everyday i'm hustlin

Took a long bus ride to Costa Rica and visited a local zoo that worked primarily in rehab and reproduction. They have had many problems of people taking wildlife, and then later trying to drop it off at the zoo when they either felt bad or didn't want them anymore. This objectification of animal life, which is not uncommon in the US, angers me so much. The two most often questions I get asked when I tell people I am in vet school: 1. You really like animals huh? 2. What do you think of Michael Vick? But this is neither the time nor place for a rant.

We got a behind the scenes tour and got to handle some animals. I love my field!

Their friendly guard dog.

A baby sloth

Afterwards, we stopped by a nearby restaurant for lunch. I forget what the dish was called, but you had your basic beans, rice, beef, that mashed stuff was potatoes, but it had a coffee taste to it, and a fried plantain. The beef was overcooked and dry, but I did enjoy the sides.

Got to wander the streets of San Jose for a bit. Came across some beautiful masks there...one of my favorites.

Another night in Heredia, we went out to a restaurant near our stay. I got the traditional Aztec Soup (whether or not this is what they actually ate remains a mystery to me). It was a tomato/vegetable broth with pieces of avocado, cheese, and tortilla bits that was a bit on the bland side. Still, given the rainy and cold weather up here, I'd have another bowl of that right now.

School has been relentless, but I still love it. And it's little things like this that make my day. I found this in my class mailbox for vday (some other classmates got one too, but who did it still remains a mystery) that's just too good not to share. Warning: unsuitable for kids.

i'm back

Apologies to the handful of readers who still check the blog. Things have been busy/rough to say the least, but you're not reading this to hear excuses, so onto the show.

In December, I had the opportunity to go to Nicaragua and Costa Rica to do some volunteer veterinary work. Overall it was an amazing experience as I got to see vet medicine practiced in other countries, learn some clinical skills, and practice my high school level spanish =) The trip definitely made me reflect on how I live in the U.S. as well as what kind of work I wanted to do in the future...

Here's a few of my favorite pictures that I took in Nicaragua.

We flew into Managua, but stayed at an orphanage on Ometepe Island, off the east coast.

My roommate

Here, we worked with large animals, mostly Brahmin cattle as well as some horses and goats, all of which were suffering from malnutrition. Having pretty much no experience w/ LA, I was more than happy to learn.

The meals that I had here at the orphanage were my favorites of the whole trip. You just can't beat a home cooked meal. The ladies working would make lunch and bring it to us at the worksite, something everyone looked forward to. Lots of rice and beans, a cabbage slaw, fried plantains, and some kind of protein, here chicken. Being that Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the western hemisphere, I did not expect to eat so well over there.

We also go a chance to learn and do some castrations. After a friend finished neutering a bull, the owner requested the testicles. A few minutes later, I walked by, only to see him slicing it up with a machete and tossing it back w/ some salt and lime. I was curious to know how it tasted, but given the fact that we did the surgery with a local anesthetic, I really didn't want to ingest lidocaine.

Had to try their beer here. It tasted like a lighter/bubblier version of Heineken.

And if you know anything about me, you know that I love soup....something my team soon learned. Here was a fish soup, the stock a bit on the bland side.

And I had it almost every time we went out to eat. Seafood soup complete w/ lobster tail. This was on the other end, really really rich.

And the chicken soup was just right...a very homey and simple soup.

Quite the gathering...

Can you see the two little hooves coming out of mama cow?

I could really see that the kids in the orphanage were loved and had a strong connection to the place. Amidst all the bs and horrible things that we see depicted daily on the news, it was refreshing to see something positive for a change.

The last night, they threw a good bye party for us, where the kids performed, and went all out with a pinata, cake, and ice cream. I'm not quite sure what kind of cake it was (banana breadish), but it certainly was delicious.

Once the pinata hit the floor, it was every man, woman and child for themselves.

The island was a beautiful place, and it felt quite odd to be swimming out there in the middle of December (not that I'm complaining). A week here and we were off to Costa Rica.

korea: hongdae and shindangdong

We stopped by Ewha University (the top women's university) to visit an old friend, then we were off to Hongdae U, in which the surrounding area is known as a popular college hangout. While I loved UCSD and La Jolla is a beautiful place, it's far from a college town and I was always slightly envious when visiting friends at other campuses, particularly Berkeley, where the city seemed to be integrated, and not segregated, with the school.

