June 11, 2019

You know you have been writing Jung too many times when you go to write June and you write Jung!  Jung 11, 2019!  LOL!!!

I’m back in Boston and back in my life… I’m happy to be back to the people and places of my life.  In the end I did walk the threshold of my home at 1:47am!  So in total… I flew 14.5 hours, first flight 12.5 hours, than with the delay a 6 hour wait for connection and then almost 2 more hours in the second flight, that’s a total of 20.5 hours!!!  My feet are still swollen.  The biggest news everyone is talking about here is the Final game of the Boston Bruins against the St. Louis Blues for the Stanley Cup (in hockey)!  If Boston wins, we will have won three major sports championships this calendar year!  Tying the only city that has ever done that back in 1935: Detroit, Michigan!  Here you can see how we have been spanking seriously these past years:

Go Bruins, Go BOSSTOWN!

Update 6-17-19: The Boston Bruins lost 4-1… so yes, they spanked us!

So.. the day after Jung Il-woo’s Fan Meeting was a day I made another personal dream come true.  I had always wanted to dress in a Hanbok and hire a photographer to take my photos.  One I wanted to feel a bit like Ilwoo in his photo sessions and Two, I wanted to have a beautiful memory of my time in Korea.  It was simply perfect.

First I visited a Hanbok place I had made a reservation at… they had so many dresses!  It was so hard to choose!  In the end I chose a very simple skirt or chima! … and I balanced it with a more ornate top that were both the colors I wanted… red my favorite color on the skirt and lime green on the top… this was more an olive green, but I liked it even more.  The tones of gold were great too!  The lady who helped me get dressed was so kind, and helped me do my hair too… so I became a Hanbok Maiden!

The photographer came to meet me at the shop and he was such a good person. He was  patient, kind and open to my suggestions, and we had a great conversation going so we ended up spending two more hours together!  That meant that instead of the 50 photos he gave most clients, he gave me 150!  He took over 800!!!  Imagine that!  At the very end another dream came true as we found a cart that sold hotoks!  It was so, so, so delicious!!!  We were starving so we ended up having lunch before parting ways.  Hopefully we’ll stay in touch!

Here is a selection of my photos… sorry… I choose to stay anonymous for now… so I am the Headless Hanbok Maiden:

Wait let’s set the scene… my photographer just became Jung Il-woo!  OMG!!!

Nothing but smiles now!  These were at Gyeongbokgung palace:

And these at Bukchon Hanok Village, a lovely ancient looking neighborhood filled with Hanoks (old houses):

They are so beautiful!  So blessed!  And hotok … it tasted like fried dough meets heaven!

For lunch we had a delicious Seolleongtang soup… it is a beef bone soup… very healthy…full of collagen.  You just have to make sure you add all the salt and spices otherwise is rather plain!

After parting with the photographer, I headed to the Hanbok place and changed, and hurried back to the palace to see the Change of the Guard at 2:00PM.  It was much simpler than the Change of the Guard at Buckingham Palace (the only other change of the guard reference I have) but full of color.  The guard are dressed almost in all the colors of the rainbow! except purple.  They move to the rhythm of drums and other instruments:

After the Change of the Guard, I went to see another important place on my list.  The Dongdaemun Design Plaza, or DDP.  This impressive structure full of curves and silver color was designed by Zaha Hadid, one of the best architects this world has ever seen and a woman.  This is a cultural space dedicated to art… mostly visual, graphic and industrial.   These are some cool facts listed on their brochure:

45,133 panels!!!  WOOw!  Imagine counting them?  Like how?

and this is the main map on their brochure:

I will post some photos now…but the rest I will post under Visiting South Korea.  I have so… many photos!

I loved that last shot… and yes you feel tiny! But in a good way, protected… its very organic forms make it very soft looking, kind… no hard edges here…

I saw an exhibit about the Art of Animation of Walt Disney.  I really wanted to see it as they had original animator’s work!  The exhibit covered a lot!

So expressive… I can just hear him complaining!  Adorable Donald!

Then I walked to other areas… the aesthetics of the place from staircases, to  ceilings, floors… everything was so elegant and futuristic looking.

Yeah…it looked pretty out of this world!

I saw a lot more art, I’ll just show you a bit…

Yeah, I ran into Haechi almost every day!

I had a nice tea there relaxing there and a bit of shopping.  I ended the day eating another soup that I liked more: a Samgyetang soup.  A ginseng chicken soup.  Absolutely delicious!  It made my whole body feel so good!  I loved the place too, it was very traditional:

Oh!  How I will miss the food here… so much tastier than in Boston!  I could live on the soups!  Well except for breakfast.. Nothing beats American Breakfast even if it’s just sugar:  pancakes, waffles, French Toast, omelettes, eggs a la Benedict, and cereal!

Frog encounter?  Yes but it was hard to take a photo… it was the hat of a little boy… really cute!

I went back to my room and went to bed at 8 PM… completely and happily exhausted!