Adventures of an Ex-Pat

Indian Adventures

2011-02-02T14:17:00.001+09:00

Just because I am no longer living the adventurous life of an ex-pat abroad in Seoul, South Korea doesn't mean that I am not an ex-pat at heart.   I am bound and determined to get snippets of that lifestyle any chance that I can get them and just because I happen to be back on American soil doesn't mean that my adventures and travels are over. In fact, quite the opposite.   I have no doubt in my mind that in the future I'll pack up and leave to live on foreign soil once more, and that's no reason to stop blogging about traveling during that time. Afterall, vacations really are just samplers to see if maybe that's a place I'll someday call home.

I spent two weeks from December 2010 to January 2011 traveling the Indian southwestern coast. I can tell you I sampled a good amount of that country - and I can tell you that I most likely will not be moving there any time soon.

India was actually pretty great - in hindsight.   I did not take Malaria pills or get any typhoid shots, so I guess I have 3-6 months to go before I can say that I made it out alive truly, but I can say so far that I survived. And that's saying something.

Mumbai - Wedding Festivities
My best friend and I traveled to Mumbai from New York on Christmas Day, literally minutes before a gigantic blizzard dumped 3 feet of snow on the area, to attend a wedding for the first 5 days of our trip. The wedding was for my friend's former coworker who is first generation American, but Indian by family. It was a fairly traditional catholic mass, but the events surrounding the wedding were traditional. On our first full day/night in the country, we stayed in a suburb called Bandra, and went to the bride's home for a party. We participated in a fascinating tradition called a Paani, where the entire party has a live band follow them around in the streets dancing, singing, eating, drinking homemade whiskey from tea kettles and having an all out parade.   We stopped at a house and danced on a patio and had buckets of water thrown on us, and the party/parade continued back to the bride's home where more events and a wondeful buffet of traditional indian dishes awaited.

Five days in Mumbai is far too many in my opinion. It's a very loud, dirty, abrasive, and difficult city. I swear I will hear the sound of carhorns in my head for the rest of my days.   The rickshaws and cabs use their horns in such a way that it's practically another language, and with no kind of public transportation system setup for a billion people, it's a kind of controlled chaos. The sound makes rush hour in midtown Manhattan sound like a whisper. The beaches the surrounded Mumbai are trash ridden and you can see raw sewage flowing into the ocean. The water is quite toxic, so I wouldn't get too close.

You might think at this point that I actually didn't enjoy Mumbai, and you'd be wrong. In a lot of ways, it's exactly what I pictured. It was fun to walk around central Mumbai and see buildings that are 2, 3, 4x older than America itself. The people were so nice and friendly that it made all the difference. The food was unbelievable - though of the 50 American wedding attendees, I'd say 99% of them got what's lovingly referred to as "Bombay Belly" and it did a number on more than a few. Some couldn't even get out of bed they were so dehydrated. Whether it was the bacteria in the food, the water not being safe, or just not being accustomed to the spice level, it wasn't pleasant for a few.

Fort Cochi - Kerala
After five days though, we flew down to the southern state of Kerala and into the city of Cochin. We hopped in a cab with a fine Australian lady and drove 2 hours into the little backpacker town of Fort Kochi. We stayed for 3 days in a god awful little homestay called Costa Gamma where we slept on bricks and our bathroom was the gateway to Mosquito hell. It was lovely.

I decided to nap a bit on that first day, and my friend wandered the abandoned down which was New Year's Day.   After a few hours he returned to inform me that I had missed Carnivale - a gigantic parade with floats, dancers, drag queens, and elephants.   Figures.   We went out for dinner and there were thousands of revelers in the streets of this tiny town - it was amazing! The community that lived in this little town known for ancient Chinese fishing nets and backwater tours was vibrant and so excited to be celebrating the New Year.

We didn't plan very well, but one of the days we took in a cooking class from a lovely woman named Leena who was off of Tower Road. We were the only two students that day and she taught us to make Banana Lassi, Chicken Masala, Roti, and Coconut/Carrot Salsa.   It was...one of the most amazing things I've ever done.

We hired a rickshaw driver for the day as well and he took us all around to shops, and a spice market, and the Dutch Palace, and a temple.   A few hours for a couple hundred rupees ($5) and it was rather nice.   Though he brought us to two shops that were basically the same - one we were in for hours and I walked out with more knowledge about rugs than I ever imagined possible AND a brand new orange bedspread that would come in handy more often than I'd like to admit for the rest of the trip - and one that if we went into, our driver would get a free shirt out of the deal.    We ended up creating a whole side story about the life we lead and how we owned 10 houses and needed rugs for all of them.   If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, right?

GOA
After 3 days in Fort Kochi battling the mosquitoes that owned our room, and the only town where we found pretty decent coffee, we flew up to Goa. Goa is a weird place. It's a place of beaches and tourism and hippies.   If you're a foreigner, you are pretty much going to wind up in Goa at some point, and that's not necessarily a bad thing, but you're going to be amongst so many other foreigners. Many of whom are pre-packaged British tourists on holiday who've spent thousands to stay at the most ridiculous resorts.   Just be forewarned.

