museum inside the gargantuan Lotte World Mall where you can not only get an overview of ancient Korean history through different exhibits, but also watch a real, traditional Korean wedding if you show up at the right time (the latter not shown due to file corruption, apologies)!
Here is Michael showing off his backpack that he uses every day for school and to gather crops from the backyard as his daily chores….
I decided to do away with my unseemly alter ego Soju Boi in favor of the more cultured Hanbok Boi for Mom’s visit.
The museum, like all museums, had lots of information, pictures and captions, all ready to be read and forgotten shortly thereafter. For me though, My favorite part of the museum had to be the wonderfully crafted modeled landscapes of ancient Korea which really brought me back to my early days of nerding out and playing countless hours of Warhammer. Those were the days, those were the days…..
The next day, we met up for a nice Korean lunch with Michael, his Mom, Dad and cousin.
After lunch, we all went to check out Gyeongbokgung Palace, the main royal palace of the Joseon dynasty. I had previously been to Changgyeonggung Palace with my friend Maggie, but this was a first for me. As was trying to figure out what the hell was going on in the picture below….
About halfway during our stay at the palace (and running lots of races or playing tag with Michael), Michael and his family had to head off to Church and so Mom and I finished walking around before heading off to Hanok Village.
Hanok Village was another area I had visited previously with my friend Maggie and since it was so close to the two palaces, Mom and I decided to head over in the late afternoon. This time, I made sure we stopped by the tourist office where we picked up a map of where to walk, because the first time Maggie and I were hopelessly lost – we had no idea which roads to take to see the traditional housing architecture that is incorporated into the rest of the more modernized neighborhood and we paid for “winging it” by wandering aimlessly for over an hour.
Prior to beginning our trek of Hanok Village, my Mom spotted a churro shop but decided against having any. We just so happened to see it again on our way to the subway and like good little Mexicans, we gave in to our appetite for the sweet, fried batter.
My Mom was very clever with her timing on coming to Korea – she made sure that she would be here for her birthday AND Mother’s Day! Continuing off the churro theme, Mama wanted Mexican food for her birthday and what Mama wants, Mama gets. I took her to El Pino, probably my favorite Mexican restaurant in Seoul. I’ve written about this place before in a few of my posts but I’ve never mentioned the owner and chef of the restaurant, Kim Dong-hwa. You can read about his story here, which is pretty incredible.
While waiting in line, we started chatting with a couple of guys – Vincent and Rob – both of whom are government contractors that have lived on and off in Korea for a number of years. They asked us to sit and eat with them and when they heard it was my Mom’s birthday, they offered to pay for our meal. Honestly, two of the nicest, good-natured guys I’ve come across during my time in Korea – they were even gracious enough to have me over recently for post-July 4th celebrations along with a bunch of their co-workers which was nice as I got to meet a bunch of cool people, eat a lot of great food and get a tour of what was certainly the nicest apartment I have seen during my time in Korea. But I digress sorry sorry sorry….
Of course, Mom didn’t come all the way to Korea just to do touristy stuff – she had to come see the places I was working and all of those cute little kids! She was able to sit in on two of my classes, one with my 5 year olds and another with my advanced 7 year old class.
Ma also came to my Adult English institute, BCM a few times as well. While my kids are adorable, I think my Mom enjoyed visiting my adult class just as much as it was a great opportunity to learn about Korea from Koreans! It’s a big reason why I teach here part-time even though it’s quite far from my apartment and the pay is only decent, but being able to learn more about Korean culture through Koreans perspective has been very interesting to me and certainly worthwhile.
For Mother’s Day, I took my Mom out to a classy restaurant right by where I work which I had been to once before with some of my co-workers. The meal is about 4-5 courses and a variety of dishes are constantly coming in and out of the room. The highlight was the beef, which was of the highest quality and certainly the best I’ve had in Korea.
During my Mom’s second weekend in Seoul, we spent the day visiting Namhansanseong Fortress, one of ten UNESCO World Heritage sites in Korea. The Fortress is easily accessible by subway or bus even though it’s not in Seoul and is a great day-trip outside of the city.
A three week stint in Seoul can’t be done without visiting Lotte World Tower, the fifth tallest building in the world. I’m probably single-handedly funding the construction of this thing considering I’ve already been up it four times which is three times more than probably any other Korean so yeah, you’re welcome Korea. It was a really hazy day when we went so I spared you the cityscape pics and just went with the one below which in person, is slightly terrifying.
One slightly disappointing part of the trip was the fact that our JSA DMZ tour was canceled a few weeks beforehand due to military operations. This is supposed to be an incredible all-day, extensive tour (fingers crossed it doesn’t get canceled when my Dad visits) of the DMZ so my Mom and I were pretty bummed when we found out it wasn’t going to happen. Lucky for us, our Korean guardian angel of the trip, Michael’s Dad Yoon-He, offered to take us anyway where we ended up doing a half day bus tour together.
After the DMZ, we thought it would be fitting to eat budae-jigae, a military personnel dish created after the armistice which ended the Korean War and continues to be a popular dish among Koreans.
The last day of Mom’s final weekend was spent visiting Seoul’s Museum of History which is as equally interesting as it is self-explanatory. Despite the fact that we both forget far more than we remember, I think my Mom and I both enjoy reading up on the history of different cultures so attending a variety of exhibits for the better part of the day is never an issue when were out exploring
Probably one of my many personal favorites of the trip came when we went to the Seoul National Cemetery, where all soldiers, police officers and reserves who fought and died for their country are buried. I was actually quite stunned by the beauty of the cemetery – the only other cemetery that I’ve been to which outdoes this one is the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in France. While of course many people come here to pay their respects for loved ones, I was pleasantly surprised at how many people came to simply enjoy the day for a stroll or picnic as there are a multitude of serene areas to take your mind off the stresses of life that often inhibit so many Koreans. If you’re looking for a nice place to explore but want to get away from the typical hustle and bustle of Seoul, I can think of no better place than here.
As a thank you to Yoon-He and his family for being so gracious with their time and hospitality while my Mom was here (not pictured was them having us over to their luxurious apartment for dessert for my Mom’s birthday), my Mom and I offered to take them out to eat some western food (something they don’t eat very often) – I sent them a number of choices and of course they went with none other than….El Pino (I’d be incredibly surprised if any food is mentioned more than dakgalbi and any restaurant more than El Pino in this abysmally written blog series, seriously).
True to form, Mom came as she left, with a request for a selfie from the guy who literally never takes selfies (and not pictured, in tears hehehe)!
All in all, it was an unforgettable, action-packed three weeks with Mama! Now that she’s visited, I know she’s gained a much deeper appreciation for Korea and Korean culture (as I have) and I hope her fears of impending nuclear doom at the hands of Kim Jong-Un have been allayed. Personally, I got to see a lot more of the city that I hadn’t ventured to before and obviously, got three more weeks with the woman that birthed me than I had had in over a year! Sorry that the blog post is so late Ma but hey, better late than never! 안녕히 계세요 ‘annyeonghi gyeseyo – goodbye Mom, blog audience…until next time!