Miss you all! <3
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Well, I'm off on my 23 day adventure through Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. I'll try to post blogs and pictures as often as I can along my trip. We have a lot of fun things planned during our trip including going to an elephant sanctuary, sleeping in tents on a island, and eating tons of delicious food. We'll be following a path somewhat similar to this one:
Miss you all! <3
Miss you all! <3
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Christmas & enemas
I keep meaning to update this thing, but whenever it comes time for me to actually write, it just seems like too much work. I'll give you the overview of what's gone on recently.
Last week was my final full week of school before vacation, so I did Christmas lessons in all of my classes. I began the lesson by showing the students a short powerpoint about Christmas traditions in America. The first thing I taught them about was that many Americans cut down real trees for Christmas. I showed them pictures of people cutting down trees, a xmas tree farm, and how people put the trees on the tops of their cars when they drive home. All my students kept saying "chincha!?" which means "really?" in Korean. Then I showed them pictures of the some of the more extreme exterior decorations that people do. They were absolutely amazed. I got a lot of "wow"s and "Teacher, your house?". Finally, I showed them a YouTube clip of one of the houses that has their lights change to xmas music (don't worry, I explained that most people don't go to that extreme). The kids loved it, but the funniest part was that the song that was playing in the clip was The Carol of the Bells, and every class said how scary the music was. My co-teachers asked if it was Halloween music. I guess I never thought about it before, but the song is pretty creepy.
After learning some xmas vocabulary and playing a game, I had my 5th graders make xmas cards and my 4th graders complete a letter to Santa. The xmas cards were my favorite part of the lesson. I gave the students options on what to write on the outside of their card, and told them what to copy on the inside of the card. I had a slide up on the TV that said "Christmas Card Front" and "Christmas Card Inside" above what they were supposed to write. Not surprisingly, at least 5 of my students actually wrote those words on their cards. I also had "your name" in the place where students should write their names and had a few write "your name" inside their cards...but my favorite was when one student wrote "your mom" instead. I think he was confused about where he was supposed to address the card, so he was unknowingly being a smart ass. The best thing about the cards was how into making them the students got. They were told to bring paper to class to make the cards, and many of them brought whole bags of things to use. There were a lot of origami Santas and stickers and one student even brought in a pine branch that he glued pieces of to his card! I think the boys were more into it than the girls in some classes. One thing to mention about my students is that there are an unusually high number of them who are very artistically and creatively talented. I don't know if its a Korean thing, but I was amazed at some of the cards these kids designed.
Student making a Christmas card
This past weekend I went to go and visit Seth in Busan. I had a really great time, but of course it went by way too quickly. We did some shopping in an area called Nampo-dong that has a lot of upscale stores. In the middle of Nampo-dong is a street market where you can buy cheap sunglasses, bags, scarves, etc. We also went to the fish market that is famous in Korea. It's called Jalgalchi, or something along those lines. The market is pretty much as Korean as you can get. If anyone visits me, I will definitely be taking you here. All along the street are old Korean women vendors selling all different kinds of fish, stingrays, crabs, things in shells, eels, octopus, etc. At every stand you can watch the old women hack up the fish into tiny pieces. We also got to see the fisherman unloading the crates of fish right off the boats, which was kind of neat. Saturday evening we went to Seth's homestay to have dinner with his host family. At the end of dinner, Seth's host dad asked if we wanted to go to a nearby Christian university that had many xmas lights. I didn't really know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was a smaller, walk-around version of the old Core Creek Park light show, sans the moving pieces. Minus the fact that it was absolutely freezing, it was nice to get a little piece of Christmas here since nothing about Korea has been able to put me in the Christmas spirit.
Jalgalchi Fish Market
unloading the fish off the boats
Harbor
I <3 Busan
watching some 3D video at the light show
Me, Seth and his youngest host brother
Christmas lights at the Christian University
Christmas in Korea is definitely a much smaller holiday that in America. My Aunt Barbara sent this to me in an email, and I thought it pretty accurately describes Korean Christmas from what I've been able to witness so far...
"There are more Christians in South Korea (the Republic of Korea) than in other Asian countries such as China and Japan, so Christmas is a celebrated more widely. (Christians make up about 25-30% of the population.) However, the other 70% of people in South Korea are mostly Buddhist, so Christmas isn't an important festival (and not really celebrated by Buddhist people in South Korea).
Unlike Japan, Christmas is an official holiday - so people do have the day of work and school! But they go back on the 26th (Boxing Day). There's a longer official winter break in the New Year.
Churches are decorated with lights and many have a bright red neon cross on top (all the year!) so that goes very well with the Christmas lights! Most churches will have a service on Christmas day. Going to Church for Christmas is becoming more popular, even among non Christians.
Department stores put on big displays of decorations. There's also an amazing display of lights in the capital city, Seoul. The lights are all over the city centre including the bridges over the Han River.
Some people (especially Christians and westerns who live in South Korea) will have decorations at home including a Christmas tree.
Presents are exchanged and a popular present is money! Gift actually gifts is becoming more popular, but giving money is still very common. Korean's don't usually have birthday or anniversary celebrations. The main gift and money giving time is during Korean New Year (which is at the same time as Chinese New Year).
Santa Claus can also be seen around Korea but he might be wearing red or blue!
A popular Christmas food is a Christmas Cake, but it's often a sponge cake covered in cream brought from a local bakery! Or you might even have an ice cream cake from a shop like 'Baskin Robbins'!"
I've seen the Christmas cakes on display outside Baskin' Robbins...kind of hoping my family gets one since they're in the shapes of really cute snowman, penguins and polar bears.
My host family, even though they are Buddhist, have a mini Christmas celebration. We have a small xmas tree in our apartment and Tammy and I decorated the living room with paper chains. We are going to open our gifts xmas eve morning because that night we are going to grandma's house near Seoul and staying there until Saturday morning. As per usual, no one has given me any hint as to what we will be doing there, but Tammy did mention going out to dinner and noraebang when I asked her a few weeks ago. Nothing like some Korean karaoke to put you in the Christmas spirit.
Going off on a different tangent...I had an interesting day today. Today was my last day of school and I knew I had no classes but that I had to come in for some sort of closing ceremony (Koreans love their ceremonies, almost as much as they love their banners). Co-teach told me to come to school at 9:30am. I figured I'd be at school maybe an hour at the most and then I could come home and go back to sleep. I got to school promptly at 9:30 only to be told by my co-teacher that the meeting had been moved to 12. Thanks co-teach...ever heard of the phone? I asked her what I was supposed to do until then and she said "Just relax." So 2 1/2 hour later I'm sitting in my ice box of an office watching my third episode of Law and Order SVU on the computer when co-teach comes and tells me we are going to Pizza Hut for lunch with all of the English teachers. We ended up spending like an hour and a half at Pizza Hut where I found out that the meeting had been moved to 1:30. After lunch my teacher and I go to the teachers office for the meeting at 1:30 and find out that it was moved to 2:00! At this point I'm wondering if I'm ever going to go home. Co-teach then suggested that we go say goodbye to the principal since I won't see him for over 2 months. I don't know if I've told you about my principal, but hes a very intimidating Korean man who has been nothing but kind to me since I arrived at his school. He speaks very very little English, so we usually just sit in awkward silence when we are alone together. But he likes me because I give him gifts all of the time. Anyway, we go to see the principal and I tell him "Merry Christmas...blahblahblah." He then starts talking to my co-teach in Korean and the only things I understand are the words "tomorrow" and "I will call". Moments later in the hallway I found out from co-teach that the principal was saying that tomorrow him and I are going to go to lunch together by ourselves, and that he will call my cell phone tomorrow to tell me when. Ummmm WHAT?!? Does this man honestly think we can have an entire lunch together when neither of us speak each others' languages? So I'm currently terrified out of my mind about this meeting. My host mom says that she thinks he will bring his daughter or something and I'm praying that she's right. I am really flattered that he asked me to lunch, but I'd like him a lot more if he hadn't. At least it should make for a good blog entry.
