Day by Day with Gina

Days of Rest and Korean Potty Adventures

UPDATE FROM SOUTH KOREA
Friday, December 30, 2005

After our two busy days Seoul-searching, we decided to take it a bit easy. We hung around the apartment for the first half of the day, then Becca, Shane, Jason, and I decided to do some shopping in downtown Songtan. I made some all-important purchases during our excursion: jewelry, stickers I will use for my scrapbook, a cool scarf, and some hand warmers. They have these cool hand warmers you put in your pocket. There's a little bubble with some kind of chemical in it, and you pop the bubble, and it gets warm. You can put it in your pocket and make use of it at anytime. You can even reset it by putting it in the microwave, then reuse it at will. They are a brilliant invention, and they are in really funny shapes, too.

On Friday nights, Britt and Becca do a meal for the Hospitality House. Becca made ham, carrots, and green bean casserole (Jason's favorite dish). It was mashesayo (delicious)! After staying up a bit later to have a deep conversation between Ben, Jason, Shane, and me, we all got a really good night's sleep.

Saturday, December 31, 2005
New Year's Eve!!!

After sleeping in this morning, we took it pretty easy all day long. Ben is still feeling rough, so we decided to rest. We slept in, ate meals at appropriate times, and watched some Arrested Development. We're in season three now!! Woo hoo.
We getting up early to go to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) tomorrow. The DMZ is the area that separates North Korea from South Korea. It's a pretty big deal, and a pretty long trip. It involves us traveling about three hours each way to get there, then taking the tour while we are there. Large time (and money) commitment, but I think it will be well worth it. There is one part of the tour where you actually get to step into North Korea--enemy territory!!! Someday, Lord willing, the DMZ won't exist anymore, and it will be very cool to see it while we are here. All that to say, Ben and I intentionally took it easy today in an effort to store up energy for tomorrow. It's going to be a long Sunday doing the DMZ trip, and then we wake up on Monday to go to the airport and take the long journey home, so it was good to chizill today.

The highlight of the day, for sure, was the evening church meeting. Britt and Becca hold a meeting in the Hospitality House on Saturday nights. Becca usually cooks another meal, but this week, we had a teacher at the school where Britt works and her familiy cook some awesome Greek food. It was great! After the meal, we had a time of singing and sharing about what the Lord is doing. The meeting went really well, and Britt shared some good teaching. Most of the sharing and teaching tonight was about focusing on the Lord and being willing to die to ourselves, our desires, and our dreams and let Him be enough. It was a good word, and I was really blessed by it.
Shane started Micah on his first piano lesson tonight! He was pretty distracted, but that's okay.

So, tonight is New Year's Eve, and I am going to be in 2006 before all you guys back in the states, so nanny-nanny-boo-boo! I will hopefully be asleep by midnight as long as my laundry finishes in time, isn't that sad? I am getting old...

Korean Potty Adventures

So now, time for what I promised: my Korean bathroom experiences. Here are some things to know about public potties in Korea.

• Most of them are not heated, and therefore quite cold since this country has very chilly winters and the restrooms are all ceramic and metal.
  
• In many public places, such as the subway, you won't have a "Western" toilet, but what we affectionately call a "squatty-potty," that looks like this:

• They don't have hot water to wash your hands. The water is honestly right around 33 degrees Fahrenheit in most I have seen: just "warm" enough to be able to flow out of the faucet.
• They also don't usually have paper towels. They may have a hand dryer that blows out cold air. Between the cold water and the lack of paper towels or cold dryer, my hands have had trouble staying warm.
• Several places I have been also don't have soap. Rinse, rub, repeat, shake dry, then hand sanitizer is the best formula.
  
• Most Koreans don't flush their toilet paper. They use it and deposit it into a small trash can next to the toilet. This causes bathrooms to both look and smell rather...interesting.
• The topic of toilet paper brings me to my last, and most funny, observation. There are three varieties of toilet paper providing. 1) My personal preference, which is a roll of toilet paper in each stall. Seems normal and expected, right? Oh, just wait. 2) A large roll of toilet paper in some central location of the bathroom. Grab as much as you think you'll need, and take it in with you. Makes me concerned when I don't see women grabbing any, though...guess they drip dry. 3) Last, and least desirable, is exampled by my experience at the bus station the other day when we went to pick up Shane and Jason. I went in the restroom, looked around for the toilet paper, found none in a central location or in the individual stall. Seeing my confusion, a Korean lady motioned profusely and told me (in Korean) that I had to go buy some at the small store in the bus station. So, for about 500won (50 cents), I bought some toilet tissue. Ladies and gentlemen, if you ever come to Korea, bring some toilet paper with you. I would hate for anyone to have to "drip dry" if they weren't planning on it. That's just an uncomfortable situation.

So, the funny thing about this toilet paper is not only that I had to buy it to use a public restroom, but the package itself is quite amusing. Koreans really like to use English words, but their phrasings are rarely exactly correct. This is a perfect example. I will show you the pictures of the three sides of the pouch that have such writing, then put the words in quotes underneath so you won't miss the linguistic humor.

posted by Gina @ 7:39 AM