One day left

Until school is out for Winter break and I am off to Paris. David left yesterday morning and is already enjoying cheap brie and croissants. I can't wait to join him and have an adventure outside of the Asian continent. I wanted to post this picture awhile back because it is pretty much the best way to explain the couple of blocks surrounding my school. The street is called the Hagwon-ga, which means 'private school road'. As you can see in the sign there are floors upon floors of English schools, math schools, pc bangs (rooms with computers that Korean's spend hours playing starcraft and other various computer games) and of course, because this is Korea, there is a random bar thrown in the mix. Such a crazy, but cool place.

a little holiday message from my friends

Starring Weisse class 6 year olds, Eagle, Brian Lee, Marcella and Alex. Eagle was loving it. The others were really into coloring Santa.

Highest Art Gallery in the World

David and I spent Sunday exploring the Seoul National Cemetery as well as one of Seoul's tallest buildings. The cemetery offered a peaceful hike through rows of graves and monuments dedicated to South Korea's most honored soldiers, generals and presidents.It was refreshing to be out of the concrete jungle of the city. We even signed the guestbook saying we paid our respects to the past presidents of the country we currently call home. After working up an appetite we headed to Seoul's 63 building. With 60 floors above ground and 3 below, the building was quite an interesting mix of entertainment.The basement housed a wax museum, aquarium (complete with penguins...underground. strange.), a hugely expensive buffet, food court, imax theatre and of course a bakery. We also discovered that the 60th floor was currently home to the highest art gallery in world, showcasing the work of several iconic artists. The promise of a sunset and views of Seoul from South of the Han beckoned us to the top. We weren't disappointed with what we found.

Sa wa de kaa.....wait where am I?

Saturday David and I met up with Danny and his co-worker Gabby in Dongdaemun market. While I wouldn't suggest anyone go to this market around Christmas season, on a Saturday afternoon (one could hardly move because there were soooooo many people out) it was fun to explore the never ending stalls of clothing and accessories and pretty much anything else you might want. Outside of the big shopping centers one could find stand after stand of ajummas (old ladies with perms and visors) selling stacks of books, as well as more scarves and beanie hats than I have ever seen. All really interesting, but just a little too crowded.

After a full afternoon of shopping, we headed back across the river to South Seoul for some very tasty Thai food. We spent two lazy hours feasting on duck curry (with the most delicious pineapple I have ever tasted), chili chicken, noodles and of course a giant pitcher of beer to wash down all the Thai spice. So so good.

A Merry Little Christmas

In the name of Christmas spirit I splurged and bought a mini fake Christmas tree the other day at Home Plus (sort of the Korean equivalent of Target, needless to say I love Home Plus ALMOST as much as I love Target). David and I were very cheesy, drinking hot cocoa and listening to the 'Number 1's: Christmas' cd, while decorating it. David's mom was also sweet enough to send an awesome package to him full of gifts, taco seasoning, lifesavers and wedding invitations. Pretty much everything that you need to celebrate Christmas in Korea. The tree makes it much more cozy in here. And being cozy makes me happy.

"Dear Santa, I like beetle"

This is my friend Eddie. He is in first grade, likes purple grapes and his favorite animal is the king beetle. Every week I get to spend two glorious, easy, hours with him at the end of the day hanging out, taking spelling tests, talking about our favorite foods, and playing games. Today we got done with our class work super early and I asked Eddie what he wanted to do. I offered up several games but he had his own idea. Eddie just wanted to spend some time drawing beetles, because really who wouldn't?

Acro Towers

On a cold, dark walk home it is nice to have these towers to guide me. Even though I've never been in them Acro Towers constantly proves itself to be my point of reference whether I am on top of a mountain looking down on Anyang, or catching a cab home. They are kinda pretty too all lit up.

same same

If you spend enough time in Korea you will notice a certain silly trend among couples. In an effort to express their love to the world, couples can often be seen in head to toe matching outfits. And I seriously mean head to toe. I've seen couples with the same shoes, jeans, jackets and baseball caps.

