Sun Cheon - Eco Geo Garden Expo

Two Saturdays ago my friend Jess and I decided to take an adventure. We went to SunCheon for a project called Eco Geo that I had seen on a water bottle. It was a garden expo and we really didn't know much about it except that we wanted to try it out and that it would have flowers.

I met her over by GNU and we took a cab to the train station nearby because we didn't know exactly where it was. She told the cab driver the name of the station then went "chuga chuga" like the American sound for a train. The cab driver laughed and pantomimed that that is the sound for brushing your teeth. The sound for a train is "chick chick bok" or something like that. When we got to the station, the ticket guy was really nice and told us to have fun and exactly where to go in the station. The train was fun because we usually travel by bus here. The AC on the train was nice and we chatted for the hour and a half ride. When we got off the train they had a trick art display at the bottom of the escalator. A man was there and we asked him to take a picture of us. Then Jess asked if he wanted her to take a picture of him. He then pulled me over into the picture with him. It was very strange.

Riding the train! The one there was pretty empty but the one home was filled with middle school boys who must have been on some sort of field trip.

Jess catching a fake train in India?

Us and Marilyn.

After the pictures, we found an information desk and the woman there was also really helpful and nice. She told us where to go to get the bus to the expo. We found the bus and asked the driver who was really funny and then when we was explaining things in Korean, he said there were foreigners on the bus and asked someone to explain things to us. A nice lady across the aisle told us which stop to get off on and where to buy tickets. So far our day was awesome!

It was sort of hard to miss this bus.

When we got there, the tickets were a bit higher than we had expected and both of us said we were glad that other friends didn't come with us. It was also really really hot. We started off in a garden area that was in a huge greenhouse type thing. They had like backyard gardens from different countries set up. It was cool except they all had these little paths and benches, but you couldn't walk in or sit on any of them, so it was weird.

In front of the gate

Flowers have feelings and feel pain you know.

Me and a waterfall

The most sexual coconut (according to the sign). The nuts look like ladies' butts and the stems look like male parts.

Hawaiian garden? I like the chandelier made from wine bottles.

After that we walked toward the water and got sprayed with a mister fan. We also got some waters and carried those around with us because we had both already started sweating. We sat down and made a plan to go to a hedge maze, walk around the different country gardens and go to the wetlands area. I wanted to see the wetlands because I had seen a picture online and they looked really pretty. We started up to the maze and on the way stopped off to take a picture with our heads in police officer bodies. The man who took our picture tried to be all professional about it and we were just like - click it! Then he caught up to us again and asked if we were German. We said no, but then decided that if anyone asked again that we'd be German for the day. No one else asked.

I am a Korean police man

Hills with twisty walking paths and the central pond

We found a rose garden and the maze was next to it. The maze was slightly disappointing in that we made it to the center and out again in less than 10 minutes. It wasn't that complicated.

Giant wire cats in the rose garden because why not?

This is what the maze looked like

This rabbit was in the center of the maze. He wanted to hold hands, so I obliged.

After the maze we decided to cross the bridge over the center pond instead of going around. We also took jumping pictures (a typical Korean pose) while on the bridge. Jess loves to take jumpers, but says her face always looks crazy.

My ups aren't so good - this is about as high off the ground as I go.

Jess got some more air

We were both super sweaty at that point and stopped to get some more waters and Jess got a slushie. We sat under an umbrella for maybe 10 minutes then continued to the Dutch garden - complete with windmill and fake wooden shoes!

Wooden shoes! I was so distracted by these that I didn't even think to take a picture where it looks like I am turning the windmill.

After that, we walked through some tree lined path that had lots of photo spots. While we were on the path, a lady stopped us and told us to fill out postcards and that they'd be mailed anywhere. So we each wrote one to our parents. Who knows if they will get there, but mom, I did send one!

I am an angel :)

Sending my post card with the lady who helped us

Heart within a heart

Sideways heart - Jess kept yelling change and then would take another picture. Some were cute. Others...not so much.

Blowing on some pinwheels made from grass.

Walking on train tracks. When I passed the bar, the guy in the hut yelled at me. It scared me because I didn't see the guy in the hut!

