mud and climbing!!

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You can't break out of a circle
that you never knew you were in.
-Connor Oberst
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Update time: last I wrote, i was heading to the world-famous Boryeong Mud Festival over on the west coast here in South Korea. this is something i've known of for years since seeing pictures on old college friends' facebooks or wherever them and their friends from all over the world partying on a beach CAKED in thin grey clay mud. i was intrigued at least and then suddenly found myself here and within range of it so it was a MUST ATTEND.
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We filled two full buses with friends and acquaintences and headed out early on Saturday morning after having partied nearly all night just before. we made the best recovery attempts we could muster and jumped back into an out of this world experience! we checked into our hotel, fuel'd up on food and beer and headed down the shore not really knowing anything about what we were doing - we knew only that we were looking for, of course, MUD.
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And find mud we did! primarily in the form of a massive tent area that looked like a war-zone. there were massive clay pits in the middle of the tents and civil-war style clay-ball flingers on either side standing about 25 feet apart. i jumped right in and up to the front lines where i quickly got separated from all of my friends and found myself getting pelted in the face - eyes, ears, mouth, nose, everything included - point blank by complete strangers. it was a bizarrely awesome experience despite itself!!
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I lasted in the front lines for about 20 mintues before i limped away and found everyone else. this is when i also got the news that one of my good friends, Vinny, had gotten split open when a nameless flying rock tagged him in the side of the head!!! finally, it became more obvious (than it should have been already) that what we were in the middle of was NUTSO.
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having made it out relatively unscathed, i can look back and say that it was one of the most FREE experiences i recall. completely animalistic 'lord of the flies' style chaos... but in a way that you could simply walk away from it at anytime and have no real consequences... aside from sand in your, well, everywhere!
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Sarah and I headed for the sea for a quick rinse, lost more friends, regrouped with others and finally went to check out the slightly more tame area. this is where we found the mud slides, mud wrestling, mud prision... put the word mud next to any noun or verb and you could pretty much do it!
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Most of my pictures from the event ended up being of strangers because when we were covered in the stuff, obviously it was tough to use the camera. if i ever went back or gave advice to someone who was, i would say to absolutely buy a waterproof disposable camera and you could get some intensely wild pics. this one is the mud pit free-for-all!
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After we cleaned up, we had a couple of beers, played some carnival games, ate some dinner and headed back for a rest. There was plenty to do that night around the area but took it somewhat easy compared to the 24 hours that had preceeded. That was the last time we were covered in mud that weekend. Every foreigner in Korea was (as well they should have been) there... go your first year you come here - you will have an incredible experience but probably never want to go back!! Thanks to Ring for setting it all up! :)
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Then back to another week flown by at work! the months are piling up in a way that never ceases to amaze me (just like always happens). I've been here almost 5 months now and have been in love with the entire experience. i've experience most of South Koreas larger cites, coasts and foods; i can phonetically read and am starting to be able to communicate very basic ideas in Korean; and feel well-versed as a kindergarten teacher! i would absolutely recommend this for any 20-something that isn't sure what the next step is; or anyone who is just plain bored with what they are doing!
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my work life has been as fun as ever! we have a blast and it is extremely rewarding to see the kids improving before your eyes as the months pass! we are currently looking to replace my two co-workers who both have less than a month until their notice is up and they move on to their next steps. I hope we can fill the spots soon!!! what are YOU doing these next 12 months?? ;)
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Then came the first weekend since sometime in may where we had absolutely no plans! it was kind of refreshing - the openness of the idea - but still, not wanting to waste anytime at semi-douchey 'foreigner bars' here in Daejeon, we rounded up some climber schwenns and headed out of town Saturday morning. We had no idea really where we were going, but did know that we were in the able and experienced hands of our friend Jake - an Aussie that's been here in Daejeon for almost a decade now - Climber extrordinaire and all around solid schwenn. He and his Korean-native wife, Kyung Ah picked us up at the subway station across town and we headed south.
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A few hours later we were on the island of Geoje-do and were making our way up the trailhead until we found our crag. Already close to 2000 ft above sea level, this gorgeous piece of rock looked super inviting towering out above the trees. After a quick refresher course from Jake, I lead up the first pitch with Sarah belaying me on her own! (she's a VERY fast learner!) and jake over to my right about 10 feet. The climb was steady - nothing too tricky or dangerous so was a perfect warm up / refresher.
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The view started out amazing and only improved from there! soon we were at the top of the quick 2-pitch and looking out over the bays, harbors and a dozen islands scatered around the sea - all right about eye level with the clouds across the bay! it was an amazing spectacle, a beautiful feeling and a place that I will forever want to go back to.
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We were the only ones who had this incredible view which made it all the better; there was only one way up to the top and it was certainly the road less traveled. You had to earn it and now you are reaping the benefits. THIS is why rock climbers go rock climbing.
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We hung out at the top for about an hour taking pics and resetting our gear to for the rapel back down to earth. It was a day filled with many firsts for Sarah; her first real rock (as opposed to climbing gyms like at Stout and Vertical Endeavors), her first multi-pitch and her first rapel; shown below! she is very adventurous, out-doorsy and an extremely fast learner so she did fantastic as I knew she would! Very glad to have a great gal that can share all of these things with me! :)
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Sarah rap'ing down Ae Bawi over the southern shore of Geoje-do!
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The Deajeon crew up on top! great peeps!! - We headed back down, found a traditional korean motel - where you sleep on the floor with blankets provided - right on the beach in the village you can see below the rockface and took it easy for the night. Fried chicken, home-made humus, and their home-brewed beer on the sea after a long day of travel and climbing..... THIS IS LIFE!! :)
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Jake made a an awesome pancake breakfast the next morning and we headed back up the same rock for another few pitches and a look around. After that, it was frisbee on the beach and a sleepy trip home after dinner. Absolutely a fantastic weekend!!
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The week since then has FLOWN by but was highlighted by a minor league baseball game date last night at Hanbat stadium with Sarah! they lost 9 to 2 but it was still fun. the fans stay true and intense all the way to the end... down by 7, 2 outs, and an 0/2 count in the bottom of 9 and the fans are still going nuts!! really great to see such optimism and support and always a ton of fun!
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This weekend begins a 10-day vacation for me (starting in a number of hours from when i'm typing this!) and there are many plans for more of the same. We leave for Jirisan mountain tonight and will get a full weekend of climbing, camping and beaches in there! - very excited to pitch the tent for the first time since i've been in Korea and I've heard only great things about the place so I should have some great pics come Monday morning.
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After that, i'll still have an entire week of wide open excellence! I took too long trying to book plans so the airfare, even for a 2 hour flight, jumped up to over 600 dollars on average! Now the plan is to maybe scope out the last bits of Korean areas I haven't made it to already and maybe get some serious training done for my marathon. I am in full swing and feeling great with 12 weeks to go until Chuncheon Full!! Stated goal range: 3:15 ~ 3:20. Bring it on!!
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Life is great! Hope to catch you guys on the phone soon! It has been far too rare that I've been able to.

