Farm fresh, free range eggs {& how two CityGirls had such fun collecting them}

Last month Farmboy and I were home in South Africa for our Winter Holidays. We got to spend time with all our respective families, and had a most enjoyable time on his family dairy farm. As a CityGirl, and considering I had only ever seen eggs come out of grey boxes, collecting eggs is still very much a novelty. This time round I had the help of my gorgeous cousin Jess. Together we set about collecting all the eggs from various chickens dotted around the farm. 

Thanks for a wonderful eggy adventure Jess <3

Farm Holiday in South Africa

Farmboy and I have been at home on holiday here in South Africa for a week now, first spending some time in Joburg, the Drakensburg and have finally touched down on the family dairy farm in Creighton, KZN.

Here are a few snaps of the drive from Joburg, as well as my first morning waking up to the cows and chickens, and wide open spaces that make this place such a wonderful retreat from Korean life.

Happy Christmas from South Korea!

Wishing all my readers a very happy Christmas and a wonderful year ahead! Thank you for reading and following along in my search for pretty-ness.

<3 Roxy

Winter in Korea....it's going to be a white Christmas!

This is our third winter here in Korea and yet this is the first winter that Farmboy and I have ever seen or experienced so much snow. Our first year in Daejeon and last year here in Buan it snowed twice. This year has been completely different. The snow started on Monday and hasn't stopped since! We have had a few hours of sunshine in between but it just keeps on coming. It's incredibly beautiful and the first few hours of morning when the snow is falling are like magic. Everything is quiet, the snow muffles out all the usual sounds of the town and it's incredibly peaceful. 

But, the snow is not very kind on our poor old car, Cherry. Whose doors and windows freeze shut locking us out (and sometimes even in!). It's really scary driving in the snow, the roads are icy and people have very little control over their cars. But even still, we feel like little kids at Christmas every time we wake up and find it's still snowing. And our little pup Shadow is in his element. He just loves the snow. He saw it for the first time this week and even though he hates water, he can do snow. It's so cute watching him jump and burrow his way around, in and under everything. He doesn't feel the cold, unlike us!

Here are a few photographs from our first early morning out in the snow.

Enjoy!

x

Shadow our Black & Tan Korean Jindo rescue pup

We've had little Shadow for 2 months now, and boy have our lives changed. The first 2 weeks of having him were an absolute nightmare. We really had no intentions of having a pet while living here in Korea, not just because of the logistics of keeping a pet in an apartment, but also because of the costs associated with bringing them back home to South Africa. But once we started getting into more of a routine, around the 3 week mark, and of course once we decided that we could keep him, he has brought us so much joy.

You can read the full story of how Shadow came into our lives by clicking here, but to sum things up, we found him wondering a dark road late at night. He wasn't in bad shape when we took him in, he was obviously owned by someone, whom we later found out had to get rid of his dogs to go to the military. There's pretty much only one place an unwanted pup ends up here in Korea, and that's in the soup pot. Dog meat is an age old tradition here in Korea, especially in the more rural areas like where we live. It's too easy to judge people for their cultural differences, and so have just learnt to accept that eating dog is a part of the older traditional culture here in Korea. We may not agree with it, but that's not to say that the Koreans are wrong in their ways.

Anyway, here are some of photographs our little pup. In the first few we had just got him and he was about 2 or 3 months old. The last few photographs are of him from the past few weekend, he is about 5 months old now and growing by the second. I have been taking weekly photographs of him which I will share here on the blog in the next few months. It's been such fun watching his little legs grow and his ears get bigger and bigger and floppier and floppier.

Owning a puppy or dog here in Korea isn't easy. But it can be done with proper training and a lot of patience. I'll also be sharing a few more puppy related posts in the next few weeks for anyone thinking about getting a dog. In the mean time, I hope you enjoy these pictures.

x

Buan, South Korea

Farmboy and I live in a very small town here in Korea called Buan. It's not much, but it has become our home and we are happier here than we were when we lived in Korea's third largest city, Daejeon.

Winter is just about here, and before it got really cold I managed to get these photographs of the drive into town. Just to give you an idea of what 'rural' Korea looks like.

Shadow & Nami {Puppies in Korea}

Today my four month old Jindo puppy Shadow, had his first play date with another pup.

Nami is an 8 month old Golden Retriever who lives with his humans (Tom & Mairead) in a town nearby called Namwon. Nami was also a rescue pup like Shadow, found on the streets of Korea. Unfortunately there are too many unwanted dogs littering the streets here, but his and Shadow's stories are happy ones.