We spent a few days in Candolim and checked out the Anjuna Market that's a village that sprouts up on Wednesdays only. Again we hired a cabbie to take us here, and to the largest lighthouse in Asia at Fort Anjuna. The beach in Candolim was nice - very clean, flat, beautiful sunset, and beach shacks that lined the sand as far as you could see that served breakfast, lunch, dinner, and booze until 10pm.

The one really cool thing about Candolim is the marooned River Princess Tanker that ran aground in the 90s and no one ever bothered to clean up.   It's only a few meters off shore, and I bet you could swim out to touch it if you really wanted to. Though it's a large rusting tanker, so I wouldn't advise you to try.

We actually got out of Candolim and drove 2 hours south to Palolem to stay the night in our own pretty spacious beachhut. It was glorious.   Falling asleep to the sound of the ocean right outside my window is exactly what I want everyday of my life.   The cool thing about Palolem is that it was featured in the Bourne Supremacy so my feet have touched the same beach that Matt Damon has ran on.   It's the little things ;)

And that pretty much sums up my experience with India.

Some things that I would like to share with those who may also be going to India:

Bring plenty of antibiotics. I never do this on trips, but I was glad I did this time.
Bring plenty of random meds. Immodium, Tums, Vitamins, Allergy medications, etc. You WILL need it.
Don't touch the animals. You WILL see dogs, cows, elephants in the streets, in the cities, on the beach. Don't touch them. Though I will say I broke down and picked up a little fluffball of a puppy after noticing he was on a leash and had a collar and assessed the risk. He was maximum levels of cute.
Don't drink anything with ice in it from anywhere. Ever. (Ice may not be from filtered water)
If you're going for an event - flat shoes. Heels are a really stupid idea.
Eat breakfast at the Kashi Art Cafe in Fort Kochi. You will not be disappointed.
Read the book Shantaram and freak out that you're in Mumbai, at Leopold's Cafe, just like in the book!
IF someone asks you if you want Weed, and you say, "No Thanks, I don't smoke" that's not an acceptable answer. They'll offer you cocaine, heroin, and other such stuff that you can snort or shoot. Be specific & say, "NO DRUGS THANK YOU!"
Everything will smell like mothballs. Seriously. They put them in bedrooms, sinks, bathtubs, anywhere they can. Burn your clothing upon returning home, b/c it will smell like mothballs for the rest of eternity, even after multiple washings.
Everyone will tell you that their items are made in Kashmir. I am convinced that the entire population of India is Kashmiri.
Make sure to print out your itinerary for EVERY trip you take in the country. To get into an airport you MUST show them you're confirmed flight status or they WILL NOT let you into the building. Showing them a picture on your iPhone of the confirmation MIGHT work, but will cause a lot of questions to be asked. Trust me.
In airports your bags, checked AND non-checked, will be scanned 1000x and be stamped. Make sure this stamp does NOT wash off before you get to your gate on your carry on luggage and they will not let you on the plane. Again, TRUST ME.
Make sure to read the cab meters correctly. On the first day we were giving 10 and 20 rupees to people instead of 1 or 2. The difference is pennies in USD really, but no sense in over paying.
Download Google Maps for the cities that you're visiting before you go. Not having a data plan abroad blows. The maps in Lonely Planet weren't terrible accurate either.
And that brings me to last point: You will get to know the areas you're staying in better than the locals because you're using a map. I can't tell you how many times we had to direct our drivers to the places we were staying b/c they had no idea what planet they were on, much less what street.

India is not the feint of heart. It's NOT a starter country to visit if you've never left the good ol' US of A. It's a fantastic challenge though, and one that I am really glad that I took. Traveling to a third world country is never a vacation - it's nothing short of an exciting, exhausting, stressful, and rewarding adventure.

Thoughts After a Year of Being Home

2010-12-21T04:00:00.001+09:00

I returned home December 19th 2009 after living abroad in South Korea for 2.5 years. I thought that it would be important to reflect on life back stateside after one year to the day that I returned home and what life has been like after being an expat. Before I continue, I have been looking into getting a Masters in TESOL to do go back and do this professionally. I may not be there yet, but I could see it something I do in the future.

One thing I can tell you - it's unbelievably easy to fall back into old habits. Eating unhealthy, American sized meals is awful. Not going hiking or being as active exploring new cities and different countrysides doesn't help. Everything is familiar and at first it feels odd, but wonderful. My first trip back into an American grocery store was actually overwhelming and I walked out with absolutely nothing. Even one year later I find myself spending crazy amounts of time in the local Wegmans just perusing all of the different options that we have - but that store IS so awesome, people do that anyway. The difference being when you're abroad, you meet other like minded people who want to travel and try new things. At home, things are a bit mundane, and it can be hard to rally the troops for a silly weekend.

When you're living in a foreign country - especially in a place like Asia where everyone looks different than you, talks differently than you do, and lives quite differently than you, you get used to the unusual. You come to expect that something at least once a day will shock you and not because it's shocking, but because you experience so many odd things daily that you're only shocked that you're not shocked. When you're living abroad your brain is practically a sponge that just takes in new information at alarming rates.

