Day trip to Gyeongju (aka Kyungju)

Last week, my friend Tina and I had planned on going on a trip to Gyeongju. Then we realized with lack of money, maybe we should just do a day trip. Now she is sick. But i decided I still wanted to go. I believe this is our longest national holiday all year, so I wanted to have something to show for it. When I told one of the Korean teachers at my school that I was going to go alone, she offered to go with me. So that made things a bit more exciting :)
Sonny and I headed for Gyeonju on Tuesday morning around 11. Took the 20 minute bus to Nopo-dong and then the 1 hour bus to Gyeongju. Thank God she is Korean cause Gyeongju wasn't THAT english friendly. There was some stuff but not a lot. We arrived at the bus terminal and it was a bit cooler than Seochang. Gyeongju is a very old city. Many of the buildings are set more in a traditional korean style (see picture on the left). As we set out on our journey, we passed a very popular amusement park and water park... and yes the water park was called California Beach. I just thought that was very funny.
Sonny and I both decided that the first thing we wanted to do was to see a temple. The Bulguksa Temple specifically. We took the bus ride up and around the city and hills, until we arrived. As we were taking the bus ride, we noticed that there was still a lot of snow left in Gyeongju. In Seochang, we had 2 days of snow, and it was all gone and melted now. Here there were still many patches, there were still semi-frozen lakes, and and it was still snowing just a little bit. Neither of us counted on this. We actually thought it may be a little bit warmer! I had bought a new pair of boots the day before and i was very excited to wear them... so I did. Needless to say, when we arrived at the temple, the ouside area was covered in mud and ice. My new boots barely survivied. They definitely had a big mess on the bottoms (that i had fun cleaning off later). Bulguksa Temple was beautiful (once we hiked up a big hill). The picture on the left was the entrance. Once we got into the main courtyard area, this statue (on the right) as well as another statue in the shape of a tower stood next to each other. The theory behind it is that the
Beophwagyeong preached side by side together to spread the word of their religion/doctorine. The Temple was painted so elaborately. The detail and color used is amazing. Reminds me a lot of the 'awe' i experienced with some of the European cathedrals. It is amazing when you see the whole thing decorated in tiny detail. The temple itself, you are not allowed to take pictures of inside. But there was a big Buddha statue, and other smaller gold statues beside him. They were all holding up a symbol with their hands that was a meditation type symbol where the ring finger and thumb come together. I think I need to do more research on Buddha and learn more about the symbolism. There were many paths to take that lead to different statues, drums, rooms, etc. Even though they all had a tiny blurb about what they were all about, I wish they had guided tours. Those always seem to be so informative. I'm going to have to look into that. The picture on the drum is just a nice view of the roof tops of some of the traditional Korea buildings (and my friend/co-worker Sonny). On the right, are tons and tons of tiny towers built from rocks, obviously by people like me. Sonny said that people build them as a sign of good luck on their families. I am pretty sure there is a structural theory behind that (hence the Christmas tree shape). Of course, I made one, but I wasn't as picky at my perfect shape and rock formation... it was cold! So yea, that's my little tinky tower on the right :)
As we walked out of the temple, we were approached by this little old lady.. Hazuma, that said she has food and to come into her restaurant. So we followed her over... we were starving. But we ordered a few dishes and they were really good! I ate crab and shrimp with the shell still on for the first time. I figured since it was just crab and shrimp, I'd eat that normally anyway. Koreans eat it with the shell... nutritional value. Then we had like a stir-fry type dish of some veggies, mushrooms, in a soy sauce type sauce. It was DELICIOUS! And then more soup that had rice cake and seafood in it, kimchi, seaweed stuff, and some kind of root (it was kinda sweet... good!). My tummy was happy. I just want to point out the 'hangover soup.' I dont know what's in it but I will let you know lol. I think it's funny.
