Trickin' Out and Visiting the Sea Creatures

Since Daniel James is now officially finished with college, he was able to stay in Seoul for a few extra days for some more sightseeing.  We covered all of the main tourist attractions during his first visit in September 2011, so now it was time to hit a few "off the beaten path" type things.  About a month ago I made my list of things I want to see in Seoul before I leave and it just happened to have the Trick Eye Museum in Hongdae (practically next door to where I live) and the COEX Aquarium in Gangnam (as in "Gangnam Style") on it.  With Daniel's approval, we decided those would be our sights to see during his extended visit.  On Saturday we were still a little travel weary, so we hung out at the apartment, watched Big Bang Theory, and went out to dinner.  Sunday morning we got up late, got ready, and took a ten minute taxi ride to Hongdae to hunt down the Trick Eye Museum.  It turns out the place is harder to find than we thought, but eventually this directionally challenged girl was victorious!  Despite the fact that it was an absolutely glorious spring day, we were greeted by half of the neighborhood inside the museum.  Here's the premise behind the whole thing.  You enter, position yourself as part of a 2D painting, and take a photo that "tricks the eye" and makes it look like you and the painting are 3D.  It's a pretty fun concept if you do it right!  Some of the paintings do have 3D components for you to interact with too.  So, we patiently waited our turn at each painting, took our beautifully framed and perfectly posed photos, and had a blast.  Okay, not really.  We got a little annoyed with people who kept pushing and cutting in line, argued (as brothers and sisters do) about framing the photos properly, and took a bunch of mediocre (and a few great) pictures.  Then we popped into the Ice Museum for a few minutes to check out some cool sculptures and go down the ice slide--talk about freezing your butt off!  All-in-all, it was a really fun afternoon.  On the way out I convinced Daniel to have a caricature drawn of the two of us.  Kiko, our artist, was really sweet and did a fabulous job of making us look much cuter in cartoon than we are in real life.

Hanging out on the wall.

Oh no, little Daniel is in trouble!

Puss n' boots…and Daniel in a boot.

This is highly unfortunate.

Yes, and now my true persona is revealed:).

Daniel is the mischievous angel!

I had to take this photo especially for my friend Erin Canova who grew up swimming synchro.

Turtle ride.

Spidey ride

Alternative transportation.

Four visits to Venice and this is my first time in a gondola.

Oh no, sad panda!

Ohm…I have found my inner peace.

Looks comfy.

Awkward!

Brrrrrr!

Our fun caricature from the Trick Eye Museum!  We look way cuter in cartoon than real life.

On Monday the vacation bubble burst and I headed back to reality.  Daniel decided to come on in to school with me and sit through my classes.  I think he finds this amusing in some way.  When I taught my first group of students, Dan was a freshman in high school and that's the age of students I still teach today.  Sometimes it's hard to imagine my little brother as a grown-up.  While I taught, Dan worked on his resume and LinkedIn profile.  After school we hopped on the subway to Itaewon, the area near the military base.  I was craving Thai food and I wanted to take Daniel to Buddha's Belly.  It was another beautiful night so we were able to eat dinner on the patio overlooking the main street in Itaewon.  After a great dinner and a little shopping, we were back on the subway and home in no time.  

The plan for Tuesday was to send Daniel out into the city solo to take the Seoul City Bus Tour.  It's a hop-on/hop-off bus tour that loops around the city and hits many of the major sights.  Mom and I did the same thing when she visited and I figured it would be a good way for Daniel to get up to Seoul Tower and to any of the other sights he hadn't visited yet.  Despite walking down the front of the hill and taking the VERY LONG WAY to the subway, he managed to follow my subway directions successfully and just as his bus was about to depart a group of cameramen boarded the bus.  Daniel was asked if a mayoral candidate could interview him and he learned that the former Prime Minister was running for mayor and was looking for input from foreigners.  I guess you could say Daniel had 15 minutes of fame while visiting Seoul.  As of yet I haven't seen his picture published anywhere, but I'm keeping an eye out;).  He hopped off to have a look at the Korean War Memorial Museum, for lunch in Itaewon, and at Seoul Tower.  It was a clear enough day that he was able to take the elevator to the top of Seoul Tower and have a nice view of the city.  All went well and Dan was even feeling confident enough to take the subway back, rather than grabbing a cab, until he surfaced in Sinchon.  Each time you exit the subway, you have to choose from several exits--it could be five to ten options.  Not knowing which one to choose, he surfaced and realized that nothing looked familiar.  Uh oh!  A phone call to the school did him no good because I was in a meeting. Hmmm…when in doubt, look for the Yonsei University sign, and he finally found it.  Following the signs led him to the university and subsequently to the back gate of the SFS campus.  For dinner on Daniel's last evening, he requested crepes at my favorite little place in Sinchon--La Celtique.  Back down the hill we went for a wonderful dinner of sweet and savory crepes and a lovely time with my friend Erin, who also accompanied us when mom was in town.  

