I quote, "The Best Chuseok Ever!"

Hey everyone,


Ed and I have been pretty busy lately, and are very much looking forward to a relaxing weekend. But I figured you would be interested in reading about what we have been up to. Its a long post, so grab a coffee (or hot chocolate) if you want!

First of all, last weekend was Chuseok (pronounced chew-sock) which is the Korean version of Thanksgiving. After hearing about it, I think it is more like a combination of Thanksgiving and the Day of the Dead, but either way here is what the Koreans do. They usually have about four days off to go back to their home "town". This means big cities like Seoul and Busan clear out. Everyone heads to Grandma's house. Once at Grandma's, the women start cooking. The men sit and watch (they offer no help what-so-ever, thus the reason why many women here HATE Chuseok). They eat tons of food. Then visit their ancestors graves, where they leave food, say prayers (and maybe a hello too!), and then clear out of there to eat more food. The kiddos get presents (like money), the men get drunk, and the women get headaches. Very similar to our version of Thanksgiving, right? Okay so now you are Chuseok experts. So what do the foreigners do for Chuseok??

Ed and I went to a nearby city named Gwangyang to visit our friends, Kerry and Nikki. Gwangyang is a relatively new city because of its massive shipping ports. Ships from all over the world dock here, so the foreigner population is quite diverse (a good thing for Korea). Anyways, we saw a movie (Nick Cage in Bangkok something--it actually wasn't that bad), and went back to Kerry and Nik's place to get ready for pot luck dinner!! We went to a small bar where we had the most fabulous food. Jerk Chicken, Subs, Pasta salad. It was extremely delicious.

The next day we met up with some of their friends (Wendy and Alfia) and set out on a mission to find a local river with some water holes into which you can jump. Well, we had a general idea as to where to find the river, but we needed to take a bus there. About two hours later (the bus ride itself only took maybe 40 minutes--cost $4 for both Ed and I--but it took so long because we had to wait), the bus dropped us off in this tiny, tiny town. Fortunately for us, there was a woman on the bus who spoke English and asked if she could help us.

Now let me remind you--this is a serious holiday day--family time. Anyways, we get off the bus, and she runs to her house to get her father. Instead the whole family comes down to meet us (and many, many other children too-the word had gotten out that there were some waygooks in town-one of them black-gasp-and in like 30 seconds the whole village was out to look at us). We tell them that we wanted to go swimming, and they say that it is too far to walk. So "dad" goes and gets his pickup truck, "mom" runs and grabs us food, and we pile in to head up the mountain.

"Dad" brings us all the way to the top of this road/mountain, where there is the most beautiful temple I've seen. It is nestled into the mountain, with the river running along the side. Vivid colors, vivid people. It was great. Meanwhile, "dad" is kind of freaking out because it is a long walk back to the bus stop and is worried that we can't make it back to the stop (mind you it was downhill and pretty straight). We finally convinced him that we would be okay, so he left.

So really long story, not so short, we find the watering hole, eat some wonderful fruit that "mom" gave us and had a really great time.

The next day, Ed and I headed back to Yeosu to get ready for our "Tour of Yeosu" with the Lee family. That is another post (with more pictures--yeah!!). I hope you enjoy the pictures. Remember to check out the link to the right of the page--there are more "Chuseok" photos there!


Ummm yeah...this is for sale at our local supermarket. When did Vermont become famous for its curry and why wasn't I told about it!?