Happy Lunar New Year!

This past weekend I celebrated Lunar New Year, also known as Seollal, here in Korea. Soellal is the beginning of the Lunar calendar. Koreans also celebrate solar New Years Day on the Gregorian calendar, which is January 1st. This is the day when everyone turns a year older. To explain this, the minute a baby comes out of the womb they're already 1-year old. Then at the turn of every new year, they become a year older. Sounds complicated, but it's very interesting. 

Thanks to this holiday, I had a 5-day weekend. It was such a great weekend to just relax and hang around Seoul. On Sunday, I went to The War Memorial of Korea in Seoul.  This is one place that I've been wanting to go to for the last six months. It was a really great museum/memorial dedicated to all of those who fought!

After the Memorial, I went to Gwanghwamun and did a little sightseeing. I saw the statue of King Sejong. King Sejong invented the Korean alphabet, known as hangul. I also saw the statue of Yi Sun-sin, who was a Korean naval commander during the Joseon Dynasty.

king sejong

Yi Sun-sin

That same night, a couple of friends and I went to the restaurant On The Border. I've never been to this restaurant in the states, but I heard rave reviews about how much it tastes like the On The Border back home. All I can say is that I don't think I've eaten that much food, nor have I drank so much tequila since I've been in Korea. It was blissful!

coronarita

Lunar New Year was officially celebrated on Monday, the 23rd. I decided to cross another thing off my bucket list for Korea and that was to go to a jimjilbang. A jimjilbang is a Korean style spa with saunas, hot/cool tubs for bathing, and body scrubs. Because these operate 24 hours, many people will go for a cheap place to sleep. Yes...sleep! They have mats, TVs, and a food area. The cost is about $8 and includes a "not so hot" outfit for you to wear and unlimited access to all that I mentioned above. Unfortunately no one was giving massages the day I went, but after spending a few hours in the saunas my skin felt like a baby's bottom.

such hot outfits

all the ladies make these little hats out of towels

As many of you may have already seen, over holiday I decided to take a risk and get myself some bangs. If there's anything the Koreans know how to rock...it's the bangs. 

Later that night I met up with some friends and played Korean monopoly. It was a little different then the normal monopoly I'm used to, but it was still fun. 

While walking around Seoul I had remembered I had forgot to mention one very interesting thing in my posts. Below is a picture of gas masks stored in glass cabinets, called "nation masks". Each of these cabinets are found at every station, because many emergency shelters or "bunkers" are located in the subway. It's very comforting knowing that there are almost 4,000 shelters just in Seoul, but it's also a little distressing at the same time.

It was so nice to only have a 2-day work week, but it's going to be brutal to have to work five days in a row next week. Next weekend I'll be going down to Haeundae Beach in Busan for my Birthday. I've recruited some really great people to join and can't wait to bring back some great stories.


Miss you all more than you know!


-Jenn x0x0