Soooo after my minor panic attack, my co-teach also told me that the principal said I could leave and that I didn't have to attend the day's meeting. So I pretty much went to school to watch SVU, eat Pizza Hut and be forced into a very uncomfortable lunch date with my principal. Awesome.
This evening I met some of my former students from my teachers class at their English study group they started. It was so nice seeing them again, even though only three were able to attend. We spent a while catching up and talking about winter vacation plans. The group of them are using a textbook created by the English radio network that they all listen to daily (sidenote: my host mom also listens to this show at full volume at 6:30am 3 feet away from my bedroom door...I HATE that show). Today's topic of conversation from the textbook: constipation. I kid you not. They all memorized a whole short article about it. At the end of the article are the key vocabulary words from the text. Here are the words that I had to read aloud and have them repeat after me: constipation, digestive system, feces, stool, poo, bowel movement, uncomfortable sensation, fiber-rich food, dietary changes, laxatives, metabolism, relieve, enema. I mean, I don't know about you but enemas and bowel movements are definitely a part of my daily conversation in America. After each teacher said the memorized article aloud, we then had a conversation about constipation. I tried to explain to them that they should probably avoid asking someone in America if they were ever constipated.
My life here never ceases to amaze me...
In other news, my winter vacation has officially begun!! I don't have to return to my ice box of a school until March 2nd, with the exception of my 3 day English camp at the end of January. Here is what my winter vacation looks like:
Dec 29-Jan 20: traveling to Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand with Seth
Jan 25-27: English camp
Jan 28-Feb 5: Busan to help Seth with his English camp
Feb 5-Feb 28: Korean Language Class at Daegu University where I will be living in the International dorm and taking Korean classes for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week
The best part about my 2 month vacation is that we continue being paid by our schools the entire time.
It's going to be a beautiful, beautiful two months.
Last week was my final full week of school before vacation, so I did Christmas lessons in all of my classes. I began the lesson by showing the students a short powerpoint about Christmas traditions in America. The first thing I taught them about was that many Americans cut down real trees for Christmas. I showed them pictures of people cutting down trees, a xmas tree farm, and how people put the trees on the tops of their cars when they drive home. All my students kept saying "chincha!?" which means "really?" in Korean. Then I showed them pictures of the some of the more extreme exterior decorations that people do. They were absolutely amazed. I got a lot of "wow"s and "Teacher, your house?". Finally, I showed them a YouTube clip of one of the houses that has their lights change to xmas music (don't worry, I explained that most people don't go to that extreme). The kids loved it, but the funniest part was that the song that was playing in the clip was The Carol of the Bells, and every class said how scary the music was. My co-teachers asked if it was Halloween music. I guess I never thought about it before, but the song is pretty creepy.
After learning some xmas vocabulary and playing a game, I had my 5th graders make xmas cards and my 4th graders complete a letter to Santa. The xmas cards were my favorite part of the lesson. I gave the students options on what to write on the outside of their card, and told them what to copy on the inside of the card. I had a slide up on the TV that said "Christmas Card Front" and "Christmas Card Inside" above what they were supposed to write. Not surprisingly, at least 5 of my students actually wrote those words on their cards. I also had "your name" in the place where students should write their names and had a few write "your name" inside their cards...but my favorite was when one student wrote "your mom" instead. I think he was confused about where he was supposed to address the card, so he was unknowingly being a smart ass. The best thing about the cards was how into making them the students got. They were told to bring paper to class to make the cards, and many of them brought whole bags of things to use. There were a lot of origami Santas and stickers and one student even brought in a pine branch that he glued pieces of to his card! I think the boys were more into it than the girls in some classes. One thing to mention about my students is that there are an unusually high number of them who are very artistically and creatively talented. I don't know if its a Korean thing, but I was amazed at some of the cards these kids designed.
Student making a Christmas card
This past weekend I went to go and visit Seth in Busan. I had a really great time, but of course it went by way too quickly. We did some shopping in an area called Nampo-dong that has a lot of upscale stores. In the middle of Nampo-dong is a street market where you can buy cheap sunglasses, bags, scarves, etc. We also went to the fish market that is famous in Korea. It's called Jalgalchi, or something along those lines. The market is pretty much as Korean as you can get. If anyone visits me, I will definitely be taking you here. All along the street are old Korean women vendors selling all different kinds of fish, stingrays, crabs, things in shells, eels, octopus, etc. At every stand you can watch the old women hack up the fish into tiny pieces. We also got to see the fisherman unloading the crates of fish right off the boats, which was kind of neat. Saturday evening we went to Seth's homestay to have dinner with his host family. At the end of dinner, Seth's host dad asked if we wanted to go to a nearby Christian university that had many xmas lights. I didn't really know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was a smaller, walk-around version of the old Core Creek Park light show, sans the moving pieces. Minus the fact that it was absolutely freezing, it was nice to get a little piece of Christmas here since nothing about Korea has been able to put me in the Christmas spirit.
Jalgalchi Fish Market
unloading the fish off the boats
Harbor
I <3 Busan
watching some 3D video at the light show
Me, Seth and his youngest host brother
Christmas lights at the Christian University
Christmas in Korea is definitely a much smaller holiday that in America. My Aunt Barbara sent this to me in an email, and I thought it pretty accurately describes Korean Christmas from what I've been able to witness so far...
"There are more Christians in South Korea (the Republic of Korea) than in other Asian countries such as China and Japan, so Christmas is a celebrated more widely. (Christians make up about 25-30% of the population.) However, the other 70% of people in South Korea are mostly Buddhist, so Christmas isn't an important festival (and not really celebrated by Buddhist people in South Korea).
Unlike Japan, Christmas is an official holiday - so people do have the day of work and school! But they go back on the 26th (Boxing Day). There's a longer official winter break in the New Year.
Churches are decorated with lights and many have a bright red neon cross on top (all the year!) so that goes very well with the Christmas lights! Most churches will have a service on Christmas day. Going to Church for Christmas is becoming more popular, even among non Christians.
Department stores put on big displays of decorations. There's also an amazing display of lights in the capital city, Seoul. The lights are all over the city centre including the bridges over the Han River.
Some people (especially Christians and westerns who live in South Korea) will have decorations at home including a Christmas tree.
Presents are exchanged and a popular present is money! Gift actually gifts is becoming more popular, but giving money is still very common. Korean's don't usually have birthday or anniversary celebrations. The main gift and money giving time is during Korean New Year (which is at the same time as Chinese New Year).
Santa Claus can also be seen around Korea but he might be wearing red or blue!
