First Adventure into Pyeongtaek

Pyeongtaek is the largest city that's close to Camp Humphreys

We live closest to Paengseong-eup.

We have not really figured out how the naming thing goes here :)

We went to Pyeongtaek with another couple:

AK Plaza is a mall and also the train station (you can take a train to Seoul from here).

Behind AK Plaza is a district that branches out in 5 streets.

We went down one of these to find this little gem:

Maroobeol - Korean barbeque

Korean barbeque involves a hole in the table where they put a basin with coals. Then they place a grate over top and that's where you cook the meat. We ordered some kind of pork, spicy pork, and pork neck (yeah that wasn't me or my husband's order ;).

The neck was actually pretty good! It wasn't overly tender, but the flavor was good. The table next to us also had the pork neck (I assume this means muscles/tendons from the neck area).

Each table has a little button you can push for service. We did have to push it several times to get our rice delivered. 

This salad below was my very favorite!!! It had a green sauce on it. The other couple said they really liked it too.

Below you see a piece of pork neck dipped in sriracha (hot!!).

Some kind of soup...it was not my favorite.

Cooked onions - those were actually pretty good when paired with a lettuce leaf and the meat.

Below are some kind of egg dish and a bean sprout side. 

Here you see the lettuce leaves we wrapped our meat and rice with. It turned out great!

Yes...that is laundry drying in the window ledge of the restaurant full of people.

Overall, the meal was wonderful!!

It cost around 36,000 won (or about $36) for 4 people and a great dinner out!

After dinner we went to a little coffee and pastry shop.

I had a strawberry pie.

Husband had pecan pie!

And husband attempted to eat the coffee grounds he thought were cookies...yeah you're supposed to smell them ;)

After dinner and dessert, we returned to AK plaza where our friends parked their car.

I had to go to the restroom -  you will notice that in Korea they often use the translation "toilet" instead of "restroom."

Below you will see the more local type of toilet. I haven't been brave enough to attempt it, but I definitely learned a few things while in this restroom ("toilet"):

1. Make sure you find toilet paper before you go in the stall - they typically have it on the wall outside the toilets.

2. Make sure which type of toilet you are attempting to use.

3. Throw away the toilet paper in the trash can provided in the stall.

4. Carry hand sanitizer unless you would like to use the blue soap provided in the following picture.

5. Finally, the last picture below is where young boys go to the restroom in the women's restroom...as far as I can tell ;)

Hope you enjoyed! Learning new things every day! ;)