Adventures from around the World

So we arrive in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia really late at night, and because the airport is really far from the city, we don’t actually arrive at the hotel until 2:30am!  However, we still had to wake up early in order to have breakfast (included with the room) by 10am. 
After breakfast we headed out into the city centre, towards the structures that define this city and possibly this nation, the Petronas Towers (Pr. Petro-nass, not like Petronas from Harry Potter, I know, I was disapointed too).  The towers are owned by the national oil and gas company - Petronas. Up until recently the towers were the tallest buildings in the world, though they still maintain the title of world’s tallest twin towers.  There is free admission to the skywalk that connects the towers ~half way up the building.  However, they only give out a certain number of tickets throughout the day, and its all based on a first come first serve basis.  So even though we arrived at 10:30am, our time to go up to the skydeck was not until 5:30 that evening. 
Well never fear, there actually happens to be something else to see in this city.  The KLTower, the world’s 3rd tallest free standing structure.  The tower is not a far walk from the Petronas towers, so we grinned and bared the greuling heat and walked to the tower.  Now there are two entrances to the base of the tower 1. via the road 2. via the jungle track.  You see KL was built over a tropical rainforest/jungle and this small piece of tropical paradise is all that remains of KL’s wild past.  So naturally I want to take the jungle path and I don’t care what Justin thought about the idea, cos I had the map and I didn’t even tell him about option 1.  So in the jungle there are lots of stairs, rope bridge things, and shade.  You would think that this abundance of folliage would provide relief from the searing heat.  Unfortunately not, we emerged from the jungle literally dripping - it was pretty nasty.  The greatest bit of relief came when we went up the KLTower - A/C
So from the tower you are naturally given views of the city, which are supposed to be supierior to that of the Petronas Towers.  So we took a look, it was nice, you could see pretty far, and you could see the towers.  But the one thing that stuck out, the white elephant as some might say, was the ever darkening sky.  You see it is the rainy season in KL, a rainy season that last 12 months (remember the tropical rainforest).  So everyday it WILL rain for a few hours in the afternoon.  Luckily that day we avoided it.  We walked back to the hotel, and almost immediately after we made it through the entrance the downpour began.
The rains stopped by the time we were to leave for the towers.  Before you go up they give you a little briefing on the history of the company and the intricasies of the tower itself.  For example, the towers are constructed on a floor plan derived from the concept of two interlocking squares, or an eight pointed star - an idea that upholds the beliefs of islam, the national religion of Malaysia.  This geometry is representative of the idea of “unity within unity, harmony, stability, and rationality.”  After this little information session we headed up the tower to the skywalk.  It was pretty cool.  Essentially it is a glass tunnel (with the exception of the floor and ceiling, which are not glass, though I though they should have been) that links the two buildings, which you can’t go into because they are offices.  Infact you are actually on the lower deck of a double-decker skywalk.  Employees get to use the upper-deck.  To get an idea of the upper deck, you should watch “Entrapment,” part of the film is shot there.
After the tower we went into the mall at the base of the towers (KLCC) to grab some dinner…I had some AMAZING Malaysian curry.  Afterwards we walked around the mall a little.  The mall is actually the largest in the country.  In the centre of the mall we saw a traditional music performance.  We then walked around KLCC park where we caught some pretty great views of the towers at night.
The next day we did some islam-inspired sightseeing.  We took the subway out to the old colonial centre of the city, where we got to see some pretty cool islamic architecure integrated into most of the buildings, including the train station and office buildings, most notably the Kompeks Dayabumi.  In this area are also several mosques, of which we went into two, the national mosque and the MAsjid Jamek.  I though this was a pretty cool experience.  I mean I have seen several mosques and I know people who go to mosque, but I have never seen the interior of one myself.  So the first mosque we entered was the national mosque, where I had to wear this big purple robe that would cover my arms, legs, and hair.  The interior however, isn’t so exciting.  It is really just an open room that can be filled with 15000 people praying.  We did meet this wonderful woman who explained the layout of the place to us.  The second mosque was smaller than the first, but it did have an onion dome, something that I associate with mosques and islamic buildings than the fan shaped roof of the national mosque.  Other than the roof the concept of the building was the same - big open room for praying.  We then went to Merdeka Square in the centre of the colonial area.  I don’t really get it, its just a big open field with a flag pole at one end.  Across from Merdeka Square was the national history museum, which was supposed to be pretty fantastic.  But it was closed :( 
At this point in the day the heat was unbearable, so we went back to the hotel to use the pool - well I used the pool, Justin said he would use the pool but instead he stayed in the room and watched tv.  The rains began shortly afterwards and lasted until dinner time. For dinner we had some amazing Indonesian food that was served on a banana leaf. 
On our last day in KL we took a cab out to the Batu Caves. This is a huge cave complex ~13km from the city. We visited two of the caves - temple cave and dark cave.  Temple cave is exactly as it sounds - a Hindu temple built into the cave itself.  At the entrance stands a 140′ golden statue of a Hindu god. The other colourful Hindu dieties fill the large cavern some 272 steps above the ground.  Every year around January 20th is the Thaipusam celebration, where over 1 million devotees will flock to the cave and climb the 272 steps.  Unfortunately we were a week too early :(.  The temple and cave are also covered in monkeys, which were so cute :)  The dark cave is about half way up to the temple cave. This cave is a 2km long limestone cave home to 3 types of bats - fruit, nectar, and insect.  Because of the bat’s sensitivity to light, there are no lights in the cave.  Instead you are given a helmet with a little light on the front, and you are put on a guided tour so you don’t get lost.  It was pretty interesting but the attention the guide kept giving my foot got pretty annoying.  Overall it was a pretty good day.  For dinner we had Vietnamese food which was pretty good, though I have to say Viet isn’t my favourite, but Justin wanted Pho.  We made it a pretty early night as we had to leave very early the next day to catch our flight to Cambodia.
Photos of Kuala Lumpur
1. Petronas Towers 2. KLTower 3. Jungle entrance 4. Skywalk 5. Petronas at night 6. Me in robes at the national mosque 7. National mosque 8. Kompleks Dayabumi 9. Big open space at the Masjid Jamek 10. Colonial buildings 11. Batu caves entrance 12. Guys breaking coconuts to feed the monkeys (the embodiment of the god Hanuman) 13. Hindu Dieties 14. Monkey 15. Arrow on the ceiling of the hotel room pointing to Mecca. 

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Welcome to week #2.  We begin with our flight out of Bangkok and head north to the rural town of Sukhothai, which besides being rural and a welcomed change from the hectic Bangkok, is also the area of the 1st kingdom of Thailand so there are lots of ruins and stuff (fun times).
Anyway this is where it is, because most people don’t know:

Unfortuatly this journey did not begin so smoothly.  I didn’t get a confirmation email from Bangkok Airways for the flight so I tried emailing them to find out when exactly the flight was.  Justin had written down 3:00pm in his little book, but for some reason was second guessing this and thought it was really 1:00pm.  So we wake up early to have breakfast before, what we think is an hour long trip to the airport.  The trip to the airport works out to be more like 15 mins and we arrive around 10am.  It turned out that our flight was at 3:00 not 1, so we now have to spend 5 hours in the airport…always fun
At 3pm we board the propellor plane that will take us on our 1 hour journey to Sukhothai.  This whole trip was pretty great though, 1. I had never been in a propellor plane before 2. They fed us a pretty decent meal, icluding chocolate glazed banana chips 3. The airport in Sukhothai was like 2 rooms, the smallest airport I have ever seen 4. The guy from our guest house picked us up from the airport…and he had a sign
The guy who owned our guesthouse was English. He was born and raised in England, met a Thai girl online, came to Thailand fell in love with the girl and the country, and has lived here ever since.  They own the guesthouse as well as a restaurant along the main strip in town - his wife runs the restaurant.  They are extremely nice and helpful.  On the first night there we met a couple of Chinese-Americans from San Fancisco.  They were a mother and daughter who were travelling around asia together.  They were both very sweet and very nice and the time we spent at the guesthouse was largely with them, including dinner every night at the guesthouse’s restaurant.
Some Photos
1.The plane, 2.The airport, 3.moooo welcome the rural Thailand!

