Vacation continues but the agenda is empty. Thinking of spending this week actually relaxing and exploring this area of Korea. Every weekend it's been something else that I haven't actually spent much legit time in this town. Weather's been mint so a hike up into the Sea of Clouds see what that's all about. Be mighty cold, but it would be totally worth it. Plus, gives a chance to actually save some money. Things have been getting a bit more pricey than I'd expect, apparently live an expensive lifestyle over here.

Battled through my cold last week and managed to slightly squeeze by it (another reason for the relaxing this week) but I did manage to get my first haircut. Kind of a big deal. First, this was the first time I've EVER paid to get my haircut. Considering my cheap ways, that's a big thing. Second, I had to push my way through the language barrier to avoid getting a typical Korean haircut, looks good on them but if I repped that? Nah, wouldn't be having it. So this was a big thing and glad to have the experience, plus had to look good for round 2 in Seoul! New Years 2012 in Times Square Seoul! Had to bring in the new year proper, plus needed to go big in Korea, how could you not? Minor setback when I got to the bus terminal only to find out all the buses were either filled or cancelled going into Seoul so had to trek to the nearest city to hop on an express. Think I'm starting to get the whole transportation thing here. For some reason I find it a lot simpler to use here than using the buses in Canada. But off to Seoul! Met up with Ellen in the Express Terminal and we got lost on the way to the hostel, some nice hospitality from a group of Korean guys though, walked us to the hostel--well they thought it was the hostel. They led us back to where we started. Nice of them, but we were no where close. Luckily the pair we were sharing the hostel with saw us and hailed us down and managed to find our way. Chill first night went later than anticipated but it was great to be back in the city for a visit.

Woke up for a Gyeongbok Palace visit. Beautiful place. Walk out of the subway station and you're face to face with the palace entrance. It was like walking into a fantasy. I'll upload my pics (really been meaning to) and you can see how surreal it is to have the city scape on one side, palace in the centre and mountainscape on the other side. Unbelievable. Followed up with a trip to the arts market, nice stuff, expensive, but nice and then we were off to Subway. Legit, sandwiches. Mind blown. Downside is that I'm pretty sure they use peanut oil or some kind of nut flour or something to make the bread (at leas the italian breads) so that sketched me out. So after a switch finally got to eat a wicked sandwich. And to top that made our way to Itaewon (I'm actually liking the subway system in Seoul, super convenient and so easy to use) to visit...(my heart raced when I saw this)...Rocky Mountain Tavern. A Canadian pub in Korea. With real Canadian ginger ale, think I went back home for a minute there. And to eat...poutine. Mind you it was actually one of the worst things I've eaten in a long time, but still we managed to grab a poutine! They use white gravy here and it basically turns to soup and there was no poutine taste, basically throw french fries in a garlic bread soup and you have a Korean poutine. Not pleasant. But the day was just getting started so back tot he hostel to get ready for New Years!

The basement of the hostel was a "dining room" so the 8 or 9 of us made it our room for the pre-NYE celebrations and within no time there were about 20 of us crammed in there. Ah it was nice. Then off to Times Square! After grabbing our tickets the event is already getting started and spread over 5 or 6 floors with something different going on on each floor. There were concerts straight from 7pm to 5am and managed to catch a few of them, and actually surprisingly really freaking good. They were all over the world but such good sets.I took a video of New Years Countdown and it was phenomenal. Fire show, concert sea of balloons and confetti, how can you go wrong? I'm not sure how many people were there, but likely a couple thousand so it was a pretty big thing.

But another year gone and I can't believe how fast 2011 went and how much things could change in such a short amount of time. This time last year Korea was barely an afterthought. Teaching overseas was always a maybe, but one year ago it was not a serious consideration. But now look at this, Korea baby! Pretty significant year to pass as well. Some things were lost or had to be given up to make way for the future, but there were also huge gains and accomplishments. After a prolonged study, finally finished undergrad. Met some incredibly people along the way, and even though I will only continue seeing about a handful of them when I come back to Canada it was well worth the journey and they've helped make me who I am. And then preparation for Korea, which is a huge step in my life. This is my first solo adventure overseas without having a familiar counterpart to balance out what I miss from back home. And not only that but this will be the first time that I've ever gone this long away from home. The comfort zone of the homsestead has been shattered so it's been a battle to actually make a life of my own without relying on so many familiar aspects of my life. Still some carryovers from 2012, there are still things I need to read that I wanted to read last year, I was hoping to have a stronger grasp on the Korean language, but so far I think I'm doing alright. I can understand and I've managed to have a couple broken conversations and I'm getting better at ordering things at restaurants and reading signs and posts so that I don't have to rely on my little translator anymore. So who knows, I am going to finish my Korean course this week hopefully and that should help me a bunch.

I've talked to a few of you already today and it was great to be able to hear your voices! It definitely made my day. So cheers to 2012 and starting things fresh and to new experiences, and 새해 복 많이 보내세요 to all of you! (pronounce "say hey bo ma knee bo nay say oh" I'm pretty sure I said this to every single person at the event, it actually started some pretty solid conversations with complete strangers, it was great, managed to meet people from all over the world).