Christmas in K-town

The first of several outdated blog postings :-)


So as you may or may not know, this was my first Christmas away from my family. Sorry, by the way, because it's my fault that this is also the first Christmas that my family has ever not all been together. Luckily, we got together on Christmas Day (me) and Christmas Eve (my family) via skype. I opened some presents, and they made our traditional post-mass pizza and cheese and sausage. We even had a trans-hemisphere cheers! After talking to my family, I had to rush out the door to meet up with other people to go out of town. A group of perhaps 40 foreigners from Buyeo, Nonsan, and a handful of other places went to the nearby town of Boryeong to a "pension."


A pension in Korea is basically just a rented cabin. The pension was really nice - we had rented two on account of having so many people, and the cabins were located in this nice resort-type area. It even had a swimming pool and hot tubs, but due to the cold weather everything was closed. It started snowing just as we pulled up and proceeded to snow almost all night, giving us a wondeful white Christmas. Our gathering included Americans, Englishmen (and women), an Irishman, South Africans, New Zealanders, and Canadians. The Saffers and NZers were very excited for the snow because in SA and NZ Christmas is a summer event - lots of barbeques and pool parties, so they were all pumped for their first white Christmas.

We made a Western dinner - my first mashed potatoes in months! Delicious! Also salad, macaroni and cheese, turkey, and vegetable kebobs. We also had a Western breakfast. I made bacon for about 40 people... never again. It was a really great time though. We did a secret Santa as well - I drew another girl from Buyeo, and I bought her fake Uggs to wear in school because she was always saying how cold it was in her school. I got, among other things, a pair of blue fleecy pants, a most excellent present.

Overall it was a good Christmas for my first time away from home.