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So our adventure in Sukhothai really began the next day when, after breakfast in the guesthouse - where we were served piles of fruit (which Justin thought were disgusting and should not be served at breakfast) and toast - we were taken into the town to rent bikes.  You see the ruins are REALLY spread out and walking is not a viable option, plus bikes are awesome, even if you have a cast and a broken foot.  Plus the bikes were really cheap.  The problem was that Justin was spoiled, unreasonably cautious, sheltered as a child and has not been on a bike since he was 7…so he had a few problems. But, because it really is “just like riding a bike,” he eventually figured it out, even if it was after much anger, usually focused at me for “forcing” him to partake in such activity.  Anyway, here is Justin trying to ride the bike at the beginning, what is missing are the small boughts of laughter from both me and the Thai woman renting us the bikes:

So off we went.  On the first day we went around the inner city, checking out a lot of the highlights including Wat Malithat (a massive temple in the centre of the city, seems to be the most important in the complex), Wat Si Sami (contains three decorated pillars in similar style to Ankor Wat), and Wat Sa Si as well as many smaller temples and buildings.  Around 1pm (the hottest part of the day) we decided to check out the national museum located near the inner city to learn about Sukhothai (history and current geography) and about buddhism, both of which are extremely important when viewing the site.  We then had lunch, checked out a few more ruins, and then biked back to the guest house, where Justin again got mad because he claimed that “physical activity did not belong on vacation.” At the guesthouse I went for a swim before dinner, it was great.
On the second day we decided to check out some of the arterial ruins to the west and north of the city.  Some of the highlights included the 90′ standing Buddha at Wat Saphaan Hin on the top of a hill, the massive seated Buddha in the Wat Si Chum, Wat Phra Pai Luang (a large temple complex surrounded by a moat) and the elephant temple Wat Chang Lom.  I personally liked this day more than the first.  It felt much more exploative.  The temples were, for the most part, hidden from the road.  They are also less frequently visited by tourists so you were generally alone.  They were also less restored, and were a part of the communtiy, often you would see cattle grazing in between pillars.  We returned the bikes in the afternoon and went back to the guesthouse where I again had a swim before dinner.

Photos of Sukhothai
1.Wat Malithat 2.Buddha in Wat Malithat 3.Wat Si Sami 4.Another seated Buddha, unknown location 5.Buddha and Wat Sa Si 6.One of the unkept arterial temples 7.View from the hill where Wat Saphaan Hin sits 8.90′ standing Buddha of Wat Saphaan Hin 9.Seated Buddha of Wat Si Chum 10.Elephant temple, Wat Chang Lom 11.Elephant
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The next day we had to wake up rediculously early (6:15am) to catch our flight back to Bangkok.  This was a mistake.  Instead of buying a round-trip ticket to Bangkok we should have continued out journey to Chang-mai and flown from Chang-mai to Kuala Lumpur.  But, Justin doesn’t travel by bus he exclaimed several times that it was “for poor people,” so in the end we returned to Bangkok.
The flight was delayed until slightly after 10, so we didn’t get into Bangkok until noon-ish.  This time we booked the hotel ibis for our stay, a much cheaper option, and to be honest I liked it better than the Shangri-La.  I am not even going to bother breaking this stay up into days as we really didn’t do all that much in these next 3 days.  A large part of our day was spent inside malls.  Like westernised malls, with stores you get back home or in England, not that it mattered as we never went inside any stores (except bookstores) we just walked around….I felt like a mall walker, it was so boring, but I think this is what Justin thought was fun, because for the first time he didn’t really argue about anything.
But what else did we do?
Well we went to the Vimanmek Teak Mansion, the largest teak building in the world. The mansion is actually part of a park complex called Amphon Park.  The mansion was built by King Rama V in a very westernized style.  It was the former residence of the royal family, and they still entertain dignitaries there.  We had a guided tour of the building which was really interesting, and was what was lacking in a lot of other places we saw.  It was nice to really learn about a place, rather than just read the small descriptions.  I did learn that my lucky colour is green because I was born on a Wednesday.  We saw some other buildings in the complex as well including, the Abhisek Dusit Throne Hall, which displayed arts, crafts and jewlery, and the Elephant National Museum which described the royal white elephants and the influence of Hinduism (Ganesha) on Thai Buddhism.  
We also checked out Chinatown and the Theives market, which was more crowded than anything.
We went to check out the palace, which re-opened on our last day in the city.  It was a huge waste of time and money! For $9 (or 250 thaibhat) we were given entrance to the temple of the emerald Buddha (we saw earlier in our trip for free), the teak mansion (we saw a couple of days earlier) and some of the exterior of the palace.  The palace was somehow disapointing.  It was smaller than I thought it would be and we were only allowed to see a small fraction of the property, as parts were still closed for mourning.
We went one night to see some Muay Thai (Thai boxing) but unfortunately the stadium was closed until later in the month :(. 
Overall I was pretty bored on our 2nd visit to Bangkok and was pretty happy to leave for Kuala Lumpur.

Some pictures of Bangkok
1.Slums by the water 2.Vimanmek Mansion 3.Massive lizard in Amphon Park 4.One of many malls in Siam Square 5.”I am Siam” for some reason I think of beer 6.Lumphini Boxing Stadium - note the sign 7.Entrance to Palace 8. Main building of the palace 9.Victory monument - I’m not exactly sure what they won (they sided with the Japanese in WWII)10.Coke in Thai - also note that the volume is measured in cubic centimeters

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Some comments about Thailand:
1. There is a lack of crazyness in the capital, with the exception of the traffic.  It was like Amsterdam, whose reputation preceeds it but in reality it never really livse up to the madness.
2. Wealth.  There are so many places in Bangkok that are full of high end shops (many more than are in Toronto), skyscrapers, and fancy condos.  I really did not expect that.
3. English. It is everywhere, and everyone speaks it, even in the rural areas where it is spoken less, it is still incredibly easy to get around.  In fact, in Bangkok a lot of signage is ONLY in English, Thai isn’t even present.

So coming back to work after my 6 weeks off was not as bad as I thought it would be.  This could be because I have done very little (in fact that is probably over stating what I have done in school this week…I have been playing Pirates of the Carribean over and over and over), or because I, in some ways, loathed the trip and wished for it to be finished.  Now that isn’t to say it was all bad.  I actually had a pretty good time, I saw so many things that I have wanted to see and so many things that I never knew existed.  The problem really lay in the company…but more about that later.  First let me tell you about the trip itself.

