Good times

Well, even though it's getting really cold outside, and even at work I wear many layers, hat and scarf, I'm still enjoying myself. My birthday was a few days ago, and I didn't really want to celebrate or make a big deal out of it. It was nice to get some emails, phone calls, and messages from people wishing me happy birthday though. The weekend before that I felt a change in me. I feel like an adult now, ready to consciously take my life into my own hands and be responsible for the consequences of my decisions. I find I have to constantly remind myself of this, but at least I have went up a level in my development.

Here are the latest pictures :).


This is Ryan and me at a pub being silly and taking random pictures.




This is in the morning, amazing light coming through, after a nice cuddle, I'm all warm and fuzzy inside :)

This is my life

Here I am, Tuesday night, it's 3am, am talking with my friend Ryan, have had quite a few drinks, just went outside for a smoke, and saw that it was snowing. Then I had an amazing realisations. THIS IS MY LIFE!!!!! From now on, it is mine. My responsibility. Only mine. No one else's. My decisions, my choices. What I want out of my life, I will have to do, work for, get, accomplish, figure out, all that. But now it's only up to me. I'm far away from family and friends, and the only person I have to rely on is myself. This is my life and my life alone. I hadn't realised this before. I was living someone else's expectations, doing what was normal and common, but not anymore. Now, this is my life. I will do what I want, figure out what is good for me and be where I want to be , go where I want to go, because this IS MY LIFE!!! How wonderful is that :D

Fall Hike at Naejangsan

Decked out in the latest hiking fashions, equipped with a cup full of silk worm larva in one hand and a walking stick in the other, as soon as the weekend hits, the Koreans head for the mountains. Even with hundreds of mountains in the Seoul vicinity, I still find myself surrounded by masses of Koreans looking to escape the city and experience nature. Rows of spices, ginseng, sweet potatoes, roasted pork, corn, persimmons, chest nuts and a variety of unidentifiable edibles.

Here are some of the pictures.

This is the map of the region with the park and the mountain.

At the base of the mountain is a little village with restaurants, motels, buses and LOTS of people.

Traffic jam. There's no escape!!

People heading up towards the entrance to the mountain trails.

I thought this picture was really cool. These big pots are traditionally Korean. Pretty much every household has at least one of them in which they make chimchee, a sort of pickled spicy cabbage that is said to have incredible healing powers.

No weekend hike would be complete without the local drag queen.

Mmmmm, roasted chestnuts.

Mmmmmm, mini shrimp stew.

Mmmmmmm, silk worm larva :).

So this was the little road that lead up to the park entrance. The colours were amazing.

This pictures is called, "Two foreigners and a red tree".

This tree looked like it was out of a spooky fairy tale.

Dried out river.

These two pictures are taken from another person who went on this hike.

Alright, so I promised a long time ago, that I would take a picture of the very common and super scary public toilets. I finally took a second to snap a shot of the "toilet" at one of the rest stops on the way to the mountain.