For me, I taught myself to read Hangul, the written Korean language. I practiced on the subway and walking down streets and reading menus, (It's incredibly easy to learn, so don't be too impressed). One year later, I crave seeing it to make my brain work to understand something out of the symbols. I get excited when I see a local Korean supermarket or restaurant just so I can read the Hangul.

It's amusing to me to think that while I was in Korea I craved American foods like Pizza, Peanut Butter Cups, and Cheese and got excited when we'd find a new American chain to go to. Honestly - Korea has a number of California Pizza Kitchens and Outbacks and TGIFridays and Bennigans - American food is NOT hard to find. I can remember going to a store in Jeongja called "I Love Cookie" and paying TOP dollar for a jar of Nutella. It was so easy to find Western food after awhile.

On the flip side, it's really hard to find Korean food here, not unsurprisingly. I haven't had Korean BBQ in 365 days and I would maybe kill a man for just one more dinner at the Yellow House in Garak Market, or Tteokboki from my favorite street stand near my old apartment in Ogeum.

Things to Miss That No One Tells You
The ease of getting around without the need for a car. The entire country is on a perfect continuous loop of effective transportation. Everything is on one card - the bus, the subway, and even the taxis, which are SO cheap.

My friends. You say goodbye to your home friends and family knowing you'll most likely see them again. When you leave a foreign country after years of living there you're potentially saying goodbye to them for an indefinite amount of time. Who knows when you'll see them again, especially if they're native.

Cost. Living abroad in some countries (if they pay you well) you get used to the costs. Baseball games were $8, beers are $1-3, World Cup Qualifying Soccer games are easy to get to and $20-$50 a ticket. My apartment in southeastern Seoul was $500 to be split with my roommate.

World Events. Americans are unbelievably shut off from the world... surprisingly. It is a lot easier to feel a part of a greater good when you're outside of your home country. Things like the Olympics and the World Baseball Classic, or the World Cup Qualifying Games really demonstrate an interest in all other countries, NOT just America's point of view.   It doesn't stop there - I can remember the entire country of Korea coming to a grinding halt to watch Obama's acceptance speech or the first Asian woman to go up in space during a Chinese launch.

Education & Health Insurance.   I once broke a tendon in my foot in Seoul and for xrays, doctors, medicine and bandages I paid a whopping $8 and was in and out in an hour.   Without health insurance I would have paid $26.     No WAY could you get an ace bandage in America for $8.   Or the education systems in Asian countries - there are reasons why Hong Kong, China, Korea, and Singapore are amongst the top 10 most educated countries in the world. I wish America had a fraction of their tenacity for education.

Glad to be Home.
It's home. My life is here, my friends and family are here, more professional opportunity is here. America is one of the best countries on earth (I do not subscribe to it being the "Greatest country" because we have a NUMBER of broken systems in place, and I have seen first hand that many other countries do it better).   I wouldn't give up my citizenship to this great nation because of all the potential that it has, but I do see myself going abroad again sometime in the future. For now, I'm happy with just vacationing and traveling. India is up next...

One of the best things that I took away from the whole experience?   Looking forward to all the times I'll meet up with those I met who live in other English speaking countries. I'll be spending time in England, Ireland, and New Zealand at points in my life, without a doubt.

If any of you are considering going abroad.... do it.   No matter how it turns out - good or bad - do it. You only live once and there's a whole big wide world out there to see. You won't regret it.

Adventures...Paused.

2010-01-11T06:04:00.004+09:00

Alright - I've purposely waited to write this final post. I've been home now for 3 weeks and have had time pause, catch my breath, and really kind of figure out what's what.

I flew home on December 19th. I partied in Gangnam on Friday night with some of my favorites, walked an hour in the blistering cold to find a cab, was home at 4am, packed, and was out the door by 6am to catch the bus, and take my 930am flight. I flew to Beijing where I waited for 2 hours and soaked in my last remaining Asian moments. I hopped on a plane that was something straight out of the 1960s, complete with lack of any in-flight entertainment and cigarette ashtrays in the armrests. There were some very pleasant conversations with random people on board, and 14 hours later, I landed at JFK in New York City, literally minutes before an impending blizzard ravaged the east coast.

Sharon, Jess, and Jennette were waiting for me amongst the hundreds of people outside the door, and I only knew they were all there because I could hear their 3 voices somewhere in the crowd bickering (in a good way). We drove to Manhattan, I purchased an iPhone, partied until 4am - including bowling at the Port Authority - and finally got myself to sleep after 48 hours. I woke up on Sunday - completely exhausted.

Spent a few wonderful days in Manhattan, very wide eyed and happy to be home. Moved on upstate to be with family for Christmas and New Year's, seeing old friends, and sleeping - A LOT - because of all the jet lag and excitement.

The first week of 2010 has seen a lot of excitement and the same amount of boredom. I've settled into my house - cleaned out my room, donated tons of things to charity, and sent out dozens of emails and resumes. I've got projects to work on, a lot of writing to get done, and have settled into a great workout routine at the local gym (and struggling to stay on top of it). Things still seem new and exciting.

