Sunday, March 6, 2011

Summer in Korea, Part 2


I left off with returning to Busan with HoIk (my son's brother). We spent just about a week in Busan. My hosts had their 10 year-old grandson come and be our translator/tour guide while we were visiting. We went out just about every day to have an adventure. We rented an umbrella/patch of sand & intertube at Haeundai beach, went to an amusement park, saw a movie, and shopped at E-Mart. The subway was always fun as people tried to figure out why this white woman was traveling around with 4 Korean kids - 2 who spoke only a little Korean. They would ask if I was 선생님 (teacher) and when I would say no, and point to my kids and say 어머니 (mother) people just sort of stared, then asked HoIk what the story was in Korean. The poor kiddo doesn't really understand why he has a brother in America (Halmoni hasn't explained it to him yet). The adjumas would come to my son, whose hair was getting rather thick, shaggy and a bit long and tell him to get his haircut. We did end up getting it cut in Busan - it was the BEST haircut he ever got. We are still trying to find someone locally to replicate it. The food was SOOOO good. We had the best calbi at a small place near the beach. I love it fresh of the grill in front of you. One day we took the train to Daegu and went to EcoWorld - another amusement park. The train system is very easy to use and really nice. We had quite the taxi ride in Daegu - the driver hit another car, tossed the guy his business card and kept going! While in Busan we bought some games to play together and some great learn Korean books. HoIk worked in an English book. He loved teaching his hyungnim Korean.
Next installment... Seoul.