A popular Christmas food is a Christmas Cake, but it's often a sponge cake covered in cream brought from a local bakery! Or you might even have an ice cream cake from a shop like 'Baskin Robbins'!"
I've seen the Christmas cakes on display outside Baskin' Robbins...kind of hoping my family gets one since they're in the shapes of really cute snowman, penguins and polar bears.
My host family, even though they are Buddhist, have a mini Christmas celebration. We have a small xmas tree in our apartment and Tammy and I decorated the living room with paper chains. We are going to open our gifts xmas eve morning because that night we are going to grandma's house near Seoul and staying there until Saturday morning. As per usual, no one has given me any hint as to what we will be doing there, but Tammy did mention going out to dinner and noraebang when I asked her a few weeks ago. Nothing like some Korean karaoke to put you in the Christmas spirit.
Going off on a different tangent...I had an interesting day today. Today was my last day of school and I knew I had no classes but that I had to come in for some sort of closing ceremony (Koreans love their ceremonies, almost as much as they love their banners). Co-teach told me to come to school at 9:30am. I figured I'd be at school maybe an hour at the most and then I could come home and go back to sleep. I got to school promptly at 9:30 only to be told by my co-teacher that the meeting had been moved to 12. Thanks co-teach...ever heard of the phone? I asked her what I was supposed to do until then and she said "Just relax." So 2 1/2 hour later I'm sitting in my ice box of an office watching my third episode of Law and Order SVU on the computer when co-teach comes and tells me we are going to Pizza Hut for lunch with all of the English teachers. We ended up spending like an hour and a half at Pizza Hut where I found out that the meeting had been moved to 1:30. After lunch my teacher and I go to the teachers office for the meeting at 1:30 and find out that it was moved to 2:00! At this point I'm wondering if I'm ever going to go home. Co-teach then suggested that we go say goodbye to the principal since I won't see him for over 2 months. I don't know if I've told you about my principal, but hes a very intimidating Korean man who has been nothing but kind to me since I arrived at his school. He speaks very very little English, so we usually just sit in awkward silence when we are alone together. But he likes me because I give him gifts all of the time. Anyway, we go to see the principal and I tell him "Merry Christmas...blahblahblah." He then starts talking to my co-teach in Korean and the only things I understand are the words "tomorrow" and "I will call". Moments later in the hallway I found out from co-teach that the principal was saying that tomorrow him and I are going to go to lunch together by ourselves, and that he will call my cell phone tomorrow to tell me when. Ummmm WHAT?!? Does this man honestly think we can have an entire lunch together when neither of us speak each others' languages? So I'm currently terrified out of my mind about this meeting. My host mom says that she thinks he will bring his daughter or something and I'm praying that she's right. I am really flattered that he asked me to lunch, but I'd like him a lot more if he hadn't. At least it should make for a good blog entry.
Soooo after my minor panic attack, my co-teach also told me that the principal said I could leave and that I didn't have to attend the day's meeting. So I pretty much went to school to watch SVU, eat Pizza Hut and be forced into a very uncomfortable lunch date with my principal. Awesome.
This evening I met some of my former students from my teachers class at their English study group they started. It was so nice seeing them again, even though only three were able to attend. We spent a while catching up and talking about winter vacation plans. The group of them are using a textbook created by the English radio network that they all listen to daily (sidenote: my host mom also listens to this show at full volume at 6:30am 3 feet away from my bedroom door...I HATE that show). Today's topic of conversation from the textbook: constipation. I kid you not. They all memorized a whole short article about it. At the end of the article are the key vocabulary words from the text. Here are the words that I had to read aloud and have them repeat after me: constipation, digestive system, feces, stool, poo, bowel movement, uncomfortable sensation, fiber-rich food, dietary changes, laxatives, metabolism, relieve, enema. I mean, I don't know about you but enemas and bowel movements are definitely a part of my daily conversation in America. After each teacher said the memorized article aloud, we then had a conversation about constipation. I tried to explain to them that they should probably avoid asking someone in America if they were ever constipated.
My life here never ceases to amaze me...
In other news, my winter vacation has officially begun!! I don't have to return to my ice box of a school until March 2nd, with the exception of my 3 day English camp at the end of January. Here is what my winter vacation looks like:
Dec 29-Jan 20: traveling to Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand with Seth
Jan 25-27: English camp
Jan 28-Feb 5: Busan to help Seth with his English camp
Feb 5-Feb 28: Korean Language Class at Daegu University where I will be living in the International dorm and taking Korean classes for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week
The best part about my 2 month vacation is that we continue being paid by our schools the entire time.
It's going to be a beautiful, beautiful two months.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
reason #483
Reason #483 why I love my life:
These are 4 of my students who are also Tammy's best friends. They were supposed to be studying for their finals tomorrow, but instead they decided to videotape themselves singing a Korean pop song. I could hear them yelling from my room but I didn't know what they were doing until they all came running in and showed me this video. Its super cute, but the funniest part is the end when the little 12 year gives the camera the middle finger. Tammy was taping, so its kind of all over the place. Please enjoy!
These are 4 of my students who are also Tammy's best friends. They were supposed to be studying for their finals tomorrow, but instead they decided to videotape themselves singing a Korean pop song. I could hear them yelling from my room but I didn't know what they were doing until they all came running in and showed me this video. Its super cute, but the funniest part is the end when the little 12 year gives the camera the middle finger. Tammy was taping, so its kind of all over the place. Please enjoy!
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Soju! Mekju! Makali!
Two things happened in school today that I thought were worth mentioning.
In my one class I had today, I was bent over two girls helping them with their worksheets. I must have had some stray hairs hanging out down because both of the girls grabbed strands of my hair and pulled them out of my head. They then continued to hold them up to the light and play with them on their desk after I left them. I was told that this happens sometimes in Korea, because people here only have dark hair so they aren't used to seeing blonde hair. But it was really strange once I actually saw kids do it. Kind of creepy.
The other thing that happened today was that 3 of my classes were canceled and all of the students got to go home early so that the teachers and some parents could play kickball, volleyball and dodgeball together. It was a lot of fun and pretty hilarious/pathetic. 95% of the women who played with us either ducked or screamed when the ball came towards them. Most of the games were played by the few men we have at our school. It was kind of frustrating for me at times because I actually want to play and know that I can at least hold my own if I'm given the chance. As per usual, I didn't know what was going on half the time...still unsure of who won the games. I was the most confused during dodgeball because apparently Korean dodgeball is very different than the American version. There is only one ball used and you only get out if you're hit by the ball, not if your ball gets caught. They also have this crazy rule where once you're out, instead of sitting down you go behind the opposing team and you can hit them from behind with the ball if it comes to you. The game wasn't as fast paced as our version, but the extra rule makes it so much fun. Again though, the guys pretty much dominated the game. After the tournaments we all congregated in the school cafeteria where, of course, there was beer and Soju and Makali and kimchi waiting for us. At the end of our mini meal, there was still a lot of alcohol left over, so I grabbed a bottle of beer, Soju and Makali for my host dad, since the way to his heart is through alcohol. I lined them all up on the kitchen table when I got home for him to see when he came in the door. I was laying in bed and heard him come in. Suddenly I heard him gasp and say, "Soju! Mekju! Makali! Ohhhh yeahhhh." Probably the greatest thing I've ever heard him say.
