Goofy? Well...maybe just a little...

In exactly 2 months from today I'll line up with about 17,000 other people at the starting line of the Disney World 2013 Marathon. And hopefully when I cross the finish line I'll be getting not one but TWO awesome medals. I'll get the Mickey Medal for completing the marathon, and the Goofy Medal because I ran the half marathon the day before. I am so excited/scared/nervous for this event that I can't decide if I want all the preparation and anticipation to last, or if I just want to get it over with! I'm even starting to have race nightmares where I can't find my bib, or I show up at the starting line with only one shoe, or I get there an hour late. Soooo many things can go wrong that even with training it's not a done deal until I cross that line. I could get sick or injured, the zombies could rise up, Obama could get re-elected.....
Oh wait.
Yesterday I finished my longest run ever, 17 miles and I can't believe that I only have 3 long runs left, a 20, a 23, and a 26. I can't even imagine running those distances but what I'm finding out is that God gives you just the stamina you need for the run you have to do TODAY. So run today's run and don't stress about what's ahead.
There are so many things I am looking forward to on this trip. Believe it or not there is still a huge bucket list of things to do at WDW that I have never done and on each trip I get to knock a few out as well as enjoy old favorites. On this trip we'll see the Osborne lights for the first time, we've got a split stay planned at the Contemporary and the Wilderness Lodge - 2 resorts I've never stayed at, we're going to watch Wishes from the beach at the Poly and from the top of the Contemporary, and we'll try out 7 new restaurants!
We are taking my parents and Jeff's parents and I think the 8 of us are going to have a total blast. One of the rules for this trip is that everyone not fighting off cancer has to participate in one of the Marathon Weekend events. So on Friday the 2 Grammas are walking the 5K together, Sasha is running with Papa, and Teddy is running with Jeff while Dad and I cheer everyone on. Then Saturday Jeff and I run the half together and then hopefully I finish the full on Sunday. I'm so excited to share this event with so many family members. I know they're all proud of me no matter what happens and I feel exactly the same about them. So excited to go to the Expo all together and get our race stuff. How special is that?
In the meantime I have lots of Goofy things and people in my life that inspire me all the time. And an impending marathon is GREAT motivation not to gain 5 lbs over the holidays!

Top 10 bizarre things about South Africans

Here we go:
1.) They are OBSESSED with driving stick. They love their manual transmissions like I love Disney and it makes no sense. I mean shifting is a whole bunch of fun when you're off-roading but in stop and go morning traffic, not so much. You can't drink your coffee, you can't pick your nose, you can't even slap your kids because both hands are busy ALL THE TIME. Shifting is work people, get over it. Jeff and I finally got our cars and we both got automatics and let me tell you, it was like trying to find 2 needles in a haystack. We'd be working the search critieria and the minute you checked "automatic transmission" the number of cars available would go from 427 to 8. Wow!

2.) Doesn't matter what your race, creed or socio-economic status is, if you're under the age of 12 shoes seem to be optional. Kids are barefoot all over the place here and it's not about poverty. Kids get out of luxury SUV's and walk all around barefoot. In the grocery store, the mall, Home Depot, the Airport, public toilets, you name it - kids are barefoot. And don't go thinkin' that it's because things are all lovely and pristine here... it's Africa. Things are DIR-TY. No one picks up dog poop, there's litter and there's broken glass. Help me understand! Can't you get some kind of horrible parasite through the bottoms of your feet? Yuck. Somebody call that guy at Tom's and tell him that PE needs shoes.

3.) They love sports like it's their job. Really. I'm thinking in the next 10 years they're going to be killing us at the Olympics for a few reasons. 1. There are a lot more of us but the percentage of Americans thin and fit enough to participate in sports is a number roughly equivalent to the population of Monaco. 2. The South Africans start sport early and they are SERIOUS about it. Teddy does swimming, cricket, tennis and judo. And let me tell you this is not "splash around and have fun in the pool", "hey we're all winners" sport like we have in the US. When they're in the pool they are racing each other, analyzing their stokes, and trying to be better. At age 6. On the soccer field there's no celebrating second place with ice cream and participation medals. If you lose you are a LOSER and you may want to go back and watch the film and figure out where you went wrong so you can work on your skills for next time. Also on the weekends, it's pretty common to see grown men and women walking around with their faces painted in all kinds of team colors for whatever sport is being played that day. They're serious folks.

