Hey mom and dad!
I got the package (and sang Happy Birthday to myself as I opened it). My co-teachers were quite impressed with the smarties, and I think the kids will love them even more!!! As for the novels (or "smut" as grandma would call them), they'll keep me entertained for a while!! The best thing by far: Kraft Dinner. I know it's sick, but I always find myself craving it. Drool... tonight once I get home from work I'm going to cook up some delicious fake-cheese and macaroni goodness.
I love you guys!!
Monday, October 30, 2006
Yo-yo-yo-yeosu
So, halloween party in Yeosu:
Before Yeosu, Alex and myself went for a walk on one of the mountains in Naju. After many instances of me needing a rest, we arrived at the big pagoda at the top and it was totally worth it!!! The view was really nice. One side was a huge, endless mountain range, and the other was literally all of Naju, marred only by the smog caused by the big LG factory. If there was no LG factory, Naju would be a ghost town. It's where everyone who lives in my apartment works (apart from shop owners)!
The party was fun. There were lots of interesting costumes:
1. The oompa loompa- I don't remember his name, but his costume was amazing! Apparently he had a Korean tailor make it for him, so it was really well done. He also knew all the words to the oompa-loompa song, which was quite impressive. I always found the oompa-loompas so freaking creepy!! These creepy little dudes singing the same song all the time. Weird!
2. "Fan Death"- I'm not sure whether I've mentioned this, but here's another bizarre Korean Fact:
There is a sort of "urban legend" that states if you sleep in your house with a fan running and all of your windows closed, you will DIE. If "cause of death is unknown, apparently people have cited "fan death" as an explanation. It has also been used to explain away suicides, which are quite taboo.
So, Nicola had on make-up to make it look like she was dead, and some fans. It was a very nice costume.
Some other favorites: a milk box (Maelik, a Korean Milk company in competition with Seoul Milk), "Holy Shit" (a guy dressed all in brown with corn kernels stuck to him, and a halo on his head), some mermaids, devilled eggs (devil horns with a white shirt and yellow circle), an emoticon (with different levels of drunkenness), one of the security guard dudes from Spaceballs (hahahahaha, the helmet was two salad bowls taped together and painted white).
My costume was that of a super ajumma. In Naju, there is a ridiculous amount of Ajumma's. Translated literally, it means "aunt", but ajumma's are so much more than that!! They are the old ladies that I see constantly on the mountain in huge sun visors, bright (usually pink) outfits, and they're usually staring at me as I pass! So I had the visor (which is actually pretty sweet, I may wear it on the mountain too!), an ugly polyester shirt that I painted an A on, a korean fan, and a big pink cape. Oh yeah!! Then an actual ajumma showed up at the party trying to sell some rice cakes (I think she was maybe a little unbalanced), putting my costume to shame.
Then on Sunday I took the bus back home and sat around in my apartment for the rest of the day. Watched "Pretty Woman" for about the six-thousandth time since getting here.
Before Yeosu, Alex and myself went for a walk on one of the mountains in Naju. After many instances of me needing a rest, we arrived at the big pagoda at the top and it was totally worth it!!! The view was really nice. One side was a huge, endless mountain range, and the other was literally all of Naju, marred only by the smog caused by the big LG factory. If there was no LG factory, Naju would be a ghost town. It's where everyone who lives in my apartment works (apart from shop owners)!
The party was fun. There were lots of interesting costumes:
1. The oompa loompa- I don't remember his name, but his costume was amazing! Apparently he had a Korean tailor make it for him, so it was really well done. He also knew all the words to the oompa-loompa song, which was quite impressive. I always found the oompa-loompas so freaking creepy!! These creepy little dudes singing the same song all the time. Weird!
2. "Fan Death"- I'm not sure whether I've mentioned this, but here's another bizarre Korean Fact:
There is a sort of "urban legend" that states if you sleep in your house with a fan running and all of your windows closed, you will DIE. If "cause of death is unknown, apparently people have cited "fan death" as an explanation. It has also been used to explain away suicides, which are quite taboo.
