Coulda Woulda Shoulda

Magical day wandering the streets of an incredible academic hub.

As I was driving to the grocery store today I was taken aback by the beauty of the mountains along my view.  We've been here for over a year now, working and studying away, pleasantly surprised by the mild weather, not so surprised (or enthused) about the expenses here in the most beautiful & expensive end of the country. It feels like home, like we've been here forever. And although I've spent a good chunk of this 'winter' outdoors, spring is making it feel even more like a renewal. But even with all this comfort and homey-ness abound there is still one sight I'll never get used to. Those glorious mountains. And even as the thought crossed my mind, "Wow, do they ever look pretty today" I had to correct myself. I mean, do these suckers ever NOT look pretty? Snapped during Vancouver 2010 ...... but they looked like this today... minus the cute boy in green

Being somewhere means you have an opportunity to experience something. That means, if you are on a beach in Mexico, you have as many margaritas as you can and eat as much tortilla as humanly possible. If you’re hiking the Mournes in Northern Ireland, you make sure to stop when the sun comes out to admire a rare view. And if you’re at home, where you live, where you work, where you don’t necessarily think of yourself on vacation, you find the things that make the place where you are incredibly special and you make sure you soak in all of those places. I’ve heard it called a ‘staycation’, which I like, though I would go further than that and say this is more a state of mind. Sure, it’s easier to explore when you have multiple days off in a row but that doesn’t mean you can’t experience at least some form of discovery each day. I am lucky that I do have the hours in my day to make this possible. I don’t commute as I have a home office and I don’t have children that need me. Both o...

When we lived in Toronto, we rarely went further past Spadina on Queen Street. Not that I had anything against the street, it's just that I spent more time up Church Street or down to Jarvis and Front or up to Bloor and Yonge than I did in that direction. Ryerson's near the Eaton's Centre. I was a lazy student. I just stayed closer to home. This weekend my lovely friends from Korea K and W met D and I downtown for some visiting and potential sightseeing. As the weather was garbage - not unusual for February - we ended up walking underground for awhile. After a quick lunch near the Eatons Centre we ventured outside towards City Hall and onto Queen Street. I knew it would be a street that K would like I also knew that W has lived here before and probably frequented this street as well. So we walked, in the slush and the snow and the rain (yes, it was raining. IN FEBRUARY. And making this mucky and wet and melted and brown). W said he knew of a place where we could sit, have a...

In an effort to will the sun back to Busan so we can all head to the beach this weekend, I decided to post some pictures of the Baseball/Soccer/Football/Beach Festival weekend we had a few weekends ago. On Saturday - we hit the benches Lotte Giants on the field. Crazy Mascot dressed in a traditional Korean hanbok - female dress. D and B enjoy the game. I was there...see?? Kiwi D sneaks a peek at the camera. K and E REALLY enjoyed themselves. On Sunday - we hit the beach: Korea E prepares herself for the long day and Sun Hat K give some encouragement to N. Magazines always help footballers wives pass the time. Action of their final game. Way to go waegooks! Sand, sun, soccer, some magazines, some footballer wives, such great craic. What a blast.

Although I've always got a lot of words bouncing around in my head, I can't always say that they make that much sense. So, in an effort to compile some information that might be a bit less scrambled, here is a snapshot (ha ha, i'm TOO funny) I've what we've been up to over the past couple of weeks. First, there was my birthday which included tacos some wishes a pinyata and many many MANY songs sung by me and others, when I finaly gave the mic away. And then there was my ACTUAL birthday, which I shared with Buddha, and also meant, I got the day off. Happy Birthday to us, big guy. Then, there was a trip to Pohang to see some cute kids at an orphanage my friend K used to work at which included some playing some measuring - of the length of noses that is.. and some hugs and then an ice hockey game.. in which two foreigner friends were playing! It included a bit of drama, when a player stormed off the ice, because he lost his glove. More likely, it was because the G-town...