Philippines!!!

This summer vacation, 3 Canadian friends and myself decided to head to the Philippines for a quick 11-day vacation. We stayed 2 nights in Manila and then we stayed 9 nights on Boracay island. Boracay island has been consistently rated the number 1 beach in the world and after staying there for 9 nights I can understand why. The beach was phenomenal! Powdery white sand with gorgeous crystal blue water that was absolutely perfect for swimming, snorkeling or just swimming around in. But, starting from the beginning..

In the Incheon airport we met a dude from Texas who told us he had a house in the Philippines and being the rubes that we are and doing little to no research before we went we asked him where we should stay in Manila. We took his advice and stayed at a hotel on the street in which he claimed to be the best in Manila…

First off, once we got into the taxi in Manila, it was an immediate culture shock… just some of the buildings, some of the living conditions we saw and all of the prostitution and drugs that were offered to us was just a complete culture shock and quite an eye opener.

So Manila was gross and we were able to dodge the Viagra and prostitutes. 2 nights in Manila felt like an eternity but I’m glad we did it just to get the experience. It also really opens your eyes and makes you realize that it’s out there. Growing up in the Midwest you don’t really come across many situations like that. There were also a lot of kids coming out of the woodwork to beg and pester foreigners for change. That’s also quite eye opening. Kids tugging on your arm, wearing tattered clothes asking for change is quite powerful. I also saw a few mothers, as skinny as a bean pole, breastfeeding in public asking for change as well… powerful stuff.

So we headed off to part two of our trip, Boracay Island. It normally is an adventure getting to anyways, but it was raining at the airport we were suppose to land at so we had to land at an airport on the other side of the island and take a bus to the original airport which ended up being about a 2 ½ hr bus ride which was an unfortunate kink in our plan. Just to give you an idea of what we had to do to get there was we had to take a plane from Manila to Caticlan, except it was raining in Caticlan so we were dropped off at a mystery airport on the other side of the island and bussed to Caticlan, after we got to Caticlan we had to take a taxi, which is just a small motorcycle with a makeshift side car, to the port in which we were then brought to Boracay. Once on Boracay we had to take another taxi to the beach where we wanted to stay.

Once we finally got to the place where we wanted to stay we bargained with the lady at the front desk and got her down to the Paso equivalent of $9 a night, per person. Overall Boracay was beautiful! The beach was phenomenal but there were other aspects of the island that were much less plensent like all of the vendors on the island trying to sell you a jet skiing, parasailing or atv’ing experience which got quite annoying but overall the beach and the entire experience was unforgettable !!!

World Cup Fever!

This weekend was the beginning of the world cup… Which is a big soccer tournament for those reading this that are in the states and don’t know what the world cup is! I had a few friends that I went to school with come down for Seoul for the weekend as well so it was nice to have some familiar faces around as well. Even though I’m sure it was probably much more crazy in Seoul than it was in Daegu, Daegu still did well for us! I’ve never experienced anything like it in my life! It was insane! There was a huge celebration complemented by fireworks at the start of South Korea’s first game. The park that we decided to go to was literally packed with people… literally. I’ve never seen that many people packed into that big of an area before. We got there a half hr before the game started and we were WAY too late. I heard of a few people who got there 2 hrs early and still couldn’t find a seat. Looking over the sea of red you notice beer being consumed, kimbob being eaten and red horns that light up on top of heads. It was quite the sight. We had a small hill the we deemed ours but it wasn’t that great of a spot because you couldn’t see the game, so we decided to trek over and try and find a seat closer where you might actually be able to see the game. Unsuccessful. It’s hard to imagine being in a park, with one absolutely enormous projection and two smaller one’s set up on the sides and still not being able to see a thing but that’s literally what was happening. The people on the edges, who couldn’t see, opted to watch on handheld TV’s or find nearby stores, coffee shops or bars that were broadcasting the game, which wasn’t hard to find because any and every bar that had a TV was broadcasting the game.

Korea defeats Greece 2-0! The scene was wild in downtown Daegu as well. There were people driving cars slowly, packed with people, front back and most of the cars had the trunk open with 2-3 people sitting in back, chanting the Korean equivalent of (U! S! A!). The USA team played England that night as well, but with the time difference it wasn’t being aired till 3:30 in the morning Korean time so needless to say ALL of the brits and many American’s conjugated to a place downtown that was big enough to fit everyone. There was quite a bit of shit talking before during and after the game but in the end it was a draw, another exciting game of soccer… but the comradery was great and everyone was there for a good time so it was a blast! All in all, besides a few breaks for food, we were out and about from 5 in the afternoon till 6 in the morning! It was a bit disheartening walking out of the bar at 5:30 in the morning and seeing the sun. Never a good feeling. Anyways, the weekend was a blast and I think my friends had a great time as well!

Buddha's B-Day and New Co Teacher.

Thursday afternoon we headed to the bus station after work, we had Friday off because of Buddha’s birthday so we decided to take a little trip and get away for a while. Some 13 friends and I decided to head to Sunyudo Island off the west coast of Korea. It was phenomenal! We had a private ferry from Gunsan to Sunyudo as well as transportation from Gunsan to the ferry which of course was not free but still very convenient, much more convenient than if we had taken the public route.

Friday was gorgeous. Partly cloudy and about 74 when we arrived on what looked like was a half deserted island. It seemed fairly barren and there was only one undersized, family ran convenience store near our beach house, which sold the essentials, and what we lived on for the next two days – Hite beer, and ramen noodles. The ‘downtown’ was composed of about a dozen stores and a couple restaurants scattered in the middle. Despite the tiny population of the island it had some of the best and most picturesque natural beauty I had ever seen. Like I said, it was unpopulated and despite the pedestrian paths, a handful of shops and a few restrooms scattered throughout, it was relatively undeveloped – it was exactly what you would think a traditional Korean island might look like.

Once we threw our bags down and claimed our rooms we decided to rent some bikes and explore the island. The bike rental place rented out single and double seater bikes as well as some small mopeds. $9 per bike for the entire day and needless to say I had to hop on a double seater to start the day! It was intense. I was seated on the back and I was controlling more of the bike than the person steering which turned out to be an adventure. We almost died about a handful of times, which ended up foreshadowing an event to come… But it was difficult to control because the roads were so curvy and Koreans ride bike significantly slower than I was used to. Anyways, once we got to the ‘downtown’ area, which was conveniently located near where you access the beach, we threw our bikes down and headed out to explore. As we were biking down to the beach access area we were passing by Korean families and westerners alike grilling and drinking beer along the beachside and underneath some hard to come by shade. It was beautiful and a well needed getaway from the busy workweek. There was a rocky area that leaded to another VERY small island which besides the small hiking path connecting one end of the other and a few empty beers bottles, it looked like we were the first people to ever step foot on the island. After we hung out on the tiny island for a bit longer and had a couple more beers we decided we needed some food.