In my one class I had today, I was bent over two girls helping them with their worksheets. I must have had some stray hairs hanging out down because both of the girls grabbed strands of my hair and pulled them out of my head. They then continued to hold them up to the light and play with them on their desk after I left them. I was told that this happens sometimes in Korea, because people here only have dark hair so they aren't used to seeing blonde hair. But it was really strange once I actually saw kids do it. Kind of creepy.
The other thing that happened today was that 3 of my classes were canceled and all of the students got to go home early so that the teachers and some parents could play kickball, volleyball and dodgeball together. It was a lot of fun and pretty hilarious/pathetic. 95% of the women who played with us either ducked or screamed when the ball came towards them. Most of the games were played by the few men we have at our school. It was kind of frustrating for me at times because I actually want to play and know that I can at least hold my own if I'm given the chance. As per usual, I didn't know what was going on half the time...still unsure of who won the games. I was the most confused during dodgeball because apparently Korean dodgeball is very different than the American version. There is only one ball used and you only get out if you're hit by the ball, not if your ball gets caught. They also have this crazy rule where once you're out, instead of sitting down you go behind the opposing team and you can hit them from behind with the ball if it comes to you. The game wasn't as fast paced as our version, but the extra rule makes it so much fun. Again though, the guys pretty much dominated the game. After the tournaments we all congregated in the school cafeteria where, of course, there was beer and Soju and Makali and kimchi waiting for us. At the end of our mini meal, there was still a lot of alcohol left over, so I grabbed a bottle of beer, Soju and Makali for my host dad, since the way to his heart is through alcohol. I lined them all up on the kitchen table when I got home for him to see when he came in the door. I was laying in bed and heard him come in. Suddenly I heard him gasp and say, "Soju! Mekju! Makali! Ohhhh yeahhhh." Probably the greatest thing I've ever heard him say.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Check out this website: http://blackoutkorea.blogspot.com/ These pictures are hilarious (and tragic) and are a very common occurrence in Korea. I have a few pictures of my own I could probably add to this website. There has been a number of times where my friends and I were just leaving to go to the bar and we see guys either passed out or puking already from drinking so much. Koreans also have this amazing ability to sleep ANYWHERE. Every time I take a bus, within 5 minutes of leaving everyone on the bus is passed out. I think its starting to rub off on me. I now pass out anytime I'm on a bus, and often in cars. My host family and I went to dinner the other night to a restaurant that was only 10 minutes away, and I managed to fall asleep on the ride there.
Tonight I had my 2nd to last English teachers class. This class has become the highlight of my school day. All of the teachers are so kind and funny and caring. We've really become like a little family. I'm very sad that the class is ending and that I won't be seeing the women anymore. Anyway, tonight I had all 20 students together since my guy co-teacher had something to do tonight. I planned a Thanksgiving lesson and Thanksgiving dinner with my class. Each person was responsible for bringing in one dish to share. I made awesome mashed potatoes (recipe courtesy of Seth). The class was a lot of fun, and the food was even better. But the best part of class was when I had each person take a turn to say something they were thankful for. The majority of the students ended up saying that they were thankful for this class because they bonded a lot with each other and because they really enjoyed having me as a teacher. It was really difficult not to cry when they told me this. It just felt really good to have people appreciate me and all of the work I put into each of the lessons. Then it came my turn to share what I was thankful for and I said that I was thankful for Fulbright and the opportunity to spend a year in Korea because I've learned a lot about myself, met some really amazing people, and done a lot of things already I never thought I would ever do (i.e. eating live octopus and seeing the Great Wall). As I was saying this I realized how thankful I really was and almost started crying again. I'm such a cornball.
In other news, I'm off to Seoul tomorrow to have Thanksgiving dinner at the US Ambassador's house with all of the other ETAs. Sooo excited!
Tonight I had my 2nd to last English teachers class. This class has become the highlight of my school day. All of the teachers are so kind and funny and caring. We've really become like a little family. I'm very sad that the class is ending and that I won't be seeing the women anymore. Anyway, tonight I had all 20 students together since my guy co-teacher had something to do tonight. I planned a Thanksgiving lesson and Thanksgiving dinner with my class. Each person was responsible for bringing in one dish to share. I made awesome mashed potatoes (recipe courtesy of Seth). The class was a lot of fun, and the food was even better. But the best part of class was when I had each person take a turn to say something they were thankful for. The majority of the students ended up saying that they were thankful for this class because they bonded a lot with each other and because they really enjoyed having me as a teacher. It was really difficult not to cry when they told me this. It just felt really good to have people appreciate me and all of the work I put into each of the lessons. Then it came my turn to share what I was thankful for and I said that I was thankful for Fulbright and the opportunity to spend a year in Korea because I've learned a lot about myself, met some really amazing people, and done a lot of things already I never thought I would ever do (i.e. eating live octopus and seeing the Great Wall). As I was saying this I realized how thankful I really was and almost started crying again. I'm such a cornball.
In other news, I'm off to Seoul tomorrow to have Thanksgiving dinner at the US Ambassador's house with all of the other ETAs. Sooo excited!
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Thanksgiving Lessons
This week I'm teaching my students about the history of Thanksgiving and I'm having the 4th graders make hand turkeys. On their turkeys they have to write one thing they are thankful for. My favorites so far are:
"I am thankful for my body." - Not quite sure what that means, but kind of weird.
"I am thankful for my ball." - It's the simple things in life...
"I am thankful for kimchi." - You are sooo Korean.
"I am thankful for... NAME" - This student copied my example from the board. He didn't realize that he was supposed to finish the sentence and write his name. I still put it up on the wall with the other turkeys. :)
"I am thankful for my body." - Not quite sure what that means, but kind of weird.
"I am thankful for my ball." - It's the simple things in life...
"I am thankful for kimchi." - You are sooo Korean.
"I am thankful for... NAME" - This student copied my example from the board. He didn't realize that he was supposed to finish the sentence and write his name. I still put it up on the wall with the other turkeys. :)
raw fish, booze & noraebang...on a monday
This past Monday I was invited (last minute of course) to go to dinner with my 2 co-teachers, my one co-teachers boyfriend, the male PE teacher, and 3 other female teachers, all of whom I eat lunch with everyday. We ended up meeting a raw fish restaurant near my school. The dinner was mostly delicious. I tried a lot of weird looking raw seafood, half of which I don't know what it was. I even voluntarily ate the live octopus again! The company was a lot of fun; the PE teacher is especially hilarious. He's a younger guy and we always have really funny broken English conversations over lunch. I think he enjoys practicing his English and hitting on me at the same time. At one point during dinner he serenaded me with "You Are So Beautiful". I guess in the states it would border on sexual harassment, but I think its really funny and I'm 99% sure he's just doing it to be silly. Towards the end of dinner & drinks I heard the word "noraebang" being tossed around. I started to get worried because the only times I've been to noraebang (karaoke) was at the end of a long night at many different bars, and it was only 7pm and none of us had had a lot to drink. To make a long story short, everyone, with the exception of my co-teacher, went to noraebang together for a couple hours. It ended up being a lot of fun and a great bonding experience for all of us. I sang some old school Britney Spears, NSYNC and "Twist and Shout" (a crowd favorite) and the other teachers sang a bunch of k-pop. My usually annoying co-teacher was the best noraebang-er out of everyone. Her and her boyfriend sang duets the entire time and even had dance moves to all of the songs. PE teacher had an amazing voice as well and he would jump up on the couches and dance up on the older Korean teachers whenever he sang. At the end of the night I had a really funny conversation (in broken English of course) with the PE teacher. It went something like this.
