The Simpsons in Seoul: June 2008

Jaylen Mattis Martin

We've been meaning to post some pictures of our nephew, Jaylen Mattis Martin. Isn't he adorable!

We've been trying to go to a baseball game for a while. So a group of us decided to attend a 2 o'clock game one Sunday afternoon. We arrived at 1:30 to book tickets but the queue was exceptionally long. Anyway, we stood in the queue but after a while we realised that the ticket booth wasn't even open yet which seemed unusual since the game was due to start in half an hour. We eventually learned that the game only started at 5:00 and since there were 6 kids with us we decided we'd go for lunch and then come back later. Our friends assured us that we'd get tickets later. So off we went for lunch. The restuarant we were heading to seemed much further away than we expected and after a looong walk and subway ride we arrived at the restuarant only to learn that it had closed down. So we went to TGIF which was nearby. Our orders got totally messed up and lunch landed up taking a lot longer than expected. We thought we'd head back to the baseball park in a taxi. Four of us got into the one taxi and the 6 kids and 2 dads squashed into the next one. The poor taxi driver! They got into the taxi so fast, I don't think the taxi driver had a chance to say 'no'. Someone joked that we'd probably get stuck in traffic and, guess what, we did. Someone joked that the game would proabably be sold out and when we finally arrived back a the park, we discovered that it was indeed sold out. So we headed home - exhausted!

The next weekend we tried again. This time we knew the game started at 5. So we got there at 4:30 booked tickets and in we went. In Korea, they divide the crowd into two sides and you have to sit on the side of the team you support. It creates a really good vibe because each side has their own set of coordinated cheers and there's a guy who leads the crowd and tells everyone when to cheer and what to do. It's lots of fun! We supported the Doosan Bears! They won! It was a good game! We're going to try and go again some time soon.

The Vatican City

The Vatican City

While Brad and I were in Italy one of our favourite places to visit was the Vatican City. St Peter's Basilica is amazing and,of course, we loved the Sistine Chapel. It truely is amazing to think that Michaelangelo painted that fantasitc ceiling. One can just stand there and stare at the ceiling for hours. Brad was able to attend confession in St Peter's Basilica since they have priests available who speak various languages. Once I left Italy, Brad went back to the Vatican City to see if he could attend a church service on Sunday, he managed to watch some priests being ordained on a big screen outside the Basilica but he said that the queues were so long that he wasn't able to go inside again. I think we were lucky because we walked straight in without queueing and we only stood in a queue for the Vatican Museum but that was only for about half and hour.