On our way back to the main island there were small pods of Koreans, hovering around small patches of the beach shouting like they were watching a horse race. As we got closer, we noticed they were pulling back areas of the beach with a deformed shovel that exposed numerous small holes hidden underneath. At first glance they looked like tiny little holes that would never excite anybody, but after we watched for a bit we noticed they were pouring salt from a small Dixie cup on top of these holes, waiting a few seconds and grabbing what looked to be another life form popping up from underground. It was intense! And a team effort as well. One person was controlling the shovel, while one person had the salt and there were maybe two or three people plucking because the window of opportunity to grab these slimy little bastards was quite small. I’m ashamed to say it, but it was quite scary. The first time I tried to grab one, it slipped through my fingers and as it did I took a quick three steps back and screamed like a little girl. It was weird; I knew I wasn’t going to catch it. I was thinking in my head, “I know I’m not going to catch this and it’s going to scare the shit out of me!” I think my anticipation of being scared made me more scared and it just kind of blew up all at once. It was actually quite embarrassing. I take a look around and ALL of my friends are grabbing them like it’s their job and I’m literally the only one who hadn’t caught one yet. So, I give it another try, crack the shell, and then throw it in the bucket where the rest of the snails were being kept. Apparently it’s worthless if the shell is cracked but I threw it in anyways and hung up my snail catching jersey for the day. I THINK it was a snail anyways. It was a long and narrow (about the size of 2 new pencils put next to each other). It was quite strange.

I decided to take a nap slightly earlier than the people I was with, so I stole a single seater bike and headed back to the beach house. On my way back on the narrow, curved and ever so crowded road I took a bit of a spill. I was flying past families because everyone rides a bicycle in Korea like they had literally just taken training wheels off yesterday. It was so slow I couldn’t handle it. So I’m flying past families, children, old people and as I’m heading down a fairly steep decline I see a family coming around the bend so I, for some reason, decided to only slam on one break instead of easing into the break or ideally, using both breaks… remember, I had been drinking, I wanted to get out of the sun and I could feel that nap a mile away. ANYWAYS, the right handles break turns out to control the front break instead of the back break, which is how bikes are designed back home. Soooo, the front tire locks up and I superman over the handle bars, but don’t worry, my face and entire left side of my body, which was being protected by an ultra thin basketball jersey, broke my fall. I remember my face hitting the pavement and the next thing I remember is that Korean family, whom I was trying to avoid, is now up in my face, I think asking me if I’m okay in Korean. I get away from the concerned mob, bike the 3 minutes back to the beach house and take the most painful shower of my life. That was Friday; I still had to tough it out for Friday night and all day Saturday and Sunday which turned out to be the most terrible two and a half days ever because I couldn’t sleep because of my arm and every shirt I put on would be instantly ruined because of the light yellow ooze coming from my arm.

It was actually quite fascinating how little I knew about first aid after this debacle, and how much everyone else thought they knew. “You need to wash it Mayo, it’s gonna get infected if you don’t” says person number 1. “You can’t put water on it, that just makes the yellow stuff come out and increases chances of infection” says person number 2. I didn’t really know what to do so I just kind of humored everyone and took the least painful routs of everyone’s advice. Surprisingly it didn’t get infected and I never had to amputate my arm so all is well. I thought I got stares before this accident for being a foreigner … now I had a black and blue eye and yellow ooze coming from my arm… people are literally terrified of me!

Back in school all is well and not much new… I’m actually getting a new co teacher, which I’m pretty bummed about because I get along really well with the one I have now and she has really helped me out with a lot of documentation crap that needs to be done seemingly every week. She also speaks really good English and I can communicate with her really well, much better than any other teacher at my school. Anyways, the teacher that I’ve been kind of tutoring every now and then is a head teacher which basically means she’s an important homeroom teacher that has to do more paperwork than regular teachers. I don’t think there many perks. Anyways, I was joking with her about who we were going to hire next as an English teacher… I explained to her that we had two check marks… young, and pretty. She explained to me that these were recent graduates from the Korean Education University so they were already young; we just had a question mark in the pretty category. I was of course kidding but I think this was one of the ‘lost in translation’ moments and she jokingly said she was going to call her and ask her if she was pretty. I sarcastically said, “Okay Sister Kim, that’s a really good idea.” Annnd she proceeded to actually pull out a list of all the teachers that had graduated recently grabbed her phone number off the sheet and started punching her number in. I was terrified. I don’t know what she actually said but I heard my name in there a few times and I of course got up and was walking around the room for fear of her handing me the phone… I spent the next twenty minutes of my lesson explaining to her what sarcasm is…

I’ve also noticed a few things that didn’t really catch my eye as a new teacher and more importantly, a foreigner. I’m reaching the 100% sure mark that there’s a kid that has uncontrollable turrets syndrome in one of my classes. He just sort of sits in the corner and shakes and nobody really pays any attention to him, it’s absolutely bizarre. There’s also a student I believe should be on some sort of suicide watch. He sits near the back and stares out of corners of his eyes towards the window and never says a word to anyone. He doesn’t seem to get along with any of his classmates and every time my co teacher or I try and get him to participate it’s literally like he can’t even hear us. I’m actually terrified of the kid now and am more reluctant to get him to participate. That bothered me at first but when you see as many students as I do in a day you start to realize that not every student is going to participate all the time. If you can get a 9/10 of the class participating and having fun, that’s a victory in my book. They don’t have special ed. classes here so there are disabled kids sprinkled into my classes, which makes for some interesting classes. There’s this one kid in one of my grade five classes that brings a plastic zip lock bag to class, lays it out as flat as it could possibly be on his desk. He spends the first 10 minutes of class flattening this bag to his desk. My co teacher and I will peel it off his desk and put it back in his bag but as soon as we turn our backs it’s back on the desk being flattened perfectly so there are no air bubbles underneath. After he’s satisfied with how flat it gets to his desk, he peels it off, and blows it up. Once it’s blown up, he uses both hands and rubs it back and forth on the top of his head, making his hair hilariously static and a bit electric as well. The rest of the class, and occasionally my co teacher and I will find it absolutely hilarious, but come on! This is in the middle of class. Anyways, after he’s done experimenting with the friction and static of his plastic bag he gets up and starts to wonder around the room. We’ll be in the middle of a lesson and he will stand up, walk to the corner of the classroom where we have giant picture books, sit in the corner and entertain himself until my co teacher or myself physically grab him and put him back in his seat. As hilarious as it is, this kid really needs to be in a special education program. He’s not learning in my class and if anything he’s just disrupting other classmates. But that’s dynamic Korea I suppose.

Another event I think is worth noting is the hike I took with my principal and a few other teachers. It was my principal, the head teacher, a first grade teacher and the office secretary who went with. We first went into this Buddhist temple, which was not as magical as I was expecting. I don’t really know what I was expecting but it just didn’t capture me like I thought it would. Anyways, we’re heading up this enormous hill and I’m quite unprepared. I was told we were going ‘hiking’ and not mountain climbing. We ended up climbing 1084 meters or 3,556 feet and the view was spectacular. I of course didn’t bring my camera because I figured we were going hiking, not mountain climbing. My legs were literally trembling by the time we got back down to the bottom. It was actually really cool being on top of this mountain. Apparently it’s the highest mountain in Daegu and you can literally see forever. I actually felt a bit of accomplishment reaching the top of the mountain… of the seven people we went there with only 3 made it to the top. I couldn’t be too excited though because I was competing with a 60-year-old man and a 50 something woman, so I played it cool. Except once you reach the top you realize you have to trek back down, which is a pretty depressing realization.

