Everyday Adventures

Bee and I went out today for a few different activities. On the subway we decided to take the more adventurous, less known way to where we were going for dinner rather than the simpler but slightly longer way. As we were leaving the station where I thought we were going to get off we ran into a spontaneous adventure. The escalators at many of the subway stations are motion activated to save energy. This particular stop was not all that busy and the escalator was not on as we approached it. The sensor to activate it and set it in motion is located 3 or 4 feet in front of the escalator on the corral fence that funnels people into the narrow escalator steps. The sensor beam is about two and a half feet off the ground. It is easy to see the sensors if you know what they look like.

So I decided I would see if I could step over it. Have you ever tried to step over an invisible laser?! If you have ever ran out of your garage after pressing the button for it to go down and had to step over the safety sensor you have. I pulled one leg up and over but I was not tall enough to set it on the ground on the other side without disrupting the sensor so I had to do a little hop to switch which foot was off the ground. Then it was easy getting that trailing edge over the beam. Success! I made it over. I feel like a spy! Now it was Bee's turn to get through. Of course she is much shorter than me so there was no way she was going over the top. She decided to go underneath. She gets down on the ground and high-crawls underneath the laser. I did not fully expect her to do so. She is so awesome! I love her!

After we both successfully made it to the other side without setting the escalator in motion I kicked the laser to turn it on because I felt like being lazy and not running up the whole escalator. Half way up we look back to see another person stepping on. If only we had known he was coming; we should have left it off and walked up it to confuse him. Would he have taken the steps seeing that we were on a not moving escalator or would he have just looked at us strangely after tripping the sensor with us already being half way up? We will never know!


Another part of our underground adventures today was several yellow and black signs we saw saying: "Please don't step on it!" That's right, don't step on it!

I am sure we have all seen the warning signs that say "Do not step" or "Stay off" or "Do not climb." Well we are in Korea and it is not uncommon to find sentences and advisories a little off than what we are used to seeing. For instance, I bought a small trash can the other day to use for food waste but on it it says "A new broom sweeps clean windy." I have no idea what it is supposed to say but that is Korean English for you. Every now and then you will see a young Korean wearing shirt with English writing on it and spend ten minutes trying to figure out what the shirt is supposed to be saying. It is rather entertaining.

This warning sign in the subway is just another example. It may look like this ledge needs to be stood upon but "Please don't step on it!" (Don't worry mother, I did not step on it.)

NEW CAR!!

Hunny and I have been car-less for almost two months now. This means that for church and institute or any other adventures, we were banished to the subway. It was okay until monsoon season hit this past week and walking to church from the subway station in the rain is not my idea of fun. We have been looking for a car but not with much zeal or effort. We had checked billboard ads and Lemon Lot but nothing seemed quite right. We really didn't want to spend more then $1200.

When in Korea, you really aren't asking for much. Just something to get us from place to place, and that if it gets banged in the teeny tiny parking space, that's fine. But when we had pasted by the Lemon Lot a few days ago we saw an influx of new cars. We decided to take a look and the first car we checked out said $250 on it. Sold! I was barely skeptical. If it turned out not so hot though we could just sell it to the junk yard for $300. We looked at the rest to make sure that was what we wanted to do. Eh, they were okay, but you can't beat $250. So we called the guy and was able to show us later that day. It was perfect. That was Saturday, so on Monday we met and got paperwork taken care of and the title transferred and drove home in it. I was cheering as we were leaving the parking lot. No more hour bus ride there, hour back, spurts to the commisary and carrying groceries up the hill home. No more hour and a half subway ride both ways to church. No more questioning if we can go somewhere, we can just GO! OH I feel so free!! I think to celebrate Hunny and I are going to the commisary and loading up the car with groceries. Something I haven't been able to do in forever. Yes... I think so. I can't wait. I almost want to pull out the ice cream.

Day Hike

It started with Hunny and I looking for a place to go camping and repelling. In efforts to find a spot, we went hiking. When Koreans go hiking...they go hiking. Koreans love hiking. There are trails everywhere. If you see a mountain you can guarantee there is at least one trail up to the top and on the weekend that trail will be slam full of Koreans in brightly colored outfits, walking stick in hand, hiking up and down its rocky steps. Although...hiking and camping here is a sport for the wealthy. They have the nice gear, walking stick, boots, sun hats, the works. All super expensive! How do they afford to do it?

We started up the mountain. I don't think they know what a switchback is. When they go hiking, it is straight up, and straight down, no matter how steep the mountain. They do have steps at times when it gets seriously steep.

Yeah! Look how far I made it!

Part of the way up I heard English. A big deal for me in Korea. Hunny saw the child that the English had come from and noticed he was wearing an army hat. It was a family we go to church with. We chatted for a while and since they were on their way back, we got some tips on the best places to go. There are a lot of branches if the trails.

Up and up we went. We eventually took a turn that I'm not sure was on the map. But there was a Korean family ahead of us that we were following so we figured it worked. And it did, until the family was gone and we were on our hands and knees crawling up the side of a mountain. We got up pretty high. It was gorgeous! All the mountains here are now full of green, and luscious.

The way back down was the scary part. I was slipping and sliding all sorts of over the place. Thankfully, my Hunny is a very experienced outdoor explorer and knows the ropes. By the end of it, I felt like a pro mountain climber.

Hula Hoop!

