Conquered: Marathon and Highlights.

My half marathon went great! I went, I conquered, and I pretty much felt full of joy and happiness the entire 2 hours and 6 minutes (faster than I expected!). I know hindsight can be optomistic, but in general, it was a great experience. I was the only blonde in the bunch, ofcourse, which made me somewhat of a celebrity among the curiously toned speedy little Korean dudes, meaning I got about 70 thumbs up and 'GOO JAAA" (good job) along the way. They even pulled me out of the crowd right before the race began to shoot off the little gun that makes the loud noise to start the race. I was confused and scared that I was actually going to shoot someone, or that pulling the gun meant I couldn't actually run the race, but other than that, everything went swimmingly! It was along the Han River that runs through Seoul, it was a beautiful, sunny, cool morning, and with every step I thought to myself..."I've always wanted to do this! Now I'm doing it! Go me!" Ali was my loyal supporter, and had to race to the finish line to take pictures since I got in a good 20 minutes faster than he expected!

What's next? A full perhaps? We'll see...

In other news, I got my hair highlighted last night. Some of you may remember the little predicament I found myself in my first year in Korea where, after asking for subtle highlights, they dyed my entire head of hair the color of neon yellow post-it note. After which it turned a hew of moldy green and stayed that way for a good 6 months until I returned home and got it fixed. So this year, I was not taking any chances. Fortunately, there just so happens to be an Aveda salon right around the corner from me, which I decided would be my reward for completing the half. I was there for a good 3 hours last night, being meticulously worked on by 3 Korean woman at once, all very intense and focused, giving me the impression they were very serious about this and had done blonde highlights many times before. After they finished and I beemed with approval and said, "It's perfect!" they all quite literally breathed a sigh of relief the size of a little fat kid blowing out birthday candles. Turns out they hadn't done this as many times as I thought.

But it is, as I told them, perfect! I was really worried it was going to be either blindingly bright or completely unnoticeable, and it is neither. Just natural, normal highlights. Now it's my turn to take the big sigh of relief! (Especially since I paid more for it than I've ever paid for anything done to my hair before...) They also gave me a free hair treatment, hand massage, and back massage--well about a 30 minute back massage. But I'll take it! I love how Korea dishes out the free stuff.