I spent my last couple days at home before moving up to the Dragon Hill rapidly finishing up my "nesting" tasks. We completed the nursery, cleaned the house, and I cooked up several crockpot freezer meals that we can eat after the baby arrives. I also made sure James had plenty of his favorite foods and snacks in the fridge since I knew he'd be home alone for at least a week. I wanted to make sure he ate more than Thai food and trail mix that week. ;^)
On Thursday, July 18th, I packed my bags and boarded a bus to Seoul. After checking in at the Dragon Hill, I went over to the hospital for my 38 week check up. The doctor examined me and said I was dilated to 1 cm, which was exciting because something was happening, but we still had a long way to go. So I mentally prepared myself to spend several days in this hotel while we waited for our little boy to arrive!
As inconvenient as it is being away from home for so long, the Dragon Hill is not a bad place to hang out. My room is comfortable - with a comfortable queen sized bed, a couch, table and TV with DVD player. I have a little "kitchenette" area with a sink, mini fridge and microwave plus dishes and utensils so I went to the grocery store and bought myself some snacks and meals that I could prepare without a stove. Inside the hotel there are several restaurants, plus a convenience store that is open 24 hours which has helped keep me fed when I'm too lazy to take a cab off base. The hotel also has a really nice, air conditioned indoor gym and pool facility where I go at least once a day to try and walk that baby out on the treadmill. I've also discovered in my time here that the BX, food court, smoothie shop, library, bowling alley and base movie theater are all within walking distance. It's a very convenient central location!
The best thing about being up here, though, is definitely the peace of mind that comes with knowing that the hospital is a 3 minute cab ride away. The labor and delivery nurses encourage us to call or drop in at any time, day or night, if we have questions or concerns. That has come in handy a couple of times already as I had one false alarm and a couple of other pressing concerns that they were able to easily help me with. That safety net is definitely worth the weeks of living out of a suitcase.
My days are not very eventful - but that is probably a good thing. Stork nesting has pulled me out of my home and my usual routine and completely opened up my schedule. It's kind of nice knowing I have literally nothing I have to do all day. I can sleep in, rest, watch TV and movies, read, exercise, wander around, eat and take naps whenever I feel like it! While I sometimes get bored and lonely, I can see how this forced "me time" will be a huge blessing right before our newborn baby turns our world upside down. Sleep while you can, as they say!
Thankfully, James was able to come up here on the weekends those first couple of weeks and take me out to explore the city. We went out to several delicious international restaurants and toured some of the big tourist sites around Seoul. Below are some snapshots from our first weekend together:
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| Dinner at Santorini, a delicious Greek restaurant |
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| We walked around the Korean War Memorial & Museum that Saturday afternoon |
One of the most interesting things about the Korean War Museum is that it's not only focused on what we call The Korean War. It highlights all of the wars and struggles with foreign conquerors that Korea has dealt with all the way back through antiquity. So we got to see ancient weapons and artifacts showing how they fought against multiple invasions from various empires around the globe. No wonder they don't have a whole lot of unique or distinctly Korean cultural traditions, architecture, etc. They were almost always ruled and influenced by someone else!
Later that evening we went on a pilgrimage across the city to find the one Korean location of our favorite Japanese restaurant called Pepper Lunch! We used to have regular date nights in Misawa where we'd travel to the local mall and eat at Pepper Lunch before going to see a movie at the Japanese theater. It was one of the few places I new I would miss and crave when we left. So when I found out they had a location here in Seoul, I knew we had to find it! Of course, it was buried in the basement of one of the largest shopping complexes in Asia. But thankfully, we found it, and enjoyed some steak & pepper rice - even if it wasn't quite prepared the way we're used to. That's Korea for you, though - "The Land of the Not-Quite-Right."
After dinner, we took three subways back to the international restaurant district outside the base where we met up with some friends who were up having drinks at a local pub. I got a kick out of the fact that I can now legitimately claim a seat in the "priority seating" section on the subways because I'm large with child! haha.
The next morning, we slept in, ate brunch in the hotel, and then headed out for what promised to be a memorable experience. We had heard that the biggest church in the world is located here in Seoul. Their sanctuary building is probably comparable in size to many mega churches in the States. But the Yoido Full Gospel Church of Seoul has over 1 million members! They hold several packed services each weekend, plus several people tune in and follow along via a web broadcast. The cool thing about visiting this church is that they have a whole section up in the balcony set up for international visitors. They have bulletins printed in several languages that outline the sermon content, plus headphones that you can tune in to one of 10 different channels that provide a word-for-word translation of the prayers and sermon in your language. We felt a little like we were at the U.N. or something. Over all, we were very impressed. The sermon was good (although long), and the music was fantastic! At the beginning they had some contemporary worship music. But during the rest of the service it was more traditional hymns sung by a choir of 100+ people accompanied by a small orchestra. No joke. I'm not sure we'd pay the cab fair to go back but it was a memorable experience!
Our second weekend in Seoul was a lot more laid back. Most of our trips out the gate involved food rather than adventure. But that's ok! Jon and Claire were up here saying farewell to some non-military friends and invited us to join them for dinner. Their hosts are a very nice French couple who cooked us an authentic French meal of homemade bread, salad, pork chops and ratatouille! SOO delicious. We love being able to tag along with Jon & Claire because they can provide a much more unique travel experience than any one else we know. =^)
That weekend I also made sure to take James over to the hospital and give him a tour of the labor and delivery unit. He was planning to go back to work for at least another couple of days and I figured it was important for him to know where he was going incase I went into labor while he was away. He was very impressed with the staff and facilities. We look forward to checking in over there and delivering our baby. Eventually.
Thankfully, he didn't have to stay away long. He worked for two more days and then decided to just go ahead and take some leave so he could join me up here 24/7 until this baby arrives. It sounds like we've still got quite a ways to go but as I've not been feeling so great the last few days, it gives me a lot more peace of mind to no longer be hanging out up here alone. =^)
Also, with my partner on my arm, I feel more confident about exploring out the gate. So we've continued our culinary tour of the local international district over the last couple of nights. First we went to the famous Vatos Tacos for some California style Mexican food.
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| We splurged on this shared dessert to celebrate reaching 40 weeks. Holy moly was it good - fried cinnamon & sugar coated tortilla wedges topped with ice cream, drizzled in melted Nutella sauce and sprinkled with powdered sugar. =^O |
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