Only 5 Days Until Halloween!!

If you know anything about my family, you know that we go big at Halloween. I mean, we love Halloween! So I am so excited that it is only five days away! Halloween isn't celebrated in South Korea (really the US is the only place it's a big deal) so it is sad that there's no pumpkin patches or decorations anywhere, but I'm spreading the Halloween spirit the best I can! I decorated my desk at work with things I got in a care package (only desk decorated btw) and I've been handing out Halloween stickers and giving the kids Halloween worksheets since October 1st! Needless to say, the kids are really excited about the Halloween party at school next Monday, and so am I. I'll have to post pictures of it next week!
Even though there aren't Halloween decorations anywhere here, it still feels festive because all the trees are bright red, orange, and yellow- it is so beautiful! My apartment overlooks a park so the view is just incredible. And the weather- I know I talk about it every post but it's because I can't get over how amazing it is! Normally in Texas we have one day of perfect fall weather- sunny but crisp and chilly, perfect jean and jacket weather but still feels good enough to spend time outside. That is how almost everyday of fall has been here. This is definitely the time to visit Korea!
So enough about the weather, let me tell you what's been going on since the last post!

Last Friday night, one of the teachers at school had a house warming party at her apartment! It was really fun, tons of food, wine, and beer (and I mean TONS) and we had fun just hanging out outside of school. Robin, who's apartment it was, confessed that sometimes she likes to watch the people in the apartments across the way so we were making fun of her for being a peeping tom in the picture below!

Afterwards Cassy, Sam, Ben, and I walked around and explored Songdo a bit on our way home. We were looking for new bars and restaurants to hang out at and we came across a giant boat! Never seen it before, but apparently normally it's a fountain but it's drained for winter so Cassy used it as a photo op:

On Saturday, Cassy and I went into Seoul! First stop: the Hello Kitty cafe in Hongdae to get some warm drinks! Here are the cup cups they give you water in:

The whipped cream on top the hot chocolate had a Hello Kitty face!

Then of course they have tons of souvenirs you can buy, even Hello Kitty dressed in a traditional Korean Hanbok!

Korea is really big about putting fake food on display to show what's on their menu, I mean nearly every restaurant or cafe you go to will have the fake food on display, and the Hello Kitty Cafe was no different! So I took a picture of it, all the food in the case is fake but it looks pretty good!

Then as we were walking around Hongdae we came across a Charlie Brown Cafe! So of course I had to have my picture taken with Charlie Brown:

We'll have to go there next time! Then we went over to Myeong-dong for some brief shopping, then headed over to Itaewon. In Itaewon they have a very large english book store, so cassy stocked up. They even have brand new magazines you can buy, but they're about $10 each, so I passed. We wandered around looking for Halloween flyers for this Saturday. Some of the pubs even had some Halloween decorations up! So that's the plan for Saturday night: dress up in Halloween costumes and go out in Seoul! While in Itaewon, I came across this sign and had to take a pic for my sister:

Then our last stop was the foreign food black market, where I FINALLY found some oatmeal!!! I have gone to 4 different grocery stores looking for it everywhere, so I was so happy I finally found some! I got the big one, and hopefully it will last me awhile! Also got some tomato soup because they don't sell that in normal grocery stores here and some diet coke because that's another thing that's really hard to find!

I made myself an egg sandwich and tomato soup for dinner- the perfect winter comfort food! Oh and I have no idea what was going on Saturday, but the subway was crazy packed! Never seen so many people on it before, complete madness. Like literally didn't even have to walk down the stairs to the tracks, because the shoulder to shoulder crowd could have just carried me down! The older generation here are always soooo nice to us, I was not expecting that! For example, on the subway ride home it was really packed still, and Cassy and I had to stand and normally would hold our heavy bags for an hour and a half, but this nice older women who was sitting down grabbed our bags and held them for us instead! They also always make sure we get their seats when they stand up to get off the subway (it's a mad scramble for seats), they're just always very kind to me.
One last thing before I have to go back to work (I'm on lunch break!) Sam, Cassy, and I booked our New Year's Eve trip Monday night finally! It's been a difficult process, we found out you can't use any American credit cards in Singapore or for any companies that use Singapore banking, so we couldn't book our flights through the airline because of that! So because of that we have instead booked a flight to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia for the holidays instead! I know it sounds completely random, but that was actually our next choice after Hong Kong fell through. Anyways, it's their capital city, looks like fun, it's cheap, and Sam has two friends living there that will be able to help us get around while we're there! I am really excited about it, never thought when I was coming to Korea that Malaysia would be one of the places I would visit! So now the flight is booked, what a relief, and we've found a nice place to stay with a private 3 bed room for $9 a night. $9!!!!
Ok that's it for now, must get back to molding minds and all that!