Christmas parties in Korea

Another wonderful weekend for Ellen and I. We were invited to a bad sweater Christmas party on Friday and on Saturday we attended a very nice UNESCO dinner in Gwangju (one hour bus ride).

The theme for the party on Saturday was bad sweaters. I fell short for the dress portion, but others did a great job.

Here is one of our hosts, Dean. He is actually from Guelph and has friends in common with Ellen. Awesome sweater. He is making us some popcorn. Old school style on the stovetop.


Here is Dean's girlfriend Chelsea with their batch of eggnog. Made from scratch with nutmeg sent from Canada. No way you would find eggnog in the stores around here. It was very good.



I was checking to see what time some of the boyz were going to show up and make sure they had the directions. My outfit was a red Christmas ball on my shirt (Rudolph in a snow storm) and the antlers. Thanks Ellen!!


Here is Chris. One of the guys I play hockey with on Thursday's. He is snug in his womans red sweater. Nice. Chris went to University of Guelph for some time. Small world eh?



He is Andy. He is from Dryden and is married to Jane. They are posted on an Island and takes them 3 hours by boat to make it in to Mokpo to visit. We've had them over for dinner and get along with them really well.



Nick here is from Minnesota and made his own shirt. He is a very good hockey player and also plays hockey with us on Thursday's. He was going on TV the next day to shoot a Korean cooking game show. He was out like a trooper!!! He made his own sweater too!!



Here is Ellen showing the gang her chin-up abilities. I'll let her tell the story.


The UNESCO dinner was the following night. Don't bother looking for us, as we are not in this shot. Very few shots of us, but we had a great dinner. 25 of us also went on stage to sing Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and Christmas in Killarney (Irish Christmas song).



We finished the night walking around Gwangju and looking at the Christmas lights.


Really nice weekend to put us in the Christmas spirit. We only have 8 more days of classes to teach then Christmas break. I am off until Mar. 3rd if all holds up well. Ellen is teaching two weeks in January. The beauty of teaching. I'll enjoy the break and hopefully with things are back home, I won't be off for two months next Christmas. Hopefully I'll find a job ok. Times are tough, but we feel great and optimistic!! Bye for now.