We had our city tour today and it was a beautiful day! The temperature was just perfect and we were out and about all day. Apparently, the people of Seoul didn't think it was such a great day. Our guide informed us that yellow dust from China had blown in and was in the air and all over everything in the city. Blake and I noticed it was hazy but thought that it was just fog. Our guide said that lots of Koreans will wear masks when the dust blows in because it's really bad for your throat. We could see the dust settling on the palace that we visited but noon the air had cleared considerably and it was a perfect day.
Our guide took us to Gyeongbokgung Palace first and it was beautiful! And huge! The actual buildings were enormous and the grounds went on forever. Amazing history!
After visiting the palace our guide took us over to Insadong for lunch. Unfortunately, I don't have any good pictures from lunch. We were sitting on the floor (uncomfortable) and honestly, didn't really enjoy our meal. It was a fun experience, but I don't think I've acquired the taste for Korean food just yet. =)
And I also forgot to get a picture with our guide! I'm really upset with myselft about this.
After lunch our guide wanted to help us do some shopping. Blake was so excited! Haha! My favorite part of our shopping trip was getting our name chops made in Insadong. Name chops are stamps. I'll get a picture of our stamps later but for now, here is the famous chop shop and the man who makes the chops.
After our shopping fun we went back to hotel and grabbed our donations for the babies at the reception center and jumped on the subway again. This was a longer, more confusing subway experience and finding the Holt reception center was even more difficult. I new we were close to Holt but couldn't figure out which tiny alley way to turn down so I walked into a little store and asked a nice Korean man. He nodded, said "Holt," and then proceeded to walk us all the way to Holt. It wasn't that far but it was so kind of him. I guess it's easier to just walk us there rather than try to communicate verbally.
We visited with the babies for about 30 minutes and gave them our donations. There are five little boys in care at the RC right now, and one of them really took to Blake. They were big buddies! Blake hasn't stopped talking about how our confusing, long trip to the RC was so well worth it.
After we left the babies we headed to Itaewon and found the Outback. Poor Blake was in serious need of some American food. Outback was delicious but we were exhausted and ready to head back to the hotel. We took our subway ride back, Skyped with Kinley at 10:00 PM (8:00 AM Oklahoma time), and crashed into bed. Awesome day!
