immigration was annoying. first we were selected for "extra interrogation" and had to go to their security offices and spent about half an hour there. second, once we were past immigration, the customs officer searched all of my luggage and even went through my laptop. i'm a canadian citizen and have travelled/visited the States more than 5 times in the past 4 years (and each time had to undergo some "extra" checks) but i still had to open my hand carry, my two suitcases, and then log into my laptop and let him search through it for more than 10 minutes. i've no idea what he was doing.. i wasn't allowed to look at the screen >:( finally, when he was done with all my luggage, i started to lift lunato's suitcase so i could put it on the table and open for him but he told me, "It's ok. She can go." bah! canadian citizen vs south korean citizen. oh well, at least we got to see the Golden Gate bridge... and it was really beautiful :)

we took the BART train from the airport to the Civic Center station and then a cab to the Golden Gate bridge. you can see the Alcatraz island from the bridge. the 1996 movie, The Rock featured this prison and since i really liked that movie, i was really excited to see it with my own eyes.

after spending half an hour on the bridge, we barely made it back to the airport and we were the last two to board the airplane :P when we boarded the airplane, we heard the air hostess tell the pilots "ah, they are here!." unforunately, during the rush to the airplane, i forgot to pick up my wrist watch from the small box i had put it in while going through the security checkposts. doh!!

from SFO, we took an Air Canada flight to Toronto and apparently from this flight was considered a domestic flight and not an international one. that is part of the reason we were so late to get to the boarding gate. we were looking for the gates in the International Terminal instead of the Domestic Terminal. so, in case you're traveling between CA and USA through SF, either be smarter than us and ask someone beforehand which terminal you should be leaving from OR remember this post!

but... wow, it was really strenuous. i was exhausted by the time we reached the first summit and wanted to stop for a rest half way up there... but i thought maybe this is some sort of a physical endurance test and i was being tested by the family. gotta go on.. one more step.. and another.. and another. remember, each step brings the destination closer. go go go.. phewh. the climb was extremely tiring and my calves were screaming for a rest every time i took a step... but i made it!!. and the view was breathtaking. we basically started from the buildings you see at the right most corner in the amatuerly created panorama.

the climb down was easy. losing potential energy is always easier than obtaining it. i am pretty much out of shape as well so it was a good exercise and a good wake-up call as well. however, i really wanted to relax so lunato and i went to downtown Anyang and after food (i laugh in the face of exercise.. hah!) we went to a Karaoke bar. i have no singing ability at all. my allergies, deformed nasal passages, and an almost-ashtma-type condition robbed me of that a long time ago. but this was my first time in a korean karaoke bar so i had to sing and i sang along with lunato and managed not to break any glass :)

we sang a lot of our favourite songs; Eagles - Hotel California, Coldplay - Talk, Coldplay - Yellow, Oasis - Don't Look Back In Anger, and ended the night with Extreme - More Than Words. Amazingly enough, all the songs we wanted to sing were available. Karaoke is a pretty good way to relax and pass the time. Fun!

while passing by the SETEC exhibition place, we saw numerous kids dressed up as anime andcomic characters. the annual Seoul Comic Book World exhibition was taking place today and since we were there already, we decided to visit and see what it is like. i had heard of comic- and anime-cons but had never been to one. this was a unique opportunity to explore and experience this fad.

the tickets were only $5 CDN and they allowed access to entrance area and the numerous halls inside. we took a lot of pictures :)

COEX mall wasn't too far away from SETEC so we visited it again. we went there last time i was in Korea as well. it is a nice mall and a definite visit if you're in Seoul area. there were some interactive games in the mall that lots of kids were playing. a projector was displaying a pool table and a soccer field on the floor and you could interact with the pool table balls and the soccer ball with your feet. it was quite impressive and fun as well. lunato just had to play them.. even if it meant winning against a poor little kid haha.

later at night we had a dinner reservation with lunato's brother's family tonight so after the comic-con and COEX mall, we took a bus that would take us to the yoido district. on the way we saw a Trump World tower.. in Seoul.. Trump is everywhere :P lunato's brother's favourite restaurant was in yodio and we spent about half an hour trying to find it.. but luckily we were on time and didn't keep them waiting too long. mmmm, more good food. i'm going to gain so much weight here in Korea!!

Lunato's sister-in-law was going to the temple for an annual ceremony of some sort so I went along with her to see what it was like. The temple was quite big but she told me that it is actually pretty small compared to the bigger and more popular temples in Seoul. I couldn't understand what the monks were chanting, nor what was actually going on in the place but it was a unique experience and I enjoyed the trip.

Met a bunch of lunato's friends in Seoul. Good food + good people = good times. One of the restaurants was named Happy Together... how can one possibly have a bad time there? ;)

Did some shopping at the various malls in the numerous commercial areas. The subway is amazing.. very easy to get anywhere you need to. Spent some time at the library taking care of some work items that had to be taken care of.

