Busy, Busy, and then some more Busy

     To say that we've been busy is an understatement. It started just before Jungwon's graduation from the SMU Tesol Program. We had a few weekends full of her final class projects which included a foreigner interview (guess who was the foreigner), a lot of typing, and very little sleep.
     Just before her graduation, after the projects were submitted, the celebrating began. We had a quadruple date with some of her old university friends. The night began with too much soju, and ended with a few hours of sleep before Jungwon and I took our promised trip to Suwon.
     Before we left Suwon, I asked Jungwon if she thought she would like to come back to visit. She answered with something akin to, "why would I come back here?". Yet, she was very excited to go back to our old haunts. We had lunch at D-Deli, went to visit the old elementary school, and then went to the fusion restaurant named Su. In between we took a break for a few hours to catch the Sex in the City movie, and we sat for a time in a park we used to visit during our lunches. It was a good time even if we were tired from the previous night of drinking.
     The next weekend was the celebratory weekend for Jungwon's Tesol program group, G9. We went out for wine, and then took a trip to Namsan. Visiting the mountain was very different at night, and they had even changed out the art work. The evening was more relaxed than the previous weekend, but we still stayed out late, and drank a good bit of wine.
     The next Thursday was Jungwon's SMU Tesol graduation. Her mom and sister were there so I was very nervous. After the graduation program, which was a bit different from any graduation I'd been to, we took lots of pictures, went out to eat, and then Jungwon and I joined her classmates at a nearby bar for a nightcap before heading our ways for the evening.
     The next day was a workshop day for my school. We took a trip out to Namisum. The island is absolutely gorgeous, but I was wary of the wild ostriches roaming about. Yes, I typed ostriches.

quadrupal date	Suwon Revisited
G9 does wine	grad

namiseom

Plus One

     I have officially started at my new job. It's amazing that I can work a "long" day at the school, eat supper, buy some necessities for the apartment, and still get home before seven. Coupled with the fact that the owner of the school keeps telling me not to rush or to try to go through the lessons in a certain amount of time, I am feeling mightily relaxed. The school has this crazy new idea of actually teaching the kids so that they learn, not to level them up in classes, sell books, or to feed the mommies' egos. The difference between this school and everywhere else that I have been is like night and day.
     The school has recently moved into a new building. They own the whole building, and it is very well designed. I personally wish I had one less window so that I could have more shelf space, but after the plastic wrapped window experience of POLY I will not complain at all. I am up on the third floor. I have my own room that I teach two and a half set of kids in. In the mornings I teach my prekindergarteners. These are children that are Korean age six (four to five years old by western counting). They are learning English at an alarming rate, and they are reluctantly relinquishing their dominance in our power struggle. Originally there were seven students, but we gained another student last week. I teach the same children from nine:thirty until three in the afternoon.
     After the prek'ers I swap to my first graders. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I teach what is dominantly a reading and conversation class. These students are a kick to work with because their English is very good, but this is their first hakwon experience outside of Kindergarten. They had very little concept of how to keep up with their homework, so I bought them a set of notebooks to write everything down in. These classes run from three:thirty until five, with a ten minute break near the middle. The Tuesday class is a mix of some of my reading students, and a couple of students from another reading class. The schedule is the same, but this time we study a north American science textbook and do a small experimenttowards the end of class. It is really fun, and I think I enjoy it as much as the children. On Thursdays I go home at three.

PlusOne

Fire Ants

     When I first looked around this neighborhood it was dark, and hideously cold outside. I did not know exactly where I was, I only had a faint map and address that I had printed off the internet. The streets were not brightly lit, and I stumble across this monstrosity of a graffitied building. I had a feeling that my new apartment was not going to be in an ideal neighborhood. I finally found the address, and half a block away I found a well lit and manicured area full of new wealth and vigor. "At least the neighborhood is only half bad." I thought.
     For the past couple of weeks that night stumbling about in the near dark and freezing temperatures had tainted my view of the southwestern part of my neighborhood. However, during the past few days I have attempted to acquaint myself with this area. Happily I can say that my first impressions were wrong. The graffiti was only to say that the building had been condemned. The streets are dark at night, but they are safe and the neighbors are friendly. There is a bit of revitalizing construction going near my building, and apparently money is being poured into the area's general vicinity to make it more akin to Seolaemeoeul, or Insadong. The more that I look around the neighborhood the more I get a feeling of the Fine Arts building back at GSW. There is a mix of design companies and other studios peppered about the general populace. Although it is not terribly visible, their mark is on the town.