Week 1 (Dec 30 - Jan 5) Hong Kong, Macau, and Bangkok

So the trip began actually late at night on the 29th when I took the Incheon express bus from Mokpo at 2:30 am, which got us to the airport at 7 in the morning.  The trip began on a fantastic note!  We checked in for our flight to Hong Kong, on Cathay Pacific, and they upgraded us to Business Class!  I don’t really know why - they said why but I couldn’t understand the check-in woman…but who cares I was going to fly business class!  
Business class is amazing.  First the seats are huge, probably something like 1.5-2 ecomomy class seats, and the foot room!  I’ll put it this way, I needed to undue my seat belt to reach my bag that was stored under the seat infront of me.  Also once you get on the plane the flight attendant comes around and offers blankets, socks, eyemasks, headphones, orange juice, water, champagne (or sparkling wine I’m not sure), and hot towels.  And this is all before the plane starts moving.  Once you are in the air you get to watch tv/movies/play games on your own tv tucked into your armrest.  Then the flight attendant comes around and puts a table cloth on your tray table (which is tucked into the other armrest) and offers you a larger assortment of alcholic and nonalcoholic beverages, a bowl of nuts, and the menu for your meal.  The coolest part is that she addresses you by your name!  The menu describes your options for the 4 course meal that is about to be served to you.  It begins with a salad, a warm roll (of which there are 4 varieties) or garlic bread, and this thinly cut slamon and olives thing.  Then they bring the main course, I think I had the chicken and vegetables thing, but there were 3 choices to choose from.  I should also mention that these dishes aren’t being served in plastic trays with tiny compartments.  No, these are served on large ceramic plates, and each course is cleared before the next one comes out.  Ok the 3rd course was a selection of cheeses and fruit served with your choice of wine, then there was cake.  They came around offering more beverages and some pralines before they packed away our table cloths and give us another warm towel.  
Its too bad the flight was only 3.5 hours
Unfortunately this luxury would not last.  Our accomodation in Hong Kong was less then desireable.  It was along the Golden Mile in Kowloon in, what I think is the scumiest building in the city! The room itself was ok, there were no windows and it was small, but overall not bad.  The building just housed some really sketchy people, and looked like something out of an infomercial asking you to send money and help the poeple out of squaller.  Anyway, we didn’t stay in the hostel very long.  We took the star ferry across the river to Hong Kong Island and sort of meandered around the central area, checking out all the fancy shops and tall buildings including the bank of china building, which is possibly cooler in person than in pictures.  Just in behind the bank of China building is the entrance to the peak railroad.  There is a train - or possibly a funicular - that takes you up to Victoria peak on Mount Austin, the highest moutain in Hong Kong at 552m.  The train is supposed to be the steepest track in the world, or so said Justin, however this fact would be contradicted later in the trip (and by Wikipedia right now).  Anyway, we get in line, a very long line, and wait.  Eventually we get on the train and ascend the hill.  There are some pretty spectacular views up there, which would become even more spectacular after dinner, when the city lit up.  We ate at Bubba-Gump’s, in one of the many over-priced restaurants in the peak complex.  I had some excellent pasta, something I have a hard time finding in Korea, so it was a very nice change!  After dinner we get into the incredibly long line to descend the mountain.  Having had little to no sleep the night before we head back to the hostel pretty early.
The next day we went to city hall for some authentic dim sum…yum yum.  This restaurant is supposed to be the best dim sum place in the city, and judging by the line that formed before the restaurant opened, I would say it was probably pretty good.  We were seated with a mad rush of locals and tourists at 11am and randomly picked dishes that passed by on carts - not really knowing what was coming.  It was all really good, and considering the amount we had it was pretty cheap as well.  One thing I have learned from this experience was that you need to do Dim Sum with at least 4 people, that way you can get a greater variety of dishes without having to stuff yourself.  After lunch we checked out the crazy high end shopping in the central area.  There was this one mall that was filled with all high-end shops like chanel, louis vuitton, D&G, Tiffany’s, Marc Jacobs, Jimmy Choo, etc….it was amazing, I only wish I was travelling with a girl :(.  Next we walked to Causeway Bay on the other side of the city and checked out some more rustic shopping, including live chickens.  The sights and sounds of this area were incredibly interesting, but besides a lot of junk that I would never want I didn’t see anything particularly cheap.  We head back to Kowloon and grab some authentic Hong Kong noodles - very good.  We then headed to the avenue of the stars to wait for the New Year’s fireworks.  The celebration included a pretty spectacular display of lazers, lights, and fireworks that integrated the entire skyline.  But there was no countdown, how crazy is that.  Getting back from the event was INSANE!  The streets were entirely packed with people, and the previously 5 minute walk became 45 minutes.
HAPPY 2008!
The next day we took the ferry to Macau ~1.5 hours away.  The city is pretty crazy.  There is construction going on everywhere and glitzy hotels and casinos line the coast.  I didn’t really know much about Macau other than that it was previously a Portugese colony, which was returned to China in 1997, just like Hong Kong.  What I didn’t know was that Macau is the only place in China where gamling is legal, and because of all the new money in China it is becoming the Las Vegas of the east, except that it is already making more money than Vegas!  So the construction on the islands is almost entirely new huge hotels and casinos, and the city has recently celebrated the opening of the Wynn, MGM Grand, the Venetian, and Sands.  However, the day we spent in Macau was not in the casinos, except for dinner at the MGM Grand.  We actually wandered around the old colonial district viewing such attrations as Senado Square, the Ruins of St Paul, and the mountain fortress.  This area of the city was really nice, and very different from what I had come to believe was the feel of asia.  In fact, this area had a very European feel - cobblestoned streets, a plethora of chruches and public squares, and short (3 storey) buildings. 
The next day was our flight to Bangkok - officially our first day in SE Asia, and the crazy heat that encompasses the entire region.  We flew airAsia, the up and coming discount airline that is connecting SE asia with a system of operation based on Ryanair and other European discount airlines, though not quite as cheap.  Flights are more like $20 plus tax rather than a penny, and the taxes tend to be higher, but it is still cheap and the fastest and most comfortable way to move around the area.
We arrive in Bangkok in the late afternoon and immediately take the shuttle bus to the guesthouse.  The guesthouse is cozy with a pretty cool atmosphere.  The room itself didn’t have A/C but there was a fan, and it seemed pretty good to me.  Justin on the other hand refused to stay, he is super high maintenance and claimed that he couldn’t possibly stand four nights in such squalor.  I said that I didn’t want to spend a lot of money and that I was quite happy with the guesthouse.  So Justin said that he would pay.  So we spent the evening looking at hotels in the area.  Eventually he decided that the Shangri-la was up to his standards, and decided that this was where we would spend the night.  We checkout of the guest house and use the services of a tuk tuk, who drove down a one way road the wrong way, to move to the Shangri-la.  For those who don’t know this is a tuk-tuk:

It is basically a motorbike suped up with a carriage.  The term “tuk tuk” is reference to the sound that they make.  This type of transport is extremely prolific in Bangkok, and also exists in the rest of the region as I would learn later.
So the next 3 days were spent checking out the sights of Bangkok.  Some, like the palace, were unfortunately closed because of the death of the king’s sister and an official 10 days of mourning.  But we did get to see a lot of stuff including:
Wat Arun - the temple of the dawn
Wat Pho - the temple of the reclining buddha
Wat Phra Kaew - Temple of the emerald buddha, which is actually jade - and rediculously small.
The National Museum - learned about Thai history and the royal lineage.  As well as the real Anna Leonowens (The King and I)
Chatachuk Market - gigantic weekend market with over 15000 stalls selling everything you would ever and never need all at incredible prices that are bargained even lower.
We tried to go to the Oriental Hotel for cocktails one night, an event recomended by Justin’s professor.  But when we arrived Justin was not allowed in, as he was wearing shorts.  And since he refused to change it never ended up hapenning.
I also got to eat so much amazing Thai food, which is incredibly delicious and cheap…though it is served in far too small a portion.  Phat Thai, Green Curry, Satay, stirfries, rice dishes, noodle dishes, and fruit in abundant quantities :)  It was all spicy (and not the bad spicy, like Korean food, but tasty spicy) and delicious.

