Happy Saint Paddy's

Things here have been pretty low key for the most part here in Dublin. Nothing too major to report. Just filling my time with a little work, a little play, a little running, ya know trying to keep life balanced, but wishing I could do a better job at it. :)

Anyways, for the major holiday Enda and I headed over to county Tipperary to watch the fireworks lighting up of The Rock of Cashel. Surprisingly there wasn't any rain! The weather was pleasant, and the show was amazing. I would have to say, it was proabaly my favorite fireworks display ever :)

On Saint Paddy's day, we headed downtown to check out the parade, but sadly it wasn't nearly as entertaining The R of C. I was a little disappointed. There was a lot of green. A lot of really tall hats, and a lot of tourists.

The parade itself was more like people just dressed up than anything else. I believe there were mad scientists, overgrown spiders, fishes, and cars....and a ton of American marching bands. I believe there were maybe 2 Irish bands and 6 U.S. ones.

Anyways, that's about all for now. We're going to be doing a little more traveling soon, s

o hopefully the next entry will be a little more entertaining! :)

Rain

Well, there's really not too much to report, so I'll keep this post short and sweet :)

Things have been going well. I've been able to do a part-time job which is nice, seeing that things in Dublin (and everywhere I suppose) seem to be twice as expensive as Korea and home. Anyways, the weather has been getting more and more rainy as well, but on the off days we have been able to take a couple road trips.

One of them was to Glendalough which is in Wicklow Mountains Nat'l Park. This was a monastery that was founded by St. Kevin in the 6th c. but was unfortunately destroyed in the late 14th c by the English army. Near the monastery there was a large graveyard where I took this picture. I'm always astonished by the elaborateness of the grave sites in Ireland. They seem to stand very proud.

Anyways, this area also consisted of 2 lakes. The upper lake, I think, is shown to the left...it could be the lower lake...but yeah... Anyways, the view was very peaceful and serene. It was a good trip.

Well, we're currently in Kerry (Enda's hometown), and about ready to take off. It was a relaxing trip. Spent some good time on the beach with the dogs...good times.


I guess that's about all that's happening here. Oh, and Happy Mother's Day! (This past Sunday is when Ireland celebrates their mother's day).

Ireland

So I made it safely to Ireland a couple weeks ago. Time is flying by. Where does it go? It felt good to be on a plane again...missed the traveling. The flight wasn't too bad; 7 hours I believe. I watched a wierd film...not impressed... Seats were small, food was edible at best... thankfully I had 2 to my self (including the window seat). Wahoo ;)

When I got off the plane, Irish immigration was difficult.bleh. They wanted to know who I was visiting, where I was staying, why i was here, how much money I had, what my IQ was, and when I would be leaving. I was thinking about pretending I couldn't speak English (put on the korean act...or start speaking german) Anyways. I figured that wouldn't go over very well.

After I got through all of that I finally was able to see Enda which was great! (He was a little overly excited as you can see below....)

It's different being in his country with him rather than both being in a foreign country together. It's been great though seeing where he grew up and the irish lifestyle.

I have been busy checking the sights and adjusting to life here Dublin. Things have been going well so far. Enda took me to the Ireland v. Brazil football game on my first night. Great night, great company. We toured Dublin. Slowly but surely I'll be able to maneuver around the city. It's pretty nice overall. Surprisingly it hasn't rained yet! Supposedly Jan. was rough for Ireland in terms of rain.

Let's see, I also went to my first horse race! Very exciting :) One of my horses won! Good times. Enda and I also took a trip down to Kerry. The countryside is gorgeous. Open fields with sheep and little houses (and some rather large houses). Narrow winding roads....beautiful.

The ocean was also nearby, so we brought the dogs out there a couple times and ran around. I "played" hurling with the dogs. It was more like me attempting to swing a hurley and failing to hit the actual sliothar (to the normal person that means "ball" hehe :) Anyways, it was fun. I think i'll stick to singing though....hmmm.

There have been some other outings but I realize this is getting rather lengthy, so i'll cut it. On the end note, my latest expedition was this morning to the Guiness brewing house :) Good way to start the day :)

The chilly month of january

Well, things have been going pretty well since I've been home. It's been nice to relax and spend time with family and friends. Kate left to go back to Nicaragua in the beginning part of January, and I've been living between Grand Rapids and home. I've just been chillin and working a little at the Gardens.
(The pic. to the right is of my cute niece trying to figure out how to use the whistle from Nicaragua.)

