Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Tourists!

Because we like to do things cheaply, and because we see no reason in investing a large amount of money in curtains for an apartment where we will only be for a year, we made our own curtains. That's right. It's been two months living with a big window with no coverings, and it makes for sunny mornings with not a lot of sleeping in. So, we bought some material for about 20 dollars, and hand sewed two panels together, and put some loops on. We bought some hooks and voila!

It's okay. You can laugh. I have no idea why they're crooked, but they serve our most basic purpose: keeping out the sun in the mornings. Since we rarely have guests, and our budget is our biggest concern we just don't care! And we are rather proud of ourselves. On one hand I'd like to think my grandma would be proud, but on the other hand, they're pretty ugly curtains, so she might also be ashamed. Ha.

Yesterday was our day off, and after meeting some friends from church for lunch Stephanie and I went on a small tour on double decker bus! This is one thing we've been wanting to do because we rarely travel around Seoul in a vehicle and it seems now we are in our daily routine of seeing our neighborhood, the church's neighborhood, and not much else. It was a really nice ride and I love a double decker! The tour was just along a small stream in the middle of Seoul that was once covered by a main road, but was uncovered in the 1960s and is now a public place where people can walk along the stream. It's very neat. Here are some pictures from the bus ride.




This area is a big shopping district, and so there are all sorts of small stores. In season- Christmas! We are figuring we might come back here to do some shopping.








Pets for sale! (including chickens)


Old and new.




This was our tour guide on the bus. She was really sweet. She gave us each a free pack of postcards, and would come to tell us things in English after she had made the announcement in Korean. Afterward we asked for our picture with her and she was just laughing and looked flattered. It was fun. We also had a guy from Thailand sitting in front of us and he kept offering us things like gum and pineapple candy.

When we went to go meet our tour bus there were a lot of demonstrators outside the subway station. Our Korean friend who was there said it was about the Free Trade Agreement. Where we got off the subway was right across from the US Embassy.




All of the busses are police vehicles.

We thought it was limited to just this area, but then while we walked to our bus, were on our tour, and later after we got off the bus we realized that the Seoul Plaza was surrounded by these busses, and there were large groups of policement EVERYWHERE. They were by the subway exits, outside the US Embassy, in large pockets on street corners. There were hundreds of them. It was certainly a little unnerving, as a white girl, to walk past all of them. Nothing was really happening while we were around (except for one small shouting match in a subway exit), but I read up on it later in the Korean Times. So now you know. We were by City Hall. The neighborhood where the picture is from Myeongdong, a very large shopping area very close to our church (we often eat there on Sundays before or after church).

One more picture, by Seoul Plaza (outside of City Hall).


Just FYI- for every picture you can click on it and it becomes a bigger picture.

This morning (Thursday) there were tiny little snowflakes outside our window :)

2 Comments:

At 8:08 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Pet chickens? Right. I think those are going to be dinner, honey. Say, who is the chick with the bangs?
Mom

 
At 8:09 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Me again. Yes the curtain looks a little pathetic - but your grandma is proud of you no matter what, I can assure you. Besides she'll probably never see that picture.

 

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