Well that is the end of the week….next time to Sukhothai and back to Bangkok.
Photos
1 - appetizer on the plane

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Hong Kong
2 - Hong Kong skyline 3 - Bank of China building 4 - Peak tram 5 - city from the peak 6 - Dim Sum 7 - Fancy mall 8 - Live chickens in Causeway Bay 9 - ghetto hostel building 10 - skyline at night 11 - crowds after new years
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Macau
12 - Senado Square 13 - Church 14 - Ruins of St Paul 15 - from the mount fortress 16 - MGM Grand
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Bangkok
17 - Ronald McDonald 18 - Buddha and a Wat 19 - Crazy steep steps up Wat Arun 20 - Reclining Buddha head 21 - Reclining Buddha body 22 - A lot of Wats 23 - Entrance to Wat Phra Kaew 24 - Me and a Guardian 25 - mm Phat Thai 26 - Wat Arun 27 - Satay 28 - Chatachuk market
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What has been unsurprising to most and incredibly embarassing to me, happened a mere week and a half ago.

On the 1st of December I went to Gwangju with 4 of my friends, not simply for a day to shop, as per usual, but to stay over night and party in the city.  So in the early afternoon we took the bus to Gwangju and then a cab to a motel recommended to us, called the Windmill. 

This motel was incredible.  The 5 of us stayed in a delux room that was twice as big as my apartment.  there were two king sized beds, a ginormous television, couches, a jakoozie tub, and several other amenities….it was actually hard to leave the room.  The most brilliant bit was, of course, that it only cost us 14,000 per person.

We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping in shinae, which was located conveniently about a block from the Windmill.  We hit up Shinsegae, the underground grocer, Migliorae, and a buch of other shops.  In the evening we headed back to the motel to get ready and predrink before meeting up with several other people to go dancing.

So around 10-11 we all pile into a cab and scoot across the city to Andrea’s apartment.  There are already like 25 people there, but we easily mingle with the likes of people we have never seen, and people we have not seen since orientation in August. Soon afterwards Andrea puts on some good ole Cape Breton Reels and she is showing us how to dance.  Essentially she was showing us some Irish/Scottish dancing.  After the group reel ends a jig comes on, and try and stop me from doing a jig after I have had a few (really bad memories of Ireland are flooding back right now).  Anyway I begin dancing and after a few minutes I fall….didn’t feel or look like anything major, so I laughed along with everyone else and then grabbed my coat to head for Shinae, for the bar/club.

Tanya and I get into a cab with these two really annoying girls, who we had never met before, all the time wondering what could have happened to Camille, Liz, and Krista, but too happy to really care. We arrive in Shinae, and guess what everyone is already there, buying street food and waiting to head off for a great night out.

The bar we have gone to in the past was really lame and quiet that night, so instead we went to this club called Vanilla.  It was small, but the music was really good (ie they were playing stuff from back home), and the dancing was a lot of fun.

There was a very odd moment when the DJ had everyone sit down on the dance floor (and they did which was even more odd).  He then proceeded to have people in the club partake in a dance-off.  It was all fun and games until one guy decided that it would be fun to take his shirt off (granted the song was sexy-back).  This lead to a full on strip-off between the three finalists (two guys and one girl).  It really was incredibly shocking.  I have seen much more of these people then I would ever care to.  Though I have to say it was sweet that one of the guys held up a jacket so that the girl could put her clothes back on. 

Anyway it was around 4:30ish and most of us were getting tired (Tanya, Me, Camille, and Liz) so we decided to head back to Widmill, which only took about 3 minutes, amazingly.  Thank goodness Camille though to walk otherwise we would have taken a cab, literally a couple of blocks. 

So we are back it the georgeous room and I remove my shoe to realise that my foot is really killing me.  The sock is removed and there is the swollen mass.  But it is not the ancle that is particularly swollen (though there was some minor swelling) it was the right side of the foot.  So I just figured that I would sleep and see how it was in the morning.

Well in the morning it was worse.  I was left in the room, as the rest of the group finished there shopping, in such pain that I could barely walk.  I did however manage to shower, dress and pack before they returned.  I then hobbled my way to the cab, and then to the bus terminal.

When we got to Mokpo I decided that I should go to the hospital and have the foot looked at.  So I cab it to the hospital that my co-teacher took me to when I was sick and guess what? It was CLOSED!!!  how on earth does a hopital close!  So I went home and decided to ask my co-teacher to take me in the morning.  So after making me feel incredibly guilty for not hobbling to school I was taken to the hospital by my co-teacher and VP. 

Turns out that my little fall caused a break in the 5th Metatarsal bone. Not a complete fracture but about 3/4 of the way through the bone.  So I was put into a partial cast.  I have a plaster splint that goes from my toes, under my foot, to half way up my calf.  This is wrapped with a wide tensor to keep it in place. The good thing about this kind of cast is that I can actually take it off to shower, etc….so no smelly cast for me
I have negotiated with the doctor to be allowed to take the cast off by the 28th, the day before my 6 week vacation to SE Asia.  As a condition to this, I must  go to the hospital every week for x-rays (or pictures as the Korean doctor calls them in broken English) and to have the split refitted.
 

What a fabulous weekend I have had!
On Saturday morning I awoke at 6am.  This was not as hard a feat as you would imagine, fore I had been very tired the night before, and had fallen asleep at 8:30 watching Stardust, which I had downloaded after school that evening.  So anyway, 6am I wake up, shower, pack, finish Stardust (fabulous movie, btw), and take a cab to the train station in old Mokpo.  Amazingly (as I left a little later than I wanted), I am the first to arrive at 7:50, but by 8:05 I was joined by the rest of the group: Liz, Krista, Christa, Camille, Tanya, and Justin.  At 8:20 we boarded our train and began our crazy trip to Seoul.
The train is 3 hours long, which is obviously shorter than the 5 hour bus ride and significantly more comfortable.  Also, while buying indivdual tickets is rather expensive (41,000원), you can buy a table (4 seats) and the price works out to only 30,000원 per person, which makes the trip only slightly more expensive than the 26,000원 bus ride.  Anyway, the journey was really nice and I had some great conversation with Tanya and Justin, even though we were told to be quiet several times along the journey.  This, I do not understand.  We were not very loud and there were others talking in the car!!! But you just go with the flow (the foreigner’s mantra in Korea) and tell the train attendant “OK” and resume talking once they have left the car.
When we arrived in Seoul the first thing we noticed was that this city is far colder than Mokpo.  I am not exactly sure how much colder, but mitts were needed.  This did not stop us from purchasing the first of a long string of western food - Baskin Robbins I had 엄마는 외계인 which is pronounced ‘eommaneun wehgyeain’ (mmm coconut and chocolate swirl with chunks). and looks like this:

We then took a taxi to our hotel in Etaewon - the foreigner diskrict of Seoul.  Seoul is a very dispersed city, and is divided into 25 distinct areas that fuction as little cities of their own.  I was told that taking a single line on the subway from one end to the other can take over 2 hours.  This dispersion and division is necessary as there are 23 million people living in the Seoul metropolitan area (~10 million in the city alone) making it the 2nd largest metropolitan area in the world, after Tokyo.  This is pretty astounding considering that Korea itself has a population of only 50 million.  However, because of this division there is no real “downtown”.  The tallest building in the city is located in Gangnam-gu, and is called the World Trade Centre of Korea.  Gangnam-gu is an island on the boatless Han River (boatless as the river leads to North Korea, therefore there is no reason to be using this waterway), and you can kinda think of this as the Manhattan of Korea, as there is a small clustering of financial buildings, though many others are spread throughout the city. 
The area that we stayed in, Etaewon, is very reminiscent of Queen St. in Toronto.  The buildings are not very tall, only around 5-6 storeys, and the first 2-3 floors are commercial restaurants, shops, and bars.  The bustle of Etaewon is concentrated on one main strip, and our place of accomodation was located ~30 minutes away by foot.  The hotel/motel was called SungJi Motel and it was clean, fairly cheap, and quiet.  Once we had checked in we made our way to the main strip for lunch.  We ate at KFC.  I ordered the spicy zinger burger, which was significantly spicier than “spicy” burgers at home, but it was nothing I couldn’t handle now and I enjoyed it immensly.  There were a couple of things that I noticed 1) I understood much of the conversation around me 2) most of the people were foreigners (both white and not white - this was surprising as Koreans tend to be quite racist towards people with dark skin, and 3) most of the Koreans spoke english.  This whole situation made me very uncomfortable.  It was like culture shock - in reverse!  I felt very out of place and awkward in this much western-ness.
After lunch we went shopping, 1st along the strip - which was a lot of fun and I was able to buy so great christmas gifts.  There were a lot of knock-off stalls set up along the street and I was tempted to buy a “Burberry” scarf, but I didn’t, though when I go back I think I might.  Burberry plaid is rediculously popular here, and its not so much that I want to be like everyone else, I just like some of the different colours that they offered and I think the style is quite nice too.  After the strip we went to ETLand - the world’s largest electronics market.  The whole this spans ~20 buildings, though it is consentrated in a couple near YeongSan train station (which is where we stayed).  Here I bought myself a camera.  I did this for 2 reasons 1) I forgot to bring mine to Seoul and 2) I need a newer camera so that I can use the entirety of my 2GB memory card (my camera is too old to understand anything beyond 1GB).  But I did like my camera a lot, so I decided to simply buy an upgrade of the casio exlim - the Z8 (8.1 megapixles….). 
The 1st table I went to quoted the camera at 260,000원 and laughed when I tried to bargain under 200,000원.  But I shopped around and I eventually found a seller who let me have it for 190,000원 (this is about $190).  Also these guys were super nice, and I can actually say I bought it from the self-proclaimed “casio master”.  I took the camera to school and I showed my co-teachers and they thought it was an amazingly cheap price.  I also looked the camera up online and it is 1) not sold in Canada, and 2) the prices I saw it for online ranged between $260 and $350… so I think I got a pretty good deal.
Outside ETLand they were selling some DVDs - some looked real, others not - and they had an amzing selection of old films (7 Audrey movies (inc W&P - they are seriously obsessed with that movie here)) for which Tanya and I were especially excited. Anyway it was 1 for 3,000원 or 4 for 9,900원 so I bought 4: the Umbrellas of Cherburg, Rebel Without a Cause, Wuthering Heights, and A Place in the Sun.
We were at ETLand for a pretty long time, Christa was buying A LOT! and by the time we left it was almost 7:00. So we went back and dropped off our purchases and went out for dinner at an amazing Greek Restaurant called Santorini.  I had a great Greek Salad (and they actually did the feta greek style  - a brick on top) and some zuccini pies.  It was expensive, but incredibly delicious - we were told that the chef is actually from Greece!
After we went back to the hotel and got ready for a night out, which included some bacardi 151.  We then headed out to Rocky Mountain bar (a Canadian bar).  The ceiling was covered in hockey jerseys.  We met some really interesting people there, including a couple of Newfies (Lori that was for you - though I mentioned West Port and they had no clue where it was - they were from St John’s though).  We then went on the a dancing place (I don’t think I ever paid attention to the name).  The music was pretty much everything that was popular when I left 3 months ago.  The place was really crowded so Camille, Liz, Justin, and I left pretty early (around 4am), the others stayed until the bar closed at 6.
We all woke up around 10:30 the next morning, which was sort of weird since we didn’t plan to wake up at any particular time - some of us were better off than others. By 12 we were on our way to the train station for lunch before our train at 2.  We had pizza - which was surprisingly cheap though extremely good.  We hung around the train station after that, had some more Baskin Robbins (this time it was chocoholic - mmm swiss chocolate and brownie bits), and then boarded our train for the 3 hour ride home.  Not surprising in the least, most people slept the majority of the way.

Overall this was a fabulous weekend, and I will definately do it again soon - maybe next month (if I can afford it :P)    

Hello and happy pepero day….well actually early pepero day, since it is really on the 11th, but since this is the last school day before the holiday it is celbrated today.  For those who don’t know peperos are the chocolate covered biscuit sticks that you often see in asian grocery stores/convenient stores and are quite expensive for what they are (in Canada anyway).  And if you haven’t had one, they are also very good.  Well, November 11 (aka 1111 - or 4 sticks) is pepero day here in Korea and it is customary for children to give their friends and in my case, teachers some boxes or large sticks of peperos….I am cleaning up!  They have so many flavours and sizes and types it makes me super excited just thinking about it….though I have to say I think I may be eating these things for months to come!!!  I think my favourite are the almond coated, though the strawberry are really good too, as are the pineapple, and the chocolate filled are really good also…oh I just like them all. 

On another note I am heading to Seoul this weekend.  I am super excited, we are taking a train super early tomorrow and returning in the afternoon on Sunday.  There won’t be a lot of time for sightseeing, but I will hopefully finish my christmas shopping as well.

TTY soon
shanda

Mount Wolchul (or Wolchulsan in Korean) is located in Yeongam, about 45 minutes from Mokpo.  The mountain is only 809m high, but there is a very challenging obstacle that can make this relatively small mountain take the entire day to climb.  This obstacle is called the goat’s path, and I will later discover why this is so aptly named.