 After the posing, we found what was marked on the map as the wetlands. It was not what I was expecting. It was basically a marsh. We did see some cool rock speakers though. Then we walked back and decided we were about ready to go. We started walking to the opposite exit when I saw some really cute swings. Anyone who knows me, knows I love a swing. Plus these were shaded and in a little secluded area, so we decided to sit down and swing for a bit. This was fun and breezy, but when I stood up, my butt was covered in sweat. I told Jess that it probably looked like I had wet myself. She said, 'It can't be that bad" then I turned around and she went "oh...well maybe people will think that's just what your shorts look like." I appreciated her attempt to make it better. They dried fairly quickly though.

This makes me look like I have a tiny head. Perspective is dumb.

Then we crossed what was called the "Bridge of Dreams". It had all these tiles that kids had drawn. I think they were supposed to draw what their dream job was, because there were lots of teachers and doctors. But then other kids just drew random stuff like animals and Harry Potter. They also had TV stationed at random areas that showed you and then someone at other TV location.  It was kind of neat because we kept getting to the TVs at the same time as another group of people so we kept seeing each other.

There were 2 sides to the bridge and each had 2 walls like this. So there were thousands of these tiles.

Jess and I are in the left TV. Our TV stalkers are in the other one. We never actually saw them, but we looked!

When we decided it was time to go get food and rest because we were both exhausted from the heat, I finally saw the wetlands I saw in the picture - it was the Korean experience and was on the opposite side of where we came in. I was too tired and hot to go over there, but it was pretty from where we were.

We then hopped in a cab, thanked him for the AC, and went back to the bus terminal. We looked all around for some food, but they didn't have much. We settled for a coffee shop and got a really good sandwich and coffees. Then we caught our bus with a few minutes to spare and looked at our pictures and chatted until we made it home. Both of us were almost punch drunk from being so tired/hot. We said goodbye and I caught another bus home. The rest of the day/weekend is in the previous post.

Saturday Night and Sunday

On Saturday morning, I met my friend Jess and the 2 of us went to Sun Cheon for a garden expo. That is another post that is coming soon because Jess took most of the pictures on her camera and she's giving me a CD next week, so that post will be out of order, but it's worth the wait for pictures :)

As background however, just know it was crazy hot on Saturday and the amount of sweat that I was covered in was not pretty. When I split up with Jess once I got back to Jinju, I went home and Dallas was there waiting for me to go to the gym with him. For some reason I thought this was an ok idea - I think the heat made me delusional or something. So we went to the gym and I did the treadmill and some abs for about an hour. Then we went back to my house and got ready to go out.

For some reason Dallas has been wanting to do my hair, so I went ahead and let him. It's not like I can do anything with it. He used product and tried to make my hair curly. It sort of worked. We went to Urban Drink and ate a salad and had a drink and people watched for a couple of hours. It was a very chill night and we chatted for awhile about real life stuff and it was nice. Then we took pictures with this wall art.

My pupils get crazy big

Bar art. We did take a picture making the same face, but it was really dark...and not cute.

The next morning I finally made the Reese's peanut butter cup muffins that my aunt sent me in March. They tasted like cupcakes. So we had cupcakes and coffee for breakfast and then left for church. On the way there, we stopped under the flower arbor so Dallas could take my picture because he said I needed a new profile picture for facebook.

Sharing Korean style

They just opened up a Starbucks next to my house. This is good/bad news.

After church, a big group of us went to Mom's Touch for lunch/dinner. It's sort of like a KFC, but better. I hadn't had fast food of any time for a long time, so Dallas and I opted to go for a baked chicken thing and split it. It was still a little greasy, but better than a fried filet. We stayed and talked and played with babies for a long time. I know it's still 3 months away (yikes!) but I am really going to miss my IEC family when I go back home.

"Summer Camp" - first 3 weeks

Starting on July 22nd, we started "summer intensive session" at school. What this means is that while students are on summer vacation from public school, they come earlier in the day everyday instead of a couple of times a week after school. This is both good and bad. It's good because I'm not bored at work. It's bad because I have lots of classes. It's good because I (sort of) get off earlier. It's bad because I have to go to work earlier.

