Random "Living in Korea Stuff" - Part 7

It's been awhile since I've done a "Random in Korea" post, but there have been a good number of random experiences lately, so I thought I'd lump them together. Here's your hodgepodge of Korean culture and adventure for the week:

There are markets and shopping alleys galore in Seoul. One day we braved Toy Alley and managed to survive without buying more than we could carry. It was tough, as there was store after store of awesome looking toys.

That same day I took the boy on an adventure in Myeongdong to a Cat Café - he was soooo excited!

The café has a TON of cats that you can pet, cuddle, and play with while enjoying a nice beverage. All survived and none were too traumatized by an over-excited petter.

Spring is flower season in Korea - here's one more cherry blossom picture for you:

As I previously shared, poop is popular here...and we found an awesome kid's activity book all about it:

The book is very educational, tracking the path food takes through one's digestive system and comparing the different shapes/sizes of varying animal's waste. It even comes with stickers to place on the pages; this page was my favorite, with funny faces on the poo as they were being flushed:

At a recent event, I enjoyed watching a traditional Korean Tea ceremony. It was beautiful to watch - very detailed, synchronized, and long - probably a bit more than I would want to do on a daily basis, especially for a cup of tea just for me.  Here's a great video about the ceremony: Tea Video

I thought that Renaissance Faires were the land of food-on-a-stick, but then we found this: a long waffle with toppings on a stick - what?! How do you even eat that without becoming covered with sweet, yummy goodness?  Ha ha!

We're almost ready to head back to the states, but not without a few more souvenirs. This was our most recent purchase at a furniture market - just a little taste of Korea to bring back with us and replace our old fiberboard TV stand, which will have an unceremonious curbside end once we get it back out of storage!

Spring at Seoul Forest

Spring in Korea means warmer weather (alleluia!) and flowers. Lots and lots of flowers. The cherry and plum blossoms were popping out all over the place, so I felt the need to find a new place for  some pictures and fun. One lovely day last week (which turned into two days, after we had so much fun the first time!), Michael and I headed off to Seoul Forest to explore.

Seoul Forest is a large area near Ttukseom consisting of five parks - ecological, nature study, cultural art, riverside, and wetlands. There are a ton of things to see and do there, so I knew we'd have a full morning.

We found the kid play areas, so our first stop was a romp in the sand pit.

Nearby is this cool sculpture, called "Love Letter" when translated, and the word for "love" is carved on it in 95 different languages...none of which is the English word "love" (this had us Moms giggling a bit as we told the kids to keep looking for it...).

Our day was made even better by the music that was playing throughout the park, through speakers like this one.

The large art culture park has some pretty interesting art pieces:

After wandering for a bit, we finally found what I had been looking - the flowering trees - so beautiful!

The above picture was taken on a Monday. As you can see, the blossoms were already starting to fall and these trees were almost completely bare by Wednesday. Spring moves along quickly!

Our journey continued through the park...

We passed this pine tree, which was 50 years old when planted in 2008 to commemorate cultural exchanges between children of South Korea and China.

We found a koi pond and heeded the signs to not feed them...especially since all we had to offer were goldfish crackers.

Two paths diverged in a wood...

...and since they both led here, we chose the shorter one! This climbing sculpture is awesome!

Michael made some new friends on the first day's climb and romp at the large kid area:

And had some fun in a cement tunnel:

He was eaten by a snake..

...but soon conquered it.

Glad we didn't meet any of its live cousins...or bees.

We tried to visit the deer to feed them, but that section was closed.

That didn't keep me from leaning over the gate to take this photo, however.

On our second visit, we met up with some friends and actually managed to get the kids together for a nice photo:

No deer this day, but the bunny area was open. Unfortunately, they did not stand a chance against...

...the exercise equipment. It's always a hit.

Hold on!

At this point, we said goodbye to our friends and headed into the Bug House (yes, there's one of those, as well!)

He was very concerned that this bee was not moving. That made for an interesting talk about things being alive and dead...oy.

The chipmunk was alive, thankfully.

The butterflies were not, but he was happy to be one for them.

And then we found the butterfly house, so all was right again.

The last room in this building had an assortment of reptiles, arachnids, fish, and amphibians. The tortoises, iguanas, and even this tarantula, lost all appeal once we found the pool of crabs and tadpoles.

It took quite a bit of doing to pull him away from there, since it was pretty cool to see all of the tadpoles with legs sprouting.

Hope you enjoyed our spring tour!