The Sunnyside of Seoul

The day has finally arrived when the rain has departed and the sun has moved in, praise the lord! It has been over a week since my last blog and I am happy to report it has only rained once, and only for a brief amount of time. Now for those of you following my blogs this is HUGE! The temperatures have begun to fall slightly and we are finally without all the humidity. It is currently a comfortable 85 with most mornings averaging the upper 70's. 

Since David has been working away I decided last week that I would do a little exploring and take Bear on a hike. I found Mount Achasan online, did some research on how to get there and decided to leave on Thursday morning. Now Bear had never been on a hike before so this was all very exciting for him. It was about a 20 minute subway ride and another 25 minute walk to the trail but it was well worth it. The trail took us up above the city where you could see the most incredible view of the river. It was mainly dirt paths with a bit of rock mixed in. Surprisingly Bear did amazing and walked the majority of the time. We even managed to find a little stream where he was able to drink some water. At the top of mt. Achasan we located yet another temple and a really nice lounging gazebo that puts you up above the tree line. The weather was a bit hot that day so by the end of our hike Bear and I were quite tired. I will mention though that we found the Koreans extremely helpful along our journey. When we first started out a very nice Korean man lead bear and I up the mountain and showed us where all the good trails were. He even gave Bear some water and offered to carry his Carrier. Two other Korean men also came up to us later on and tried to strike up a conversation and play with Bear. Had we been back in the states I would have been a lot more alarmed however Korea is much different. People here will bend over backwards to help you and ensure that you are enjoying their country.

On Sunday morning David and I tried our second church out and had a really great experience there. We went to Seoul Union Church which is designed specifically for expats and foreigners. It also just happens to be the oldest Protestant church in all of Seoul, founded in 1886. The church is now a non-denominational, English service lead by a rev. Prince from Africa. While the preacher wasn't the most charismatic teacher he certainly had some wonderful insight about the scriptures and used at least ten different scripture verses during his sermon. The best part about our experience there had to do with the people. The moment we stepped into the chapel we were greeted by four or five different people. Most of them were teachers or missionaries from the states and were very quick to offer their emails and any support we needed. After the service lunch was provided downstairs (lunch takes place once a month) and we were able to meet with some more members and mingle. We were very fortunate to have hit it off with a new couple from New Zealand. They arrived in Seoul only days before and were in much the same position as David and myself. They are a younger couple so we are excited for the opportunity to go out with some people our own age. We also met a really interesting Korean native. At the age of eighty he looks and sounds as if he is only 65. He was extremely friendly and was super excited to tell us about how he once lived in Houston and still remembered all of the sites. We too had traveled to his hometown of Jeonju so he was even more excited. We sat and talked to this man for at least a half an hour and he made us promise to return next Sunday.

Well that is about all of the exciting new stories in our lives except for the fact that we have resumed our Korean language training. We are taking two hour sessions twice a week with a Korean woman names Isabel-that would be her English name that is. We had our first session last night and all I will say is that the woman is a tornado of energy but we hope to learn a lot from her!

Enjoy and God Bless