The original schedule had me going to work at 9, starting classes at 9:30, with an hour (more or less depending on the day) lunch break around noon, then going home just after 6:30. This wasn't a bad idea, even though it's early. That was the schedule for the first week. Then, last week, the schedule got even weirder because high schools started regular classes at different times. So to allow for all students to be able to come to class, the high school students and my adults are coming at "regular" times - meaning from around 7:30 -10pm. So...everyday except Wednesday, I finish at 5, go home for 2-4 hours, then go back to work for 50 minutes to an hour and a half. So I'm at work from 9 until 10 with random breaks.

The day before camp, my boss called me to tell me that my co-worker Lucy "broke her butt". Lucy and I texted each other and basically what happened was that she was walking near a stream, slipped on a rock, and fell on her butt. She actually broke her sacrum. She was in the hospital for a week, now she's at home. She then had an infection in her toe and couldn't move it, but they put her on an antibiotic for that. The doctor told her it will take 6 months to totally heal the bone. Right now, she's only allowed to stand, walk short distances and lie down. She can't sit or drive or exercise. When he first called, I thought my schedule was going to be awful. Luckily, he hired a temporary teacher for camp. Her name is Ruth and she's a student at the teaching college here. She's really sweet.

Classes are going well, but I feel like I'm constantly on the go. I don't really have breaks except for lunch time. Like I said earlier, in lots of ways this is good because I don't really get bored at work. But I'm tired! Another good/bad thing about the schedule change is that because I'm going to work early, it means I can't go to my dance class. I've been going for 5 months now and I do miss going. To compensate for missing that, however, I joined a gym. Dallas was nice enough to join with me and "train" me. We get up at 6 and meet at the gym around 6:15. We work out - cardio or weight training - for about an hour then go back to my house and make breakfast and eat together. It's been really nice. The second week was the best because Dallas was on vacation, so he didn't have to leave to get ready for work and would do the dishes after cooking too! I told another friend about it one day and she said I was lucky. I know I am and I seriously will need to hire a cabana boy (which is what I have dubbed him) when I get home and win the lottery.

We've also been having lunch regularly and cooking dinners. One day I got home from work and he had already made dinner and had it waiting for me - chicken with pineapple and broccoli! We're trying to eat healthier but there have been a couple of days where I think we've cheated pretty badly. Then again, overall we've eaten much better. One bad thing, that I really need to work on, is coffee. They just opened a Starbucks next to my house - like within a 2 minute walk. There are already 4 other coffee shops that are about that close too, but Starbucks has nonfat milk. I buy coffee at least 3 times a week - that's what I need to cut down on.

We got some kimbap last week and it looked so pretty I had to take a picture.

Found this beer called "Bob's Your Uncle" at e-mart. I didn't buy any, but I took a picture because, well, Bob is my uncle.

Two Wednesdays ago I went to dinner (well I just had a beer because I ate at home first) at a new Irish pub called "Diddly Bop". The beer was ok and apparently the food is pretty good. After that we went to a norebang and sang for 2 hours as a group. It was pretty fun! Hopefully I'll have pictures sometime soon. Last Thursday, I met my friend Kylie for dinner and we went for Vietnamese - she, Dallas and I split banana rolls, pineapple fried rice and pho. Then we went for coffee and the guy basically screwed up our order, but all of us are pretty lax and just rolled with it. It was pretty funny trying to figure out whose coffee was supposed to be whose though.

Norebang snacks

Last Sunday we had a planning team meeting for church. Elder Kang had it at his house and he has one of the nicest houses I've seen. It seriously looks like a museum. I couldn't get a good picture because I didn't want to be rude or weird. They fed us dinner too - lots of dinner. First was sushi, fried chicken, mushrooms and salad. Then we had rice and special soup (which I like a lot). Last we had fruit and I ate a ton of cherries. Here's what the table looked like when we walked on - sorry it was the best I could do.

This was a facebook picture from Jamie - these are 3 kids from church - the 2 Korean girls are sisters and drew pictures of Olivia!

I know this isn't great, but there is the mushroom salads and chicken - 3 settings, one for each table section.

Song Jeong beach

Dallas and I had high asperations and set alarms for 8am to work out before we went to the beach. However, when the alarm went off, we decided that wasn't a good idea and went back to sleep for another half an hour. Then Dallas made breakfast and we got ready for the beach.