Sinsa

It's that sort of...

     I was sitting in a coffee shop Sunday morning flipping through an art and design magazine. This is the sort of neighborhood that has coffee shops, and they are open on Sunday mornings. The coffee shop I went to is the sort of coffee shop that provides you with high-brow magazines. The magazine I picked was mostly about objects. Cars, daily planners, cellphones, furniture, anything that is ever used, even if it is only to decorate, was discussed in this periodical. There was a paragraph about the milk ajuma hand carts. It compared phones by Prada and Giorgio Armani. The magazine seemed to focus on the ideal of, "Form follows function" and added the clause, "and an important function is to look pretty". It was simply entitled Design. It is that sort of magazine.
     There was a particular shop that the magazine discussed. The photo spread showed a shop full of merchandise that looked a bit more low-brow. The items were of a modern pop-art theme. Toys, posters, and random odds and ends were the norm. The photos reminded me of "Juxtapoz" . The main item that I remembered from the write-up was a trophy mounted polar bear head that was wearing a pirate hat. It was that sort of shop. I remembered it specifically because it did not seem to fit the clean cut image of the magazine. It was that sort of photo spread.
     Yesterday, I was wandering around the less clean, more graffitied part of my new neighborhood. I was looking for an old furniture store that I had noticed a few nights before. I was heading in a general southwesterly direction when I saw a polar bear's head mounted on a wall inside of a shop. I stopped to gape for a moment because I began to notice other items from the magazine spread. It is that sort of neighborhood.

Transitions...

     I am in a state of transition. It is a bit like being a minnow in tapioca pudding. Friday was my last day at Sungdong POLY, and I am now finishing up the last hurdles of the new visa process, and should hopefully begin teaching at PlusOne by the beginning of March.
     Why the change? Well, I'm still searching for a school with integrity. POLY quickly proved itself to not be such a school. I am not going to get into details here, but from the moment I turned in my notice (over a month ago) I have felt a weight off of my shoulders.
     On the other hand, PlusOne is proving itself to be an awesome school. Everything that I have seen shows a relaxed atmosphere with more devotion to teaching the children rather than making a quick buck from the parents.
     I am not putting up any PlusOne pictures just yet. I have another week and a half of down time, so I should be able to catch up on my back log of blogs. Instead enjoy my farewell photo essay of POLY.

**I apologize in advance if I have misspelled anyone's name**




ByBye POLY

Namdaemun:RIP

     It's amazing how the destruction of a site that I barely visited can affect me so strongly. The people around me today (namely at the hakwon) have expressed little emotion towards the event, but just hearing about it, and later seeing the pictures that accompanied the Associated Press Article has left me feeling a bit hollow. I can only assume that this is because I consider Korea as my home, and Namdaemun (남대문) was an important cultural treasure.
     Unfortunatly the only pictures I ever took of the gate was on a cell phone, before I purchased my digital camera. Even more unfortanatly I was never able to transfer the pictures from the phone onto my computer, and are now gone for good. This has just given me the conviction to always carry my charged camera, and to take pictures of everywhere that I go.