Peace an' love!
aw

Time marches on.

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Time is FLYING by as it always will do.
I figure the only way to keep up with it is to learn to fly too! :)
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I left off just before the Ansan half marathon a couple weeks ago and i think that most of you few that read this probably arleady know the scoop... but that's never stopped me before!
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Ansan is a 1.something million person city on the coast up outside of Seoul a little bit. We made it into town early in the afternoon on Saturday and had plenty of time to look around, eat a delicous carb-loaded dinner, relax and get a good nights sleep - all the opposites of my race prep for the last 'half' a month ago! I felt truly ready. I hadn't felt this poised for a perfect run since high school cross country.

The busy and dense downtown of Ansan, South Korea. Plenty to do and see as is the trend over here.
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Race morning came and everything was on track. We were the first ones there and felt fine. The rain was clearning up and I had nothing but a personal record in mind. Sarah had made a last minute decision to go ahead with her run eventhough she had the 2nd degree burn the size of a silver dollar on the top of her left foot from the 'hair straigtener incident' a few days before. the 10K that morning would be her first race in years! Both excited and ready to do something amazing, the race started and soon proved to have other plans for us.
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Here come the excuses: the most humid conditions I have EVER run in made everyone's legs feel like cement by maybe the 5 or 6 mile mark..... except we had no idea where any mile (or kilometer) mark was becasue there was absolutely NO indication of how far you were along the entire course!!! i've never seen anything like it. Those markers let you know your pace, give you short-term but significant goals to pick off one-by-one and keep you going. Never had a clue the whole race!! Top it off with only having five water stops on a half marathon course in July! AND the 5th one was OUT of water by the time the first 20% of runners came through! This was the first of my 5 half marathons that I ever walked even a step - and I walked much more than only one step.
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However; at long last.... the stadium and finish line came into view and the horrific course became a memory. I never even looked at my official time but it was around and hour and 51 minutes - right about the worst half i've ever run. Nonetheless, another half under the belt and many lessons learned!! Perhaps the most important thing that I took from this race is a serious hunger to run like a world champ in my next runs to make up for it! Sarah was able to fight through the foot pain and finish her 10K too! What a gal! ;)
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There's the exhausted finishers with their medals and great senses of relief.

