Weekends in Korea

Last weekend:

After getting paid, Andrew and I decided to go shopping for all the clothes and accessories and guitars we didn't bring to Korea with us. I got lots of clothes, and Andrew got a guitar which he's currently rocking. After shopping, we crossed the downtown river to the Land of Tiny Pets.



There is a street lined with pet stores, and each one looks pretty much the same. There are little glass cubicles lining the front windows with puppies galore. Many were sleeping, some were playing, but all were adorable. The stores themselves inside look like living rooms of homes, where puppies just go wherever they want. The employees inside all looked bored, either sitting on couches or chairs. We didn't go in, since Korean retailers have a propensity to surround you and hawk-eye you until you leave or buy something. There were also cats in big elaborate cages, but they were not next to the windows.

This weekend:

We kicked of Saturday with our academy's Sports Day. All four schools, Kumho Avalon (my school), Langcon English (Andrew's school), Bongsundong Avalon, and Reading Star, competed to win fabulous prizes.

(Unfortunately, there are no pictures, since we just figured out our camera is dual voltage and so the batteries just got charged.)

The day started off by us being shuttled on luscious tour buses which ajummas (old women) use for karaoke, complete with multi colored lights in the mirrored ceiling and a microphone that stretches throughout the bus. We were taken to a train village about 45 minutes away from where we live. It was a gorgeously sunny, but slightly chilly day. There were trains everywhere in the village, and pretty landscaping, and interesting statues. We were taken to an open area, and when we all lined up in our teams, a dancing display of fountain brilliance came out of the ground accompanied by some uplifting music. About 10 minutes later, we were moved to an adjacent open area because apparently, the music wasn't going to stop for another 30 minutes and no one could hear anything. Priceless.

Some highlights of the day:
Andrew and I and six other unlucky souls were made to drink vinegar to win points for our team. (No one felt quite so good in their stomachs after that).
Women's soccer proved that no one had any idea of what was going on save for maybe 2 people.
Andrew was one of only three out of about 50 people to kick a shoe into a bucket in a backpack on his back.
We were given a great Korean barbecue (which is only barbecued meat, without sauce).

By the end of the day, we were exhausted and passed out at around 10 pm.

Yesterday, we cleaned the apartment, did laundry, and went on a long hike to find Angel-in-Us iced tea. After we enjoyed our deliciously sweet tea, we took a walk around Pugnam reservoir.



It was such a beautiful day out. We then caught a bus to go to U-Square (the bus terminal and shopping area) on a mission to find me a new iShuffle or iPod, since I forgot the dock to my shuffle back in the states. We didn't get one, but I did get myself some fancy new shoes. We then explored E-Mart, eating all the samples in the food area. Yum! As it was at Target back home, we left with more than we intended to, so we got a fancy E-Mart tote to carry it all in.



We dropped our stuff of and checked the Internet for an English menu of a chain restaurant nearby: http://maryeats.com/2006/11/16/kimbap-nara-menu/

Finding this extremely useful, we went to try something new, and I found my new favorite food: DUMPLINGS! Mmmm... gogi mandu is what it is, and it's served with soy sauce, which makes everything taste delicious.

In conclusion, we had a great couple of weekends, and hopefully in 5 more days, we'll have another!

9/11

I have never felt as old as I did today.

In one of my more advanced classes, we were reading an article about face-recognition technology being put into airports and public places to stop crimes before they happen. The beginning of the article mentioned the terrorists who hijacked the planes on September 11, 2001, and if that technology would have done anything to stop them. Just off-hand I asked if they knew what happened on 9/11, not thinking for a minute I would get so many blank looks.

I spent the next 15 minutes explaining to them what happened on that day. I told them about how I was in my Freshman high school taking a biology test when I watched the second plane hit the towers.



I realized that when this happened, they were only 3 years old. I had one ask me why they would even know about it if it happened in America. They were completely unaware of the shockwaves it sent across the globe.

Blossom Festival

The Gwangyang blossom festival takes place in the Maehwa village every March. The village has the largest concentration of apricot trees in South Korea, and the village is very proud of this reputation, so they hold a festival when the trees start blossoming. The festival originally began to bring in revenue to the village, and now it’s a huge tourist attraction. People come from all over Korea to see the trees.