Anyways, last night David Green and I decided we needed an after dinner snack (a snickers of course). Without thinking we jumped into our shoes and headed down to the convenience store so very conveniently located in my building. About halfway through the elevator ride down we realized something....



We matched. And were fairly embarrassed because of it.

"and then he scratch me"

Meet David and Terry. They are 7 years old and very silly. In the morning they are both in Grun class (that is German for green. Each class at HABA is identified by a different color in German. We have gelb, wiesse, schwarz, violet, grun, rot, blau and orange. It makes total sense that an English school in South Korea would categorize itself using German right?) In the afternoons I teach their English club group, which they refer to as "B team", once a week. During this hour I am not only impressed by the progress they have made with their English but throughly entertained by their stories. Today Terry told me about his weekend encounter with his little brother Eric. Eric is 4 and also a student at HABA. Terry refers to Eric solely as "my baby".

Terry: "ABBY TEEEEEEEEEACHER! This weekend my baby scratch me"

Me: "Oh no Terry. Why did Eric scratch you?"

Terry: "My baby Eric...I give him toy....and then he scratch me"

Me: "Was he angry at you Terry?"

Terry: "No. I just give him toy and then he scratch me like this [insert clawing of the face]. I dunno. My baby Eric is crazy"

I somehow think there was more to the story than this. I sincerely hope that none of you encountered any crazy scratching babies this weekend. They seem quite dangerous and out of control.

Oh yeah. They wanted me to take a picture of them coloring. They wanted people to know that yes, they are indeed good students.

"Abbbbbby teacher we will color and you take picture. ok?"

and then 2 seconds later....



p.s. in order to update this more often and to truly show what my everyday life in Korea is like, I have made a pact with David to not only take a picture everyday but to post one as well. so far 3/3. Ole!

Jogyesa

Today we explored Jogyesa, a Buddhist temple in the heart of Seoul. It was a freezing but perfectly clear day. After joining Danny and Alex on a private guided tour, we were told the story of the Buddha's life. The story was depicted in paintings surrounding the main temple hall which housed three giant Buddha figures.
We were told to come back at 5:30 to hear the bell ringing ceremony.

Shamu Shamu

The past saturday was spent strolling through the two big department stores that are a few blocks away from my apartment in Anyang. I was overjoyed with all the Christmas decorations and definitely caught the Christmas spirit bug. I think I am even going to buy a tree tomorrow to decorate. After an afternoon of shopping and napping, we headed out to eat Shamu Shamu (I think thats how you spell it). Shamu Shamu is a style of cooking that involves adding thinly sliced pieces of meat, in our case beef, and various vegetables to a boiling broth that is conveniently located on your table. You pick out of the broth what you want to eat and it is all very delicious. Tableside cooking might be one of my favorite things about Korea. Whether it be bbq or dak galbi, I love having everything cooked right in front of me. It makes eating a much more social event when everyone is centered around the communal food rather than staring down at their own plate.

thankful.

christmas lights in Beomgye.

a boy that always makes me laugh. multiple times everyday.

costco in Korea.

the internet.

blankets...many many blankets.

champagne.

daily emails from family.

packages from home.

taco seasoning.

cheese.

opportunity.

7 year olds that are in a cooperative mood.

giggles.

walks home.

beautiful, wonderful, amazing friends. even if you are half way around the world right now.

beautiful, wonderful, amazing family. ever if you are half way around the world right now.

the upcoming thanksgiving party.



and probably you.

"Be here now, and know the beauty of what is.
Free yourself from concerns about what was,
or anxieties about what will be." - Ralph Marston

Out, About and the Daily Grind

It has been far too long since I've last posted. This is most likely due to the fact that the weekends are full of random adventures and the weeks are full of long days and lazy, lazy nights. Not a bad life. The strange thing though, is that today when I went out to run errands (recharge my cell phone which is less than $10 a month, and pick up some things for special 'pepero day' dinner) I hardly even felt like I was in Korean (or any other foreign country for that matter). Things have become so routine here. And not routine in a bad way at all. I just knew exactly where I needed to go, in order to do exactly what I needed to do. No more guessing where I could find some brie cheese or fretting over the fact that I wouldn't be able to communicate what I needed to cell phone guy. I just simply went about my business.