My principal decided to start a walking class before school. I actually wouldn’t really call it a walking class as much as I would call it, ‘before school recess.’ These kids get no time to actually play and ‘be kids,’ and that’s why I think more students participate in this walking before school than I had originally thought. The average elementary student will be at school from 8:30 (without walking class) to 4:30 and then head to a hagwon (more school) for at least another 4 hours. It doesn’t seem too awful but remember, these are elementary students, aging from 7-11 years old; their schedules consist of school, school and more school from elementary all the way to high school where it gets much more intense and time consuming. They also go to school every other Saturday; Saturdays that they have off they are referred to as ‘holidays’ instead of weekends.

So, on days it’s not raining, the students have the option of coming to school before classes start to walk in circles around the playground and listen to music. It doesn’t sound too thrilling but let me tell you, it’s as entertaining as anything you’ll find on TV. During one of our teachers meetings, the principal suggested that I come early and walk around with them… at first this sounded pretty awful because getting up early and exercising isn’t really my thing, but after I did the walk a few times I really started to enjoy it. Everyday that I’m early enough to wal, how everything unfolds is like clockwork; once I’m close enough to the playground where kids start to realize that there’s a way-guk (foreigner) the, “Mayo Teacher” starts spreading through the playground like a damn wildfire. Most of the kids running up to me just come up and say, “Hello Mayo Teacher” and then scatter off, but some of the older kids who can actually formulate sentences will ask where I live, for candy or even ask for money. There is this grade 2 girl, whom I don’t have in class because I don’t teach grade 2, who literally hangs on me while I walk around the playground in the morning.

I’ve learned to keep my laptop bag on my person because I’ve brought a backpack to school before and this girl had actually taken it and hidden it on the other side of the school. While she thought it was HILLARIOUS, I didn’t quite see the same humor in it as she did… It took me about ten minutes just to get close enough to her without her breaking out in laughter to figure out where it was. It was quite a show. I would think following me around in circles might get boring after a while, but she seems like she can’t get enough of it. There are literally about 10-15 students surrounding me at any point during my walk. I wish I could get a picture of this. I tried pulling out my camera this morning but it was pointless because I had no arms to snap a picture, the kids had hijacked my arms and were using them as their personal human jungle gym. Sangwon keeps some pretty intense video footage surround the school (they probably have about 10 cameras outside the school) - I’ll check the tapes and see if they have a camera on the playground because it’s literally like a paparazzi surrounding me every morning and I really need to get some footage of this. Most of them are just following me, trying to hold my hand, jump on my back, tackle me, ask me to run, to race someone or asking me where I live for the one hundredth time.

It’s pretty fascinating how entertaining they find me. I’ve been here for two months now and they still act as if seeing me everyday is some sort of miracle. I don’t know if they’re expecting me to bounce out of this country everyday or if I just hand out the most candy in class but something is sparking these kids into a frenzy every time I’m spotted. Well that’s all for now, I did my best to take pictures today during the walking sessions and the after lunch recess. Like I said, it’s difficult to snap pictures in the morning because they hadn’t seen me in a whole 16 hrs so I’m pretty tied-up, but I did my best to take some pictures during recess. Some of the kids get shy when cameras come out and some go frickin’ nuts, you’ll see…

The Hike...

I had wanted to climb a mountain since I’ve been in Korea. Actually probably before I arrived, because I remember watching a YouTube video of some guy climbing Mt. Apsan which is the biggest mountain around Daegu, and I just remember it looking like something I really wanted do once I got here. Well I finally ended up going this weekend and it was actually pretty cool. Not quite as intense as I thought it was going to be, but for a Sunday afternoon, after a long weekend, it was just about perfect in the struggle category. Not an intense where you couldn’t feel your legs, but I certainly had to stop and take a break every twenty minutes or so. I went with my co-teacher and her husband. We had lunch (their lunch, my breakfast) in the park before we headed up the mountain and then went and drank some mokolii (rice wine) afterwards, which was much better than the rice wine I had had earlier by the way. There were still rice chunks in it, but not to the same extent as the previous experience.

On our way up the mountain, about ¾ of the way up, at a particularly challenging part of the hike, my co-teacher stops, looks at me and says, “This is a test for me.” I didn’t really know what she was talking about, but I was thought to myself, “maybe she’s challenging herself to be more active, I mean, she did tell me a few weeks ago she’s trying to loose weight.” She probably weighs 120 lbs. soaking wet and she’s worried about loosing weight… anyways, her husband is leading us up this mountain and he’s a good 20 yards ahead of us and we had only taken one break at this point so we were getting pretty exhausted.. Nevertheless, I stop and ask her, “What do you mean?” I was really curious what test she was referring to, or if she had just misused the word “test”. She responds, “My husband is making me skinny, because in Korea, men do not want fat wives.” I was taken back a bit by her bluntness, but at the same time it didn’t surprise me as much as it would have a month ago. I actually found it hilarious and I’m pretty sure I laughed out loud after she told me. I explained, “Actually, I think it’s similar in the U.S., but I can’t speak for everyone I guess.” She laughed and continued up the mountain. I tried to explain to her that she’s not fat and that she shouldn’t be worried about her weight being as skinny as she is but I don’t think it registered as she shrugged off the topic… She nodded and carried on the hike, we actually ended up climbing to the top which was more hiking than I was planning on doing on the Sunday afternoon. My co-teacher also kept reminding her husband and I that, “we work tomorrow, we mustn’t climb too far.” Which I was actually opposed to because I had never been up a mountain and I just really wanted to keep climbing even though I could tell she really didn’t. I couldn’t really tell what her husband was thinking. He would crack jokes every once and a while but for the most part he didn’t smile much and seemed to take life a littler more seriously than his wife…

Speaking of jokes, my co-teacher ended up inviting me to her house that evening for supper as sort of a thank you for talking with her in English a few times a week. She will call me, about three o’ clock everyday, Monday thru Friday and ask that I come upstairs and teach her English. This normally consists of me complaining about something, or her talking about how she “doesn’t understand” why one of her kids studies so hard but doesn’t get good grades… it’s seriously the same thing every week. But I don’t mind, it’s good to get out of my office and feels good to help her with something even though it normally turns into her helping me with something, i.e. figuring out when I get vacation days, figuring out my pay schedule or making sure that I get an air conditioner in my apartment before it starts getting ridiculously hot out. Supposedly Daegu has similar weather patterns to Minnesota, with the super cold, dry winters and the hot, humid summers… fantastic. Anyways, I meet her son’s at the corner of a bank near my house and they walk me to their home. She lives door-to-door, about a 7-8 minute walk, so it was pretty convenient. I walk inside and it’s a pretty big/nice apartment, at least compared to the apartments I had been in before, which just consisted of my fellow EPIK teachers. I told her she had a beautiful house and that I was surprised that it was so clean, because I usually make fun of her for having such a messy office. Her oldest son assured me that it’s not normally this clean and that they had spent most of the afternoon cleaning and preparing for my arrival. Which actually made me feel a little bit guilty because I wasn’t that excited to go there. I had just spent about three hours with her climbing a mountain and I see her everyday at work so the weekends are a nice getaway normally. But in the end it was actually very nice. She cooked a bunch of beef that she always assumes is my favorite because I’m an American and a bunch of side dishes. It was delicious. Her husband busted out some whisky which they also assumed I like because I’m American, and we sipped on some Scottish whisky for the remainder of dinner.