We got on a bus to Namhae around 10:30, then got tickets for the local bus to the beach. It was pulling out of the terminal when we ran out and both of us made sad puppy faces and the driver stopped and let us on. Dallas showed him a message asking him to tell us when to get off for the beach and he nodded.

Us on the bus - me with neon nails and coffee.

Getting ready for naps

We got to the beach around 12, rented an umbrella and tubes and put on sunscreen. We waited for about 10 minutes then hopped in the water. We swam out to the buoys and floated and played around out there for about an hour. Before we went back to the beach for lunch, we decided to work out a bit. First Dallas pulled me and the 2 tubes for a couple of buoys. I held onto his feet so he could only use his arms. Then I pulled him back the other way, except for a shorter distance. By that point we were both hungry and decided to get out. Plus, Dallas got stung by something on the wrist. We didn't see any jellyfish, but there was a mark, so something got him. We sat on our mat and ate PB&J sandwiches and part of an egg wrap thing from Paris Baguette. Then we resunscreened and walked down the beach. While we were in the water earlier, we saw this really cool tube called a "Fly Fish" and checked to see how much it cost to ride. We made a deal that if it was less than $30 we'd ride it. It was $30 per person, so we said no, although it did look really cool.

This is the left edge of the beach. Pretty sure that river is sludge from the shower room. But I just pretend it isn't.

Eating sandwiches. He's not sad, he's squinty. And trying to get David Beckham hair...it's not quite there yet.

After checking that out, we walked to the other side of the beach, which is like a 5 minute walk. The beach itself is a decent size, but there isn't much else there besides the beach. So we just grabbed the tubes again and went back in. This time we decided to stay in the surf and play in the waves. The disadvantage of this is that we were surrounded by people and kept running into them or being run into. I made Dallas laugh really hard one time when I went heels over head and flipped over on a wave - it hit me exactly at the right point in the break. He made me laugh by saying the waves were big. Then I remembered he's from Texas and is used to lakes. We played for a long time. He spun me in the tube into waves and we rode the tubes like boogie boards. Then we played some tube wars and sumo wars. One guy thought it was hilarious when he spun me into a wave and I flipped. Dallas tried standing on the tube and made it up once or twice for like a second before busting. The saddest part of the day was that we forgot the waterproof case so we could take water pictures. We need to remember it for the next beach trip.

Not sure if this guy knew he had been buried. He was like that for a long time.

Typical Korean beach attire - clothes, life jacket, sitting in a tube with a regular umbrella under a beach umbrella.

After we stayed in the tubes and played for a few more hours, we decided to get ready to go. They had some shower rooms, which cost $2 to use. It was a lot more uncomfortable than I was imagining. I guessed it'd be similar to a sauna...not so much. There is a curtain blocking it from the outside, then a wall with baskets where you put your bags etc. Then around the corner is a ring of showers. It felt very high school locker room, but full of totally naked Korean women and children. I, of course, was the only foreigner. I got moved from one shower to another and then stared at for awhile, so that was fun. The worst part was actually getting dressed because the area is so crowded like you have to reach over people to grab underwear and stuff, then the floor is wet and sandy, so you have to be careful not to drop anything. But I did feel cleaner than riding home in a wet bathing suit.

After showering, we walked back to the main parking lot where there was an information stand to ask where we were supposed to pick up the bus back to the terminal. The 4 college kids there thought the whole situation was hilarious for some reason, but one guy was sort of normal and was able to explain that we had to walk up the hill and wait up top. The bus wasn't coming for about 40 minutes according to him, which was good timing because it probably took us 15-20 to walk up the 2 hills. The bus stop was on the wrong side of the street from the direction we needed to go, but we didn't know what else to do, so we stayed there and ate the rest of the pb&js. Then the bus came and we ran across the street to get on it. Very strange and totally something that would not happen in the states - running across a street on a corner with no crosswalk or lights or anything.

View of Song Jeong beach from the bus stop

Me with wet hair waiting for the bus with D, who looks like he used Sun-In but is such a baby that he doesn't even understand that reference.

This is the bus stop. It stopped across from this, not near the crosswalk. Not sure if you can see, but where that blue sign is, the road splits, so cars were coming from 3 directions.

View from the bus - it is a really pretty drive.

We made it back to the terminal where we got tickets home, an ice cream and nail polish. Dallas also found some owl shorts that are so ridiculous that they're awesome.

