10:05 am on Tuesday the telephone rings in the hotel room and all 3 of us are still completely passed out. We were supposed to be up and ready to meet Ah Ja Ci in the lobby at 10. We were more than late. We all hopped right up, swiftly got our stuff together and were out the door within in 20 minutes. I must say, we were all very efficient and for 3 ladies to get ready in 20 minutes, it was quite a miracle.
And we were off. The pouring rain was not going to stop our adventure. We took the train to the Dosunsa Buddhist Temple where my grandma used to take my mom and aunt.
This was one of the most incredible places I have ever been; labeling it peaceful does not do it justice. This place was on a level of Zen that I have never experienced. There were monks chanting, people praying and bowing, candles being lit, mountains in the distance and waterfalls flowing. Numerous statues of Buddha and other idols were strategically placed all over the grounds and a stream of prayer lanterns covered one courtyard (shown above). The temple was magical; everything you could imagine about a practicing Buddhist temple was there.
After this, we took a bus back to the hotel. During this time a ridiculous rain storm hit Seoul and some of the streets/subways were flooded. At one point on the trip back water on the street was so high that it came in through the bus doors! It was basically a flash flood in some neighborhoods on Seoul-we later found out that an accumulation of 257 mm in 12 hours (10.1 inches).
Due to the rain we decided to stay inside and lounge for a while. Sara came and met us at the hotel and we went to market from the first night. We found this dumpling place my mom was looking for and sat down. Almost immediately after ordering 2 mondu plates, they were placed on our table! It was the fastest service you could imagine! MMMMMMMM the mondu were absolutely delicious and we devoured them pretty quickly. We left just as quickly as we had arrived and wandered the market for a while before returning to the hotel.
We had Italian food and had some quality ladies time! This is proof that Laday and I hung out :)
Today-Wednesday September 22
Chuseok-Korean Thanksgiving
8:45 arrival at Ah Ja Ci's house for the traditional Chuseok traditions. This was my first ever Korean Thanksgiving, so I was quite intrigued. I had no idea what to expect. When we walked through the door and we were met with a table fully covered with Korean food. My kind of holiday...
Come to find out all of this food was for the ancestors. Korean Thanksgiving is all about ancestors. Ah Ja Ci lit incense and then proceeded to open the front door in order to let the ghosts of our ancestors in. Then the praying began. Ah Ja Ci's great grandfather was the first person to be prayed to. Each ancestor is bowed to 3 times and poured sake and presented with various rice dishes. There is a methodology as to how to go about feeding the ancestors, but it was quite confusing and too hard for me to write. Three generations of ancestors were prayed to and fed in about 20 minutes. Then it was time for the family to eat.
We feasted on all sorts of food including meat, fish, vegetables, rice, soup, and even sake at 10 am. It was amazing. I feel like all I keep talking about on this trip is the food, but words can't even begin to describe how incredible the Korean food I have been eating is.
Good food/Good company-it was a wonderful first Chuseok for me!
Time for bed now-next blog will be about the most authentic bath house experience possible! It would take me too long to write about it now, but today we did go to a Korean bath house and had quite the culture shock!
Off to see Gina and Shin's Emo (auntie) tomorrow!
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