Unexpected weekend in Seoul

In my last post, I mentioned how Jayden had been in a bus accident. On Friday evening, he told us that the doctors were making him stay in the hospital for a week, so he had to reschedule his plane ticket back to Australia. We decided to go and visit him and give him some moral support. Plus, this was one more chance to see him before I go back to the US. We woke up pretty early on Saturday morning and made the trip up at about 8 am. Dallas got us coffees one the way there and for some reason drank his out of the carrying case.

He also wore my UGA hat all weekend because he forgot hair care products :) Go Dawgs!

The ride up was pretty uneventful - or at least I don't remember anything about it. Then we rode the subway for about 20-30 minutes and met Jayden outside of his hospital. He walked out and met us in his hospital pjs. We went back to his room, which is a smallish room with 4 beds (and 4 patients) in it. Under each of the beds was a roll-out bed for family. I'll tell you a little more about his roommates later. We dropped off our stuff and chatted for a little bit.

Around noon (or possibly a little before) his mom came and wanted to take us out to lunch. This was the first time for either of us to meet his mom and she's adorable. She was wearing shorts and talked about how Jayden's dad didn't like it when she did because she was too uncovered. But we said she looked good and she was happy. She took us to get shabu shabu which was really good. I must also mention that J was still wearing his hospital pjs at this point. People just come and go in hospital gear all the time in Korea. It's very strange. At the restaurant, they had these long sticks with what looked like uncooked meatloaf on the table. Once we ate most of the veggies, the waitress came over and used a little knife and made the sticks into meatballs. It was pretty crafty. Then we went to a bookstore to get Jayden some reading materials and Dallas bought the first three books in the Heroes of Olympus series (we read the Percy Jackson series earlier this year and this is sort of a continuation of that). Then his mom wanted to get us coffee or snacks, but we were still really full. So she just got some waters and drinks, then went home.

Shabu shabu with salad and kimchi. Jayden is cooking and you can check out his jammies.

We all felt a little awkward in the hospital room, because other people had family in there and it was slightly crowded, so we decided to leave again - oh and J was still wearing hospital pjs. We went to a cafe and ate patbingsu with fruit and frozen yogurt, then Jayden had to go back and check in at the hospital, but was only gone for a few minutes. When he came back outside, the three of us went on a walk near the Han river, which is the main river that flows through Seoul. The parks/bike paths/walking trails are one thing I will miss a lot when I go home. We have some parks, but you have to drive to get there, while there has always been something within a 15 minute walk from anywhere here.

The path we walked down. It would have been really pretty at sunset.

Us and some flowers

After our walk, we went back to the hospital room. One guy's family was there and he had some super cute daughters who looked at me and Dallas like we were aliens (the youngest ones were probably about 2 or 3). The middle daughter didn't want to leave and asked if she could stay with her dad, but they wouldn't let her. It was very sweet. Jayden got a shot in the butt around then I think and so did two other guys. That's one Korean experience I haven't had yet, but is very common as a remedy for pretty much anything. Cold? Butt shot. Neck pain? Butt shot.

Then Jayden's parents came to the hospital to take us out to dinner. His dad is super cute and shook both of our hands. Neither of his parents speak English and our Korean is limited, so Jayden had to translate a lot. We weren't hungry, plus we felt bad for them paying for everything for us, so Jayden told them to go have dinner and that we would see them tomorrow. We rested for awhile - Dallas fell asleep and Jayden and I chatted, then watched some of a variety show which is pretty funny. One of the other guys came back and he laughed a lot.

The last man (who was across from J) had a meanish wife. Apparently she had been complaining all week about wanting to get this or that or change beds. She was annoying everyone in the room.When all the other patients were in the room, we decided we should leave and go get something light for dinner. Plus, they lock the front door of the hospital at around 10 pm, and we wanted to make sure we were back by then. We ate some cold noodles that had a sauce made from beans. It was ok, but it had chunks of ice in it, so it would have been better without those. Dallas didn't like it much because it was basically tasteless, so he ate some of Jayden's noodles that had clams in it.

When we got back to the hospital, I decided to change into pajamas and the mean lady was actually really nice to me. She offered me shampoo and her shower shoes, but all I was doing was changing. Then she noticed that I'd be sleeping there, so she got me a pillow and a blanket. Then the nurse came in and gave everyone the door code so we could leave if we wanted to. Even though I had already put on pjs (just shorts and a t-shirt), we decided to leave and go to a coffee shop. We walked around for a little while, then found a really cute one that was across the street. It had really cool interior with wood and brick and the coffee was good too. We taught J how to play rummy and he taught me a game called 3 strikes, which is a number game. We stayed there until just after midnight.