So far, there are only a few things I really miss about Korea... my friends, the randomness, constant entertainment, celebrity status, food, transportation, and neon lights. That was probably the first thing I've noticed actually - how dark everything is. Even in New York - EVERYTHING is that depressing orangey light. All storefront signs are dim or missing letters. Sure, it's probably more green and such to not have a thousand bright flourescent lights on every inch of space like in Asia, but it sure does keep you happy.

There are a lot of perks about being home though - for one - my mom makes me dinner everyday and I spend no money. And we're talkin', good old fashioned homemade Italian sauce and things of that nature. I can talk to anyone I want about anything because there's no communication barrier. I can go to the grocery store and be overwhelmed by all of the choices for everything, and the deli - don't even get me started on that. I can jump in my car and drive anywhere. I can go to Syracuse basketball games again. I get to be a part of my friend's lives again instead of just hearing about it.

The only negatives come from the fact of being unemployed and the uncontrollable weather (it has snowed for the past 12 straight days). Everyone's doing something exciting in Seoul, in New York City or in Denver, and I'm sitting in CNY attached to my computer looking for a job that will get me somewhere where I can have a rewarding career, money to travel, and a daily routine again. However, I have to keep in mind that this is only temporary and there are plenty of things on the horizon. The faster the better.

Coming home has been good. It's an adjustment for sure, but it's also nice knowing that chapter is closed and I'm starting a new one. One thing I know for sure, that living in Asia wasn't my last extended abroad experience, because I will live abroad again someday (soon if I can't finda job). For now - wish me luck, and if you're someone I don't know reading this - I'm only an email away for Korea/Asia related questions. I can't wait to go back and visit Seoul - that's for sure.

It was the experience of a lifetime, and I don't regret a minute of it.

-------
PS - I'll be speaking on my time in Asia at Syracuse University's Career Center Lecture Series in the spring. I'll post once more when that gets closer.

The Adventures are Coming to An End.

2009-12-04T23:58:00.005+09:00

I suppose this has been a long time coming. When you sign on to come to Korea, you know you have an expiration date because you're only signing a one year contract. It seems like it will be a forever amount of time, but in reality it's only one year. When you get here, within a few months, you know of know if you're going to finish after the one year time frame, or possibly extend. For me, going to Korea seemed like a seamless transition and the most right decision I've ever made - going home was the farthest thought from my brain. I drank in all the adventures I could.

Settling into Suji was of course, a bit of a shock, as you'd expect. I got there after the longest flight I had ever taken and dumped into a spare bedroom of a guy's apartment with no air conditioning in the middle of a heat wave in the dead of August across the street from a dump. Within 6 days I had gone from working with A List Rappers to working with 100 6 year old Asian children, and within the first two days I had 20 new friends that quite a few of them are still some of the best people I know to date. To say it's the weirdest situation is an understatement. It goes without saying that the question, "WHAT HAVE I DONE?!" repeatedly went through my brain the first week.

With all of that being said, there is nothing more liberating and mind opening than being abroad for any amount of time. I got addicted to it and kept pushing my leave date back time and time again. I love who I am when I'm living here. I'm an ex-patriate. I'm unique. I use my passport, I'm seeing the world. Everything is new and shiny because it's nothing you've really seen before. I meet other travelers who share the same opinions I do, and all have that same lust for life and love of the open road. Sure - you meet a lot of directionless people, or weird vagabonds, but mostly you just meet people that are inspiring. You're living the dream and are not just able to say that.

The next few weeks are going to be insanely difficult. It'll be weird because I really am looking forward to going home, so I'm not sad, and after the year that I've had it'll be nice to catch my breath a bit, hear and speak English again, be a part of the majority. But in a lot of ways, I love not understanding everything perfectly around me, I have made some amazing friends that I know I won't get to ever see again, I will miss the food that I have come to crave daily, and all of the benefits of the lifestyle here. The new friendships, the healthcare, the work sometimes, the freedom, the lack of a closing time in most places, outdoor markets, bartering, the impeccable transportation system, the cities I get to visit, the reasonable pricing of everything, the lack of taxes and tipping, no open container law, the challenge in the little things, the bars/clubs, the randomness, the events, the sports, all of it will be sorely, sorely missed. On the other hand, there are things I am looking forward to not having to deal with such as the basic questions "What is your name, where are you from, do you have a boyfriend, what are your hobbies" over and over, not being able to find simple food I want, living in a state perpetual college life, the temporaryness of everything, and the constant saying goodbye to great friends.

December 19 I fly out of Korea, most likely for good. Crazyness all around.

The Art of Drinking in Excess in Korea

2009-11-28T13:01:00.001+09:00

I am convinced, that there is no other drinking culture in the world quite like the drinking culture in Korea. There hasn't been a day yet where I haven't seen someone passed out in the street, or slumped over in a bar indefinitely. It's fascinating to watch, really.

Basically people work 6 days a week, sometimes 12-14 hours a day. And the business culture here is to take your clients out to dinner and show them a good time. That good time generally means going to a BBQ place and pounding Soju and beer for hours on end, parting ways, and stumbling home. I can't even count how many times I've seen a dressed up businessman just peeing on the side of the road, on a sidewalk, or in the bushes. Once a guy even saw me, turned while peeing, and waved at me.