PE teacher: The past 2 weeks I just stay at home and drink alone.
Me: Why would you do that?
PE teacher: Because my heart is broken. (fake crying)
Me: Awww. What happened?
PE teacher: One-way love. I love a girl but she does not like me.
Me: Awww so sad. What is her name?
PE teacher: (pause) Her name......is Cassidy.
He was only joking of course, and all of us died when he said this. Fun night.
PE teacher: The past 2 weeks I just stay at home and drink alone.
Me: Why would you do that?
PE teacher: Because my heart is broken. (fake crying)
Me: Awww. What happened?
PE teacher: One-way love. I love a girl but she does not like me.
Me: Awww so sad. What is her name?
PE teacher: (pause) Her name......is Cassidy.
He was only joking of course, and all of us died when he said this. Fun night.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
The story of my life...
This morning I had plans to go out to lunch and shopping with my host mom and host sister. I was really looking forward to it because we don't do stuff like that often, especially just the girls. 5 minutes before we are supposed to leave, as I'm sitting in my nice clothes waiting for my host mom to get ready, she comes into my room and says "How about we go to San Seong first." (San Seong is the fortress we go hiking at some times that is a 2 hour time commitment) Ummm excuse me host mom? I'm pretty sure hiking and lunch/shopping are not in the same activities category. I stared at her for minute and for the first time since I've been here, flat out told her "no". No I am not going hiking in the freezing cold. I hate hiking and I especially hate hiking when its taking the place of one of my favorite things to do: shopping.
Still not sure what we're going to end up doing because shes currently yelling at my host sister because she had the same exact reaction I did.
Just had to share because this is the story of my life in Korea.
UPDATE: We ended up going shopping in the end (thank god). Shopping was an experience in itself. I don't know if its a Korean thing or that my host mom is just weird, but she has no sense of appropriate social rules. For example, she doesn't ever follow the rule of standing in a line. If there is a line at the cash register, she just walks up to the front and butts in front of everyone. I always try to point it out to her that there is a line, but she always tells me I'm wrong. Lately I've just given up and let her go and get yelled at by people. Another interesting moment was when we were at the pizza place getting lunch. Host mom wanted to order a shrimp pizza and couldn't understand why I didn't want to order it. She told me to just take the shrimp off, and I tried explaining that the whole pizza is still going to taste like shrimp. The whole day was filled with moments where I wanted to kill her and then 10 seconds later she would do something cute and I would like her again. For example, I cooked dinner that night for the family. I made them penne and meatballs and homemade garlic bread. Host mom knew I was making dinner but ended up missing it because she stayed at her mom's house for a very long time. I was a little annoyed at her since I took the time to cook mostly for her. But later on in the night I hear her say to host dad "Yeobo (honey), come and look at me!" I peek my head out my bedroom door and there she is parading around in her new boots and mini skirt she bought while we were shopping with the biggest smile on her face. It was sooo adorable. As with everything here, just when I think I'm tired of it all, something happens that makes me realize how glad I am that I'm here.
Still not sure what we're going to end up doing because shes currently yelling at my host sister because she had the same exact reaction I did.
Just had to share because this is the story of my life in Korea.
UPDATE: We ended up going shopping in the end (thank god). Shopping was an experience in itself. I don't know if its a Korean thing or that my host mom is just weird, but she has no sense of appropriate social rules. For example, she doesn't ever follow the rule of standing in a line. If there is a line at the cash register, she just walks up to the front and butts in front of everyone. I always try to point it out to her that there is a line, but she always tells me I'm wrong. Lately I've just given up and let her go and get yelled at by people. Another interesting moment was when we were at the pizza place getting lunch. Host mom wanted to order a shrimp pizza and couldn't understand why I didn't want to order it. She told me to just take the shrimp off, and I tried explaining that the whole pizza is still going to taste like shrimp. The whole day was filled with moments where I wanted to kill her and then 10 seconds later she would do something cute and I would like her again. For example, I cooked dinner that night for the family. I made them penne and meatballs and homemade garlic bread. Host mom knew I was making dinner but ended up missing it because she stayed at her mom's house for a very long time. I was a little annoyed at her since I took the time to cook mostly for her. But later on in the night I hear her say to host dad "Yeobo (honey), come and look at me!" I peek my head out my bedroom door and there she is parading around in her new boots and mini skirt she bought while we were shopping with the biggest smile on her face. It was sooo adorable. As with everything here, just when I think I'm tired of it all, something happens that makes me realize how glad I am that I'm here.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Beijing photos
Guard in Tianenmen Square
Beijing street market
Beijing airport
Tianenment Square
My tour group
Tianenmen Square
Entrance to the Forbidden City
all of these white stone is jade
Live scorpions
yummy
At the Empress's garden
In my rickshaw
Some of the very poor areas we saw.
At the sacrificial temple.
TV screen at "The Place"
In order to get to our boat tour, we had to take the steps up through this dragon.
On our boat tour of the mountains...we were freezing!
on our boat
Host mom and I
On the Great Wall
BEIJING
I've been meaning to write a post about my recent trip to Beijing, but the task seemed pretty daunting and I don't really know where to start with my story. I'll do my best...
Last weekend I went on a 4 day trip to Beijing with my host mom and host sister. I was fortunate to be allowed to take Friday and Monday off from school for this trip. The idea for this trip originated when I told my host mom a while ago that I've always wanted to go to the Great Wall, and that I hoped I would be able to go while I was in Korea. She had mentioned that she had always wanted to go to, and the next thing you know we were looking at tour packages online. If it were up to me, I would have never chosen to go on a group tour, let alone a Korean group tour, but she was willing to do the work, and the price was very cheap. She took care of booking a tour that included going to the Great Wall of China. I was a little bit wary about going on a tour that would be given in Korean, with a bunch of other Koreans, but I figured it would be an interesting experience. I also found out after we made our tour plans that the reason the tour was so cheap was because it was one of those time share-type deals where you have to listen to people sell you things for part of the trip. But again, I figured it might be entertaining.
I definitely got what I asked for out of the trip. At the very least, I have some interesting stories. I would say about 75% of the trip was really good and it was a great opportunity to bond with my host family and to see some incredible and historic sites. 25% of the trip was hell and I wanted to rip my hair out or run away with one of the many groups of white English-speakers that I saw.
Before I tell you about what we actually did on the tour (because we did A LOT), let me describe to you some of the people in my Korean tour group. First there was an old woman, who I was told was over 80 years old. It turns out she owns a big building in the most popular shopping district in Seoul...so needless to say, she was loaded. She was the only one to buy something at every shady tourist trap they took us to (and not cheap things). She also flew first class by herself there and back. Then there was a man who wore a light gray tracksuit and purple tinted glasses the entire time, who was the spitting imagine of Kim Jung Il. I tried to get a picture of him inconspicuously, but without any success. The most interesting member of our tour group happened (unfortunately) to be my bus partner. She was a middle-aged Korean woman who weighed about 90lbs and had a short manly haircut. From the moment I saw her I knew she wasn't normal. She was traveling alone, which was unusual. She never smiled and had big dark sunglasses on in the airport. She never took her big dark sunglasses off the entire trip, even though it was cloudy and foggy the entire time. She even wore them at night on the bus. She also liked to randomly punch me or grab my shoulder and say something to me in Korean, and then proceeded to stare at me intently like she actually expected me to answer her. She seemed miserable the entire trip, minus a brief break in character where she bought me a sweet potato from the side of the road.