Ringing in the New Year

     Happy 2008, everyone! The end of 2007 was fairly eventful for me. On the 15th Jungwon and I had an action packed day. It started off with ring shopping at Insadong and Chungro 3Ga. This was followed up by some coffee at the Insadong Starbucks, and then meeting Sarah and Michael. The four of us then went to a ceramics party that Jungwon's friend was catering, and then on to some fancy building back on Chungro 3Ga that had a fancy sky lounge.
     During the ring shopping Jungwon and I started at an artsy jewelry shop in Insadong. They had some lovely rings, but Jungwon wanted to check out the well known jewelry shops along Chungro 3Ga. So we walked there and I immediately didn't like the shops. Imagine a room full of greasy men that could very well be used car salesmen only instead of trying to sell fenderless Pintos, they're tying to pass along cheaply stamped out gold foil rings. It was obvious we weren't going to find anything there.
     So Jungwon and I meandered around, and we broached some cultural differences that we hadn't fully noticed before. I had to explain that engagement rings are for the woman, and that they are typically worn on the finger along with the marriage band. Jungwon explained that I should have a ring too (I'm not sure if this is a Korean thing, or a Jungwon thing), and with her bashfulness of her hands, they may very well be the only rings we buy.
     We also decided that we both really liked one of the specific designs back at the first shop in Insadong. We soon found ourselves back in the shop being measured and jittery with excitement.
     The rings are two tone, white and pink gold. There are four stones set along either edge (see the pictures) of each ring. The gold is unfortunately rather soft (as gold should be), and Jungwon insisted on cubic instead of real diamonds. "Can you tell the difference?" She asked. I, of course, had to admit that I couldn't. The delivery from the workshop was delayed due to the Christmas orders, but we finally picked them up on the 29th. Unfortunatly my ring was a bit larger than I was confortable with. I could just imagine it slipping off if I was to ever go swimming. So Monday I returned to the shop to get it resized, and I'm hoping it will be ready sometime in the next few days.
     Still, Jungwon and I consider ourselves officially engaged. There aren't any dates set, and I'm not sure anything will happen anytime in the next year. Just rest assured that when the weddings bells do ring, they will probably ring twice, once for each homeland so don't be afraid that you'll be missing anything.

RingShopping

Sarah and Mike Last Fling

rings

Where to begin?

     It's been a long month. Dad has come and gone from Korea, Jungwon and I went to Namsan, and of course there was Halloween at the school. I'll keep the text short, and let the pictures do the talking.

Namsan	Halloween	Dad

Han River

     Back in July, Jungwon and I went to the Han River. The Han River (Hangang {한강}) is the main river that runs through the center of Seoul. We took the number 2 (green) subway line to Sincheon Station {신천역} and walked north for a block to get to the river. The area that we walked around was a public park of sorts. There was a swimming pool, a walkway that was fairly crowded with people, and some ferries.
     The swimming pool made me realize again that there are many differences between Korean and American culture. The women were pretty well covered. If they weren't swimming, the women had loose dresses on to cover themselves. I was thinking that many girls walking around the party areas of Seoul wear less than these women were swimming in. In contrast, the men were wearing little speedo swimsuits. They had no qualms, in the water or out, of showing off their....packages. These are probably the same men that walk around in business suits, in the middle of summer, no matter what type of business they are attending.
     The walkway was full of pedestrians, cyclists, small dogs, picnics, and vendors. At times it was difficult to walk around the sporadic picnics, but we managed not to fall into the river. Another cultural phenomenon that I noticed was spitting into the river. At first I thought it was just the older men, but after it was mentioned we noticed young people including women spitting nice wads into the waves. Maybe it was just a desire to mix their water with the water of the world.
     Finally, we decided to ride one of the river ferries. Just due to timing we ended up purchasing the more expensive tickets for a ferry that featured a Live Cafe. There weren't any seats outside on this particular ferry so my camera was having a fit trying to focus on the outside world, the dirty window, and the reflections on the windows. The good news was that there were no mosquitoes in the ferry.
     All of the pictures were taken before we hopped on the ferry. It was getting fairly late in the evenings and I got a few decent shots of the sun struggling through the clouds to shine on the water. The movies were taken on the ferry. The first one is on the way down the river, looking at the south bank. The second movie is heading back up the river, looking at the north bank. The final movie is a shot of the Namsan tower. The background noise for the movies isn't very good, just the murmur of a few dozen people around us, and the music from the cafe.
     On a side note: during the whole trip to the river I kept thinking of this movie.

hangangpics

Heading West, Looking South.

