It Rains in Korea... A LOT!

Well I guess there is no reason for me to tell you that... perhaps you already knew that Korea is one of the monsoon countries. Sigh, I have been stuck indoors for the last three days, and I just checked the weather... It will rain, every single day, until I fly out on September 1st. I was really hoping to do something nice outside, like hike in a mountain, or along the Han river, or something! sigh, oh well. At least I am able to update my blog a lot now! YAY for documentation!


So, I love Kiva. I think everyone should know about Kiva. With Kiva you can lend money to people in developing countries. I think this is a lot better than donating money for several reasons. The obvious reason being... the selfish one... you can get your money back. Now of course there is no guarantee you will get your money back... and you don't make any interest, BUT, when you donate money it disappears forever. And you don't even know if it got to a real person, or did any actual good. Well, with Kiva you pick the person you want to lend to, so you know exactly what your money is being used for. Another reason I think Kiva is better than donating money is this is not a hand-out. They say "Give a man a fish, he eats for a day, teach the man to fish and he eats for ever" And probably teaches his kids how to fish too. Well, when you lend money to people with Kiva, they use it to build their future, and pay back what you gave them... so they make profit... they don't just get by. I heard about this from an interview with Bill Clinton, I checked it out, and I have lent money to people via Kiva. Four of my loans are currently being repaid, and another 4 are still in the fund-raising state. I only lend $25 to each person, this way if they default I only loose $25. But hey, if they default then I guess I have still donated money to a good cause, a person in a developing country trying to improve his or her situation... so what if they couldn't pay me back... I'm sure they wanted to, and next time they will try harder. But anyway, I added my Kiva Lender page to the links list on the right. You can check out the people I'm lending money to. Maybe you would want to lend some money to them too. I think they look like nice people. Let me know what you think about it.

This is the street I live on. You cant see my little apartment building, but its off to the right. I might not live here next year cause my landlord wants to raise the rent. I will talk to her this week I hope and try to figure something out. I really like this place. The room is really nice and clean and big, the street is relatively quiet and clean (considering the area I live in) and I actually think my landlord is a nice person.


This is a sign from the subway. It has an interesting cartoon. In the picture you can see some of the common subway peddlers. Selling stuff like this is illegal, and most people tell me it is also controlled by the gangsters. Well, one of the characters is a well dressed man pulling a small cart and shouting about something he is holding in his hand. These guys go from subway car to subway car with a little cart full of: umbrellas, socks, shoe shiners, underwear, pens, or other interesting items that they sell for less than $5. The other character is a rather sad looking old woman. She is generally sitting on the floor somewhere in the station selling things like gum, kimbap (a roll or rice and veggies contained in seaweed), rice cakes, or vegetables for $1-2. Your not supposed to buy things from them, but everyone does. Its hard not to, I feel sorry for them... especially the old men and women... I mean where is their family? I hope they aren't alone in the world. They shouldn't be working, they should be playing with their grand kids or doing needlepoint or something relaxing... oh well.


So, we went to Outback Steakhouse. I have to say, of all the western restaurants in Korea Outback is by far the best. It is really pricey (I have pasta for those of you who wonder what a vegetarian eats at Outback) But SO worth it. John gets their ribs, which he says are really good. They have a nice potato soup, good veggies, tasty bread, etc. They also have this wonderful thing called ade. Most of the restaurants have at least a couple flavors of ade. Orange and grapefruit ade are pretty prevalent. This time I got Kiwi-ade... which ROCKED. I have also tried Strawberry-ade, that was awesome too... you have got to get this over in America! They make it with real fruit and I think seltzer water... not sure though.


Not just bbang (the Korean word for bread... and yes the two 'b's is intentional... its a really hard b sound, they also have a soft b sound... 'bang' means 'room' in Korean... so the different 'b's matter quite a deal) This wonderful waiter gave us chocolate sauce to dip our bread in. The servers at Outback in Korea are AWESOME. Some of them even speak pretty passable English! Totally American style service, but I still don't have to leave a time! I bet your wondering why you haven't come for a visit yet!!! hehe :)

On a final note, I added something new at the very bottom of the page. Its a work in progress and much more for me than you. I am posting it to add a small degree of accountability on my part. On one of the links from my dads blog I read about this "101 goals in 1001 days" idea. Make a list of 101 concrete things you want to accomplish in 1001 days. Then tick them off as you complete them. I still have a lot of things to add... and Im sure some of the things will be a little unrealistic, but I guess its good to have a plan, even if it fails :)