Wow! Been a while.
So, a quick update for y'all:
Jess and I have both re-signed at our respective schools, giving us another year in Korealand. Jess is going strong on her 3rd year, and I, for the first time in my adult life, am staying in the same position for more than 1 year.... I know, right?
Last we posted it was about going vegan. We've been going through the trials & tribulations (man, English is weird) of readjusting our diets.
It can be trying, but we help support each other and both understand that occasionally satisfying any cravings we have is overall better for us than not; we don't expect each other to be 100% perfect. It's better to occasionaly say "Sure, why not?" than "No, never!" and then give in during a moment of weakness & fall off the wagon completely due to a self-indulgent guilt complex.
Basically, I'm trying to follow my new favorite quote:
"Don't let being perfect stop you from being good."
Anyway. Really I just wanted an excuse to post some pictures of the local market. It's called 일산 시장 (Il-san si-chang, lit. "Ilsan market") in Korean. There, we get most of our greens, our tofu, bean-sprouts, potatoes (regular & sweet), 도토리묵 (acorn jelly), mushrooms, bell peppers, fruits, onions, garlic, ginger root, and basically anything that looks good and is in season.
We get any other items we need from Homeplus (great organic veggie section & good bran cereal), E-Mart (the best organic peanut butter, pasta sauce, brown rice & barley), Kims Club (nice foreign food section - miso, olives), Kosa Mart, the local mart next to our apartment (good soy milk "Vegemil" & any emergency cooking item we may need), or one of the two local fruit stands down the street (strawberries, apples, Korean 하라봉 hallabong).... hmmm good stuff.
Either that, or we have to order from iherb.com. Vegan protein powder, nutritional yeast, couscous, quinoa, almond milk, almond butter.... and now I'm hungry.
On another note, we've joined a Toastmasters club & have been enjoying it immensely. We've got a Facebook group here if you're interested in seeing some recent pictures :)
I've got an upcoming speech (my 3rd) for our next meeting this Saturday, so I gotta start thinking about a topic.
So yeah. That's it. Just wanted to pop in say all is well~ Stay strong!
-Jay
