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| Happy Halloween from Korea :) |
Day 64- October 30,2010
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| These are my advanced second graders, who I teach once a week for 2 hours after school. They are funny, wise beyond their years and more importantly they speak near perfect English. Here they are working so hard on a creative writing assignment I had them do. I had them write a story which included 10 random words that I gave them. I wanted to encourage them to use good grammar and also practice their creative thinking. As they were all quietly working, I just sat back and was just so happy that I had a really successful lesson and I was challenging my students to do something a bit outside their comfort zone. It was a good feeling |
Day 63- October 29, 2010
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| Just a little treat I gave the teachers for Halloween. I think they liked it and it always wins brownie points to give the teachers little gifts. |
Day 62- October 28, 2010
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| On todays episode of random stuff i get at work. Rice cake and toothpaste. This rice cake was about the size of 3/4 of a brick, and i whittled it down during hte day to that. I now know why i am not losing weight in Korea... no.self.control |
Day 60- October 26, 2010
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| You know what's cute? Small Korean children. It's my 2 month anniversary of being in korea. Oh does time fly. |
Day 59- October 25, 2010
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| So I was waiting to get this picture from a friend, but wanted to tell you about my friday night convenience store crawl. As you remember from day 30 drinking is fun easy and cheap via convenience stores. The men and women who run them are lovely and usually very accommodating, so it's fun to see what each different store has to offer. Similar to a traditional bar crawl, we plotted out a time frame and went from one bar to the next, totaling (in the plan) 8 bars. It was destined to be a mess of a scenario, but due to a general sense of exhaustion and several trips the following day, the night ended at bar 5 around 11:00. Here we are at stop three outside 7-11 (most of us) looking enthusiastic still. Hopefully this plan will carry through stronger in the spring when it gets warm again. |
Day 58- October 24, 2010
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| This is a great chance to talk about Ajummas (Aunts). In Korea, older women, typically 50 and up, tend to have perms and wear crazy outfits. At this point in their lives, they are busy raising kids and have let themselves go. Often these women are extremely pushy, rude and are fascinated with Americans. They are not afraid to touch you or stare at anytime. Basically social graces just don't exist. They are fun to spot on the street, and at least when you see them you are ready to handle it. Regardless, today I saw and Ajumma, on an ATV. Now usually these are not the type of vehicles you see in the streets of a major korean city. I'd say this was slightly peculiar. |
Day 56- October 22, 2010
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| Today was our school festival, a fun day for the students to take a load off and have some fun. These are all 1200 boys that I see walking through the halls everyday! that's a lot of koreans! |
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| In the afternoon, students did kind of a talent show and got judged by some of my coteachers. This is in fact a cross dressing 1st grader dancing to a KPOP song! |
Day 55- October 21, 2010
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| My whole week was spent spending late nights after school helping my student ChunHo (Peter as I call him) get ready for the Pyeongtaek English Speech and Debate Contest. He was really nervous, but here he is rocking it up on stage during his debate about cosmetic surgery and he did great! I'm so proud of him and our 1st grader who gave a great speech about a book that inspired him. |
Day 54- October 20, 2010
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| Leaves are starting to change in Korea. Looking forward to my mountain hike next weekend to see all the prettyness. |
Day 52- October 18, 2010
MY APARTMENT IS A MESS!!! I PROMISE MOM, I'LL NEVER COMPLAIN ABOUT THE CLEANING SERVICE COMING AGAIN AT 7 AM. CLEANING YOUR OWN HOUSE IS AWFUL!