What I was going to say about jokes though was that her son wanted to hear an American joke… he had just explained to me a Korean joke which I didn’t understand at all but faked a laugh, to make it seem like I at least pretended to understand. But he sort of put me on the spot, he just said, “Tell me an American joke.” My mind went blank; I don’t know any American jokes… I thought for a while saying, “ummmmm”… to make sure he knew I was thinking. I had just started up watching ‘The Office’ again so the only thing I could think of was “That’s what she said” jokes… I thought to myself, “great! I can use one of these!”, forgetting that the only way to explain them to a foreigner was to explain something sexual. So I’m sitting there, on a pad on the floor as usual, sweating because their house was 100 degrees and I had just drank a few shots of whisky and an entire Korean family is staring at me, really expecting me to say something that will really tickle their funny-bone. They have this idea in their heads that all American’s are comedians… and fat. But anyways, they’re all staring at me, I’m sweating, thinking of a way to explain “That’s what she said” jokes without being sexually inappropriate and am just drawing blanks left and right. I begin to explain, “That’s what she said” and come to dead-end every time. I try about three different ones but when I realize they’re starting to get sexual again I stop and just kind of awkwardly laugh it off as if to say, “I forfeit this American joke thing, I can’t think of anything you would consider funny, and the only joke I can think of is referencing to out of context, sexual innuendos.”

I finally end up changing the subject and explain to them that maybe we have different senses of humor and that I couldn’t think of anything right then. Well we finished supper and my co teacher’s youngest son actually has a friend of mine that I met at orientation for an English teacher at his middle school. I introduce the family to facebook and show pictures of his English teacher, myself, friends from college and high school. I also show them a picture of my sister because the two boys really wanted to see what my sister looks like. I get to her profile picture and they both go, “Ohhh beaufiul.” I replied, “ I know! Right?” And then the youngest son says, “She looks Asian.” So I don’t know if their judgment was off or what because she most definitely doesn’t look Asian… unless most Asian’s have blond hair and blue eyes. It was pretty funny and I know Brittany will appreciate this story. Well, that’s all I have for now. I hope this finds everyone well and that I can continue to update you whenever something interesting happens!

Explaining the pictures.

The pictures are from my trip to Seoul the other weekend. the first one is of me and a few friends in front of the hostel we stayed at called "Mr. Sea"

The next picture is of us decided which delicious selection of street meet to invest in.

Th 3rd picture is of myself in front of Seoul soccer stadium. We never actually went inside but it was pretty enormous.

The 4th picture is of a few friends any myself in front of a traditional Korean castle.

The last picture is of the super complicated subway map of Seoul. Daegu has 2 lines...

The Black Sheep

Apparently once a month all of the single teachers at the school get together for dinner and drinks after work. This was obviously my first time joining and was really looking forward to it. It’s all females by the way, and most of them speak pretty good English so it’s nice to be able to talk to some people who speak English well, unlike most of the people I share an office with. We went to a Korean BBQ, surprise, surprise, of the millions of restaurants in Korea I think about 99% of them are Korean BBQ joints, which isn’t terrible but gets old after a while. And they are delicious, but you stink like a deep fryer when you leave. Anyways, we’re finish eating super and decide to head to another place for more appetizers and some fruity soju. Fruity soju is basically watered down vodka mixed with sugary fruit drinks, needless to say, delicious. We literally order a ton more food, it was like eating another meal, and we’re all stuffing our faces with this delicious deep fried food like we hadn’t just eaten an entire meal moments earlier… Anyways I get a call from my co teacher and she wants us to go meet up with her and the principal for more drinks. Nobody was very excited to leave because we had just ordered some delicious fruity sojo… Anyways, we ended up going; it turned out they weren’t that far from where we were eating…

So we’re rolling up there and it’s literally me and 5 other Korean girls; I’m getting mean mugged left and right, but at this point I didn’t mind. We get to the restaurant and my co teacher is TRASHED. She begins by pretending to be mad at me for not going to some dinner thing with her and the principal that I had apparently agreed to a week earlier. She kept saying “Arrrron is a bad guy” and that I was very untrustworthy. It didn’t hurt my feelings because I could tell she was blitzed. Well anyways, once us 5 get to the restaurant we had to move to a bigger table to fit everyone. We finally get situated after making quite a commotion (my co teacher was trying to chrs (cheers) with literally EVERYONE) well we get situated and I see what’s for dinner.... Raw meat. More raw meat. It was raw fish and raw beef. Both of which looked and smelled terrible and were about as uncooked as a raw piece of meat could possible be. I refused. I couldn’t do it again. There’s no way I’m going to go from eating delicious deep-fried food with five single Korean teachers to raw fish and meat with the principal and my belligerently drunk co teacher. Speaking of my embarrassingly drunk co teacher, she was now telling everyone to only speak in English and that she was very sad because she didn’t pass her exam to become a vice principal. She was telling EVERYONE this… oh, she was also telling people she didn’t know where she lived and she had no clue where her car was. Some of the teachers I was with and myself kept insisting that we had a sober ride home for her, which just prompted the next ‘chrrrs’. I really wish I could describe this sound with letters… Koreans have a hard time with the letter ‘r’; added to a heavily intoxicated older woman is literally priceless. I’m going to guess she probably tried to cheers about 30 some odd times with everyone at one point in the night. The principal, whom I was sitting next moments earlier to said, enough of this and moved to the other side of the table. Anyways, there was this jar of peanuts on our table and I told my co teacher that I could beat her in picking up single peanuts and putt them in a separate dish using chopsticks faster than her. Not to toot my own horn or anything but I’m becoming pretty phenomenal at using chopsticks, I still struggle with lettuce and noodles but am getting much, much better… Anyways, we started off playing fairly and after she realized she was loosing (no lie) she began to pick up 3-4 at a time which I cannot do, but it was taking her longer to grab 3-4 at a time and I was still keeping pace with her. I think the soju must have kicked in because she ended up grabbing a bunch with her hand and putting them into the bowl. Perhaps this was a bad competition for me to start because she proceeded to ask me every two minutes if I wanted to race again. I kept saying “No, you’re wasted Sister Kim, plus I’ve already proved I’m better than you at using chopsticks”. This really lit a fire under her because then she kept saying “Arrrron I’m better than you, I’m better than you” enough times to get under my skin enough that we played about 4-5 more times more, all of which ended up with her tossing peanuts across the table.

During this time there was a clear division of the people who wanted to hear her ramblings and get a good laugh out of them and those who were trying pretty hard to avoid her. I was stuck. I was sober, or pretty sober and every time I would leave she would screech, “Where’s arrrron” like a five year old might say if someone just took her favorite play toy. I actually ended up pretending to use the bathroom about 3 times just to get some fresh air and get away from the constant ringing of her babblings in my ear.

