My mom flew from NC to visit with us over our Spring Break week, April 5-14.
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After recovering from her jet lag, we took Joyce on a crazy, fast city bus ride to downtown Daegu.
It was an experience she won't soon forget. |
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| We dined at Bennigan's for Levi's 13th birthday... |
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| ...and walked around & shopped downtown. |
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| I think some of the most fun Mema had was just hanging with the grandkids. |
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The next day we went to Bullodong Ancient tombs park which is very close to our school.
There are over 200 burial mounds here, all dating to the 5th century. |
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| The cherry blossoms were in bloom everywhere. |
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| We rode up to my favorite local (Bongmu) Park. Mom liked this little lending library there. |
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| We walked around part of the lake... |
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| Along the way were lots of lovely magnolia trees in bloom. |
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| "Stop poking me!" "Cut it out, you two, or I'll smack you with this cane!" |
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| We stopped for a cup of coffee, and this helicopter took off on a practice firefighting mission- it has a bucket dangling under it. |
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| The cherry trees were blooming everywhere and they looked and smelled beautiful! |
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| Even the magpies came out to greet Joyce. |
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| The next day we went to the Oriental Medicine Museum in downtown Daegu. |
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| ..fun with the Chinese statues out front... |
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| This is a wonderful FREE museum with lots of interactive displays in English, explaining about Oriental medicine. |
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| There was even a dress-up area. |
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| ...one of the best things there was the hot herbal foot soak- ahhhh.... |
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| ...we all loved it. |
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After the museum, we walked one block over to the Hyundai department store,
which has some tasty restaurants on the 8th floor.
Nice mouthful of pizza, Mar. |
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| ...view of the city from up there. |
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On Wednesday we rode out to the ancient village of Hahoe, two hours away.
The river on the right here loops around and encircles the village on the left and is quite lovely,
with cherry trees growing all along the bank. |
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The homes there are all preserved in their original exterior form from the 1600's, with thatched roofs.
Families from the same clan still live in all the houses (with modern upgrades inside). |
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| This is a very famous place in Korean heritage and some notable scholars and prime ministers came from Hahoe village. |
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The entire village is open to paying tourists, to walk down the streets.
The streets are like walled corridors and we enjoyed walking through and looking at all the beautiful traditional Korean architecture. |
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Hahoe is beloved by Koreans and is a well-known tourist spot.
Queen Elizabeth visited here in 2007 and planted a commemorative tree in the village. |
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| After shopping for souvenirs, the highlight of the trip was the legendary Hahoe mask play. |
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Each mask is portrayed as a different character through dance and some talking,
with Korean drums playing in the background. |
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| Some characters are funny.. |
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| ... and some are proud. It was all really entertaining, even without understanding the language. |
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| The next night we went out for traditional Korean barbecue, or Sam-gyup-sal. Nice mouthful of that, Mar. |
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We finished up the week with Mema with a cake to celebrate both kids' birthdays in April
(Levi's 13th & Marly's 10th).
We're so glad Mom came to visit and plan to do it again next year! ☺
* Side note: at the time, North Korea was making threats against the US, but no one seemed a bit worried, and we never heard anything about them! |
