Ron and Sally Jo Blog

Our final week in Chuncheon included a number of “farewell” activities.  Things were just beginning to open up and people felt more comfortable inviting us to join them.

One day Yoon Shik Lee invited us to visit his home.  He and his family had lived in our house in Goshen in 2005-6 when we spent the year in Papua, Indonesia.  He and his wife live about 45 minutes from Chuncheon in a lovely spot in the mountains only 12 miles from the DMZ.  They are developing a retreat center – Abba Shalom Koinonia.  We took a short walk in the woods/hill behind the house and then walked down to the river below their house.  Beautiful and peaceful.  They also own a thermotherapy center (which we visited) in the small town near them.

Songdo Cha, his wife and another couple (important in the beginnings of Anabaptists in Korea) from the Jesus Village Church invited us to a good Italian restaurant.  We first met Songdo Cha when he was a visiting professor at Goshen College.  Because of Covid, we had been able to visit the Jesus Village Church only once.

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The Jesus Heart Church is located in the same space as our office.  We had worshipped with them three Sundays and then they were closed because of Covid-19.  They still had not opened when we left but some of them wanted to give us a farewell and to hear a little of our story.  On our last Sunday afternoon a few first met in a French tea room where we had good black tea and delicious desserts (baked custard, cheesecake, and oranges).  We then went back to the church where Boki (one of the church members) made a great meal of sushi.  He is a trained chef and the meal was absolutely delicious.

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Our MCC staff had lunch together at SeongHan’s house one last time.  This time they made Japanese Shabu-shabu which is a hotpot dish of thinly sliced meat and vegetables boiled in broth and served with dipping sauces.  It is always good to visit SeongHan’s house.  In the mountains, peaceful, beautiful, and always something new.  He had laid out a labyrinth since the last time we were there.

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On our last day in Chuncheon we took our final walk along the lake and drove around the lake one last time.  It is a beautiful area!

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We have left South Korea but before we blog about that final week, we want to look back to the beginning of our time in Korea.  During our first week there, we traveled to Seoul for some orientation sightseeing.  We did not post much about it because we always thought we would return.  Little did we know the future.

When we visited Seoul that Saturday (middle of January), it was very cold and we were still very much in jet-lag mode.  We had other things to blog about at the time and just assumed we would return to Seoul and then combine our activities into one post.  It didn’t happen.

We rode the train to Seoul that day – about 1 hour ride.  Our MCC service worker met us at the station and showed us how to get to the subway which we rode.  We ate lunch at an Indian restaurant.

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We walked to Gyeongbok Palace, the main royal palace of the Joseon dynasty.  It was built in 1395, reduced to ashes during the Japanese invasion of 1592, rebuilt in 1867, and again extensively damaged during the Japanese occupation of the early 20^th century.  Restoration efforts have been ongoing since 1990.  We took a tour and visited a number of the buildings on the nearly 100-acre piece of land.  It is a beautiful place with beautiful/ornate buildings.  We did not write down the name of the places we visited so we can’t tell you.  Just know that is was a remarkably interesting area.

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We had wanted to see various other places in the vicinity, but the main street was packed.  Apparently, it is a custom in recent years to hold huge rallies/protests on Saturday on this street.  Some groups were wanting a former president released from prison; another group were demanding that the government investigate the Sewol Ferry tragedy; another group were advocating for recognition of the “Comfort Women” from the war.  And many other issues.

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Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this was our only significant time spent in Seoul.