20 days later

It has been 20 days since my last post and i must say there is much to talk about. Many things have happened and all of them have been good. Snowboarding has been wonderful, my birthday was great and soccer has begun. My birthday weekend was very exciting. Let me tell you about it. Firday night after work, my friends and co-workers, both one in the same, took me out for some delicious Korean BBQ which by the way should make its way to all Canadian cities. Saturday, my actual day to celebrate my birth, I spent at Yang gi pine resort snowboarding away. It was a lot of fun and good times and pictures were made. Although, Emiel was not there, we managed to have a good time. On Sunday it was full of fun as well. I had a hockey game, the last before my special event. We played against the Incheon Iceholes. clever name. we lost 6-4. I scored a goal and one assist. It was a good game, great to play with these guys, the Chiefs are a great group of people who really love hockey which is fantastic when you win or lose. I will miss them come August. Anyway, after the game i made my way to the army base to play soccer with Seoul Celtic FC. We played an exibition game. It was great to be on the field again. I scored two goals and got an assist. it was nice, but we tied 4-4. Celtic seem like a great group of guys, except when they start talking fast, most of them are Irish and I cant understand the Irish accent very well. but nonetheless the games will be played and I hope to score many more goals for them. they have a keeper already and he is good so i have confidence in him, and that will be better playing up front, i need a break. I wonder if i will become accustomed to playing striker and never go back, we will see. It is a lot of runnng, thats for sure, but i am allowed to make mistakes as a striker. After the game i made my way home, exhausted and getting sore from carrying my hockey and soccer equipment on the subway. a "little" side note here, Hockey sticks are a novelty in Korea, which means 90% of people here have not seen or touched one. So when you are a foreigner and you have a hockey stick you become a side show on the subway. People stare and not politley. They stare with great interest, either facination or with anger thinking I am going to attack them. Either way you feel slightly awkward when you have 20 Koreans staring blankly at you. So anyway, I made it home and proceeded to go out that night, I was very tired and frustrated, but we had plans to eat dinner and party. And so we did, and SO WE DID. It was a great night. We went to VIPS, which is like The Keg but way better and much more food. We went there last night too. Fantastic steak, the best I have had from a restraunt anywhere. It also helped that I havent had steak since I was in Canada in July. So it was nice, after that we ventured without any real plan, we hit up about 4 bars and had many drinks and finally made our way to a Karaoke room and sang the night away, finishing it off with a great song, Love Buzz, by Nirvana. Needless to say Monday was a write off, I never left my place, although at the end of the day my place has never been cleaner and for the first time all my clothes were clean. So not all was lost that day. Tuesday came quickly but that is the weekend. We had monday off due to the Chinese New Year. And that my friends is my bday weekend.

This past weekend, Mandie, Neil and I made it to the largest resort in South Korea and by any means, I believe it is the biggest in Korea. I must say if you come to Korea and like to ski you must visit this resort. Oh yes in Korea they dont call them hills or mountains, they are called resorts. It was a good time, hit a few rails and boxes, the jumps were good, it was cold, and we all ended the day with smiles on our faces. Yangpyong resort is where they are pushing for the 2014 Olympics I hope they get it simply so I can say I skied the same hill as Olympians. That would be neat. I will be 34 when it happens, but I can say i did it.

Well next week I will have a great story for you, hopefully filled with excitment and cheer. Enjoy the snow back home for me, as I went through withdrawl here, no snow, except on the hill, not my idea of a winter. well till next time.