We met at the Mokpo Bus Terminal at 9am. “We” refers to me, Liz, Camino, Krista, and Camille.  We finally found everyone, bought our tickets, bought food and drink for the day, and jumped onto the bus at 9:50, which got us to Yeongam around 10:30.  So even before we headed out for the mountain, we decided to use the washroom.  This sounds like a mundane task, not worthy of entry, but it is actually far from it.  Basically if we didn’t use the facilities now, we would have to pee on the mountain, and there was no way I was going to do that!  So we walk into the festering bathroom, which really was only a small step up from peeing on the hill, and realise 2 things: 1. there are only squatters and 2. there is no toilet paper.  So we hunt for tissues in the station, find them and squat…the most awkward and uncomfortable thing I may have ever done.

The climb began just like any other, fairly simple trail through the forest.  It was a little steeper than most, but a nice climb nonetheless.  We stopped quite frequently as most of the group was not very fit.  But I didn’t complain, it was actually nice to stop as the weather was VERY hot and humid.  We discovered part way that Liz was actually afraid of heights, and needed to be coaxed to continue in areas where the path narrowed and looked out at the incredible view.  The path stops somewhat at these flat rocks, so we took this opportunity to stop for lunch.  While eating we met these 3 Korean men.  One was to be married in a few days, the other was his future brother-in-law, and the third was his father, who was celebrating his 75^th birthday.  He was celebrating by not only climbing this mountain, but by doing so in a mixture of socks and flip flops….It seems that climbing is in the Korean blood, or something…cos these people are absolutely crazy, and are in a way, like billy goats.

The climb became much more interesting after this.  The Koreans headed back the way they came, as this is technically, and legally the end of the path.  The path that we chose to take is “off limits.” Some highlights from this gruelling leg of the journey include clinging to boulders, climbing over, under, around, and in between boulders, and using ropes to climb up, down, and across crevasses.  This was a workout and a half, you worked every muscle in your body, and it was in many occasions very nerve wracking.  And if it was scary for me, think about poor Liz!  The problem for her was that she knew she had to continue, for it would be nearly impossible to go back the way we came once we were well into the path marked “off limits.”  I would say that the scariest part was using a rope to guide you down this huge boulder.  It was quite like real mountain climbing, except we had no gear, and there is no one sharing the path with us…if someone were to get hurt we would literally have to carry them out…and it was hard enough without.  But luckily no one was ‘seriously’ hurt.  Camino did slip while using the ropes and cut her leg, but she was able to continue.

After cutting through over-grown bushes we eventually make it to the real path, and to other Koreans.  The rest was incredibly gruelling, but mostly because we were so tired.  Eventually, after 4.5 hours we made it to the top…I felt almost sick, from the sun and the lack of food…in the 4.5 hours I had only eaten 1 hard boiled egg.  I ate another egg and an apple at the top, and this made me feel much better.  We took the real path down, and as anyone who has climbed a mountain knows, this can be as tedious if not more than going up.  But, 3 hours later we made it down, just before sunset!  It was incredibly gratifying…we all had such a sense of accomplishment and we rewarded ourselves with a cab ride back to the bus station—all 5 of us in one cab!

We took the bus home and had originally planned to change and go out for dinner, but we were so exhausted that that plan was cancelled quickly.  I instead ate a roll of Kimbab from 7-11, which looks similar to sushi.  This may have been a mistake, for I believe the combination of the heat, sun, and dodgy Kimbab caused my sickness the next day….for which I had to take a sick day from school.

So last week was Cheusok, or mid-autumn festival, or thanksgiving…however you want to put it, its a holiday.  So I had a 5 day weekend (yay me).  I decided to stay pretty local here in Mokpo, which surprisingly turned out to be a lot of fun.

On Saturday I went to Yeongam to see my vice principal who had invited me to lunch.  I took the bus, which was incredibly nerve wracking because I had no idea when I was supposed to get off, and I kept seeing signs for Yeongam and I thought that we had passed my stop, but luckily the bus driver let me know when we arrived. 
I arrived kinda early because I had no idea how long the bus ride would be or when the buses left.  When I got to the bus terminal in Mokpo the bus to Yeongam was waiting.  Also the ride was only 40 minutes.  So I got to Yeongam about an hour early.  But my VP was waiting when I arrived. So into his car and around Yeongam we went.  This did not take very long because, well Yeongam is very small ~10 000 poeple.  So we went up this hill and looked out at the town below, saw rice fields, and saw this rock climbing facility.  He then took me to where he lives and showed me around the facilities….2 pools and a norebong (aka Karaoke bar).  He wanted me to sing, but I refused, as it was just the two of us…so instead he sang for me, some Beatles track…it was fabulous (*sarcasm noted). 
After this he took me out to a restaurant to eat.  What did this restaurant serve? Eel! Oh I do not like eel.  But I ate it anyway ~ 2 eels each, why because my mom always taught me that it is rude to not eat what is given to you when you are a guest. Thanks Mom!
Afterwards, he wanted to take me on a hike up Wolchulsan, but it started raining, and besides I had plans for dinner with Mir-ah.  So instead he simply dropped me off at the bus station to go home.
At 5:30 I was to meet Mir-ah and her family outside the Pizza Hut (about 2 minutes from my house).  I was late…but it was not my fault.  You see the lights, which are already retarded and incredibly slow,  were super slow for Cheusok.  You see it is traditon for people to go to their parent’s house for the holiday.  This means that a ton of people are fleeing Seoul, Busan, and other cities and traveling to smaller cities like Mokpo.  Well traffic WAS insane, there were cops controlling movement, and the lights were running extra long.  So this meant that I had to wait at the light for literally 10 minutes….so I would’ve been on time, early infact, had it not been for these blasted lights!
Anyway, I met up with Mir-ah, her husband, 4 year old son, and her sister and we went to this little ITALIAN place near the water in Hadang (new Mokpo).  I think they did Italien for me The place was really nice, and the food was ok.  I had spaghetti and seafood, the spaghetti was slightly under-cooked and there actually wasn’t much of it…there was more seafood infact, and quite the variety at that….shrimp, mussels, crab, and clams.  Her family was super nice.  Her husband is an English teacher as well, and her sister is an administrator at another elementary school.  Her son was super adorable, and her was singing and laughing the whole time….he nick-named me Miss English.

On Sunday, I walked to Lotte Mart (about 30 mins from my house) to meet up with Liz, who lives in Mokpo, and Debbie and Ramona, who had made the trip for the weekend.  We started off looking around lotte mart, which has a much better selection of clothes than emart, and then had lunch at a Japanese Restaurant.  The food was pretty good, I had a soup with temura and random vegetables.  It was raining, so instead of hiking one of Mokpo’s mountains, we walked down to the museum area and checked out the culture centre.  There was a lot of art inside, a lot of landscapes (mostly seasides), some modern art, and for the most part it was pretty nice.  After the museum we decided to head down to the warf to check out the fish market in old Mokpo.  So we got in a cab and tried our best to tell him where we wanted to go, including showing him on a map!  But he took us in the complete opposite direction and dropped us off in front of a fish restaurant.  So we got out and flagged another cab…this time we told him to go to the ferry terminal, which is just down the road from the market.  This time we actually got there. *yay us*  So we spent some time wandering around the area.  It was pretty cool, the streets are very narrow and there are these little alleys that take you within the labryith of the fish market.  Some parts were … special.  There was a little boy peeing on the street and they were actually gutting the fish on the street…. but they had an amazing selection of sea food, including a bunch of stuff that I would never want to touch (though I probably already have).  We wandered further down the waterfront as dusk set in.  You could see some of the nearby islands, and as it became dark lights came on all over the islands illuminating them in multiple colours, it was beautiful!  Afterward we headed back to the lotte mart area, called peace square.  The whole square and water front was lit up, actually most of Mokpo is lit up at night, its kinda like a mini Las Vegas.  There are places along the boardwalk where you can rent bikes, rollerblades, scooters, etc.  We were walking here and almost got hit by several.  There was also a man playing the sax in the square, he was pretty good!  We ate dinner near the square at a chicken restaurant.  We wanted to have spicy chicken and made the mistake of asking 0the waitress, who only spoke broken english, to make it hot.  Well as soon as they brought the plate of chicken a crowd of wait staff began to form and they watch as we took our first excruciating bite.  Then came the laughter as we frantically grabbed for our water.  We had to order rice to help cool it down, Ramona and Liz resorted to washing the sauce off in the soup, but all of us were still having issues feeling our mouths….it was actually the hottest thing I have ever tasted in my entire life!!!  Afterwards we walked around peace square, had some coffee and then returned to our respective abodes for a well deserved night sleep.

