That time we ate Mexican food in Korea and I backed into a car

• The sitter arrived at 9am yesterday morning. Steve and I bolted out of the house and into the car, because FREEDOM!
• And before you pity my children, just know that Sam started dancing when the sitter arrived and then said he didn't want Mommy and Daddy to come home. ((If we could afford to stay somewhere overnight, you can bet your last squeezy pouch that we would have done that, little man.))
• We arrived in Seoul mid-morning and hit up the mega-commissary on post, the booze section at the PX, and Starbucks. Living the dream, people.
• We were able to park on post and walk a short distance to Itaewon- a neighborhood in Seoul that we haven't been to before. It's the "foreigner district" and they have lots of "Big Size" clothes stores, foreign restaurants (Indian, Thai, Italian, Mexican, McDonalds, Bulgarian, etc), and bars. We went to a popular Mexican restaurant called Vatos Tacos for lunch and it did not disappoint.

Not disappointing unless you're into chips and dip, because they brought out exactly 3 massive chips and about a tablespoon of salsa.

I had a galbi burrito and it was uhhhmazing. It's no Chipotle, but it was A Very Delicious Burrito.

• We walked around until my hair had officially turned into an afro (nothing like 1,000% humidity and a light mist) and then headed back to our car. We weren't sure what the weather was going to do, so we headed for IPark Mall, which, idk if you've heard, is MASSIVE. We parked there and walked around for a bit, admiring how lost we were in a matter of minutes as well as the amount of stuff they had managed to squeeze in this place.

Drooled over cameras and lenses and then decided that it wasn't worth the risk. (This photo shows approximately 1/264th of the camera and lens sales counters on this floor. The entire floor was cameras and camera gear. The electronics section of the mall had its own little (ha) wing.)

• We also made out in a dressing room.
• We eventually met up with Aggie and family and walked around together (aka the blind leading the blind). After dragging them all over kingdom come, we decided to head back to Itaewon for dinner. 
• We randomly found this LOVELY little Italian restaurant and decided that Korean-Italian was better than no Italian. Except we were totally shocked because it was actually real Italian food. (That, or our tastebuds are thoroughly confused at this point.)

Open air dining! (all the windows are rolled back)

That drink was called "Blue Lemon" something and we still don't know what was in it. Caprese salad was the bomb dot com though. (Also, an awesome photobomb of an impressive noodle slurp back there.)

Poor Steve is allergic to shrimp, so I couldn't share. I hated to be responsible for eating this shrimpy, bacon-y, onion-y, broccoli, creamy goodness all by myself....

• One of my main goals for our day was to see the Banpo Bridge show. (Every night, the bridge puts on a water and light show that is all set to music. Pretty amazing.) Steve had to get cash out of the ATM for the sitter ($$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$) so I went and got the car to save time ("Get in, ya sexy betch!" - peel off at 20mph) and then drove us down to the river. We were going to miss the first show by a few minutes, so I might have been going a bit faster than usual, but when we started pulling into the parking lot, I saw FIREWORKS going off and I was more ready than ever to get out and go stand next to the mighty Han River. So I'm backing into the spot and waiting to hit the parking stopper. I slowly run into it, throw the car in park, grab my purse/camera bag, and start running. Then I see a Korean couple standing behind our car and staring at our bumper and oh no. I did not run into a parking stopper. I ran into a parked car. With people in it. People who, at the time of the bump, had been bumping in a very different way, if you catch my drift. I gave them my best "stupid American" and bowed a few times while saying "sorry" in English. I do believe they saw no scratches on their car in the pitch-black darkness of nighttime, and maybe they also wanted to get back to whatever was happening in that car before I so boldly interrupted. Steve and I stood there for a minute more after they got back in their car (hoping they'd call the cops on us maybe? trying to feel less guilty? like standing there staring makes it better somehow?) and then we noticed their seats were reclined once again, so we skedaddled on over to the riverside.
• We watched the end of the fireworks show and some more of the bridge show. We walked further down towards the bridge to get a better look (and because we could barely even hear the music from where we were standing). There were also a TON of people out! It was incredible. The weather was amazing- so cool from the rain earlier in the day and nice and breezy. I was actually a tad chilly. AT THE END OF JULY. Where was this weather last year when we had no car and I sweat gallons upon gallons every single day until October?

Look at the little cruise ships watching too!

• We finally decided to head home and then got lost (or if you're Steve- "just seeing more of Korea!") and then got home around 10:30. I showered and fell asleep while Steve sat on hold with USAA for half the night to get our second car insured. (Oh yes we are buying an upscale hoopty!)
• Overall, it was the most fun I've had in a really long time. If it didn't feel like hemorrhaging money, I imagine we'd do it more often.