4.) The entire country is bi-lingual. Makes me feel very inadequate. All the blacks speak English and Xhosa and all the whites speak English, Africaans and some of them also speak "one or two" African languages. This involves a lot of clicking and it's quite impressive. I have had to explain to many people that Americans are linguistically challenged. It's not OUR fault that the rest of the word speaks English so well that we don't have to learn anything else right?!?

5.) They looooooove their school uniforms. Adorable children are all over town in various versions. You read my last blog entry so you know what I'm taking about.

6.) There's only one radio station in town - Algoa FM and I mean there's only ONE RADIO STATION. As in when you get out of your car and the song gets cut abruptly short, you hear the song pick up from all the cars around you and the establishment you are about to enter. If some dictator wants a good platform to indoctrinate an entire city, look no farther. We're all listening all the time. 'Cuz that's all there is.

7.) The aforementioned radio station plays cheesy, cheesy, CHEEEEESY music. In a GOOD way. It's shocking. Peter Cetera followed by Aretha Franklin/George Michael duets "Kneeew you were waiting for meeee.." and pretty much the entire soundtrack from A night at the Roxbury. "What is Looove? Baby don't hurt me...." All the songs you're embarrassed to admit you secretly know all the words to they play. It's like the entire town is one big acappella group that's trying to determine their new fall song list. And I love it. My kids are constantly like "You KNOW this song?" as I sing away. I'm easy to spot in town... I'm the chick in the car with the Disney sticker and the automatic transmission belting out "Secret Lovers" at the stoplight.

8.)They like to "braai". This is grilling out over a wood fire. They have Braai'ing grill/cooker things instead of gas grills. Braai'ing is fun like once a year. After that I'm pretty much over it. Do you know how long it takes for a wood fire to burn down to coals that you can cook over??? Too damn long, that's how long. You start the fire at about 5pm if you want to eat at 9. By that time I have eaten my pets. They turn it into a whole event mostly I think just to have an excuse to hang out and drink around a fire. But here's the thing... you can eat and then just have a fire to drink and hang out around. I'm going to revolutionize them with this concept. We bought a gas grill. Like the dad on Phineas and Ferb says, "You Americans are like big, fun children." Yes, yes we are. And we do NOT have the attention span to cook over wood. Let's eat NOW and then we can hang out around the fire and relax. Cooking marshmellos is a concession I will make, but it's the only one. If someone ever invites you to a South African braai, do yourself a favor... bring a snack because you're not going to eating for a WHILE.

9.) Terminology. I'm still trying to figure it all out. But the biggest problem I'm having revolves around the concept of "now". If someone tells you that they'll be with you "just now" wouldn't you think that means immediately? Think again. The rough translation of "Just now" is actually: "NOT now, and BTW, I have no idea WHEN I'm going to be able to help you but it's probably not for a while." And then there's "Now, now" and I still have no idea what THAT one means...

10.) They are obsessed with dried meats. SERIOUSLY obsessed. It's called Biltong and it comes in many different animal variations. Some of it is in strips, some in "wors" which is like a dried sausage, and you can get it in all kinds of flavors. They eat biltong the way we eat ice cream. Every mall has biltong shops and people are lined up to buy it. If you go to an outdoor event there will be not one but SEVERAL dedicated biltong carts. They even have a section of the grocery store devoted to biltong. I'm not making this up. You know how the aisles are labeled "dairy, baking goods, produce, ect.." They have a section for Biltong. It's actually quite good.

That's just the first 10 things that have hit me in our first 6 weeks. So If I come home to the US a shoeless, sports-loving, beef jerky eating, manual transmission-driving, singer of cheesy songs you'll all know why...

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School In South Africa

Step 1: Show up one day before the last quarter of the 2012 school year for placement testing and uniform fitting. Sasha placed into grade 3 and Teddy placed into grade 1. This was great news. It put them a year ahead of their South African classmates which means that they will be the youngest ones in their class but it also means that they won't be half a year behind when we get back to the States. Great job Hyundai Foreign School! Teddy becomes a 2nd grader and Sasha a 4th grader in January. Yikes!