Knowing all this, Andrew and I decided to take our first journey out of Gwangju to see the blossoms. We went to the Gwangju bus terminal and got a ticket straight to the Maehwa village. We had to wait about an hour for a bus, and almost got on the wrong one, but we made it. It took the bus about half an hour to work it’s way into the village because there were so many people there.

I thought it would be a little festival in someone’s apricot orchard, but that’s not what it was like at all. The streets were lined with vendors pretty much selling the exact same foods and products. There were stages set up for music and performances. We saw a drum circle, a string quartet, Korean rock music, a man singing with 10 guys in chef uniforms behind him, and an over-acting pseudo male stripper.



We hiked up the streets on the sides of the mountains and up numerous paths throughout the village where the blossom trees were. Unfortunately, because it’s been unusually cold this Spring, a lot of the trees had just started to bud. There were a several that were in full blossom, but not as many as I had hoped. That being said, no one seemed to care much about the lack of blossoming trees. The Koreans scoped out the fullest ones for the photo ops, and the festival was still packed.




There was a building set up to buy little trees and plants, pictures, and other goodies. I wanted a plant, but I tend to kill them all so I passed. I went near a table eyeing some artwork that I considered buying, and two or three Korean women took my arm and pulled me over to an area where children were playing with a canvas. They were all smiling and laughing and pointing to the steps showing me how to draw a flower with a big brush. It was a beautiful flower, if I do say so myself, and they all clapped and smiled when I completed it.

So we had been there for a couple of hours, and though we had apricot ice cream, we were starving. We went near one of the many festival tents where we saw a large pig roasting on a spit. Two of the women came over and pointed and said “barbecue” so we agreed to have some. It was absolutely fantastic. Beyond fantastic. Happy with our purchase, we go to pay, and end up paying an OBSCENE amount of money for a plate of pork and some spices. 31,000 won. 31,000 won for one plate of food. That’s about $26. Now that it’s written, we never want to think about that again.

When we got back, after being helped by multiple Koreans, one whom we’d heard speaking English to her son fluently, we went downtown to meet some friends. We went to their favorite restaurant, First Nepal, and had absolutely incredible Indian food. Beyond incredible. Then we went out to some foreigner bars and had a great time.

Today, we’re focusing on being lazy and doing laundry. We should be set up for actual Internet tomorrow and posts will become more frequent, with more picures.

Written a week from today's posting.

THREEDAYWEEKEND!
THREEDAYWEEKEND!
THREEDAYWEEKEND!

We still don’t have Internet or a cell phone, but we just our alien registration cards so those should come soon. We’re still living in the temporary apartment, but should move this Thursday. It’s getting a little chaotic living in a 20x10 foot room with three suitcases we can’t unpack, but we make due. All the junk food we are buying helps! (I’m currently eating a Cheeto that shares nothing in common with the American Cheeto besides the name, btw. Oh how badly I want a bright orange Cheeto now that I can’t have one.)

Without boring you with details of our week, let me just outline a few things:

On Tuesday we were taken to downtown Gwangju to the sprawling Chosan University Hospital for a battery of tests for our alien registration cards. Hearing test, eye test, dental check-up, chest x-ray, urine test, and last but not least, the blood test. From which I almost passed out. The two Korean guys who work at the front desks of two of our schools looked so worried. I felt so embarrassed.

I started teaching on Thursday for Katherine, who I am replacing. The new semester starts Tuesday. I teach a lot of elementary classes and two middle school classes. The kids are pretty awesome. Some are little brats, but most of them are so adorable. And funny. While discussing why they might become wax figures in Madame Tussaud’s museum, one little girl said she will solve World War 3. “Oh really? How will you do that?” I ask. “I kill everyone” she says and proceeds to giggle her head off. Another boy becomes a wax figure for becoming leader of the world. And stealing all the money of the world. It’s difficult not to laugh at some of the things they say.

We also figured out that when we’re hungry, we can’t go that wrong with just pointing at something on the menu and eating whatever comes out. Just standing around and observing what everyone else does helps us figure out what to do, too.

