I'VE HIT THE MOTHERLOAD!!!!!

While driving to Asan for our trip to Admiral Yi's park (see previous post), my eyes were transcendentally drawn to a junk store at one of our turns.  Of course, I had to come back. So with the help of my beautiful and brave friend, Leah, we risked our lungs, tetanus shots, and scaredy cat-ness of big horking spiders lying in wait for us, eager to pounce on an unsuspecting arm or leg, and dug through Ajusshi's treasures.  Man, oh man, what glorious, heavenly things awaited us!  Doors and windows and old silk screens and beautiful paintings and dressers and old cameras, I could go on and on.  We climbed through some pretty treacherous broken glass and rusty metal pipes to get to the good stuff.  All in all, Leah came home with a beautiful door, which Ajusshi lovingly tied to the top of my Jeep with an extension chord he found amongst his rubble.  And I found and old door, and old screen and two old windows.  I have posted some pictures of other treasures to be found.  

Ajusshi's prices were a little steep....something that will change as we build a relationship with him and he does not think we are stupid Americans.  I am sure the more we go, the more his prices will go down.  It seems most business people in town are skeptical of Americans; maybe because they do not speak English and we do not speak Hangul.  But that will never stop me from finding treasures and goods that are unique to Korea.  We googled how to say "See you soon" which is "god dangsin-eulbogo", we wanted him to know we would be back.  He seemed skeptical of our motives at first, but I think with the loot we packed in my Jeep, and the fact that we were not afraid to dig in his outside junk pile, made him view us differently.  A definite trip back for sure, only this time with a Bongo truck and a KATUSA, to ease the translation process!!!  (Note to self...must also learn to translate "junk" in a positive fashion in Hangul).

 

Okay, so I am a neglectful blogger.  I try, I really do.  It has been a WHILE since my last post.  We are all settled in our apartment....so much so, that it might be time to rearrange things while the Mister is gone (muhahahahaha - he hates when I rearrange things).  We have been super busy...which I will update this blog with pictures later of our trip to Hong Kong, my treasures I have found, and a myriad of other things going on here in the Land of the Morning Calm.  

I felt compelled to post today because my sweet friend Jacqi and I, along with a sweet new friend (new to me) Katrina, took our ducklings to Asan.  It is a nice town about 20 minutos away from the Hump (that's Camp Humphreys to you commoners!) It was a mildly chilly, but gloriously sunny day in our neck of the woods.  We enjoyed a nice picnic lunch (okay, I cheated and went to Subway) under a tree.  The park is for Admiral Yi, a very important military figure and hero to the Korean people.  Admiral Yi was an extremely skilled naval officer who effectively used the Turtle ships, or Korean Warships, to save the peninsula from the Japanese invasion in the 1590's.  There are several books written about his tactics, his love for his country, and his heroism.  The park is expansive. There are so many beautiful trees; Cherry Blossoms being the main ones.  But the azaleas are blooming like crazy.  Some of the trees in the park are over 500 years old.  Admiral Yi's house is on the park property, as well as the museum, his grave, the shrine built in his honor, and the graves of his descendants.  This park is one of the reasons I love Korea.  It was a living nature museum to one man who played such a pivotal role in Korea's history.  I have never seen a park in the States that compares.  Not to say there aren't any, I just haven't seen any.  The sheer beauty of the landscaping and naturalistic aspects of the park made it enjoyable for everyone.  It was very romantic and beautiful. It was so romantic and storybook like, you would think Prince Charming would come sauntering down the hill amongst the trees on his white horse. The breeze, the sun, the wonderful Korean people, and my company, made this day truly enjoyable.  Okay, enough rambling, here are some photos:

And I could not resist adding photos of my Ducklings! 

Turtle Ship!

Admiral Yi and Monty

Koi invasion!!!

Beautiful!!! 

Just in case you needed to know where you should go to hang on a park bench and look suave, I found the place...30m to the right!! 

 

The only Cherry Blossom left in the park in full uniform!

Finally....pictures of our apartment.  I tried to showcase everything in the apartment that I am particularly fond of, but there are so many wonderful things I actually enjoy about it, I did not want to bombard the blog with a billion photos.  It is still a work in progress, so without further adieu....I give you Apartment 904....

This is what I like to call our front porch!  Luckily, we are in the back of the building, so to speak, away from the elevators.  Unluckily, when I get a wild hair to redecorate, as I am so often wanton to do, I have to haul things up from the basement and traverse the 18 steps from the elevator to our "front porch".  

My little wonderful $5 entry way table.  I have carried this thing with me for a while and can never see myself parting ways with it.  It has just the right amount of scuff and peeling paint that a girl could ask for.  Downside to decorating an apartment (besides the fact it could save our lives) are those horrendous fire alarms and alert alarms.  Can't seem to fit them into my decor, not matter how industrial chic I plan to go.  

