CLC Spring Party

The Chinese Language Center at CUHK is where Sam and I take Cantonese and Una and Rachel take Mandarin. In order to bring people together for the purpose of eating, speaking Chinese and sharing our respective cultures, the CLC threw its Spring Party last week. We were told to bring a dish from our country, so Una and I baked cookies. The highlights of the evening were Rachel and Sara (Wellesley Fellow at CUHK) doing the Lion Dance (Rachel has the lion head on the left)


and the taaitaais dressed up singing Cantonese songs. We were told to wear our national costumes. So I, of course, wore jeans and a sweater.

Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon . . . er 10K

Today I ran the 10K for the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon. It was a big race (30,000+ runners) and a great way to see Hong Kong. And my time was only a few minutes off my Bolder Boulder time from last May, so all that dimsum eating hasn't slowed me down yet! It might also help that the run was at or below sea level. Yes, below. If you start in Tsim Sha Tsui (the tip of Kowloon) and end in Wan Chai (on Hong Kong Island), you have to cross the harbor. So the race route takes you throught the West Harbor Tunnel. While the air quality left something to be desired, both in the tunnel and running straight through Central, overall it's a great route.

Seoul

Taking advantage of our Chinese New Year vacation, Una and I went to Seoul for 5 days. It was not nearly as cold as we were told it would be, but we wore our warmest. Some things were closed in celebration of the new year, but we still got a chance to see the sprawling city of Seoul. We went up to Seoul Tower to try to get a sense of the city:

We had a chance to see a few Yalies teaching at the afterschool schools (Hagwon) and try soju, the brutally strong Korean alcohol. We ate lots and lots of amazing Korean food including Korean BBQ and bibimbap (this amazing rice, vegetable, egg, chili sauce dish that is sometimes served in a hot earthen bowl. Yum!).

The hip Myeong-Dong district:

The palace:

DMZ

While in Seoul, Una and I went on the USO tour of the DMZ. It was quite an intense trip. It's incredible to leave from Seoul, drive less than an hour and be in the DMZ. We were able to go out to Conference Row. We went in the neutral buildings where the negotiations are held (the blue buildings behind me):















The 17 inch cement line that marks the border, taken from within one of the neutral buildings (on the north side of the building, so geographically in N. Korea):




















South Korean soldiers in front of the border (there was a N. Korea solder at the top of the stairs of the large pavillion across the border):