So far in 2012. . .

One day we went to Busan.  Maybe it was my first or second or so weekend back here in Korea.

We woke up and decided that we were bored and it was time to go somewhere.  We went to the train station and asked for three tickets for the first train out of there.  They asked us where we wanted to go and we shrugged and said that it didn't matter.  They laughed like crazy and gave us a choice between two places we had already been, so we chose the beach.

Busan.

On the bus to destination unknown.

Bound and determined to find something awesome.

At the train station, eating Oo-dong noodles.  Cheap and delicious!

On the train to Busan.  The only way to travel.

Anriette, ready for trouble.

We left a little later than we planned so here is the sun setting against the ocean.

Isn't it pretty?  And only about an hour from us :-)

Sunset against huge apartments.

So, we went to Busan and had a lovely time.  Then we came back and had to go to work for a bunch of days in a row.

That's pretty much how it worked around here.  Work all week and then go somewhere on the weekend, or sleep, or something.

But, now there's a new schedule.

We decided it was time to get serious about some things, namely, going to the gym and getting ready for our black belt test next month.  So, now we have a very strict schedule that we follow everyday, and Anriette thought it would be a good idea to take some photos, so here it is, our daily lives these days.

7:20am on a freezing cold morning, on the way to meet Lindie at the corner on the way to the gym.

Anriette in her cold weather wear for the long trek to the gym.

Not feeling it this morning. . .so cold and early.

It takes about 15 minutes or so to get to the gym.  Every morning we stop at this little convenience store called GS25 and get a few supplies, as you can see.  Dr. You breakfast bars, water, Hot 6 (like Red Bull) and this juice I love called "Salad Juice" that is kind of like V8 Splash.

Every morning.

This is the corner right outside of the GS.  This is Babo Street, which means Idiot Street, and is where all the university students go to get drunk and, well, act like idiots, I guess.

The view from behind us, the English Cafe is right there on the right, where we used to study Korean.

Almost there, this is the last crosswalk before the University, Anriette beat the light, but I guess Lindie and I were too slow.

Here is the main entrance to the University of Ulsan, where the gym is.

See?  University of Ulsan! :-)

Here is the gym!  Kinda pretty, isn't it?

Here is the lobby.  It's very shiny.  It's also the last thing we thought we could safely take photos of.  Here, they scan your card and give you work out clothes and a towel.  Then you walk through the endless locker room/shower room which is usually filled with naked women of all ages just, well, being naked.  Then you walk up the stairs and get to the pretty awesome work out room and we stretch then start kicking it hard.  :-)

 After the gym Anriette and I take off for the next 15 minute or so walk to the taekwondo gym.  This particular morning it was a little messy, so, we took a few minutes to get it straightened up.

Beating the mess with a padded bat thingy.

We take this stuff REALLY seriously.

That's what she gets for being flippant.

Kimchi!

Time to get started.

Master Jack and I. . .waiting for the rest of our class.

So, that's what we do Monday through Friday.  Now, on Saturdays we have a special sparring class, which is really just a kicking our butts cardio class with some fighting at the end.  Sometimes, after we get run ragged, Anriette and I stay after and practice some random things.  This particular Saturday we didn't have a scheduled class, but we convinced him to give us a key and let us practice on our own, since our apartments aren't big enough and it's still too cold outside.

So, last Saturday we got to class, unlocked the door and walked inside.  It was a wreck!

What even is all of this stuff???

So we spent a while straightening, vacuuming, and mopping.

All clean!  Time for work!

So, we did.  For a couple of hours.  Just practicing random stuff in our own studio.  Awesome.

BUT

Last Monday there was a special surprise while we were at the gym which caused us to go rushing out before we really did anything:

Woo hoo!!  Snow!!

Big, fat, lovely flakes of snow!

:-)

We stood out there for just a little while and it really started piling up.  We were having sweet dreams of a snow day. . .

First snow! :-)

Look at these snow flakes, man!

Getting ready for a snow ball fight.

I think snow on bamboo looks really amazing :-)

Snow :-)

Annie's first snow angel ^^

It started to really slow down, but we still wanted to make the most of it, so we skipped taekwondo and walked all over town looking for a good place to throw snow at each other.  After it nearly stopped we realized we were starving and walked to the grocery store to buy some bacon.  I haven't had bacon that wasn't from McDonald's in Korea yet, but it sure sounded like a good idea to me.  So, we loaded up on home-style breakfast foods and headed back to my house.

Lindie on bacon duty, and I'm on eggs.

Bacon and little sausages.

