When in Rome... Get Naked!

alright, so i'm back safe from Pusan.. it was wonderful.. and for the most part we all got along (surprising being as there were 5 chicks in one hotel room)

i have about 50 pictures from the trip.. i'm one of those "let's document every step of this trip" people.. i'll include some good ones.. plus angela, one of the korean teachers who came with us took about 120 pics...

so.. we caught the train earlyish saturday morning.. early for me in korea i guess... i didn't think that Asia had a 7:30 am.. apparantly it does.. just like home.. we rode the bullet train to the coast, i was told it goes around 400 km an hour or something like that.. it didn't seem that fast but we got to our destination quickly enough.. we went to our hotel as soon as we got there.. it was gorgeous.. five star.. biggups to carey and her mom for getting us the deal.. we were right on the beach.. RIGHT on.. and our room was really comfortable considering the amount of people we had sleeping in it.. our first plan was to get some food, and i had heard about a couple of good places i really wanted to try. first was an authentic indian restaurant. i've never had such good curry... it was a beautiful restaurant with amazing food.. after that we went shopping (of course.. ) we were searching for a GAP but that ended up being a bit of a dud.. however, i did find a dickies store so that made me happy.. i got a couple of shirts and then headed back to the hotel because we had scheduled massages (man my life is so tough)

it was fun because i've never had a massage with friends before.. this massage took an hour an a half and it was amazing! those koreans know what they're doing.. it was cool too because sometimes you would have more than more person working on you at a time.. after that marla and i decided that we wanted to try out the sauna and hot tub... and we had heard things about korean "bath houses" but thought we'd check it out for ourselves.. this is where the title of the blog comes in...

we walk in the change room and it's just as i imagined.. many many very naked korean ladies... almost how i picture the bathhouses in ancient rome to be.. lots of naked people.. people rubbing eachother... i'll say one thing for koreans.. they are very comfortable with their bodies.. marla and i thought.. well .. i guess we can go but wear our bikinis.. so we go.. shower up and try to get into the hot tub.. there was a hot tub.. cold tub.. dry and wet saunas.. we were told no bathing suits allowed.. we look at eachother and say "are we gonna do this?" we decided yea, why not.. it will be a cultural experience for us.. and though we were the only foreigners we realized it was a way bigger deal to us then it was to them.. after about 13 seconds i got over myself and started to enjoy it.. though it wasn't a big deal we are still quite proud of eachother.. after what i call the "naked party" we hooked up with everyone again and headed out for dinner..

we just got some western food that time because of angelas discount card.. we ate waaaaaaaay too much.. walked back to the hotel and had a drink in the lounge.. or one of them i should say... it was hilarious.. there was this .. umm band i guess you'd call them.. duo.. not sure.. they were ukrainian and trying to sing the eagles.. we chucked and then headed to the beach.. it was late evening but sooo pretty out there... we played in the water and watched the fireworks... there were people fishing from the shore with these really big fishing poles.. it was really cool to watch..

today we slept in and then headed down the beach again for lunch.. this time to the thai restaurant i heard of.. i'm so excited i got to eat some ethnic food.. i love korean food but i miss the selection of home.. i had, hands down.. the best pad thai i've ever had.. meg it beats wave pad thai.. this thai restaurant was soooooo nice too.. it's weird.. when you eat at ethnic places at home they never feel so authentic.. this one definitely did.. after that we headed to the aquarium!!!

it's the biggest one in south korea and it was huge.. and great.. we spent a few hours in there.. we took a glass bottom boat ride which was cool... and there were sharks.. they kinda popped up out of nowhere to me.. i freaked out a lil bit.. but after awhile i got used to it.. i found out that you can go swimming with them too... folks i think i'm going to do it.. i'm going to go back to pusan and have some thai and indian and then face my biggest fear...

we we'll see...

so after the aquarium we had to head back to the train station.. which was packed... chuseok is like christmas for home... i think it's thanksgiving.. they're thanking their ancestors for the harvest... in reality it just means that the men get the lay around and the women spend all day preparing the feast..

anyways.. i will post pictures.. not 50 but a few..

love you all
jen xo

ps: note in that one pic where i look really really freaked out.. there is a shark behind me.. though really tough to see...