Heading East, Looking North

Namsan Tower

Shabu-shabu

     Unfortunately I'm going to skip posting about the Turkish restaurant that we ate at on Sunday. We didn't take many pictures, and the few we did take were too dark to make the food look yummy. Instead of Kebab, I present, Shabu-Shabu!
     Shabu-shabu is one of the meals that is so healthy, yet so yummy, you can't stop eating. Jungwon suggested that we stop by a local restaurant for lunch yesterday. it had been a few weeks since we'd last been so I quickly agreed, and gorging was commenced.
     Shabu-shabu {샤브샤브} (the current-correct romanization from the Korean would be syabeu-syabeu) was a dish that came to Korea from Japan. The basic idea is for the restaurant to give it's patrons a pot of boiling broth, and enough food to feed them twice. Shabu-shabu usually has thinly sliced beef (it browns in just a few seconds in the boiling broth), some mushrooms, and tonnes of veggies. After the pot of goodies is eaten, the servers will bring some noodles, and freshen the broth a little. After the noodles they'll ladle out most of broth and throw in some seaweed mixed rice.
     The shabu-shabu that we ordered was beef and dumplings. Usually we have to shovel in the goodies ourselves once the pot begins to boil, but for this particular meal the pot came preloaded. Luckily this particular meal excluded the final rice course. After the cabbage salad, main course, and noodles, I don't think either of use could have touched the rice.
     Enough babbling. Here are some pictures from Monday's lunch.

shabushabu

Busy, busy, busy

     As of late, I've been busy looking for another job. I didn't have to start this early but I did, and I hope that I've found a good one. I'm not going to hold my breath. Both of my previous jobs in Korea sounded great until after the VISA.
     Now, I know that people come here to see pictures and movies of Korea and hopefully me, and not to hear me whine or rant about work. Instead I'll talk about food. I have lots of pictures from various meals that I've eaten in the past week. I even have pictures of a potential meal. A Korean treat that I promised Jungwon that I'd try.
     I will post the meals in the order eaten. Tonight's post is from two very large chains in the Seoul/Gyeonggido areas. The restaurant is Pho Bay. It's a Vietnamese restaurant, and the food is filling, delicious, and healthy. David was gracious enough to pay for the meal as a gift for Jungwon's coming birthday (July 25). The bar that we went to afterwards is named Wa Bar. The chain is very popular among the foreigners. This was only the second time that I had been to one.
     The usual main course that we get at Pho Bay is a plate of assorted veggies and a bit of meat, a plate of hard rice paper discs, and a bowl of hot water. You take a disc of rice paper, soak it in the hot water, spread it onto your wooden plate, laden it with veggies, roll it up, dip it in peanut butter and enjoy. It's a lot of work for a few bites, but it's really worth it.

Pho Bay

     After Pho Bay, Meg wanted to go out for drinks. David suggested the Wa Bar (western style bar specializing in imported beer). David had a Jack and Coke (not pictured) I had the Lowenbrau, Jungwon tried the Hooch Ice; Lemon, and Meg had the ultra-captain tall glass of Wa-bar draft something. The most interesting part of the trip to the Wa Bar was that the waitress had no idea what a Jack and Coke was, so David had to mix it himself.

Wa Bar

Seoul Grand Park

     Jungwon had been wanting to go to the zoo for a while so last Sunday we kicked things off by watching Shrek the Third at CoEx, and then heading down to Seoul Grand Park.
     First the specifics. Seoul Grand Park is on the number 4 line (light blue) 3 stops below Sadang {사당역}. It is subway station number 437 and is listed as Seoul Grand Park {대공원}. When you get off the subway simply follow the signs and/or crowds of people. You'll eventually come to a ticket booth to buy a tram ticket (or as an alternative you can veer right to get a ticket for a ski lift type thing, but I don't know where that will deposit you). The tram follows a circuit allowing you to easily get to any of the park's attractions. There is a rose garden, an amusement park, a museum, and of course, the zoo. The tram costs 800 won and has Korean and English voice overs.
     Jungwon made it a point to mention that she wanted to see the dolphin show so when we bought our zoo entry tickets we made sure to get our reserved seats. The zoo admittance and dolphin show came out to be 9,000 won total for two people. Total cost for tickets including the trams back and forth came out to be 12,200 won. Frozen bottles of water cost 1,000 won in the park, and during the summer they are a necessity. We went through three bottles of water, two that we brought with us, and one that we bought after the dolphin show, and this was only June!
     The zoo had a good collection of animals. Of course I didn't like the small sizes, ugliness, and boringness of many of the animals cages. For the most part the animals did seem to be in good health, although the monkeys and apes seemed very stressed by the jeering visitors and the lack of intellectual stimulation.
     One thing that I liked about the zoo was the fact that it had a lot of educational side shows. Little rooms you could enter that had information (in Korean) about how the wolves at this zoo were genetically altered to have domestic dog stomaches, or a room that talked about animal dung (many Koreans, especially children, seem to be obsessive about poop).