Poor Nami was absolutely terrorized by Shadow, who is a little bundle of energy with razor sharp teeth. But they had a ball nonetheless, and even kept still long enough for me to take a few photographs. Here are a few snaps from this afternoon in the golden Autumn sunlight in Jeongeup Park.

Shadow our Korean Jindo puppy

World, meet Shadow, our +-2 month old black and tan rescue Jindo puppy. We think he is a Jindo from what we can found out on Google (Rotweillers and German Shepards are extremely uncommon here in Korea) so this seems like the most likely option considering his colouring.

Farmboy and I found Shadow 3 weeks ago wondering around a dark road, late at night and narrowing avoiding oncoming traffic. He had no sign of any owners, so we picked him up and took him for the night with no intentions of keeping him. We have since found out that his owner had to go to the military and aren't sure whether he was being sold for food (eating dog meat it is an age old tradition here in Korea) or whether he was destined for a life chained up outside a kennel.

Jindo dogs originate from Jindo Island, a small island off the West Coast of South Korea. Jindos were bred for hunting and are most well known for their fierce loyalty and brave nature. Mainland Koreans keep Jindos as watch dogs, and all of the ones we have seen are chained up outside their homes. We have only ever seen 4 or 5 Jindos being taken for a walk by their owners in the 2.5 years we have lived in Korea. Space is a big issue here in Korea, and that is why when Koreans choose to have dogs as pets they favor the small breeds, like Chihuahuas, Toy Pomeranians, Maltese Poodles and Pekingese. 

Jindo's grow to a medium size, similar to the a Border Collie . We don't think Shadow's original owner would have been as uncaring as we was if he was a pure Jindo pup, so depending on what mix he is he might be smaller (or maybe even larger!) than a sheep dog. Jindos come in 6 different colours. White, Yellow or Brown, Black & Tan, Grey, Tiger Brindle and solid Black. White and Yellow are the most prized and popular colours.

As I have spent the past 3 weeks scouring the internet for information on this unusual breed, I thought I'd share some facts with you about them:

1. They are pretty much housebroken automatically - We just though Shadow was super smart II'm sure everyone thinks this about their dog), having only pooped in the house on the first night we had him and then only peed once or twice since then if we ignored his winning in the early hours of the morning.

2. They are super-clean. Like most northern breeds, they have self-cleaning coats. Dirt just falls right off, and they are super fastidious about the condition of their fur and groom themselves like cats. They also have no doggy odor. 

3. They are aloof with strangers. Jindos are incredibly loyal and loving to the people they know and love, not just their owners. But a correct Jindo temperament means that they will ignore or avoid attention from strangers - Because of this we are trying to socialise Shadow as much as possible with our friends so that he gets used to being petted and stroked by people. We have also read that Jindos only bond with one owner in their life, I'm not sure just how true this is, but it has been the most consistent thing Korean friends have mentioned to us when we tell them we think he is a Jindo. 

4. They are quiet. Some dogs yap or bark for attention. A socialised Jindo only occasionally barks when he feels it is absolutely necessary - Shadow only has barked a total of 5 times since we found him.

5. They are wonderful guard dogs. They have a strong sense of territory and will work very hard to maintain borders and to protect their families. 

6. They are incredibly intelligent. This dog was bred to think for themselves. They have very strong problem-solving capabilities, and if left in a backyard 24/7 will find a way to entertain themselves and escape. Also, they are so smart and independent that although they pick up obedience commands very quickly, they don't always listen. Similar to cats. But on the other hand, they are super-submissive to their owners. A harsh word can bring them quivering to their bellies. In that sense, they are a soft breed that needs very positive training techniques. 

7. They are very quiet and calm inside the house. As puppies they can be destructive like any other breed, if not excercised enough, but as adults, you hardly notice they are there until they come by to check up on you. They don't even like to go on furniture. This is a common trait  with fellow Jindo owners. You invite them to sit on the sofa with you, but once you're done petting them, they prefer to be laying next to your feet.  So the upholstery stays clean. - We gave Shadow all kinds of blankets and pillows, and yet he prefers to sleep on the floor

8. They are the best independent hunting dogs. They were made to hunt their prey in difficult terrain. They will range over large territories in pursuit of game. This is part of the reason why they are known for "wandering" if not kept indoors - This is why we are okay with keeping him inside our apartment during the day when we are away at work. We make sure to walk him twice a day and play with him whenever we are home, and so far so good. 

