We're Expecting...

by Amy

That's right! We are expecting to add a new member to our family. Brad and I have spent several hours discussing this and feel like the time has come. Five seemed just right, but now we're ready for six members in this family. We still haven't told the kids yet, but we're sure they'll be excited..... And, thankfully, they won't have to wait the normal 9 months for him/her to arrive. We have a trip to the Sunday market planned. There we will acquire our newest family member.... Pictures to come soon!

My Treo

From Brad.

A driving principle in my life since I moved overseas is, 'If it adds convenience to our life here, then we pretty much want to get it.' Of course this has limits, but because life over here can be quite annoying/frustrating at times, a few extra dollars spent to alleviate some of that frustration is plain ole' good stewardship.

Before I came over, a friend who was already here recommended that I purchase a Treo to bring over. I have owned a palm pilot since the late 90s and even different smartphones (palm+phone) since 2001 so I was familiar with the Treo. However, I had no idea you could buy a cell phone in America and use it overseas. As it turns out, there are 2 major networks that cell phones operate off of...GSM and CDMA. Long story short, if you purchase a GSM phone and get it unlocked, you can use it anywhere in the world where they have a GSM network (basically...). So I got an unlocked Treo in America and have been using one here ever since. My Treo ranks closely behind my God and my family when it comes to the loves of my life. Of course I'm jesting, but I never knew how integral this tool would be to almost everything I do here. Here are the different ways I use my phone...

1) Cell Phone

2) Text Messaging - better than email with the Treo's Querty keyboard.

3) Bible (for free! Greek, Hebrew, English, etc).

4) MP3 Player - Either for music, messages, or language files. I will often listen to MP3s of my local language while walking to class of the text/vocab we'll be discussing that day. Also, my Treo will plug into my apartment's speakers functioning as a sort of stereo. It also has a small but powerful speaker on it if I want to play some music for my kids at bedtime, etc.

5) Calendar - reminds me of important appointments I can tend to forget.

6) To Do List - I love checking things off

7) Calculator/Converter - Converts pounds to kilograms and all those other annoying things. Isn't it time for America to join the rest of the world in the metric system! Oh college engineering courses would have been so much simpler.

8) Movie player - Yes, I can take my DVDs and put them on my Treo to watch. Better than a DVD player, I can watch about 6 hours of movies before the battery is dead. Also, this program was Free! With an 8gb SD card to boot, I can throw lots of music, messages and movies on there.

9) Timer - especially helpful for kids in 'time out' :) or Granola in the oven

10) Voice recorder - can record classes or funny songs the kids like to sing

11) My English-Asian dictionary. This dictionary wasn't cheap, but I always have it with me and whenever I'm talking and don't understand a word they're saying, I can type it in and (usually) figure out what they're saying. What is wonderful is if I deem that word to be helpful, I can immediately add it to my electronic flashcard pile. As a mostly visual learner, I can later see the word I learned and add it to my repertoire. Often my study time will consist in cranking through some 2000 flashcards I have created since I got here last year.

My Treo is simply a tool that enables me to function more smoothly in a society which seems anything but smooth a good portion of the time. Amy has one as well and its become so important to us, we now have a backup one just in case we lose our (like I did in a taxi 3 months ago). Remarkably you can buy the older 650 model on ebay used for $80-130 or new for about $150. Extremely affordable in my opinion and I've read reviews that say it really doesn't fall too short of the $500 iPhone. If any of you have smartphones, I'd love to hear how you use it and if they have features the Treo may not have.

It's About Time....

by Amy

Well, if you're still a faithful Morello Madness blog-checker, I'm impressed - and shocked! My parents were in town for about a month, so we were super busy. And, having an extra person battling for the computer didn't make it any easier to find time to blog. But, I will say that between our camera and my dad's we did a capture quite a few fun moments that I'll gladly share with you -- over several posts....

First week and a half highlights and pics:

Having my parents here was a lot of fun, for us all. I was pleased at how quickly they adjusted to the 14 hr difference time zone. Their second night here we celebrated Mom's birthday. She actually spent her birthday in an airplane. I'm not sure exactly how it worked out, but this year her birthday was only about 7 hours long. They got on a plane in LA just after midnight on her birthday, chased the sun, crossed the International Date Line and arrived in South Korea at 13 hours later. But, it was already the day after her birthday. Bummer.... We were all happy to get to be together to celebrate the 60 years of life my sweet mom has had.

About three days after they arrived we headed to the BIG city just north of us. Again we stayed in a three bedroom serviced apartment for the week. It was great. We were able to do several fun things on top of eating at all the great Western restaurants we always hit. My dad and I had fun shopping the markets and bargaining for all the knock-off goods available. The kids had fun playing at a HUGE indoor play area a couple of times.

We also discovered a really fun park not too far from the hotel. It had a lake, and lots of fun carnival rides/games. We went on a beautiful, sunny day, but it was a little chilly.



Our favorite thing we did there was watch a 4-D movie about fish. Do you know what 4-D means? I didn't....It's basically a 3-D movie on steroids! Not only do you wear the lovely glasses that make it seem like the shark is going to bite your head off, but the seats you sit in move, water sprays in your face, and air blows on you -- all corresponding to the events in the movie. It was great!!! My kids weren't too sad when it was over, but I was. It was really fun!



We also had fun visiting a really big wall just outside of the city we were in. We had been to this city about 5 times, but never seen the wall. We were happy to use my parents as an excuse to get out there! It's one big wall!! The day we were there was also a beautiful day. And, since it's winter, it wasn't too crowded.

Here my kids are posing for one of about 50,000 pictures they had taken of them that day. They had great attitudes about it though! I was thankful!

One afternoon while the kids were sleeping, I took my parents out to see a really famous square that was down town. To be honest, it wasn't much more than some old looking buildings and a huge picture of a dead leader, but now we can all say we've been there.....It was interesting to be standing where so many college students were killed 20+years ago during a political demonstration.

On our last night there, my parents took me and Savannah to an acrobatics show. It was amazing. Savannah loved it! Here are a few of her comments as she watched the show: "I'm not allowed to do that!" "That would hurt!" "Wow! How do they bend like that!" "That's amazing!" It was so fun sitting next to her, getting to listen her as she enjoyed the show so much.

We returned to my house exhausted from a great trip! We rested a day or two, then the fun kept on coming. But, I'll have to save that for another post!