2010.07.18 - Dodgy ankle

Twisted ankle and BBQ

After updating the web site last weekend, Jamie and Colin walked through our front door. They had come to join us (mainly Paula) for a night at the movies. Paula is a huge fan of the Twilight saga (or Twiglight as Colin says), and true to their word they turned up as my moral support for number three in the series. Last year - as we were leaving the movie theater after number two - they had bravely told us that they would go see the next release with us if we returned to Korea. Little did they know ..... and now they paid the price !

We started with dinner at a Korean restaurant in the new downtown (Seomyeong) and the continued on to the Lotte cinema. I will not write about the movie because I will just get in a foul mood, so let's fast forward to the part where we try to dodge the rain on our way home.

For the next day we had planned a trip up to the old fortress wall but the rain was still coming down in buckets. So we decided to walk to the Busanjin market 5 minutes away. It was closed ! And the rain seemed to be coming from above, the sides and below. It was really really wet! So Jamie and Colin decided to try their luck back in Ulsan instead and left us to our own means. We ended up going over to Haeundae to play squash with the Norwegians, which turned out to be a mistake of the bigger ones ! I twisted my ankle by stepping halfway up the back wall with my heel. I was rather painful although compared to the treatment I got by a Korean fellow squash player, it was nothing! He insisted on rubbing my ankle with a heat generating paste. And by rubbing I mean torturing ... if I hadn't been writhing in pain I would have risen and smacked him a good one!! I am convinced that the source of the one-week swollen ankle was in fact this torture and not the twisting itself!

So - Monday and Tuesday I worked from home. Wednesday I stumbled in to the office and then over to my colleague Saikat's house for dinner. His wife Pushpita had made a nice Palak Paneer for Paula and a wicked curry for the rest of us. Unfortunately, their son Sayar had a strange fever-induced (?) fit at the end of the dinner, so we all had to rush off so they could bring him to the doctor. It was all rather scary! Next day we were able to locate some recommended (English-speaking) hospitals thanks to our Scandinavian friends here and Friday he was examined at the Busan National University Hospital and diagnosed with Tonsil-problems. It has been a hard week for Saikat and Pushpita but we have just heard from them that he is feeling better now. Everything becomes much more difficult when you are in a foreign country, but luckily our secretary Ms. Yang was of great help to them.

This weekend we drove up to Ulsan to be with Jamie and Colin once more. We can't seem to get enough ! This time we had planned a rooftop BBQ. True to style there was plenty of drinks and even more food. Around 30 people turned up for a good evening in a smashing location.

Today we had breakfast at Café Bene just down the hill from J&C's. Ilsan beach has been cleaned up nicely and some interesting cafe´s are moving in among the garden lots and love motels! From there we drove down to the new fish market (my fault - I am still not in a walking mood) and then back to the roof top for a dip in the pool and a bit of cleaning up from yesterdays party.

On the way back to Busan we were going to stop by a flower/plant shop we used to frequent down by the sunrise point (Gangjeolgot), but again we failed in our Sunday quest ... there was nobody there. And to make things worse .... J&C had come along to see this fantastic place we had been talking about! It was open and had a few very nice orchids on display but it was impossible to find anybody around to buy them from. And to be honest - they had about 1/10 of the flowers they used to have, so I think we have to find a new flower supplier.