*Thanks to The Jindo Project for the above information.

However, having a dog in Korea is not ideal. It's not ideal for any dog to be kept inside alone all day. But we are making it work. We are very lucky that so far we haven't had a problem with any barking, and so have had no complaining from our neighbours. This has been a big problem for a lot of our friends who have dogs here in Korea. And the fact that we are now 'tied' down, and can't just jet off for holidays has been something else to consider. Luckily we have a car here in Korea, so we are able to take him with us when we go away for the weekends (we usually camp and so have had no issues so far with accommodation...click here for more posts on camping in Korea).

The last hurdle we have had to deal with is the cost of taking him back with us to South Africa when we leave Korea in 2016. It costs A LOT to take a dog to SA (they have to go into quarantine, they need blood work sent back and forth to Korea and SA, the cost of the flight alone is ridiculous...we're talking thousands of $US). But, to us he is worth it, and we are simply going to make it work. We had never planned on having any pets in Korea, we knew the costs and the apartment living situation wouldn't be good for any animal, but Shadow came into our lives the night before our two year wedding anniversary. And well, he just feels right. 

So please bear with me as I flood Instagram and Facebook with images of #ShadowTheJindo. I'm sure the puppy pictures will once again make way to stationery and other pretty things, but for now I hope you can understand that with a blogger and photographer mom, he is going to be one photographed pooch!

Celebrating Two Years of Marriage #farmboyandcitygirl

Today marks Farmboy and my two year wedding anniversary. And to celebrate I'm going to go a little wedding crazy and post a whole bunch of photographs from our special day in September 2012.

We were married on Farmboys family dairy farm in Creighton, KZN South Africa in a large stone barn, and then had our reception in the cow shed. It was the most perfect day. Here are a few of my favourite photographs taken by our photographer Jacki Bruniquel. 

You can read about our wedding (including all the small details like our hand made wooden tables, stationery, sourced vintage cutlery, my hair and makeup and everything else by clicking here).  

Jeju Island over the Chuseok holiday

This past weekend was a wonderful 5 days for those of us teaching English here in Korea. It was the Korean Thanksgiving, Chuseok, a time when Korean families get together to celebrate. Many Korean people visit their ancestral home towns, escaping the big cities to spend time with grandparents and other family members.

Farmboy and I headed off to Jeju Island with two friends for 4 days of camping and exploring. It was our second time on the island (we visited Jeju back in 2010 when my mom came to visit us here when we were living in Korea the first time) and it was such fun to revisit the places we explored together, and take photographs in the same spots. Back in 2010 Farmboy and I had only recently started dating so it was a special time to look back on our first holiday memories together.

These photographs were taken by Storm, my stylist and partner in crime to the styled shoots I have been doing lately. I will have my photographs up in the next few weeks once I get to editing them. Storm has a great eye, you should pop onto Instagram (@StormRossSa) and follow along in her journey here in Korea.

Highlights of Beautiful Bali

Farmboy and I have just got back from our summer holiday in Bali. One of the major perks of living in Korea is the opportunity to travel South East Asia, as places like Indonesia are easily accessible.

We were in Bali for 12 days and tried to see as much as could in the time we had. I will be posting a full travel guide soon, like I did with Vietnam (click here) but for now I'll leave with a visual feast of colour.

I traded in my trusty Nikon D300s a few months ago, for a Nikon D700, which I used to take these photographs. As I now shoot full frame, I have to invest in full frame lenses (and these do not come cheap!) Currently I have only a 50mm prime lens and this is what I used for the entire trip. No fancy zooms (I had to make do with my feet) and no wide angle shots. It can be a stressful process trying to find the 'perfect' lenses to take with you on holiday, and you often feel you need to have ALL the things to take perfect photographs. But, what I soon came to realise is that all you really need is a little patience and practice to train your eye to capture your subjects in new and interesting ways.

We loved our time in Bali, spending 4 days in Ubud, 5 days on the Gili Islands (3 days on Gili Meno & 2 days on Gili Trawangan) and then 3 final days in Ubud. We stayed in a variety of accomodation, from fancy villas overlooking rice paddies, to bamboo huts on the beach. What our time so memorable was the people we met throughout our stay. We had a wonderful host and tour guide for our first few days who taught us so much about the people and their way of life in Bali.

But more on that to come in another post.

For now, the photographs.

Enjoy!