When we got back to the room, it was really cold and everyone else was asleep. The boys fell asleep pretty quickly, but I basically only slept for about an hour. There were 7 people in the room (including me) and every one of them snored at some point. The adjuma got up and turned off the ac, so then the room got hot. One guy had a nightmare and woke himself up and another guy's phone rang at 4 am. I figured out that I need to get in rhythm with the room when I sleep and that just wasn't going to happen. Then at 5:30 a nurse came in to see if everyone was there and at 6 another nurse came in and hooked all the patients up to IVs. Shortly after that, they dropped off breakfast. Then some people tried to go back to sleep, but I couldn't, so I got up and took a shower and got dressed. When I got back to the room, the super loud snorer gave me some iced coffee. Then the boys woke up a little bit and we watched the news. The other patients all apparently felt bad that Dallas and I didn't get breakfast, so each of them gave us something. The snorer gave me more coffee, the nightmare guy (who had the kids) gave us ramen and the adjuma gave us grapes and melon. They were all very sweet. Then Jayden's mom and dad showed up around 9 or 9:30 and said they'd be back in a bit to take us to lunch. They came back after about 30 minutes and Dallas and Jayden had barely gotten dressed. The other people in the room told Dallas to wear the snorer's sandals instead of his sneakers for some reason, and he did. It was totally bizarre and yet totally Korea.

We told his parents that we weren't hungry yet, so they said they'd drive us around and show us some of Seoul. It was foggy so Jayden's dad was mad that we couldn't see good views. His mom then suggested we go to this cool park thing where the two branches of the Han meet. On the way, his parents were talking and asking us some questions and just generally being parents. They were both grateful that we came to visit J and at one point said that we were like their son and daughter. When we got to the park, we had to walk down this trail, but the dad went back to move the car to a different parking lot so that we wouldn't have to walk back that far.

While we were waiting for him to park, we all got ice creams or popsicles.Then we walked across this cool ship bridge with lots of flags.

This is where we started to go to the main part of the park.

This is why it was called the ship bridge - it was resting on boats.

Abandoned (or carefully placed) boat in the middle of lily pads.

The park was full of lotus flowers, which I had never seen in real life before. It also had small ponds set up with random statues around. The whole park was adorable and we walked around for a little while. Dallas and I probably could have stayed for another hour taking pictures, but we could tell that his parents didn't want to wait quite that long, although they didn't rush us.

D on a tiny bridge over a lily pond.

Lots of the statues were of naked people doing weird things. Many were naked women with babies. I don't really know what the theme was supposed to be.

There were also 3 goats randomly walking around and eating grass or lying in the road.

Me, D, Jayden's mom and J standing in front of the lotus pond.

Pink and white lotus flowers.

Me and the flowers

Another picture of us

Dallas's hand for comparison. He has big hands too.

Jayden's parents wanted us to see all of the park, so they took us back over the bridge and had us walk around some more. The main reason for the part is the spot where the two branches of the river meet. It's called Du Mul Mori (or something close to that) which means 2 waters head/meet up. 

Me on the other side of the park with more flowers. They hadn't bloomed yet though, just had huge leaves!

Pretending he's falling into the leaves.

It was really bright - this was for head comparison with the leaves - see, they're pretty big!

Just beyond this tree is the spot where the rivers meet. I like the artsy shot D took here.

After the park, his parents took us to this out of the way tofu restaurant. They go there often apparently. This place makes their own tofu and it was really good. We split plain tofu (which is the white squares) with kimchi and other sides, plus a bowl of sudubu which is tofu soup. It was really good here. His dad kept trying to make us eat more, but we were both full. We also found out we had splinters from the porch where we leaned over to take pictures of our heads with the leaves.

Lunch!

After lunch, we drove back towards the hospital, but decided to go to Olympic park instead to walk around. Jayden's dad had a meeting, so he stopped the car near a subway stopped and hopped out. Dallas and I got out to hug him good bye. Then Jayden took over and drove us to the park. We tried to go to the art museum attached to the park, but it was closed because they are changing exhibits. We went to a coffee shop and got take out coffees. We tried to pay, but Jayden's mom said no and slapped Dallas's hand out of the way. Then we walked around the park for awhile, but it started to rain, so we went back to the car.

Jayden and his mom. This is very common for Korean boys and their moms. One thing I like about Korea.

We drove back to the hospital and packed our stuff. It was about 3 pm so we decided we should get going so that we wouldn't be home too late. We all hugged good bye and Jayden walked us to the subway. He texted later that his mom was more upset than he was! When we got to the bus station, we couldn't get a bus until about 5 or 5:30 (I forget exactly when), so we walked across the street to another coffee shop and played rummy again and chatted. We talked for about the first hour on the ride home, then both of us fell asleep for an hour until we woke up at the rest stop. Dallas bought some snacks and then he fell asleep again. We got home around 9ish and went to emart to get some groceries. Then we went back to my apartment and I made breakfast burritos for dinner. We watched some TV, he went home and we both went to sleep.

It was a really good weekend, full of random and fun events. I know I'm forgetting stuff and that this is a long post. Maybe I'll add more details if/when I remember them. I also realized even with the good public transportation here, there are places that you need a car to see. I had a great time meeting Jayden's parents, but wish there hadn't been such a language barrier. I'm also glad I got to see J one more time, although I know I'll see him again eventually. This once again goes to show that sometimes it's the unplanned things that are the best.