Step 2: Rent an extra vehicle or a trailer to get all the mandatory uniform items back to the house to be labeled and sorted. You think I'm kidding right? Here's the bare minimum we were required to get for this quarter:
Here's just Sasha's stuff: (note the required red school undies. REALLY?!? This is strangely disturbing. Like who is going to be seeing my kid's undies?)

Just Ted's: And this wasn't all if it!!! Still on order waiting for mandatory custom embroidery were their school swim towels, art smocks, pencil bags, music bags, and for Ted a chair bag and a school bag. And a rain jacket for Sasha that was back-ordered. At this point I was terrified and ready to flee the country. How on earth was I going to figure out which version of which uniform each kid was wearing on any given day? The answer turns out to involve an extensive chart with multiple colored highlighters.

Step 3: Try it on!
Step 4: Get ready for the real deal on the first day of school!
give the puppy a hug good-bye! (Note that this is the early, unbroken version of the puppy. Simpler times people....simpler times.)
Step 5: Have Mom figure out that the Blazer is, indeed required. We don't want any debits in our behavior book after all...
Step 6: Make sure you know when to wear the sporty version of the uniform:
Step 7: Make sure make sure that Mom knows when to pick you up and what you have to bring for any given day. Because on Monday Teddy needs lunch and a tennis racket and Sasha needs swimming stuff and Teddy gets picked up at 2:30 and Sasha at 3:15. On Tuesday Ted wears his sports uniform and has swimming. S pick up at 2:10, T pick up at 2:30. Wednesday Teddy has Judo and needs that outfit and gets picked up at 2:15 and Sasha at 3:15 after swimming. I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP! Thursday is awesome because Sasha has no sport and gets out at 2:10 and Ted gets out at 2:30 and has cricket so no one has to bring anything. And on Friday everyone needs swim stuff and Ted gets out at 1:15 and Sasha so far has gotten out at a different time every Friday so I have no idea WHEN she is supposed to be finished.

Step 8: Unpack the car at the end of the day. Which is like coming home from the beach and summer camp all rolled into one. There are lunch boxes to unpack, wet bathing suits and towels, sporting equipment and the ever-precious blazer (that has hopefully not been lost or crumpled into the bottom of a sports bag or dragged through the dirt) and the uniform parts to all be sorted shaken out and hung up.

AND to top it all off we have to get up at 6am like real people just to make it to school on time. Did I ever complain about the schedule at HFS? Because if I did I needed to be slapped....
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A series of unfortunate events....

When it rains it pours. And it's been pouring for 2 straight weeks. It's depressing and sad and makes it nearly impossible to meet anyone to make friends, and VERY difficult to potty-train a puppy. We're still in settling in mode so each and every day there are a million errands to do... dropping the kids off to school, gym, car shopping, physical therapy, finding the new post office, grocery, setting up phones, picking kids up from school at 2 different times, and on and on it goes. All in the rain. Sideways driving rain that makes it nearly impossible to use an umbrella. You just get home and it's time to take the dog out in the rain to potty. I only have 2 pairs of long pants and they are both jeans. I feel like I am always wet and cold. Jeans don't dry well and after a while you just consign yourself to being wet and damp.
Then this weekend we hit 100 year flood level in the Eastern Cape. The area is being declared a disaster relief area. Huge chunks of road are washed away and sink holes have opened up. Huge areas are flooded. We were glad we live on the top of a hill. Until I saw this about 8pm Saturday night:
Water was literally pouring into the downstairs hall from both downstairs bathrooms. The house was flooding! The cause was the entry way. The drain had stopped draining and a second swimming pool was forming.
We called our landlord stat and found a pump and started trying to pump the area dry. In the mean time water was streaming down the front of the chimney and off the beams in the living room so we were moving furniture to high ground and moving the kids upstairs with us as their bedroom is right around the corner from the flooded hallway. One big happy family.
It was POURING! Check out the downspout in the corner...
Then right in the middle of the action Roxy fell off Teddy's bed and BROKE HER LEG in 2 spots. I am not making this up. We had to take her to the vet on Sunday morning (animals ALWAYS get hurt on the weekends...) and we just got her back today.
She was so happy to see us. I think she thought we dropped her off forever since she was broken, poor girl. She has not wanted to leave my arms since she got home. Poor baby!
She has a cast that has to stay completely dry all the time. I just laughed when they told me that one. What else can go wrong? WAIT - don't answer that!
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Seaview Lion Park