And speaking of food, there is a pizza place on the corner near our schools (which are directly across the street from one another) called Nanta pizza that is just fantastic. If the rain doesn’t get any worse we’ve got to get some tonight. If I could get garlic dipping sauce with it, I would say it’s as delicious as Papa John’s.

It’s now Saturday. Monday is a holiday that the Koreans aren’t even really sure of. Something that has to do with something that happened in the 50’s when Japan invaded. Or so we were told. Moral of the story, the kids don’t have school and we don’t have work.

Today we took a journey to E-Mart in Sangmu, which is just another district in Gwangju. E-Mart is a 4 story department store which stands out due to it’s gigantic orange sign with a Greek-looking ‘E’ on it. Right across the highway was a hiking path up a little mountain with a three-story pagoda thing on it. It was a very beautiful view at the top. The whole city of Gwangju is surrounded by mountains. Not Everest-sized by any means, but still lends a great vista.



We also visited a memorial to the May 18th Student Uprising that occurred in 1999, I believe. It was pretty impressive, if you take away the 4 or 5 teens dressed up as Japanese Anime characters posing for pictures within the tall metal poles.

The city is MUCH bigger than I thought it was. We haven’t even scratched the surface. Katherine left me a tourist map of the city and there are many cultural places to visit in just this one city. I can’t wait until we’re more settled so we can begin traveling more.


Next weekend:

Andrew and I went out bowling Friday night with some other ex-pats from the neighborhood. One of them was telling us about a place downtown called The Underground Grocer (as in the London underground, we discovered!). It's a store run by a Canadian who came here 15 years ago to teach. Now he has a Korean wife and daughter. There are a lot of American products that are super expensive, about $19 for a big box of Cheerios, but they have stuff to make tacos! And speaking of tacos, he just opened up a restaurant next door with a small menu of comfort food for all the foreign teachers from the UK, US, and Canada in the area. There are tacos, chicken and dumplings, a burrito, and some other things on the menu for now. It was a soft open, so he asked us to make some suggestions on his Facebook page. Right across the back alley is a restaurant just opened by a Chinese guy with real Chinese food, not Korean-Chinese, which we have heard is terrible. So now we know where to get what we need to be able to survive those hard times. The tacos were really good, but at about $3 a taco, we won't be eating there every weekend.

PC Rooms

I have a post all ready to go on the laptop back at the apartment about the previous week which I will post as soon as I can, but I'm currently at a PC Room down the street. They're gaming rooms that you will find all over the place. Computer games are huge over here, (Starcraft even has it's own channel dedicated to it, like an ESPN kinda thing) so we asked to use a computer for Internet instead. The guy at the counter spoke enough English to get what we were wanting, but put us at the back of the room at the very last computers with big monster monitors and cigarette burns on the tables. The other 54 computers have nice new flat screen monitors. I know those babies must be connected to the Internet too. :-I.

Today is the very first day that I have been on the verge of selling all my possesions for some tacos and guacamole. I have 365 days to go. How will I make it without? Maybe I will start up my own taco stand in Korea and be famous for bringing them their new favorite food...

Fade in.
We see Cayce sitting in bed, a bed with lavender frills and embroidered lavender flower blossoms upon a lavender quilt and lavender frill pillows.
Gwangju, South Korea. The time: 9:33 PM. The date: February 19, 2010.

It took 23 hours to get here. We flew Asiana Airlines from Chicago to Seoul, which was a 13 hour flight. I slept most of the time, minus dinner (delish), and a snack (tomato, carrot, lettuce sandwich), Surrogates (very underwhelming), and breakfast (omelet fest 5000). I surely don’t feel like I slept all that time, but I don’t remember doing anything else. I won’t bore you with all the travel details because nothing of any real interest occurred, but I will say that every Korean we have met so far has been extremely helpful and kind.