A week or so ago I was able to take a little road trip to St. Louis with my friends.
One of our friends was getting married there, so we all decided to take a trip down there and
celebrate the special day with her. It was a great trip overall. The wedding wasn't until a little later in the afternoon, so we were able to visit the infamous arch as well as the zoo. It was a good way to spend time with friends as well as see a new city.

The wedding itself was lovely. It's always exciting to see friends and family enter a new chapter of their lives. (This is a picutre of the bride :) Lovely :)

I'm currently preparing myself for my long journey on the Greyhound. I'm taking off to Oklahoma to visit another dear friend of mine in a couple days. I'm very excited to reunite and spend some quality time with her. It will be a long and cultural experience on the Greyhound...I believe the last time I was on the Greyhound, the man sitting in front of me continually talked about as well as showed me x-rays of his arm. Yuppers. And that was only like a 7 hour trip. This one is about 24 hours....i'm sure I'll come out with some great stories afterwards. :)

After that I'll be back in MI for the weekend and then off to Ireland to see Enda and his family! I'm very excited! Should be a good time....rainy.....but good. I'll be there for a little while, chillin, travellin, spendin quality time in Dublin and elsewhere. Hopefully I'll be able to understand everyone.....hopefully.........I guess I'll just smile and nod. Unfortunately I won't be able to blend in as well as I did in Korea. Back to being a expatriate. I think I'm getting used to it.

Anyways, hopefully once I get some enthralling adventures I'll update this blog more often. Until then Mind Yourself :)

Back in the U.S. of A

So I realize it's been about 2 months since I've written...time passes all too quickly. Well, I guess I'll just dive right in...please...contain your excitement....

I finished up my time in Korea about 3 weeks ago. It was weird to leave...good and bad I suppose. It's like leaving one world in exchange for another world. I would like to take a piece of both of those worlds and combine them, but I know they could never work together, and it would take the uniqueness away from each of them. I guess you just take the good with the bad wherever you are.

Anyways, it seems like a dream now looking back on Korea and the places I went, things I saw, people I met. But it is also very real seeing how it has changed me. A year is a long but short time.

The culture shock wasn't too bad. I might still be going through it..who knows...It's weird to be around so many white people again....back to being the minority....the large grocery stores are also a bit much...seriously...why do we need a full aisle just dedicated to cereal...crazy. I miss the Korean food, the markets, the friends. I don't miss the pushy ajumas or the overwhelming amount of mirrors everywhere you go....seriously, you don't need them up and down every escalator.


It was a long flight back home. I flew from Incheon to Japan to Chicago (where my flight was cancelled) and then onward to G.R. In total, it took me about a day or so...i think...I'm actually still not quite sure (with the time change and all...I think I lived like 40 hours of Dec.5.)...My luggage actually made it home before me...surprising, but true :)

Well, I'm home for the holidays, which is nice. It's good to see the fam and friends. The nephews and nieces have grown way too fast.

(Titus, Blake and Levi on the Right) Hyper, but awesome nephews. :)

Currently I'm chillin in MI (with a couple road trips here and there) until Mid Feb. I've been working off and on.
From then on Enda and I will continue out travels together...we might be heading to the America's for a while visiting the sister, and somehwere in there we'll also be going to Enda's homeland of Ireland...then who knows.....I get restless very quickly.....planes and continents are calling me......... :)

Fall is finally here....

So this past month has been pretty low key. Just doing odds and ins around Korea. Enda and I went to check out the Incheon area and see what was good around there. We had the initially intended to head out East and do some relaxing in the mountains, but that didn't work out, so then we decided to head to an Island out West, but the ferry terminal was closed by the time we got there, so we decided to just chill in Incheon and finally something went right! :) We were able to see a nice sunset over the Incheon bay...watch some airplanes take off, etc...a good night.

I also attempted to do a little golfing at a driving range....good stuff..not my forte for sure though....anyways...

Teaching has been going well. It's crazy to think I'm only here for another month of so. Time has flown by as usual. I've been here over a year....crazy.

I've been trying to see a little more of Korea with the little time that i have left. I was able to make it out to Olympic Park ( the '88 olympics were held here I believe). I was blessed with a gorgeous day. The temps are perfect right about now with Fall here. I thought the rainbow in the fountain was nice...It's an interesting park. It was a pretty peaceful place given that it is in the middle of the city and all.

It's nice to see families getting out with their children...away from the apartment buildings and traffic...

I've also been keeping busy with Taekwondo. I seem to continue to injure myself in some form. First it was my back from soccer, now it's my foot from sparring...who knows what will happen next...I'm too young for all of these injuries....or in the prime age for them all...hmmm.

