Trip to South Korea

So this past week Gwen travelled to Seoul for work.

I started in the business class lounge of Cathay Pacific in Hong Kong on Sunday afternoon:

Noodles for lunch

Got bumped to business class - not complaining

I am always looking for interesting treats in lounges (habit from my days in domestics), and this day I found Tim Tams - chocolate biscuits.  I will be looking for these next time I go shopping.

It was a beautiful clear day - could not resist taking a pictures of the puffy clouds.

Best part of the meal :)

Day one was full of meetings in our office, but it ended at happy hour / dinner drinking Korean Rice Wine with my team.

This was breakfast in honor of my friends Bob & Wendy Pascucci.

I delivered a few gifts from the Minneapolis team.  Here is Helen modeling her Skaist-Taylor Faux Fur vest from the NM/Tgt collection.

Here is the making of the rice wine.

Another picture of wine making.

This reminded me of Germany or Rock Bottom Brewery where you can keep your own mug, but here it is a bottle of your own wine.

Elin and Lalit waiting to eat.

Sami & Gwen acting silly for the camera.

Helen preparing (mixing) one of the dishes with Dawn watching.  In the left side of the picture is a jug of Makgeolli - it looks like milk, but does not taste like milk.  I think the alcohol content was around 4-5%.

More food.

And more food.

Tuesday was half sample rooms and half office.  I could bore you will all the pictures, but I will just give you a taste.

Embroidery

Screen prints

Foil prints

Glitter prints

When I got back to the hotel I decided to cruise the mall attached to the hotel.  There is one thing Korea is not lacking - that is coffee shops.  I had breakfast at a different one everyday.

I saw this couple carrying boxes of Krispy Kreme donuts.

This place was tempting.

Wednesday was more factory visits.  I did take one picture of the mountains.  It snowed, and there are ski resorts here.

Thursday was wrapping up and heading back to HK.

The Korea team with HK visitors of Ninh & Gwen in the middle.

Lunch at a traditional Korean noodle restaurant.

Helen, Dawn & Elin at lunch.

Yes - that is Spam on top of rice with seaweed holding it together. 

 The drive to the airport was a little over an hour with lots of sights.

The sea we drove along was covered in ice.  It was between 0C and -7C while we were here and it was about the same temps in Minneapolis.  I was ready to head back to 15C in HK.

Korea is full of greenhouses and I was trying to get a good picture, but this was as good as I could get in a car doing 120kph.

Huge windmills at the airport.

Friday was back in the office and the first thing the team did was find me a doctor.  I caught something on my trip back from the US 2 1/2 weeks ago, and it kept getting worse.  I was chugging Robitussin the whole time I was in Korea.  I was diagnosed with bronchitis and have lots of pretty pills to take.  They seem to be be working - half way through the antibiotics.

That's all until next week...