Camping in Korea - Gangwon Province

We recently bought a little car here in Korea and it has been an absolute game changer. As we live out in the countryside, there is so much to explore, but very few ways of getting there. Having a car has also meant that we can just go off for the day to a new town, to parks, to mountains, lakes and rivers with a picnic, a hammock and of course our little gas stove for tea. We also found a tent and have dipped our toes into camping in Korea.

Camping here is very different to camping back home in South Africa. Koreans like to camp in parking lots, close together, no wait, scratch that, on top of each other. They don't mind not having a view and they certainly don't mind listening to whatever their neighbour has blasting out of their portable sound systems. That is completely not our scene, and so our recent camping trip up north to Gangwon province had us driving around for hours in search of peace and quiet (and a little shade). We finally settled on an old abandoned road (it was the smoothest surface we could find that had space for the tent and that was close to a stream) and it turned out to be the perfect spot. The road was closed off (little Cherry, being light weight and the size of a sandwich, was able to squeeze through the barriers - probably very illegal) and we found ourselves alone, with privacy and a flowing stream for my avid fisherman hubby.

Numerous cups of tea, plenty of relaxing and cooling off in the stream led to a wonderful camping trip. 

Our iphones and their navigation system were life savers, especially as we were only able to leave work at 6pm and only got to Gangwon province at 11pm. They showed us each camping site in the area (most of which were abandoned with no toilet facilities) as well as showing us small, farming roads which we were able to navigate around to find the ideal place to set up tent. We spent our first night just outside the town of Jecheon and then settled on the abandoned road somewhere along the river, north of Pyeongchang.

Driving here in Korea has been remarkably easy to adjust to. The roads are pretty well sign posted (although a lot of the time only in Korean) and the toll charges for our little Matiz are extremely low. 

The Wonderlust Tag

I saw this tag on Emma's blog (Emma is a fellow English Teacher & blogger based here in Korea and blogs over at Cupcake Traveler) and it inspired me to write a post using the Wonderlust tag too. If you do a post on your blog, please do drop me a link so I can read it, or link up on my Facebook page, I'd love to know more about you x

1. Your most treasured passport stamp?

I had to spend a bit of time thinking about this question. I think it would be a mixture of my first South Korean stamp which I got when moving to Korea the first time back in 2010, and then the stamp for Greece which we got when we went on honeymoon in 2012. 

2. Can you recite your passport # from memory if asked?

Ummm...no. I might be able to if I didn't have to also try and remember 2 sets of South African ID numbers, passport numbers and Korean ID numbers...now I have to rely on scanned coppies of all of the above in my emails.

3. Preferred method of travel; planes, trains or automobiles?

Planes, trains, bikes and feet! I don't really have a preference, I think time would be the only limiting factor for me. Trains are great when you don't have to be anywhere in a hurry (especially the overnight train we took in Vietnam). Also, we have spent a fair amount of time in buses too as they tend to work out better for our pockets (and of course when time is a again not too much of an issue). As I am quite little (5'5 to be exact) I can usually curl up easily anywhere, and so legroom on planes/buses isn't too much of a problem for me....I guess it also helps having someone who doesn't mind having me leaning on him ALL THE TIME.

4. Top 3 travel items?

Down travel pillow, kikoy (a cotton towel/sarong/blanket/) and my iPhone (for quick snaps and it's indispensable 'maps' & hotel booking app features).

5.  Hostel or hotel?

Both. If it were up to my husband, we would never stay in a hotel. But, I am, as he calls, rather 'precious' and he doesn't mean it in the princess kind of way, and I have a habit of breaking out in rather unsightly rashes and bites when staying in hostels. But, I love the experience, and right now our budget only caters for hostels, and we have had all sorts of adventures staying in them. I may be a city girl, but I am rather adaptable (and with the help of my own pillow) can sleep anywhere.

6. Are you a repeat visitor or do you explore new places?

We have yet to go to the same place twice, there are just far too many places to explore in this world, and not enough time to see anything more than once. Having said that, the one place we would go back to, again and again, would be Greece.

You can see photographs from some of our travels by clicking here>>> Vietnam, Malaysia, Greece, Cambodia, Hong Kong & the Phillipines)

7.  Do you read up on your destination (culture, history, safety) or do you wing it?

We pretty much wing our holidays. I don't think this is the best way to travel, but we enjoy feeling like we are the first people to experience something or see a particular place. It's not for everyone, but we enjoy our travels and so far so good!

