Gyeongju Saturday/Sunday

My computer seems to be working just fine now! Praise GOD!

Yesterday, Saturday was a rough start. We checked out of our first hotel room- which by the way had 3 beds, one for each of us girls sharing. (they were rock hard)- Traditional Korean beds. With a glass window bathroom door. Kind of akward for us, hahaha! So we put up a towel.
We met up with the host families children at the Dobong City Hall. Once we did we started our jouney to Gyeongju (pronounced, JOHN-JEW) about 20 minutes into this 5 hour drive to Gyeongju I started to get really car sick. Most of you know how L.A. drivers are right? Well Koreans are a lot like it! A lot of stop and go. So as I began to make my way to the front of the bus I looked at the lady with a sick face and put my hand over my mouth because I was about to throw up- without saying anything she grabbed a bag for me to throw up in, I threw up probably 5 times…SO nasty! You know that feeling that you get when you throw up and you are like, “oh man I want my mom”? haha! Well I wanted my mom but had 4 Korean moms huddling over me patting my back and making sure I was okay. It was so sweet! Its funny how there is a language barrier yet with my facial expression she knew I was in need of something. That is why I love sign language!
Any ways, we got to Gyeongju just fine and had Korean meal! It was good! LOTS and I mean LOTS of food is always on the tables! It’s like a feast! I think I might come back 10lbs heavier! Haha! We got to see lots of really cool things there like tombs that look like hills. Oh and the tour guide there could speak English- she was amazing! I think one of the coolest things I learned was about the Korean flag. If you don’t know the Korean flag has the ying yang along with lines that represent heaven, earth, fire, and water. The ying yang was picked red and blue to represent men and women. Men are red because they are very hot, and women are blue because they are very cold. Well now men wear blues or greens for their clothing because they need to cool down and women wear pinks and reds to warm up. So its all about balancing out each other. It was pretty cool to learn so much! The lily pads in the ponds there were amazing! I wish we had them in Vegas! After the night we got to stay in a really nice hotel room that overlooked part of Gyeongju. We even went on a little night tour; there were tons of people out for this event! Even the spiders! I couldn’t believe how big the spiders are there! The body was the size of like a .50 piece! Yes …the body!
Sunday morning we got to go to a breakfast buffet- they had lots of American food there! I was so happy! Its funny because none of the kids really liked any of the traditional Korean food. Maybe it was because they had us “Americans” with them. All they were talking to us about was hamburgers from McDonalds and how they wish they were able to get refills! Haha! They were so funny!
Today we went on a hike up a mountain it was pouring raining outside- probably one of my favorite parts of the day was breathing in all the fresh air and being surrounded by all the green! Once we got up the mountain we got to see the Buddha temple. It was built in 716 and there were people worshiping it/praying inside. There was a big sign that said no photos, so I took out the video camera to just record it, and one of the workers (an old lady) jumped up and said NO PHOTO!!!! I felt SO bad! I was thinking maybe no photos because of the flash. I learned my lesson well! Then another temple we went there were more Buddha’s. We learned about the past, present, and future Buddha. I was in shock when I saw what I know as the Nazi symbol all over the buildings there. Come to find out it is a Chinese symbol for Buddha. I was very shocked! My favorite thing there was a Korean tradition where they stacked rocks on top of each other. The rocks are people’s wishes. So each of us made wishes and stacked rocks. I made 5 
After this we went to McDonalds! It was so good and different tasting, but not in a bad way.
Once we got back to Dobong City Hall our host families picked us up. I got to meet Shin Hyang, YooJin and their father. They made a really cute welcome sign on their front door, and on my bed room door! They are SO sweet! Yoo Jin was so excited to see me! She couldn’t go to Gyeongju because she had a piano contest- which by the way she presented me with a welcome concert in my room by playing Beethoven #7. She is truly talented!
Well that’s it for today! Tomorrow is Monday and I am off to more tours!
Love you!