October Happenings

How is it November already? Only 38 more days until Christmas, a.k.a. 38 days until I leave for vacation in Thailand! It will be my first vacation of life where I'm not running around trying to see and do as much as humanly possibly!

I arrived here in July, in the midst of literally unceasing heat and now the weather brings to mind the fact that I absolutely hate being cold and the only reasons I tolerate winter is because snow is beautiful and Christmas is the best time of year, ever– but it doesn’t snow much in Korea, and Christmas is the opposite of popular here. What am I going to do??

Anyway, the true purpose of this blog is to recap the busyness of October. (Please note that this will be largely a photo-blog, mostly because this should have been written weeks ago, and I've finally found the slightest inspiration to finish this thing thanks too my procrastination impulses- I have kindergarten reports due tomorrow, so let's see if I can bang this thing out before I lose it again. . .)

October 9th was Sports Day for SLP kindergarten. This day was begrudged by many teachers, but not myself, because, hey! I had enjoyed playing games as a camp counsellor and we were getting paid for it, so how bad could it be? Also, I ran in the relay race in front of all my students, their parents, my co-workers, and my bosses, and didn’t fall on my face! Of course my team won, largely due to my participation, and having nothing to do with the fact that we had a pro-baseball playing father on our team.

I wore this and posed willingly. I was in the midst of being over-fed with pizza, chicken, and donuts, so of course I was so happy I would've done almost anything!

Don't worry, if he does this in class, he gets in trouble. I'm a good teacher.

October 17th was a belated Thanksgiving celebration. We had everything a Thanksgiving dinner needs, courtesy of Costco, except it was chicken instead of turkey.

Our school let us foreign teachers use the school roof for our dinner and even decorated the table and gave us wine!

Mmmmm.... (Sorry, I didn't know what else to say. I mostly added this photo because I know some people would prefer to see photos with me in them. You're welcome.)

One Friday, Sonya and I took our kids to the park, which isn't all that noteworthy, but I want to show off how cute my kids are:

I'm biased, but they're adorable!



Gets me every time- SO CUTE! She's the baby of the class, turning 5 on December 26th. She was also the only student in the class who knew why camels have humps. I would steal this one.

So serious looking here, but he's got the most charming little grin which will likely never be captured on film because Koreans usually try their best to look serious for cameras.

October 23rd saw me committed to a 12 km hike up and down Songnisan Mountain with Heather’s fellowship group. Why?????

Of course, we don't look miserable here -there's nothing excrutiating about posing for picture.

I learned a few things that day. First, I enjoy hiking flat trails. Mountains make hiking not fun. Second, the best part of hiking a mountain is before. Third, apparently I suffer from memory blocks when it comes to physical pain, case in point being the very next weekend, when I voluntarily hiked Gyeryongsan mountain.

The crew of SLPers who didn't back out the night before (the rest of you know who you are. . . shame, shame).

Then there was Halloween. . .

I don't want to overload you with pictures of my kinders, because I know I'm biased about their cuteness, but I just had to share this. Yi An was so serious about this one, and it was all I could do not to laugh!

Sonya was a ghost, or a zombie, or a zombie ghost?

The SLP foreign teachers were invited to (crashed?) a party at KAIST.

There's a story behind that "tatoo" entitled "Lost in Translation". Certain people find it funnier than others.

And that was October.

Finally, Beijing . . .

Our Beijing trip started off with some dramatic running about, which should have been a sign of things to come. . .

Kristin spent the night at my place because Anna's sister and niece were staying in Kristin's apartment. The next morning on our way to the bus stop, Kristin stopped by her place to grab her passport at which point she discovered that Anna's sister was nowhere to be found. Trying not to panic we started a search, which thankfully ended almost before it began and, passports in hand, we were off!

My first view of China was surprising. . .I looked out the windows at Dalian airport and felt as though I was somewhere in the UK- rowhouses, rain, and fog.

A few hours later, upon arrival in Beijing, this image was replaced by a much different, dirtier, more crowded, less English-speaking one (also, MUCH cheaper- 30 cents for a subway ticket? Yes, please!). Being the brilliant travelers that we are, we easily made our way to our hostel, but not before walking down a rather sketchy-looking side street and thinking, "Oh man, this could be BAD!". Thankfully, the images on hostelbookers.com had not been deceptive, and our hostel turned out to be something of an oasis in the middle of this previously-described city.

