Chinese Dumplings

There's a lot more going on in Korea than me eating Chinese dumplings, but they were so good I had to share. Too bad I can't literally share. There's a place in Seoul that has traditional houses, where the rich and famous own a lot of the property. It's extremely expensive to own a house here, because, well, nobody lives in a house here. Everybody lives in an apartment. So to have a house all to yourself and use the space it takes to create a house all for yourself is considered quite a luxury here. Being from Texas I take for granted all the space, but in a city of 12 million, space is hard to come by.

This area of Seoul is called Bukcheon, or Bukcheon Village. On a little backstreet there, not far from the traditional houses, are some small but very good restaurants. The Chinese dumplings were hidden there in a crummy little space in between some nicer looking places to eat. I have the opinion that a business that looks like crap is either excellent or the absolute worst. This happened to be one of the ironically excellent places. They are all handmade and quite delicious (and cheap too!).

The only reason I know about the dumplings is because of a friend who took me there, so shout out to that friend.

In other news, things are going good in Korea. I'm a lot busier this year what with having more friends and all, haha. I did change churches this year, but I've met some people in the new one. And this year I'm taking a Korean class in another part of Seoul, so I've met some really interesting people through that.

I've also started taking some K-Pop dance classes after the Korean class.  (If you've heard the song "Opa Gangnam Style" on the radio, that's K-Pop^^) I'm quite jealous at the moment of some girls I met in class who are from Poland and Russia who can speak almost fluent Korean. They came to Korea to study for PhDs and Masters, so they are taking intensive language courses. I wish I had the time to do that.

School is going great. I'm not worried so much and am able to give the students work that is more on their level. Last year when I went home I was so tired and my brain was fried so I didn't do much. This year I was surprised to find that I have energy when I go home, so I've been doing more productive things with my time and hanging out with people more.

Last but not least, I'll be coming home for Christmas! It's just for 2 weeks, but it'll be better than being in Korea for that time. Miss you guys!