So, Nicola had on make-up to make it look like she was dead, and some fans. It was a very nice costume.
Some other favorites: a milk box (Maelik, a Korean Milk company in competition with Seoul Milk), "Holy Shit" (a guy dressed all in brown with corn kernels stuck to him, and a halo on his head), some mermaids, devilled eggs (devil horns with a white shirt and yellow circle), an emoticon (with different levels of drunkenness), one of the security guard dudes from Spaceballs (hahahahaha, the helmet was two salad bowls taped together and painted white).
My costume was that of a super ajumma. In Naju, there is a ridiculous amount of Ajumma's. Translated literally, it means "aunt", but ajumma's are so much more than that!! They are the old ladies that I see constantly on the mountain in huge sun visors, bright (usually pink) outfits, and they're usually staring at me as I pass! So I had the visor (which is actually pretty sweet, I may wear it on the mountain too!), an ugly polyester shirt that I painted an A on, a korean fan, and a big pink cape. Oh yeah!! Then an actual ajumma showed up at the party trying to sell some rice cakes (I think she was maybe a little unbalanced), putting my costume to shame.
Then on Sunday I took the bus back home and sat around in my apartment for the rest of the day. Watched "Pretty Woman" for about the six-thousandth time since getting here.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Oh, Canada
So, I went online and registered with the Canadian Embassy in Seoul. They now have my address, so if there's ever any danger they can come and save me. Go Canadain Embassy.
Today was one of the usual days. It was a blessedly small class, so the kids were really well behaved. My favourite part of the day is when I'm in the fake "immigration", and the kids come around and work on their dialogues. That's when I can just act like a moron and make the kids laugh for a while. When the kids fill out their passport, I always make them draw a picture of themselves "so that I know it's your passport". They're always laughing at their drawings, so I usually harass them by saying "Monkey!! That looks like a monkey!" and drawing in a tail. All of the kids know monkey. And pig. And ugly. They love insulting eachother. They'll point to their best friend and say "She's/he's crazy!!", which is considered a bad word in Korean.
Yeah, life is good being a pronunciation whore (sorry mom!); definitely not too stressful. My biggest worry is being asked questions about grammar. I speak english, but I'm not sure how it works.
Today was one of the usual days. It was a blessedly small class, so the kids were really well behaved. My favourite part of the day is when I'm in the fake "immigration", and the kids come around and work on their dialogues. That's when I can just act like a moron and make the kids laugh for a while. When the kids fill out their passport, I always make them draw a picture of themselves "so that I know it's your passport". They're always laughing at their drawings, so I usually harass them by saying "Monkey!! That looks like a monkey!" and drawing in a tail. All of the kids know monkey. And pig. And ugly. They love insulting eachother. They'll point to their best friend and say "She's/he's crazy!!", which is considered a bad word in Korean.
Yeah, life is good being a pronunciation whore (sorry mom!); definitely not too stressful. My biggest worry is being asked questions about grammar. I speak english, but I'm not sure how it works.
Monday, October 23, 2006
Seoul Grand Park
Seoul Grand Park had everything. But what we really wanted to see were some animals sitting in small cages. Weee!!! I think the most depressing animals to see were the apes and monkeys. They were far too human; and therefore, their boredom quite obvious!!! I think this is about close to wildlife as it gets in Korea.
After the zoo, we went to the National Contemporary Art Gallery, which had some interesting stuff as well:
Most of it was like most contemporary art-- way over my head.
After the zoo, we went to the National Contemporary Art Gallery, which had some interesting stuff as well:
Most of it was like most contemporary art-- way over my head.
Gyeongbukgung (palace) Am I spelling that right???
This is the National Palace of Korea. It was all in all pretty cool. And very big!! There was also a museum nearby that I went into so that I could spend some money in the gift shop. Everytime I buy something I don't need I keep on telling myself "it's okay Cathy. No, you don't need any of this stuff. But you're helping the Korean economy!! Suuuuure!!!".
As I was walking around there were lots of ceremonial performances going on. I had no idea what they were about of course, but the outfits were cool and they all had pretty flags.
