August 24: Seoul Day 2

Saturday was our last day in Seoul. We signed up for a bike tour in the morning which turned out to be the perfect way to see a lot of sites in Seoul in a short amount of time. Our tour company provided e-bikes, helmets and safety vests. The e-bikes made pedaling uphill a breeze.

 

Our first stop was a statue of King Sejong who is famous for inventing hangul, the Korean alphabet in 1443. Prior to his invention, Koreans used Chinese characters which are difficult to learn. The Korean alphabet made literacy achievable for ordinary people who couldn't devote years of study to learn how to read and write.

Next up was Gyeongbokgung Palace, This was the main royal palace during the Joseon dynasty and was originally built in 1395. It suffered during subsequent Japanese occupations, but has experienced ongoing restoration since 1990. Ancient Korea used four colors and assigned values to each color. Red is power, yellow is riches, blue represents purity of thought and green is for benevolence and love. The palace is mostly painted blue and green, highlighting those virtues.

We got to the palace in time to watch the changing of the guard, a highly choreographed event that happens twice a day.

The palace was guarded by haechi, magical creatures that protect against fire and bad luck. And which are evidence that Koreans have appreciated cuteness for centuries.

We rode our bikes through the West Village to see examples of traditional Korean architecture. Servants who worked in the palace in the joseon dynasty lived in the West Village.

The streets in the West Village were very narrow with 90 degree turns which made bike riding challenging.

Next we stopped in a market.

We sampled a few different kinds of ddoek. Although they had different flavorings, they are all made of rice and are all chewy. This does is all chewiness and no flavor.

The brown ddoek are fried in soy sauce and the red ddoek are flavored with chili sauce.

We also visited a bakery named Scoff, whose motto was Eat More Gluten, which is not especially helpful to Abe,

Here's a photo of a few of the delicious bakery items for isle.

This is a fountain near the Blue House, South Korea's official residence for their president. The buildings in this photo are for entertaining heads of state. North Korea is about 30 miles to the north of the big hill.

The North Village is on the other side of the government buildings. During the Joseon dynasty, this area held about 30 villas where noblemen lived. The Japanese ended the Joseon dynasty when they invaded in 1910. Economic and social pressure meant the villas were chopped up into about 2,300 homes. Now the area is carefully preserved.

Our last stop on the tour was the Jogyesa Temple. The temple was celebrating a water lily festival so we saw lots of potted water lilies.

Here are the happy bikers.

This temple held three statues of Buddha, representing the past, present, and future.

This is a photo of our two terrific tour guides who kept us safe and answered all our questions. Taejin is a native of Seoul and Tom is from the UK.

We had time for one more Korean meal before heading to the airport. This time Abe and Gibson had bulgogi, thinly sliced beef, and Brandan and Becky had bibimbap, rice and vegetables. This restaurant had the very best die dish we ate the entire trip: fried eggplant. It also had the strangest: steamed jellyfish. Becky gave into peer pressure and ate some. She didn't die, but is unlikely to eat it again. In the photo you can see the fried eggplant on Gibson's plate while Abe and Gibson have loaded their chopsticks with jellyfish.

Abe was an excellent tour guide and we enjoyed our adventures in South Korea. We are inspired to be more generous like the Koreans we met are and to be open to new experiences. And we were thankful to see faithful Korean saints living the gospel joyfully and faithfully. Abe's mission continues to bless us.

August 23: Seoul Day 1

We arrived in Seoul earlier than we thought we would and had a few hours to look around before meeting up with friends. We like sending postcards when we travel and sometimes finding a post office is tricky. In Seoul, our hotel was a short walk from the post office headquarters for the country of South Korea and we dropped our post cards off here. We were impressed with the efficient postal service when Abe was on his mission. It only took 10 days for a package to be delivered and we could track the package the whole way.

There's a statue of Hong Young-Sik in front of the post office. He was the first head of the general postal service which began in 1884 and is regarded as the father of the postage stamp in Korea.

Shinesgae, an enormous department store was also nearby. Shinesgae sells every luxury brand imaginable, like Gucci, Chanel, Rolex and believe it or not, National Geographic. National Geographic is a power brand in South Korea, selling high end outdoor gear and expensive T shirts.

Being a long way from home feels even longer when the distance is given in kilometers. It's 11,172 km to Washington DC.

We tried another Korean snack, cookies shaped like walnuts.

The cookies were very cute. This one was filled with red bean paste and walnuts.

We met a fantastic group of young people Abe served with on his mission for dinner.

From the left are Gibson, Abe, Becky, Brandan, Kim Jun Min, Kim Ji Seung, Kim Seoyeon, Park Seoyeon and Hwang Jong Hyun.

Here's a close up of the restaurant name. Jjimdak means steamed chicken.

Here's a photo of our dinner. Basically it was a pile of chicken, vegetables and rice noodles cooked in sauce, then layered with dumplings, ddeok, cheese and french fries. Somehow all the flavors worked together and the dish was quite delicious.

After dinner we walked to a nearby photo booth to take a group photo. We saw dozens of these photo booths in Busan. They're open 24 hours a day and entirely self serve. This is a photo of Gibson and Abe choosing accessories before we took the photos.