The front entrance. . . looked very promising. . .

For $9 a night, I approved!

Because we arrived rather late, all we did our first day was walk around the area looking for food. And so began the first of many food scavenging escapades. . .

We were starving and couldn't find a single restaurant, let alone one with English! Finally, FINALLY we saw a department store in the distance and gained some hope. Then, just as we were about to cross a street I saw the Pizza Hut sign and freaked out and grabbed Kristin so hard she thought I was rescuing her from being run over (which was a very legitimate possibility- in Beijing the green walking man is a trickster and apparently means "Force cars turning right to stop by walking in front of them and praying they stop on time". Needless to say, we spent the majority of our road-crossings piggybacking with some experienced Chinese person or other). Anyway, we ended up going to the KFC at the same department store, because we are thrifty people. (Sidenote: KFCs are rampant in Beijing- I mean they're like the Tim Hortons of China. On a related note, coffee shops are the opposite of popular there. Which was a culture shock in itself, because you could be blind, deaf, and searching for a bar and still end up in a coffee shop in Daejeon).

The next day we set off early to trek the Great Wall. Being the aforementioned stellar travellers and thrifty folk that we are, we decided to go it on our own, instead of doing the tour offered through our hostel. It would've worked out fine, if people in China spoke English as much as I assumed they would (go ahead, accuse me on insularity, but come on, they just hosted the Olympics. . .) Anyway, for a number of reasons, including the decision not to risk wasting any more time getting unlost, especially because it would apparently take 3-4 hours to get there, we decided to hit up the Beijing Zoo and see the pandas. . .

. . .who were all napping, along with most of the other animals, including the Procyon lotor (aka the raccoon) and the Mephitis mephitis (aka the striped skunk).

Thankfully, on our second walk-around they decided to feed the pandas. Seriously though, I have pictures to prove the inordinate number of sleeping animals in that zoo!

This was the time the random stranger wasn't caught taking a picture of me.

I was happy the elephant was up and moving!

After that, we raced back to the hostel hoping to catch the group bus to the kung fu show, but were undaunted when we didn't. Starving from having not eaten all day we made it to the Red Theatre on our own 5 minutes before the show began and grabbed up some last-minute cheap seat tickets, which ended up being front row-middle seats (six feet away from rock-solid abs = good deal)! It was an awesome show that made me embarrassed to feel accomplished over the fact I can now touch my toes after two months of yoga.

After the show, we were exhausted and hadn't eaten in 9 hours. On our way back to the subway station there was literally nothing open and so on the subway we decided we didn't care if we ate KFC two days in a row and I literally prayed to God that it would be open. And it was.

The next day, we conquered the Temple of Heaven, Tian'anmen Square (massacre, what massacre?), and the Palace Museum (aka the Forbidden City). It was all very impressive looking, but it was also all "Ming this, Qing that", and I so didn't really have any context to put any of it into.

The Seventy Year Old Door at the Temple of Heaven. The door was there exclusively for emperors of 70 or older. It was made especially for an old emperor who was taken there to walk a much shorter way towards the Hall of Annual Prayer. He didn't want his descendents to be lazy so he made a rule that an emperor had to be 70 to use it.

Tian'amen Square

The Forbidden City. Dang, I didn't see The Karate Kid til after, or I would've known to rub the golden knobs on the door for good luck!

On our third day, we decided to take it easy, especially because we had both started limping around with a shin splint on my part, and bloody and blistered feet on Kristin's part, so we went shopping. This is significant because it was at this time that I bought the first ever under-analyzed purchase of my life (I barely looked at the price tags- what!) It was, of all exciting possibilities- a jacket and scarf from H&M because I was cold (under-analyzed, but still pratical- I hadn't completely lost myself!)

In the afternoon, we checked out a Buddhist temple where I was intrigued by the people taking Buddha seriously and the endless number of Buddhas- apparently "there are more buddhas in the universe than grains of sand in the Ganges river".

The Yonghegong Lama Temple where you are constantly prompted by signs to burn three sticks of incense in honour of every buddha there. Whose idea was this I wonder? The guild of incense vendors lining the street outside, perhaps?

That evening we strolled around Wangfujing, a popular shopping area with streets of tourist items where you only dare give items a fleeting look out of the corner of your eye while walking briskly past for fear of otherwise being hounded to death to buy it.