Her shenanigans got progressively worse throughout the night. The principal’s son and son’s friend ended up coming and eating diner with us towards the end of the night. Anyways, the principal introduces his son to me and emphasizes how handsome he is to everyone. My co teacher must have thought this was untrue because she stood up and said, “Principal Hueng, only you think so.” I was shocked. I actually was a little upset. I put my hand over her mouth and told her to sit down; it was getting a little ridiculous now. We finally ended up leaving after several attempts at getting my co teacher into a cab and convinced her that nobody wanted to go sing karaoke with her and that we had someone with us that knew where her house was…

During orientation, someone said that no matter how drunk Koreans get the night before and no matter how much of an ass you make of yourself, it’s never brought up the next day. This was apparently false because everyone at school was saying that they had heard about my co teacher the night before and how bad everyone felt for me. It was pretty remarkable. I actually found out that she said, “I can be a better principal than you” to the principal, which I did not catch because she had said it in Korean. So it was actually a slightly worse situation than I had initially thought.

FF through March!

So, I have just started formal teaching, which means I’m actually making lesson plans with my co teachers and having to put more and more thought into class preparation. I wanted to set up a Skype session with my cousin, Kristie, who’s a teacher at North Elementary in Saint Peter, but I don’t think it will work with the crazy time difference. I thought it would be really awesome to link up both classrooms, I know my Korean students would absolutely love something like that; to see a real American classroom and other American students about their age would be quite a treat for these kids. For the most part, I’m the first white people that these kids have even seen, more or less talked to, so they really find it quite fascinating. One thing that I’ve come to see as an issue is the fact that some of the more privileged students will attend hagwon’s after school, which offer private English, math and Science lessons, while some of the less-off students are literally just beginning English in 3rd grade. The gap between the most advanced English student and the lowest is enormous. Example: There are some students that can carry on a conversation in English for minutes and others who can only comprehend a handful of words.

Today was actually parent’s day, elementary style. I was actually told a few days in advance, which was a pleasant surprise but I guess I didn’t realize I would be talking in front of about 300 curious parents. I guess the principal wanted to say “Hey! We’re serious about teaching English here at Sangwon!” So, I was required to give a little speech, which just consisted of me telling everyone where I was from and that I was happy to be in Korea. They were just giggling through most of it, I think because they couldn’t understand me, but they would all say,“Ohhh” as if they understood me, so I don’t know some of them actually understand me or if they were just ‘ohhhing’ because I would pause for a moment or two. They did seem to be impressed that a native English speaker would be teaching their kids; they gave me a pretty impressive round of applause after my full-hearted bow. I think I saw one of the teachers taking a picture of me stumbling through my speech, so I’ll have to hunt that down and see if I can’t get it posted on this blog, add insult to injury I guess.

The kids love me, I walk into school and all the kids will stop whatever it is they’re doing and give me a big “Hello Mayo Teacher” and then an enthusiastic one or two-handed wave. It’s pretty cute. It’s hard for that not to put a smile on my face. It’s been about three weeks now and it still hasn’t gotten old, but I feel that this constant attention might get a little exhausting. I think some of the teachers feel the same way. I’m starting to get the impression that other teachers are a little displeased at my popularity with the students. It has actually gotten kind of bad at times. Pretty much every class that I go into with a co-teacher all the students say, ‘hi’ to me without any regard for my co teacher. I feel bad, but I don’t really know why I can do; tell the students not to say hi to me? I’m probably looking too far into it, but there have been a few instances where I get a weird vibe from some of the other teachers after a group of kids say, “hi” to me and not them. I guess it’s better than everyone hating the weird foreign teacher.

Actually the other day I brought in a big thing or mandarin oranges and some strawberries and they loved it. My head teacher made a big deal out of it and brought me into the main offices, got on the intercom and said in Korean, “Mayo teacher has brought a treat for everyone” and then proceeded to make me hand out oranges one by one to everyone that walked in. It was quite humiliating but it was over quick I guess. No, actually it really wasn’t. I ended up sitting around a table talking to some co-workers eating strawberries, oranges and someone had brought a cake? It ended up turning into a big deal, there were probably about 10 – 15 of us in their at one point. It probably would have gone on for a while longer if it had been mid-day instead of towards the end of the day.

So my co-teacher is pregnant and I thought I would give her a gift! I taxied down to E-mart and bought her a little baby boy’s outfit, complete with mittens and slippers. I have no clue if her baby is going to be a boy or girl but I just bought boy clothes. She didn’t know either, I suppose I could have gotten her something more neutral like diapers but where’s the fun in that? I also remember reading from the travel book that it used to be illegal in Korea for you to figure out the gender of your baby before birth. Most people in Korea want a baby boy to carry on the family name; so many baby girls will be aborted late into the pregnancy, much like in China. But there’s no one-child-per-family policy in Korea, so it’s not nearly as bad is in China and might even be legal now to determine the sex of your baby. But yea, the outfit wasn’t too expensive and I already had to go there to pick up a few things for my apartment so it wasn’t like I was making a special trip or anything.

During orientation, we kept hearing, “dynamic Korea” and by that they meant that things can happen unexpectedly in Korea, and to not to take it too seriously. I remember one teacher telling a story about how he had stayed up late the night before preparing a lesson plan that he thought was going to be great and he was very excited to get to school and give it a go. Well, when he got to his school all of the kids had big white things stuffed in their mouths and everyone was drooling white foam... He said that they canceled all classes that day because it was time for everyone to get their monthly fluoride treatment. He said they must have known about it weeks in advance but failed to inform him that there was no class and he wouldn’t have to come in that day. The moral of the story being: he could have gotten really upset about this, and made it a bigger deal than it needed to be, but he said he just went home and said, “dynamic Korea.”

My first experience of “dynamic Korea” was on Friday night. I had just gotten off work and was planning on catching some ‘z’s’ before I head out for the night. I had made some plans with a few friends and wanted to meet up downtown for some Pizza and beers. About mid-nap and full drool, I woke up to an old Korean woman screaming “Awween” and pounding on my door. After I realized what was going on, I get to the door and it’s my furrowed, 70 year old landlord, (the polar opposite of what I had been dreaming about a moment earlier) so needless to say I was not excited to see how this situation was unfolding. Anyways, she storms into my room and hands me a phone. It’s my co-teacher. She’s on the other line repeating, “Principal wants to eat dinner with you, I be there in 10 minutes.” I think to myself, “oh great, another uncomfortable meal with uncomfortable conversation and terrible food, much better than pizza and beer with friends.” I check my watch and it’s 6:00 pm. I’m supposed to meet my friends at 8:00 so I wasn’t too worried about missing the rendezvous point. I get to the restaurant and it’s my principal, vice principal, co-teacher, another administrative guy and three other parents of the some Sangwon students. The dinner ends up taking quite a bit longer than I had anticipated. Every time I thought we were done eating, they would bring out more and more food. It never ended. I ate so much. However, it was actually really good. A big delicious bowl of boiling beef soup is what I remember most, but there was other good food there as well. Also, I’m pretty sure that they didn’t talk about anything else but me. I couldn’t tell you exactly what they were saying, but I’m starting to get better at deciphering some words and picking out English words every now and then. Well and everyone at the table would look at me every two minutes so that was a dead giveaway. After about 3 hrs of dinner (literally) the principal decides we should all go to a rice-wine bar and keep drinking.