After lunch, we took a bus to the Gyeongju National Museum. I thought it may be closed due to the holiday, but Sonny thought it would be open... I was correct. It was still very beautiful outside and we walked around a bit. After, we took a walk thru this park area where apparently they do theatre sometimes. On the other side of the park, I saw these big hills. I asked Sonny, what they were and she said that they were Kings tombs. The bigger the tomb, the bigger the King (not fat or tall but a big deal type thing). I have informed my family that when I die, I would like to be mummified... however this may change my mind. I like this tomb concept :)
Then lastly Sonny and I went to this... thing. It was used to look at the stars... astronomy thing. Very old. Kinda cool the way they explained it. After this, we walked over to get some bread (I guess Gyeongju is famous for a certain kind of bread). Sonny gave me some and it was ok... has some kind of red bean something in the middle. Not bad but not great. So that was my trip to Gyeongoju!

Lunar New Year 2010

Happy 2010... again :) I've had a great holiday weekend, trying new things, and hanging out with new friends, etc. My 4 day weekend couldn't have imagined it going any better :)
Early Saturday afternoon, I took a bus to meet my friends Lacey and Gillian (and their friend Christina) in Ulsan... another big city about 25 minutes from me (20 min. south is Busan and 25 min. north is Ulsan). We wanted to get away and do something fun but not go too far. With the snow the past 2 days, we weren't sure what to expect. Luckily the snow stopped Saturday morning, it was just still really cold. We got a cheap motel to unload our bags. As cute and little it was, it is so strange knowing that the "love room" (as it's translated) is purely used for people to have sex for a couple hours. Not really used for traveling, etc. The room had many products, shampoo, conditioner, lotion, hairspray, etc as well as 'personal products' condoms, lubricant, even dirty tv. So wierd lol. I tried not to think about it and just laugh it off a bit.
After we unloaded, we walked the town in search for a BBQ lunch. Well we didn't really think about it being a holiday weekend and most things being closed. There were soooooo many places closed. We found the downtown area and there was close to no one there! We were so surprised. We thought it'd be easy to find a place to eat lunch but it was actually tough...we wound up finding a BBQ place and enjoyed a nice meal (my first meal where we actually sit on the floor). We really weren't sure what to do after, so we roamed around and wound up at another 'bar' that opened early. Turns out that some of the 'bars' here, you can order a drink but you must order food as well. I say 'bar' because, it looks like a bar atmosphere, but nice. Maybe more like a lounge atmosphere? But yes, you have to order food. Since it was early, we were the only one's there and we had just eaten, e just ordered some soju and a fruit platter. So yummy :) I love fruit. Surpringly, fruit and veggies are actually quite expensive at the grocery store...more than home I think. So it's nice to eat a bunch when you can. Once we finished there, we stopped by Paris Baguette (the popular bakery chain around here) and decided that we needed to pick up a Valentine's Day cake for ourselves. So we did. It was so pretty :) (the cake the right). However, we did see this little cake there as well. We thought it was so cute because it said 'travel' on it. So 19,000 won is equal to just about $19. Not too bad right? It's so cute!! So we headed back to our motel, showered, got ready for the evening, and ate our yummy cake. Yes, the candles was to celebrate us girls on Valentines day :) lol. Nerdy? Absolutely. Funny part was that we didn't think to get plates or forks or chopsticks or anything. The motel had coffee cups so we all ate the cake in coffee cups and with our fingers lol. That was a sight to be seen for sure.