A picture with the Wangfujing sign, I suppose as proof I was there. Also, please note my spontaneous purchases. Disclaimer: KFC capture was unintentional and unavoidable.

Wednesday was the day we conquered the Great Wall! It was a spectacular day, although it started off as complicated as ever. We had previously found the right bus to get us there, and so headed out bright and early, anticipating the 3 hour trip. When we got to the bus station we spent 20 minutes standing in a line wondering why people kept standing in line for 5 minutes and then walking away, until someone kindly informed us via minimal English and extensive hand gestures that this was an express bus for which they needed 45 people, which we were never going to get because people kept leaving the line. So we followed our kind Chinese friend to another bus station down the block and finally were on our way. The best part was that the supposed 3 hour trip was actually only 1 hour!

Upon arrival in the gorgeous Chinese countryside, we realized that we were underdressed for the second day in a row as the wind whipped through our thin sweaters. So we were off shopping again, this time for some lovely tourist hoodies that read "I climbed the Great Wall".

Here I am!

We climbed UP!
We met a fellow Canadian traveller named Jodi who joined us on our trek and whom we ended up spending the rest of the day with (capping off our last day in China by eating Italian food!)

The Great Wall of China. This doesn't do it justice, it's only a miniscule fraction of the 2 000 km that remain of the once 6 500km wall.

And that is that! The next day we headed home, and Korea really did feel like home- it had signs with letters I could read, even if I didn't know what the words they spelled meant; and a language that sounded oddly recognizable, even if I only knew 20 words; and coffee shops; and food that is now familiar; and now waiting five minutes at a crosswalk isn't such a big deal, because I know that when the green walking man finally does appear, I can trust him.

Life at the Sogang Language Program Institute in Daejeon!

I know some people want to find out about my work life at SLP, so. . .

I take a 10 minute walkd to get to school at 9:10-ish every morning (yes, I'm a teacher and I get up at 8 am), and classes begin at 9:40. From 9:40- 2:10 I teach Rainbow Bridge to two second-year kindergarten classes (Korean age 6, Canadian age 5) of 10 students each, rotating between them with my Korean co-teacher, Sonya. My students are essentially fluent and very bright, so it’s quite easy (although, it’s a bit ridiculous when I have to teach them what “laboratory”, “broadcasting station”, “antenna”, and “disc jockey” mean), plus the lessons are pre-made, and I have a helper teacher to help with the students behaviour and hand out supplies! I don’t have any “favourites”, but I do have a favourite class, because this one class is much more enthusiastic and lively than the other (Today, they randomly broke out humming "If all the raindrops. . ." while colouring). Here is my favourite class in their hanboks for our Chuseok celebration (Korean thanksgiving)today:

Yi An and Soo Ah. This is not a good representation of Yi An, who is is forever kissing the girls at break time.

Sung Hun and Amy.

Tae Hee.

Sun and Seung Yeon. A completely unprompted engagement-esque photo. I could barely hold in the laughter.

Hyun Jin and Se Yeon. Again, unprompted.

On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I teach a Milestone class from 2:30-4:00. This is a class of (Canadian age 7) students who did SLP kindergarten, and now take afternoon classes at SLP. They are not as enthusiastic about coming to SLP as the kinders, that’s for sure, so I’m try to lay down the law against their counter-productive behaviour.

On Tuesday and Thursday I teach Hi, Kids! levels 2 and 3 to classes of 12 and 8 students from 2:30-4:00 and 4:10-5:40.These are 7/11 year old students who didn’t do English kindergarten and know very little English, so this is where I have to simplify my English and use lots of hand gestures. Also, the SLP rule is “no speaking Korean”, but that just doesn’t happen in these classes.

On Fridays, after my Milestone class, I teach an Aim High class from 4:00-5:40. However, the 4 students in this class have completed Aim High and are now using textbooks that are preparing them for the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). However, these texts cater to university level students, and as fluent as these students are, the language is a bit challenging (examples: a scientific discussion of genetically modified food; an analysis of invasive species) for these 10 and 12 year olds!

That's life in brief at SLP. The days and weeks are flying by, and I still love my job!

As a special treat, and because I've already been tagged in photos while wearing it on Facebook so I've decided it's no use trying to hide, here is a photo of me in my hanbok:

Sonya, my co-teacher, and I.