What's really brought this into focus for me though, is a new website called blackoutkorea.blogspot.com. It is an epic website of pictures of Koreans passed out all over the place. Sure, it might be an invasion of privacy, BUT if you're that stupid to pass out in the worst positions and places publicly then you should really suffer the consequences.

Drinking in Korea is perhaps a bit out of control, but if you're a person with any kind of self restraint it can be a lot of healthy fun. There's no closing time, no last call at most places, an age restriction for 19 and under, and you can buy Soju for a buck and wander the streets with their lack of open container laws. It really is a fantastic playground for alcoholics.

Lost in Translation...Still

2009-11-26T23:52:00.003+09:00

You always hear these stories about people going abroad, and learning the language over time. They don't seem to study, they just kind of pick it up via osmosis or something. Or maybe they just really focus on trying to learn new words and sentences each day, practice in conversation, and then over time it all just kind of ... happens.

That has not been my experience here.

Firstly, Koreans speak English pretty well, and if they don't their skills at charades are impeccable. Secondly, 90% of foreigners are here to teach English. The Koreans have such a lust for learning English that it's almost impossible to try out Korean on them without them responding in English and turning the conversation around. You're a one trick pony, and if that pony starts improvising they lose all interest.

That being said, one should take it upon themselves to learn some things on their own. I can read the language (luckily it's phonetic, and this can be done in a matter of days), write it if necessary, and I can say basic phrases and directions. One of my biggest regrets is not making a better attempt at learning the language though. Time just... got away from me. The first 6 months here are spent getting the lay of the land, and then the last 6 months you're preparing to go home. For me, I stayed 3 months longer. Then 4 months longer, then 5 months, and finally 3 months and didn't take one Korean class and money was an issue. This hasn't entirely bothered me until today. A regret for sure, but bothered? Not so much, until now.

I go to this little shop 3-5 times a week, easily, to get Galbi Mandu (meat dumplings) and tteokboki (spicy thick rice noodles). The staff changes there fairly often, every couple of months. And lately, there are these two people - a man and a woman, who don't speak a lick of English. They get a kick out of the fact that I come there so often, order the EXACT same thing, and go off on my way. It's also on my way to and from home a lot, so they're really friendly, wave, and say anyong every time I walk by. But tonight, they were just rapid fire Korean speaking at me, and I didn't pick up one word. Usually I can figure out the subject of a conversation, but this was tough. I finally heard the words "hagwon" and "Eolmayo" - "Academy" and "How much?" and then they started rattling offer numbers like 30, 40, 50. I assume they were asking how much money I was making working for a hagwon. I tried saying I don't work for a hagwon, and we all laughed at how hard it was to communicate. Then some random customer decided to offer his translation services, and turns out, they just wanted to know my age, but I didn't realize this, and kept telling them that I was 50. Slightly embarrassing that I never bothered to learn the phrase, "How old are you?" in a country where age is of the utmost importance.

This obviously, isn't an isolated instance. A few weeks ago, a man stopped me on the street and asked me for directions, and it took me about 10 minutes to figure out what he wanted and how to tell him. He was so excited that I did it that he gave me a fist bump and yelled "MIGUK!!" (America!!). I believe he was just testing me, since there were dozens of other Koreans around.

So while I'm not the only one who didn't learn, and in some cases I'm better than most, I still should have made a better effort. If anyone reads this who is coming to Korea, its VERY easy to get by without knowing the language. A word of advice though, it's much more fun to learn to read it, and it would have been really helpful to have attempted to learn to speak it.

Efficiency of Dating & Weddings in Korea

2009-11-18T13:00:00.008+09:00

Korean dating practices and weddings are in stark contrast to western ways. A friend forwarded me an interesting article about Korean Weddings in the NY Times and the unique practices that go along with them. Which got me to thinking about what I've witnessed in my time here, and I think by mapping out the whole process, you'll be entertained (of course, this is an overall generalization, but I'd say it represents 90% of what I've seen):

First, dating here is amusing. I really do think that sometimes this country is what America must have been like in the 1940s and 50s. Most people (especially the majority of women) live at home with their parents until they get married. The ideal marrying age here is probably sometime between 26 and 32 for women, and maybe 28-35 for men. After that you're considered too old to get married. Oh, and of course these are in Korean ages, which means western age is probably 24-30 and 26-33, respectively. So, dating is pretty much of the utmost importance to almost everyone because they have to meet that target. Occasionally you will find the random forward thinker who's focused on their career, is looking for love, or who just isn't focused on marriage.

Anyway, being that everyone lives at home for the most part, there are hundreds of places called "Love Motels" all around this country. And they're just that... a safe haven for those who need it for, uh, "activities" that can't take place in the home out of courtesy and respect for parents and rules. You'd think with a moniker like Love Motel they'd be the seediest places on earth, but I can assure you, they're actually quite clean, and very nice if you can get past the fact that there's free porn in every room, and that they hand you a toothbrush, soap, and maybe a condom when you check in. I have stayed in quite a few (sometimes while traveling in this country they really are your only option) and they're just basic motels...with character.

