This has been an interesting week. Last week we sent Michael home. He was ready to go. As soon as he got home he was headed for a week long field trip to 제주도. We Skyped with his mother before he left. She missed him a lot but it looks like she had to wait another week before she got to see him. We, on the otherhand, just sent our oldest daughter to Korea. She will be there for the next seven weeks. She is doing a "service project" for school credit here where she will be volunteer teaching at an elemetary school, helping out with English instruction. Her first day will be tomorrow. She is feeling a bit overwhelmed with the lack of English interaction already. Not understanding anything that is said around you can be headache inducing,... Show more

Our exchange student, Michael, goes home this week. We spent this weekend in Yosemite. For an 11 year-old I was surprised at how impressed he was with the sights. The typical response we have gotten from children and adults alike has been something along the lines of, "that is nice and all but we have rocks and trees in Korea too..." We asked him what he enjoyed or found different about his time in the United States and here are some of his thoughts: He was surprised that younger children needed a babysitter, that they couldn't stay at home alone for extended amounts of time. In Korea this is no big deal. He was also surprised that we don't have any 학원 here to speak of whereas in Korea everyone takes some kind of after school... Show more

My wife and I were recently driving through a typical suburban neighborhood when we saw a blond woman pushing a stroller down the sidewalk. My wife was captivated by her to the point that our conversation stopped. Before I could ask her what she was looking at, she said something like, "우와, 여기 미국 사람 있네." And then she laughed because she realized that obviously 미국 사람 should be here as this is 미국!  When we travelled to Korea last year we had a similar experience. We were at a museum and it was full of middle school and elementary school children visiting on a field trip. I think we were in 경주; that seems to be the place to go for extended school field trips. While my dad was enjoying saying hello to all of the students and his new found... Show more

We spent last weekend at Disneyland. Amazingly, my younger two children did not want to go. My youngest feels clastrophobic in the lines (I don't blame him.) and Alexia would rather hang out with the girls. So it turned out that I went to Disneyland with only Michael and my son. It actually made the park easier to navigate but that is another story. We stayed with some Korean friends while we were in L.A. They live quite close to Disneyland and would have been offended if we came all that way and didn't stay with them. (My sister lives down there too but she was probably relieved that she didn't have to entertain seven extra people!) They have a daughter, five, who didn't speak any English a year ago but now naturally switches between... Show more

We went to Pier 39 last weekend, mainly to see the Aquarium of the Bay but also to see San Francisco. As a teenager I spent a lot of time in San Francisco either just hanging out or working. It is fun to visit every once in a while, and our visitor (I'll call him 'Michael' from now on) wanted to see the city. When he first came to the states he flew into San Francisco but he really doesn't remeber seeing any of the city or the bay. Pier 39 was fun. They have some interesting shops and a whole lot of touristy stuff. The aquarium was a bit of a disappointment in that I was expecting more, something on par with the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We were expecting to spend much more time there than we actually did. So we spent more time wandering... Show more