We got off at the first stop on the GNU side of town and went to Valance Burger for dinner because neither of us had had a burger in a long time. Then we met up with Cody at Urban Drink for a drink and a chat. We left around 11:30 because we were both exhausted. I love the beach and wish we had more days/opportunities to go!

Ups and Downs (this was started 3 weeks ago, but I'm leaving the title since it's how I felt at the time)

I've been in sort of a funk this week (and that week was actually the third week in July). I've had ups and downs. Dance class has been awesome and I feel great after I finish it - that has been a motivating factor in me getting out of bed in the morning. Not that I'm depressed, I just don't feel like doing anything.

On Tuesday I made myself get up and cook because I bought chicken and veggies and they were going to go bad. I made lemon chicken in my toaster oven and green thai curry with tomatoes, chicken and zucchini. Both were actually pretty good. Dallas ate some of the curry.

Wednesday we had a new boy in dance class. He came with his girl friend and the two of them are English students at a local university so they talked to me and Krista for awhile. The class was much harder than he was expecting and he was in pretty good shape too. They have switched to the night class apparently and I don't blame them because it has a younger crowd. I got some bad news about summer camp which was frustrating because basically I had a plan set. In retrospect it's not that bad, but it was still annoying. Dallas met me after work and we walked for 2 hours so I could vent.

On Thursday I got more class changes. My adult class, which was 50 minutes, was extended to 90 minutes. I like the two ladies in the class because they are dedicated and teachers so they're actually working and interacting with me. But it's still a long class. After class I went on another walk with D. He worked out at the pull up bars and I continued to walk. I attempted to jog a bit because I want to push myself a little more, but 30 seconds into it my shorts fell off so I stopped that.

I'll start another post about the last 2 weeks right now, but I'll probably post it later this weekend :)

Last weekend in July - Seoul trip

Last weekend Dallas and I went to Seoul. We hadn't been in awhile and wanted to check out some new places and go dancing (there aren't any good places in Jinju). We decided to leave super early on Saturday morning and sleep some on the bus instead of spending money on a hotel room.

We got up at around 5:30 and met at the bus stop. We tried to get an earlier bus, but the next one to have seats was the 7:10, so we sat at the bus station for a little while. We tried to get a coffee somewhere, but none of the close places were open and we didn't want to risk missing the bus. We bought some granola bars for breakfast then got on the bus. The trip wasn't bad and we made it in less than 4 hours. Our first stop was Seoul forest. Neither of us had been there and we wanted to do something outdoorsy since we had so much fun at Olympic park. It was a really hot day, but we found the forest easily from the subway and walked in. We found a community garden and it had what I'm assuming were supposed to be scare crows made out of water bottles and decorated to look like monsters or Harry Potter.

Dallas next to the Seoul Forest sign

A pig with wings

Some really pretty flowers. Maybe some type of lily?

Writing his name with a rock on the arbor.

We tried to find the cafeteria and followed the signs, but we never found it. Instead, we went to a convenience store and bought water and peach frozen ice cubes - they are really good and I want to find them when I go back to the States. We walked around an arbor and saw some fake deer. Then we went into the butterfly house and stayed there for awhile. They had some beautiful flowers and some huge black butterflies that looked like bats when they flew over your head.

Orange flower with black bat/butterfly.

Blue and orange. I like him even if he is wearing Florida colors.

This one "landed" on Dallas's finger.

This white and blue one was really pretty. They had so many colorful flowers in here, but it was kind of steamy.

Then we went to the insect house, which for some reason had catcti, turtles, fish and other random animals, including an Asian chipmunk. It didn't have that many insects, but I was kind of ok with that.

A variation of cacti

Crabs in a topless tank. I almost picked one up but there was a random guy in the room looking at us, so I didn't.

These three turtles were in this pen with a rabbit too. We named them Winston, Harry and Betty. Winston is stepping on Harry's head.