I took the day off work on Daniel's last day in Seoul for a final adventure, this time to the COEX Aquarium in Gangnam.  Four years in Seoul, and I've only been to Gangnam once before.  We got on the subway, not realizing it was peak commuting time, and settled in for a forty-five minute commute with hundreds of others on their way to work.  Before long, we were there!  The COEX Mall has been under construction for about a year and is slowly starting to re-open.  Passing through on the way to the aquarium let us check out some of the new stores and restaurants I'd been seeing posts about online.  It took us an hour and a half to make our way through all of the exhibits and we thoroughly enjoyed seeing new species of fish and reptiles in each room or area we passed through.  I loved the room with household items used as fish tanks.  I also enjoyed the sharks, manatees, and seals.  The aquarium was pretty empty, which was great for us and gave us free reign of the place!  After a stop at Starbucks to recharge, we headed home to grab lunch at the newly opened Subway in Yonhidong (I know, not a big deal to all of you Americans, but Subway is a scarcity here!) before sending Daniel off to the airport.  And so another year of Spring Break fun has come to an end!  Here's hoping we can do it again next year…

Stoplight fishtank

I think this fishie is out of luck...

Daniel is experiencing what we call "Dr. Fish", the little fishes that eat the dead skin off you.

He said it tickled.

Bumphead fish

Otters

Yes, we sort of suck at selflies!

Just going for a swim.

Sleepy croc

Tortoise

Creepy things in a beaker

Baby jelly fish!

Daniel making friends with a manatee

Seriously disturbing sea worms.

Beautiful fish!

Incredible coral reef

Aack!

Real manatee!

A friendly sea lion posing for a photo.

Jaws!  Nope, just Daniel.

Very cool viewing tunnel.

Jellies in different colored lighting...

Penguins!

Making our best fish faces before leaving the aquarium! 

Becoming Beach People in Boracay

If you haven't already had the chance, you should check out the post about our adventurous journey from Seoul to Boracay…after all, Getting There is Half the Fun!  Now, for the rest of our spring break vacation in the Philippines.

Growing up just an hour's drive from the Oregon Coast one would surmise that I would be a certified beach lover.  That's not quite the case.  In fact, I think I can count on both hands the number of times I've been to the coast in my lifetime.  Okay, perhaps that's an exaggeration--but certainly I could count those trips on my fingers and toes.  I like a good trip to the beach, but it's not my first love.  That, as you all know, is Europe, but after this Spring Break trip, it is quite possible that my mind is changing.  I think the chilly, windy Oregon Coast weather (year round mind you), grainy beach sand, and frigid water is enough to make even the most hard core beach bum think twice about a trip to the coast.  This trip, however, was blissful.  

After the rather eventful travel day, on Monday Daniel and I played things low key and walked down the beach toward boat station 2.  We found the D*Mall and wandered through the stores while scoping out a place for dinner that night.  We ran into some of my colleagues from school and learned quickly about the intensity of the sun.  Just an hour long walk in the heat of the day=sunburn.  Yep, we both burned, but not badly or painfully, thank goodness.  Just a little pink!  We stopped at Starbucks on our way back for a beverage and had our first taste of lounge chair time in front of the Sea Wind.  Life was good.  We discovered the magic of Jonah's smoothies at lunchtime and made it a daily ritual.  We also learned about the beauty of a daily nap:).  I took my camera out quite a lot--once in the early morning and daily in the late afternoon to catch the incredible sunsets.

Gorgeous water and foreboding skies.

A very happy camper after a trip to Starbucks and some time in a lounge chair.

My first of many mango smoothies from Jonah's.  YUM!

First night sunset--I took the camera out every evening from then on!

Amazing sandcastles built on the beach as we walked toward Station 2 for dinner each night!  Too bad the tide destroyed them:(.

Willy's Rock at sunset.

Station 2 was just starting to get the party vibe as the sun went down.

The sunset just got better and better as we walked down the beach.