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Next in line-

Aug 24: The King of the Mountain in the southwest of Korea: 18K up, along the top and back down the other side of a 2400 foot mountain! for charity and going to be a BLAST!

October 29: Chuncheon Full Marathon, will be my thrid full, but only the first where i'm even remotely near to prepared properly! can't wait to see how I actually do?? life goal remains.... QUALIFY FOR BOSTON.

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Then last weekend we headed for The Seonudo Islands along with Adventure Korea - our righteous tour group that we've found over here. This was a trip primarily planned as a biking trip since there are only a handful of cars on the islands. The islands are tiny, touristy and connected to a whole string of beautiful islands that are accessible only by narrow bicycle bridges. true getaway feeling, extreme beauty, some light hiking and biking all for dirt cheap! :) actually, the weekend was a gift from my lovely girlfriend anyways so even a better deal for me than most! ;)

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Easily the most extreme tides i've ever seen! the shores draw back almost a mile to the point where you can walk to other islands! on the islands, they call this the 'Moses miracle'. Really a cool thing to witness though! you can see the boat landlocked by more than a hundred meters is anchored down. :)
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excuse us little guy... just passing through and want no trouble! 3 inch spider that looked like one mean S.O.B!!

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A great little spot that we found as we ventured out to the little ports around the island. Was an awesome experience!

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What's next? tomorrow morning we leave for the Borean (spell check??) Mud Festival!! a giant party on the beach when the soils and clays turn into pure mud due to the raininess of the season. We are going with a group of about 60 foreigners on a bus that includes mainly everyone we know in Daejeon. it will no doubt be a complete and total RIOT! (but we'll be safe, Ma!) ;) tons of pics of mud wrestling and general mud-cakedness will be popping up on facebook in a few days, to be sure!

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after that, i have two more weeks of work and then our 1 week summer vacation the first week of August! not sure what yet, but pretty sure something incredible has to happen! will work with the budget on that one!! After vacation, BOTH of my coworkers are heading elsewhere so we're going to shuffle the chips and see how things land at work! i'm optimistic. ;)

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thanks for checkin in with me! miss you guys badly, particularly on the 4th of July! better drink SEVERAL up at Kilworry for me next month!!!!

Vacation at home (and much more)

I just can't help but wonder how almost another month has gone by since i've put any updates on here. Seems strange to write too much about my trip home since i'm sure most of the people that read this were right next to me almost the whole time. I'll give the brief rundown though if only to commit the awesomeness to official record!
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I left my apartment at 5 something on Friday morning. Almost 24 hours later i got home at 1 pm the same day! It felt like i had been traveling for a week yet only 8 hours had passed on the clock! things like that really make you realize what a man-made fabrication time actually is!
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My dad picked me up at the airport, took me to get my tux fitted and finally i got to get home and see the family and my little blue kitty! I unpacked and had only a couple of hours to settle in before it was time to start setting up for the poker game at my parents' house that would take place as the start of tony's bachelor party. We had a SOLID group of brothers, and brother-like cousins and friends; and even one adventurous uncle Deaner! Tony cleaned house all-around by taking down the tourney, the prizes Brian chipped in and a bunch of money donated to him from the guys - just the way we all would have had it, i imagine tonz! We headed for a bonfire and drinks at Broey's house, spent a couple hours at the Sherwood Lounge and then back to Broey's where it was every-man-for-himself to find a place to crash.
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It was the first time EVER that all four of us brothers got to party together and an uncontrolable riot of a night!! Hugemongus thanks to Brian and Joe for putting everything together while i was struggling from the other side of the world!!!! was a great night with most of the best guys i know!
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The rest of the week was a whirl-wind barage of my favorite people, places and restaurants without hardly stopping to breathe! i even got to see not one, but TWO Twins game at the wonderous Target Field tuesday and weds nights! We even ran into one of my favorite teachers ever, Mr. Doepner, who happens to be the biggest collector of Twins gear in the history of Twins gear and also the curator of Target Field! i had no idea, but it proved to be to our advantage when he gave us the VIP intimate tour of the different areas of the new park!

