The New Year

So back home you think the holidays have already passed... well not in Korea! We're still in the midst of the holiday season with Lunar New Year coming up at the beginning of February. It's a good thing too because the holiday lights are necessary to your emotional well-being when you're wandering around with your face freezing off in the dead of the Korean winter.






Haley came and went, sadly. We didn't do as many glamorous things as I had hoped. The cold weather put a bit of a damper on any out of the house activities. On the upside, I felt like my home life was normal again. I think I am used to having an overabundance of estrogen in my living situations. This whole 50-50 thing is just not what I'm used to. We did go out to a fancy dinner for New Years (the best Italian food I've had in a long time), did a lot of shopping, and visited the DMZ.







The DMZ is a several kilometer-wide expanse of unoccupied territory between North and South Korea. It is manned on both sides by military personnel and monitored by the United Nations. It's necessary because the Korean war is still technically not over, as a peace treaty was never signed, only a cease fire (I read in the news today that the plan is to have a peace treaty signed by 2010). While the land is still riddled with land mines and anti-tank barriers, it now harbors some of the most pristine wilderness on the Korean peninsula (including tiny deer that grow fangs instead of antlers) as a result of it being virtually untouched by mankind for over 50 years. We got to stand in North Korea for a few moments and took some bleak-looking but interesting pictures. On the way back in the bus we watched a documentary about the Korean war, and it was amazing to see footage of the city back when it was leveled by war (only 50 years ago) while driving through the giant metropolis that has sprung up since.

Richy and I have both started our in-school winter camps which are much more relaxed that our normal school days. It's nice having a small number of students to get to know and be able to have more one-on-one time with them. It's also nice getting off work early and having the rest of the day to do whatever we want. Next weekend we start our away camp, so for ten days we'll be staying at a complex outside of the city. I'm a little bit nervous about it just because I don't really know what to expect. I hope it isn't too stressful as I know other NSETs have complained about them in the past. Either way, we'll be making extra money which we will be spending on our trip to Thailand for the last two weeks of February. We are both looking forward to sand and sunshine. It will be a much needed break from all the cold weather here. I'm hoping that springtime in Seoul will be showing itself when we get back.

Richy recently invested in a fancy digital SLR camera so he's been taking a lot more pictures. So we should have more photos up soon (and of a much higher quality).



By Katie