Home-stay!

It is raining like crazy again tonight and the baseball game we were going to has been canceled. I am really bummed out about it....so instead I decided to catch up on my blogging. I apologize to my "blog followers" about the lack of posts. Too busy and too busy of a social life!

Two weekends ago the university organized a "home-stay" where the international students in our program spend the weekend with a Korean family. Becca and I were the only "professors" who wanted to do a home-stay and as the time approached, I was a bit nervous about the two of us invading some poor Korean families space. Well....as it turned out, I didn't have to worry. We were "placed" at Seung-Ho Kook's house! Seung-Ho, also known as Ryan (his American name) spent the year at MU studying Engineering. He ate quite a few meals at our house and spent the better part of a week staying with us after the dorms closed at the end of the year.

Ryan said it was "pay back time". The photo below is a picture of him at our home eating ribs!!



So on a very warm Friday evening Ryan pulled up to our dorm and off we went for our weekend home-stay. We left Gwangju and headed towards the rural areas that surrounded the city. Our first stop was....what else, but FOOD! We had dinner at a Korean Barbecue "place" that was really great!



As you can see, Ryan was a master with the scissors and managed to cut this huge piece of beef into smaller pieces which we put on a lettuce leaf with other veggies such as onion and cabbage, rolled and popped into our mouths. It was really, really tasty.

After dinner we visited Ryan's small town. We stopped to buy ice cream and found a shop selling bamboo items. I saw a rice farmer's hat --popped it on my head and decided I really could use this hat back in sunny Missouri. So for $3.....it was mine!


And, I was really glad I bought it because the sun and heat were pretty intense the rest of the weekend and I wore it most of time--as you can see in the photos to follow.

I anticipated we would be staying in a traditional style Korean house --meaning small, compact and efficient. We pulled up to the building below and I asked Ryan if we were going to church--because that is what the place looked like. He looked at me and said..no, this was his house! I was pretty amazed! The place was beautiful and as non-traditional as you could get. Ryan said his father designed the house and had it built for them.




As you can see, the place was magnificent! Lovely round windows....huge rooms....70 inch TV, and fancy kitchen. The bedrooms were huge and comfortable. Becca and I had our own separate room with private bathroom. Amazing! I had a beautiful round window with a georgous table right outside my bedroom.





The next morning Ryan cooked breakfast for us. Omelets, dumpling soup, and about four different kinds of kimchi. I learned that most Koreans have two refrigerators...one for regular food and the other for kimchi. PHEW....when you opened the kimchi refrigerator, you immediately knew why they have two.....




After breakfast we headed out to visit a nearby bamboo forest. A huge stand of bamboo is along a nearby river. It is quite the tourist attraction...and the place was packed. It also was HOT.....we sweated lots as we walked up and down the mountain slopes. These photos don't do the place justice....






and this is a picture of Becca and me next to what Becca called a big pile of bamboo poop. She said it looked like a pile of poo......that's why we are laughing!


After the bamboo forest, we headed to a nearby temple and a late lunch. The temple is located in a national park that is nestled into the mountains. It really was a beautiful walk.......




And once there, we really enjoyed seeing the place.





We were pretty hungry when we left, so we stopped at a restaurant just a few yards outside the temple gates. Guess what? Ryan's mother owned the restaurant--so you know we had a super fantastic traditional Korean meal! Lots of familiar...and not so familiar things. A zillion types of kimchi. Strange fish such as skate. Lots of vegetables and other tasty treats!




After lunch Ryan drove us back to Gwangju and our dorm. Wow...it was a great home-stay and great pay back for hosting Ryan!!! Both Becca and I had a grand time and agreed that our tiny dorm room was a pretty sad place compared to our rooms the night before!! But we were really, really glad we decided to do the home-stay. It was nice to get out of this big city and into the countryside!!!