Then we walked around outside again and came across a deer area. They had a stand to buy food for the deer, but it was sold out or broken, so Dallas didn't want to walk through the deer park without food. Instead we walked around it, following a sign to "the Hill of Wind". We passed a fence and a buck with some pretty big antlers came up to it. Dallas gave him some cashews and he let us pet his face and antlers, which really do feel like velvet. We found the wind hill, which wasn't anything except for a slight breeze, sp either we were in the wrong spot or got a bad day. Dallas spun in a circle for a few minutes to make wind. Then we walked down a bridge to a path along the river. We didn't go down to the path because we were both sweaty and hungry. Dallas said if he didn't eat in the next little while he was going to get grumpy and I don't like grumpy D. I know this because my siblings and mom get sort of like that too.

Here's the deer. He was really sweet. And he really wanted those cashews. Hope they are bad for deer.

Dallas spinning on the hill of wind.

Me on the bridge to the river path.

View of the park from the bridge. It didn't look like we could go down to that area though.

View of the river and skyline while we're standing over the highway.

On our way out, we passed this little waterfall called the waterfall of wishes. I had two coins in my purse, so we each threw one and both of us made it into the bowl. Then we walked down a semi-shaded path and back to the subway.

Waterfall of Wishes

We decided to go to a jimjilbang to relax, cool off and eat. On the way, we stopped off at a grocery store. Dallas bought a salad and apples and we ate them on the walk to the spa. We went to one called Spa Garden 5. It was pretty big. We split up for the saunas (because those are separated into women and men since you're totally naked the whole time). We said we'd meet in the co-ed area in about 30 minutes. First I went to the shower area because you're supposed to scrub down before you get into pools or saunas. I forgot shampoo, so I bought a little packet of it and washed everything. Then I got into the cold pool and swam around for a few minutes. There weren't too many people in there, but I was the only foreigner. Two younger girls (maybe 4th or 5th grade) kept looking at me and I have a feeling if I'd stayed in there longer that they would have come over to talk or play with me. The cold pool had some high pressure jets and I stood under them because my thighs were really sore. This was apparently a bad idea because the jets actually bruised me. After the cold pool, I still had about 10 minutes, and I saw a pool labeled "full body massage experience" and how do you pass that up? It was a tiled pool, angled like a hospital bed. You laid down on it and the majority of your body is under warm water. There were jets lined up under both sides of you - shoulders, back, legs. It was very nice and I hit the button three times. While I was being massaged, I saw a women with a waterproof pouch for her phone and I'll try to remember to do the same one day so you can see the inside of the sauna (but no naked pics of anyone :) ).

After the pools and water massage, I got dressed in the jimjilbang uniform of shorts and t-shirt. Then I met Dallas out in the common area. This area was much more crowded than the sauna. There were lots of families just chillin' or couples taking naps. First we sat in massage chairs and did a 15 minute massage for $2 - it was really hard, but felt pretty good. Then we tried to go to the restaurant, but it was closed for an hour. So we went to the snack bar and got juice (literally blended fruit with some ice) - I had strawberry, Dallas had kiwi, and tteokboki to split. After snacks, Dallas gave me a little tour of the spa. It had an ac room, some really hot kiln things, a PC room, and a nail salon. It also had a movie theater with really big leather seats. We tried to go there first, but it was full and they were showing a Korean movie, so we went back upstairs. They had 3 other sauna-type rooms: a wooden room, one that's apparently good for allergies and a salt room. We stayed in each one for about 5 minutes before Dallas got too hot. Then we went into one of these private nook things to try and nap. The nooks are actually a nice idea because they are dark and a little more private than the bigger rooms. The bad part is that people walk over your head so it sounds like a herd of elephants. It was also really hot, so I only slept for 15-20 minutes before it got too hot to sleep.

Me in the salt room lying on a bed of salt rocks in my uniform.

The salt room from where I was lying down to the door.

Me in a nook - you can see the mats and the steps to the platform above me where there are more mats for people to sleep or what sounded like clog dancing.

At that point we decided to get dressed, get dinner then check into our guest house to take a rest before going out later. On the way, we passed a make-up store and got some cheap nail polish because I wanted to paint mine before dancing. We tried to go to On The Boarder because I was craving non-Korean food since we were in Seoul. Unfortunately, the wait was almost an hour and both of us were really hungry. So we decided to go to another place that is sort of other Asian - Vietnamese or Thai fusion I guess. Dallas got chicken pho and I got beef and pineapple with rice noodles. It was really good and made me happy.