As for me personally, I had an American boyfriend the majority of the time I lived in Korea, but once that ended I did attempt to date Korean men of curiosity and slight interest. And what I found was kind of laughable. A first date cannot be just the boy and the girl. It must be the boy and his guy friends, and the girl and her girl friends. Right there I was kind of at a disadvantage because I'm not the type to have a bunch of girl friends hanging around. Subsequent dates can and will be alone if the first goes well, but it's very cutesy and there's a lot of texting involved. And it's not the sweet single text of, "Had a great time" or "Thinking of you" or whatever, it's the Asian cartoon type text of "kekeke <3 <3 <3 Fun!!! ;) :) ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ ㅎㅎㅎ" all the time. Not cute. My experiment was very short lived.

Here is a classic example of Korean Dating Efficiency of someone I know:
A 32 yo Korean guy wants to meet a girl. He has his friends set him up on dozens of blind dates. Nothing really interests him over the course of a couple of months. He goes to his bank, which also has a matchmaking service. The bank system is kind of like match.com and asks for your personal profile, information, likes/dislikes, etc. The interesting part of this, is that it also asks you for your assets and income. Then it cross references everything and finds you the perfect partner. So, the man does this, and bam, it sets him up with a 30 year old woman who happens to also live in his same apartment building. They actually have a lot in common - both educated in the States, both have advanced degrees from prestigious American universities, and have a multitude of interests. They met in August, two weeks before she went back to the States to finish her Masters degree. They keep in touch, and she visits once, and they discuss marriage. He tells me her sole purpose in returning to Korea when she finishes school in December is to get married because she can't wait as she's considered too old. The guy has a choice to make, marry her or not marry her. He also wants to get married, because he is also considered to be getting too old. And literally, they are perfect on paper. He told me he will probably propose in late December/early January (by just asking, not doing anything romantic, and will be married by the end of summer next year.

No where in there do you hear him tell me of love. In fact, when he showed me a picture of her and I said she was beautiful he told me she wasn't (trust me, she was). It's kind of nothing short of being a business transaction.

Ok Ok, so this is a BIT on the extreme side, but it's not too far from the norm. In fact, once Koreans do get married, another sad fact happens a little later on down the road. What happens is that children usually come VERY fast after a marriage. The idea could come from the woman or the man, or even both, but it happens fast because that's the point. The women stay home and tend to every single thing in the home. More often than not they also quit their jobs to do this. In order to provide for the new family the men now will work from early morning until well into midnight. The sad part comes in here... since dad is spending so much time in Seoul working sometimes he will go to one of the many "massage" places here, or, even frequent one of the many love motels while the wife turns a blind eye or worse, really just doesn't know. I had a student tell me once, "I don't see dad often because he spends some nights in Seoul. My mom says his company pays for a hotel." Doubtful. I even knew a guy once who actually went all the way to divorce his wife, but still stay in the same apt for the sake of the kids because they didn't know, even though he was oftentimes out with other women.

Now this clearly isn't all Koreans, as family really is very important. Many go off to be very very happy. And their weddings are big, lavish affairs to start off their happy lives. In fact, a wedding is one of the best times to show off everything you can. Korean weddings are kind of great in the fact that they take at most 3 hours and they combine the ceremony with the reception. You say hello to the bride and groom as you enter the reception hall, and there's a giant alter in the middle of tables set up for probably 500 people. EVERYONE is invited to the wedding - business partners, every relative, colleagues, every friend, anyone the entire family has ever come in contact with. The ceremony starts up, and a few minutes in, dinner is served. The ceremony ends, and you're probably into course #2. Then the married couple and the parents of each side make their rounds to each table. That's it. There are some traditions afterwards for the smaller family, but the wedding does not take up the whole day. It will end up costing you a pretty penny though. I attended one high class wedding this year that was about $150 per plate. Luckily I did not have to pay that, as to have a foreigner at your wedding ups your status by about 50 cool points. Each guest is supposed to bring an envelope of cash as their present to help offset the cost of the wedding. Which this is the very subject of the NY Times article, as this has been considered a means for bribery to happen amongst elected officials during times of weddings and funerals.

It has been an absolute pleasure to really get to know how truly different another culture can be in the arena of love. In so many ways its better than what I know, and in so many other ways its worse and limiting and holds women back. I gotta tell ya though - and this is purely personal preference - I'll be holding out for love and happiness, and be pretty happy for a chance at a wedding with all the bells and whistles (as long as its small, and a destination wedding, ha).

Sonicbooms, Speed Thunders, Land Elephants, Oh My! Korean Basketball Edition

2009-11-10T01:29:00.003+09:00

I have never been more mad at myself for not doing something earlier. I've been here for two solid basketball seasons and I've foolishly spent all my time worrying and paying attention to games back home (as an AVID Syracuse fan, not that silly NBA stuff). What I should have been doing here is being a fan of the Korean team, the Samsung Speed Thunders!

What's a 'Speed Thunder' you ask? I have absolutely no idea. My guess is that it has something to do with lightning as their very effeminate mascot has a lightning bolt on his stomach, but I can't entirely explain it. Taking a further look into it, it seems the whole organization doesn't know what its doing as we have teams that are the Sonicbooms and the Land Elephants. A 'Land' Elephant? Is there a 'Water' Elephant I'm unaware of?

