Monday Music Time

I'll be in the air, flying home for the first time in a YEAR AND 9 MONTHS, and I think it's safe to say that I am completely incapable of focusing. So I'll grace you all with more videos of my little kiddos that I'll miss so much while I'm gone. These videos were taking from Monday Music Time!

My 6 year olds (American age 5 -- it's annoying that I always have to clarify that, isn't it?) singing their hearts out to "My Bonnie."

My 3 and 4 year olds rockin' out during instrument time!


And my favorite part of music class -- the lullaby! At the end of each class, they all pass out during a sleepy song. And if you're wondering how I get them to all lay still..."NO SLEEPING, NO STICKERS!"

I'll be Home for Christmas

I leave for America in 2 days! My mind has been in a whirl -- tying up things at work, last minute Christmas shopping, giving Ali a haircut, packing, unpacking, repacking, realizing my suitcase has gone WAY beyond weight limits, unpacking again, packing into two separate suitcases, remembering how much I hate packing...

Why can't Thursday just be here already?!? I had a nice conversation with Alligator Class about Christmas today, that is, after we cleared up that Sam had apparently taken a quick trip Haiti to see dinosaurs on Sunday...

Ali's Birthday

And just like, I'll be going home for Christmas in 2 weeks. In fact, exactly 2 weeks from this very moment, I'll be on a plane heading to Tokyo, and will just be a hop and a skip through Dallas away from landing in Omaha for the most epic Sybesma family reunion of all time! :)

Last weekend was Ali's birthday, and we celebrated in style. I'll let the pictures do the talking.












Firday night, I took Ali to a French restaurant with 7 courses! This was course #6: AMAZING steak! Almost as good as steak from Iowa. :)












The restaurant was called Chez Simon, and was up a little staircase down a little alleyway in an amazing part of Seoul. Great atmosphere, great food, great company! :)














Then Saturday, we roamed the streets of Seoul with Taylor, had coffee from one of the one hundred top espresso machines in the world (the pope has one!0, and then had an afternoon beer.











Saturday evening, we met up with friends at a little Spanish restaurant called Pakito.















Birthday cupcake with crooked candles!














The wine and beer was a flowin'.











Then we went bowling and drank white russians! (Which we brought ourselves.)












Go girls team! Me, Sarah Jane, Mary Soo, and...Olivia! (Olivia is really Oliver, but he very graciously played with the girls to even things out...)











Boys team! Ali, Taylor, Reuben (with a seriously gross mustache for his soccer game the next day), Ross, and...Olivia! I mean Oliver.



Welcome to your 26th year, Ali!!!

Peter Pan Performance

Another performance! This is my 6 and 7 year olds performing Peter Pan. They did a FANTASTIC job and loved this play more than I could have ever imagined. For the past month, all I've heard in the hallways is lines from Peter Pan, songs from Peter Pan, excitement about performing Peter Pan and so on. A couple of the kids even bought their costumes for Halloween so that they coordinated with their character. (You will notice that Tinkerbell is pretty decked out in full costume -- wand and all!) My favorite part is in Scene 4 when Leo, who was playing Lost Boy 1, says, "He took her to his shit!" instead of, "He took her to his ship!" so keep a look out for that. :) I'm so proud of them! I think this play and the songs from this play are some of my favorite that I've written so far. How will I leave these kids and this program to someone else? I'm getting so attached...

A Small World

I've been battling one of those colds you get in Korea that hangs on and on and on until you forget you have a cold and start thinking that blowing your nose 29 times a day is normal. I woke up Saturday morning, fully planning to stay bundled up in my covers all day to recover, until I checked facebook and saw that Lisa Duitman, a friend of my mom's and someone I grew up with, wrote on my wall. Apparently, her daughter, Elayna, was on tour in Asia with the Cleveland Orchestra and perhaps I would be able to see it. So I did a little searching on google and lo and behold, Elayna and the Cleveland Orchestra were literally playing a concert 5 minutes from my house that evening. What were the odds! So I promptly biked over to the concert hall and bought myself a ticket. Hooray! An orchestra! And not just any orchestra--the Cleveland Orchestra is currently ranked #1 in America and #7 in the world. It was an absolutely amazing concert, and being the absolutely only white girl in the audience, it felt even more special. What a small world! A girl from my home town playing a concert just minutes away from me in Korea. I caught Elayna after the concert (MUCH to the disapproval of the Korean usher who very plainly told me that I was ABSOLUTELY not allowed to go back stage) and we went for breakfast the next morning at her hotel in downtown Seoul, and then I showed her and a couple of the members from the orchestra to one of Seoul's palaces. (That's where the picture of us was taken.) So random and so fantastic. God bless facebook.

And speaking of facebook, later in the weekend I saw the new movie that just came out about Mark Zuckerberg and the beginning of facebook called "The Social Network." It was one of the best, most engaging movies I've seen in awhile. Everyone who knows anything about facebook should see this movie! And if you don't care about facebook, go for the soundtrack! Trent Reznor does all of the music for the movie, and it is PHENOMENAL.

To end on a less upbeat note, today at 2:30pm North Korea shot artillery shells at a South Korean border island called Yeonpyeong Island. Two marines were killed, sixteen were wounded, and three civilians were wounded as well. South Korea then fired back, and they're saying this is one of the worst clashes between the North and South since the Korean War. As one person who commented on the BBC website put it, "North Korea is like a spoilt child. You can issue empty threats of retaliation all you want but it won't learn." This incident is a bit unnerving, especially after the Cheonan naval ship was sunk (presumably by the North Koreans) just last March! But don't fret, friends and family, Yeonpyeong Island is a couple of hours away from here. Also, it seems as though South Korea may have been conducting some military exercises near the border, so perhaps the attack from North Korea wasn't because they're completely crazy and there is fault from both sides? For some reason, that seems slightly more reassuring. If you haven't read about it already, click here for the article from the BBC.

Success!

Ali and I ran the Sports Seoul Half Marathon on Sunday! It was cold, it was early, and there was a shockingly fierce wind when we turned around for the second half of the race, but we survived! The han river was a nice place to run. I ran it in 2 hrs 7 minutes, similiar to my first half marathon, but not as good as my last one (which I did in 2 hrs.) I blame it on the wind! :) Ali did it in 1 hr 43 minutes, which is a KILLER time, especially since it's only his first one! That's under an 8 minute mile! I was proud. :)

We spent the rest of the day in recovery, and I'm afraid that my knees still haven't forgiven me. How people do a full marathon, I don't know. Every time I've done a half, just as I'm about to cross the finish line, I think..."Imagine if I had to do that all over again right now..." and I shutter at the thought of doing a full marathon. 13.1 miles is enough for me. :)







Nervous smiles before the race...














Ali showing off his form!




















World Cup Stadium in the background, where the race started.


















Kissing our medals!

Goodbye, Korean Fall

Fall has almost already come and gone. The leaves are barely hanging on to the trees. So before my final fall in Korea says goodbye, I'd like to give a little shout out to Korean Fall. Hollah!!!! I took these shots in the big square near my house on Sunday evening. I love Fall in Korea and I'm sad that I may not ever see it again. So, Korean Fall, I just want you to know how much you've meant to me and how much I've loved seeing you after the long, oppressive Korean Summers. Just between you and me, you are my favorite of all seasons in Korea. But don't tell the others. (I don't want Korean Winter finding out and lashing out at me like last year...)

























































































And a Happy BOOOOlated Halloween to everyone! I went as a Geisha Girl (very appropriate given my surroundings) an Ali and company went as zombies.