Trip Report Part 2.

First of all, as promised, a picture of the Asiana Stewardesses. They have an amazingly fast-paced walk so it's a little blurry and they are waaay better in person, but you get the idea.



Well we're back. I was hoping for a wireless connection on the plane so I could do all this while in 13 hour lock down but no such luck so you get one today and one tomorrow.
When we last left our heroine she had just arrived at the Lotte Hotel in Ulsan. So about the hotel... the first thing that caught my attention was the incredible complexity of the toilet. Not what you want to see when you need to pee and then have to worry "is this thing going to do something unexpected while I am at my most vunerable?" and you're standing there doing a little I-have-to-pee dance trying to figure it out. The good news is that you can choose to just pee in it without any bells and whistles if you so choose. If you want something EXTRA however, it will spray water at you (with different vectors to choose from) or send nice warm air in the general direction of your bum (quite enjoyable). There is also a lot of warnings about what NOT to do with the NASA potty:
You can click on any of these pictures and make them bigger by the way...
So from the potty I moved to the fridge and checked out the selection of beverages. The name "Pocari Sweat" does NOT make me want to crack open the can and give it a swig. I don't know who Pocari is, but he can keep his nasty sweat to himself.
So I decided that in part two of the trip report I would talk about Ulsan and my impressions of Koreans in general and then tomorrow I would give the day to day of what we did and saw. Korean Observation #1: They like to mix things together that don't necessarily belong together. Like shorts, tights and knee high boots (more on fashion later) or they'll take an ultra-modern decoration scheme and then throw lacy doilies on the couches (NO!!). It's really strange. So the Lotte Hotel which is one of the nicest hotels in Ulsan is kind of like a decor potpourri:


The sleek, modern kitchen with floating glass shelves:



The more formal furniture, recessed ceiling, and wall paper:


















Yup, all mixed together:

Or this lovely combination - two great tastes that taste great together! (can I have mine without the sand though?)
Occasionally you see signs like this in English, but don't be deceived, almost everything is in Hangul - the Korean alphabet, and sometimes the places that have signs that are written in English (we suspect to lure us in) have NOTHING else in English and no English speakers once you go inside. WHY is the sign outside in English then?? If I find out I will let you know. We were blind-sided by this phenomena several times during the trip, once at a bar that promised us "Beer, Wine and Soju" and then had no wine, no English speaker waiters, and then basically kicked us out. But I digress!
Here is a typical street shot:

So you know at all times that you are no longer in Kansas. The city is very large and very spread out, and almost everyone lives in apartment buildings. To drive from one area of Ulsan to another can take 40 minutes going along at a good clip. It would be like if the city of Houston Included areas like Spring, The Woodlands and Katy. The definition of what's in the city goes waaay farther out that what we would normally define as being part of the city. Our room was over a big megaplex that had a giant Ferris wheel on the roof. It was pretty neat and all lit up at night:
Here is another shot of the same view that I took during the day. You can click on it to enlarge:
Another night shot:
It's a very modern city with lots of restaurants and offices and department stores that have the same shops and brand names and make-up counters that we do. There was a North Face outfitter right down the street from us and an Outback Steakhouse and a Bennigans around the corner. You have to be careful when you try to eat "western" food prepared by Koreans though which brings us to Korean Observation #2: They really like to put their own spin on things. For example at our hotel, at breakfast they served oatmeal cold alongside the cold cereal. All made and milk added and everything just cold. Have you ever eaten cold oatmeal? Not. Good. Or another evening we ate at an Italian restaurant and they had on the menu Spagetti Kimchee. Like "OK, we get how to make spagetti, but this will make it so much BETTER!"
They also have McDonalds but they McDeliver! On mopeds!! Seriously, on the side of the mopeds it actually says "McDelivery" - you can't make this stuff up. A McDelivery man:


So what else? Korean Observation #3: From now on (KO #3: ect. We're going to need an acronym. Something tells me there will be a lot of these...)
They have a really hard time standing in lines (ie airplane boarding in part one) so they have come up with nifty ways to avoid standing in lines. For example when you go to the movies, instead of lining up at the ticket window, you have to take a number and then everyone just mills around, and the ticket people flash numbers over their stations and when your number comes up you get to approach and buy your tickets. You get an assigned seat in the theatre and you get to pick your seat right there at the ticket window like an airline seat selector so then your seat is all saved and you again avoid having to stand in line to get a good seat at the movies.
KO#4: Crazy fashion sense. I was not kidding about the boot/tights/shorts combo. I saw this many times along with animal prints, strange accessories and other ecletic combinations that most of us would never think up or at least wear outside the house. I tried to take a picture of this but Jeff has a "thing" about me taking pictures that you will read about in part 3 so no fashion pics. Sorry.
KO#5: They genuinely seem to like Americans and are very friendly and helpful (except that one guy that made us leave his bar). This kind of makes sense because I totally understand residual resentment from the Japanese and I sometimes have the feeling that China is just waiting for a weak moment to make us all their slaves, but South Korea would be part of North Korea if not for the good ol' US of A (and apparently living in North Korea kind of sucks) so they seem to really like us. Much better than moving to France.....
KO#6: They have FABULOUS bathrooms. And I am a fan of bathrooms that are spiffy. They are always just nice and modern and clean and a lot of the time there is a stall just for children and their parents. How cool is that?
The stalls are great and the locks on the doors always work and they are very private, The doors go all the way to the floor. This makes it impossible to peek under the door to see if the stall is occupied and I don't yet know how to say "Hey, anyone in there?" so this caused some difficulty and I still haven't figured out the best solution. You are welcome to post suggestions.
KO #7: They are obsessed with their phones. Really obsessed. They all have them, they have them out all the time and they will answer them if they ring. Mid-sentence, meal-time, driving, praying, they're answering the phone if it rings. This lady was in the middle of doing a tradional Korean tea ceremony for us and when her phone rang she took the call! I will report back on how far this goes.....

Last but not least is KO#8: They can pull stuff off that we just can't. Like wearing a flu mask. You see people wearing these all over and no one thinks anything of it but something tells me that if an American wore one they would look like a total candy-ass. We often saw groups of people, including school kids where only one or 2 people had a mask on. Can you imagine an American 8th grader with a mask on walking up to peers and going "Yeah, hi guys - mom wanted me to wear the swine flu mask today". I mean it's all over at that point. Kid may as well just save his friends the trouble and dive head first into the trash can right? But the Koreans pull this stuff off and everyone just rolls with it.
So that's it for now. Part three is coming tomorrow, but the jet lag is catching up with me. Time to catch some zzzz's

Housing Trip part 1

Left Houston Mon am for Seattle and then a looong flight to Seoul. First group of people I spotted in Seattle were a cluster of stewardesses for Asiana airlines. These women were BEAUTIFUL. I mean, gorgeous, bird-like, perfectly proportioned model-lookin' women all identically and impeccably dressed without a crease in their uniforms or a hair out of place. This is what American stewardesses USED to look like in the 1950's. Man, what happened to us? I lament that I do not have a picture of these beautiful beings because I just sat there gaping at them like a moron and by the time I pulled myself together they had passed. I WILL get a picture for you before the trip is over.

I can't convey enough how much reassurance stewardesses THAT perfect give to a passenger. Just looking at them, and you are totally convinced that any plane carrying them could NEVER crash because that would be ungainly, and unorganized and just plain RUDE, all qualities these women would never be associated with. So right from the get-go I felt I was in good hands. I would also like to add that these women looked just as happy and perfect after taking care of all of us on an 11 hour flight. We were bedraggled and wrinkled and I'm sure all had airplane breath, but they looked just as shiny and bright as a new penny. How do they do that??

Checked in at the business class counter and was told I could go hang out in the business class lounge. Never one to turn down a free perk, I headed post-haste to said lounge which was full of Koreans all speaking Korean. So at least I was getting an auththentic experience. They had all kinds of little snacks and drinks and such and 2 kinds of cup o' noodles, regular LAME-O American kind and Korean kind. Of course, I wanted to be cool and fit in with the scene so I chose the Korean kind. Added my hot water, added the little spice pack (I know all about this right? Just like the little foil spice packets that come with ramen noodles and such right?) And that's when I experienced Korean Blind-side #1:Spicy noodles of death. So hindsight being 20/20 I should not have added the entire packet of flavoring. If you ever see these noodles, you have been warned.

Next adventure was boarding the plane. As soon as the boarding folks arrived at the gate the entire waiting area (777 plane so we're talking a LOT of people) Rushed the gate like a bunch of rowdy teens at a rock concert and formed a scary, tight pushing mob. Like we don't all have assigned, reserved seats on the damn plane people?? What's that about? So they boarded business class first and it was all I could do to get up to the front of the crowd and get to the gate. Geesh.

Business class on Asiana is awesome! You have
a seat that reclines almost all the way flat, beautiful women who bring you things constantly, slippers, ear plugs, eye mask things, and so much leg room than if you want to get to your bag under the seat in front of you, you literally have to get up out of your seat because your bag is unreachable. This is my awesome seat in relax mode, not sleep mode mind but just chillin' and waiting for my hot towel mode.

So they bring us appetizers and then ask do we want western or Korean lunch and I said of course Korean. I sat next to this 70 ish Bible-college-in-the-phillipines guy we will call "Billy Graham" (he looked and sounded just like him). He flies Asiana all the time and he chose western but I figured he was just lame and unadventurous.

