Here is an update of my trip so far. I'll be updating this with pictures at some point. Day #1 (Aug 5) - Got in to Anchorage and was greeted by my Uncle Dale, Aunt Kae, Bro, Grace, and Joshua :) Then we headed to Aunt Taeja's house for a yummy feast...the highlight...the FRESHEST salmon sashimi EVER! Just caught week ago by my aunt :) Day #2 (Aug 6) - Headed out to see some glacier with the family. Visited my grandma's grave site and had a family memorial service for her at Aunt Malsun's house. My grandma died about 4 mos shy of her 100th birthday. She is one of the most influential people in my life, a true Mother Teresa to me. Went for a nice 45 min run in the neighborhood with the mountains in the background. Day #3 (Aug 7) - Went shopping at the PX on the Air Force base. Later headed out to aunt Taeja's house for a family BBQ (Kalbi, king salmon, dungenous crab, etc.) where all my aunts & cousins living in AK gathered for a mini-reunion...over 20 of us were there. We ended the night with Aunt Kae telling us some amazing stories about my grandmother. Day #4 (Aug 8) - Bro & Uncle Dale reserved a camp space and parked the camper. Meanwhile Grace, Joshua, Aunt Kae and I leisurely woke up and got ready. Then we went to the shooting range to try out some guns. Man, guns have a loud bang.. esp. the 9mm. Uncle Dale has TONS of guns floating around the house and some of them were loaded! EK! Before I knew that fact I pulled one of them out of the holster to look at it...good thing i didn't pull the trigger...double EK! After the shooting range we went for dinner to Lone Star and had some good eats and finally headed over to go "camping". We drove up to our RV. Started a campfire and had us some yummy puggie pies over the fire and eventually went to bed. It was about midnight but the sky wasn't completely dark...weird. We all got settled into our beds in the camper for the night...fun stuff! Day #5 (Aug 9) - We woke up about 8:30am. Joshua didn't wake up once during the night.. awesome! After washing up we all headed out to good ole Carl's Jr. for some breakfast, then went to our cuz Kathy's house to drop off the camper. Kathy has lots of outdoor toys in her garage, 2 four-wheelers and 2 snowmobiles. We were going to go out four-wheeling the next day but couldn't make the time work :( boooo! We spent the rest of the day veggin' out at home and got to see my parents for the day until they went to church. For dinner we had fresh salmon sashimi and soba noodles :) I'm trying to cut down on the massive eating going on here...The rest of the night we watched the olympics and I went running (50 mins). Its been a really great week. My parents are staying with one aunt and chris, grace, joshua, and I are staying with another aunt. We have two completely different schedules and barely even see each other. Its turning out to be a really great vacay. They do their thing which is mostly talking and telling stories and we are doing our own thing which is mostly exploring and going here and there. Couldn't be better :) I'm seriously starting to think about my life back home and how much i'm enjoying the lifestyle here in AK. Everything is outdoorsy. Everyone here has a toy whether its a RV, boat, four-wheeler, snowmobile...etc. Once Friday hits my cuz Kathy is always out every weekend camping. I am seriously tempted to re-think how and where I want to spend the next decade of my life. I rarely get to spend any time with my extended family and I see how nice it is to have lots of family close by. It would be nice to have the chance to have some new experiences than the daily humdrum of nj life...Whew, PDanny says not to make major decisions when you're stressed out. I think that applies to the opposite end of the spectrum. I shouldn't make big decisions when I'm too relaxed.... Day #6 (Aug 10) - Went to church with my aunts at Onnuri Anchorage. Day #7 (Aug 11) - Head out to Seward. Made some stops along the way. Hiked right up to Exit Glacier. Very cool. Settled into army hotel. Day #8 (Aug 12) - Took a day boat tour along the Alaskan coastline. Day #9 (Aug 13) - Go to airport in the early AM and head to Seattle then Beijing. | 