And spent a lot of time with the different family members. 5 nephews and 1 adorable niece are a handful and when you put all of them together... sheesh. Lunato's mom expects me to learn Korean in one year! Yikes. I better get started right away!

It took almost three hours to reach PyeongChang and we were pretty tired by that time. We stopped for some food at a traditional Korean restaurant (yumm!) and then spent about an hour in the city. PyeongChange is located at exactly 700 meters above sea level, an ideal altitude for winter sports. The city's nick name is "Happy 700" and because of its ideal location, the city is bidding for the 2014 Olympic Winter Games. Go Happy 700!!

Farm Herbnara is a famous herb farm located close to PyeongChang. A river runs through the farm area as well and lots of people were out and about; swimming, relaxing, hiking, cooking, etc. We spent a few hours at the farm relaxing in the excellent weather. It was quite peaceful. Sunyul and Kihun swam a lot and tried to get me to join them but I don't know how to swim so I had to decline. I must learn!

PyeongChang is also the hometown of the famous Korean novelist Lee Hyo-Seok who used the city as a background for his masterpiece "When the Buckwheat flower blossom". The Lee Hyo-Seok Memorial was on the way back to Anyang so we stopped there as well and took some pictures of the water mill house.

We had dinner at another restaurant and then took a smaller highway, instead of the main highway which was jam packed, all the way back to Anyang. It took almost 4 hours and it was pretty late at night by the time lunato's brother dropped us at lunato's parent's house.

THe northern part of South Korea is quite beautiful. I would love to visit again. Oh and here is Sunyul playing with his baseball bat: MOV01904.MPG.

I spent a lot of time with Kihun and Sunyul, lunato's nephews, during the mornings while lunato was at work. I took a picture of her running off to catch her bus to go to work in the morning. Talking to a foreigner continuously in English is a daunting challenge to anyone who is not fluent in the language. However, Kihun and Sunyul faced this challenge quite enthusiastically and I could tell their english was somewhat improving.. or maybe it was just the shyness and fear of speaking awkwardly that was dissipating day by day. In any case, I was really glad to have them around.

Here are some pictures of Anyang, Seoul's suburb, and of Kihun and Sunyul as well.

"But my ticket is from United Airlines. Its a roundtrip to Seoul"

"Yes, I am aware of that but your flight to San Francisco is actually operated by Air Canada. Just go down that hall and turn left at the corner and you'll find the Air Canada booths."

Alarm bells rang in my head. I had wasted 10 minutes standing in line for the United Airlines booth. It is now 8:25 AM and my flight is supposed to depart at 8:50 AM. I hate being late to airports. Oh no.. what if I miss my flight ? What will happen ? Do I loose the ticket ? Should I call lunato ? Do I get a refund ? What about our plan ? No no no...

All sorts of disaster scenarios went through my mind as I hurried towards the Air Canada booths only to find the line at least 20 people long. Great! Oh hold on, I only have a hand carry and my laptop bag. Maybe I can use the Automated Check-in machines.

8:30 and I'm standing in front of the AC and furiously punching in every reference number I could find on my Itinerary. None of them work. I tried searching by last name, first name, credit card used during purchase, date of purchase... nothing works. I asked a fellow traveller which reference number I am supposed to punch in. He replied that he would love to help but he is also running late so good luck! Thanks! I stop an Air Canada official but she tells me to get in line.

8:35 and I am in line with 14 people in front of me. 8:40 and amazingly enough I am now at the front of the line. The first booth opens up and the lady asks me to step forward. I sprint forward and tell her that my flight is supposed to leave in a few minutes and I misunderstood my itinerary and was sent here from the United Airlines booth.. what should I do? She asks for my boarding pass and I tell her that the Automated Check-in refused all my attempts. She sighs loudly and then asks for my passport and itinerary.

"Oh! This flight is closed Sir. You'll have to go the Customer Service Centre to get re-ticketed."

Oh, My, God! "What does that mean ?"

"Just step over to Customer Service and they will issue you a new ticket. Don't worry, a few other people had the same problem,"

"Oh, so I'm not the only one ? Ok, that's sort of comforting to hear. But about this ticket.. will it be for today ?"

"Sir, please just go there and they will take care of you and answer all your questions."

8:50 and I'm now walking towards the Customer Service Centre, somewhat relieved that I am not the only one who couldn't make it to United 8151.

The staff at Air Canada's CS Centre were very nice and they issued me a new ticket without any hassle. They also gave me a complimentary $200 discount coupon for any Air Canada flight for all the "trouble" I had to go through because of the overbooking of their flight to San Francicso. Furthermore, this ticket will take me from Toronto to Vancouver and then from Vancouver to Seoul and arrive 40 minutes earlier than the SF to Seoul one. Not bad at all.