Tuesday and Wednesday morning we hung out on the beach with our SFS friends.  The ocean water was beautifully clear and wonderfully warm (unlike the Oregon Coast).  I read on a lounge chair while Daniel built sand castles with the kids (still a kid at heart that one as evidenced by a certain crab poking incident which I'll leave to Daniel to recount at a later time).  There were more mango smoothies from Jonah's (they claim to be the best on the island and we don't disagree), and time to just relax.  For dinner we had Thai, Italian, and American fare.  We passed up snorkeling, island hopping, and shopping for the opportunity to just relax.  It was a great decision.  What was not a great decision was too much time in the sun and not enough water, which meant Thursday was spent indoors for me.  I think I got a bit of heat exhaustion so I was pretty under the weather for most of our last day:(.  Good thing I had a Kindle Reader full of great books!  I finished two and started a third during those not so pleasant hours spent in the hotel room.  I read Allison Vesterfelt's "Packing Light", Cameron Wright's "The Rent Collector" and I've made good progress on "The Book Thief", which I begun before the trip.  I've missed reading terribly because I've been so busy with school work so, it was great to catch up a bit and the books I finished were wonderful.

The sunrise sky around 6am

Sunrise sky

Willy's Rock at sunrise

Close up of mother Mary on Willy's Rock

The horn which was down the beach to the left of our hotel.

I loved the reflections in the tide pools.

 Another day, another sunset.

Daniel became a kid again and enjoyed playing in the sand with our SFS friends.

Palm tree shot!

Our final sunset

I taught Daniel how to light paint with the camera:)

On our way back from dinner we stopped to watch some fire dancers!

Friday morning came far too quickly and before we knew it we were back in the van, on the "ferry" (our own private boat this time), and hitting the road for that lovely two hour scenic journey to the airport.  As it was daylight during this trans-island trek, I made it a point to keep my eyes open and take in the scenery.  I hadn't realized on our first trip that we followed the coastline for part of the journey.  We saw farmers working in their fields using oxen to plow, goats and cows wandering along the roadside, and lush, jungle-like vegetation.  It reminded me quite a lot of the landscape of Indonesia I had witnessed on a similar ride to the airport.  Unfortunately our "uneventful" airport transfer came to an abrupt halt when a large hauler truck with a dozen or so men riding in the back clipped the guard rail and nearly toppled over in the oncoming lane.  Luckily the truck remained upright, but one of the men sitting on the edge tumbled out headfirst landing in front of our van and was badly injured.  Our driver and his colleague stopped and rushed out to see if they could help, but I think the best thing anyone could do was scrape him off the road and rush him to the nearest medical facility.  As we drove off, I realized how different life is for people in developing nations.  I looked over at Daniel and thought about the holiday we just had, how fortunate we are, and how much we take for granted.  We are so blessed and we live so extravagantly compared to most of the rest of the world.  It was a sobering experience and I think Daniel and I both silently prayed for that man for the remainder of our trip to the airport.

Our final morning on the beach.

Brother/sister shot!  Can you believe this is my "little brother"?

I'm going to miss these patio chairs!

We loved the Sea Wind!

Thatched roofs of our hotel.

Hotel pool

Heading for Caticlan Jetty

Not quite what I'd call a "ferry boat", how about you?

Security at Kalibo airport was interesting because it was incredibly relaxed.  I made it through without removing a single article of clothing OR throwing away my opened and half consumed water bottle!  Apparently they don't have problems with terrorists, just lots of tourists bringing home dried mango:).  Miraculously, our flight left 45 minutes early.  I suppose they were trying to clear us out of one of those three precious parking spots.  We essentially had the back of the plane to ourselves and everything was going great until…the bone rattling turbulence hit!  I never used to be a timid flyer until I experienced the death drop on a flight back from Venice to Seoul, you know where the plane suddenly feels like it's falling out of the sky and you think "This is it, I'm going to die!".  Well, we had a wee bit of turbulence on the way back from Boracay too and what I'd call a mini death drop.  When the captain tells the flight attendants to sit down you know it's bad!  I felt my face go pale and I just prayed my way through it.  Within ten minutes or so the air was smoother again, but those things always seem to feel like an eternity when you are in the midst of them and every bump after that had me feeling a bit shaky.  When the pilot put that plane down at Incheon Airport, I couldn't have been happier to be on solid ground.  A taxi ride later and the spring break adventure was officially over.  This year Daniel didn't have to rush straight back to Portland for the start of the spring term, so we had a few more sightseeing plans in Seoul before his departure on Wednesday and I'm hoping to write about those and post photos soon!