Our really large living/dining area.  I was super impressed with the crown molding and recessed lighting, 
especially for being a military house.  The only thing they did not get right was the ceiling fan in the LR.  I can probably ignore it for two years though.  Isn't the space open and airy??

This is another piece I could never get rid of. It's wobbly and has been painted a million different colors (it's actually twice the size from when I first got it because of all the paint layers).  I found this gem on Craigslist in Houston and sweet talked my dad into picking it up for me because we were at Ft. Hood.  The Korean movers did not seem to appreciate its peeling paint and shabbiness....they seemed perplexed that this American gal would ship something so distressed clear across the Pacific Ocean to place in a new apartment.  

Something I absolutely love about this apartment is all the natural light the windows let in.  There are those horrid vertical blinds that I have bound up and tried to hide with my wonderful old door and column post, but I know they are there and still working on something to get rid of them altogether.  The LR is cozy, yet spacious, if that is possible.  Those two months of me drawing our furniture on the floor plan housing gave us paid off...everything fits right where I wanted it to. 

I was not too crazy about the cabinet color, but I have to say, the government did pretty good again here.  Although there is not a pantry, or a garbage disposal, and the range hood is stainless and the rest of the appliances are white, there are plenty of cabinets and there is plenty of room on the bar to entertain, put out food,etc. for parties.  Which we love to have.  I think I have everything situated..I packed our entire kitchen and I still have empty cabinets.  Which only means I need for kitchen goodies!!! Ssshhh...don't tell the Mister!

This is what I lovingly call my back porch.  There is a bit of room for a small patio table and we are currently looking for hanging baskets of some sort (as soon as I can get someone to tell me how to say that perfectly in Hangul so I can ask someone in town and they not look at me like I just asked if I could eat their first born baby) to have a small garden. We get plenty of sun...we face to the South of post, which I hope means we will always have great sunshine all year long!

We have an extra long and wide hallway, which we love, but so do the kids because they like to play "Risky Business" and slide down the hallway in their socks.  Again, I tried to blend the fire and alert alarm in with my wall treasures, but I know they are there.  

Guest/kid's bathroom...It is nice and open.  I was amazed at the nice pedestal sinks.  Some of the apartments we saw had those horrible high school bathroom sinks, with the pipes exposed...which does not come off as industrial chic, but high school bathroom chic.  I suppose a spouse could make a sink skirt, but I am lucky I did not have to bust out my horrible sewing skills (probably the one craft I can't do, but should, since my grandmother was a seamstress and my mom sewed all our clothes) and make a sink skirt.   Natasha - 1, Sewing machine - 0.  

When I told the Mister I wanted to do our bedroom in all white, he turned white.  Because he knows how messy we can all be.  But I assured him I would set aside my OCD nature or get off white colored linens so they would appear less dirty and more shabby (notice the large, dirty, er, I mean shabby flour sack pillow on our bed).  He didn't like the grimy pillow at first, but now seems okay knowing he could accidentally let it fall on the floor and not worry about me yelling at him for not keeping stuff clean.  I would still like to slipcover our headboard, with some white fabric of course, but I will pay some one to do that...

The other side of our room....my "new" white chairs fit perfectly in our white bedroom.  These were some old wing backs we found in le garbage in a rough area of Houston.  They were covered in some velvet fabric and were very dirty.  They are now covered in painter's canvas we picked up at Lowe's for $25...enough to cover both chairs.  Take that fancy schmancy expensive decorator fabric at $99/yard! 

Finally...our laundry room.  We got a new washer and dryer with the apartment (okay, every apartment gets one, we aren't that special).  Again, super impressed at the size of the laundry room.  I even had room to add some decorations that I had and did not have a place to put them (our basement storage is gettin' kind of full and the Mister has not even gone to CIF yet to get the rest of his gear and our gas masks).  

I took a ton more pics, but I fear this blog is getting bogged.  At least for today.  As I sit on my couch and look out my huge apartment windows, I wonder what other treasures await me from beyond my 9th floor balcony.  And where can I put them when I do find them?  We are sort of at max capacity, especially for our weight allowance to go back home.  8500 lbs adds up quickly!  We were about 9693 lbs coming over...so I guess I will have to sell some stuff while we are here so I can bring home some of the wonderful treasures I have seen along side the road already.  Now, we are finally settled, I can work on getting those in my used/new-to-me 1995 Jeep Grand Cherokee and haul them up to Apartment 904.  Hopefully I can convince the kids that the junk looks really great in their rooms and pretend I have always had it when the Mister asks where it came from (come on ladies, admit you do that, too!)  I did find a really gross cabinet door in le garbage while in town a few weeks ago.  The Mister and the ducklings just shook their heads while I beamed at my treasure, daydreaming about a million and one things it could become........

Houston, we have an apartment....