I had my boarding pass in my hand and all that remained now was to go through security and board the plane. I called skid before leaving Toronto and left a message saying that I will be transiting through Vancouver for the 2nd time but like before, I, unfortunately, wouldn't have enough time to go out and meet him. Someday, hopefully soon, I will visit Vancouver and stay there for a few days.

The flight from Toronto to Vancouver was quite impressive. I was flying Executive Class, which is another name for First Class, and had a lot of leg room. I stretched my legs completely and still didn't touch the seat in front of me. During the meal the plates were actual plates, not plastic plates. The glass was a glass, not a plastic replica. The fork and spoon were stainless steel. I didn't notice any of these differences until I had almost finished the meal. Flying Executive Class is pretty nice. There was no movie though so I spent the time reading the 2nd Takeshi Kovacs novel by Richard Morgan: Broken Angels.

I only had 30 minutes in Vancouver so I spent that time buying Estée Lauder cosmetics from the Duty Free Shops for lunato, her sisters, and her sister-in-law. The plane took off again, I took a lot of pictures of Vancouver and I think I saw my brother's apartment as well. This leg of the journey will be 13 hours long.

also, on the way to the restaurant, we saw a sign for a "Modern Toilet" and we went inside to see what a modern toilet is like. it wasn't so impressive at all. in fact, it was even a bit disappointing.

so i started to have piano lesson which i have wanted to do for so long. especially after sikander left korea, i need something to focus on and feel happy about it. i searched several piano lesson places and found one very near my house. it opens until 10 pm, monday to friday which is very nice for me because i can go there even though i finish work late.

i was so surprised that i still remember some stuff on the piano music book. when i was a little little kid, i didn't realize how nice piano sounds, and now even with my clumsy broken piano skills, the sound is still very impressive to me :) :) who knows one day i play this music (george winston's canon) with my ten fingers.
 

lunato's work finishes at 6 pm so i wrapped up my work for the day and left the hotel at around 5:30 to reach her office on time. i took the subway to get to her office because i love subways. transportation is extremely cheap when compared to north american prices. the stairs to the subway stations in seoul just keep going down and down and down... some shopping malls have 8 levels of underground parking !! crazy !! the big subway stations where more than one of the 10 subways lines intersect each other look like some sort of space ship hidden underground just waiting to emerge and wreak havoc when the north koreans attack. the airport is pretty damn cool as well.. but i'll get to that later

i picked up lunato from her work place and met her coworkers there. they were very nice and one of the supervisors gave me a 2005 Philakorea (a World wide stamp exhibition held in South Korea each year) stamp booklet and some seaweed (no really .. fried and salted seaweed is awesome).

after saying goodbye we were on our way to meet xphil near Gangnam subway station. we were supposed to meet near Exit #7 and we arrived there on time.. but no xphil in sight. well i didn't really know what he looked like either. i tried to imagine what a korean shacker would look like but i had no idea how to imagine that.. so lunato and i just stood there and tried to guess who he might be. there was one korean guy wearing a baseball cap standing near the exit stairway and he kept looking my way every now and then so i kept looking back occassionally as well... but he started to walk away as soon as lunato and i decided to walk towards him and ask him his name. foreigners are quite rare in seoul and i guess i must've scared him off when i started towards him. after a few minutes we thought it best to call him and ask where he was. it turns out that he was waiting for us at the top of the stairs while we were waiting for him at the bottom :P

xphil is much much taller than i imagined. actually he's much taller than the average korean male. after the initial "hey hello how are you and what do i call you", we started walking away from the subway station with no specific destination in mind. since it was evening time and all of us had just finished work, we were quite hungry and decided to go somewhere for food. it was freaking cold outside anyways. there were lots of restaurants in the area and it took us some time to decide where to go. xphil didn't really care what kind of food it was as long as he was inside and not outside in the cold. it was only -4 or -5 hah.. canadia goes down to -40s during winter my friend ! eventually we found a restaurant called Bong Chu Boiled Chicken and since i dont eat pork, it seemed like a good choice. and indeed it was.. the food was awesome.

we talked about what games we're playing ( lunato's one and only game is Zuma but she enjoys watching me play Rocket Arena III or Counter Strike or whatever ) , our impressions of half life 2, best moments of half life 2, WoW and i explained how i dont like MMORPGs because they take up far too much time, tv shows (he hasn't seen Sopranos... wtf ... and i haven't seen 24... wtf ), video cards, and how we found the shack; lunato though me, i through bookmarks folder in my older sibling's computer, and xphil while he was working as a gaming journalist of some sort.

we kept eating, drinking, and talking till around 9 pm. xphil's ride home would take about an hour and tomorrow was another work day so we decided to say tatahs at that point. we went home while lunato and i explored a little more of seoul before taking the bus back and retiring for the day. it was a fun evening and we made shack history together :)

and finally, here are the Incheon Airport pictures