So I got "Kimbibap" or something. Looked like this:

So it's a pile of meat in the middle and veggies all around and a side of rice and some soup and some Kimchee and some kind of red paste (WARNING!) and some brown rice. Great! Super healthy, and I feel Korean already.

Korean Blind-side #2: That's not brown rice. After taking a big crunchy, fishy bite I took a closer look at the "brown rice" and realized that each grain had eyes. NICE! They were little

worm/fish things. Ok, so I did my best with the rest of the meal and had a lovely cheese and fruit course and dessert and then the beautiful people made it pretty clear that they were putting us all to bed. Here I am getting ready for a nice little snooze. (Billy Graham took this picture).

Slept for a few hours. Watched some movies with Bill, (together we watched some abdominoplasty videos that a DR was watching across the asile - GROSS!) and ate more food with no adventures. And then had like 5 more h0urs of flight. Really? All I could think at this point was "I have to do this flight with TEDDY!!" Sweet Lord.

Read, watched another movie, more plastic surgery videos, and FINALLY landed in Seoul. Cleared immigration, checked back in Domestic and had a one hour flight to Pusan where Jeff met me. We took the Bus to Ulsan and got here about 10:30 Tuesday eve. Impressions about SK in part 2!!

Imagination Movers!!

So the kids LOOOVE the Imagination Movers on the Disney channel. Found out about a week ago that 1.) They tour, 2.) Houston is on the tour, 3.) In a week!!, 4.) Show is sold out.
And I mean SOLD. OUT. Looked for tics on craigslist and came across many ads desperately wanting tickets but none selling tickets. Kept looking and looking and last night scored 3 tickets at 11:05 at night!! 9th row, on the aisle, $35 each!! All I can figure is that they were VIP seats held in reserve and then opened up at the last minute. Told the kids we were going downtown at 11AM and when they found out why they were soooo surprised! Teddy thought we were going to a movie until the actual Imagination Movers ran onto the stage. So fun!
He pretty much had to climb into my lap and put his thumb in his mouth, something he hasn't done for a LONG time..
This left Sasha on the aisle and she worked it! Here's Sash with Mover Rich who came and said "Hi" and hung out next to her so they could watch the antics on stage together for a few moments.
At this point, Teddy's eyes rolled back into his head and he fell asleep in my lap in the middle of a raging concert. Just went into shut-down mode. Couldn't handle it!! Probably won't ever make a good frat boy, which is GREAT news...
Sasha enjoying the show:
It really was a great show, and it seemed like God reserved those seats just for us. OK, maybe not for Teddy, but definitely for Sasha and I. Jeff was also thrilled as this got us out of the house so he could organize and pack. He goes to South Korea in the morning!

Teddy waited a looong time for this....

Can you believe that one of MY children had to wait until they were 3 1/2 before they got their first snow suit?? One of the things we are looking forward to in South Korea is doing a little skiing on the weekends. We got the kids some great snow gear this week at REI. Too bad it's still 90 degrees out because they can't wait to use it! Love those bare feet sticking out from the bottom of the bibs.

Trip to Ulsan

So it looks like Jeff and I will be traveling to Ulsan October 20 - 31 (Jeff) and October 26 -31 (Me) to get the lay of the land, find housing, and figure out just what Kimchee actually tastes like (hey, if it's awful, that could be a deal breaker...)
I was really hoping that the housing thing would go something like this:
"Hey we sent you guys an email with full photo spreads of your three top hosing choices complete with maps showing the locations of the housing"
me "SWEET! We'll take a look at them"
me to Jeff "wow, these housing choices are amazing! I really like the one where they come and give you a massage every morning while someone watches your kids..."
Me to NOV " we'll take THAT one..."

But that's not how it's been goin' down. NOV apparantly has NO IDEA of where we should live in Ulsan. My plan is to buy an Ipod touch, download the Korean application, type in the phrase "Help, I need a realtor" and just walk the streets of Ulsan with the phone hopefully chanting that in Korean until someone takes pity on me and shows me some housing. I am open to better suggestions.
I am much more worried about Jeff. He actually thinks that he is going to fly into Pusan, rent a car (after a 16+ hour trip) and then DRIVE himself to Ulsan. I told him that he is going to hit the first intersection, realize that all the street signs are in HANGUL and that if he had cross referencing materials and a quiet space and 20 minutes he could probably figure them out. In a car, driving with cars honking for him to GO, not so much. So that should be interesting. If any of you get a garbled phone call on the 21st or so, it might be Jeff in Pusan or the people who found him alseep in his car because he just gave up and decided to nap.
More news to follow as we get it. And Lord I hope we get some soon. Still know nothing about the dates of the actual move, how the sale of our house works, when our big container ships, or anything else.
I have learned that 2 weeks or more may pass before you get an email back from someone in SK, and that screaming obscenities at the Rosetta Stone software is counter-productive. So I have learned one or two things in the last month....