Author Archives: Ben Maxwell

About Ben Maxwell

Over twenty years experience in creating, developing, and executing promotional and advertising campaigns across multimedia platforms including print, radio, digital, and social media. Broadcast radio manager, programmer, on-air talent/producer, and voiceover artist..

Inside Tous Les Jours

Of eating healthy…

I kinda fell off the 4HB wagon today and I’m not proud of it.  But it’s okay.

There’s a little something called a Hangul language barrier that goes hand-in-hand with a fried chicken and beer barrier which is a little farther down the road from a carbohydrate goodness barrier that has been erected all over Korea.

It took every ounce of self control I had not to gobble all the carbohydrate goodness that has been presented in front of me since moving to the RoK from the Rock.

There are an abundance of coffee bars on not just every main street, side street, and alleyway, but they are sometimes hiding on the second and third floors of what look like office buildings.

And in addition to having the life saving nectar of caffeinated ambrosia, they all have pastry.

Not just any pastry, but what looks like the most delicious of deliciousness.

This might come from Starbucks where they have the cookies and pieces of cake and brownies to accompany your soy chai latte or half-caf almond milk iced cappuccino.

In addition to the mermaid, there are Paris Baguette shops, Tous Les Jours shops, Dunkin Donut shops, Baskin-Robbins shops and other stands and sweet-selling and sweet-smelling shops all over the place.

All of the places below are within spitting distance of each other…

There is more pastry and sweet here in the RoK than I could possibly imagine. It’s everywhere. And it all looks so damn good.

At dinner earlier tonight with four other teachers, we hit the FryPan Restaurant in Sunae.  They serve fried chicken tenders and potato chips and a salad covered in sugary dressing.  I was going to pass on eating b/c I had my usual 4HB breakfast of (homemade) egg whites, spinach and black beans for breakfast, and a spinach salad with black beans and chicken for lunch and knew that I shouldn’t have the fried chicken tenders for dinner.  But something switched inside of me and the hunger got too much.  Poor planning on my part.

So we decided to make the most of it and have a dessert called a patbingsu.  Ashlea and Natasha had one last week at Paris Baguette with tons of fruit in them, but you know how anti-fruit Jenn and I are, so we had one at Tous Les Jours of the green tea variety.

Ashlea & Natasha and their fruity potbingsus.

Ashlea & Natasha and their fruity patbingsus.

Potbingsu at Tous Les Jours

Patbingsu at Tous Les Jours

Then it was cookie time.

I’m down to my lowest weight ever as an adult and I think I’m gonna cut myself a little slack…

From a walkway over the Hannam-daero looking north into the heart of Seoul.

Successful bus trip, finally

I wouldn’t exactly call myself dumb, but why it took me more than a few days to successfully navigate a bus trip in SoKo, I have no idea.

It all started last week when I was supposed to meet Jenn at her school via the 5500 bus north from practically one block from the apartment.  Instead of being there early, I arrived a little late because I missed the stop.  I should point out that the stop I missed is the second to last stop south of the Han River and into Seoul proper.  So it was another 25 minutes up the road, over the river, out of the bus at the first stop, across the street, waiting for 20 minutes and then back down to where I should have been.  Except in my haste, I got off one stop ahead of where I should have been.  Perfect.  I did what any other person would have done in my position, knowing exactly how far away I was from the school and the fact that a walk up a big hill was coming.  I hailed a cab to take me 5 minutes away (10 via walking).

I’m not ashamed to admit it.  The SoKo public transit system almost had me beat.  A few other mishaps occurred since then but finally, with Jennifer’s help, we managed to have a perfect experience coming back from Cafe Street to Samick.

Being without WiFi has now become crippling.  Once we get our ARCs (Alien Registration Cards) and are able to get our mobile phone plans set up, everything will be better.  That’s if my old carrier in Cayman is finally able to do what they said they’d do with the CI$500 I paid them for my unlock.

But I’ll save that story for another time, when it’s hopefully resolved.

 

One of the differences here is that bars/restaurants/cafes are located on the 2nd and 3rd floors of what looks like business-type buildings.

1 Aug 2013, Korea

Today has been an interesting day so far.

Jenn has had to get to school early for some admin work and today I decided to join her so that I could see where the main bank branch would be for setting up our accounts.  There are no joint accounts in SoKo, so we’re going to get two, because, hey, why not?

I’ll have to go back there tomorrow to finish up the paperwork, but she’s all sorted.

After the work was done, I went for a little walk around Sunae.  Lovely little area.

I’ll have some random food-in-grocery-stores photos coming soon for all my foodie friends.