I usually do a quick search for the top things to do in a particular place, and then rely on locals and their recommendations for attractions/restaurants and activities. As we don't get very long for our holidays, we find ourselves constantly on the move (which we enjoy as we like to jam pack as much as we can into a trip, knowing we will mostly not be returning).

8. Favourite travel website?

I spend quite a lot of time on Trip Advisor, and then highly recommend apps like Orbitz and Hotels.com for great deals on places to stay (they often have amazing discounts for using the app too!). I spend a lot of time on forums and personal travel blogs, but it can all get very daunting when first researching a country. I like to have a pen and paper out, as well as Google Maps open so that I can start to get a feel for the place first. Once I have a basic idea of where I want to go, I create an excel spreadsheet and get to planning the finer details. We don't often book accommodation in advance (this has worked both well, and worked terribly in the past!) but again, we like to wing our travels and not be too tied down, as often we will really like a place and want to stay much longer there, or really not like a place want to cut our stay shorter. Having a good skeleton planned in Excel helps a lot, and then allowing yourself breathing room when it comes to accommodation works for us. 

9. Where would you recommend a friend to visit? Name the city & why

Here is a small list:

Hoi Ann in Vietnam for their tailors, incredible night life and delicious food

Lazy Island, Koh Rong Saloem in Cambodia (just off Sihanoukville) for the wonderful, quiet & relaxed beach atmosphere and their incredible hosts. They have a small selection of beach bungalows and the island is small and peaceful, the perfect place to unwind.

Buan, South Korea our current home town. It's small, and very much in the countryside and gives you a real feel of genuine Korea. It's close to the beaches and not too far from the major cities. And we live here and can show you around :)

10. You’re leaving tomorrow, money is no option, where are you going? 

On a roadtrip in a vintage (but carefully checked by a mechanic) comfy RV motorhome to explore America. 

Our new apartment in Korea {the before photographs}

A few weeks ago I posted some photographs of our apartment here in South Korea. Since then we have moved into a much larger (but very much older) apartment and have spent the past few weeks getting stuck into scrubbing, clearing and DIYing.

In my haste to get my hands dirty, I didn't take very many (or any good quality) photographs to show you the real 'before' shots, but here is what I do have. We took over this apartment from a good friend who finished up his time here and went back home. In no way are we saying he was a dirty creature, but, mess and clutter and dirt has a way of slowly creeping up on you, to the point where you don't even notice it anymore. And if you're not an OCD cleaning machine like I am, then you wouldn't even notice the layers of grim collecting in all the nooks and crannies. So, these pictures are pretty bad...We love you Owen, but boy oh boy did we have our work cut out for us moving into your place :)

Some of these photographs were from the day we moved in, and others are from a few days after when things were tidied up. The weather on both of those days doesn't help the photographs, and makes everything look worse. It wasn't pretty for those first few days...

The Kitchen:

Dining Area (part of the Kitchen)

Main Bedroom

Bathroom

Lounge & Front Patio

Spare Room (to become Farmboy's Man Cave)

Second spare room (to become my office)

Laundry/Outside Patio

So as you can see, we have a huge amount of space to work with, and that alone was enough to help us look through the mess. This will probably end up being one of the biggest houses/apartments we ever live in, and is more than triple the size of the first flat we lived in after being married in 2012. 

Since these pictures were taken we have spent countless hours scrubbing and cleaning, sticking, moving, spraying and throwing out. Make sure to pop back next week to see how our little home is coming along.

Do you have any great cleaning tips to pass on? We don't know whether to replace the bathroom tiles (a big expense to spend on a place we will probably only be in for another year or two) or any other tips for getting rid of mould and grime? I'd love to hear from you!

Yellow Ribbons...South Korea still in mourning after Sewol ferry disaster

If you're here in South Korea you may have noticed little yellow ribbons hanging from trees, or pinned to peoples clothes. These yellow ribbons are part of a campaign (노란리본달기 캠페인) to pray for the victims of the Sewol ferry disaster in which more than 260 people have died, most of whom were high school students on a school trip to Jeju Island.  The ferry started to sink 3 weeks ago, and divers are still searching for bodies.

The yellow ribbon tradition is said to have originated from an incident that occurred on a bus bound for Miami, Florida. It seems that one of the passengers had just been released from prison and he was bound for home. He had written to his wife and let her know he still loved her and wanted to be with her. He asked her to tie a yellow ribbon around the lone oak tree in the Town Square of White Oak, Georgia, if she still had feelings for him and wanted him to be with her. Everyone in the bus asked the Driver to slow down as they approached, and there was the yellow ribbon gently blowing in the breeze.

