To catch you up to date, remember we started the year with the Blue Jays, and S reported to AAA in Buffalo then we got our contract purchased from the LG Twins and ended up in Seoul, South Korea pretty quickly.  Of all the baseball experiences we have encountered, this was the craziest.  We were excited about something new and different and the financial aspect.  After all S’s hard work in baseball, he was finally getting compensated for it.  I feel like in my past post I really only mentioned the “good” things we experienced in Korea, but to be a real person I feel like I should also show the bad things we encountered and how hard the adjustment was for the both of us.

As I  mentioned before, upon arrival, I had a terrible stomach bug that felt like sharp pains in the upper part of my stomach, and I was so tired.  I could not find anything I wanted to eat to make me feel better and that was so hard.  They made S go to the minor league complex to pitch for a day, and I was left in a foreign country by myself for a night with a stomach bug.  “Like what??  Your leaving and I’m by myself in a foreign country and I haven’t even been here a week?  Ummm that’s not cool!”  At this point, I told S if the food here is causing my stomach to mess up I’m not sure I can stay.  I felt at a loss because I wanted to be there with S, but I had to take care of my health.  Finally, after a week, I started to feel like myself again.  The smells of the city are seriously disgusting.  When you walk pass a sewage hole it literally makes you gag.  This city is huge, and its constant.  S and I would be dodging people like a running back trying to find the hole.

The food was a big adjustment for me.  We didn’t have an oven just a stove top.  We found a Costco and that helped with my stomach, and I ordered American food such as Mac and Cheese on an app called IHerb which saved my life.  We started to find restaurants that had American type food too!  Another struggle was the language barrier.  Your trying to order something and its a hassle just to order.  Your frustrated and they are frustrated and you just crave somebody that speaks fluent English to understand you.  It is very isolating and lonely considering I’m an outgoing person; it was really hard for me.  Our team wouldn’t allow families to travel to the road games.  So basically, I was expected to stay by myself in a foreign country instead of traveling with my husband and seeing the country and exploring.  I honestly just do not understand that aspect at all.  Korean baseball is so different from American baseball in so many ways.

We are so blessed by this experience, but we could not be happier to be back in America.  It’s honestly been the craziest year we have ever experienced.  LG placed S on waivers.  He came home from Busan, which is about 4/5 hours from Seoul, and we started packing to head back to America.  We wanted the first flight out so we could get back to our house, our kitty and start looking for a new job.  One of the perks of playing overseas is no matter what happens you are guaranteed the money in your contract.  We get a phone call to tell us we can’t leave that we have to stay a week in case we get picked up.  Like what??  So basically, we had a week together in Seoul which was nice to get some time together.  During the season, you don’t get to spend much time with your man because they have to be at the field and then games are late and by the time you get home you eat and go to sleep.  We went to a handful of movies, shopped, played darts, went to church and just enjoyed the city before we left.  Our translator had our flights booked for Friday, and we wouldn’t find out if we cleared waivers until Friday morning.

We called our translator Friday morning and were told we cleared.  We were so excited to get on the plane and get to America.  It’s crazy because our flight left from South Korea at 3pm Friday, and we got home at 6:00pm Friday.  We were running on fumes just to get to our house.  Our house in which we got to spend a month in a half in before we left for spring training.  We had Friday night, all day Saturday and Sunday morning before I had to drop S off at the airport again to report to Buffalo, NY back where this whole journey started.  Yep, so we just did a full circle with the Blue Jays.  As crazy as all this has been, we know God’s plan is bigger than ours and everything that has happened is part of his master plan for our lives.  Do not get me wrong there are times I’m like uh God why did you send us all the way over here to only send us back?  Hopefully, we made an impact on the people’s paths we crossed and that was the purpose.

“Don’t worry about anything ; instead pray about everything.  Tell God what you need , and thank him for all he has done.  Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand.  His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.”  (Philippians 4:6-7)

Thanks for reading!

XOXO,

HC