On our second weekend in PE we decided to check out Seaview Lion Park. There are 2 game parks very close to our house and we had heard that this one was the lesser of the two, aka the "chaucy" park. So not wanting to be awed and then disappointed we decided to start low and work our way up. Oh and we had heard that if you show up at noon on Sundays you can watch them feed the Lionesses. Yes please!
The park turned out to be 15 minutes from our house. You pay 20$ for a family of 4 and then drive yourself into the park looking for wildlife. Like you're on the Kilimanjaro Safaris at Disney but driving yourself. How cool is that??? This by the way would have been waaaay cooler had we been there in our own 4x4 vehicle and not a rented, orange Kia Sorento but we promised ourselves that we would correct that when we went to our next park.
The first thing we saw was a mama Giraffe with her baby.

We stopped for a long time to watch them. I even got out of the car and stood on top to get a better view. Then we made our way through more of the park and spotted springbok, and many more giraffes and zebras.
We finally got to the Lion enclosure. We were a bit early so we decided to walk around and check out the different big cats before feeding time. At first I was tragically underwhelmed. I mean they have Lions like this at the Houston Zoo and just like at the Zoo all the Lions are ALWAYS sleeping. I have often wondered if the Lions are not just animatronics with a breathing mechanism installed to make them look more life-like. This guy was at least rolling all around which was pretty funny.
The Tiger was awake. I Love Tigers.
Then it got really cool really fast. The question of the day was "how does one feed Lionesses?" the answer is: very carefully. This involves loading a bunch of carcass haunches into the back of an open pickup, letting the cats pull them out and then driving away hoping they're satisfied with what you gave them. As you can see in the video, one Lioness was clearly NOT satisfied and charged the truck as it came back around. Yowza!

FOR VIDEO CLICK HERE

After that we wandered down to see some Lions. They had not yet been fed and were obviously hungry. They were in a pen with some fencing that may have been appropriate if you were trying to contain a Border Collie or some medium sized goats. So just being there was kind of thrilling.
Plus they were glaring at us and clearly fantasizing about how we would taste. Then a little kid got away from his dad and ran down the side of the enclosure. It totally brought out the predator/prey drive in this one Lion and he charged after the kid on his side of the fence. The dad was yelling "don't run, don't run!" and Jeff was like "get your camera ready... 'Toddler eaten by Lion at Seaview Game Park' is sure to go viral on YouTube and it's goin' down!" It was SCARY. The hairs on the back of my neck were on end when you saw the speed and power the things moved with.
That Lion was mad that the kid and all the rest of us were on the wrong side of the fence and given the power of the beast, his obvious motivation and the dubious holding power of the fencing, we decided to back slowly away muttering "nice kitty" soothingly under our breath. That experience alone was worth the 20$ entrance fee. Talk about up-close and personal!
After that we headed up to the main lodge where they keep the 'baby' lions and tigers that are part of their breeding program. For 9$ you can go into their enclosure and hang out and pet them and take pictures. Yeah. I was all about doing this until I realized that the word 'baby' is relative and the newest litter was about a year old. There was NO WAY I was letting Sasha and Teddy climb into an enclosure with Lion and Tiger cubs twice their size. Especially not after seeing how fast a Lion can eat a kid if he wants to. Same experience with no fencing? No thanks! Here's a vid of one of the workers trying to get a tiger 'cub' to come with him to visit with the guests:

