This year is the first time we celebrated Christmas in Korea, we usually celebrate Christmas overseas or in the air, what I mean in the plane while traveling to our destination.  We didn’t travel this holiday because we are leaving Korea soon and we are planning to travel for six months, I am hoping I could get a visa so I can tag along with my husband.

As we are going to Seoul for the weekend to eat Bulgarian food we really didn’t prepare anything for Christmas, we had a pizza and spaghetti from Pizza School and baked goods from Paris Baguette.

My husband went with me this time at Pizza School to order pizza. When we arrived I first thought the shop is closed, although I see the owners eating their dinner. Well it turns out I pushed the door instead of pull, silly me! Business as usual, the owners stopped from eating and prepared our order, new customers came in too.  I was surprised to see the owner’s son because every time I dropped by their shop to order pizza, it was only him and his wife although I saw another female once which I think their daughter.  I was happy to know that they have kids, because grandpa is not getting any younger. When we left with our orders the son greeted us Merry Christmas, we say thank you and greeted back. Probably the son is studying at University in Seoul and came home for vacation.

Instead of buying Christmas cake we opted for baked goods because the Christmas cakes left at Paris Baguette are all in white cream, I prefer chocolate cake. Unlike most days Paris Baguette is quite busy,  there are a lot of customers coming in and out. The baked good trays are empty but there are a lot of Christmas cakes on display. I think they hired extra baker because at the back of the counter we can see two people in their white uniform baking cakes.

Well this is how we celebrated our first Christmas in Korea.

Last Sunday I went to downtown Icheon and after shopping at Daiso I walked through the shopping street and look around what’s on sale. When I reached Watsons I was tempted to go inside but thinking I just spend $30 in Daiso and shopping in Gmarket is cheaper it stops me and I continue walking until I reached Naughty Cat accessory store. I was also tempted to go inside but thinking I don’t need anything from the store I continue walking but seeing a newly opened shop beside Dickies stops me. The shoe store was gone already, the last time I passed it is under renovation and now a new shop is already opened. Within four years in Icheon I already see how shops closed and new shop open, business is not good all the time. I just took a picture of the newly open ARTBOX shop and go, but after a few steps I walked back and went inside the shop, the impulsive me can’t control myself again. I have thought from the shop name I can find Korean art inside like cards, stationaries or other items to display.

There’s  a lot of shoppers and curious shoppers inside, I took a small shopping basket thinking if the items are cheap, I can buy a few but I have already reached the end of the store I can’t find anything good it is basically like Daiso but the items in Artbox are more expensive and most of the items have no prices written on them which is quite a turn off,  I will not pick an item I like and be surprised of the cost when I have to pay, I should say Artbox is more about Olive Young, Naughty Cat, Daiso and Barunson combine, which are all few meters away from Artbox.

Artbox have beauty and makeup section, accessories, school supply items, bags and luggages, candies and even few house supplies like in Daiso.  I have to walked twice on the shelves to see what’s good, when I found scented candles I took two of lavender scented candle. My husband wishes the other night to have a lavender scent in our apartment so he can sleep, there are times he can’t sleep and it makes him grumpy in the morning.

I continue checking the aisles again I maybe missed something, I went to perfume section and try the tester. I tried four different perfumes and I am about to buy the scent I’d like when I found the cheaper perfume below the display cabinet, it has been just too bad there’s no tester for them. Oh well, I just follow my instinct and  pick the purple box and went to the counter, service is not that great, a little slow. I spent about $18 for my haul after paying I left, while walking I saw Missha on holiday sale and it didn’t stop me to check what’s for grab, I spent too much already for one day, it should be enough.

Looking at the photos I took, it seems I missed to visit the second floor section of Artbox, I’ll probably check it next time I went to downtown.

Since we moved in Shinha-ri I seldom go to Icheon downtown, I only visit once a week when there’s no frozen chicken breast anymore for my husband daily meal. Unlike when we still lived in downtown Icheon, I can wander around three or four times a week to shop, go to the gym and pay the bills.

If I felt like walking the long way I get off at the Seolbongsan bus stop and from there I walk to the shopping streets back to the bus terminal where I should get off on the first place.  That’s what I did last Sunday, I walk through the traditional market to shopping streets, every Sunday is market day so the market was full of people, selling and buying local food.

When I am around the market I always went to Daiso to check what’s new and if there’s an item that interests me, when I saw bubble wrapped displayed outside I immediately took one roll, I need it for wrapping my box and probably could use it too to wrap our windows to avoid cold air entering our apartment.  Daiso was quite busy there’s a lot of Christmas shoppers and just ordinary shoppers, every time I visit Daiso my first stop is the school supplies aisle. I picked some oil pastel colors, my godson’s in the Philippines will like them, I will include them in the box I need to send home in a few months time. Aside from oil pastel colors I bought other stuff like color sand, clay, pens, shoe laces, colorful makeup case comb and earphone.

Most of the items I bought I don’t need like color sand, the makeup case, shoe laces, clay and pens. I just bought them because  I found them cute, cheap and colorful, hopefully my family will find a use for them. If you will ask my husband about my shopping loots these are junks and I am just wasting my money.