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| I bought this mop on friday. my floor definitely needs to be swept. it is now monday, and nothing. should really get on it |
Day 50- October 16, 2010
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| Today I headed to Insadong, an area of Seoul that is known for more traditional Korean items like handmade paper, Buddhist items, teas and scarves. |
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| These are all kinds of mushrooms |
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| After words Ali and I got our nails done :) I picked a color that looked pink but turned out bright orange?!? we decided I should draw some jack-o-.lanterns and make it look like it was on purpose. Also.. I know this isn't a picture, but today I made a video riding over the river into Seoul. Thought you might enjoy it. |
Day 49- October 15, 2010
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| Today was the 2nd grade class trip to Everland, an amusement park in Gyeonggi Province. I got to tag along for the ride. |
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| Halloween parade. Apparently, what I thought was a lost holiday here came to Korea in some form. |
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| Some of the teachers I work with,. An excellent posse indeed! |
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| Like my ears? I'm Korean now!!! |
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| The swarms of Korean children lining up to get back on their respective buses. Imagine about 100,000 elementary, middle and high school Koreans all packed into six flags. The product was pure insanity and a giant headache for any adult that had to witness it. Still a fun day!! |
Day 48- October 14, 2010
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| Some of my advanced second grade students working on their monsters. I asked them, if their monsters could have any super powers, what would they do. We were practicing conditional statements. It did not go all that well in terms of the writing, but the monsters were funny looking. Apparently, it's really cool to give monsters "6-pack." |
Day 47- October 13, 2010
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| My attempt at being artsy. Just some Korean graffiti at a great korean bbq restaurant I went to that was super cheap! |
Day 46- October 12, 2010
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| Okay so this is the cutest Jindo ever. A Jindo is a traditional Korean dog and I saw him on the chestnut farm I was at the other day. I really wanted to take him home with me, as my desire for a puppy to better fill this large apartment grows everyday! Who thinks i'm responsible enough to get a dog? |
day 45- October 11, 2010
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| This is my school lunch.. probably my favorite meal of the day. Today we had fried (some kind of meat) with a chinese sauce, spicy tofu, radish kimchi and leak(?) soup. A standard lunch always has rice, soup, some kind of kimchi and a main dish. In all restaurants, you use a metal spoon and metal chopsticks. |
Day 44- October 10, 2010
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| What a real Korean 3 bedroom apartment looks like |
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| Nice Kitchen |
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| Jian's Daughter |
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| Jian's Son |
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| Kim family picking chestnuts (Pom) on a family farm. |
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| This is what a chestnut looks like when it grows on the tree |
Day 43- October 9, 2010
a At yet another palace, Jian invited me to stay with her and her family and her "parents in law" in Gongju, a small small city near Daejon ( 1 hour south of Pyeongtaek) |
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| Light Festival in Gongju with Jian. |
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| Cool Paper Dragon. |
Day 42- October 8, 2010
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| A nice night out at VIN 79. A new favorite place of mine in Pyeongtaek. Delicious wine, yummy fondue, good company. Will definitely do it again. Sorry the pic isn't great, I have to worry about taking some more artsy ones. |
Day 40- October 6, 2010
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| Today.... I successfully ordered my first Korean Delivery. After witnessing a Korean do the same thing I asked them for the phone number of the "chinese" place and some of the stuff on the menu to order (as I could not really read it). I called the number ordered buk um bap ( which i believe translates to fried rice and egg) and mandu (fried dumplings). It all came to my door in approximately 6 minutes (puts jimmy johns to shame). All the food comes super saran wrapped in plastic dishes with a real spoon. When you are done with the plates you put them outside your door and the guy comes back and picks it up. All for 9,000 won ( which i think would be cheaper if i didn't order sooo much mandu). So easy! |
Day 39- October 5, 2010
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| Everywhere I go I see people collecting these berry type fruits that fell from the tree. Usually these types of berries get stepped on back in the states, in Korea, apparently, they are a delicacy. |
Day 38- October 4, 2010
위아래로 언덕: Up the Hill and Down the Hill
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| So today, all the co teachers went hiking. Needless to say, much of the trek was in the vertical direction (straight up). Definitely more than I bargained for! |
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| This wasn't the top, but it gave me a nice view of Anseong ( the city close to Pyeongtaek) |
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| I made it to the top!! So I wanted to make a quick comment. This is going to sound a little cheesy but today, much of my hike was extremely uphill, or extremely downhill. It got me thinking, especially after this (kind of sad) weekend how much this hike paralleled my Koeran experience. It really is a roller coaster, and some days are going to be better than others. I have to remind myself though, that at the end of the trek, I'll always feel a sense of accomplishment at what i'm doing here. |