강화도 | Gangwha Whistle-Stop Tour

It's vacation time! \o/ We have two weeks off school for summer vacation, and after the stress and pain of Summer Camp week (my body picks the best times to mess up) I was very ready to just kick back and get on with some good old-fashioned exploring.

Nick's parents visited for the first week of the holiday, so we packed in a LOT. Day 1 was a tour of Gangwha, an island near Incheon and the place where one of Nick's co-teachers grew up. He picked us up bright and early and very kindly drove us around. A personal tour! It was so wonderful and we probably learnt a lot more than if we'd just tried to go out there ourselves (although we probably would never have even thought to go). It's a wonderful island, so different from the packed streets of Incheon and Seoul that we've seen so far. It's much more similar to the countryside I'm familiar with at home.

It's got a long, sad, hardworking history, like much of Korea, and definitely a great place to visit if you have the chance, and are interested in gorgeous scenery and extensive history.

First stop on the tour was , an old fortress that saw a terrible battle with some American troops in 1871. For a military area, it's strangely beautiful.

Forever finding doorways that are too small.

Seoul Food | 비빔밥 Bibimbap

I think this was the first Korean dish I ever ate, courtesy of our "research" undertaken at Bibigo in Soho before coming to Incheon.

It's great, healthy (-ish. You can never tell with the Salt Queen) and makes a little bit of meat stretch a long way.

Anyway, Nick brought home a little book about Korean cuisine in our first week, and there are a few recipes in the back. We use this one a lot, because it's fairly quick and easy, as well as tasty. My presentation is by no means as wonderful as the traditional Korean style, but I hope it still looks fairly appetising. Apparently the toppings are from old Buddhist traditions, with each bit of food representing a different colour, which is really lovely and actually a pretty smart way of getting a balanced meal.

The recipe calls for burdock root and bracken as a topping. I have no idea what these are or what they look like, nor do I know the Korean names for them, so alas I have struggled to buy them. So my bibimbap is generally made with carrot, zucchini, onion of some form, and a separated egg or two, fried up and sliced.

It's by no means authentic, but it's tasty, so maybe try it sometime~