ice-uh!

two weeks ago shannon came up from daejeon for a trip to the hwacheon ice festival. she and joanna and i left jukjeon around 9.30 on saturday morning, and after missing our first bus out of seongnam by four minutes, as well as our bus out of chuncheon due to over-fullness, we managed to make it to hwacheon by 3.30. here are shannon and joanna attempting to recover from four hours of bus ride over some bibimbap:


hwacheon was adorably tiny. it's a small mountain town close to the border with north korea (we actually crossed the 38th parallel on the way up), and i believe that this fishing/ice festival is their biggest event all year. all over town were these adorable fish lanterns, winding through fences and occasionally sending us messages of love:


when we finally made it down to the festival we only had about two hours to spend there, or else we would have missed the last bus back to seoul from chuncheon. this turned out to be super upsetting, as the festival was AWESOME. there were giant snow sculptures galore. some super creepy:


and some super baller:


here i am entering the cave of wonders:


on the inside it was even cooler than aladdin would have me believe. it was completely lined with giant blocks of ice backlit with colored lights. we heavily desired photo ops (we went through twice), but it was a little overpopulated to get the effect we wanted. hence, the presence of this guy:


to be fair, i wouldn't be opposed to being his buddy. we also got arty:




wacky !!

afterward we scored free tickets (probz because we're white) to this massive ice slide. we sat in inner tubes and were shot out onto ice, where a dude holding an inner tube was responsible from stopping us from running into a wall. sweet. here are shannon and joanna being terrified in anticipation:


the entire river was frozen over (if we had had more time, we could have gone ice fishing and immediately cooked up our fish on a number of barbecues). there was also this sweet ice formation under a bridge with those fish lanterns and trees attempting to free themselves from it, which i will now share with you:


another activity offered was hand-fishing, wherein the fisherman (or woman) would get into an almost-freezing pond in a t-shirt and shorts to try to, you know, catch fish by hand. it was highly popular:


in an attempt to find the mythical room full of ice sculptures (which we only managed to discover minutes before our bus left, so upsetting), we found more adorable snow sculptures. here i am with my bestie, that cartoon penguin that i see everywhere:


look at all the fish and lights everywhere! hwacheon you are so cute !!


we were very sad to leave, as it was a legitimate cultural experience/we really wanted to see ice sculptures. fortunately i scored this sweet christmas picture to remember it by:


lots of love, 화천 !!

COME HANG OUT WITH US

so i figure i should go ahead and do a post about the philippines, since i completely neglected it.

quick rundown: we left our apartments at four am on christmas eve, and got to manila around two o'clock that afternoon. the plan was to stay in the city for a night at a backpacker's hostel and then bus it north to a beach on christmas, but our cab driver got us all nervous about the prospect getting onto public transportation, and instead drove us straight to a bus station. we hopped on a six-hour bus to san juan, which featured both under siege and under siege 2: dark territory, as well as double impact, starring jean claude van damme, with jean claude van damme.

"WE HAVE BEEN ON FIVE MODES OF TRANSPORATION AND AWAKE FOR NINETEEN HOURS HOW ARE WE DOING?!"

when we got to san fernando we stayed the night in the city, checking out an adorable christmas eve mass in the square, as well as dozens of delicious street food vendors.

lights!

mass!

the next morning we headed a little farther north to san juan, a crazy remote beach town inhabited by filipino squatters/surf instructors and several retired australian surfers. obviously we blended.

check out our adorable hostel!

$14 a night. total.

look, i match the room!

the beach was magical and ryan learned how to surf while i learned about george orwell's dystopian future.

ryan is surfing here somewhere.

how cute is this jetty?

we were utterly useless all week, and it was glorious. we made lots of friends for the night:



including some koreans who were studying english nearby (because apparently the philippines are the best place to go for english?) who made us 삼겹살 for new year's eve dinner deliciousssss.


we also borrowed these puppies from the hotel we splurged on the last night. you know, the one with ac, a massive shower, two double beds, and a private balcony. for $30. what is wrong with us.

neo !!


neo and ej !!

new year's eve was on the beach with the one hundred stick-in-the-sand-and-run-away fireworks we bought at the market. which the koreans knocked over, launching at least ten into the surfboard rental booth. nice-uh.

frenz !!



ryan partying hard with filipino besties.

what would new year's be without some karaoke??

the one tragic causality of the new year was my relatively brand-new pair of rainbows. camouflaged in the sand, they were never to be seen again after i was distracted by some pancit and kpop jams. :(

new year's day we packed up and left, hopping on a miserable six-hour bus back to manila. we had a lovely night in our air conditioned room with no sand, where my gaping foot wound had a chance to recover. though we were sad to end our very warm vacation, we were excited to be heading back to the land of both bip and bap:


OH AND GUESS WHAT. we were late for our flight because the manila airport has three different security checkpoints, as well as a line to pay a departure fee. when we got to the desk, we were informed by the very apologetic woman that the flight was full. we bugged out, until she explained that we'd have to get bumped to first class. i mean, if you insist.

course one, nbd.

o hay, row six !!