As I was walking around there were lots of ceremonial performances going on. I had no idea what they were about of course, but the outfits were cool and they all had pretty flags.
I would never write anything so cliched as "I've got Seoul", don't worry!!
So here are some pictures from my trip to Seoul!!! First off!! Alex and Kristen on the KTX and arriving at Yongsan Station (near downtown Seoul):
The KTX took us from Naju (southern S. Korea) to Seoul in under 3 hours. Apparently it can travel up to 200 plus km/hour, but it felt very smooth as we travelled along. Since it was during Chuseok, a really important holiday in Korea similar to thanksgiving, roads were VERY busy, so the best way to get anywhere was to take the train. Yongsan station was HUGE!! It's also attached to a big shopping complex, an imax theatre, and many many restaurants. From there we decided to walk to 'Itaewon', the "westerners" section of Seoul (which is basically the equivalent of china town in toronto but for white people). I didn't really like Itaewon; it just seemed to be all the worst of western culture, or culture period-- tourism, burger king, prostitution, seedy motels.
The KTX took us from Naju (southern S. Korea) to Seoul in under 3 hours. Apparently it can travel up to 200 plus km/hour, but it felt very smooth as we travelled along. Since it was during Chuseok, a really important holiday in Korea similar to thanksgiving, roads were VERY busy, so the best way to get anywhere was to take the train. Yongsan station was HUGE!! It's also attached to a big shopping complex, an imax theatre, and many many restaurants. From there we decided to walk to 'Itaewon', the "westerners" section of Seoul (which is basically the equivalent of china town in toronto but for white people). I didn't really like Itaewon; it just seemed to be all the worst of western culture, or culture period-- tourism, burger king, prostitution, seedy motels.
Random and Strange
Okay, these are truly random pictures. Ice cream is normally delicious and wonderfully cheap in Korea. But then I found the watermelon popsicle, which was so bad that I felt the need to document it. Although I was impressed with the attention to detail, the green rind part actually tasted like rind, and god knows what the seeds were made with!! They tasted like chewey weirdness. So here's a picture of it. Most of the ladies in the grocery store probably think I'm hiding a fat kid in my apartment with the amount of popsicles I buy.
The second is a picture of the back of my head. I bought that huge, tacky (and magical) barrette for a dollar (1000won) at my local grocery store. Really not much more to say about it. In Korea there are entire stores devoted to assorted hair clips, all bigger and more outrageous than the next.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Classic Korea Moment
Last night, after losing two games of 10 pin to Stu and Max, we all head over to Heim Pizza. "Heim" is a bastardized version of Pizza Hut that probably serves some of the most expensive food there is to be found in Naju (because it's "western"), but when you're craving cheese, there's nothing to be done!
So we're sitting in Heim at a front booth munching on some cheese crust pizza when an old waygook walks by, sees us, stops dead in his tracks and comes in. This guy fits the "world weary traveller" stereotype perfectly. He's got a dark tan, a couple old bags of god knows what, a hat with a flashlight on it and some "hiker" style clothing with lots of stains. So Tom (as we later learned was his name) came in and asked who we were, and where we were from. Max is from England, Stu from Australia and I'm from Canada. He called me a hoser.
Then he asked if any of us were catholic.
My first thought: "Oh man. A missionary. How do we get rid of him???", but he launches into this story about how he sells furniture from the orient overseas. One day he was lifting what he thought was a huge one-piece dresser, but it came apart and smashed his left foot. When he went to the hospital, the doctor apparently took x-rays and Tom found out that his foot had indeed been crushed. At the same time this is happening, in Naju, a statue of Mary becomes famous for crying tears of blood. Tom goes to the statue everyday for a week and puts a drop of water from the fountain nearby on his broken foot. After this he goes to the doctor again, gets another x-ray, and his foot has completely healed.
So not he goes back every year and gets more water to ship home. Apparently the same water has also healed a brain tumour the size of a fist.
An interesting guy!! He also basically told us his life story; he's married to a Korean woman, has 13 or 14 siblings, his business is worth a million dollars (but his partner was a dirty rotten thief) etc. etc.
