Saturday

It is Saturday so off we (Chris and I) go to the thrift store to buy power strips. Outlets are not common in this apartment and even then many are 220 not 110. If they'd had 220v lamps, we would have gotten them. After returning our treasures to the apartment, we headed out to Iteawon to find an optical shop. We found several, but none to rival the one on post. So we kept walking. There was so much to see. That particular street featured tailors, so lots of clothing shops, handbags, ties, sunglasses, shoes. Finally we felt ready to turn around, have lunch and head back. We stopped at a Korean resaurant. They understood very little English. We ordered the grilled pork entree, and a bowl of veggies and rice, and a bowl of spicy beef soup. As you can see in the picture, we got a lot more than that. First they brought us a bowl of hot coals which they put in our table top grill. Then they put a grill cover on it. All the side bowls came next. When the meat arrived, it was raw. The waitress put the meat on the grill and left. So we figured we were supposed to cook it ourselves. One of the side dishes had garlic cloves, so we threw that on the grill, too. The pork was thinly sliced and turned out like bacon. Then the bowls of veggies and beef came. The beef soup was at a rolling boil. What we didn't get were plates, just stainless steel chopsticks and a spoon. So we dug in to the side dishes (about 10) with chopsticks, one dish at a time. It was all edible, some interesting, and some very good. One plate had lettuce leaves and what looked like hydrangea leaves. After we'd eaten most of our meal, I noticed a lady at a nearby table putting a little of this and that on a lettuce leaf and rolling it up to eat. I'll remember that for next time. The best part of the meal was the spicy beef soup, mmm. The hydrangea(?) leaves I could do without.
We walked back but not the way we came, could have gotten lost, but came out at a familiar place. Lots of narrow alleys, with tiny shops. We found our way back to post, visited the Px and the library (where Chris got Predator vs Alien), and the commissary. The commissary was having a caselot sale. Still, we only got what we needed and walked home. Sunday and Monday the commissary will be closed due to Chusok, a Korean holiday akin to Thanksgiving. Michele wasn't home because she'd been invited to a birthday party. She is so independent.