Buddha's birthday and river baseball

I know this post is out of order, and don't worry, I will be posting much more about mom's trip, but I wanted to post this one before I forgot about it (considering I've probably forgotten a bunch of details from mom's trip already).

Today (Tuesday) was Buddha's birthday (or Seokga tanil) and it's a national public holiday in Korea which means all the teachers get the day off from work (and kids too, but whatever). Apparently it was established in 1975 an is based on the lunar calendar so the date changes every year. We went out on Monday night to Jijimi's (the soju slushie place) and I didn't get home until around 3am. This is one of the reasons why I love Korea - on the way home, Liezle wanted some food (rice noodles) and we walked to a place with fish out front, and she went in and said the name of the noodles. It had started to rain at this point, and neither of us had umbrellas. The man in the restaurant, came outside and walked us part way to point out a place we could go, then wanted to give us his umbrella. We didn't take it, but that's what they do - just give people stuff to be nice.

Liezle has joined a gym here and has met a few Korean ladies, one of whom speaks very good English. Her name is JJ (well that's what she calls herself). She invited Liezle (who asked if I could come too) to a temple to show what Koreans do for the holiday. So we got up and met her around 11:30. Liezle and I didn't know what to wear, so we were kind of dressy - they were in jeans and track pants. JJ's husband and sons took her car and met us at the temple. We rode in a car with JJ and her friend Cathy (who also speaks decent English) and Cathy's 6 year old twin daughters. They told us that we were going to a small "house temple" first because less people would be there and it would be easier for us to get lunch.

We walked to the temple and ran into a mass of people. The downstairs area was full of low tables crowded with lots of people and old ladies were walking around serving people. We took our shoes off and went to a table and JJ brought us bowls of bibimbap (which wasn't as good as others I've had) and kimchi and water kimchi (mul kimchi), which was cold and tasted like salt water with cabbage in it. It was actually pretty good with the bibimbap since that needed some salt, and I liked it much better than regular kimchi. Then they brought us bananas and hot rice cakes for dessert to take with us, but neither Liezle or I wanted it, so we tried to leave it on the tables in a way where her friend wouldn't notice. To me, rice cake tastes like glue, so I didn't want it.

People eating at the house temple

Cathy and the twins eating bimbimbap and mul kimchi and bananas

Then we walked upstairs to the temple part. We got mats and were told to bow 3 times. It was almost like a yoga pose - you stand up straight at the end of the mat, put your hands in front of you in a prayer sign, drop to your knees, open your arms with your palms facing up and put them on the floor, then bow your head to the mat and get up "gracefully". I did it with only almost falling once. JJ said that you're supposed to visit a temple at least 3 times a year, but she doesn't usually go. She goes on Buddha's birthday because you get free food. She said she doesn't even believe in Buddha.

Inside upstairs temple at house temple, where we bowed

After the small temple, we went to a temple called "Protector of the Nation" or Hoguk-sa (sa means temple in Korean). It's actually in the back part of Jinju castle, and mom and I didn't go while she was here because I didn't know about it. I will hopefully go back when nobody is around and get some better pictures. They had a lot of lanterns up and a bunch of people eating bibimbap there too. JJ asked if we wanted to eat again, but we were both full. Plus there was a really long line.

Me and Liezle outside the temple gate

People eating outside of Hoguk-sa

Me and Liezle and some lanterns - there are some more pictures on facebook

There was also a line of people drinking "mountain" water that is supposed to be special, but since JJ doesn't believe in Buddha, she didn't drink any (neither did Liezle or I). Then we walked up to the temple proper and monks were leading a prayer of some sort.

Inside of Hoguk - sa with a monk leading a prayer

Liezle and I both washed Buddha in a small tub before the main temple. I took a video of Liezle too, which is posted on facebook, and videos of some random people before I knew I was allowed to try it, but I'm not posting those because you can get the idea from this one, plus there's all the chanting in the background here.

Kid washing Buddha

Then, a Korean lady with a tape recorder started talking to Cathy and asking her questions about the day. Then she asked if she could speak with me and JJ and Cathy translated. So I am going to be on Korean radio I guess. After the monks were done, a large group of women in the traditional hanbok clothes started singing in a smaller temple below the main one. We watched that for a minute and then left to walk around the castle grounds.

