Two Weekends Ago

Two weekends ago, we decided that we were tired of being cooped up inside and wanted to go and take a walk on Sabbath. Lucky for us there is Subong Park just up the hill—so even though it was raining we decided to go.



We walked up stairs and up hills…




and down hills and down stairs…

and up hills and around and over until we finally went down and ended back at the main street and walked back on the street to our apartment. It was really nice to get out, even if it was raining.

The next day we traveled on a new bus route to get to Neo’s (Matthew's student) university, Inha University. He gave us great instructions and so we got on the right bus and got off at the right stop. What also helped us get off at the correct stop was the fact that a student with a college textbook got on and so we figured that we’d follow his lead. It worked out pretty well.



Bus 512



Neo is a great student and he took us around the campus and showed us different things. He is only a level one student but his English is great.





This gazebo thing is by very disgusting water that the students throw each other into on their birthdays. I jokingly said that since the next day was Matthew’s birthday we should come back so we could throw him in. =)

There were a lot of cool things at his university:





dragon statues



pretty landscaping, a small circle area that echoed when you stood in the center (not pictured)



and a tree that if couples sat in (and fit) that it was then supposedly “destiny” for them to be together. I think we’re a bit big…but he kindly smiled and said that he thought it was fate for us to be together. Either way, it’s too late huh? =)

After the tour he got us fruit smoothies that were amazing. And only one thousand won! (Approx. $1.00). We enjoyed these and talked for a bit inside the campus.




We told him that later that afternoon we were going to meet one of my religion class students to go out to a park. We invited him and he said he’d come and then asked what we were going to do until then. We didn’t really have anything in mind, so I decided to ask him to come over to the apartment and have lunch/dinner with us.

This was more risky than you might think. Not because he’s dangerous, but because I don’t know how to cook Korean and it could have great potential for embarrassment. So he drove us in his car to our apartment and I made him burritos. He’d never had burritos…. Matthew grills them so we had grilled burritos with our precious chips and salsa. It’s funny how giving someone your food when you don’t have as much as you are use to is more of a sacrifice. I think it was good for us to sacrifice our beloved salsa. Thankfully he really seemed to enjoy the burritos! I think it was the salsa, because he said he loves salsa. Jason and him could be friends. We even had dessert to offer him because of Mama’s package! So he tried Dove Dark Chocolate and after eating it said that it was bitter (Matthew did not understand how this was possible), so we offered him a Reese’s instead.

Then we headed to meet Regina. She and her friend David met us at the school and Neo was gracious enough to drive us to the park in his car! This is a huge blessing for a number of reasons but one of the reasons was that we had about 7,000 won left. So the bus would’ve taken about 4,000 of that. The park we went to is called Wolmi Park. It’s a much bigger park than Subong Park that is up the hill from us. It’s about a forty minute walk to the top, but it’s not too bad until the last ten minutes. It was during this walk that we first started to notice signs that Matthew might not be feeling well.



Once at the top you could choose a couple different directions to go. We went to the tower first.



(Interesting bug lantern posts were all along the trail, and for a while we couldn’t figure out what they were, but then we finally got to the right angle and saw that they were light-ning bugs.)



From the tower you could see quite a bit.



This is the Incheon Bridge that goes from Yeongjong Island (I think) to the Incheon airport, that is on an island. It is still incomplete but is supposed to be finished by 2009. Looks scary unfinished doesn't it?



These are cars from Daewoo waiting to be exported.



And this is Incheon.



And this is us.



Beth-Anne, Regina, David, and Neo. Regina's shirt says, "I love NY more than ever." If she only knew how true that is for me now...



At the park were beautiful flowers. Flowers are a treat to see and we soaked up the beauty.









The sun was setting as we were there and in these pictures you can pretend we are in the country somewhere.

After the tower we went up this other path to where there is this circle with the names of different popular cities in different countries. And the distance to them from the center of the circle. The squares on the outer edges are for NSEW. It reminded me of Four Corners in the United States, even though it’s not really related, it just reminded me the way it was set up.



Then Neo drove us home and we went to bed. It was a really great day and we enjoyed all the time we spent with our students.