All in all, an interesting night!
So we're sitting in Heim at a front booth munching on some cheese crust pizza when an old waygook walks by, sees us, stops dead in his tracks and comes in. This guy fits the "world weary traveller" stereotype perfectly. He's got a dark tan, a couple old bags of god knows what, a hat with a flashlight on it and some "hiker" style clothing with lots of stains. So Tom (as we later learned was his name) came in and asked who we were, and where we were from. Max is from England, Stu from Australia and I'm from Canada. He called me a hoser.
Then he asked if any of us were catholic.
My first thought: "Oh man. A missionary. How do we get rid of him???", but he launches into this story about how he sells furniture from the orient overseas. One day he was lifting what he thought was a huge one-piece dresser, but it came apart and smashed his left foot. When he went to the hospital, the doctor apparently took x-rays and Tom found out that his foot had indeed been crushed. At the same time this is happening, in Naju, a statue of Mary becomes famous for crying tears of blood. Tom goes to the statue everyday for a week and puts a drop of water from the fountain nearby on his broken foot. After this he goes to the doctor again, gets another x-ray, and his foot has completely healed.
So not he goes back every year and gets more water to ship home. Apparently the same water has also healed a brain tumour the size of a fist.
An interesting guy!! He also basically told us his life story; he's married to a Korean woman, has 13 or 14 siblings, his business is worth a million dollars (but his partner was a dirty rotten thief) etc. etc.
All in all, an interesting night!
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Boredom Sets In
So, yeah, it's only 10am on my class-less day and the boredom has already set riiiiiight in. Why couldn't they just give us the day off? During the week, things are generally ridiculously boring here in Naju. After work I go home and have hours upon hours of "me time" which is only interesting long enough to realize you are a really boring person. I just don't have much to say to myself anymore. At least I have some actual plans tonight! Me and a couple Yongsanpo'ers (Stu and Max) are going to go bowling in Naju to alleviate the boredom for a while. That's right, Naju apparently has a bowling alley (but no movie theatre interestingly enough)!!
I think I'm going to start hanging out with the Ajummas (the old ladies). Whenever I walk around the shanty-town areas of Naju, there are always a bunch of Ajumma's sitting out with their drying chilli=peppers (it's usually hard to tell which is more wrinkled-- the dried pepper or the Ajumma). Whenever I walk by a gagle of ajummas, they stop talking and just blatantly stare. It's a little disconcerting. It's not an angry or happy stare, it's a "what the hell is that thing?" stare. Sometimes I'll try smiling, or an "Ahnnyong Haseyo" to break the trance, but they don't even seem to notice. I think one day I'll just stop and stare back. For. As. Long. As. It. Takes. That would probably just piss the ladies off though. It's okay for people to stare at me, but when I stare back (which I've done a few times) it's considered insulting.
I think I'm going to start hanging out with the Ajummas (the old ladies). Whenever I walk around the shanty-town areas of Naju, there are always a bunch of Ajumma's sitting out with their drying chilli=peppers (it's usually hard to tell which is more wrinkled-- the dried pepper or the Ajumma). Whenever I walk by a gagle of ajummas, they stop talking and just blatantly stare. It's a little disconcerting. It's not an angry or happy stare, it's a "what the hell is that thing?" stare. Sometimes I'll try smiling, or an "Ahnnyong Haseyo" to break the trance, but they don't even seem to notice. I think one day I'll just stop and stare back. For. As. Long. As. It. Takes. That would probably just piss the ladies off though. It's okay for people to stare at me, but when I stare back (which I've done a few times) it's considered insulting.
Gwang-ju Biennale
Here are more pictures from Gwang-ju Biennale:
More random art pieces. The piece that looks like the moon falling apart is actually a cracker. The creepy picture of the man standing is only funny to me because the guy looks exactly like a guy I went to school with (Jeff Tran. Doesn't it look exactly like him Alex, Kristen??).