We got picked up by the airport by a fellow whose name so much resembled the man we interviewed with and had been in contact with up until this point, that we didn’t understand why this man could speak very little English when it had been flawless up until that point. Turns out it was someone different. He took us to our apartment, which is barely larger than our previous bedroom. The bed’s pieces were laying on the floor and the mattress was up against the wall and we didn’t have even a moment to look at the other 3 feet of the apartment before we were whisked away to the Avalon Kumho campus. We met two Korean teachers whose English was pretty limited. One of them (whose name we still can’t figure out) and the man who picked us up from the airport took us to lunch at some unnamed restaurant near our place. We sat in a little room with its own door on the floor on little pillows. The floors were heated and it felt great.

There was a lot of awkward silence and a lot of the two Koreans amusingly watch me and Andrew try to use chopsticks with grace. We had some kind of soup thing made of a ton of veggies and a meat which I originally thought was dog. I’d heard it from so many people as a sort of joke that maybe when I heard “duck” pronounced with an accent the idea of eating a puppy leaked into my subconscious. So the entire time I’m eating I’m try to mentally force the idea out of my head that I was eating Shiloh. After lunch, Andrew and I were left alone in the van and after I turned to him and said “I can’t believe the first thing they fed us was dog” he informed me I had misheard. Glad that’s off my conscience.

We then went to Bongsundong campus, which is the larger one where we thought we would be at and met the teachers at Reading Star and Avalon. They were all really nice and welcoming and all seemed to be having a good time. We met Sue, the director of Reading Town with whom we had previously interviewed, and Joey, who we had been corresponding with. Joey took us around and sat with us for about an hour and answered all our questions.

We were then taken back to our apartment where someone came over and installed the bed and the “closet,” which is really some poles with curtains over them. But I like the way it looks. He then took us to LotteMart where we bought some essentials and some food. Unfortunately, since we don’t live with any other teachers in our building, there’s nothing to be passed down to us. Oh well. A $2 gold pot with a plastic handle can do wonders, I’m sure.

(Interlude)

I'm currently getting a wireless signal from our small, cold bathroom. So I'm taking advantage of the Internet while we have it!

It's now Sunday evening. Andrew and I spent the weekend exploring this part of the neighborhood. Since no one knows where we live, we were on our own but passed one of the teachers we'd met the night before walking down the street. So they're around here somewhere. I think I've watched more TV in the last two days than I have the whole year previous. There is such a random mixture of English movies and shows on Korean cable . I went from watching the re-make of The Parent Trap with Lindsey Lohan to watching a marathon of Without a Trace.

It's not as foreign here as I would have thought. I feel safe here, I feel comfortable. I'm only nervous when it comes to trying to order food without knowing what I'm getting or how to order. But isn't that the fun of living in a new culture?

We met a lot of the teachers at both campuses in Gwangju. Tomorrow one of the staff is taking us to the hospital to get tests in order to get our alien registration cards. After those come, we should be able to get cell phones and Internet and finally be able to communicate. I'll post pictures as soon as I can.

Our love to everyone back home!

Kimchi!

To see just what we've gotten ourselves into, we took a trip to Asia Mart yesterday on a mission for kimchi, one of the foods Korea is most known for. Basically, kimchi is pickled vegetables. I stumbled upon a fun fact while Googling 'kimchi': It's so popular that the Korea Aerospace Research Institute developed space kimchi for all those homesick astronauts out there. The most popular vegetable to use is cabbage, and that's the kind we got.



We had to search everywhere in Asia Mart because we had no idea where to find it. Finally, I saw an older man and woman getting into the refrigerators by the fish counter and pulling out a large jar of what I thought looked like kimchi. As I stood behind them and waited, the old man turns and looks at me and says, "Kimchi! You want kimchi!?" in an excited/ surprised voice. Jackpot!

When we opened it, we tentatively smelled it to decide whether or not to proceed. It's a subtle peppery smell which is not completely foreign. I'm still not sure what to think of it. The spices are good, but the veggie taste is what gets me. I guess if cabbage is not slathered in mayo or coated in butter, I don't much care for it. However, I think it's a taste I can get used to. There are many other veggies used in kimchi, too. Perhaps I would prefer cucumber kimchi!

We also got a little juice box from Korea which was banana flavored soy milk. It was good!

Anyway, only 10 days left before we board the plane!