On our way to the bar the principal holds my hand for a good minute … In Korea that’s not considered weird or anything. I mean, I was uncomfortable as all hell but he seemed to be enjoying it a lot. He said, “friends” and motioned to us holding hands; I just kind of nod my head as if to say “sure.” It’s not uncommon to see two guys or two girls walking hand in hand or with their arms around each other. I know it carries quite different meanings back in the states and in most western cultures but here it just means friends. I actually read something that mentioned homosexuality as being considered so repulsive that it’s just considered a fable or something that doesn’t really exist, at least with the older generations. Anyways, the principal and I are walking hand in hand to this bar for a good minute or so and we finally get there and get seated and what do they bring out? Larva. A giant plate of larva. They said, “This turns into butterfly” and proceeded to pressure me into trying it. After a while of saying I was still full from dinner I give in and slurp one down… It really wasn’t that bad, I would have been better off not knowing what it was but yea, it was super salty! We drank for a while longer, talking about how I should start a basketball clinic after school and coach basketball and teach English. I would absolutely love to do something like that but I don’t think it’s going to happen. They don’t have a gym here and their outdoor court is a portable hoop on gravel plus, many students attend hagwans after school anyways so I really don’t see anything coming from it. If it did, great, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

That’s about all going on in my life right now. I’m helping my head teacher with some English for about a half hour a day after school. It’s not intense and she usually just ends up talking about her kids for most of the time, so I just listen. But classes are going good and I really like my school and co-teachers. Everyone is really nice and they tell me just about everyday how glad they are to have me at Sangwon. March is FLYING by and I’m getting excited for spring/summer!

UPDATE: I was about to post this when one of the teachers I share an office with asked if I had breakfast. I said no and she offered me some mocha cake that she had brought in. As I’m eating the cake the teacher whom I bought the baby clothes for comes up to me and says, “My husband and I were moved by your kind heart, so we bought you something.” It was a sweatshirt from a popular Korean clothing company, apparently because I was talking to her earlier this year about how I needed to expand my wardrobe. I was really hoping she wouldn’t do that… I knew Korea was a very gift giving culture but I was still just kind of crossing my fingers and hoping she wouldn’t return the favor.

Which reminds me of a story, during orientation I was out to eat with some friends one night and there was a table next to us celebrating a birthday. It was a man; early twenties and we decided to get him a bottle of soju, it’s inexpensive but we just thought we would do something nice. So I walk over and hand him this bottle and say, “Happy Birthday.” They all stand up and bow. I walk back over to our table and sit down, not a minute passes and they’re bringing over cake and different types of Korean food to our table. It’s just Korean culture I guess!

1st Day!

So today was my first day of class!

This morning I walked into a classroom of about 25-30 Korean 4th graders all giggling and going “Ohhhhhh” at the tall white guy in the corner. I was a little nervous going into class but then quickly realized that they couldn’t really understand me. It worked out pretty well, my co teacher and I have a pretty good system, if I said something too quickly or use some vocabulary that the student’s don’t know, then my co teacher will repeat, in Korean, what I say. It’s really funny, the students are very, very curious of me. At the end of my slideshow I opened it up for questions and the most common questions I got were “How much do you weigh?” “Do you have a girlfriend?” and of course, “How old are you?”

All three times I walked into class I almost started laughing, because there is a, “Whoa” when I walk into the class; some of the kids sit hard back in their chair and get wide eyed like they’d just seen a ghost. It’s seriously hilarious. My co teacher took the first 20 minutes to introduce herself and go over class rules; while I was given the last 20 minutes to introduce myself. During the first twenty minutes I would sit over to the side and let my co teacher do her thing, during that time I would catch about 5 or 6 students literally staring my down like I owed them money. I would make eye contact with them, thinking they would shy away and start paying attention… wrong, they would just give me an expressionless stare, but they’re literally so cute that I can’t help but laugh. The first ten minutes of each class consisted of me sitting in the corner trying my hardest not to break out laughing. It’s hard to describe the situation. All these kids are staring me down and you can tell - itching for a chance to ask my age and weight; it’s the funniest thing ever.

My introduction got progressively better throughout the day. I’m pretty sure my first one sucked, and then got a little better from there. I showed a video of the Minnesota Vikings on my PowerPoint… They were asking me so many questions about American Football afterwards. One student asked, “Is football in America violent?” I don’t think they really have much for contact sports over here; Ty Kwon Do is huge as is baseball and soccer. Oh, and a side note, after the first class, I don’t know what I did, but I had about 15-20 kids follow me and my co teacher out into the hallway laughing, jumping up and down, wanting a high five or just saying, “goodbye” and waving with both hands. One girl even wanted an autograph.

I also asked them if they knew who the president of the U.S. was, and the entire class erupted and said, “OBAMA” “OBAMA”- it was pretty hilarious. I didn’t think they would know who the U.S. President was; I thought I might be able to teach these Korean 4th graders something today, but apparently not. I did show a picture of Obama after that and said, “Handsome?” and the entire class said, “NO!!!” I guess I really don’t know what to think…

Once school was over, all the male employees, my interpreter and I went out to dinner… we had raw fish and steamed pork… it wasn’t nearly as sweet as it sounds. The fish, whatever kind of fish it was (I saw a picture of it, and the fish was a in the shape of a square, so your guess is as good as mine) was probably one of the worst tasting things I’ve had ever ate. I almost puked. And on top of that it smelled awful inside (like ammonia maybe) and it was a smell that didn’t go away with time, it stayed right under my nostril and burned inside my nose, terrible. On top of that I was sitting on a pad on the floor so I had to choose which leg I wanted to fall asleep next, by which one I decided to lean on. I can’t sit camper style, because I’m about as flexible as a 2x4 so I had to put my legs straight under the table, which helped for a while but then my side started to hurt because you can’t lean back. It’s just the worst situation I could have been in. Oh, and we had some homemade fermented rice wine that had literal chunks of rice in it. It probably wouldn’t have been all that bad if I didn’t have to sift through the rice with my teeth as I drank it. To sum up, this evening I was sitting at a two foot table with 4 other people, 3 of which I can’t communicate with, eating god-awful, unnecessarily spicy ‘food’, drinking fermented rice wine with literal rice chunks floating inside while I’m trying to situate myself so I don’t die of a side ache or turn the table over.

Besides these conditions I was in it was actually a pretty nice restaurant, clean and very traditional. It was expensive too, I saw the menu and our meal was about 80,000 won, about 70 some odd dollars, all of which was paid for by the principal. I may have paid my own money not to eat it, but that’s part of the experience I guess. I didn’t feel too bad either because two of the other people I was with openly admitted not enjoying the meal either; which I thought would be rude but apparently not. We did have some good conversation too. We talked about North Korea and how bat-shit crazy Kim Jong Il is. I told them I was hesitant to ask about this because I was unsure if it was a sensitive subject or if they openly talk about it - I guess 30 years ago it would have been sensitive but apparently not anymore. The younger generation actually has the mindset that North Koreans have the same blood and could see the two countries merging in the future. Another interesting bit is that Korean men are required to join the army for two years during adulthood, which I was told because “North Korea could attack us at any point and we need to be ready.” Comforting I guess.