More random art pieces. The piece that looks like the moon falling apart is actually a cracker. The creepy picture of the man standing is only funny to me because the guy looks exactly like a guy I went to school with (Jeff Tran. Doesn't it look exactly like him Alex, Kristen??).
No Classes
Hello there reader(s?)!!
Today I have no classes because all of the grade six students are taking exams. Yesterday a bunch of girls were telling me that they have to go straight from Naju E.S. to Hogwans, where they study and take "lots of hard tests" until 9pm. School here is pretty intense. The kids do a lot of fooling around, but the hours are really long!! Kids barely see their parents during the week.
Becuase I'm going to be doing absolutely nothing all day, I've decided to make this my "offical blog update day". Isn't it exciting? First, I'll talk more about my stay in Gwang-ju for Biennale, which is a huge arts festival held every once and a while. I already bitched about my stay at my co-teachers house, so I won't get into that again!! I will just say that my co-teacher is an very kind man, but WAY over-protective!
And so, here are some pictures!!
Okay, these pictures are in no particular order!! I met up with Kristen and Alex and we all went to this restaurant at the festival that had a bit of a "war" theme. Our tables were held up by massive old missiles (which you can kind of see in the background) and our chairs were these futuristic looking stools with glass seats so that you could see the ammunition shells set in resin! So very bizarre... The picture of me is at the HUGE contemporary art show that was at biennale. I'm in front of a really scary collage by a german artist. When I had my picture taken in front of this, I got the weirdest look from my co-teacher. It was pretty funny. I don't know if you can see this because of the flash, but directly to the right there's a drawing of a guy with a gun to his head. I have no idea what the art piece was about. Many of the works were commentaries on the "war on terrorism". Very interesting. The last picture features Ye-Jin, my co-teacher's granddaughter. At Biennale there was a litle amusement park and she made me go on every ride with her. She lives with her grandfather, so I ended up spending the weekend with her as well. Everytime I would go to the bathroom she would bang on the door, wanting in. If she spoke enough English, I would have loved to tell her about the "buffer zone" or that "people in Canada don't usually use the bathroom together". Ack! In South Korea, kids are fond of the "poking adult in the butt" game, and Ye-Jin is no exception!!! Eventually I had to just make sure I was walking behind her so there were no sneak attacks. She, of course, thinks it's all freaking hilarious.
Today I have no classes because all of the grade six students are taking exams. Yesterday a bunch of girls were telling me that they have to go straight from Naju E.S. to Hogwans, where they study and take "lots of hard tests" until 9pm. School here is pretty intense. The kids do a lot of fooling around, but the hours are really long!! Kids barely see their parents during the week.
Becuase I'm going to be doing absolutely nothing all day, I've decided to make this my "offical blog update day". Isn't it exciting? First, I'll talk more about my stay in Gwang-ju for Biennale, which is a huge arts festival held every once and a while. I already bitched about my stay at my co-teachers house, so I won't get into that again!! I will just say that my co-teacher is an very kind man, but WAY over-protective!
And so, here are some pictures!!
Okay, these pictures are in no particular order!! I met up with Kristen and Alex and we all went to this restaurant at the festival that had a bit of a "war" theme. Our tables were held up by massive old missiles (which you can kind of see in the background) and our chairs were these futuristic looking stools with glass seats so that you could see the ammunition shells set in resin! So very bizarre... The picture of me is at the HUGE contemporary art show that was at biennale. I'm in front of a really scary collage by a german artist. When I had my picture taken in front of this, I got the weirdest look from my co-teacher. It was pretty funny. I don't know if you can see this because of the flash, but directly to the right there's a drawing of a guy with a gun to his head. I have no idea what the art piece was about. Many of the works were commentaries on the "war on terrorism". Very interesting. The last picture features Ye-Jin, my co-teacher's granddaughter. At Biennale there was a litle amusement park and she made me go on every ride with her. She lives with her grandfather, so I ended up spending the weekend with her as well. Everytime I would go to the bathroom she would bang on the door, wanting in. If she spoke enough English, I would have loved to tell her about the "buffer zone" or that "people in Canada don't usually use the bathroom together". Ack! In South Korea, kids are fond of the "poking adult in the butt" game, and Ye-Jin is no exception!!! Eventually I had to just make sure I was walking behind her so there were no sneak attacks. She, of course, thinks it's all freaking hilarious.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Same old same old
Ahhhh... entertaining. But at the same time, whenever I hear planes and helicopters overhead I'm expecting to see Team America swooping in "to save the mother-f**king day, yeah! America f**k, yeah!!" and so on! When I first saw Team America, I didn't realize how close to my heart it would become!