The other people on the tour were all very kind, and enjoyed using the few English phrases they knew on me.
Now let me give you a rundown of my schedule during the 4 day trip. I'm pretty sure that this trip was the busiest 4 days of my entire life. Everyday we got up at 5:30 am for breakfast and didn't return home to our hotel until 9:30 at night. Here was my itinerary for the trip:
FRIDAY:
1. Chinese shopping district modeled after a traditional shopping street
2. Tianenmen Square- My favorite part of the trip. It was really surreal being there and incredible to see such an iconic building in person.
3. Walk through the Forbidden City- Also surreal. The city is gigantic and the buildings are beautiful.
4. Homeless people- There are many many homeless people and beggars around the touristy areas in Beijing. If there is one word I could use to describe the people of Beijing, it would be "shady". I was a little afraid of some of these beggars because they were pretty aggressive. However, at one point during our touring, a little boy who was only about 4 or 5 years old and covered in dirt came up to me and started pulling on my sweater and asking for money. It was one of the sadder things I've seen in life and I'm still upset about it now. I didn't give him any money because I knew it would go to whoever was making him do it, but I felt horrible afterwards. I wanted to bring him home with me.
5. Wangfujing- Upscale shopping area. Behind the expensive stores there was a traditional market area. We were told by our tour guide that the market was famous for the weird food they sold, such as scorpions. When my host mom told me this, I immediately wanted to go and try them. I really enjoy trying weird food, just so that I'm able to say, "One time I ate __(insert weird food name here)__." We found the food stands with scorpions and sea horses for sale. The scorpions were impaled on skewers and were all still moving. Luckily, the men cooked the scorpions on a grill and put some spicy powder on them. I was able to talk my host mom into trying them with me, and surprisingly they weren't horrible. I almost bought a sea horse too, but they're too cute and I felt like I would be sent to hell for eating one.
6. Chinese circus- The last tourist stop of our day was at a very ghetto and very shady Chinese Circus. It was very obviously a tourist trap. I'm pretty sure the children in the show are forced into labor, and I would also aim to guess that the music for the show was played on a shotty CD player backstage. At least the kids were actually good at what they did though.
7. Hotel- One of the better aspects of the tour was that we were able to stay in a 5 star hotel. I shared a room with my host family which I think ended up being a good bonding experience. The hotel room was beautiful and we had a real shower, comfortable beds, and CNN. We also had American breakfast that I was thrilled with, but the Koreans were upset about. I secretly got some satisfaction that the tables had been turned on my host family for that brief instance.
SATURDAY
1. Empress's Garden- Early in the morning we went to a garden that was built by an Empress when she ruled over China. The garden was eerily beautiful since the morning fog was there and the garden was built around a giant man-made pond. One thing to mention about this trip, specifically at these gardens, is that I was constantly being asked/forced to be in pictures with complete strangers. This has happened once or twice in Korea, but it happened at least six or seven times on my trip. It was kind of surprising since there were foreigners everywhere, but I just chalked it up to the fact that most of the foreigners were old and ex-hippies which mean they aren't looking too hot nowadays. Normally I don't mind the attention, and I usually think its pretty funny. However, I think it may have freaked out my host mom and sister, as well as the other Koreans in my group a little.
2. Pillow shop- The first shady place that they took us to was a place that sells Latex pillows and mattresses. As per usual, I didn't understand what my host mom meant when she said we were going to the Latex shopping center. What ended up happening was that they led us through the pillow factory into a tiny room where they tried to sell us Latex pillows and mattresses for 20 minutes in Korean. I fell asleep right away (Sidenote: I took about 30 naps throughout the trip. Every time we got back on the bus I fell asleep.)
3. Rickshaw Ride- The next stop on the tour was to experience a ride in a Chinese rickshaw. We got off the bus and were led down a sketchy side alley where we were met by a bunch of run-down, toothless men with rickshaws that were attached to broken bikes. Since I was the third wheel in my family the whole trip, I had to sit in my own rickshaw. We rode around in a line through the back streets of Beijing for about an hour. Never in my life have I felt like a bigger douche-bag. I was sitting with a blanket on my lap with my nice winter coat on and my Nikon around my neck while we were riding past people who lived in the tiniest of houses (some of which could have been described as garages) all of which were fallen apart. I wish I could've gotten better pictures of the area, because I have never seen anything like it before. It was very sad. I kept thinking that if I took one of these people to the US and showed them my house, they would have a heart attack. I'm slowly learning just how fortunate I have been in life.
4. Lunch at a restaurant owned by North Koreans
5. Art Show
6. Tried to be sold Chinese medicine
7. Sacrificial Temple- Beautiful, like every other temple I've been to.
8. Chinese Ballet- One of my other favorite parts of the trip. Unlike the circus, this was a real performance with amazing special effects and at one point, a real waterfall flowing down the entire stage. It was a combination of ballet, modern dance, and acrobatics and it told an ancient Chinese legend about a Queen and King who fell in love. It was absolutely amazing and beautiful.
9. Chinese food dinner- The only Chinese food we ate the entire time :(
10. The Place- Before going to bed, we stopped at a shopping area called "The Place". The interesting thing about this place was the gigantic IMAX-like TV screen that was hanging from the ceiling outside. I've never seen anything like it.
SUNDAY:
1. Boat tour of the mountains- We drove about an hour and a half to a deserted tourist village in the mountains where we ended up taking a boat ride on a peaceful river through the mountains. It was very serene and extremely cold. It was nice to see another side of Beijing besides the inner city, very busy touristy areas.
2. The Great Wall- This was the best part and the biggest disappointment of the trip. The whole reason the idea for the trip even came up was because I had said I wanted to go to the Great Wall. We ended up going and the Wall itself was incredible, but we were only allowed to spend 30 minutes there. It was barely enough time to walk up and back on one small portion of the Wall. I was very disappointed and almost cried when they made me leave. I definitely need to go back there at some point in my life and hike along the wall for a day.
3-6. Many hours of being sold shit- It was at this point in the trip that I lost my patience and was absolutely miserable. Besides being tired and having spent 3 days with a bunch of Koreans, I then had to sit through about 6 hours of people trying to sell me things I don't want or need in Korean. I think it was the worst I've felt since leaving the US, and I got very homesick. Luckily, as per usual, it only lasted a short while, and I felt much better by the end of the night.
7. Foot massage- The final stop of our Korean tour of Beijing was a massage parlor that I think is specifically geared towards tourist groups. The whole placed looked kind of dirty, but once again I figured it would be interesting so I went along with it. We ended up getting pretty good foot massages...unfortunately, mine was given to me by a guy who was probably not much older than me who I'm pretty sure has never touched a young white female. He looked absolutely scared/excited out of his mind. He smiled at me creepily the entire time and apparently told my host mom that his heart was beating fast when he massaged my leg. Super creepy...but maybe he'll always remember that young white girl with the old Korean men and women who he got touch.