Though the day was gorgeous and the climb an adventure, we didn't find the camping grounds. Sad face! We will keep looking which probably means more hiking! :D

ALSO!!! Behind our new home, up the street some, is a trail. How neat! One Sunday afternoon we headed up it. Most of the trail follows the ridge line if that tells you anything. Again, no switchbacks but much less brutal then the first. At a second point, there was some exercise equipment. There was this really neat looking hula hoop. First off, it was HUGE; and secondly, it had these bumps on it. We think it was to make you tense up your abs to work them more. I find it all too funny how Koreans have exercise equipment near the top of a trail. That way you can work out more then just your legs right?

When we made it to the top, as far as we cared to go anyway, we read scriptures. It was so nice and peaceful. What a delightful way to spend the afternoon. We look forward to more day hikes just up behind our house.

A Good Start

So Hunny and I were invited to eat dinner at family's house from the branch after church one day. While conversing, it came up that the husband was interested in and made his own cheese and bread. I have recently been on a huge cooking high and was thrilled to hear this. While discussing this interesting hobby, he offered us some of his sourdough starter. I am about jumping out of my skin in pure excitement at this point.

We were instructed to feed it once a week, flour and water, after dividing it in half. What do you do with the half that's not fed? BAKE IT!! Instead of yeast, use the starter. This was all very new to me and I was super excited to experiment. I feel like yeast is very temperamental and easy to mess up on. Our poor started looked pitiful. It had not been in the fridge for a while after we got it allowing it to rise a bit but when we got home it was placed in the fridge.

A week later when it was feeding time, it looked so very flat. But we attempted to use it anyway. Mind you, this is late Saturday night and the recipe we use required us to continue in the morning before church. Hunny and I threw the ingredients together and Hunny kneaded it. Why would I need a KitchenAid when I have my wonderful husband?

With bread prepped and set aside to rise we decided to start cinnamon rolls for breakfast, being in the bread making mood and a little more comfortable working with yeasts and dough. It was a box that had it's own yeast but it was old and we were afraid it was dead. Fortunately, Hunny had previously bought me my own yeast for my experimenting. Though it was a wee bit more then called for, my research told me that it wouldn't hurt rather, just make it rise a bit faster. Perfect! I would have to say cinnamon rolls were more fun to make. Again, when the hubby is the kitchenaid you can see why. :)

With both batches set to rise over night, or chill in the fridge till ready, we headed to bed. Having to allow time to re-knead, rise, and bake, we set our alarm for 6am. Well, instead of 6, we were alarmed at 8am when we woke. We promptly flew out of bed and Hunny went to work on the breads while I got ready. This is a time when I am glad guys don't take much to get ready. We only had time to bake the cinnamon rolls, mostly because that was too much to pass up and it was to be our breakfast. Unsupervised in order to get ready, they were slightly burnt. But other then that they turned out wonderfully! I would still say what a success! They were perfect! It was somewhat disappointing that they turned out that wonderful but were burned. But I must redeem ourselves by saying we are using a Korean oven. It also acts as a microwave and grill and something else but I don't read Korean. :P

We were able to hitch a ride from some buddies to church and made it in time. We gave them some not so burnt cinnamon rolls as payment and they loved them so it is not just me being biased about our baking skills.

After church and home again we went back to the not yet forgotten bread. The instructions said to allow to rise and when it didn't we... ok I, began to worry. But always calm and cool Hunny plopped it in the loaf pan and turned on the 'ub-un' to bake. We learned with the cinnamon rolls to watch and when the top began to get toasted to quickly, I had read to place tin foil on it. We did, but this made it harder to watch. When we thought it time we pulled it out. I smelled slightly burned smell, and sure enough, the bottom? weird? was burned. It wasn't fluffy but it's not a rock. It's actually really good. I'm proud of how well it turned out considering. We have been using it with everything. I began looking up online if I could make it wheat and I will be buying wheat flour here shortly. ;) I can't wait till next week to have another go. Hopefully we will be making our own bread on a regular basis after a while.

Updates

It has been a super busy month and as a result we have not had much time to write and let you all know what has been going on. The beginning of this month Bee and I moved into a new place. They call it a Ville. It is a three story building and each floor is it's own apartment. You can expect a post about it soon. Right after that, before we even got all moved in I had to go to the field for a few days so Bee was left to her lonesome for the weekend while I was out playing army. I got back from that and went straight into studying for my annual flight examination which I just got done with yesterday so hopefully everything should be settling down for a while.

I wanted to let you know, if you have not yet noticed that we have changed a few things on our site. Two more tabs have been added to the top of the page. One is just an archive of past posts sense the most recent 5 only show up on this this screen. The other is Videos. We have a bunch of videos from our wedding and reception that we added to the site so if you were not able to attend or if you just want to remember the awesome times we had feel free to click over to that tab and check them out. The ones of the wedding day are just random happenings while taking pictures at the temple but the reception ones are entertaining.

Thanks for your interest in our comings and goings. We love you and are grateful for your influence in our lives.

Stick Fighter

So Bee downloaded this app the other day on her phone and showed it to me. It was called Stick Fighter and it lets you make little stick figure animations. It is super cool! She shows the program to me and tells me that she is sure I would enjoy playing with it. She shows me the basics of it and I go to town messing with it seeing what all it does. Well...about 10 minutes later I have this short little movie of about 30 slides. It is nothing special, just me experimenting with moving the guy around. Bee tells me to keep going with it so I do and about 10 minutes and 90 more slides later this is what I end up with. I think there may be more episodes to come but we shall see.