The Goodies


     First we have pictures uploaded to my web folder. There are giraffes, a cute baby hippo, lions cuddling, a rhino, a lemur, and (of course) the room of poop. Next are two videos of the dolphin show. The show started with a couple of performing seals, and then the dolphins showing off. The first video is actually the end of the show. You can see my camera going in and out of focus. The Auto Focus was giving me fits all day. The second video is cute, but unfortunately the end just went totally out of focus. None of the pictures of the show turned out.

Seoul Grand Park

Dolphin Show 1

Dolphin Show 2

Ice Water

     When I first got to Korea, summer was steadily approaching. As the days got warmer and warmer I kept seeing signs for cups of crushed ice and fruit, for about 5,000 won. I would think, "5,000 won for a cup of ice and fruit! Who in there right mind would pay that? That's more than $5.00 for ice!" After a summer of walking about the cities, and the new summer pouncing on us like an overweight cat, the answer without hesitation is me.
     The cup, or normally bowl, of ice is properly known as bingsu, {빙수}. The name is derived from two Chinese characters. Bing can mean ice, and one of the meanings for su is water. Proper bingsu, patbingsu {팥빙수}, is made with crushed ice, various sliced and diced fruits, frozen yogurt, bits of rice cake, and sweet red beans. As strange as the concoction sounds it is really quiet delicious. More importantly it is very refreshing after a long trek across town.
     Bingsu can be found everywhere during the summer. Coffee shops, fast food restaurants, and anywhere else that wants a boost in summer business will advertise their bingsu.
     Jungwon and I recently went to an interesting place called Pasticcerria in Yeongtongdong that sells "Italian" style bread. We didn't try the bread, but we got a very lovely bowl of patbingsu.

bingsu

Descending Life Line (four)

     Almost every restaurant in Korea will give you complimentary side dishes. If you go out for pasta, you'll usually get some sweet pickled cucumbers and some sliced peppers. The more Korean the meal, the more side dishes you'll get.
     I go out for kimchi jjigae {김치찌개} and along with my large bowl of still boiling stew and side bowl of rice they leave me all types of pickled and preserved....stuff. Everything from squid to cucumber, from mushrooms to soy flavored jello. Masitda! {맛있다}!

Working Title

     Jungwon and I were stepping into an elevator in Gangnam the other day. The elevator was already occupied by a mommie and her little one gurgling in a stroller. The mommie took a quick look at me, then started talking excitedly to the baby. Jungwon giggled, but most of the words went over my head. I listened intently but she was speaking too rapidly and I couldn't pick out many words.
     We exited the elevator and Jungwon translated for me, "she was telling the baby, 'quick, practice your English, hurry.' And the baby said, 'aaaaaeeeei'. And the mommie praised the baby, 'good job'."
     I could probably fill a book with little stories of being interrupted by people looking for a quick English conversation for themselves or their children. Most of the time it is cute, and often it is funny (like the mommie in the elevator). Rarely is it annoying. Regardless it's the mommie in the elevator that made me think of "Descending Life Line (two)".

Descending Life Line (two)

     Here is the latest installment of Descending Life Line. If you can't read the text in the image the mommie is telling the baby, "Say hello! Say hello!"
     At the bottom I wrote, "Often when Parents see you on the street they will try to get their children to practice English..."

Descending Life Line (one)

     Here is a little comic that I doodled while I was sitting in a coffee shop in Seoul. I was thinking about the strangeness of teaching children in a language that they don't completely understand. The particular class that I was envisioning has the disadvantages of almost no English, attention span, or chances to release excess energy before class. Luckily there has been no actual fires, yet.







     The boy in the comic is saying, "Wayne teacher! Wayne teacher, homework check! Wayne teacher! Teacher! Wayne teacher, homework! Teacher~~~!"
     The caption at the bottom reads, "...And then there are whole classes that I fill with a sort of monologue: "Nick, don't stab Steve. Why is John on fire again? Alex, please get off the table. Andy please get in your chair. One moment Paul. Steve wake up. Paul help John, please. Dan put your toys away. Nick, don't eat Steve. John stop burning..."

