Two palaces and a whole lot of animals

Wed (aka lazy day):
Shari and I were extremely lazy bums and slept in until noon, which was beautiful. Sua joined us in our galavanting around Seoul. It is wonderful having my own personal tour guide who is also a dear friend. After getting ready, we hopped onto a bus and rode to Gyeongbokgung Palace. We toured the palace and took photos. One of my high school friends, Pyeong, met up with us there. Having ate breakfast late, we didn't eat lunch so around 3 we were starved. Sua informed us that there was a good place to eat a 'block' away...30 minutes later we finally came across the restaurant (come to find out later that Sua's version of a block was slightly inflated from the traditional use of the word).

We did a little shopping in the area (Shari purchased a frilly umbrella). Pyeong headed back to the army base and we girls returned to Sua's to relax before dinner. For dinner we partook of sushi, a first for Shari - although not her favorite, hopefully not a last. After dinner, we cozied up to a nice viewing of Sabrina to which Shari and I promptly fell asleep. What a great day!

Thurs:
Shari and I met up with one of her friends from high school, Allen (aka Landon...etc). He took us to a shopping center where we ate crispy pork cutlets (mad delicious). We then proceeded to a huge outdoor market (Nam Da Seong I think...but I'm a little iffy on that). After pushing through crowds in the market we ducked into a coffee shop for a brief reprieve and were rewarded with the most delicious iced Viennese coffee (it had huge dollops of heavy cream on top) as well as sweet potato cake, tiramisu and yogurt cake.

I had reached my max for shopping so we left the market and made our way to Changdeokgung Palace. The entry fee was a little steep but worth it in the end. We were given headsets that had GPS and were activated when we entered certain areas. The grounds were beautiful. Along with seeing the palace we were fortunate enough to make it to the concert of traditional Korean performance art (it's only held on Thursdays). I think overall our favorites were the dancing and the expressive storyteller. Shari and I dressed in royal robes after the show (Shari was so famous...strangers were asking to take their photo with her).

Sua had finished her classes for the day so she met up with us outside the palace. We found this cute restaurant and had Korean 'pizza' for an appetizer. Sua's brother, Isaac, joined us there. We decided on a different restaurant for dinner. I rode with Isaac on his motorcycle and the other three rode on a bus (on the way Shari discovered an amazing Korean dessert, it is pancake-like with gooey, sugary goodness in the center). Isaac gave me a tour of the university he and Sua attend and I got to enjoy the open road. We had a wonderful dinner filled with good food and friends. Isaac left us to go study and we proceeded onto karoake where Shari rocked the scene. After singing our hearts out we went on a quest for the dessert Shari had fallen for. Thankfully in the end we were successful. After saying goodbye to Allen we headed back to Sua's to pack for our flight the next day.

Fri (travel day):
Sua and Isaac sent us of with a lovely breakfast of rice mixed with beans and kimchi soup (I loved it). I won't bore you with the travel details, just the highlights. Shari and I were assigned seats apart for our 6 hour flight, but thankfully my seat neighbor graciously switched with Shari. They had kimchi (pickled, spicy veggies) in a package, I ate both mine and Shari's. We had a three hour lay-over in Kuala Lumpur, which we spent taking tea at the Harrod's cafe there. It was mighty fine ;-) We arrived in Singapore at 8:30pm. Shari's family friends (from the year she and her family lived in Singapore) John and Amy picked us up and brought us back to their lovely home, where we promptly fell asleep.

Sat (animal day):
After sleeping through a rainstorm, Shari and I woke up early to prepare for a busy day. John and Amy drove us to an outdoor food market for breakfast and then dropped us off at the train station so we could begin our day. We went to Sentosa Island (think Coney Island only classy) to see the Underwater World. Upon entering we discovered a touch pool and were both nuzzled by fish and got to hold a starfish. We walked through a tunnel with numerous varieties of fish, sharks and stingrays swimming above us. We missed the dolphin show but we still got to see the pink dolphins. We then headed back to the main part of the city to go to the bird zoo. We ate lunch before entering...lamb, curry hamburger (makes you wonder if you're eating the slow learner).

It was packed when we went but we still saw a lot of birds (just had to weave our way through the masses). We fed the Lorys (look like smaller parrots). From there we went to the regular zoo. It was amazing. The way the zoo is set up is very harmonious with the natural rainforests of Singapore. The entire zoo is very open and spacious. It started raining mid-way through our tour of the zoo, but thankfully we had come armed with umbrellas. Once the zoo closed and we had dinner, we walked over to the night safari. We queued up for the tram tour. For 45 minutes we were transported through a darkening jungle as our tourguide described the animals we were seeing. Once we alighted from the tram, Shari and I took our own personal tour. It was fabulous. It was not very crowded and in between seeing animals we were taking a stroll through lush rainforest. The rain had cooled the temp down considerably and it was quite pleasant. A bus, subway, and taxi later we arrived back and John and Amy's place. Now it is definitely time for bed...my feet are crying.