Taken just moments after ariving at our seats for the first time at Target Field.


We are 2 and 0 when i am in attendance at the park! ... they'll have to give me season tickets next year if this continues!!
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Thursday was the wedding rehearsal, dinner and then some late night swimming at tony and michelles beautiful apartment in Woodbury. ...... which brings me to.... THE WEDDING!! :)
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The cermony was beautiful and ran smootly. I really enjoyed the fact that it was at Blessed Sacrament in St Paul - the same church where i used to attend grade school, was an alter server and sang in the choir. very nostalgic and comfortable being there!! the priest commented as the ceremony concluded on 'Tony and Michelle's beaming happiness and energy that they give off' and noted that they were the 'happiest looking couple he'd ever married'!! I couldn't agree more guys! :)
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We put the 'PARTY' in 'wedding party' (just for you tonz) as we got onto our trolley - cooler locked and loaded - and headed into St Paul for pictures at Mears park and the capital. with the buzz rolling, we piled into the coolest reception hall i've ever been to! It looked more like a fancy restaurant/dance club than it did a hall for rent! I was thrilled to see hundreds of family, including DOZENS of tiny little Adrians i hadn't seen forever, one Smiley Marie out walkin' and dancing around, my nieces-in-law JJ and Em and Nearly all of the 50 odd cousins that I have. It turned out to be, truly, one of the best nights of my life!! Thanks to my parents and Michelle's awesome family for making it all possible!! Picture perfect!!!



the very talented and super cool friends of tony any schmelle's; The Limns. Put on an awesome show and must have played for almost 4 hours it seemed like?? everyone was having such a blast that we had a tough time ever letting them off the stage! such a great addition to the party!!



This has recently become one of my more favorite schwenny photogs! love these two for all time!! :)



Finally, we were able to let go and allow the guys in the band to pack up their stuff as we took over and belted out a few of our favorite tunes... then they picked their instruments back up and played behind us! if you missed the late-night karaoke, you should feel great shame!! ;) a fantastic finish to the eve.
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Through a brilliant appearance from the wedding singer (Mr. Broey Hart!), limbo, congo line, crowd surfing, hours of dancing and dance-offs, karaoke and 10 hours of drinking, you'd have thought we'd be about ready to crash, right?... that's why you don't party as hard as we do! 3 hours after bar-close and after having had more than one gentle conversation with the hotel security guard; the day was done. it is certainly on the all-time list!! :D

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I made it back to the D a few days later and jumped right back into work to the realization that we had no supervisor - she had walked out with a one day notice while i was away! I managed my way through what was left of the week and was starting to get caught up. Our weekend plans for a King of the Mountain Race in the South West of the country were foiled by severe weather so we packed up and headed east instead toward Pohang where we met up with one of my good friends from college, Amy Matthews. Luck would have that it was her birthday the following day! That fact combined with the South Korea and U.S. world cup games happening in the middle of the night, AND a nice hot following day to spend playing beach volleyball at the beach made for an awesome last minute substitution plan!! Thanks Amy!!! great to see ya! ;)

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Then came a true work-place disaster. An over-night flood of a bar two stories above our school caused me to be greeted by ankle-deep standing water throughout most of our school! with a few buckets, some extra hands and a whole lot of teamwork, we managed to somehow carry-out the entire school day! one of the leakiest spots in the building happend to be our teachers' office and there seemed to be a steady stream coming down directly over my desk all night!!! All of july's books, finished graded homework, my schedules.... everything totally ruined. Of course it happens on end-of-the-month testing and recording day... and when we have no supervisor. DISASTER. although there was a strange feeling of accomplishment in over-coming the chaotic circumstances, i hope to NEVER go though anything like it again!!! things are now getting back closer to normal now.....
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The school week is finished now here just hours ago and i head into a 4th of july weekend again filled with travel, new places and a half-marathon PR in mind! The 'Ansan Li-Ning Half' will get conqured on Sunday! Hopefully Sarah can run her 10K that she's registered for despite a 2nd degree burn on the top of her foot acquired from her hair straightener the other day!! poor thing; i told her that her foot hairs looked fine curly!!! ;) We are doing great and she can't wait to someday meet everyone back home!!!
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HAVE AN INCREDIBLE 4th at the cabin!!!!!! i will be there in spirit! love you guys!!!!
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aw :)