Quick Update.

It's currently Thursday night and I just finished eating a big buffet style meal with my entire school. I met one of my new co-teachers today and she was SO cool. She helped me out in just about every facet, from finding a movie theater to helping me pronounce some fundamental Korean words. She's pretty much fluent in English; I can talk to her as fast as I would talk to another native English speaker, I just have to remember not to use slang, like outta = out of, things like that. Anyways, at dinner, my new co teacher, myself and another new administrative co worker were recognized and we were asked to stand in the front of the room to say a few words. Of course there was no mention of this earlier. Luckily I'm pretty sure even though I was standing in front of a room full of about 30 people, about 3-4 actually knew what I was talking about. I did try and talk slow but I'm still thinking no more than 4 people could actually understand me. We finished our speeches, they gave us some flowers and we sat down. It was a very good meal, one of my co workers earlier in the day said, "We going to have traditional Korean meal but since you American, we have buffet". Normally, I would try and be polite and tell them that, that was unnecessary but at that point I was really feeling the buffet of Western food. Also, I think we may have different forms of politeness because whenever I try and tell someone that they don't need to do something for me and that I can do it myself, they seem to be either surprised or offended, I can't really tell. So I've just started not arguing or trying to explain myself and just let people do stuff for me.

The Vice Principal told me, actually told my translator, that I make her smile, and that other teachers have told her that when they see me, they become happy. I don't know if something was lost in translation there or what the deal was, but that seemed strange to me. It may be because I haven't mastered the system of greeting people here yet, it changes with every person and your relationship to them. If they're older or hold more authority than you, then they receive a new greeting than when you're greeting someone of equal or lesser 'status' than yourself. First of all, I don't know where I stand as a foreigner, and I have absolutely no idea of how old anyone is. So, I will either come off as impolite or silly if I mess up, kinda a lose, lose situation.

About the pictures... I really wish I could figure out how to put them on the side of the page instead of right on top of each other. If you notice the bottom two pictures are in the middle while the rest of them are on more of the left side of the page.... that's me experimenting with Blogspot.... I'll figure it out sooner or later, although it may be a while. I hope it doesn't bug any of you as much as it bugs me. Oh, now really about the pictures, the bottom ones are of my school and it's 'playground' in the back of the school... you can see the projects right behind the playground.... that's because I'm fairly certain there are no zoning laws here, so you could have a million dollar house next to a low income housing project. I mean, naturally there are nicer parts of Daegu, but you can find some houses that seem a little out of place. The top picture is of "guys night" with my principal and some other male employees. We ended up drinking 8 bottles of soju, which really isn't that much of an accomplishment... buy my principal was HAMMERED. It was great. I couldn't believe how drunk he got. I was buzzed I would say, but he could barely stand and was talking about god knows what by the end of the night. I didn't think he had drank that much more than I had... (he must have been sneaking some soju bombs under the table).

Hope this message finds everyone well!

My Apt

Doin' it dirt in Daegu!

annyeong haseyo!!! (Hello!!!)

If you're reading this you're apparently somewhat curious about what I've been doing the past two weeks in South Korea. It's been a pretty crazy couple of weeks; they've really flown by needless to say. I first started at orientation at Eulji University just south of Seoul where I met people from all over the world who've decided they needed a change of scenery.... This was a one-week orientation where we had lectures from 9 am - 9pm with one lunch break and 20 min in between classes. There were also ‘survival Korean’ classes that we had to attend, where we just learned a little bit about the alphabet and learned some essential phrases like 'hello' and 'thank you'. These were quite helpful, although I knew most of the phrases taught in these classes before I left. I did find some time to get out and meet some people from orientation so I have somewhat of a social connection in Daegu, which is pretty essential when you don’t speak the native language.

My experience so far has been amazing. The orientation was great because we got to hear from other teachers from all over the spectrum and got an idea of what to expect in our schools. The process would definitely not have gone as smoothly as it had without the orientation. During this orientation, we had Korean history lessons; culture lessons and teachers who have taught in both Hagwons and within the public school system. Many of the teachers contradicted each other on the route they decided to go with in the classroom but it was still helpful to start thinking about classroom management rules and the different activities we can play with the kids. One thing that was pretty universal throughout the orientation was that; in order to have a successful stay in South Korea you need to have a solid and understanding relationship with your co teacher. They really stressed that it could make or break your time in Korea. Oh, for those of you who don't know, I'm teaching with a co-teacher who will be in the classroom with me most of the time while I'm teaching. I believe we will be bouncing off one another in the classroom in terms of activities and lesson planning. From what I understand the kids don't know much English at the level I’m teaching at, so it will be interesting to see how I can get them talking in a language they don't know well or at all. It's funny, I haven't met a Korean yet whose came out and said they're good at English. Most of the time they're very hesitant to say they even speak English, but when they do, they're actually pretty good and very understandable.

So the other day, I met my co teacher. And as I said before, this is a big deal because you really want to make a good impression (1st impressions are huge here) and you really want a young Korean co-teacher because they're more likely to speak better English and be up for new ideas in the classroom. The entire process was quite nerve racking. They made us wait in a room in the upstairs of what I think was a government office of some sort, while the Korean teachers were downstairs getting a similar lecture on what their duties for us are (the Korean co-teachers are pretty much our mother's while we're in Korea). So they called the section we were teaching in, we walk downstairs and there are about 80 Korean co-teachers waving paper's with people’s names on it. It was literally like what you see in the movies at the airport, when there's a limo driver with a piece of paper with someone's name on it, except in this case it was about 80+ Korean's screaming and giggling as they wave this paper high in the air. Anyways, I finally found Aaron David Mayo flying high in the air and met my co-teacher...

Let’s move on to more about Daegu. My apartment is pretty cozy, I little drafty but cozy. AHHHH, I'm just kidding, I'll tell you a little more about my co teacher! :-) As I was saying, I met co-teacher who happened to be about 6-7 months pregnant, seemed very nice but very, very shy. I knew most Koreans tended to be shyer but she seemed unusually shy. Her friend did most of the talking and was asking most of the questions. One quick thing about questions; they can't resist the urge to ask you how old you are. They know it's considered somewhat rude in western culture to ask that, but they seriously can't resist. While we were driving to meet my principal and vice principal at the school they were in the front seats giggling forever and I couldn't figure out why. Finally the friend turns around and said, "Hey (giggle) can I ask you how old you are?" (insert giggling just about anywhere) Anyways, I said yes and told them that I was 23 American 24 Korean (Koreans count 1 year for the 9 months you're in your mothers belly, so you're technically celebrating your 1 year birthday when you come out of your mother). They were pretty surprised with how young I was, they told me they were jealous of my age (my co teacher was in her late thirty's and her friend was 26).