When we finally left the motel, we were headed to a bar called Elune when we got stopped by some random foreign guys who convinced us to go into another lounge type place called Bee. They asked us to sit with them, but we were happy getting our own booth. We ordered a kiwi flavored drink that was yummy! Maybe it had soju in it...apparently you can mix soju with anything. To make this story short, we had some drinks, another fruit platter, met and hung out with some more s.african people (they were a bit sketchy), then headed to Beat Bar (which we heard was good). Beat bar had a live korean band playing but they played a few american songs. They were actually quite good. The amps were up a bit too high though, to the point where it was unenjoyable. However, we danced while we could. Gillian was funny. when she dances, she pulls everyone in to dance with her. The korean girls were so shy but excited to be dancing. Definitely puts a smile on everyones face. While we were there, a korean guy took a liking to Gillian. She told him she wanted to go to noraebong (karaoke bar) and boy he never let us forget it the rest of the night. We decided we wanted to leave Beat Bar... to loud, so we headed to Elune which was more of a clubby place. The guy was very aggressive about trying to get us to go to noraebong but we wanted to go to elune first. So he agreed he'd go with us to Elune first if we did noraebong after (p.s. it was us 4 girls... who did he think he was trying to make our decisions for us? Yes we were very annoyed). Apparently Elune is a club, with a cover charge, etc... which we were not about to pay. Luckily Gillian, had had a bit too much to drunk, was gutsy to the point of just pushing past security and dragging us girls in... Korean guys must've paid for us lol. They came over to us again with beers for all of us. He must've really liked her. By this point, it must've been 1am... I was coming down from my buzz and ready to head home soon. But Gill was on a roll. She was so funny. Dancing on top of the speakers, pretty much bouncing the bouncers. The club was actually pretty dead. We were only there for a little bit and we left. I think the rest of us girls were ready to go to bed, but Gill was VERY intent on singing Lucy in the Sky of Diamonds... and again, this guy was sooooooo pushy! I think we were all about to clobber him. Again, literally pushing us out the door, not letting us talk about our plans, keeping Gill's purse hostage until we got there. He was a creeper for sure. We went to 3 karaoke bars. The first 2 were full or something and finally got into the last one. We finally get to noraebong and everyone sings for awhile. The karaoke bars here are a bit different. You rent a room for an hour or so. Room has long table, songlist, etc and you control everything. It's your own private karaoke room. I kinda felt bad because the guys obviously paid for us to be there, paid for snacks, food, and a huge pitcher of beer. We sang maybe 6 songs, and took off. By then it was 3am and we were DYING... definitely can't hang like I used to anymore lol. Getting too old. Something very strange was, that when we had checked into our motel, we asked the lady 'do we pay now or later?' and she said later... well at 3am when we got back, she wanted us to pay... wierd?? Overall, we had a really good night and time in Ulsan. We left the next afternoon

SNOW in Seochang!

Well hello all. Sorry I haven't written much lately. I wasn't sure what to write since the last few days have been pretty normal. Wake up in the morning, Skype with friends, go to work, and then come home and catch up on some of my American TV shows, and then go to bed. I have a few new things to report now.
FIRST... I just wanted to say that I recieved my ID card...YAY!!! I officially exist as a resident in Korea. Besides my name, I am not sure what else it says but that's me! lol
SECOND, I just wanted to mention that today, it SNOWED! :) I don't know why this makes me excited... probably cause Italy was the only place I lived where it snowed a little bit. I woke up this morning and my kitchen windows were completely fogged up. When I went to look out (it was kinda loud in my kitchen), it was HAILING outside (the photo on the right is outside my window... the hail all bunched up). Now I've been in hail a few times, whether it's been in LA, or in the mountains, but it is still fun everytime :) Of course when I tried to take pictures, they came out like nothing, but I it WAS hailing... I swear! (picture on the left was my attempt at taking a picture of the hail). Later on it started to snow just a little bit. That was fun to watch :) I was a bit nervous about taking the bus to school... more because I didn't have the right kind of shoes for this weather! Time to go shopping I guess :) I've been trying to get boots for weeks!