University students designed the above image of a simple ribbon inside a yellow square and began circulating it on Kakao Talk (an instant messaging application) on the 19th April.  The yellow ribbons began as a way of representing the wish for loved ones to return safe and sound to their families. 'The meaning began as a hopeful one, "one small step, big miracle" but as as the death toll rose, it evolved into a national sign of grief'. CNN

These photographs were taken in the centre of our small town where all my students gather to pay their respects to those who have died. 

Our Apartment in South Korea

A lot of family and friends have asked us about our apartment here in South Korea so I thought I'd post the pictures here for those of you who might be interested to see how we live here in Asia. This apartment is what is known as a 2 room apartment (one bedroom and one living room). Most teachers are placed in studio apartments which are one room, and that one room houses the bedroom, kitchen and living room. There isn't much space in Korea and nearly everyone here lives in apartments. We felt rather ungrateful asking for a bigger apartment this year, as there are families of three or four living in apartments the same size as ours. Luckily for us, a friend of ours is leaving soon (he was randomly placed in a huge three bedroom apartment in our town) and we are very fortunate to be moving in there next week It's much older that this place, and needs a lot of work done, but I'll take scrubbing for weeks on end for three bedrooms any day. These photographs were all taken with my phone, so they are a little on the blurry side but they do give you a good idea of where we have been living for the past year.

The picture above was taken from our front door. As you walk in the bathroom is directly ahead, and the door on the left houses the washing machine and boiler for our hot water and underfloor heating system or Ondol as it's called here. The picturebelow left is what is inside the washing room looks like (as you can see it's impossible to buy toilet paper in anything less than packs of 36...#toiletpaperforyears). And the photograph above right is of the front door. The white cupboard is a show cupboard. We have gone all Korean and don't wear our shoes in the house at all. It keeps things a lot cleaner too.

Below is our kitchen area. All of us teachers are given the basics in our apartment (microwave, one or two plate stove, bed, wardrobe, table, fridge and TV) the rest of the appliances we have to purchase ourselves. It's a pretty good deal considering we don't pay rent at all! We bought the little stove online (it works like  bomb) and found the milk crates outside. As our space is very limited, everything is very compact (you can se where my exercise equipment lives too!)

From the kitchen we have a sliding door which leads to the bedroom. We do have quite a lot of space in our bedroom, and  lovely big window which lets in plenty of light. Apart from our small kitchen window the bedroom window is the only other natural light source in our house, which isn't so great in winter time.

As you can see we make use of every inch of space for storage. We found the most amazing vacuum sealing bags that shrink mountains of clothes and bedding into small, manageable bags (as pictured above my wardrobe). And yes, those are aeroplanes planes you can see hiding behind the TV and on top of Farmboys cupboard (there were five, but I managed to convince him he only really needs two at the moment). They are actually really amazing little machines that Farmboy built himself and flies all over our town. You can see some of them in action here. 

And finally the bathroom (or wet room as they are called here as the space is completely with no actual 'shower area'. We are lucky that our shower is in the corner of the bathroom. Most apartments have the shower placed above the toilet, so when you shower, the entire room gets soaked (including the toilet paper!). And I've included a sneaky pic of my bathroom cupboard too (hubby thinks I own far too many products, what do you think? And yes, the top right hand corner is just for him, how much more space does he need really?)

So there you have it. Our two bedroom apartment in Buan, South Korea. It actually looks pretty spacious from these pictures, but I took them on a day when there was no laundry hanging out to dry, when we didn't have guests staying over and the blow up mattress was out, or when I was baking. It's been a lovely little home for the past year, but we are VERY ready to move into out bigger place next week...yippee! You can see our old apartments in South Korea back in 2010 by clicking here (they were studio apartments and much smaller than the one we are in now).

Rooftop gardening in Korea

Spring is officially here in South Korea, and to celebrate, Farmboy and I went off in search of some seeds to plant on the roof our apartment. Farmboy has been busy being, well, a farmboy, and hand made garden beds out of old palettes he found lying around in the streets. I found these, round smaller pots at our local Daiso. We also found all the seeds we were looking for at there too, as well as some gardening gloves for me (pink of course). For the soil we headed to the back of our building to dig up some topsoil and we found a large bag of nutrient rich soil at the local garden store. The basil and coriander has already started popping up in the big boxes and I can't wait to start making pesto again!