So another day in Naju English Town is done! It's fun because the kids are so excited to be there, and are so darn cute, but from a teaching standpoint it'sd getting a trifle (and by trifle I mean a whole hell of a lot) boring. I say the same dialogues EVERY SINGLE DAY. I am the immigration officer and this is my dialogue:
Officer: Hello, welcome to Naju English Town. Where are you from?
Sumin: Hi. I'm from Korea.
Officer: May I see your passport please?
Sumin. Sure. Here it is.
Officer: What's the purpose of your trip?
Sumin: I'm visiting my uncle.
Officer: How long will you stay?
Sumin: Two weeks.
Officer: Okay, have a good time.
Sumin: Thanks!
Yuck! This dialogue is the devil. The devil!!! If one of these kids visits another country they'd better be visiting an uncle or they're not getting in the country!
Everyday the group of girls who clean the English town stop off to come and talk with me for a while. I teach them some english, they teach me some interesting Korean facts. Today it was the boy band "Super Junior".
"Sexy" and "cutie" and "handsome" are not really words that I would use to describe them. It's more like "girly" and "pretty"!! All of the girls wanted to know which one I thought was the cutest, second cutest, ugliest etc. Every answer would produce a scream. The guy I called the ugliest caused a huge uproar. "No!! No!! Handsome!! Cute!!". I kept on calling the guy with red hair a girl and that would be met with even more screaming. Hahahahahahahaha.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Sigh... nuclear power
So, I'm sure you saw this on the news this week. My neighbour to the North (Korth Korea of course) detonated a nuclear bomb underground to show everyone how powerful they are.
And so, some jokes I found on the matter!!
"Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright called North Korea's leader Kim Jung Il a pervert. In response, Kim Jung Il said 'I dare her to put on a leather mask and say that to my ass.'" --Conan O'Brien
"Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright said North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il is, quote, 'a pervert.' When Kim Jong Il heard that, he said tell her to say it again slowly while licking her lips." --Conan O'Brien
"North Korean dictator Kim Jung Il may be stepping down. Yeah, experts in the State Department say he could be replaced by his son, Menta Li Ill." --David Letterman
"The latest political rumor, North Korea ruler Kim Jong Il is close to naming his successor. Yeah, he said the only person with glasses big enough to replace me is Nicole Richie." --Conan O'Brien"
"North Korea is making several demands in exchange for giving up their nuclear program, including a promise from America not to attack them. Which is a little strange because for us to attack them we would have to have slam dunk proof that they have weapons of mass destruction. I mean, for Gods sakes people, we're not maniacs. It would have to be an air-tight case. We wouldn't just come in there and start bombing you." --Jon Stewart
"Last week North Korea publicly admitted for the first time it has nuclear weapons. The Bush administration has so far shown very little concern, as the North Korean missiles are believed only capable of reaching the Blue States." --Jon Stewart on North Korea's nuclear weapons program
"It's been reported that in the event of an emergency situation with North Korea the U.S. is prepared to send 70% of the Marine Corps to the region. According to President Bush this will still allow us to send another 70% to Iran and keep our other 70% in Iraq." --Tina Fey
"President Bush wants a further $82 billion for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. $82 billion more he wants. If he's not careful there's going to be no money left to attack Iran or Korea." --Craig Ferguson
"North Korea has declared they have nuclear weapons, saying they need them to protect themselves from a hostile United States. President Bush said today North Korea has nothing to fear from America. He said 'Don't these people understand we only attack countries that don't have weapons of mass destruction?'" --Jay Leno
Although North Korea isn't all that far away, the laid-back inhabitants of South Korea don't seem to worried, myself included. No worries mom. I asked one of my co-teacher's what she thought about it and she basically said that North Korea is just trying to show that it has power.
