Iteawon Global Village Festival

So we arrived in Korea just in time for the Itaewon Global Village Festival.  It's a three day celebration featuring Korean traditions and foreign cultures from around the world.  Saturday's events were kicked off with a fun parade.  There were at least 50 different countries featured in the parade which lasted a couple hours.  In the picture below you can see all of the different country flags featured in the parade.  

  

                                                 

This was one of our favorite parade entries.  While every other entry was a country, this was the entire continent of Africa represented by 6 guys!

The thing that made this parade different from any other parade we've ever been to, though, was how people had no problem walking right in the middle of the parade route.  You can see the poor man in the yellow vest trying to keep people behind the caution tape.  No one would listen!  The parade came to a stand still several times for 15-20 minutes while people flooded the street.  The area the parade had to march through went from the entire street to about 5 feet wide by the end of the parade.  People just crowded the parade out.  It made us laugh.  

 After the parade the kids visited the street vendors.  Emma got her face painted.  

 Ali and Ryan had phrases written in calligraphy for them.  

Then we stopped by this one booth to take a fun picture.  

The lady running the booth absolutely loved the kids...

 Here she is in the pink vest.  First she took a picture of the kids with her booth.

Then she ushered them to the front of the line to get their faces tattooed (past all of the other kids waiting their turn).  You can see her still taking pictures in the background.  I think the kids felt a little like rock stars.

 You can see their tattoos here -- both say "Korea" on them.

 Next we tried on some traditional Korean dress.

And then we hit the food stands.  This was Turkish Ice Cream.  I've never had anything like it.  You can see the pink blob of it he's stirring here.  It's so thick you can turn it completely upside down and it will still stick to your cone.  

 Super delicious...it tastes like cold Starburst.

 We also got some Turkish Kabobs.

Then we had to try Korean food.  We're not sure exactly what it is we ordered, but it tasted great.  The lady working at the stand gave us one extra for free.  I'm not sure if she was being nice, or was shocked that we were eating it.  

About halfway through Peter found this in the middle.  Not sure if it was octopus or squid.  It was definitely chewy though.  Both Ali and Ryan tried it, along with Peter and myself.  Emma decided to wait for some pizza back on post.  :)

 Here's another piece of the tentacle hiding in the food.  It was spread throughout.  I really wish I knew what this dish was called because I thoroughly enjoyed it.  It tasted like doughy pancakes with fried veggies in the middle.     

 We searched out the American vendor to see what they were selling.  We got a big chuckle.  Here on the sign you can read "Hot Dog."  

 However, I'm not sure where they came up with the idea of hot dogs because what they were selling (as you can read on the sign below) was steamed bun with pork, or steamed bun with chicken.  For dessert you could even get steamed bun with red beans.  Yummy!

 Here's what it looked like.  Definitely not any hot dog I've ever gotten at a parade before!

 And while we were adventurous with our eating, we decided NOT to try the "gizzard hickory shad".  Not sure exactly what this was, and I'm perfectly content with never knowing.

Here are a few other random pictures from the evening.  We had a great time.  We have been so impressed by how welcoming and friendly the Korean people are.