Well last weekend I was also able to catch some of the fireworks from the competition between U.S.A., Japan, and South Korea. They were each alloted 15-20 minutes of fireworks over the Han River. Good stuff..unfortunately, we were only able to catch the Koreans due to the immense traffic in the subway system. It was ridiculous! I've never seen anything quite like it. People were cramming themselves like sardines in the train and jamming their way on the escalator....they eventually had to turn them off so people wouldn't get injured. Korea always seems to continue to surprise me.

Well, this weekend, me and my girl Nari are heading out East to hike in Seoraksan for the weekend. Should be nice with all the colors changing and Korean's eating Kimchi with their Soju on the summit...yay :) Off to work I go!

Good Morning Vietnam!

So here we go again on the fun adventures of Korea :) Please, contain your excitement ;) Well, this past week has been rather exciting to say the least. It was Chuseok Mon-Wed, therefore we had a little vacation time...much needed. There was much fun that needed to be had. Enda and I took off to Vietnam on Saturday morning and were able to stay there until midnight on Wednesday...trying to enjoy the last possible second of our vacation away from Bupyeong. I'll begin the play by play of the journey...yay! :) If you get bored with reading the blog, you can at least look at the pictures and hopefully you can enjoy them :)

First and foremost, I have to say that Vietnamese children are extremely beautiful...gorgeous big eyes and wonderful smooth skin. Anyways, you will realize my infatuation with them as you go through this entry.

Vietnam is a very interesting country. It's a dream spot of backpackers...everything is extremely cheap! The food costs maybe $3 for a full meal...coke is about $0.45 for a bottle etc...I love it! Our hostel was about $5 for a night. amazing :)

When we first arrived, the myriad of motorcycles caught me of guard for sure! I was definitely scared to cross the street...I actually closed my eyes one time...just crossing my fingers that no one would hit me...crazy stuff for sure. Everyone has mopeds. They are rather cheap to buy...maybe $500 for an okay one (an imported one from Korea/Taiwan etc...might cost about a grand or so...) It was great to see parents waiting to pick up their children from school on the moped...lol ahh...good times.

So, we got there on Saturday and spent the day just wandering around Hanoi (the Old Quarter). We then took off early Sunday morning to Handspan. We planned to do a 3 day kayaking adventure...We took a 3-4 hour bus ride to Halong Bay which was enjoyable. It was great to get out of the city for sure! I really enjoyed this area. It hasn't been too built up with hotels or tourist attractions which I find rare nowadays. I kind of hope it stays this way for awhile...unfortunately we can already see some new places where hotels are going to be built.

There were only 8 of us on the tour which was nice. We got on a boat which was gorgeous and set out for Halong Bay by ship :) Yay! It was gorgeous weather as well so we were able to do a little sun bathing on the top of the boat. Halong Bay is has over 3,000 limestone karsts. I believe is was admitted as World's Natural Heritage by UNESCO and is on the nomination list for one of the new 7 Wonders...:) (TBD in 2008)

Anyways, it was gorgeous as you can see...we were able to go swimming during sunset...very surreal...nature is so breathtaking...

We spent the night on board and were planning on going kayaking all day Monday...well low and behold what gets in our way...oh yes...a typhoon...those darn typhoons...so we had to turn our boat around and head back to the bay...oi....a very sad day for me and the rest of the crew.
On the bright side though, we had an extra unplanned day and a half before us. We decided to take the overnight train to Sapa. It's about an 8 hour train ride...costing us a total of $6 each i believe...or something ridiculously cheap :) granted the toilets weren't the most wonderful experience to see but beggars can't be choosers! :)

Sapa was raining as well, but nonetheless it was gorgeous. Vietnam is such an agricultural society...the rice fields are breathtaking...the people are hard-working, laid back people that have the most winning smiles...honestly! When they flash their smiles it's hard to say no to them :) Here are some more pics from Sapa...

The women in the picture are obviously Sapa natives. I was trying on some traditional outfits (like they are wearing). They were giving me advice as to what other accessories I should wear with the garments. It was rather random. They just showed up at the door and were watching me try on an outfit. The little girl in front had great English and was my translator :) (I eventually did end up buying part of the outfit :)

I have a ton more pics but I'm currently rather computer illiterate, so if you are interested in seeing the rest of them, they are on my flickr account :)

Must hit the sack for the night...if any of you have a chance, I highly recommend visiting Vietnam... :)