FOR VIDEO CLICK HERE

After that we hung out and just watched the young cats. They were very playful and endlessly entertaining. One Tiger climbed a tree and looked like he was going to try to jump out of his enclosure! Only in Africa... FOR VIDEO CLICK HERE
On the way out we enjoyed the view:
And spotted a few more animals on our drive out of the park:
So here's my pitch... we lived in South Korea for 2.5 years and NOT ONE of you punks out there came to visit us. So get your butts on-line and start looking at plane tickets. Free lodging, food and tour-guide services await you. I mean this is 15 minutes from the house and it's the LAME animal park! We could do this in the morning and then still have all afternoon to drink margaritas by the pool. OR we could do the margaritas in the morning and then take turns running past the lion enclosures wearing meat necklaces. Could be fun....
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Settling in

We have been here for 3 weeks and are settling in bit by bit. We got a puppy! There were 7 to choose from and we picked this one. What do you think?
I think we made a fine choice! Her name is Roxy and she is adorable but has made the last 3 weeks very hectic as we are potty training and teacher her that she CAN in fact occasionally be left alone in her little bathroom.
She had a fun first week playing with the kids and romping all over the yard.
Sash and her pup:
Adorable girl:
Asleep on Mom's lap:
Teddy and Roxy have good snuggle time on this fuzzy red blanket that they both love:
We have 2 lemon trees in our yard and they are FULL of lemons!
We bought a juice squeezer and have been making home-made lemonade. What else can we do with lemons? They're falling off the tree!!
Sasha is a pro at juicing...
And we put up a tree swing. This is version #1 as we actually ended up taking it down and securing it to a much higher branch:

 The first week we had a lot of fun just hanging out nearby the tree swing taking turns while Mom worked on the garden.

Speaking of gardens, I got one all dug out and planted. Expect fresh produce by Christmas!

 Now in all the above pics it looks nice and warm outside due to the kid's attire but it's actually pretty cold - in the 60's. It's just that we're used to summer and the kids are hopeless optimists. I keep telling them to go change but some times I just give up and let them freeze. They gotta learn sometime right? But Teddy and Roxy have discovered that when you get chilly you can warm up nicely on the bricks:

Jeff and the kids spent the first weekend making a home-made bow and arrows. I think they were inspired by "Brave" and all the space around them. I was pretty skeptical but they made a set that actually works!

 

 They even stick into the ground if you shoot it right. Perfect shot!

The yard is a great place to hang out. So far we have seen monkeys, a mongoose, HUGE snails, and lots of really interesting birds. Here's 2 of our favorites. The big one has a few babies in her nest and if you zoom in close on the picture you can probably see one. The other hanging basket nests are built by these very bright yellow birds. In the picture you can see 2 completed nests to the left and center high a ring that is a partially completed nest. There are also some large flightless birds but of course Maximus is making quick work of those suckers. He has my blessing... they eat my beans.

Here's my little hero. He's killed every last mouse in the house and has taken to killing them outside and bringing them to me as presents. Except for the flightless birds.... we only know about those because their numbers are diminishing and we find large piles of feathers here and there. After 2.5 years of being trapped inside, my guy is more than earning his keep.

 By about 7:30 Roxy is done for the day and will sleep just about anywhere but prefers to be held. Thankfully for her there is no shortage of volunteers for this job!

 The kids take turns getting to start out with her in their beds until they fall asleep and then Jeff and I get her and snuggle her on the couch. Finally she goes to sleep in her little crate between the kids beds.

All these pictures are from our first week. In the last 2 weeks it has rained constantly. I mean every. single. day. Not sprinkles, but torrential sheets of water. We're about to be flooded out and there is more rain in the forecast! It's really quite depressing and sad but looking at the pictures in this post has reminded me that this will once again be a nice place to be if the sun ever shows it's face again!