After dinner we walked to a graffitti wall, where they repaint every week or so. That day was a cat.
Then we checked into the same guest house that we went to in May. This time we actually stayed in the real guest house instead of getting upgraded. It wasn't as good - the room was a decent size, but had none of the stuff that most motels here have - like shampoo or q-tips. We went out and got some soap and shampoo, then stopped off for coffees. When we went back to the room, the elevator was acting weird and stopped slightly mid-level between floors. So that made us slightly nervous - not nervous enough to walk down the stairs later though. Dallas painted my nails and did a better job than I can do myself, so he's going to be my new manicurist. Not sure he knows that yet. After nails, I took a short nap, then got ready to go out.

Getting eaten by a painted cat.  I have bad hair in the one of me standing normal.

This was our room number - I took a pic for those in the know :)

The nails...and my fat fingers. Anyone know finger exercises?

We went dancing at some clubs. I got a little (and by little I mean a lot) drunk and don't remember a lot of that experience. I haven't felt like that in a long time. I think it was because I hadn't eaten much and drank too fast. At one of the clubs we met some male flight attendants from Ireland and Scotland who lived in Dubai for work. They were really interesting people and were only in town for the one day. That's when I stop remembering. When I woke up in the morning, my face hurt and I figured out why - it was bruised. I apparently fell down really hard on the sidewalk and ended up with a fat lip, black eye and bruise under my eye. I also busted both knees pretty badly too. I actually got pretty lucky because it could have been so much worse. So I'll be more careful from now on. There are some pictures, but I don't want to scare anyone or have one go out in the interweb somehow.

On Sunday, after we woke up and got ready, we walked around looking for food, but nothing sounded good. Then we went to H&M because Dallas can't not go there. He bought some pants that were on sale then we decided to try and find a dog cafe that I had read about. Some tour guide people were on the street and gave us a map and exact directions to the cafe, which was awesome and unexpected. Then we were transported to the world of cuteness.

We walked into Bau House and instantly fell in love. The front area had smaller dogs and a Golden puppy. The back area had bigger dogs and some of the wilder small dogs. We went to the back first to set our bags down. The dogs have the run of the place - they sit on the benches, hop over the tables, sleep on the ledges. We ordered some drinks (because you don't have to pay to go in, but you're supposed to buy a drink), then played with the dogs. Some were super calm and just snuggled with us, like a giant Huskie and an older Golden. Others were nutso and ran all around. We switched to the little dog area for awhile and one of them fell asleep on Dallas's leg. When he got up, the dog moved to me. A Pomeranian crawled into my lap and used my feet as a pillow until I reached for my camera. Then he went all crazy licky and wiggly. The Golden puppy passed out and just let us pet him - he snuggled up on my leg for a little while too.

This is one of the few non-blurry ones because he was so wiggly.

A fat lab, a random black dog and the Huskie chilling at a table.

The black maybe Dachshund on my lab was super snuggly. The what might be a schnauzer was sweet too.

This place was super fun and made me miss my dog and also want to get a million dogs as long as I had hardwood floors and someone who cleans up after them. The other interesting thing about the cafe is that you're allowed to bring your own dogs too. One lady brought her little white dog and he hated it and wouldn't leave her side. Another couple brought their two either Huskies or Akitas who were perfectly trained and beautiful. It was still weird and I would never bring my dog - partly because she's a moron and would just eat everyone's snacks off the tables. Before we left, we used the lint rollers to try and remove some fur, but I still had some when we left. I'm definitely going back when I go to Seoul again.

After the dog cafe, we were really hungry and decided to go back to On The Boarder for lunch/dinner. It was really good - I had a chicken quesadilla and guacamole, which I miss! After lunch, we went to the bus station and got tickets to go home, then got some drinks and sat at a coffee shop close to the terminal. The terminal wasn't air conditioned and we had like 40 minutes to wait. My lemon tea was super strange - carbonated somehow and too sweet, so I couldn't really drink it. Both of us fell asleep on the way home - I was actually able to lie down so I actually slept instead of that weird half awake/half sleep state.

It was a really good weekend, even though I don't remember part and ended up with a busted face. Next time I'll watch myself! It hasn't been a week yet and already my face is almost healed, so I'll be ok, even though my boss and co-worker are worried about scarring, but I think they're just being overprotective. I love weekends when I find/try new things, and this one was full of that.