China II: Ningbo!: Big John in The R.O.K!

Big Man. Small Tunnel.

Lunar New Year week rundown.

Sunday: Ian and Katie prepare to go to the airport to pick dad up from the airport. Upon a last minute email check, we discover that Katie has confused the time differences and he is still in San Fransisco.
Monday: Katie goes to work and is excitedly waiting for a phone call from her father. Dad makes his way to Katie's house! It is super exciting. We go to dinner and dad tastes his first Korean meal-pork galbi and kimchi. He enjoys it.
Tuesday: Dad and Katie wake up at 4:30a.m. Dad and Nick's mom go to the DMZ. Katie goes to work. Dad is excited to see the DMZ. Katie is sad about work. They regroup for dinner with Katie's amazing friends-BigGuyBill, James, Ian, Elise, Sophia, and Peter. Dad gets to try beef galbi, soju, a makli bar, Korean pancakes, and a favorite foreigner bar. They get home at 4:30 a.m. Dad is awake and busy for 24 hours. He liked it.
Wednesday: Dad and Katie are moving slow in the morning. They make the journey to Suwon with Sophia where they meet SaraBrown for lunch. Then to the Suwon fortress to meet up with Ian and see some stuff in Suwon. After an hour or so on the wall, Sophia and SaraBrown head home. Ian, Dad, and Katie wander through the streets of Suwon and manage to get lost. Eventually make their way back to the station where they sit down for beer and chicken. We decide to continue our evening of fun and go to Ian's town for "one drink". Katie has entirely too many Long Island Iced Teas and can't move on Thursday.
Thursday: This is the official New Year. With the thought process that everything will be closed for the holiday and we're tired, we chill out all day. Watch movies, walk around, show dad my school, go to the grocery store, and just laze around.
Friday: Dad and Katie wake up and head up to the Korean War Museum in Seoul. They learn a lot about every war Korea has been involved in. Ever. Learn a lot. See a lot. They then make the journey home and go to beef and pork galbi in Suji. Dad meets more friends: Yoanna, Sabine, Ian, James, and Peter. We have a fun dinner complete with beer and soju. The next step of the night was not Katie's idea and Dad experiences a norebang, Korean singing room, karokee. Dad and friends love it. The next leg of the journey is the Underground. It was a pretty standard night there ending with Ian, Dad, Sunny (bartender) and Katie in a 5 a.m. dart game and Sunny requesting that we go home. Ian, Dad, and Katie sit in a park, have meaningful conversation and beers and then notice that the buses are running again and we should go home. We get home and go to bed at 6:30.
Saturday: Wake up at 2. Move slowly and lazily. Eventually go into to Suji for dukgalbi with Elise and Sophia. We then have a few drinks at Batman bar. Then hometime for a movie and to check email to see how Little Man is doing at Regionals.
Sunday: Little Man got 3rd! Yay! We pack Dad up, go for a walk and Korean pizza and send Dad on his way.

Recap: it was a great week. I think Dad got a good taste of Korea. He met and seems to like my friends, and they like him. We walked a lot and I tried to make sure Dad got to try all of my favorite foods. It was a fantastic week and I'm sad that he left. I'm posting a few pictures, but Dad has a ton more that I'm sure he'd like to share with you if you ask nicely.

I'm not looking forward to this week at work. I have some administrative nonsense to deal with concerning my future as well as a performance the 15th that we are trying to get ready for. I'm betting on a pretty stressful week. IN OTHER NEWS! Peter has been here and working. And it has been fantastic! The kids love him, the parents love him, the teachers love him. Sophia and I have been working on making him our new best friend and he really likes that. So yay!