Blog 13 -April 26

After three months living in Seoul I am still very happy and feel privileged to have the opportunity to immerse myself in another culture. We are making friends - you've probably noticed the usual suspects in my photos. We are living a rich and full life, where every day is different and we are learning patience and reticence. as we negotiate the Korean systems. I had thought I'd write for three months, however this experiment has proved an excellent way to document my life and feedback has been positive. So I will continue for now anyway.

Dongdaemun Market has a plethora of specialty shops and I had a wonderful choice of wool, most of it imported from Australia and New Zealand. http://www.lifeinkorea.com/Travel2/15

Here is my knitting project. Before I left Australia, my friend Helen gave me a knitting pattern for a throw rug that has 99 different squares. So far I've finished 39. Only 60 more to go! It's been great fun and been very therapeutic over the winter months. Perhaps it will be completed for next winter. Below is my knitting group hard at work! We meets weekly or when it fits us all. Esther and Sophia are neighbours here at the University apartments.

We woke at 5.30am for the traditional ANZAC Day dawn service at the War Memorial of Korea. About 200 attended and followed the ceremony with a sit down breakfast hosted by the Australian Embassy. ANZAC Day is an Australian memorial to those who have died in battle over the years. One of the Embassy staff told us there are 2,000 Australians in Korea. We then visited the War Memorial Museum that seemed very appropriate and a fantastic history of this country's involvement in the Korean War and others such as Vietnam. This ship below is a turtle boat developed for the numerous wars with Japan.

Does Pilar look surprised? We helped organise a surprise birthday party for our Spanish Australian friend who is about to finish as the Executive Director of the Australia Chamber of Commerce. Pilar's husband Bob, in the background, is the only other Australian academic at SNU and the brother of our friend, Heather who died a few years ago. We met almost by accident here and discovered our connections. Floors stay clean as you will notice we don't have shoes on as the Korean custom is to remove all footwear inside.

Below is an image of Maria (on the right) and Diana (who we discovered is also from Damien's small home town of Warnambool) rescuing burning precious meat pies that were a rare indulgence for non-vegetarian party goers.

Our outdoor coffee shop across the road at Hoam House opened this week following its winter hibernation. Our apartments are in the background and the green bus number 2 will become very familiar to those who visit as it takes us to the subway. Some of us try to walk the 15 minutes to the subway for a bit of much needed exercise! I plan to take my own cup next time as only paper cups are available there. I wonder how my Korean will go and whether this request will be too weird for compliant Koreans.