When I went out last Wednesday to workout in the nearby M2 gym I was surprised to see snow in the ground and even blurted about not knowing that there is snow fall.  My husband who’s with me told me it snowed at night which I regret because I was not able to see the first snow fall this year.

So when it snowed yesterday, I didn’t let go of the chance not taking photos of the ground.  When my husband go to school, I walked with him thinking he can snapped few photos of me in the snow but I was not lucky because he was in hurry. So I just snapped photos around and went to bus stop, I went to downtown to buy frozen chicken breast at the Korean Mart.

Instead of going down in the bus station stop I went down at Miranda Hotel and walked to the nearby park to take some photos and have some adventure. I walked around for few minutes before walking down to the bus terminal.

The snow fall was heavy, every one around me has umbrella and all I got is a camera.  I went directly to Korean Mart to buy the chicken and went straight to bus stop, while waiting I decided to buy  잉어빵 (Bungeoppang) it is a sweet snack sold in the street in the shape of fish (carp), made of flour and bean paste. While waiting I tinker my phone and got an email from my husband telling me to buy donuts from Dunkin Donuts if I am still in downtown and if I am already at home ignore it.  So I waited until I got my order and walk back to bus terminal, there’s a Dunkin Donuts in the terminal it is nearer to buy there than going to the Dunkin Donuts near Watsons.

When I went inside the Dunkin Donuts I was overwhelmed because they have a lot of flavors unlike the one near Watsons where they only have few flavors and it is always the same thing every time I visited the shop. I immediately took a tray and started to pick the donuts I desired. My husband asked me to buy a dozen but I bought 6 more additionally using my own money of course, my husband will not be happy if I go overboard on what he asked.

I went back to bus stop and luckily within few minutes bus #8 arrives, the bus is full and the entire trip is quite slow because of the snow in the road.

What is amazing living in Korea is you just wake up one day and there’s already a church in your neighborhood.  Last Friday, when I look outside our balcony this is what I see, men busy fixing something  at the nearby building where NKIDS English School was situated, M2 Gym was also in the ground floor of this building.

When I zoomed my camera to see what’s happening or what’s new store/club they are working, I was surprised to know it’s  a church, Good Neighbor’s Church as it reads.

When we go to the gym that night they are still busy fixing something in the rooftop and when we went out everything is ready, the cross is well lighted up, definitely the church is ready for service/mass soon.

My husband and I bought a new scale when our old one stop working despite of having a new battery. Our new scale is solar power and we are hoping we can use this longer. What confuses me though when I weigh myself at home my weight is less than when I weigh myself in the gym. It has 1 kilogram difference so I don’t know which one is right, well I guess scales has different weighing system.

Anyway for your own information there are different scales according to its uses, there are food retail scales that can be used for food, fruits and in the kitchen, weight bathroom scales for fitness and infants, industrial scale for shipping, medical and laboratory scales and special scaled that are used for wrestling and weighing jewelries.

When we we out for the gym tonight I was surprised to see Christmas decorations adorned in  trees in our neighborhood.  In our old neighborhood we can’t really feel it is Christmas because there’s no decorations like this, we will just be reminded that Christmas is coming when we happened to walk in the shopping street where few stores has Christmas ornaments other than that, it was just  a normal day or celebration.

Well, we can’t really feel Christmas in Korea because every Christmas we are out of the country but not this year I guess. This year was our last Christmas in Korea as we are leaving in a few months time. 🙁

These past few days the temperature is getting colder and when I look outside our balcony window the color of the trees changed rapidly from the last time I have seen them.

The leaves of the cherry blossoms turns read during autumn season, I have asked my husband if we could do autumn hiking so I could get pictures of the beautiful trees.

If there’s one thing my husband and I in common that is  the love in watching baking show, we are the last one to know that there’s already fourth season of the Great British Bake off.  My husband immediately downloaded all the episodes of the said baking show and we have watched episode by episode.

We are fans of the bake off challenge, we have watched the American and Australian bake off as well. Of course while watching my husband and I has one or two bakers we would like to win, when Frances won my husband believed she really has the talent and she is really a baker from within.

There’s really nothing much happening to me, it was my birthday last week and on Saturday my husband treated for South African meal at Braii Republic in Itaewon. We first went to Seobinggo station to look for Turkish embassy and we found the Vivien building easily so we left right away to Hongik University to find the FEDEX but it turns out it was not there anymore. Through free wifi and my phone I have found out online that the nearest FEDEX office was in Hapjeong so went there but didn’t turn out well so we decided to just go to Itaewon to eat lunch as we are already starving.

Braii Republic is in exit 4 of Itaewon station (line 6), walk straight and turn left at the alley just before the McDonald’s. Go through the intersection, past the Juliette clothing store, and Braii Republic is on your left on the second floor.

I have ordered number 4 – Karoo Surf and Turf, it consist of 2 lamb chops, 4 prawns, green salad and potato while my husband ordered number 1 –  meat platter  consisting of  2 lamb chops, boerewors,  pork banger with garlic potato, creamy spinach and slaw. The meal was delicious and awesome I could eat more if free. Haha

The service is good, the people are very accommodating.  The place was a bit small but it was fine,  a good place to hang out during the weekend if you love meeting other expats.