A Flat Tire and the Museum

A flat bike tire and a visit to the museum pretty much sums up our weekend.  Both things allowed us time to play with the new camera lens we bought last weekend so we were happy!  Last week Eric realized that one of his bike tires wasn't holding air and wasn't ridable anymore.  Not knowing anything about bike tires we assumed the whole tire would have to be replaced and were hopeful it wouldn't cost more than 50,000 won.  On the way to wheeling his bike to a small bike tent we had seen in the past, he took the opportunity to play around with the camera.  When we got to the bike tent, where three elderly Korean men were working, he showed the man his tire.  The man quickly figured out that the small metal piece where the air goes in was broken and told us he would "change-ie 1000 won."  One of the other workers noticed his back brake was only working on one side of the tire so fixed it with a screw driver (at least we think that's what he said since none of them spoke English).  Anyway, Eric was so excited to have his bike fixed and for so cheap that we ended up biking around for several kilometers in the heat and humidity and even went all the way to McDonald's for our first Korean McDonald's dinner! 

Today we went to the National Museum of Korea.  This was basically a history museum along with an art gallery and donations gallery.  One man had devoted his entire life to studying roofing tiles and donated his entire collection of almost 2000 roofing tiles that were all on display to see.  I understand that the intricate designs on roofing tiles in Asia is quite interesting but I'm not sure I would want to devote my entire life to collecting them and studying them.  There wasn't a whole lot of interesting stuff to see at the museum but some of the Korean history was interesting to learn about and we got to see test out the camera lens inside with low lighting! 

As it continues to get hotter we are starting to be content with hanging out in our air conditioned apartment more.  There is still much to see and do but a lot of it might wait until after summer.  As July gets closer we anxiously await the monsoons to arrive to find out what they are really like...

 Stopped by Cheonggyecheon Stream just for a couple minutes when testing out the new lens.  We will go back to walk it and take many more pictures sometime soon.

 On the way to get Eric's bike fixed we saw a group of electric wheelchair riders on the bike path

Eric by the reflecting pond at the National Museum of Korea