Here are the finished photos. Clockwise from the top left are Brandan, Gibson, Abe, Kim Ji Seung, Kim Jun Min, Park Seoyeon and Hwang Jung Hyun.  

After that bit of fun, we walked to the Seoul Korea temple.

The temple is located at the top of a hill and near a Buddhist temple and several Protestant churches. With such a concentration of religious buildings, the hill is known as a holy place.

The Seoul Korea temple was dedicated in 1985 by President Gordon B. Hinkley. The beautiful gardens surrounding the temple are open to the public. President Russell M. Nelson announced a temple to be built in Busan in 2022, but no further information has been released.

Abe didn't have a chance to attend the temple on his mission so visiting the temple was a highlight of our trip for him. Brandan and Abe attended a session with Abe's Korean friends while Becky and Gibson waited outside.

The stainless steel entry reminded Brandan of the stainless steel dishes we saw at restaurants and in department stores.

Abe met a few more friends inside the temple. This photo was taken after the session. From the left are Hwang Jung Hyun, Brandan, Gibson, Becky, Abe, Kim Min Seong, Julie Chandler, Park Seoyeon, Drew Chandler (Julie's dad), Kim Jun Min and Kim Ji Seung.

We said goodbye at the temple and took the subway back to our hotel. Another one of Abe's wishes while we were in South Korea was to eat at a Baskin and Robbins. We never eat at Baskin Robbins in the US, but it is a prominent chain in South Korea. Abe ate ice cream at a Baskin Robbins for his 20th birthday. We shared a bowl of chocolate, mango and pear ice cream.

August 22: Mokpo

Although we stayed at the beach to make it easy for Abe to get in the water while we were in South Korea, most days we were either too busy or it was raining. We walked on the beach or past the beach twice a day, but we didn't go swimming. Thursday was our last morning to swim so we went down early before we needed to catch our bus to Mokpo. We quickly learned that the beach is only open for swimming between 9 am and 6 pm. A police officer whistled when Abe went in deeper than his knees. Even if he couldn't swim, he still went in farther than he could as a missionary. While Brandan and Abe waded in the ocean, Becky collected gorgeous seashells on the beach.

 

This beach had a compressed air station to help clean sand off your shoes and feet.

Our original plan was to stay in Mokpo for a day and a half before taking a train to Seoul. However, we couldn't buy the train tickets to Seoul until we arrived in Mokpo. By the time we tried to get tickets, the afternoon trains to Seoul were all sold out and we had to get tickets for a train that left at 9 am. This meant we had about 17 hours to enjoy the city. Mokpo was Abe's last area to serve in and the furthest spot in his mission from Busan. Mokpo is much smaller than Busan. About 3.4 million people live in Busan and only about 225,000 people live in Mokpo. After checking in to our hotel, we walked to a movie theater to meet Abe's friend for dinner. The movie posters outside the theater advertised lots of Korean films and one American movie, Twisters.

This is a photo of the restaurant we ate at.

Here is a photo with Abe's friend, Kim Sungnam. Kim Sungnam is a hospital counselor. South Korea is currently experiencing a covid spike, as we are in the United States. Neither country is taking much notice of the spike, except Sungnam has to wear a face mask in the hospital right now. Brandan currently is encouraged to wear a mask, but not required. Sungnam and Brandan had very similar covid experiences, both even making it until 2023 before catching covid themselves. For dinner we ate dwejidueng garbijjin, pork ribs cooked in a delicious sauce along with the rice cakes called ddeok.

While Becky generally loved the side dishes, this restaurant brought us a plate of tiny anchovies which she left untouched.

Sungnam had planned to meet up with us for lunch on Friday. With that no longer an option, we crammed in as much as possible on Thursday night. After a short walk we stopped for Korean hot dogs.

Korean hot dogs are like American corn dogs, except the batter is a mix of rice and wheat flour. The hot dogs were filled with mozzarella cheese and sausage and topped with sweet ketchup and spicy mustard.

We walked along the waterfront. Mokpo doesn't have a beach, but it has miles of walkways along the ocean. It's a little cooler at night so it's the most popular time for being outside.

This sign was on the waterfront.

We watched a water and light show, synchronized to music. The show happens every night and the city adds fireworks for special holidays.

We ended our night with bowls of seulbing, one topped with blueberries and one topped with soybean powder.

Sungnam gave us beautiful fruit for our breakfast the next morning.

Another friend, Lee Dae Song, met us at our hotel before we left Friday morning. We had planned to have a longer visit, but our train tickets got in the way. Lee Dae Song has had many careers and is currently a middle school geography teacher. With his kids raised, he bought a camper van and is about to set off on an adventure driving across Russia and Europe, eventually ending in Iceland. We hope he keeps going and makes it to Oregon.

Walking to the train station, Abe bumped into a teaching friend named Choi Sang Guyn. Choi Sang Guyn is a mathematics professor whose friend is a member of the church and asked the missionaries to meet with him. Although he wasn't ready to commit to the church, his affection for Abe was apparent.

Abe and Gibson stopped to play on some rocking seats. Abe remembered one of his companions getting air in these chairs by spinning vigorously.