The arena is next to Olympic Park at the Sports Complex stop on the green line. The tickets are 7, 10, or 14,000 won and there really isn't a bad seat in the house. The only downside is that you cannot purchase beer INSIDE the stadium. This seems VERY counterproductive and against normal Korean operating procedures - but don't worry. You are of course, allowed to bring in all the beer your heart desires and drink it inside. It is just a matter of thinking ahead and stopping off at the GS Mart or Burger King near the subway station.

The quality of play is hilarious. Each team is allowed to have only 2 foreigners on the team and they are only able to play 3 of the 4 quarters, so they have to choose them wisely. But as everyone can guess - any self respecting basketball player worth anything would obviously go to a European league if he had any chance of maybe someday making it to the NBA. Playing over here in Korea kind of means you're not going to be Michael Jordan at any point in your life, or even hope to be. But you are going to provide people like me with hilarious entertainment with how fast you rack up fouls, or with how much time you spend lying on the floor clawing after a loose ball.

I now have been to baseball games, soccer games, world cup games, and finished my collection with basketball games and 100% wish I could go back and get season tickets. I hope that I can get to at least one more before heading home, but to all of those out there who enjoy sporting events - its so cheap and fun that there's no time like the present.

Foreigners Bring Halloween to the Korean Masses

2009-11-05T01:28:00.000+09:00

Halloween is a funny tradition. I believe it started in Mexico as All Hallows Eve where they honor the memory of the dead and worship spirits and have a dinner to commemorate the occasion. There are variations of it all over, and as an American, I can say we're just in for the candy. It has become less of a "scary" day and more of a costume party for adults to dress up in ridiculous things of any nature.

However, being in Asia for a few Halloweens now, Korea at least tries. Any child who's enrolled at an English Hagwon (academy) gets to celebrate the day with candy and costumes, and maybe even a party if the school really gets into it. My school the first two years completely turned a common room into a really scary haunted house (where I will say the goal was to see how many kids we could make cry). This year I was temping at a school, and during the 5 minute breaks between classes, the kids were able to run up to a different floor and solicit candy from the teachers. It was all pretty fun and it gives the chance to the kids to do something, well, childish, and they so deserve it.

But with anything, when you're away from home on a holiday you just want some kind of connection to it. The foreigners here go all out in full force to the usual areas of Itaewon and Hongdae and just party even harder than normal (which is pretty hard to do in a place of cheap soju and no closing times). This year, I decided to stay away from the masses primarily and just went to a friend's house party in Haebongchan (the neighborhood behind Itaewon). We wandered over to the bars afterward and of course, costumes and drunkeness aplenty.

Not sure how its done in other Asian countries, but if Halloween is your favorite holiday you can at least get a taste of it here.

Hiking at Bulamsan - Northeast Seoul

2009-10-26T01:01:00.000+09:00

One of the greatest things about living in the city of Seoul is that it is the perfect combination of old and new. Tradition and Modernism. Nature and Urban. I don't know how they did it, but these krazy koreans have figured out how to have it all in one place. In this case, I'm sure they just picked a place, built a bunch of stuff, and decided to work around the mountains as this city has grown overtime, but that's neither here nor there. In the center of the city is Namsan (which actually means South Mountain) and its not too big. It's where the tower is, and it's hard to miss. A little more north there is the national park of Bukhansan which is about 700m tall, and on the northeast part of the city is Suraksan (Not to be confused with Seoraksan in Gangwan-do) and Bulamsan. Due to my timing issues of needing to be down in Bundang (south of the city) to teach a class in the evening, we went with the smallest of the 3 northern mountains and did Bulamsan standing at 508m.

Bulamsan in October is absolutely gorgeous. Truth be told, everywhere in Korea is absolutely gorgeous in the fall. The amount of colors and trees everywhere is breathtaking at times even if you're in the dead of the city. We took the subway up to Dangoggae on the light blue line, followed some ajumahs (little old ladies) who looked like they were about to get their hike on, and eventually found a map of the area. There is no shortage of trails to follow, and we just decide to walk until we got onto one after we passed a few apartment buildings. Probably about 2 km in total all the way up, it was pretty easy. The only real difficult part was when we got towards the top and there were actual vertical inclines where the koreans had installed ropes in order to help people get to the very top. Difficult, but very worth it.

All in all, we left our apt around 11, took the subway about an hour, got up the mountain and down, had dinner, and I was at my class by 7pm. Definitely unlike anything at home, for sure.

Birthday Booze Cruise! Han River/Banpo Bridge

2009-10-12T14:57:00.003+09:00

Well, no one is more surprised than me that I've somehow managed to spend not one, not two, but three birthdays abroad. Planning any kind of activity is time consuming no matter where the location is. Inviting people, picking a place, coordination all equals work. BUT true to form, everyone had a good time. This year's party included a 1 hour booze cruise down the Han River in Seoul under Banpo Bridge, followed by a club outing at The Hive to see a local electro-rock band, Swingset Committee.