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I'm over it

So I'm back in Korea. And I'm over it. REALLY over it. But I'd like to think that I'm over it for all the right reasons....
First of all I'd like to say that being done with being here has nothing to do with Korea or the Korean people. They have been the most lovely, gracious host nation to us in our 2.5 years here. I'm just burnt out on being a foreigner and being different and not being able to communicate and that would be the same no matter what homogeneous non-English speaking country I was in.
For those who don't know the story I will catch you up.... We're moving to South Africa. And we have to get our visas for SA here in Korea because Jeff can't take a month+ off from work (which is how long it takes in the States) and wait around for a visa. So the kids and I FedEx'ed our passports to Korea so we could all apply together. But then the visas for the kids and I were denied because we were not in the country with a current entry stamp on our passports. So Jeff FedEx'ed all the passports back to Korea, the kids and I flew here on Wed, arrived on Thursday, went to the SA embassy in Seoul, reapplied for our visas, and then took the bullet train to Ulsan to hang out with our friends and wait for 2 weeks for the visas to be processed. Meanwhile Jeff had to leave for SA so he is gone (we missed him by 2 days...2 DAYS!!!) and so are the cats and all our stuff. So I was expecting the apartment to look like the Who's houses after the Grinch comes: empty except for Y block furniture, a sad picture hanging wire left on the wall and a lone cheerio in the corner. What we actually came back to was fresh groceries for the morning and a beautiful vase of flowers cheering up the place. Because we have awesome friends here. And that is something I WILL miss about Korea.
I will also miss the safety factor. Leaving my iPad on a park bench and going off to play with the kids or going for a run and leaving the two of them at home for an hour is not something you can do in almost any other country on earth.
But then I venture out of the HFC to go shopping and once again I am over it. Here's why...
Korea is full of Koreans. End of list. So it's not like the UK, or the US where you would see people of every race and it would be unremarkable. I stand out like Shrek the ogre in the middle of a victorian ladies tea. Little children point at me and jump up and down and say "Wegugin!!" (foreigner) to their mother's who, to their credit try to shush them and direct their attention elsewhere, but it really does make you feel like a freak after a while. People stare and at Costco, they sometimes physically grab my cart and impede my progress so they can call their friends over to examine the contents. This apparently is endlessly entertaining. What DO Wegugins buy at Costco? The Koreans want to know. I am so looking forward to being in a country where no one will know that I am a foreigner until I open my mouth. (Which takes about 5 seconds I know, I know.... but those 5 seconds will be really enjoyable)
Speaking of opening my mouth, I am excited to get into conversations with random strangers. Those of you who know me know that this is something I do all. day. long. It drives Jeff crazy. On the beach, in the check-out line, at the hardware store, you name it, I am probably chatting someone up. And I love it. And here I just sadly shop in silence for hours with no one to talk to. (cue violin music....) It's like being isolated in your own little bubble. Over it.
Speaking of shopping, here's something I'm over that is unique to Korea. Hangul. Living here is not like living in Germany or France where it's all in a different language but you can figure it out. It's like living with the Mayans (language only). There is no reading labels or descriptions in the grocery store. Shoot, there's no telling what your buying! Picture the dairy section....all those little tubs of dairy products on their little shelves. Now picture them covered in hieroglyphics. You have no idea what's in the tub. It may be yogurt, butter, cream cheese, or some kind of fermented bean curd that you didn't even know existed. So many times I have gotten home from the grocery store and opened up purchases and discovered that I bought something totally different than what I intended. Over it.
You know the Ogre comparison? I wasn't exaggerating.... I can't buy anything here. The way it goes down usually is that I see something cute and make the exception to try to go for it. There is then a 15-20 minute scurry among the staff trying to find someone that can speak English. Someone always draws the short straw and they are then pushed to the front to engage me. I ask about the item and am then told that I am some kind of amazon and if they DID make that object in my size it would have to be special ordered. Just what every woman longs to hear. In the US I wear shirts that are size small. Just sayin'.
Now what I cannot overlook is the remarkable way the Korean people always go out of their way to TRY to find that English speaker and help me. In Seoul there was a member of the hotel staff that went out of his way to help us in a way that I have only experienced from Walt Disney World cast members. And that's saying something. That's the norm here too. People are so anxious to try to help and to try to figure out what you are asking. They really are the nicest people on the planet. If only I spoke Hovitos....
So I will enjoy their smiles and smile back and wish that I could talk to them for 2 more weeks. And I will eat Kimchee and pretend that I really do like it and I will run at all times of the day and night alone and be totally safe. And I will enjoy the awesome company of our HFC companions and be so glad that I get to see them again for 2 more weeks. But we haven't seen Max since June, and we haven't seen Jeff since Aug 4th and we are so ready to be together as a family again. And when those visas come through you just may hear me "WooHoo'ing" all the way back in the States.

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