Look at this breakfast :-)  OJ, cheesy scrambled eggs, pinapple, bacon, sausages, kiwi, toast, and my mom's home made jam :-)  Awesome.  Then. . .we had to go to work.

It's Saturday morning now, and I'm getting ready to go to sparring class.  Our black belt test is on March 27th and we're starting to get nervous.  We were on a really good schedule but then I hurt my ankle, Anriette hurt her knee and now I have a cold.  We are tragically fragile creatures.  But we will get there :-)

But that's most of what we've been doing lately.  Thank you for reading :-)

The night we thought we were hairdressers. . .

Ji Young has been beyond a faithful friend to us since we met her, and she has been our lovely, creative and ever-patient hairdresser since about two weeks after that.

Remember these times?

Way back in the day, Summer of 2010. . .wow.

The red. . .that's still there!  :-)

These do's are really still with us. . .

Then our part two about a week later.

Make it darker!

Make it redder!

Watch the evolution. . . :-)

And then there were the more recent times. . .this was a week before Christmas. . .this isn't even close to a decent sampling of the times poor Ji Young has done our hair, but here is the most recent adventure with Ji Young.

Make her blonde!

Her too!

And her!

We thought, surely, we'd seen it enough that we would be able to take a good crack at it ourselves.  Also, we're pretty free and loose with our hair so it wasn't too much pressure on us or each other. . .Lindie heard about a place in the downtown area that would mix color for you, so she checked it out and got some lovely bleach for some lovely blonde hair.  Ji Young had bleached most of it but she still had some purple at the bottom, and she knew that she probably couldn't get it all out, but she wanted to give it a try so I bleached it for her. . .it looks pretty cool, just you wait.

We went to the store together a few days later and got several boxes of bleach, a bottle of reddish/brown for Anriette's low lights, and a bottle of purple for me.  On our way back from downtown I told the girls that I bet we wouldn't be done until 2am.

No way, they said, it will be much sooner than that!

We begin with 8 boxes of bleach, a bottle of color, a bottle of manicure, gloves, pre-cut foil, combs, bowls, brushes, the works, at 20 to 6.

Look. At. This. Hair!  So long!  Now, remember, we needed low lights, highlights, and (eventually) purple.  So much to do!

Not sure what she's so nervous about, we are more than qualified!  

So, we get started, low lights and foils, and fear and trepidation.  

Part 1: basic success :-)

Part 1 finished, washed and dried.  On to the next!

I needed my roots done and wanted purple put in underneath, because it's just been such a long time since I had more than one color in my hair (except for the red/pink of course. . .)

Here's what I did to Lindie.  And also, she's wearing my glasses for some reason.

While I was busy washing the bleach out, Lindie got started on Anriette's second low lights, and ended up doing pretty much everything else for the rest of the night, which was good, because I was way too nervous to do it for some reason.  This is NOT the purple, by the way, this is the reddish/brown. . .that just sort of changed color after it was exposed to air. . .

My roots: done.  Anriette's first and second batch of low lights:  done.  Check the time.  Still so much left to do!  :-)

Here comes the purple!

Anriette did an amazing job making sure that not a stray purple strand touched anything.  That stuff was strong and fast-acting!  And smelled like grape baby cough syrup.

Purple!

That didn't take too long, time for a wash!

It's time for Anriette's highlights now!

This is poor Anriette after she called every single restaurant in Mugeo Dong trying to get someone to deliver to us, but they were all closed early because of the holiday.

Check.  The.  Time.

Then Anriette and I put more purple in. . .then washed and dried again.  And here's how we ended up!

Look how colorful!

Look how bright!

Look at the time!  :-)

I've decided to punish all of you with a slide show :-)

It's been forever, there's really no point in apologizing for it. . .but I made a slide show of. . .basically everything that has happened since the last blog.

The slide show covers Anriette's birthday, my green belt, our purple and blue belt tests, Cheusok, dinner parties, and tons of other things.

The updates, in short, are that the past several months have been really amazing.  Albert is going home soon (NOOOOOO!)  Rob is also leaving :-( but Lindie is moving back to Mugeo, so that will be pretty awesome.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I'm going home for Christmas in exactly a month!

Of course, there's a lot more than that. . .but that is the VERY short story.

Here are some great pics of some really awesome times in Korea :-)

The songs are Starlight, by Muse, Don't Stop Believin', by Journey (both of which we make habits of singing almost every time we go to a singing room. . .which is up to about 436 times at this point) and Russian Unicorn by Bad Lip Reading, which isn't exactly a song but is still awesome.

Sorry guys.