The women here were definitely a lot more beautiful than I remembered them to be. Lol, actually that's a guy, rockin the tight jeans and a leopard skin hand bag. A lot of the males here seemed to be on the feminine side in dress...Sorry for the blurry picture, but when you're in the subway station, you gotta move, lest you get trampled.

The subways are awesome here though, and we found Hongdae easily enough.

We stopped by Bonchon, the Korean fried chicken place, for a quick snack. I've actually never had visited this particular joint in the states, so I wanted to see how it would be in the motherland. We ordered some Asahi and munched on some free chip/corn thingies.

The digs.

While waiting, the helpful waiter came out and gave us each a box saying "sample." What the fruit?

Inside the cute little package lay a small chicken wing. I thought to myself if these were the size of the wings, I would feel jipped. It didn't seem to be very fresh, and I guess they were trying to get rid of them. Later when we were leaving, I saw them handing out free samples outside.

The waiter then came out with a metal gravy boat. I asked what it was, and he said it was a fruit cocktail as service. Lol...gotta love it here.

We ordered 5 drumsticks, 3 spicy and 2 soy sauce I think. These were quite big pieces and if you love thin crispy skin, you would enjoy this. I don't remember how the soy sauce tasted, but the spicy wasn't very hot at all. It reminded me a bit of a korean ramen packet seasoning (like shin ramen). I still think Kyochon has the best spicy wings although the one in Rowland Heights seems to have gone out of business.

Up close and personal with that double deep fried goodness.

We spent the rest of the night wandering around from place to place. Some kids spitting some rhymes at a playground.

Wonder what they have in here?

Seriously though, the ladies were looking right, a stark contrast from my past memory of ugly school girls. A friend of mine described this place as a "meat market."

Nearby was some reps from Cass, giving out free beer. Another watered down lager, but hey, it was free, and you know me!

Do your thing little turkey....

As the sun went down, the crowd grew bigger.

We stopped by this strange place that sold "hard" drinks in a bag, much like Kirk's adventure with beer.

I ordered a jungle juice (haha) and drank this down pretty quickly. Not very strong, more sweet than anything else.

We allowed ourselves to be pulled in by the tide of the crowd and ended up at some random drinking place.

We just wanted to drink, but they said we had to order something, so we went with the cheapest thing on the menu, a fruit salad. This weird looking thing came out. I think the white stuff was a bit like frosting.

Of course, we had to get the classic combo. How are you gonna say no to soju for under 3 bucks a bottle? Boktan gumbeh! (Soju bombs lol)

Shortly after, a waiter stopped by and proceeded to quickly put it all this stuff on the table. "Whoa whoa whoa, we didn't order any of this stuff!" *Waiter, giving me a curious look* "It's service yo, so enjoy yourself!" *Me nodding and smiling* "Thank you!" Among the goodies was a cabbage salad, seaweed soup, spicy marinated squid, tofu, and hidden in the dark because I didn't use my flash, a whole fish and corn cheese.

Finally getting to a decent buzz, I started to crave ddukbukki (spicy rice cakes), but I decided to hold back the craving (despite the fact that there were a bunch of vendors on the streets), and we took the subway back home.

But not to worry kids, there is justice in the world. I met up with my cousin the next day, and he took me to Shin Dang Dong ddukbukki town, a small strip that sells solely ddukbukki. There were people outside of their own restaurants, inviting you in, saying theirs was the best and you'd get hooked up.

This ddukbukki was a bit different from what I was used to though. It was served in a big pot and cooked in front of us with a whole other bunch of random stuff thrown in like ramen noodles. We ordered the extra spicy.

After a few minutes, it started to boil and turn an angry shade of red. And St. Peter in heaven, it was spicy. The heat on this was not a creeper; it immediately burned you from the first sip and if it went down your trachea, God help you son. Even my cousin, who has a high tolerance for the spice, had to admit it was pretty extreme. The small rice cakes were on the bottom, but because of the potpourri of other ingredients, there didn't seem to be too much of them, and that was a pity because I like those things. Overall, I preferred the more traditional version, but it was still good. After that, our two weeks in Korea were up. It went by so fast. It definitely is an amazing place, especially since I hadn't been in 15 years, but I hope to visit again soon!