Any Place I Hang My Hat: December 2009

The holiday season is always a busy time, and it has not been any different in Korea! Last weekend, we had our performance of "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever" with the kids at our church! It was a lot of fun! I had the part of the mother/director in the play, and Tim had the part of the Reverend. The performance weekend was a little stressful getting all the kids on the same page, but everything came together in the end! The kids were adorable! And I enjoyed the chance to be on stage again. :)

Yesterday, Tim and I went to see Handel's "Messiah" with a group of our friends! It was a phenomenal performance! The group that performed is called the Camarata Music Company, and it is made up of both Koreans and expatriates. The soloists were classically trained musicians who have had world-wide performance experience. It was wonderful to hear such beautifully performed music! Also, "Messiah" is special for Tim and me because we met on a choir trip to New York to sing "Messiah" in Carnegie Hall five years ago. I can't believe it's been five years! In some ways that seems like such a long time ago, but in other ways, it feels like time has flown. Similar to our experience in Korea thus far!

So during the Christmas seasons past, Tim and I have always had this big, seemingly impossible list of Christmas movies that we have wanted to watch before Christmas. We've never gotten through the whole list, but this year, we intend to! With our schedules here, we've had the most free time together we've ever had, which lately we've been filling up with Christmas movies! It's so nice to be able to enjoy the Christmas season this way. We still have "Home Alone," "The Santa Clause," "Joyeux Noel," "Miracle on 34th Street," and maybe a few others to go! But that, plus the decor in our apartment, classrooms, and around town, has definitely gotten us into the Christmas spirit!

Our new classes have been a lot of fun this month! We really love our students, and it has been fun doing Christmas activities with them lately! Our last day of school before break is Wednesday, and we are very excited about celebrating Christmas in Korea this year! We had planned on going to Thailand for 5 days, but then changed our minds a few weeks ago (and thankfully, were able to get our deposit back). Several reasons prompted this change. First, we have been feeling lately that there is so much of Korea that we haven't had a chance to experience yet. There are endless things to do in Seoul, let alone the rest of Korea. And even though we still have a good 7 months left until our contract is up, we feel like time is going so fast! We want to make sure that we savor everything that we can in our time here. Also, we have a "vacation home" in Seoul now because of our house-sitting situation. So, that makes it easy for us to be able to stay and explore in Seoul, spend time with friends, and also enjoy an amazing apartment! And on top of that, we are able to save money by not going to Thailand so that we can pay off our oh-so-lovely student loans more quickly! Win, win, win. :) We definitely want to experience Thailand, and SO many other countries, but this was the right decision for us for now. So we're calling our Christmas vacation, "Operation: Savor Korea!" We have a list of museums, cultural destinations, restaurants, and performances that we want to see, so every day will be something new. And one night we are staying at the Hyatt in Seoul! On Christmas Day, we're going to a big Christmas party with all of our friends from church, where supposedly there will be a gift exchange, a turkey dinner, board games, and Christmas karaoke! And we have plans to be in Seoul with friends for the countdown of the New Year too! We figure that if we have to be away from home for the holidays, we might as well surround ourselves with friends, and savor this season of life in this country that we are so in love with.

Merry Christmas from Korea!!