THIRD As I was relaxing in my warm apartment, watching Private Practice, drinking tea, this morning, my ceiling light (aka main light of my house) started flickering on/off. I thought it was just going to go out... but no... kept flickering and then SMOKING! I could smell the smoke and see it very visibly. I turned off the light (now provided it's snowing out, my apt was VERY Dark). Since it was only 11am and I didn't hve to be at work till 2, I called my school director who called the owner of my apartment. The owners live in Busan City and they were at my house in 45 minutes. They were the sweetest Korean couple. Surprisingly they both had very good english (I know the woman used to be a flight attendant for Korean airlines). The husband fixed my light, fixed my shower drain, and gave me a night light above my bed. They were so nice and so sweet and informative and gave me their phone number for any problems. I definitely feel like I could call them. They said they have 'empty nest' syndrom so they want to help in anyway they can. The wife has some english teacher friends in the Pusan National University area so she offered to introduce me to them :) Their 2 sons are grown and living away (one is in the Korean military). So way too much information, bottom line, I don't understand people who think the Koreans are mean. I've met nothing but nice friendly people! They were so nice, they even drove me to school (which solved my walking to the bus/shoe problem). And I am excited to be able to turn on a light and know my apartment won't blow up :)
As I write this, I am at school on one of my breaks. It started to snow just a little bit harder! Not super hard but hard enough for the kids and other teachers to make a big deal about it. The picture on the right is me with Christine (my co-worker). She took her class out to see the snow so some of the students are with us. I followed her example and took 2 of my classes out into the snow later as well. The picture on the left is my class playing in the little section of snow that gathered on the driveway. And naturally I wanted my own photo in the snow :) Again, not a lot of snow but enough to get excited about... snow in Seochang is very rare so they are all very excited (think snow in LA... it is rare but it has happened before). Just a few days ago it was beautiful out in the high 50's. Now it's gray and cold and snowing. As much as I am enjoying this, I do hope it only lasts today and maybe tomorrow. This weekend is Lunar New Year. I originally thought it was a 3 day weekend but was jut informed it is a 4-day weekend...even better! My plans are pretty flexible. Going day by day to see what happens . But hoping to see more of the South African girls (there is talk of dinner and movie nights!), a visit to Ulsan with some new friends, and then a day trip to Gyeongju with Sonny, one of the Korean teachers at my school. All the teachers are VERY nice and sweet and I get along with them well. Some are married, some have kids, etc. Sonny said most of her friends have families so it will be nice to go do something with a friend who is single lol (her parents worry cause she is 28... in American years... and still single. She seems very happy that way)....p.s. I found out I am 27 in Korean years :) It's a very complicated system they have between birthdays and new years. I'll explain more later lol.
So as far as classes go, things are going well. I've officially just about caught on to everything. The kids know me and there is only about 7 kids whose name I still don't know or I confuse with someone else. Most of my classes are very good and fun. The most common question I get asked is, 'if you don't speak Korean, how do you teach or communicate with them?" Well most of my classes (i say most cause i have 1 class that is the exception) speak/understand pretty good english. If they dont understand charades pretty well :) Here is how the day works, each class has 2 teachers, a homeroom teacher (one of the korean teachers), and a foreigner teacher (me and Christine... Christine is Korean but lived in New Zealand so has a very good in english... she leaves at the end of the month when the S.African girl comes in). The Korean teachers teach the kids grammar, what is what, give tests, and do most of the 'teaching.' I, as the 'foreign teacher' (or Way-gook-in sunsang-nim) practice more of the speaking, reading, and writing. They practice with me what they learn with the homeroom teacher. So it really isn't that hard. I have 1 class of middle school students who are KILLIN ME! Some know absolutely NO english at all, others just don't talk. It's so hard to get with them. Their book is a little too advanced for them I think. When I ask them to read, they do that well, but when I ask them to fill in the blanks, half the kids won't do it, and when I ask some of the kids who did do it, their answers, they look at me blankly like they have no idea what I'm saying. But when I look at their book, their answers are correct... so I don't get it. The other day we talked about 'preferring' something. "Julie, what do you prefer to eat in/or eat out (or if that's too complicated...) do you prefer dinner at home or dinner at restaurant?" I ask each student the same question and 1. no one listens to anyone else so after I get to the 5th person who asks 'what? sports?' trying to guess the answer cause he has no idea what I"m talking about, it just gets me mad. 2. Some still don't understand the question. I'm thinking to myself 'just say what the person before you said, even if you don't understand. 12 people went before you saying the exact same thing..." It gets very frusterating and I dread having that class. I feel like i'm just wasting my time. The teacher before me, whom I've been in contact with, said it was his hardest class as well and sometimes you just have to go through the book, whether they understand it or not. Many of them are there because they have to be and don't care and don't wanna learn, etc.
