Kicking it in Korea

Our trip to Korea...Best 10 days ever. We took a trip to tour where Mitch served his mission in Pusan, South Korea.We started planning for this trip last December and it always seemed so far away and now I can't believe it's over and done. It's always kind of sad coming home from something that you've planned for and looked forward to for months. But the memories we made and experiences we had will last forever!

Mitch did such a great job planning everything from hotels, activities, meeting with people, food, transportation, everything. He made the trip amazing. I think he was honestly in heaven the entire time we were there.

The flight over was long and a little claustrophobic, nothing unexpected there. We were both so tired by the time we got there, we would crash every time we sat down.

We flew into Seoul to see Mitch's mission president who is now the Seoul Temple President. We got off the plane and had to take an hour subway to where the temple was. In this picture, Mitch is holding on with both hands to stay standing on the subway, but I think it looks like Mitch would have made a cute cheerleader. He was that excited to get to Korea!

 

After the subway ride, we hauled our luggage around the crowded streets of Seoul looking for the temple. We decided to grab a taxi and finally made it.

President Song and his wife were seriously so nice to us. They let us stay in their 'spare house' and had us over for dinner, breakfast, and lunch while we were there. President Song's policy is he won't invite any of his former missionaries to visit him unless they have a wife. He's pretty serious about it too. :) 

 Sunday night, we took a bullet train down to Pusan. The first three nights, we stayed in Haeundae right on the beach.

Mitch was so excited to get to Pusan! Everywhere we went brought back so many memories for him and he would say that's where we would check our mail, that's where we would knock on doors all day long, that's the bus that we would take to church. A few times, he would say things like, oh that's the apartments we met so and so at. And then a couple apartments over, he would say oh wait no that's the apartment we met them at. I know it's hard to remember after 5 years all the specific places, but it just made me laugh.

The best example of this was at one of his apartments where he had lived. He said all thoughtfully "Oh here's the place where I'd come and get digits (his favorite Korean cookies) at night sometimes." As we passed it, I noticed it was a laundromat. "In that laundromat?" "Ok maybe it wasn't right here but somewhere around here." We had a good laugh after that one.

 This was the first dinner Mitch ordered for me. You'd think he'd order me something a little mild to ease me into Korean food, but this soup was his first choice. I like most of the food, but this one was a little weird for me.

I struggled to get any meat off of the bones with my very limited chopstick skills and the owner of the restaurant must have noticed because she finally couldn't take it anymore and came and picked the meat off the bones for me like I was a 5 year old bless her heart. I wasn't even sure I wanted the meat anyway. Mitch loved it of course.

Our hotel was right on the beach and only 40$ a night! Just what we were looking for.

 Mitch treated us to his classic mission breakfast...digits and pineapple juice. So healthy and delicious.

 The beach was beautiful but a little too cold for swimming. I packed three swimming suits and didn't use one of them.

Mitch looking out onto the city where he worked so hard with so many people that he loved.

We stopped for some Korean fast food that Mitch lived off on his mission and met the cutest elementary students out on a field trip. They were so excited to see Americans and to practice their English.

                           Another funny thing in Korea. All the translated English signs...

At another beach just down the road, we got our daily exercise in at some classic Korean public workout machines in the mountains.

Didn't know they made hula hoops this big.

MORE WEIGHT!!

We went to this really cool Buddhist temple on a mountain right off the beach.

More pics and fun stories to come...