Global Gathering

This is our third autumn in Busan but the first time we have gone to the Global Gathering, an annual event hosted by the Busan metro government's office on foreign relations. Its a big event for many members of the expat community, who host booths highlighting food and culture from their native countries (like Norwegian waffles, Philippine barbeque, Turkish kebab, and Chinese beer).

We arrived to find Vivian's new best friends, the Hannevik family from Norway. The Hannevik mom, Sarah, is my new best friend, too, which works out nicely!

The dads and the kids.

The papparazzi were there, as usual.

Face painting. Vivian chose a spider from among choices including a flower and a dolphin. Hmmm...is that a significant choice for an almost-3-year old?

Korean traditional drumming, which is one of my favorite things about Korea. Check out this Youtube video to see a sample:

Demonstrations and opportunities to participate in traditional Korean pastimes like walking on stilts:


playing ring toss:


making glutinous rice cake the old fashioned way (what a workout!):


playing foot shuttlecock (like American hackey-sack).


The shuttlecock is really cool in a do-it-yourself kind of way: feathers plus disks cut out of recycled aluminum cans.


And, of course, photo ops with unidentifiable mascots. Apparently this one is the mascot of one of the foreign schools here.