Not all of us have roof tops here in Korea, or rather not all of us have access to them (or land lords nice enough to let us use the space). If you don't, you can find little pots like these round ones all over the place and you can grow your own herbs and vegetables in your home. Your little plants just need water and sunlight to be happy. Now is the perfect time to start planting before the summer heat & humidity sets in.

Have you had any success growing your own herbs? I'd love to hear from you!

P.S Don't forget to enter my #NationalStationeryWeek Giveway where you can win a very pretty pink Motex labeler...click here to enter!

Beauty in Korea {and our renewal interviews for year 2}

For those of you who are new here to my blog, my husband (Farmboy) and I have been teaching English in a small town in the South West corner of South Korea since June last year. We packed up our first little home after getting married in 2012 and decided to head out here to build a nest egg and do what we love doing most, traveling and adventuring together. We were here in Korea back in 2010, as a dating couple in the bustling metropolis of Daejeon. After finishing up one year we headed back home to South Africa to get married and get a feel for the job market (which obviously wasn't very exciting as here we are again!). This time around we are able to put a lot more money away as we now live together and share expenses (we chose not to live together before we were married) and because we are in a very small town out in the country. South Korea offers many benefits to their English Teachers (free housing, return flights, renewal bonuses, extra pay for being out in rural areas and for being at multiple schools and relatively inexpensive living costs).  Farmboy teaches at 4 schools, whereas I am lucky enough to be at just one, an all girls middle school. It has been an amazing experience so far, and we have, as planned, decided to stay in our same town and at our same schools for at least another year. 

Since June last year we have been to Malaysia, Vietnam, had to cancel a trip to Mongolia  and traveled extensively around Korea. There have been highs, and a lot of lows (being in a country where EVERYTHING is done so differently from your home country is difficult. The food is strange, the people can be strange, the way that a school is run is strange, the kids can be terrors and you will miss your family and friends more than you can ever prepare yourself for. But, at the same time, if you don't throw yourself head first into situations like these you will never find out how strong you are as a person and how much you are really able to handle. And then there are the positives too (our jobs aren't exactly rocket science and in most cases we are treated really well by our schools). There are days when all I want to do is go home, have babies and spend all day photographing them while baking up delicious chocolate treats. But then I am reminded that this opportunity here in Korea allows us to save for a house back home, meet interesting new people and travel the world. 

BUT the title of this post is about beauty and Korea ( and our interviews), and I seem to have gotten side tracked...I had planned to do an outfit post here, hence the pictures below, but it has turned into more of a reflective post on our time here. This often happens when I blog...and to be honest happens all day in my classroom (my kids love this as it inevitable means less learning and teaching and more stories about South Africa).

Where am I going with this...oh yes...Image and looks are extremely important here in Korea. That sounds awfully shallow but when you live here long enough you being to understand the reasons why. I do not agree with the Korean mentality that beauty is everything, but when someone spends time on their appearance and care has been taken to look neat and tidy this translates to an overall better image of that person than someone who looks sloppy and smells funny. Koreans always look amazing, their makeup and hair is always immaculate and they always look incredibly smart. It gives off a sense of pride, pride in their appearance and pride in who they are. On the other end of the scale, this obsession with outward beauty has led to a unbelievable amount of money being spent plastic surgery, makeup products and diet pills. I understand that for Koreans appearance is everything, this is ingrained into them from birth, and culturally this something us Westerners will never really be able to fully understand. For us, beauty is linked to vanity and is seen as something more on the negative side of things than what it is for the people here. 'Beautiful' people get boyfriends, get married and have a family. If this doesn't happen, the older generation will have no one too look after them when they get to old to work. That is pretty much how it works here. The older generations worked incredibly hard to put their kids through school and university so they can get good jobs. It is then expected that they will provide and care for their elders. It seems a bit odd considering our Western mindsets, but here in Korea there are very few old age homes. Family members are cared for until death, living with their children and their families. Hence why there is such a strong emphasis placed on family.

So it seems that beauty leads to a family which leads to safety and security for the old. Beauty is that important to Koreans. Having said that, I think that one should always try to look neat and tidy, and have a certain level of pride in our appearance. But as the younger generation starts to blend into the same person (having had the same procedures to achieve the perfect lips/chin/cheeks/eyes/mouth) as shown by the latest K-pop (Korean Pop) singer, it starts to be ridiculous. The young women in this society seem ashamed of their Korean looks and heritage , opting for eye lid surgery, cheek implants, lip injections, eye brow lifts and contacts to achieve an impossible level of beauty that borders on lunacy. Here is an article and the picture that went with it which circulated a few years ago about the Miss Korea pageant, I'll leave it up to you to decide for yourself whether or not the contestants all look the same (they are beautiful, for sure, but they look eerily similar, wouldn't you agree?) 