That was my Korean tour. My overall perception of Beijing was that it was foggy, overcrowded, beautiful, shady, polluted, and the most foreign place I have ever been to. My friends here have a joke that South Korea is the opposite of Jamaica...I'm not really sure how it came about, but I definitely agreed. However, I've since learned that Beijing is the TRUE opposite of Jamaica.
So would I ever go on a group tour ever again? Hell no...especially not a Korean group tour. While it was nice not having to worry about transportation or how to get anywhere or what to see, and it was also nice being able to see so many things in such a short amount of time, it was not worth it. 99% of the time I had no idea what was going on or where we were going to next, since the itinerary changed constantly. My host mom's explanations of things usually only confused me more. One of my least favorite part was only being allowed 30 minutes in almost every place we went to. My favorite part about traveling is being able to take pictures, and on this trip I was constantly being rushed everywhere and running to catch up with the group, which was not conducive for picture taking. I also only ate Chinese food once (shitty Chinese food) the whole time we were in China which was disappointing.
Someone once told that all you have at the end of life are your stories, so at the very least I can say I've gained some good stories from this experience. My host mom is already talking about our next trip together in the spring, so let's hope I can talk my way out of a Korean tour of wherever we go to.
*I'll post my pictures very soon!
Last weekend I went on a 4 day trip to Beijing with my host mom and host sister. I was fortunate to be allowed to take Friday and Monday off from school for this trip. The idea for this trip originated when I told my host mom a while ago that I've always wanted to go to the Great Wall, and that I hoped I would be able to go while I was in Korea. She had mentioned that she had always wanted to go to, and the next thing you know we were looking at tour packages online. If it were up to me, I would have never chosen to go on a group tour, let alone a Korean group tour, but she was willing to do the work, and the price was very cheap. She took care of booking a tour that included going to the Great Wall of China. I was a little bit wary about going on a tour that would be given in Korean, with a bunch of other Koreans, but I figured it would be an interesting experience. I also found out after we made our tour plans that the reason the tour was so cheap was because it was one of those time share-type deals where you have to listen to people sell you things for part of the trip. But again, I figured it might be entertaining.
I definitely got what I asked for out of the trip. At the very least, I have some interesting stories. I would say about 75% of the trip was really good and it was a great opportunity to bond with my host family and to see some incredible and historic sites. 25% of the trip was hell and I wanted to rip my hair out or run away with one of the many groups of white English-speakers that I saw.
Before I tell you about what we actually did on the tour (because we did A LOT), let me describe to you some of the people in my Korean tour group. First there was an old woman, who I was told was over 80 years old. It turns out she owns a big building in the most popular shopping district in Seoul...so needless to say, she was loaded. She was the only one to buy something at every shady tourist trap they took us to (and not cheap things). She also flew first class by herself there and back. Then there was a man who wore a light gray tracksuit and purple tinted glasses the entire time, who was the spitting imagine of Kim Jung Il. I tried to get a picture of him inconspicuously, but without any success. The most interesting member of our tour group happened (unfortunately) to be my bus partner. She was a middle-aged Korean woman who weighed about 90lbs and had a short manly haircut. From the moment I saw her I knew she wasn't normal. She was traveling alone, which was unusual. She never smiled and had big dark sunglasses on in the airport. She never took her big dark sunglasses off the entire trip, even though it was cloudy and foggy the entire time. She even wore them at night on the bus. She also liked to randomly punch me or grab my shoulder and say something to me in Korean, and then proceeded to stare at me intently like she actually expected me to answer her. She seemed miserable the entire trip, minus a brief break in character where she bought me a sweet potato from the side of the road.
The other people on the tour were all very kind, and enjoyed using the few English phrases they knew on me.
Now let me give you a rundown of my schedule during the 4 day trip. I'm pretty sure that this trip was the busiest 4 days of my entire life. Everyday we got up at 5:30 am for breakfast and didn't return home to our hotel until 9:30 at night. Here was my itinerary for the trip:
FRIDAY:
1. Chinese shopping district modeled after a traditional shopping street
2. Tianenmen Square- My favorite part of the trip. It was really surreal being there and incredible to see such an iconic building in person.
3. Walk through the Forbidden City- Also surreal. The city is gigantic and the buildings are beautiful.
4. Homeless people- There are many many homeless people and beggars around the touristy areas in Beijing. If there is one word I could use to describe the people of Beijing, it would be "shady". I was a little afraid of some of these beggars because they were pretty aggressive. However, at one point during our touring, a little boy who was only about 4 or 5 years old and covered in dirt came up to me and started pulling on my sweater and asking for money. It was one of the sadder things I've seen in life and I'm still upset about it now. I didn't give him any money because I knew it would go to whoever was making him do it, but I felt horrible afterwards. I wanted to bring him home with me.
5. Wangfujing- Upscale shopping area. Behind the expensive stores there was a traditional market area. We were told by our tour guide that the market was famous for the weird food they sold, such as scorpions. When my host mom told me this, I immediately wanted to go and try them. I really enjoy trying weird food, just so that I'm able to say, "One time I ate __(insert weird food name here)__." We found the food stands with scorpions and sea horses for sale. The scorpions were impaled on skewers and were all still moving. Luckily, the men cooked the scorpions on a grill and put some spicy powder on them. I was able to talk my host mom into trying them with me, and surprisingly they weren't horrible. I almost bought a sea horse too, but they're too cute and I felt like I would be sent to hell for eating one.
6. Chinese circus- The last tourist stop of our day was at a very ghetto and very shady Chinese Circus. It was very obviously a tourist trap. I'm pretty sure the children in the show are forced into labor, and I would also aim to guess that the music for the show was played on a shotty CD player backstage. At least the kids were actually good at what they did though.
7. Hotel- One of the better aspects of the tour was that we were able to stay in a 5 star hotel. I shared a room with my host family which I think ended up being a good bonding experience. The hotel room was beautiful and we had a real shower, comfortable beds, and CNN. We also had American breakfast that I was thrilled with, but the Koreans were upset about. I secretly got some satisfaction that the tables had been turned on my host family for that brief instance.
SATURDAY
1. Empress's Garden- Early in the morning we went to a garden that was built by an Empress when she ruled over China. The garden was eerily beautiful since the morning fog was there and the garden was built around a giant man-made pond. One thing to mention about this trip, specifically at these gardens, is that I was constantly being asked/forced to be in pictures with complete strangers. This has happened once or twice in Korea, but it happened at least six or seven times on my trip. It was kind of surprising since there were foreigners everywhere, but I just chalked it up to the fact that most of the foreigners were old and ex-hippies which mean they aren't looking too hot nowadays. Normally I don't mind the attention, and I usually think its pretty funny. However, I think it may have freaked out my host mom and sister, as well as the other Koreans in my group a little.
2. Pillow shop- The first shady place that they took us to was a place that sells Latex pillows and mattresses. As per usual, I didn't understand what my host mom meant when she said we were going to the Latex shopping center. What ended up happening was that they led us through the pillow factory into a tiny room where they tried to sell us Latex pillows and mattresses for 20 minutes in Korean. I fell asleep right away (Sidenote: I took about 30 naps throughout the trip. Every time we got back on the bus I fell asleep.)