School has become routine as well. I know exactly what Monday means and exactly what a Wednesday will bring (oh terrible Wednesday and the 'white' hairs that you give me). Each week more or less the same things happen and soon enough it is the glorious weekend again. Speaking of grey hairs, the other day Juliet found 12 on my head. Sam offered to pluck them out in exchange for 500 won (which is like .50). I refused his offer and he was fairly upset. He didn't speak the rest of class which actually wasn't a bad thing at all.

Anyways here are few of my favorite pictures from the last couple weeks. They include trips to Seoul Tower, a hike in the huge Bukhansan park right outside the city, and finally the zoo in Seoul Grand Park. Oh and of course pictures of the Halloween celebration at school. Far too cute even if I did get swarmed a couple times for being in charge of the candy. Each kid was only allowed one lollipop each....what kind of Halloween is that?

Happy Chuseok! Let's go to the beach!

A couple weeks ago South Koreans celebrated the harvest with a holiday similar to Thanksgiving called Chuseok. For the weeks prior to the long weekend, gift sets took over the shelves of the grocery stores. These gift sets ranged from beauty supply sets, shampoo, Whiskey bottles and my favorite by far, the Spam set. This box held what I hope to be more Spam then a person can/should eat in a year. Apparently during the three days of Chuseok Koreans eat a lot of songpyeon (sort of stuffed rice cakes. We got to make some at school!) and sometimes visit/pay respect to their ancestors. At school I asked Anna teacher if she was excited for the upcoming events, she quickly replied with "Not really. I have to cook all weekend while the men relax. Women don't get excited for Holidays like Chuseok and New Years".

At school we had a good time playing traditional games and singing songs. All the kids wore their Hanboks and were super adorable. Sarah teacher even brought in her traditional clothing so that I wouldn't be left out.



Since there was no school on Friday because of Chuseok, David and I decided to head out of the city to an Island off the West coast in the Yellow Sea. Our trip to Doekjoekdo was perfect and so needed. The journey there included an empty subway ride, a sold out ferry but tickets for the one 3 hours later, watching a sketch comedy show in the terminal that we laughed at with all the Koreans even though we had no idea what was going on, a ferry ride that was far too choppy for my liking, a taxi ride that could have been a roller coaster with a taxi driving in aviators, a gold chain and redsox shirt and finally the beach.

We laid on the beach for hours, watching all the other 50 foreigners who had the same idea, then headed into town when hunger took over. While walking around we found a guy who we had met at mudfest. He graciously invited us to the bbq that his pension was putting on for him and his friends. After dinner and a gorgeous sunset, there was of course the necessary drinking around the beach bonfire. Somehow we ended up at a noreabong (private karaoke room) with a couple from Canada and New Zealand. Since we didn't bring a tent the beach was our hotel for the night and offered us a covered platform with opened arms. We even found eggs and sausage for breakfast the next morning! After a little more exploring we hitched a ride with the previously mentioned cabi back to the ferry and back to reality. Not a bad way to spend the weekend.








oh yeah....for Winter break I bought a plane ticket to France. Paris for Christmas? Why the heck not.

HABA Olympics

Today at school I was fortunate enough to snag seats to the Haba Olympics. The 6 and 7 year olds split up into a red team and blue team, one class of each age on each. It was the greatest thing to watch. They were all so so so happy and so so so excited to be playing the rediculous games that the gym teacher had come up with. I only got to hang out and help for an hour because I had to go teach the 5 year olds. ugh. They are a handful to say the least. We are working on saying the phrase, "Lets see. One book, two erasers, three crayons, four markers, and five toys". They are cute but a bunch of little monkeys. Anyways... I would like to introduce the 6 and 7 year olds of Haba!! They are all hilarious. I hope you enjoy this exclusive olympic footage.