Yeongtong-dong and Cheongmyeong-san

     Most of the pictures in the next web album are from the hike up the mountain that I took this morning. Cheongmyeong-san {청명산} is a nice, very little mountain. It takes about an hour to climb up, and 45 minutes to come back down.
     About half way up from Yeongtong-dong {영통동} (the neighborhood I live in) you'll come to a leveled off area called Noble County. I've heard that it's a retirement home (silver town) but some of my students have told me about the nice restaurants and swimming there. The whole place is owned by the Samsung Corporation so it could be a combination retirement home/recreation center for Samsung's employees. I took a slight detour on the way down the mountain today to look around the grounds.
     On the edge of Noble County is a little farm. The farm has two tiers for growing their crops. With a county as small, densely populated, and mountainous as Korea you grow what you can, where you can. The farm used to have a giant bird cage filled with parakeets, pheasants, and other noisy little things, but the cage has been mostly dismantled.
     On up the mountain you can find a few little exercise spots. Koreans are crazy for fitness and you can find exercise equipment in almost every park. At the very top of the mountain is a little stone marker and a metal sign letting you know which city is on which side of the mountain.
     I took a picture of my neighborhood on my way home. You can see the paper on the street. Unfortunately littering is a very popular form of advertising in Korea. The towers in the background were not visible from this area when I first moved here in August. Korail is putting in a subway station that will connect to Ori Station {오리역} and I think Suwon Station {수원역}, and the towers are being built to cater to the boom in population and businesses that the new station will bring.
     Finally there are some pictures of the crab tanks next door to my apartment. These tanks are very common in Korea and they are filled with all manner of sea life. I'll probably do a photo essay on these tanks some time soon.

Yeongtong-dong and Cheongmyeong-san

Icheon Redux

     I mentioned in my email about Icheon that I made some movies, but was working on converting/editing them. I couldn't find any decent looking freeware to do the converting/editing. Instead I found a way to post them on line in the full horrible glory, Google Video.
     They are horrible do to my own lacking. My Nikon digital camera has very few movie making options. I have very little experience running a camera (and usually it's a high quality camera on a tripod). A lot of video was shot with me holding the camera over the crowd's heads, and my final excuse is that it was horribly bright outside so I could not really see the LCD.
     Anyways, the background for the movies is, we (Jungwon and I) went to Icheon {이천} on May fifth, two thousand and seven. Icheon has a ceramics festival once every two years, and this happened to be one of the years. To make it even more exciting May fifth is Children's Day in Korea. We stumbled upon a Taekwondo {태권도} performance, and later we came across a group playing traditional Korean drums.

Movie One: Korean Drummers (very loud!):

Movie Two: Taekwondo Demonstration; Board Breaking:

Movie Three: Taekwondo Demonstration; Modern Form:

Bongeunsa

     Bongeunsa {봉은사 } is a Buddhist temple in Seoul. It is just a short walk from CoEx (Samseong Station {삼성역}). The temple was especially busy and decorated when we were there, because this coming Thursday (May twenty-fourth) is the celebration of Buddha's Birthday (Hooray for National Holidays!).
     It was very odd walking around the rustic grounds in Seoul. Everything surrounding the temple is cement, steel, and glass. The trees and gravel walkways were refreshing. Without Jungwon there I would have stumbled into a restricted area that was meant only for the resident monks (the sign was written in Korean). As usually Jungwon took most of the pictures (she's the better photographer). The colorful statues are made of painted paper. I was wondering the whole time "how well will they hold up in the rain?". Probably pretty well since the temples have had paper lanterns strung in the nearby streets for a month. Still, we were lucky that it was a bright and clear day.
     The grounds were crowded and we only went into one building. It had a sort of exhibition of the paper statues and a small display of how they are made. When we were leaving the building the people sitting at the table had me sign and write what I thought into a guest book. They did not let Jungwon sign, it was for foreigners only.
     Another building had some beautifully painted scenes on the side. They depicted a young monk going through all sorts of trials. He did all sorts of things including wrestling a tiger, but the worst had to be the written test. I later discovered that Bongeunsa was the main temple for giving the country's exam for admittance into the monk hood. And as a slight aside, I learned that Bongeunsa is a zen Buddhist temple.
     Finally, you will notice a few swastikas painted on the buildings. This doesn't mean that it is a hideout for nazis. Rather the symbol itself is older than nazism, and has been used to denote temples for many centuries.

Bongeunsa