First Impressions... dedicated to AW ;)

In preparing to leave the States, Taylor and I were given multiple "tips" and warnings about Korea. So far... the only one that seems to hold firm is to not drink the tap water! :) Upon arrival, some of the things that caught my attention were the very things we were "told" would not be available to us here. ***Number one being the large number of English speaking citizens. There are actually quite a few people that were able to carry on a conversation with us without having to modify our speech. We have found this to be true in Busan as well, so I am very encouraged about being able to hold a women's Bible study in our home when we finally have one! *** Corin is a big celebrity here! He catches the attention of almost all the lovely ladies and children as well. You hear the voices go up a notch as they bring out their very best "baby talk" for Cor! It is pretty hilarious. They especially like his green rain boots with the frog faces on them. You see all the women point and smile and sometimes giggle a bit. Those that speak English come up and tell us how cute our kid is. (Hopefully he doesn't get a big head about it! haha) *** We have had a few Korean meals so far, all of which we really enjoyed. (Well, other than Taylor's seafood spaghetti at a Korean Italian restaurant... not sure what they were thinking! And not sure what sea creatures were in the dish either! hahaha) I am looking forward to learning some native dishes as we begin cooking for ourselves. *** Yes, we can get diapers here! They are a little bit more expensive, but only about $4 a box and we ship them free from Japan, so they have fun little animated characters on them! :)*** We have a COSTCO! Taylor and I will be able to stock up on the "american" foods we thought we would have to go without... mainly cheese! But they also have several items that will be convenient to have in bulk, such as bottled water for a good price. Jeff was telling us that there are several Koreans who will actually go to the mountain top and collect spring water in jugs so that they do not have to purchase it, but that you can expect to wait in line for quite a while during the daylight hours. He said he had gone at 2am and even then there were contenders for the spring! ***Health care here is proving to be a great buy! It is really inexpensive yet quality care! Woohoo!*** In contrast, electrical outlet converters from Target are NOT a great buy. I already fried my flat iron on the first try. Sad. ***Busan is what I image New york City to look like, crowded and full of neon. We went to the market area with all the vendors lining the streets. It was amazingly fun! I plan to go again when I know more Korean to try and haggle down prices and do a little shopping for Busan fashions! :) *** Bus drivers are ridiculous. You had better get on and sit down... that is all I have to say! ;) ***The food is very diverse and there are several western food chains lining the streets as well. Some of the most common I have seen are Dominoes, Baskin Robins, and Starbucks. *** You can have McDonalds delivered to your door with a minimum order of 1000 won. So basically, you could have a soda delivered to you if that is all you wanted. CRAZY! haha. :) ***The streets are kind of stinky to walk down... the water run off runs under them with open grates along the sidewalks. *** A favorite movie snack is dried octopus tentacles... like beef jerky. Not sure I will be trying that one anytime soon. *** I will add more in my later posts, but I thought I would share some of my observations. There are too many to list all of them.... Oh, but I will end on a rather hilarious one *** A new Asian trend is to own a small purse dog, which has dyed pink cheeks and another color for the ears. Jeff had told us about it, but we got to witness it the other night at one of the vendor stands. White dog, pink cheeks, and orange ears!
LL