Monday was raining, and so I stayed in my apartment, cleaned and watched movies….as such there is not much to write about.

Tuesday was the actual Cheusok…as it was the night of the full moon and the holiday is based on the lunar calendar.  So everything was closed.  But it was the first day of the holiday that was sunny, so I decided that I needed to take advantage of this good luck…so I went for a bike ride, ended up in Peace Square and read for a good chunk of the day.  I went to Paris Baguette to grab dinner.  I walk passed this bakery/carb shop everyday from school, but I never go in, so I decided why not, since it was the only thing open.   They have amazing baked goods and dinner items, that were especially scrumptious that evening while I watched Moulin Rouge!

Wednesday I went to Wolchulsan…this was a crazy adventure and requires its own post!

 

 

Ok, so I left off after my first week of teaching.  So lets see if I can catch us up to date as quickly as possible. 

That weekend (Sept 8-9) was kinda exciting.  I started my day like any other Saturday, well like the Saturday before anyway, by watching some tv and cleaning the house.  Around 2pm my vice principal stopped by to pick me up for the volleyball tournament.  The whole thing was kinda boring really.  I sat in the stands surrounded by koreans who don’t speak english, eating the food they kept throwing at me, and watching some amature volleyball. The exciting part came  when I got to sit on the sidelines and watch our school’s team play.  They won both their games, which meant that they were to play again on Sunday.  So on sunday I was picked up again around 2 and taken to the tournament.  The game was already in progress when we got there, but I was able to see most of the humiliating defeat…so I was able to go home after about 1 hour.  

I decided that I had not seen quite enough of Mokpo, so I rode my bike on Sunday night to the old part of the city and then looped back to my house in the new part.  The whole thing took about 2.5 hours but it was a lot fo fun and I got to see most of the city.

The next week of teaching was very similar to the 1st in that I taught 6 grade 3 classes, 6 grade 4 classes, and the extra class….but instead of teaching 8 grade 5 classes I taught 2 grade 5s and 6 grade 6 classes.  The class structure was pretty standard for a Korean English class….I put in the CD and taught using the gigantic television that is hooked to the computer in the class. Basically the class starts like this:  

Greeting: Good morning, how are you? how is the weather? What is the date?
Warm-up/review: usually some sort of game or guessing thing, whatever the online lesson plan says
Pre-Listening: Listening to 3 short series of dialogue (I ask questions)
Listening: Listening to the full dialogue (I ask questions)
Listen and repeat
Song/Game

The whole thing is laid out for me online and it follows the text book and CD-rom exactly.  The listening stuff also has some hilarious videos which amuse me greatly, though it can still get pretty redundant.  So it sounds pretty easy eh?  Well it is and it isn’t.  The first 20mins are usually filled with all of the listening, which leaves the other half of the class for the game.  The game is laid out in the lesson plan, problem is these games are rediculously lame!  It is hard to believe that these things have been tested.  Anyway, it is my job to come-up with a fun filled activity that the students will enjoy, and which will force them to utilise the skills that the lesson is trying to teach.  The other tricky part is the preparation, finding flashcards, making handouts, etc….it eats up my time, and since my only source to the internet is at school (for now), I really can only do it there. The problem come when they kick me out at 5:00, so if I haven’t finished I have to come in early the next day which is super fun!  

I worked with the CD for the 3s, 4s, and 5s.  But the 6es were a little different.  I had to create an entire lesson on my own.

The first time I taught grade 6 was Sept 13/14.  I had to teach them past tense.  This was a fairly simple lesson.  The first 10-15 mins were filled with me introducing myself the same way as with the grade 5s, only with less words.  The rest of the class was spent talking about the rules for past tense, proper pronouciation (t, d, or id), and finally a little matching game.  The whole thing was really successful and the kids seemed to have a good time. Soo said that the kids were incredibly well behaved though, and that usually they are completely rambunctious….I guess I’m new for now and they are less likely to misbehave with someone they hardly know….give it a few weeks I suppose.

On the 14th I went to dinner with Soo.  We decided to go to Pizza Hut, which was cool.  It was very similar to Pizza Hut back home, with a few differences.  1st, they serve complementary pickles as an appetizer with the meal, they have the cheezy bites pizza all the time not a promotion like at home, they have this weird pizza called the golden ring (I will explain a little more later), and they are really in to putting shrimp on Pizza.
We started off the meal by making these origami shrimp, their thing to promote the shrimp pizza, this was fun, but also surprisingly challenging.  But if you managed to make the shrimp successfully you got a coupon for 15% off your next meal….and yes I finally managed to do it!  The waitress came around with pickles and took our order.  We ordered a half BBQ chicken (bul-go-gi) half pinapple golden ring pizza.  The golden ring loos like this:

 
So working our way from the outside in we start with a regular crust, then a layer of cheeze and herbs, a ring of sweet potato, then the regular toppings.
Overall it was pretty good, but there was a strange texture when you ate the potato that I am not sure if I really enjoyed….but generally pretty good.

While we were eating Soo told me that she is going to take some time off because she thinks she might be pregnant, and if not she really wants to be pregnant.  So her doctor suggested that she remove the stress in her life, ie. no work.  So she is going to take a month or two.  So what does this mean for me.  Well it mean that when I teach her classes (grades 4 and 6) I will be alone, unless the homeroom teacher stays with me.  This may make things difficult in terms of discipline, as the students may not care as much about what I say, plus they might be able to get away with more in Korean.  It could prove challenging because of the language barrier as well.  If there is a translation issue I won’t be able to help. but we will see, hopefully it won’t be that bad.

On the 15th I was supposed to get the internet in my house.  So I waited for the guy to show up, but he never came.  This really pissed me off.  So on Monday I told Mi-rah and in the middle of class she is on the phone with KT, the internet company, yelling something in Korean.  She then asks me if it is alright if they come then to the apartment as there is a key with the superintendant.  I said it would be fine.  About an hour later Mi-rah gets a call from KT…they can’t find the apartment.  So we have to check the address again, give it to them and help the step-by-step get to the apartment.  Mind you classes are running while this is going on.  After this 2nd call I never heard from them again…and when I got home…INTERNET!  it was fantastic, I started downloading movies and calling people on Skype.  There is so much freedom when you have your own internet.