Reflection Upon a Month's Passing (A Title Which Sounds More Profound Than the Post Itself)

It’s been a month since I last posted, but that’s what happens when life is no longer about exploring a new country and becomes all about creating routine and doing all the mundane things that make a city “home”:

So far I’ve
- set up a bank account (and had my first pay cheque deposited!)
- paid bills (so far, pretty cheap!)
- found my local post office (postage is cheap!)
- made us of my neighbourhood drycleaners ( again, it’s cheap!)
- traveled via every possible mode of public transportation this city has to offer (at the risk of repeating myself – it’s so cheap!)
- established my nearby corner store for all my “must have now” needs (I’ve got to say it: ice cream is wonderfully cheap!!)
- got a cell phone (for free!)
- joined a English-speaking church and Bible study where the service is at 2:00pm (!!)

Another thing that makes this city a home is making my house a home. This plant is a birthday present from Anna and Kristin! This is also the only thing in the past month that has changed as far as decorating my apartment :(

Some new things I’ve done:

- used an in-the-floor toilet (the first time being when I had to give a urine sample. . .let’s just say- tricky)
- joined a hot yoga class, which so much better than joining a gym, because I actually want
to go! And for a bonus- I can now count to 20 in Korean!
- ate at a sit-on-the-floor restaurant
- ate clams. . . and liked them, yum!
- ate (for those of you who know Korean food, or otherwise feel like googling the following): bibimbap, bokgeumbap, bulgogi, dak galbi, galbi in genenral, gimbap, samgye-tang, and shabu-shabu (which is actually Japanese). Those are the foods whose names I know. I’ve eaten some other things as well, and liked everything so far, except a rice and pumpkin soup.
- started learning to read Korea, which is quite easy and so makes a person feel very smart for learning so quickly!
- been introduced to more cockroaches then I would’ve ever like to be in my lifetime, but I
have started a war that I’m determined to win!
- been told to be quiet on both a train and a bus. I know I can be loud, but I swear on the bus we were whispering!

Eating shabu shabu, and only holding my chopsticks for this photo. (Left: Lisa, Right: Anna)

On the opposite side of things, so far I haven’t:

- ate kimchi- which is a staple in Korea
- mastered chopsticks (I’m so bad, I can’t even be called an amateur)
- gotten used to being stared at like I’m from another planet
- experienced Korean pop music (aka K-pop), thankfully- besides some strands of oft- repeated songs flowing into the streets from stores

I know some people want to find out about my work life at SLP, so. . .that's my next blog. It's written already and nicely edited so that the non-teachers aren't bored to death.

A Tour of My Home

Yes, this is probably less interesting than my previous traveling adventure blogs, but I know some people are curious as to what the tiny Korean apartment I live in looks like. Well, for starters, it's not so tiny- I've got a separate kitchen and bedroom area, and even a laundry room- BAM! All your stereotyped preconceptions about Korean apartments have been shattered (just wait, I have more crazy things to tell you- like not all Korean clothing is made for four-foot-nothing-size-zero women, who knew?)

Anyway:

My entryway and bathroom door. My entry light is motion-censored, and my kitchen light-switch is by my bedroom door, but I haven't run into that corner yet!

My kitchen (and bedroom door frame) from my entry way. See that tiny broom there behind the fridge? Yeah, I sweep my floors bent in half-and they have to be swept a lot.

Kitchen from bedroom door. You may note the empty cupboards. Because I am too cheap to spend $3 to buy one single item, I have 2 mugs, bowls, and plates; and one of each utensil. This forces me to do the thing I hate the most EVERYDAY!!


My bathroom. Yes, I have my shower/sink/toilet all in one space- but look at the huge mirror I have!

Here's the tour of my bedroom, going counter clockwise, starting at my door:

My bedroom from my doorway. The wall decorations are maps, etc from my travels- an idea stolen from Anna in a beginning effort to cover that huge amount of white wall space.

My bedroom from my bed corner. That's my TV that I don't use, my closet, and my beautiful, beautiful air conditioning unit.

Bedroom from far corner. My laundry room door is on the right, behind which sits a washing machine that weighs the load and automatically determines the amount of water and detergent needed!

Bedroom from my closet corner. My few pictures look pathetic, but I didn't realize how much wall space I'd have. I'm working on it!

