spirit

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so this last weekend was the jeju lantern festival. it was the first time that it has felt like Christmas season here, even though it's not a Christmas event.

but it was cold, and there were lights, and i was with friends. and it was beautiful.

the festival is held right on the river, down by a place called dongmun rotary. it's where the market that has the best 호떡 in jeju is (don't worry... i had some while i looked at the lights.). it's a wonderful area...

all of the lanterns are made with some sort of waxy paper and cut up water bottles, and they all have pieces of paper with stuff written. they were wonderful, and the colors were amazing.

and then there were random things like this on the water. it's really impressive, but what the earth are these kids doing??

gorgeous.

it was seriously magical. i was so happy.

there were random little lantern sculptures along the banks... these are some birds.

again... impressive, but what is that rabbit doing to the turtle? and why is it giving the finger?

this one was definitely the weirdest. it only had one thing that qualified as a lantern (the giant green ball of course), and then it had these naked statues, with the random little black one... again, what is it doing? i wish that i could talk to the artists to figure out what they were thinking. i'm sure all of these are perfectly innocent, but really? and this one was extra weird because it was all the way at the end by itself.

there was an owl! so cool.

before i went to the festival i put up my tree. it was bittersweet, because i was finally getting a tree up, but i was alone doing it. it really made me miss decorating at home :(

but sari and taylor came by halfway through and we drank wine and talked, which was really good. the tree is really pretty, if i do say so myself!

of course madeline was curious and in the way. this is the face i get constantly... she's right in the middle of a giant MEOW. i promise i have never met a louder cat... i'm glad i caught it in a picture.

and it wasn't 1 minute before this started. actually, she has been surprisingly good about not messing with the tree. i'm shocked!

*notice that she's sitting on my package from home... it's under the tree, even though it's still all just in the big box :) i put the one from the rozums under there too, but madeline tried to open it early, so i had to put it away until christmas eve.*

even though it's weird and sad not being home for Christmas this year, God has been blessing me with so many things to be joyful for right here. He is so good to me.

now listen to this