Day 39 (12 Aug) - Another Farewell

Tonight we went to a Korean restaurant in Songtan to say farewell to the Korean counterpart for my boss.  I'm not sure what his Korean name is; we call him "Lincoln."

This is the lovely Chung-Un Bulgogi House.

A table for 20 of my closest friends.

Grilled marinated pork ribs and garlic.

The servers cut the pork with scissors when it's ready.

The American is my boss.

The guy on my left is Kan, one of my two ROK counterpart.  The guy on my right is Mickey, who just got here.  He flies F-15Ks and went through the B course at Seymour Johnson with the 333rd in 2005, so we had a lot to talk about.  He told me that the Koreans have adopted callsigns after going through American TX courses.

The night lights of Songtan.

Cheers,
Richard

Day 32 (5 Aug) - Ta Da!

Today a minor miracle happened.  I got my stuff!

Three boxes made it literally around the world and into my room.  Golf clubs?  Check!!!

Box #2 of 3.  What I notice about this box are the two big holes in the side that are covered with tape.  Now, the interesting thing is that there were no holes in the side when it left Alabama.  Hmmm...

Only one small bit of damage.  My Black & Decker knock-off of the Foreman Grill lost a corner, but it still works.  Not bad even for how little stuff I had.

Here's my room now with all the extra stuff.  The books were a little bruised but fairly intact.  I will never ever allow them to move my books again without packing them separately.

Cheers,

Richard

Day 31 (4 Aug) - Ouch, Quit It! Ouch, Quit It!

It's been a long week and it's not over yet.

In short, 39 hrs of work in the last three days.  Yep...13.0, 12.5, 13.5.  I'm ready for this exercise to be over, and this is just the warm up.

I just typed the title for this post and realized I've been here for one full month.  Between that and finally getting my household goods (HHG) tomorrow, I should be pretty excited, if only I wasn't too tired.

Funny story about my HHG.  Turns out they've been here since July 19th.  However, TMO never called or emailed me to let me know.  Yes, it must be that difficult.

Notes if you're moving here...

1.  You must know how to use the DPS website or you will regret it (I can send slides).  This is the only way to find out if your stuff is actually here or not.

2.  When your stuff gets here, forget about DPS.  Call TMO then and when they see that your stuff is here, they'll send you a phone number for the moving company.  Call the company directly and schedule delivery.  Delivery date is negotiable based on how much stuff you had.  They said next Tuesday, I said this Friday, and they said OK.

Cheers,

Richard

Day 26 (30 Jul) - The Other White Meat

Ok, I've been bad about posting lately, but I was really busy when the girls were here and it's been a lot like groundhog day after they left, with two exceptions.

First, the boss bloodied my nose during a 3v3 basketball game, no more than an hour after the girls left base.  I can't confirm it's broken, but there was a lot of blood and it hurts.  Here's a picture from the day after.  The girls say it's crooked, but I think they're exaggerating.  After all, I've always been this ugly.

Well, Saturday night was interesting to say the least.  I went to a party supposedly thrown by the deputy in our shop.  In reality, it was a Filipino birthday party for two of the ladies there.  There were three circles of people present.  First, work people from the shop (my circle).  Second, motorcycle riders from the local Harley gang.  Third, Filipino friends of his wife and their families; there were at least six Filipino ladies married to Americans.  The great thing is that we all got along extremely well.  The main course...roasted pig.  Let's just say it was an interesting evening.  Lots of great food, lots of great people, and lots of kids running around.  I didn't take any pictures other than the pig.  I didn't really know anybody yet and I didn't want to look like a tourist.  Here's the pig...

Cheers,

Richard

Day #24 (28 July)

Hello All,
This post is not actually from Richard...It is Chrysta today.  There will be no pictures because I have no idea how to add a picture, but we have done so many fabulous things while we have been visiting.  The DMZ tour was amazing.  Shopping has been a blast.  We have been yelled at by women on the street because we didn't stop to look at their scarves, walked through kitchens, up stairs, around corners, and crawled through holes in the wall to look at purses, tried Kimchi (ick), and been told about 2 dozen times that we are the "first customer today."  Apparently we were supposed to believe that we were getting a huge discount when they told us that.  Bulgogi is pretty good, toilet paper is at a premium, and they serve steak in a sweet gobi sauce at Outback Steakhouse.

But most of all we have had a wonderful visit with Richard.   We hate to leave him, but it is time to go home and back to reality.  Love you Honey!

Day 19 (23 Jul) - DMZ Tour

Today was a long day, but well worth it.  We went on an ITT tour of the DMZ.  

This was our tour guide, Sung Ko.

The first stop: Imjingak Resort Park.  There was an amusement park that wasn't open, and some DMZ monuments.  Not sure what the thing is behind us but it looked pretty neat.

Here was a train from the Korean War.  Note all the bullet holes.

Just thought this would make a good picture.

Here's a fence along the DMZ border with notes, flags, letters, streamers, etc.

Bailey looking beautiful as ever.

Next stop: DMZ tunnel #3.  260-ish meters long and 70 meters underground.  Unfortunately, no pictures of the tunnel itself were allowed.

Next stop: Mt. Dora Train Station.  The intent of these tracks is to connect Pyongyang and Seoul.  Obviously, that has yet to happen.

Lunch, Korean style.  Bailey is pretty decent with chopsticks.

Next stop: Joint Security Area.  The blue building on the left is where north Korean and South Korean officials meet.  The cement marker halfway down the buildings marks the line of the DMZ.  Everything beyond that marker is north Korea.  If you look closely, you'll see the north Korean soldier just in front of the building in the distance.

The girls looking their best.

A Republic of Korea guard protecting the tour from any crazy north Koreans that try and grab us.  We are technically on north Korean soil at this point since this half of the room is on the north Korean side.

Gracen doing what teenage girls do best...getting pictures taken with young, single guys.

The bridge of no return.  When the armistice was signed in 1953, they lined up the POWs on each side of the bridge.  They could choose which side to stay on, but once they crossed the bridge, they could never return.

Details in case you're interested in going yourself.  We left at 0700.  We got back at 1715.  Lunch was 10,000 won each and we spent another 10,000 won on souvenirs.

Richard

Day 15 (19 Jul) - Nothing to Report

Nothing new to report other than 2 more buckets (running total: 13).  This will be too hard for me to remember, so I just have to remember that there were 6 buckets before the first key.  Each key has 50 buckets on it, so the end of the first key is 56 buckets.

I told you there was nothing to report!  It's your fault if you're bored reading this.

Richard