Bibimbap. Photo by Jennifer

We’re here…

So let’s get this out of the way first and foremost…

There is no way possible in which the Suji-gu area of South Korea is anything like Cayman.  A week in the USA did nothing to prepare me for the culture shock of coming from a Caribbean island to a major suburb of a major city.  And we haven’t even gone into the city yet…

Yes, really.

During the plane ride I decided to be a little adventurous…

Bibimbap. Photo by Jennifer

Bibimbap. Photo by Jennifer

Korean Air Bibimbap directions.  Photo by Jennifer

Korean Air Bibimbap directions. Photo by Jennifer

Wasn’t too bad and the instructions card really helped.

Korean Air was great, except for feeding us at weird times.  So that when we got off the plane on Monday evening, we were hungry and tired.

Relief was nowhere to be found as we were the last to arrive and others were waiting for us.  So it was a dash to quarantine, where all of Jennifer’s hard work paid off and both of the pets arrived safely and healthy, if not a little worse for wear like their owners.

Gigi & Rooney are okay

Gigi & Rooney are okay

Jennifer & Rooney

Jennifer & Rooney outside the airport

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On the bus to the apartment

The first full day started early with a bus to the school and a quick tour followed by a trip to E-Mart Trader (like CostCo, which we will visit on Saturday) and E-Mart (dept store) for necessities.

Wine @ E-Mart Traders

Wine @ E-Mart Traders

E-Mart Traders

E-Mart Traders

By the time we made it back home, we had started to get silly from not eating enough, so we cruised around the neighborhood…

Fresh market

Fresh market

Street food: Dim sum

Street food: Dim sum

Tomorrow (Weds) I have a free morning and will meet Jenn back at the school for a BBQ.  I think.

 

Walking in Dulles…

“I’m a rocket man…”

Elton John serenaded Jennifer & I as we rode the escalator up to the A Concourse at Dulles International Airport.

Walking thru the international hallway there are flags of various countries.

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Eagle eyed observers will ignore the Ben & Jerry’s and note the two interesting flags hanging on the left.

See you in the RoK.

Home again?

Jenn says to me, “Not only did we leave Philly behind, it left us behind.”

If home is where the heart is and pieces of your heart lie with the friends you make, and keep, then you can always go home again. As long as you’re surrounded by your friends.

The challenge is that your friends change. At least those in the Circle of Trust* change. And that’s just a normal part of life.

People orbit in and out of the Circle of Trust at a period somewhere between a calendar year and Haley’s Comet being visible from Earth with a minimum of effort.

So I think what Jenn was saying is that although we have some terrific friends here in Philadelphia whom we love, due to the Tyranny of Distance**, our orbits have elongated.

It’s okay tho, because just like Haley’s, we’ll circle back around eventually. Here’s an interesting thing maybe… Do you think that when this happens, both people will look at the other as the comet; looking at the perceived frozen alien surface and wonder what sights the other has seen and what other celestial bodies and weird elements they’ve come in contact with?

Or has Facebook ruined that, too?

*A special round table that existed at Mezza Restaurant in Cayman upon which shots were drunk, oaths were sworn, and secrets revealed never to spoken about again.

**Special thanks to my friend and fantastic chiro Liam for the coinage of this term.

Waking up in Philly

Whenever we travel out bodies go thru various processes to get things resynced. Not just time change biorhythmic stuff because of daylight but also because the food we eat has different particulates. The water is processed differently in different places and that’s why bagels from the Mid-Atlantic taste better than bagels anywhere else, fwiw.

It usually takes a day or three for all the changes to be absorbed and processed. In the meantime it’s no fun being like an illegal alien, amIright?

Even thru it all, I’m looking forward to making myself a little ill from all the different yet familiar foods here in Philadelphia. And not just the cheesesteaks, but more the small things that make it all the more comforting.

Termini Bakery, here I come.

Leaving Grand Cayman

Today Jennifer and I left Cayman. We divested ourselves of everything seven years of living in the Caribbean brings with it except seven bags of luggage, nine 22lb boxes, and two pets.

I write this onboard the airplane at altitude and location unknown. When we left the USA the Internet hadn’t gotten to airlines yet. That’s weird.

Hopefully we left a positive mark on Grand Cayman. Lord knows it made a mark on us…

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Hopefully we left the island a little better than when we found it. Maybe some people were entertained and/or amused by my radio performances over the years. And maybe some of Jenn’s students are a little smarter and/or have a better awareness of our animal friends that inhabit this planet.

Godspeed Cayman and good luck.

It’s happening…

Before I go on a trip I have these thoughts; these ideas really.  These ideas of what it will be like in another country or in a different situation.  Like “Next week I’m going to Italy… I wonder what I’ll be doing in Florence…”

And then this happens:

Ben in Florence

Ben in Florence

So I can only imagine what the scenes are gonna be like in SoKo.