The book they use has a lot of the same exercises over and over so they know what to do. I try to repeat the same greeting everyday, if I switch up a greeting, I"ll use it for awhile till they understand. Words like 'repeat' I do not think they knew but understand now when I say it and wave my arms, it means to 'say after me together.' The other kids are good kids and are curious to learn. However, the phrase 'teacher, no book, games today,' never gets old. Everyday,they want games lol. I'm actually pretty proud of myself for coming up with the games I have. Games like Connect4, I've turned into an english game, and sentence race games. Even some of the quiet/shy kids come alive when we play a good game. What is funny, is that most of my kids are at the age where boys and girls hate each other. I could have a class of 2 boys and 6 girls, and I'd try to make even teams for a game and I'd get, "No, teacher! Boys and Girls. Girls no." lol. So funny. And everything is 'die.' "Teacher, let's play, die." my response is "I kill you?" his response, "no teacher, I kill Rickie." hmmm maybe later. In one class, I we created a story where every person added a little part of the story. Seems easy, but they didn't quite get it. The story went "Homer (one of the boys in class) and Girl are together. Homer eats Girls cup. Girls is mad at Homer. Homer kills Girl" lol.
Every once in awhile, I catch one of the kids swearing in english. It's so hard not to laugh. Sometimes I wonder if they know what it means and how bad it can be. But then again, I don't know if I should give them an english lecture on swear words. I think they just say things because they, can but don't really know how to use it or what it means. One of the other Korean teachers was asking me how bad certain words were. She was confused why certain words were on TV but others were not. So I explained that some were worse than others and how they're used, etc.
So now, I'm gonna Skype with my mom for a bit before school. Hope everyone is well:)

Visitors/new friends

I am on break from work right now but I'm so excited I had to post this ASAP. My director pulls me out of class, out of the blue about an hour ago. He says "your friends are here." I'm thinking 'who are u talking about? i have no friends here lol.' and in the lobby are 2 super tall, really pretty girls. Kath and Sandy. They said they used to be friends with Thom, the english teacher here before me and recently heard from one of the kids parents that he left and there was a new foreign english teacher so they came over to introduce themselves! How great is that?!?! Just in the middle of the day, stopping by to say hi :) I was very excited. Both girls (whom were VERY tall, i might add) are from South Africa but speak with more of a british accent. We exchanged phone numbers (tho i accidently left my phone at home today). They're coming by the school at 9 when I get off to grab tea after :) They said there were many foreigners in my city. This all makes me very happy. The beginning of new friendships. Today is a great day :)

My First Co-workers dinner :)

1. I just wanted to make a correction on my previous post. Apparently I had the definition of hachima wrong? I still have to clarify a few things but I think i had it wrong lol. So confusing. 2. I had a great night last. I went to dinner with all my co-workers. I usually get off work at 9 but tonight I waited around till 10:30 for us all to go to dinner. We went to a chicken place by the school... actually the first place i ever went to in Korea (this was where the director greeted me). There were about 10 of us total and the owner of the school, Dreamon came as well. I've only met him once for about 2 minutes so it was nice chatting with him. Dinner started with cabbage salad, and like pickled raddish shut, and another little salad. They put the plate in the middle of the table for everyone to share. I don't think double dipping exists here ... YES! We ordered a couple different chicken dishes for just everyone to share (and when I say we, I just mean them lol). The picture on the right, I believe, is chicken large intestine. They said 'try this. It's good. Careful it's spicy" I ate a bite "it's a little bit squishy. What is it?" After much Korean talking trying to find the name of it, someone finally tells me "it is large intestine... you know the shit part area" lol. WHAT?! It's mixed in with potatoes so needlesss to say on THAT plate, I just ate potatos. No large intestine for me. The rest of the chicken was normal and tasted very good :) I really had a great time. This dinner was hosted for a couple reasons, 1. to welcome me, 2. to welcome a new korean teacher, 3. because winter camp is over... the Korean teachers no longer have class in the morning. So this other picture on the right is of me and Dreamon, the owner of my school. He was HILARIOUS! Cracking jokes right and left, asking me advice about what to do with one of his other teachers at another location (who am I to tell him what to do/not do with trouble teachers lol). Even after a couple shots of Soju and glasses of beer, he was the life of the party. There was a lot of conversation between me and everyone else about korean cultural differences and life stories. Everyone was laughing and having a really good time :) I was told that they couldn't have asked for a better foreign teacher and they hope the new teacher coming in is like me. Awwww :) They said they really admire the fact that I do not judge any of them and I am interested in their culture and want to try different things. A lot of Americans do not adjust well. One of the teachers, Joann (pic of us on the left), told me that I should call her sister...Unie (like undie without the d). I was told my by director to call him... Opa ... brother (Ho is the guy on the pink cell on the pic in the upper left). This is very common in the work place but it definitely made me feel accepted. Ho, my director, asked if I had ever had Soju... no i have not. So he got like 3 bottles. I really had never had it before. Everyone was drinking it out of a shot glass but some people were shooting it and others sipping. I was told for my first time, I had to shoot it. So I did. It was surprisingly not as bad as I thought. I was expecting it to be like vodka. Well it tasted a little bit similar but without the strong horrible aftertaste. Ho made me pose like this (pic on the right) but I'm still not a big enough drinker to chug a bottle!! lol. Over all a very good first soju exerience. Seemed like they would 'cheers' every time they drank it. In Korean, they say 'Gombae" which is just like cheers. I told them my way to remember that is to remember the green cartoon character called Gumby. They thought it was funny. Korean tradition apparently you can't pour your own drink. You can pour other peoples drink but not your own. Politeness? I don't know. I'll let you know. From what I hear, everyone usually gets pretty drunk. But because Dreamon As long as they were talking to each other, they'd speak korean, if they were speaking to me directly, they'd speak english. We were there for quite awhile. Till 2am or so. Usually they go karaoke after, Dreamon likes karaoke apparently. But instead we went to another restaurant type place...this reminded me of a hole in the wall, after hours type place. small, a few metal tables in the back. More food... more raddish stuff (tried it once didn't like it. Thought this was was different so I tried it... I still don't like it lol). But the soup was sooooo good. They said similar to miso soup with rice in it. It was YUM!! So we were there awhile longer, more conversation, etc. Good times!! :) Then Sonny gave me a ride home.
They were so funny. After long funny conversation, Esther tells me " we want to come to your house. It is traditional to have a housewarming party." Wow here too? lol. I think that would be fun!! My place is big enough to have people over :) Only 2 problems... I have nowhere to sit. I have a big chair and a bed. 2. I would have to cook. Traditionaly, it is considered rude to bring anything big (wine, etc) to a party. The host likes to take care of everything and considers it an insult. Little cakes are allowed though. So yea I have to cook. If you know me, you know that I LOVE to cook. But having only been here 2 weeks, the grocery stores are VERY difficult. I can't figure out what anything is. My fridge and cabinets have basic things in it... spaghetti, eggs, water, yogurt, tofu, cheese, etc. lol. So there are 2 things that worry me. 1. Finding something to cook 2. Finding something they like! I said something about apples dipped in peanut butter yesterday in class and the kids looked at me like I was crazy. They said 'very not delicious teacher.' Ok I LOVE apples and peanut butter lol. So if they don't like that, I don't know what else to make lol. Then of course they'll want alcohol (Koreans drink A LOT!). I don't know Soju from whiskey lol. ok...i think i could figure it out but honestly, I haven't drank much here yet. So many things to consider :) We will see how it goes....