On our way out of the temple, Liezle stopped to look at a braclet and the ladies running the stand gave us all coffee. JJ and Cathy said that it normally costs 1000 won, but because of Liezle and me, they also got free coffee. Then we went to the National Museum. Cathy's daughters got some drinks and one of them was "pine bud". They didn't like it so they gave it to me to try, but I didn't know they didn't like it, so when they asked what I thought, I said, "it's good" even though it tasted like drinking a Christmas tree. Then Cathy was like, "we don't like it" and I got stuck with the Christmas tree water.

Pine bud drink, aka, Christmas tree water

I think JJ wanted to show us the 3D movie (which I have already seen), but they ran out of 3D glasses, so instead we walked around and looked at some stuff and then went to the "learning center" where we tried on traditional Korean masks and made "art".

Some traditional Korean masks which are worn at festivals and ceremonies

Liezle and I felt like little kids because the only other people doing crafts were little kids. We got some paper made from rice and/or bamboo, wet the paper on this block pattern thing, then put a towel on the paper and hit it with brushes so it would form to the pattern. Then you take little sacks and dip them in ink and blot it over the pattern - almost like stencils. It was fun.

Hitting towels

The twins ink blotting the patterns before we got some paper

Then JJ asked if we wanted to make a mask (also only little kids were doing this), but Liezle and I had to go because we were supposed to meet Jinju foreigners at the river to play wiffle ball. Cathy then dropped us off and both she and JJ gave us hugs because it was the "American style" of saying goodbye. They were super sweet and we told them thanks a dozen times, and they want us to go with them to other stuff so they can improve their English. Their dream is to go abroad, but their husbands don't want to go and when I said they should just go together and leave their husbands at home, they laughed and JJ said if she did that her husband would divorce her and I'm not sure she was kidding.

Then we went home and got changed and took a cab to the river where we met up with about a dozen other foreigners and played wiffle ball. It was actually more like nerf ball because the balls and bat were padded. I was actually impressed with myself because I never struck out - although I did hit it directly to the same guy about 5 times. I also didn't fall over or injure myself, so I call it success. It was funny too because more than half of the people weren't American (we had 2 Canadians, 2 South Africans, a Scot, a Korean, 2 Irish guys and 6 Americans) and didn't really know how to play. They could hit the ball, but didn't know base running rules. Plus we confused it more because, since there was a limited number of people, we didn't have a first basemen, you just had to get it to the pitcher before the runner made it to first.

Cath up to bat with Sarah pitching - notice how the soccer ball is home plate. We had a towel as first, a Jack Daniel's flag as second and a bag of trail mix as third. We also had a can of Pringles as a temporary second base, but left them there for snack time even after we got the flag.

Rob about to run to first

We started playing on one part of the field near the river and were in the middle of the 3rd inning when 2 older Korean people just came in the middle of the game and started setting up that weird croquet golf game of theirs. Some of the foreigners tried to argue with them, but then Jung wha explained that they reserved that area to play the game, so we moved down to another patch. A bunch of Koreans were walking and riding bikes and would stop to watch us play. One guy sat on the steps behind us for at least 45 minutes watching us. Then a group of kids came over and wanted to bat. So I pitched to them for about 20 minutes. It was a group of about 6 boys - one of whom was carrying a small dog, another of whom was carrying a plastic gun. Our team kicked butt (end score 19-10) and we probably played around 9ish innings (give or take).

Some people stayed by the river and the rest of us walked to the new Mexican restaurant in Jinju (yes, you read that correctly - Mexican). It opened on Friday and is called O'Taco.

Grand opening of O'Taco

Most of the people got take out and went back to the river. Jung wha, Liezle, Jesse, Spencer and I stayed there. I'm not sure if it's because we were foreigners, or because they just opened and want people to come back, but they gave us free drinks (because we stayed instead of getting take out), brought out more free drinks later, and then gave us all coffee mugs when we paid! I had a quesedilla and it was pretty good. Not like Mexican at home, but close enough - and not Korean food. The weirdest part was that it was served with a small salad with a sesame dressing. It was good, but I didn't like the combo of Asian and Mexican, so Spencer ate my salad using tortilla chips to make it Mexicanier.

After dinner we walked to a drug store and got ice cream then met up with another Korean girl (Heejin) at Angels in Us coffee house. We sat there and talked for about an hour, then all the foreigners went home. I am very tired now, but had a great day!