Adventurous Seoul: my 26th/27th birthday!

Okay, a little bit of a culture lesson. Although I am 26 in the west, here in Korea, I am now 27 and on January 1st, I'll be 28. In 2 weeks, I will have gone from 25 to 28! In Korea, age is counted differently than everywhere else. When a baby is born, Koreans count him or her as one year old, Koreans consider the gestation period as the first year. This shows how Koreans respect all stages of life.

Koreans count themselves one year older every January 1. So, a baby born on 31 December will already be 2 years old on 1 January.

I hope I got that right. Korean friends, help me out if I messed that one up.

Now, on to the festivities.

December 22 is the best day in the world. If you know me, you know I absolutely love my birthday. No, I'm not narcissistic, I just simply love my birthday. Perhaps it's because it's so close to Christmas or because my brother and I are only a few days apart; but I enjoy making my birthday a big event or celebration each year. :) Some of my friends even refer to December as "the month of Ellie" because I tend to celebrate all month (and sometimes a few months before and after). Simply put, I love my birthday. :)

In the past, I've had dance parties, dress up parties, a Michael Jackson party for my 25th, etc. I even have my 30th theme picked out already. Who says birthday parties are just for kids? :)

Well, this was my first year away from my family on my birthday and I wasn't quite sure how it was going to turn out. Yes, it is really cool that I got to celebrate it in Korea but I was still a bit sad knowing that we weren't going to do our traditional birthday celebrations (like get up early and sing the birthday song). It actually turned out to be a great day though, or should I say month? :)

The first weekend in December, Rachel and I (another December baby) went to Hongdae, the entertainment district of Seoul. We went dancing to celebrate the beginning of December and we stayed out all night and then went to a coffee shop while we waited for the subway to open.

Last weekend, a few of us went ice-skating to celebrate John-Paul's, Rachel's and my birthday. We went to the ice-skating rink at Lotte World (which is about 5 minutes away from where I work and this place has an underground shopping mall, a Lotte Department store, a hotel and then the largest indoor amusement park in the world). Sometimes after work, I just go walk around this huge place so it was cool actually going to skate.

Really cool place!

Meg and Heather, aren't you proud? (Meg and Heather are competitive figure skaters and you think I would have learned something by now...haha)

After skating, we went to a nice chinese restaurant that was called Chinese Restaurant:)
This was our cake! (please refer back to my cake entry) :)

On my actual birthday, I had to work (boo) but it wasn't too bad. I had just gotten a package from Annie, Kim and Meg so I opened them with the help of my Giraffe class. Then, throughout the day, the kids sang to me, made me a little cake and were really sweet. Midday, I got a special delivery from my family. They sent me a rose, like the rose on Beauty and the Beast. It was so nice and so thoughtful. Then, that night, I went out for Galbi (Korean BBQ, my favorite). Then we went out for coffee and more cake!