I have nothing against plastic surgery, I know lots of people who have had some form of surgery or another, and it's a very personal decision. What I don't like is that it's being done to such a point that people are barely recognizable as their 'pre-surgery' selves. I must still say that I do have Korean girl friends who don't agree with the plastic surgery craze, so it's important for me to note that not every Korean woman has undergone surgery. But, it is alarming when I ask my middle school girls (13 - 15 year olds) whether they think plastic surgery is a good thing and 65% of them put up their hands and tell me what they are going to have done when they are old enough. It's as common as makeup shopping, and apparently Korea is the cheapest place in the world to go under the knife. You can get your eye lids done during your lunch break and be back at work the next day with little to no recovery time needed.

It's rather strange that the first thing a Korean person will say when they meet you will have something to do with your looks "Oh...beautiful", "Pretty", "Handsome", "Small face", "Big eyes". It's all very flattering at first, but, when you actually think about it, it's really strange. Would the first thing you tell someone when meeting them for the first time be "Oh, you have such a small face. And really big eyes. And you're so pretty"? For Koreans, a small face is seen as 'cute' and whereas a big face is seen as masculine (my students have told me that this is why they make the 'peace' signs with their hands and fingers in pictures, to make their faces appear smaller and therefore more cute and feminine...bizarre).  

And now after all of the above, it seems rather conceited to be posting pictures of myself all dressed up. But I wanted this post to be an outfit one, and then I got a little carried away with the topic of beauty and anyway, here we are now.

This is what I wore to our renewal interview last week. We were meeting with the VIP's in the Education Office and had been advised by friends to go all out to really make a good impression. There have also been lots of rumors of budget cuts and a number of our friends have been been moved/lost their jobs due to these cuts. So we really did want to make a good impression, and were rather nervous throughout the entire interview. But, after lots of smiling and bowing we were done in a very short amount of time and have just been told that we have been accepted to renew. Phew! Then those heels (as little as they are were killing me!) and thin stockings in the middle of winter were worth it!

What do you think about plastic surgery? How do you feel about the fixation with beauty that seems to permeate not just Korea, but the entire world? Are we all just shallow beings, or are we trying to hide what we think is ugly, in the hopes that people will love us for who we really are? I've spent a lot of time thinking about these things since being in Korea, i hope this post today has given you something to think about.

x 

February through Instagram

March has just arrived, and with it the first signs of spring. All of our colleagues have said this has been the mildest winter they have had in years, especially in our small town out in the country. But, for me I have had to layer up all day everyday and as soon as I arrive at school I have had to spend half an hour thawing in front of the heater. The temperatures haven't been excessively cold (to my poor South African body they sure have felt excessive) but it's been the wind chill that has made it worse.

But yesterday we had a balmy 12 degree (Celsius) high and I removed my down jacket for the first time during the day...yippee! I might soon be able to stop wearing my gloves to bed!

Here is a little look back at some Instagram snaps from last month:

Island hopping in Korea

I'm not sure you can really call visiting one Island here island hopping, but I like the sound of it for the title of this blog post. On valentines day, Farmboy and I had the day off as our schools had just ended for the 'spring vacation'. It certainly is starting to feel a little like spring, even if the icy wind hasn't been notified yet.

Our little town is a 40 minute local bus ride from the sea, and to make the most of the nice weather we headed out to Wido island for a picnic lunch and a stroll. Wido island is very small, and it's best not to get caught up on the term 'island' as most of the islands here in Korea look nothing like the exotic patches of paradise in the rest of South East Asia. Even with that said, it was still a lovely day out and the underfloor heating on the ferry ensured a good healthy afternoon snooze both there and back again, lying on the floor, sandwiched between some loud snoring Koreans.

As with most of the public transport here, things tend to be delayed for odd reasons (perhaps not so odd if we are able to understand more of the messages barked out by bus drivers) we nearly missed the last ferry back to the mainland. This wouldn't have been much fun as there are not hotels or restaurants on the island. Luckily, a friendly policeman spotted us wandering around aimlessly looking for the bus that dropped us off earlier and he escorted us to the ferry. We do so love Korea and it's friendly people...