They don't exactly have this much energy during class, but pretty close.


In the beginning of this video, from left to right, you have Cindy, Nicole, Nick and Dorothy. And yes...Nick does have a mullet. It is wonderful. In the video before you can also see all the usually lovely Korean teachers as well as a shot of the other native English teacher Ryan.

river hill

Last weekend David and I headed up the Han river, about 20 min outside Seoul, to meet up with his co-workers to hang out on river hill. It was such a wonderful weekend spent eating delicious (and super cheap) Korean food, riding on boats (and a lot of "I'm on booooat" singing), wakeboard watching, dock jumping and overall enjoyment of being outside the city playing in the sun.









Once again we stayed in one of the "love motels". Apparently this area is infamous for being THE place to bring your mistress for an hour or two. Not only is it close to the city but also seen as somewhat romantic. Although I see nothing romantic about places that rent by the hour and have a red light option in the room. The funniest part of all this was that rooms could not be booked for an overnight stay till late in the evening because the motel wanted to make as much money as possible through hourly rentals...oh so romantic. ick.

Swine vacation, river bike rides and football matches

Life in Korea has been pretty great lately...especially since I have had the greater part of the last two weeks off from work.

Two Wednesdays ago I was teaching my rowdy 6 year olds like normal when one of the Korean teachers rushes in and says that we all have to go home. Super confused I went out and asked the other English teacher at Haba what the heck was going on and he informed me that the school just found out that one of the 5 year olds, Raphael, has swine flu and that we do in fact get to go home...for the next week! While neither of us were to concerned and actually pretty happy about this surprise vacation the rest of the school was in chaos. Korean teachers were running around like chickens with their heads cut off, talking a mile a minute on the phone with parents and getting all their students ready to leave. Everyone was gone within a half an hour, it was ridiculous. Eventually our won jon (boss) told us that we didn't have to come back to school until the following Thursday or Friday and sent us out the door saying:
"uh don't tell that Haba playschool is sick...not good. And if you have fever call me. But don't get fever please."
So needless to say I tried not to get a fever and spent a lot of time doing this

and it was glorious. Ended up going back to school on Friday and I was actually happy to be there. I sort of missed most of the kids and we had a really fun day making menus of our favorite food and talking about building houses.

As for the swine flu, all the Haba kids are fine now but we do have to take and record our temperatures twice a day. Apparently the Korean government has issued a new law saying that if one student gets swine the whole school must shut down for a week. While David's school is ignoring this law (he has had whole classes absent because they have all been sick) I'm glad that Haba shut down. It will be interesting to see if it happens again.

In more exciting news I had a GREAT weekend playing on the Han river and watching soccer with David and Danny (a friend from Western who just arrived in Korea two weeks ago). David and I rented bikes at Hangang park and spent Saturday afternoon riding along the waterfront.It was really really nice to be by some sort of large body of water for a change. After the ride we headed to Seoul world cup stadium for the South Korea, Australia soccer game. Surrounded by a massive amount of people, free beer samples and a Hyundai car stage, we enjoyed a picnic of fried chicken and MGD.
Around game time we met up with Danny and headed into the stadium and had a great time cheering the red devils on with all the other Koreans (and in David's case heckling the few Australians who ended up on the wrong side of the crowd). Most exciting thing was the South Korea, ranked 48th in the world, was able to beat Australia,16th, 3-1.
All in all it has been a great couple lazy weeks but now its time get back into the daily 9-5 grind...ugh

some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. -gilda radner

Japan!

Here is a small slideshow of my summer vacation trip to Tokyo, Japan. For some reason it starts at the end and goes backwards...and doesn't show all the pictures haha. To see the whole slideshow click the link at the bottom. Don't worry its not too long. Out of over a thousand pictures that we took I was able to pick out the 180 best!

http://s595.photobucket.com/albums/tt38/World_Travels/Japan/?albumview=slideshow