It has been a day - or a few - since my last post.  I have been busy feathering my new nest...after countless days (62) in Army lodging, we are finally settled in our apartment.  There are a few boxes here and there, which is why I have not posted pics yet, but I will be posting some this week. For the most part, all the furniture we brought fits.  I have had to be pretty creative to get everything just right, but I think I can make it work.  It is tough going from 2300 sq ft house to 1600....thank goodness we only brought half of our stuff! But we do love our view, even though there is a dairy farm right off post (our apartments are right on the edge of post) and it smelled pretty badly yesterday.  But I have a view of the mountains off my balcony, and were it not for the view of some of the Humphreys water towers (and that blasted dairy farm), I can pretend I am at a resort! I am also going to ignore the cemetery I can see from our 9th floor view or any creepy pets or scary people that may crawl out of their resting place at night to haunt some poor unfortunate soul! Hopefully, those things stay on their side of the fence! 

We were fortunate enough to receive our household goods and unaccompanied baggage the same day as our move in.  I was worried about our huge armoire, buffet, and dining table getting in the elevator, especially because someone already stationed here told us the Koreans were weak and would break our stuff (I know, rude and presumptuous), but everything got here in one piece.  Except our couch....that is broken, but because of the packers in the states, not the Koreans.  

So when the Korean movers brought in our stuff, they unpack it for you and place it where you want it.  Every time one of the movers unwrapped one of my precious treasures, I would hear a gasp.  I brought over an old door, windows, shutters, and a huge column post.  I am pretty sure the movers thought I was building another house inside this one.  I kept saying antiques...but I guess junk doesn't translate in Hangul.  I wanted so desperately to explain to the movers that when it all comes together, this junk really looks great.  But my Korean language handbook does not have that sentence or translation.


Next week, I am all ready to host a ladies luncheon for the few spouses I have met here and like.  The Mister would rather that I wait to host and entertain, but after living out of a suitcase for so long and eating out all the time, I am ready to spread out and serve some delicious homemade meals on my new gas stove!  It has been a while since I have cooked with a gas stove, and I could not be happier! 

So, our suitcases have been put away for now...they found a new home in our basement storage, and I can't say I will miss them.  Living out of a suitcase usually means you are on a pleasurable vacation, but that was not the case with us.  The next time we get to pull out those weary bags of nylon and zippers will be for our trip to Hong Kong next month.  Hopefully, the idea of living out of a suitcase will take its normal place in our vernacular when we begin exploring Asia, and our suitcases will not be carrying three months of our lives, but souvenirs and treasures from the exciting places we will go!

Just a little introduction to Suitcase living.....after living in our beloved Texas for 7 years, and enduring deployments and other assignments which separated our family, we decided to chop down our Texas roots, and replant them in South Korea.  We have lived here before and so enjoyed it.  So while my Mister has served in the military for 25 years and was ready to retire after his last deployment, we decided to get one last "hoorah" out of the military and head overseas to give our kids the world...well, at least the eastern half of it.  This move of course meant I would be giving up my precious little antique business and relinquishing my volunteer positions and leaving my wonderful friends behind that became such a great support system while the Mister was away.  It was a tough decision, but I know it was the right one, just because of what we are going to experience here.  With the help of friends and family and army movers, we split up our worldly possessions, half to storage and half to be sent on a boat to Korea.  Around the 19th of December, 2012, we put two weeks of clothing in a suitcase, and have been living out of one ever since.  We finally arrived to our pseudo-final home on January 2nd.  We are in a hotel until our apartment is ready.  It is not easy living in a two room hotel suite with a 14 year old and a nine year old sharing a very uncomfortable fold out couch and one bathroom and still living out of a suitcase!  There is a very dim light at the end of the tunnel...we are being told the beginning of March should be our "go date" to move in.  I really hope so....we have endured temporary assignments, deployments and everything else the military can throw at you, I would hate for it to all come to a pathetic ending because 250 square feet of living space did us in (ha ha).

Besides my Mister and the ducklings (my 14 and 9 year old), one of my other passions is decorating.  It will be a challenge decorating a military house/apartment, but I know it can be done.  I will be posting plenty of photos of what I have hopefully made into a home. I know my decorating style is not everyone's style, but I hope if you have found my blog and you are moving here to Korea, you will get a sense of what to bring over here and hopefully make your move a little easier.  I only say this because there just is not enough information out there about what spouses should pack or bring.  Just in the two months we have been here, I have heard so many spouses say they did not know what to bring, how much, etc., I hope maybe my blog can give a spouse an inkling of what to bring and they will be hopeful about getting past the basic walls of military housing and make it as personal as one can with government quarters and government furniture.

Our other passion is travel.  We are beyond ecstatic about where our adventures will take us.  Our first big trip is currently planned for Hong Kong.  But there is so much to see and discover here in Korea, we have been so busy on the weekends discovering all it has to offer.  I think we could live in Korea for 5 years and never experience everything here!

Until next time.......