So we get to the school and I meet the principle who can't speak a word of English and the vice principal who can't either. They tell me to sit and get me some green tea that I almost spill because I was so nervous! But I fight through it and they told me that the principle was happy I was an American (they find our and Canadian's accents easier to understand, compared to the UK and other parts of the world). They also said that I made a good first impression and that 'teacher is very handsome'. Not to toot my own horn or anything but I did look pretty good! ☺ I think that's pretty much the only way they know how to compliment someone... it pretty just much means you look nice, I think. After this seemingly endless uncomfortable moment of everyone staring and giggling at me I went out to eat with my head teacher (not really sure what that title means but that's her title) and the friend that picked me up from the teacher's meeting. My co teacher decided not to go, it turned out she hadn’t spoke English for over ten years and was very scared to speak English in front of me. Anyways, we went to this little Korean BBQ place not too far from my apartment. It was delicious and I ate like a king. They bring out these long sheets of pork and they put these huge burning coals in the middle of your table in this bucket thing that descends into your table and you take the liberty in cooking the pork to your liking. It's a pretty phenomenal system, they bring out new coals to keep your meat cooking about half way through your meal. After you cook the meat you then put a piece or two in lettuce, then there are like about a hundred side dishes you can choose to put in he lettuce it as well.

After supper they showed me my apartment, which was quite bare when I walked in. It was fairly clean, but just nothing in it. My bed had no sheets or blankets or anything and we had to move a dresser type thing from the hallway into my room. My room is actually pretty cozy right now but it was a little shady at first glance. So after I put my bags down they insisted that they bring me to E-Mart (Sam's Club) to buy some supplies like (toilet paper, hand towels, cleaning supplies, one pot, one pan, a fork-knife-spoon combo and some essential food). Remember this is at like 11:30 pm. I was apologizing for my inconvenience, because she didn't pick to babysit me, she was told by the school that it's her job to, when really it isn't. So I felt bad that she was going so far out of her way for me. I was pretty much falling asleep in the E-Mart (Sam's Club) and finally, we got all my bedding and food supplies! They brought me back, helped me set up a little bit and then were gone! My first night in Korea without a roommate, check!

The next day I tried to meet some friends at an E-Mart (Sam's Club) because this E-Mart was enormous, I would say about 4 times bigger than the Sam's Club in Mankato (I think most people reading this can reference the Kato Sam's club). So I called my head teacher and told her that I would like a ride down to the E-Mart (Sam's Club) that we were at last night because I figured that my friend and I were talking about the same E-Mart because it was enormous and they can’t have more than one in the same area. I was talking to my friend on Facebook chat and he said that he lived near an E -Mart (Sam's Club) and I was like sweet! I was at an E-Mart last night, I should be able to find you no problem! Turn's out there are a million E Marts all over the damn place and him and I were not thinking of the same E Mart, so I got a ride from my head teacher down there and to my surprise, no friend. So I walk around aimlessly for about 15 min waiting for him until I got scared and found a taxi back to my place. I had my head teacher write down my address so that if I showed a cab driver, he could bring me back to my place, smart, I know.

So after that I got back on Facebook, I was talking to another friend and we were going to try and meet up downtown, I live somewhat close to a subway station (thank god) and it's pretty easy to maneuver around the city if you can just get to a subway station. It's cheap too, 1,100 won for a one way ticket, and that’s about $1. So that's a pretty cheap and very efficient way to get around and I will probably be using that for most of my time here in Korea. So, after my first failed adventure with the E Mart (Sam's Club) I finally accomplished something and met up with a friend at a station near downtown Daegu.

It's so difficult to find people... Nobody has a cell phone. It's very rare to get Internet in your apartment (I have a very weak signal). You don't speak the language. You can't read most of the signs. You don't know your own address, and even if you did you wouldn't be able to write it down to tell someone how to get there. Oh, and there's 2.5 million people in Daegu. The only positive thing is that EVERYONE is Asian. It's a very homogenous culture in that, if I see someone who isn’t Asain, I instantly feel a connection to that person. You just don't see any other race other than an Asian. So needless to say when EVERYONE on the subway is Asian and you're a taller white dude whose got about 100 lbs on just about everyone in the subway, you get some stares. It's kind of funny. They're not bad stares but just like, curious stares. I can tell they REALLY want to ask me how old I am and where I'm from but they don't, because they're very shy and reserved most of the time. So anyways, I met up with my buddy and we ended up meeting some other friends downtown to test out the Daegu nightlife.

Daegu nightlife was pretty sweet. We met people from all over the world. We ended up meeting this group of Polish dudes who were studying in Daegu. They were HILARIOUS! They all spoke like Borat. It was phenomenal. I seriously thought that accent was made up. They did the "Yekkshameshhhh" and "Very Nice". It was great. I was eating it up. So we ended up staying out till about 2:30 or so and decided to call it a night. I took a taxi home for 11,000 won roughly $10, which really isn't bad being it's much quicker than the subway and they bring you right to your doorstep.

The morning after my head teacher knocks on my door and invites me to have lunch with her family. Apparently it was her father and her brother’s birthday celebration and they had some family over to celebrate. I was just getting up so I hadn’t showered yet so I told them I would call them after I get ready. I shower and get dressed. I call her and she comes and gets me. We get to her mothers place and I’m bombarded with kids jumping up and down and having to greet old people. In Korea, you great an older person with much more respect than you would a child. Similar to western culture but just multiplied by 100 here. So I get there, and they have like this special table set up for me with a bunch of pork, fish, some acorn pudding type stuff, some seaweed soup and a bowl of rice along with about 6-7 other side dishes. Oh, this is on a tble about 1-1.5 feet in the air. I’m sitting with my legs stretched out underneath the table with all of this crazy food on it that I really was terrified to even touch. It was so uncomfortable, not only because I’m super inflexible but because the entire family was staring at me like I was an alien from another planet. It really wouldn’t have been that bad if I wasn’t still awful at using chopsticks. So I fought through the side splinting pain of groin and side aches and ate what I could of the meal. Oh, and pretty much the entire meal the grandma is sitting next to me, patting my belly and telling me I need to eat more. I tried to explain to her that I’m fat enough and really don’t need to eat that much. When I first met my head teacher and co teacher, I told them that my mom and dad were very worried about me and that they missed me very much. My head teacher must have explained this to the grandma because she told me that she would take care of me like I was family. So that made me feel good. They really went out of the way for me. She also said that if I need anything to give her a call anytime. They were very nice and very genuine people. During supper Kim Yu-Na came on the TV in the other room and almost the entire table cleared including all of the kids and most of the adults. They were glued to the TV. She has become VERY popular over here and you can’t go anywhere without seeing her or hearing something about her. After lunch I had a few small Dixie cup style glasses of traditional Korean rice wine with my co teacher, my co teachers husband and myself. I taught them that we say cheers in America when we toast and that it really doesn’t matter where your glass is in relation to anyone else’s. In Korea, your glass is higher the older you are. If you’re the oldest then your glass is the highest, and so on.

That about concluded my experience thus far. I will post some pictures of my apartment and my neighborhood soon! Also, downtown Daegu in the night is phenomenal; I'll post pictures!