HOME!

Team Poeun with Allie Me and Ruben!

Ruben was very happy with his award at the party! we shared a sweet moment!

Flying side kick over 5 people!! Yes that is really me...no strings!

It has been a month and a half now that I have been home!

I came back to Canada on the 5th of November, and ever since it has been a whirlwind for me! I came right back into working full-time as head instructor of Reid's TaeKwon-Do in Stittsville! We just had our annual Christmas potluck and awards dinner and did a small demonstration and everyone told me how wonderful I was and how much they missed em and how gald they are that I am home again....I am happy I was missed so much! I better not let my head swell too much though!!

Even though it is -25 and snowy out I still love Canada!

happy holiday everyone!

MOUNTAIN ADVENTURE!

In the ITF Korea office after a long day of hiking up and down a huge mountain...I was totally ITFified.... We looked very cool in our Doboks on the mountain...some people were nice enough to take this photo for us...(below)

The view from near the top...all the fall colours looked great!!

From the top! It was foggy but still a great view! I was very tired by the time we got to the top! This peak was called Munjangdae and it was 1057 M high. It was a 6.3KM climb!

I had a great weekend with Zibby Kruk and Eva! We went to mountain and stayed overnight in a small town-everyone was so kind to us and we had a ton of fun! We found a shooting range and won some prizes and then climbed a rocky mountain all day Sunday! It was a great weekend, but now my body aches all over from the climb! On the way down we were running and bounding off of all the rocks-which was a lot of fun!! I am gald we went in Fall and got to see all the great colours! It was a bit chilly at the top- and foggy as well, but it was a great climb. We crashed a disco club as well and danced a for a while and were crazy "waygooks". I had a lot of laughs and enjoyed the small town atmosphere!

MORE weekend fun!

To end my evening Dr. Kruk and a Taekwon-Do master Yoon from Morocco sang us songs on the street...I felt like a hobo but it was a lot of fun!

Downtown Daejeon streets! Packed with people and beautiful shops!

There is a river that runs through Daejeon, it has many tents next to it and at night time people and drink and sit by the river all night!

Me with many pretty Hanboks! They are all handmade and custom tailored to your body...but they are "numu pissayo!" which means very expensive!

Yes....this is some sort of intestines...they fill with meat and make something called sundae out of them...which is like a Korean sausage, the smell was pretty strong...

I went to the markets this weekend! I had some fun checking out all the various Korean wares! The market is very big and sells everything and anything for very cheap prices! You can get 7 cooked potatoes for about 50 cents! You can by fresh fish, shrimp, pots and pans, garbage cans, lights, slippers, purses...anything you can imagine! Everything is made in Korea...they are very proud of their own businesses and do not like anything from outside. Stuff that is made in China or Japan is hard to find! To end my evening I had a lovely time eating sashimi and singing songs on the street with a few Taekwon-Do Masters! You never know what is going to happen next in Korea...

BIKES AND BOARDS AND RAMPS oh my!

One of our Korean friends decided to go down the ramps on his bottom, I also tried but it hurt pretty bad...

This is Eva our skateboard expert, she was teaching us all how to skateboard!

I took someones helmet and board and put my sunglasses on to look cool...SAFTEY FIRST!

This is Kate on a dirt bike...she even drove it around the track!

Hello all!

In Korea there are many skate parks, you can rent skateboards or Rollerblades or bikes or electric scooters for a cheap price and have fun all day in the park! One of our friends had 3 skateboards and a dirt bike so we had fun driving around and falling on our butts all afternoon! It was very cold that evening so we called it a night after a few hours and went and had some Korean waffles and hot chocolate! It was a good time and we laughed at each other and had a blast falling down and having races! There was a rock climbing wall...I could almost reach the top from just standing! Korean parks are really neat because they have exercise equipment that uses your body weight to train yourself! They have soccer fields and basketball courts and tracks for running that have rubber in them so it has less of an impact on your joints! And Korea is very safe...I never hear sirens or hear of crime here-people believe that if life gives you lemons you deal with it and change it so it suits you better.

This weekend I had a lot of fun....

BUSAN-part 2...

After me and Eva got our medals...Zibby Kruk wanted to give us many hugs for putting on a good show!
My Korea TKD family! The students all came to Busan, which is a 3 hour train ride, just to cheer us on and see us compete!!

My sparring face...how ugly is that? I would not want to fight that!

Me and Eva giving a good show...we did 3 rounds of 2 mins! We had a lot of fun doing it!

Still friends...

Busan was a good tournament, good people and a good turn out overall! There was some people who had very good skill and I was happy I got to experience the tournament and meet new people!! I got a bronze in 3rd and 4th degree men's and women's patterns and I got a sliver in women's sparring. I wanted to sparr with the men but they were afraid I would embarrass them...But it was a good trip and will always remain one of my best memories of Korea!

Take care everyone...I will be sure to update again soon!!

BUSAN!

NO SMOKING ON THE BEACH! Me and Eva were the scary "no smoking" enforcers!
Morning of the tournament I was getting pumped and ready with my coach Zibby Kruk...I look mean=-would you want to mess with this?
We warmed up and did some stretching before we went in the ring....
This is lovely Busan in the morning...it was a HUGE city with some of the tallest buildings I have ever seen! It is in the middle of mountains and on the one side is right on the sea. It is the major port between Japan and Korea...many businesses and many many people!! We had traffic at midnight!
This is all the competitors lined up getting ready for the competition to start-there was a quite a nice turn-out for the first ever ITF Busan open! It was run fairly well-we even had a lunch-which is very rare!

BUSAN! Was amazing...last time I went it was only for the airport so I did not see any of it-but it has amazing condo buildings and structures all along the sea! It was a lovely city to visit-even if it was just for 24 hours! I had a lot of fun and ate lots of sashimi-which is raw fish...I even got to pick the fish before I ate it...

I liked Busan...but there was crazy traffic at midnight and we could not get anywhere...too many people in one place I guess!!