I'm sorry this last blog is so hard to read. Blogger.com sucks. I'm not one to throw the blame on someone/thing else but the picture uploading process fucks (Grandma, I apologize for the foul language) everything up. I'll have to edit a few more hours before it's neat and easy to read. Until then you can try to manage your way through it, sorry.

I got a fish! A few weeks ago my friend Karen and I popped into a pet store right down the street from the biggest live fish market in town. Instead of buying a small octopus as a pet (what I told my students, they totally bought it…) we opted for something more traditional. Karen went with two fast little black and silver guys while I got a goldfish. The two that Karen bought have been flushed; RIP Fang and Big Bang (named after the VERY popular Korean Boy Band). However, my little Honey is still swimming strong. I cherish the moment every day that I walk in and say, “Honey, I’m home”.

Other than the fish, I have a lot of catching up to do. The year has started off packed with interesting trips, good finds and a settled sense of home. Over the past two months we went to China, were extras in a Korean film, watched friends and Koreans dive into the freezing water of Heaundae beach, made/witnessed beach bonfires, dumpster dove, saw a shitty game of basketball (just yesterday, they lost by one point), new folks have come and good friends have left.

And that is just the beginning. Mom and Dad will be here in three days, I’ll wow them, hopefully, with my seamless knowledge of the navigation, food and language of Korea. Psh, well, kind of. Their arrival has pushed memorizing the Korean alphabet to the top of the list, that gives me until Thursday to get it down. This weekend we will be heading to Seoul, from there going to Kyoto, Japan taking the train to Fukuoka, Japan then a ferry back home to Busan. A short while and Nadia and Lauren will be arriving! It’s never dull, NEVER.

I’m getting ahead of myself, first China.

Beijing, China
The morning of the 24th of January I hopped in a cab with Pete and Lisa, my Canadian co-workers, to the airport. We were meeting up with a group of nearly 100 foreigners from Busan, all of which were young teachers on vacation. I’ll spare the details, but I’m guessing you can see where this is going. The English speaking travel agency in the city planned the whole package deal with transportation, tour guides, hotel and food. We easily find the group at the airport, after filing through a number of lines we exchange our money then find our way to the plane and head to China.

Two hours later, after a rocky take off AND landing (while climbing up the stairs to board Alyssa tells us that Chinese pilots don’t have the best training). We split up into four groups, meet our Chinese tour guide, Mike, and hop on the buses (Bus D) to head to the first sight.

The next three days blend together. It was a packed trip, seeing all of the major sights, eating signature food in large restaurants that catered to big tour groups and shopping at touristy “factory” stores that had a small display of how they make ancient Chinese art (bastard version of what is a beautiful process) then escort you into the much larger room where they can make money off of you through souvenir shopping.

Overall, Beijing was a wonderful city. It was very clean, surprisingly. A lot of which had to do with the fact that the Olympics just came through shaping the city up for the whole world to see. The one thing I noticed was that the architecture was different from that in Korea, more Western or European. The food was much like Taiwan’s. We were served what everyone knows as Chinese dishes- dumplings, soup, noodles, rice, and Peking Duck (from Beijing, the city is also called Peking) were among them. We had fine weather, although freezing and everything was cheap. The best part though was that it was Chinese New Year, we brought in the Year of the Bull in China. You can’t imagine the fireworks; they surrounded us from the morning we arrived until 5 am the day we flew out.

A photo tour of Beijing:

Chinese 'you-on' or Mao Money

The Temple of Heaven
Jade Factory
Like Taiwan they are proud of their Jade in China (although they don’t repeat “It’s naycha” over and over until you buy something). I must say that after the Jade factory I had a much greater appreciation for the stone. Jade is worn because it has a healing power, it makes organs strong or holds some kind of ancient magic of the Orient. Jade bangles are worn on the left arms of women to be closer to the heart and the same goes for men and children who wear it as a pendant around their necks. There were some beautiful intricate pieces of sculpture that were of fine craftsmanship. The most appealing feature of Jade is that when in contact with the human body for a long period of time it will physically change colors, but it will only turn to a deeper green when it is worn. For some reason that little fact made me fall in love with the stone I always overlooked. I didn’t buy anything, I regret that now.

The Summer Palace

These are the people I hang with in Busan, Beijing, and wherever else we find ourselves in Asia. They are Haley, Kathleen, Alyssa, Karen and Matt and they're pretty great.

The Silk Market

She is carving 'Ranew' on this stamp, although it comes out as ‘Lanew’ in Chinese. This picture makes the market look calm. It was anything but, there were many designer rip off bags and those sales people where crazy. Seriously, mentally tweaked, trying to sell you anything in any way possible. Their favorite method? Force. It was scary.

The Pearl Factory

The Chinese Empress that lived in the Summer Palace was a conqubine at a young age in the Forbidden City. When she moved up in the line of royalty she discovered a love for cultivated fresh water pearls and revived/started/popularized the pearl market in Beijing. Every morning she would crush a pearl and rub the powder on her face. Ok, so I don't know the nitty gritty of this gal's life (or even her name) but the most intriging part of her story was in her death. She died at 74, they said her face looked 15 because of the pearl powder, she was burried with millions of pearls. Her people placed pearls in her coffin and the largest one, from Chiang Kai-shek's wife, was placed in her mouth. I never really cared for pearls that much, like Jade, I love them now because of this story.

Aimee told me not to do anything stupid in China, since they're Communist and all. I did think twice about stealing a pearl from a clam sitting unsupervised. Took one anyway, sorry Aim.

The Great Wall

Sometimes it felt like we were on a high school field trip, although better. Here is the 'Bus D' picture with The Great Wall as our backdrop. Take that Lameside.

I have no words to go with The Great Wall experience. Except that 'great' is a gross understatement. We must of climbed thousands of stairs but I never noticed being out of breath because it was just so damn amazing. Some day, we'll go there together. I want you to see it.

Chinese Enamelware
This was my favorite 'factory' stop we made. The copper scraps lying everywhere reminded me of the work done over the summer with Bud, Deb and George. Sadly, this is a dieing art. Enamelware is an intriquite and time consuming, younger artists are just not interested in it.

Let's hope that changes. Here she is gluing small peices on to the copper as the outline of the design.

The copper is saudered, then painted with enamel.

They are then fired, cooled, polished and look like the above product. It was originally used only for Royalty.

The Forbidden City

Check out those hot conqubines.
Tienemen Square

Chairman Mao is much larger and more ominous in person.
Chinese Acrobatics Show
How many limber Chinese women does it take to ride a bike? Probably just one but look how many they can fit! I think it was twelve. Again, well done with the photography Kathleen.
The Hot Pot

Kat's picture (thanks girlfriend!) of our hot pot dinner. Everyone gets a boiling pot of broth that you put fresh meat, noodles and veggies into, much like Shabu Shabu.

The Bird's Nest

We were only able to drive by it, it was much larger than I imagined. Not just a sports stadium, this is an astonishing work of modern art.

Mongolian dinner and a show

Another blog to come tomorrow, gotta catch up.

Happy Birthday Karlee and Frances!