It's Fall at The Independence Hall of Korea

Oh yes. I'm pretty sure that people realize by now that I *suck* at keeping up with this blog. Somewhere between Germany and Korea I quit my job while gaining a child and I just can't get my crap together.  It really makes no sense to me. I worked more then but I have less time now? How is that possible?  I just can't wrap my head around it. So I won't. Moving on. 

It's my favorite time of year again and it's been the pits having to remind myself that I'm not in Germany anymore. Well, technically, it's easy to remember that I'm not in Germany but I often like to close my eyes and go to my happy place. That place is coincidentally in Germany. So there. Anyways, we are making the best of it.

Last month, Koreans celebrated their version of our Thanksgiving (Chuseok). We were told not to plan anything for that weekend because in addition to most things being closed... it's tradition for Koreans to visit their "ancestoral homelands" (thanks, wikipedia) and traffic heading South is a serious nightmare. So we kept close to home and took a couple walks around our neighborhood. 

A few weeks later we managed to get out and visit one of the places I wanted to scope out prior to my parent's visit. The Independence Hall of Korea is about 30 minutes away but it's *FREE* (except for parking) and great if you want to let your kid loose for a couple of hours. It's actually a really large park with about 8 museums on it, all featuring a variety of different exhibits.  One has relics that date back thousands of years while another focuses on the impact of Japanese imperialism. It's pretty much anything you ever wanted to learn about Korea all in one lovely place. Rhett ran for hours and walked up a gazillion steps. His favorite part was feeding the koi (my least favorite). We happened to go on a day that every Korean boy/girl scout troop on the peninsula had also decided to go but since this place is so huge... it didn't bother us at all. Independence Hall also has the largest tiled roof structure in all of Asia. In case you were wondering. We definitely plan on visiting again soon... with my parents... who arrive on Friday. So don't count on much blogging.

Like you did anyways. 

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Nong-seong is a small memorial park built where a fortress use to exist. It's really peaceful and has pretty views of our little town. 

Chuseok dinner, maybe?

The Independence Hall of Korea

The size of these fish really freaked me out. They were practically leaping over each other to get some food. 

I had a request recently to name the foods I photograph so in keeping with that promise... here is Bibimbap with all it's accouterments. It's basically a bunch of vegetables, sprouts etc. over hot rice with an egg. This one had fern stems that I wasn't sure about at first but they tasted fine. Bibimbap is especially delicious when you mix in the chili paste. And of course we had pickled radish and kimchi. 

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For more information regarding The Independence Hall of Korea

go here.