In conclusion, my only issue with my apartment is covering the blank wall space everywhere. Any ideas, posters, or pictures you want to send my way will be gladly accepted!

All Play, No Work - Part 2 -Seoul

Ahh Seoul, the city of 12 million people and the cultural centre of Korea. . .you’d think the things we did there would be endless and exciting. Alas, those kinds of doings take planning, and plan we did not until 11: 00 pm the night before we left. This was not intentional, as certain things were out of our hands and we weren’t even sure if we were going to Seoul until we started looking for hostels that night and realized the only available hostels in Korea were in Seoul (and there is a reason our hostel was so available, I think, but we’ll get to that later. . .)

Anna, Kristin, Robyn and I left for Seoul Thursday evening, using the gloriously inexpensive-by-Canadian-standards (and reflective of the cost of all Korean transportation) KTX high-speed train. We conquered the Seoul subway system with its madly-confusing intersecting nine lines and the masses of people (think New York City and then some and with pushier people) to arrive at our hostel which we later found out DID have air conditioning as advertised IF you had hostel companions show up on your second night with a Korean-speaking friend who was willing to argue with the host until he told him where he hid the remote. We also found out that our host liked to stare at people in the morning when they were sleeping and say things in Korean/broken English and then laugh oddly so as to make you wonder if he was all there in the head. Let’s just say we didn’t mind the company of the nine other people crammed into the tiny apartment, just so long as we didn’t have to be alone with him.

We arrived in Seoul late in the afternoon, so the first thing we did was embark on yet another attempt to eat at a Korean restaurant. This had not yet happened on vacation because we cannot read Korean and did not want to risk eating something we would rather not, and because it is more difficult than you may think to find a Korean restaurant menu with English subtitles. But we found one and had delicious chicken galbi with rice fried in an amount of butter that went against everything my mom ever taught me about low-fat eating.

Robyn and I dangerously close to being "matchy-matchy, same-same"

Then we decided to end the evening with a relaxing drink, which of course turned into an adventure. We were turned away from two places (we’re hoping it was only because they were full, except that the one definitely had empty booths) and we left two others- one because it was too expensive and the other because we had to order $14 appetizers to go with our $2 drinks. Walking out of a restaurant/bar is not so awkward when you know people are going to be staring at you anyways because you’re white, plus I’m pretty sure they expect us to be strange. We did finally find a place, at which we promptly caught the attention of some American businessmen whom we escaped- after they paid for our drinks of course!


On Friday we headed out for a hike in Bukhansan National Park. We found the general area easily enough, but wandered around for awhile (nothing new for us) trying to figure out how to get to the hiking trails until a young boy cheerfully told us to “Come here!” and skipped his way through the streets until we arrived at the entrance to the trails.

You will likely be seeing a lot of mountain view pictures over the next year as they run rampant in Korea and I enjoy hiking them.

Afterwards, we spent a while in Myeong-dong Shopping Area, Korea’s “trendiest shopping area” where we successfully searched for and found Forever 21, which I’m pretty sure has to be the largest Forever 21 in the world!! We ended the night walking along part of Cheonggyecheon Stream- something I had circled in my Korea tourism book before I left Canada. We didn’t see the whole stream, so when I'm in Seoul again, I’m going back.

A little haven of peace and quiet in the midst of a busy city.

On Saturday we took it easy and strolled around the streets, checking out little clothing shops and an amazing art free-market which made me wish I had money. In the evening we went to an FC Seoul soccer game- my first soccer game ever- at the Seoul World Cup Stadium during which there were fireworks and confetti for the kickoff and every time Seoul scored- try that at a hockey game!

This is the cheering section that was on its feet the entire game chanting, yelling, and jumping up and down like madmen. They must be very fit people. I got tired just waving my FC Seoul fan around.

Later that night while hanging out on the front step of a hostel we were chatted up by two Korean men who looked not much older than us, but then gave away their age by saying, “I went to school in America for 5 years, and worked there for 10, and I have been back in Korea for 7 years” – that makes them about 40. Yeah, buddy, you should’ve kept your mouth shut. This tip is for Koreans in general, who tend to look a LOT younger than they really are. Anyways, we dodged an invitation to go to some sort of spa and chat by agreeing to meet up with them in exactly three weeks at that same spot. . .yeah, okay.

Thus ended my first vacation in Korea.