3. Rickshaw Ride- The next stop on the tour was to experience a ride in a Chinese rickshaw. We got off the bus and were led down a sketchy side alley where we were met by a bunch of run-down, toothless men with rickshaws that were attached to broken bikes. Since I was the third wheel in my family the whole trip, I had to sit in my own rickshaw. We rode around in a line through the back streets of Beijing for about an hour. Never in my life have I felt like a bigger douche-bag. I was sitting with a blanket on my lap with my nice winter coat on and my Nikon around my neck while we were riding past people who lived in the tiniest of houses (some of which could have been described as garages) all of which were fallen apart. I wish I could've gotten better pictures of the area, because I have never seen anything like it before. It was very sad. I kept thinking that if I took one of these people to the US and showed them my house, they would have a heart attack. I'm slowly learning just how fortunate I have been in life.
4. Lunch at a restaurant owned by North Koreans
5. Art Show
6. Tried to be sold Chinese medicine
7. Sacrificial Temple- Beautiful, like every other temple I've been to.
8. Chinese Ballet- One of my other favorite parts of the trip. Unlike the circus, this was a real performance with amazing special effects and at one point, a real waterfall flowing down the entire stage. It was a combination of ballet, modern dance, and acrobatics and it told an ancient Chinese legend about a Queen and King who fell in love. It was absolutely amazing and beautiful.
9. Chinese food dinner- The only Chinese food we ate the entire time :(
10. The Place- Before going to bed, we stopped at a shopping area called "The Place". The interesting thing about this place was the gigantic IMAX-like TV screen that was hanging from the ceiling outside. I've never seen anything like it.
SUNDAY:
1. Boat tour of the mountains- We drove about an hour and a half to a deserted tourist village in the mountains where we ended up taking a boat ride on a peaceful river through the mountains. It was very serene and extremely cold. It was nice to see another side of Beijing besides the inner city, very busy touristy areas.
2. The Great Wall- This was the best part and the biggest disappointment of the trip. The whole reason the idea for the trip even came up was because I had said I wanted to go to the Great Wall. We ended up going and the Wall itself was incredible, but we were only allowed to spend 30 minutes there. It was barely enough time to walk up and back on one small portion of the Wall. I was very disappointed and almost cried when they made me leave. I definitely need to go back there at some point in my life and hike along the wall for a day.
3-6. Many hours of being sold shit- It was at this point in the trip that I lost my patience and was absolutely miserable. Besides being tired and having spent 3 days with a bunch of Koreans, I then had to sit through about 6 hours of people trying to sell me things I don't want or need in Korean. I think it was the worst I've felt since leaving the US, and I got very homesick. Luckily, as per usual, it only lasted a short while, and I felt much better by the end of the night.
7. Foot massage- The final stop of our Korean tour of Beijing was a massage parlor that I think is specifically geared towards tourist groups. The whole placed looked kind of dirty, but once again I figured it would be interesting so I went along with it. We ended up getting pretty good foot massages...unfortunately, mine was given to me by a guy who was probably not much older than me who I'm pretty sure has never touched a young white female. He looked absolutely scared/excited out of his mind. He smiled at me creepily the entire time and apparently told my host mom that his heart was beating fast when he massaged my leg. Super creepy...but maybe he'll always remember that young white girl with the old Korean men and women who he got touch.
That was my Korean tour. My overall perception of Beijing was that it was foggy, overcrowded, beautiful, shady, polluted, and the most foreign place I have ever been to. My friends here have a joke that South Korea is the opposite of Jamaica...I'm not really sure how it came about, but I definitely agreed. However, I've since learned that Beijing is the TRUE opposite of Jamaica.
So would I ever go on a group tour ever again? Hell no...especially not a Korean group tour. While it was nice not having to worry about transportation or how to get anywhere or what to see, and it was also nice being able to see so many things in such a short amount of time, it was not worth it. 99% of the time I had no idea what was going on or where we were going to next, since the itinerary changed constantly. My host mom's explanations of things usually only confused me more. One of my least favorite part was only being allowed 30 minutes in almost every place we went to. My favorite part about traveling is being able to take pictures, and on this trip I was constantly being rushed everywhere and running to catch up with the group, which was not conducive for picture taking. I also only ate Chinese food once (shitty Chinese food) the whole time we were in China which was disappointing.
Someone once told that all you have at the end of life are your stories, so at the very least I can say I've gained some good stories from this experience. My host mom is already talking about our next trip together in the spring, so let's hope I can talk my way out of a Korean tour of wherever we go to.
*I'll post my pictures very soon!
Monday, November 2, 2009
Halloween weekend
This past weekend I traveled around a large part of Korea. Friday I went to Busan to visit Seth and meet his host family. Friday night we all went out to dinner and then went back to their apartment and carved pumpkins with the two boys. The both did an amazing job, and the parents seemed to enjoy it as well. None of them had ever carved pumpkins before so I'm sure it was an interesting experience for them. The host dad took one of the pumpkins into his bedroom with him so he could sleep with it glowing in his room haha. Saturday was the littlest brother's birthday party so we hung around the apartment for a little while and watched the kids. Saturday we had plans to meet our friends in a town called Gwangju for a Halloween party. We took an almost 4 hour bus ride there Saturday afternoon. Our Halloween party was organized by our friend Dave, who has a friend who manages a coffee shop in the town. His friend allowed us to throw a costume party in his coffee shop after it closed. Almost everyone got dressed up and we played some games at the shop. I dressed up as my friend Cornelius. In case you haven't noticed him in my past pictures, hes the one who is always dressed in a suit and occasionally a bow tie. He's known for his ridiculous outfit choices, so I asked him to let me borrow his clothes as a costume. One of my guy friends had the same idea, so there ended up being 2 Corneliuses at the party. Sidenote: my English classroom, for some reasons unbeknown to me, has a costume closet full of adult-size costumes. I raided the closet and brought a bunch of the costumes with me to Gwangju for my friends to wear (hence the full-on Batman and Santa and Superman costumes). Needless to say, a bunch of white people dressed up in costumes roaming the streets together was not something you usually see on an average Saturday night in Korea. Everyone we passed either yelled out something in English, stopped and gawked, or asked for pictures. I can only imagine what our taxi driver thought when me, Batman, Superman and a clown climbed into his cab.
Here are some pictures from the weekend:
Jan-hee and Seth. Jan-hee is without a doubt the cutest little kid I have ever met. I'm adopting/stealing him and bringing him home with me.
Huan-hee working on his Homer Simpson pumpkin.
When one of the knives broke, Seth's host dad decided to be innovative and broke out the power tools.
Seth and his adorable host family
finished pumpkins
clown & Cornelius
Lauren dressed up as old Korean woman...I can't even tell you how dead on her costume is.
Batman roaming the streets of Gwangju
3 Corneliuses
flip cup team
Chelsey, an angel, Ursula and Waldo
Here are some pictures from the weekend:
Jan-hee and Seth. Jan-hee is without a doubt the cutest little kid I have ever met. I'm adopting/stealing him and bringing him home with me.
Huan-hee working on his Homer Simpson pumpkin.
When one of the knives broke, Seth's host dad decided to be innovative and broke out the power tools.
Seth and his adorable host family
finished pumpkins
clown & Cornelius
Lauren dressed up as old Korean woman...I can't even tell you how dead on her costume is.
Batman roaming the streets of Gwangju
3 Corneliuses
flip cup team
Chelsey, an angel, Ursula and Waldo
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