School Trip - Ulsan Park

We went to Ulsan park today as a school.  I had reservations about it before I went, since the previous one was something of a flop, at least fr me.  This time however I had been told a wek or so ahead of time instead of 5 minutes before and I was able to bring the correct sort of gear and also pack myself some food.

The park was pretty huge, so much so that you can eother hire a bicycle or take the in park bus to get from A to B.  At first I went off on my own and discovered some nice grasy areas and I considered doing some Kung Fu there, but I wanted to see how the day would play out first so I went back to the teachers and kids.  The older kids had decided to go off and walk to the animal petting zoo and butterfly house, but the younger kids were waiting for the bus.  It's a good thing too, else I may have lost them, although, it was because of their shouting that I was able to find them, so perhaps it would not have been so difficult.

At the other end of the park we went into the butterfly house and although it was small it was nice and we followed that with a insect house.  Not so much my cup of tea, but interesting none the less.  Next we made our way to the 'zoo', but on the way decided to make a pit stop for lunch.

I had come vastly prepared and I had sanwhiches, boiled eggs, fruit, crisps and a drink.  I had also made a batch of cookies, which throughout the day, I shared with the kids and the other teachers.  I was to eat with the other teachers, which I was rather dreading, making the asumption that it would be yet another meal where I would be ignored. But I think since there were no authority figures it was somewhat more relaxed and I felt more at ease, even if little conversation was directed my way.  The other teachers had brought an array of Kimbap and other very Korean dishes and invited me to dig in.  Then Sey Bom arrived with his fiancee and lots of delicious food, some of which was cooked chicken (still hot).  In short, the food was good.  Plus I liked his fiancee, she was able to talk to me, since her English is pretty amazing,

Next the animals.  There were a couple of macaques and some various birds, mainly pheasants and chickens, nothing too strange.  There were also some donkeys, which were good, I like donkeys for some reason.  probably because they are always portrayed as the hard working animal, not asking much of anyone.

It was funny though because the teachers and kids were trying to feed the Donkeys with chopsticks, it was a rather fruitless attempt becuase they kept dropping stuff and it rolling away from the donkeys.  So I told them how you should feed them open palm, as I had seen my sister do when she had a horse at one point.  Scared the teacher asked me to show her, I'd never done it before myself, so I was a little dubious, but I thought, meh, why not.  It was alright, although the donkey ended up licking my hand.

We walked back down to around the butterfly house and most of the kids went off to play in the big playground, made up of climbing stuff and trampolines.  While I, Sey Bom and his fiancee and a couple of kids hired out some bikes and cycled around for about an hour.  That was great, that's the first time I have ridden a bike while I have been in Korea.  I really enjoyed it.

And then we headed back to school.  Plus we were then allowed to go home early. What a great day!