The last weekend in July (well before vacation) the 21st and 22nd, Christine and I went hiking through the Seoul Fortress. A quick note from another discoverer's blog..
"One of the most conspicuous remnants of Seoul’s ancient past is the Seoul Fortress wall (서울성곽) that still encircles much of the old city. First constructed in 1396 – just five years after King Taejo founded the Joseon Dynasty – the earthen wall was built to join the ridge lines of the four small mountains that surrounded Seoul proper – Namsan (남산) in the south, Inwangsan (인왕산) to the west, Naksan (낙산) to the east, and Bugaksan (북악산) in the North. Although much of the old fortress wall has been torn down, significant portions remain and others are being rebuilt."
I've heard it referenced as Korea's great wall... BUT I think that's a stretch. Granted I'venever walked the Great Wall of China, or seen it, but I don't think that this was very comparable. It was definitely a wall along a path and some parts were really cool but I don't think it had the splendor of China's "version." The wall was still pretty guarded though, with a guard maybe every 100m, just there to basically make sure you don't take pictures, though I was able to sneak some (muahaha). It was a nice day for a hike though and overall enjoyable. The beginning though was only steep steps, and maybe it was only 20 minutes or so but it felt like we were walking up steps for hours and of course the Koreans walking are wearing their long sleeve shirts and pants. I don't understand how they don't faint from heat exhaustion... Another unanswered question of Korea.
Anyways, that night we celebrated my birthday. I know, about 2 weeks early... but my birthday fell over vacation so we went out to eat Saturday night instead. The only thing I wanted to do for my fake "celebration" was get a real cheeseburger so we went to this place in Seoul called Jacoby's Burgers that we had heard good things about. They were really good but I of course had higher expectations than what it was. I think it's hard to compare after the Nook and Matt's Bar's jucy lucys!
The last week at school went really quickly, too. My kindergartners were excited because I told them we would have ice cream to celebrate my birthday. The kid's birthday parties are so intense here that I figured it was my turn to dish out the treats... although I copped out and just gave 500W (50 cent) ice cream instead of buying a fancy half decent cake!
T- William, Eric, Samuel, Michael
B- Dane, Jinny, Clara, Amy
The highlight of July was Molly was finally here!!! She arrived on Thursday, July 26th and came to school with me on Friday. The kids kept saying "two Meghan teachers!" so that was funny. I think she confused a lot of the other kids too that weren't in my class! Friday night we got ready for our Thailand trip!!! Which you can read about in the next post because that one will be way more exciting than this one... sooo to be continued! :)
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