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
You know... stuff!
Hey mom,
I got your letter!! It was so nice to see text in english; I felt pretty special. Things are the same over here in Korea except that I feel normal!! Not sick at all!! Weeee!!!
Today's class is a bit of a handful! They're grade five students and in my section I had a big group of boys to deal with. One kid was giving me attitude and disrupting the class, so I made him stand facing the wall. He made it known that he was VERY angry with me (actually quite amusing!). When I approached him, he thought I was going to hit him, but he seemed even more upset when he learned that instead I'd be embarassing him in front of his friends. So he just stood against the wall and glared at me in a very theatrical manner. Everytime I looked at him I would smile in my own special sarcastic way and he would get even more angry with me. Hahahahahahhahaha. Good times. I'm liking this whole teaching thing.
We give out stickers as a sort of reward system, and the kids go insane over these things. "Teacher!! Sticker!!! Sticker!!" is a very popular pseudo-sentence among the kids. A group of girls also spent a long time explaining to me that a Korean boy band was very "Sexy!! Sexy!!" and then proceeded to call me "cutie honey" for the rest of the day. Where do they get this stuff???
I got your letter!! It was so nice to see text in english; I felt pretty special. Things are the same over here in Korea except that I feel normal!! Not sick at all!! Weeee!!!
Today's class is a bit of a handful! They're grade five students and in my section I had a big group of boys to deal with. One kid was giving me attitude and disrupting the class, so I made him stand facing the wall. He made it known that he was VERY angry with me (actually quite amusing!). When I approached him, he thought I was going to hit him, but he seemed even more upset when he learned that instead I'd be embarassing him in front of his friends. So he just stood against the wall and glared at me in a very theatrical manner. Everytime I looked at him I would smile in my own special sarcastic way and he would get even more angry with me. Hahahahahahhahaha. Good times. I'm liking this whole teaching thing.
We give out stickers as a sort of reward system, and the kids go insane over these things. "Teacher!! Sticker!!! Sticker!!" is a very popular pseudo-sentence among the kids. A group of girls also spent a long time explaining to me that a Korean boy band was very "Sexy!! Sexy!!" and then proceeded to call me "cutie honey" for the rest of the day. Where do they get this stuff???
Monday, October 09, 2006
Wando Revisited
Okay, this is a bit of a cheat. I'm going to write about my second trip to Wando, but these pictures are from my first trip. You're probably wondering: why the hell is there a dead fish? He looked like he was singing and I thought it was funny alright? Leave me be!
The second trip to Wando was fun. I think the most memorable thing would be the sauna that Richard, Shannon and Neal made. It was pretty sweet! So we all went swimming in the somewhat cool water and then were able to stay warm in a sauna made using two old signs and a tarp. Very ingenious!
At one point Alex and I were going for a swim and we went out a little far. There was a lot of phosphorus so the big fish that swam past us was a flash of light that scared the living crap out of me!!! In a small part of my brain, I knew that there were nets, and the general likelyhood of it being a shark was about zero percent; but I still swam like hell back to shore!
Baekyangsa Temple
Some pretty pictures from Baekyangsa Temple, which I visited during orientation. The temples were insanely detailed; getting to paint all of those pagodas would be a dream job! Everything is so colourful and there are so many patterns! Of course not far in the distance is a huge mountain range. It seems that most temples are on or near mountains here, making them that much more beautiful!
Me and my apartment!
This is an admittedly bad picture of my apartment. Two bedrooms, kitchen, dining area, livingroom, bathroom! Pretty standard.
Okay, Pictures!!
Let me start from the beginning!! I flew to South Korea on Korean Airlines!! OOOHH! This is the plane that I flew on. Fourteen hours on a plane really sucks as it turns out! Fancy that!! Although it wasthe first time I had seaweed soup, which I quite enjoy. If you want to know what seaweed soup tastes like, find the ocean and start drinking. Not joking.
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