Hey everyone! Our names are Daniel and Mandi Ellis, occasionally referred to by our celebrity name, “Dandi,” (no, no one actually calls us that, but it was a convenient hashtag for our wedding this past August and thus an easy way to find an unused url as well…fashion meets function or something like that?).

If we had to boil it down to just a few words, we’re a couple of PNW natives (Portland–>Spokane–>Boise) that love the outdoors, Gonzaga basketball, travel, music, food, and occasionally lounging around and allowing Netflix to just keep on playing the next episode. In January of 2019, we relocated to an area just outside of Seoul, South Korea by means of an opportunity at work, which we are very thankful for!

As far as our background, we both grew up pretty close to each other outside of Portland, Oregon but we didn’t meet until freshman year at Gonzaga University (Daniel–>mechanical engineer, Mandi–>registered nurse) and, following graduation, we moved to the wonderful Boise, Idaho where we’ve lived for the past 8 years. Boise is where our love for the outdoors really grew, and as a result, we spend a lot of our time mountain biking, snowboarding, backpacking, kayaking, running, jumping, kicking, and karate chopping. In Seoul, the frequency of some of that will certainly change, but luckily there are plenty of fantastic hiking opportunities as well as a whole host of new experiences for us to dive into (karaoke, here we come!).

We started this blog for the primary purpose of keeping our friends and family in the loop as we navigate our way through our time living in another country but we also want to share our experiences and use this as an opportunity to reflect on everything we see and do. Hopefully it can be entertaining or helpful in some way for you!