Monday the 17th was also my 1 month ‘versary of me leaving Canada…time has certainly flown by, its hard to believe that there are only 11 months to go, 3 of which are holidays.

The week went by pretty smoothly.  We have a holiday on the 24th-26th so for the grade 3s and 4s I had to condense two lessons into one.  This was a lot easier than I would have thought.  It was kinda cool, because we got to sing songs…like “I like Chicken” and “Who is She.”  There were also some fun games that made the class just fly by.  The grade 4 classes were the first without Soo.  Things were good for the most part.  Half of the classes had there homeroom teacher present, the other half did not.  The ones that had the teacher present were incredibly quiet.  This sounds like it would be a good thing, but it is not.  It didn’t feel like they cared about the lesson.  I find that if they are louder they are more engaged.  I actually prefered teaching the classes alone.  The kids were still well behaved, but they were participating more and they seemed to have a better time.  
The reason why they are so well behaved and quiet with the homeroom teacher is because they are afraid of them.  Corpral punishment is common in schools in Korea, so the teacher can hit the kids, and it is very common for parents to hit their kids as well.  Now I have never actually seen this, but trust me it happens.  The english teachers however, are not allowed to use that kind of punishment, hense the behaviour difference.

On Tuesday (18) we only had to teach until 10:30 because there was an inspection taking place.  Members of the school board were in the school watching the Korean classes.  Our school is a center for innovation in teaching Korean.  So essentially they are guinnea pigs and they try out different teaching techniques on the kids.  Whatever.  Basically all it meant for me was that I had from 10:30 until 5:00 to do whatever I want. 

The end of the week signified the beginning of the Cheusok holiday (or mid-autumn festival to the Chinese).  The holiday is similar to our Thanksgiving, but it lasts 3 days and falls in accordance with the full moon.  For me it meant a 5 day weekend and a present from the VP.  He gave me a cooking oil giftset.  Giftsets are a pretty standard gift for Cheusok, and they fill all the stores with them…The most popular are the spam giftsets.  mmm several tins of spam…the cooking oil is looking pretty good right now.    

My first week of teaching looks something like this:

So, while this looks busy, it really isn’t.  If you add up my class time (160×4+200)/60=14 hours.  So I am only in class for 14 hours this week.

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I teach grades 3 and 4, who are adorable, and who unfortunately were taught the same introductory lesson.  I say unfortunately because it meant that I did the same thing 12 times in a row!  Let me tell you how happy I was when it was Thursday.  So the grades three and four lesson went like this:

I told the class that I wanted them to learn my name, but I was not going to tell them… instead there were pictures placed on the board, things like snake, hand, apple, nose, dog, alligator, and that these pictures were representitive of my name.  It took about 10-15 minutes for the kids to figure it out.  Then I had the kids sit in groups of 5 or 6 (there are 35ish per class), these groups then took turns asking me what I liked…for example they would say do you like apples?  If I did like apples they would get one point, if I didn’t they would get zero points.  The team with the most points won some candy.
This game was pretty fun actually and I got asked some pretty crazy things, like do you like staples, or roads, or locks, things that I really had no opinion about.  There was also a lot of stuff about food and animals…there was even this group of girls who asked if I like princes or princesses, they were very sweet. 
I was told later by my co-teacher that a lot of the kids were impressed that I liked scary things, like gorillas, alligators, and other “scary” animals.

On Thursday and Friday I taught grade 5s and they had a different opening exercize which went something like this:

I wrote on the board the phrases: who is ____? what is ____? and is ____ your favourite (sport, hobby, season, food).  I then wrote beside these phrases 27 words, names or numbers that related to me.  These were things like my parents and friends, movies, Canada’s Wonderland, ages, etc.  It was the kid’s job to use the phrases to find out what the words meant.  I would answer their questions with a little anetdote or fact and show a picture. When they asked a question they got a candy. 
The kids were particularly impressed with how young my parents looked, how handsome my brother is (though they think everyone that is white is beautiful), how cool the new roller coaster at Wonderland looks, and how cold it gets in the summer.
They were also simply excited to get some candy.
After we went through all the words on the board, I told them that I wanted to know something about them so I handed out a work sheet that asked them to tell me their name, siblings, favourite (colour, sport, and food), something that makes them special, and to draw a picture of themselves.
It was pretty cute, the kids drawings were quite impressive, for the most part.  They seemed to like to draw themselves doing things, like a sport, or a charicature of themselves, like the fat kid drew himself as a pig. 
There was one girl who blew me away and I remember what she wrote even a week later.  For something that makes me special she wrote: “When I grow up I want to be a diplomatic officer, so I study English very hard.  One day I hope English will make me special.”  This blew me away particularly because the majority of the kids had problems writing their own name.

The extra class that I teach on Thursday is a conversation class. I was asked on the Monday if I would teach it, in exchange for getting the entire holiday off.  Otherwise I would be expected to come to school and do nothing for 8 hours and I would only get my 2 weeks per holiday off.  When this ultimatum was presented I really had no choice but to accept.  The class is really simple…I basically just play games with the kids.  In the first class I had the class of 12 split themselves into two teams.  Each team was to create a restaurant with an English name and menu.  They then served the other team.

So you may be wondering about my holdays.  Well there are two, there is the winter holiday and the summer holiday.  The winter holiday starts on December 29 and lasts until February 12 (I think).  I then have class for 1.5 weeks before getting the rest of February off.  The new school year starts at the beginning of March.  The summer holiday lasts from the middle of July until my departure on the 19th of August.  This is during monsoon season so I am probably going to head out of the country, maybe, Japan, Mongolia, something like that….but we will see.  There are also 16 national holidays, as well as, several days where I will not have classes: standardized test days, sport days, etc.

Speaking of monsoons I should mention that it rained ALL week!!! It was ok the first couple of days, but it starts to get you down by the 5th 6th day in a row of rain…. luckily the rain stopped on Friday night

I should probably also mention that I have two co-teachers: Soo and Mi-rah.  Soo teaches 4 and 6 and Mi-rah 3 and 5.  So this week I was with Mi-rah for the most part.  This was fun, she is kind of a hard-core teacher, and really sticks to what needs to be taught, but this class she let me do my thing.  I was able to teach her a new word though: Rambunctious!  Soo on the other hand is more lax and will alter the excerises when she feels the need.  She also seems to interact more with the students on their level…Soo also has a slightly better grasp of English than Mi-rah.  Both of these teachers are quite young, I think early 30s, both married, Mi-rah has a child and Soo is trying.  Mi-rah is more girly, and doesn’t like physical exertion but loves movies…Soo is more of a tom-boy and loves sports and travelling.  Both are pretty great.

I talk to Mi-rah a lot about movies, well when she learned through the games that I loved movies she brought up the subject.  She asked me about my favourites, films and actors…I told her, and left most things in.  She thinks it is great and she also loves my favourite actors, though she has not seen Moulin or many Audrey films.  She seems to go to the theater a lot, and says that we should go sometime.  The Invasion is coming out on the 21st, so maybe we will see that.

Soo talks to me a lot about travelling and has recommended some places for me to see on my holiday….she highly recommends Cambodia and has shown me pictures that are amazing… I am so excited.

On Friday I was asked by the VP to go to a volleyball tournament the next day.  Our school’s female teacher’s team was competing, so I said that I would go.  But I will tell you about that next time.