The bridge is really sweet, if I do say so myself. As we all know I'm a gigantic nerd for everything and anything Gizmodo posts, and when I read about it from them a year ago, it was just something I had to see. The bridge is akin to the fountain at the Bellagio in Las Vegas with 10,000 nozzles drawing water up out of the river and putting on a very colorful waterworks show. Take the boat from Yeouido Island (close to Yeounaru Station), one hour round trip for 11,000w, bring a couple of beers and some snacks on board with ya and enjoy the sights. I recommend it at night, of course.

Afterwards we headed over to Itaewon and went to one of the newest hot spots, The Hive. This place is pretty sweet looking, good location, but truth be told its not worth the cover unless there's some kind of event there. In this case, Swingset Committee was playing and they're a band from California, but they've been doin their thing over here in Korea and will be taking their show on the road to Japan, or so I hear. Either way, if you have the chance, check 'em out.

I'm pretty sure that this will be the last of my birthday's in Korea, but I suppose one never can say never...

Camping at Seoul Grand Park for Chuseok

2009-10-06T20:53:00.005+09:00

You remember camping at home as a child, right? Pack up the car to the tilt, sleeping bags, tents, food enough to last months for a small village. One of the things you don't really imagine doing while you're abroad because of all the equipment you would need and probably don't own. Well, yet again Korea has taken care of all of that.

Chuseok is Korea's version of Thanksgiving. It's a harvest celebration based on the lunar calendar, so the dates change every year. When I got here in 2007 it was 5 days, last year was 4 days and this year, 3 days because it fell on a weekend. Chuseok travel is unlike anything I have ever seen, and as someone who once got caught on a bus for 13 hours here for a trip that should have been 4, I vowed to never travel outside of Seoul again unless it was fleeing the country (like last year's Philippines trip). This year, 18 foreigners decided to pack it all up and go camping at Seoul Grand Park.

There are two sites directly in Seoul. Grand park and Nanji campground. Nanji is a newer facility near the World Cup Stadium in a much more urban area, whereas Seoul Grand Park is in a much more appropriate area surrounded by forests and mountains with access to Museums, the Zoo, and the Seoul Land Amusement park. It also has more camplike facilities including a campfire area, basketball courts, streams, common areas, and hiking trails. The sites come already set up with tents that sleep 4 people very comfortably for 15,000w a night and you can rent sleepings bags and mats to go in them for 1500 and 1000w each. We also got a special deal where we got cheap discount tickets for 13,000w for the day to Seoul Land so for two days/nights and an amusement park, the whole total was 45,000w (~$39) for the weekend + food. It was incredible. My only complaint? The fact that it got down to near freezing temperatures and I had a sleeping back that was about an inch thick.

There are a few main differences in Korean camping, however. At 11pm it is lights out and basically a zero noise policy. Also, campfires really are frowned upon if you light them using the 15,000w grill you've rented from them and now have a raging fire and half the forest in it as firewood. Also, Korea doesn't believe in graham crackers so it was really difficult finding stuff to make s'mores. Also, the campsites are of course, so close they're basically piled on top of each other. If you can get past all of this, your experience will be a ton of fun. A great way to spend a weekend though, that is for sure. Again, pictures speak for themselves (including being stuck in a bubble for the best amusement park ride I have EVER been on/in):

Corfu, Greece & The Best Destination Wedding of All Time

2009-09-28T21:01:00.007+09:00

Why more people don't do destination weddings I'll never know. They tend to be cheaper, a more manageable number of attendees, and everyone has an amazing time. Whilst being in Korea, I was lucky enough to meet a couple worth flying halfway around the world for to be in their wedding, and they definitely picked one of the best places on Earth to get married: Corfu, Greece.

After 26 hours of travel (Seoul -> Dubai -> Athens -> Corfu) we landed at the tiny airport in Corfu Town on Saturday September 12, and took a 35 Euro cab ride over to the Pink Palace in Adios Gordis on the Western side of the island. Corfu Island is the northern most island in Greece, about 1 km away from Albania, and just utterly beautiful. The Pink Palace is rated as one of the best hostels in Europe for 25 Euro per person, per night, for the top level room with a view. It is also a place full of sin and debauchery, and I am extremely happy that I was not there during peak season. There was a hot tub there that the Australian bartender told me, "Don't go in there unless you want to come out pregnant, fathered by 10 different nationalities." It all turned out really well though - spent a day drinking with the staff, rented ATVs and drove around, and then rented kayaks and found a small private beach on the last day before heading up to the main event.

Going from Adios Gordis up to Paleokastritsa was like night and day. It's the richest part of the island with the most resorts, we settled into a really nice apartment and then went to find the bride and groom. We got there on Tuesday, and ran into people as we went along in this one street town. With only about 4 bars in the area, we frequented all of them for the nights, and then we did beaches and stuff during the day. One of the days we rented scooters to go back around the island and as I'm returning to the apt, I ended up crashing it and had to 100 Euro to fix it. They wanted 200 but 100 is all they got and that was the end of it. Not entirely fun, but a story nonetheless...

The wedding was absolutely gorgeous and just stress free, simple, and fun. The reverend was an old college friend of the groom's who got himself ordained on the ol' internet (much like yours truly did a few years back) who said some really nice things, married the two in a short ceremony overlooking the ocean at La Grotta Bar, and the next 8 hours we spent eating and drinking and swimming. About 45 people made it out both family and friends, and overall, I have never seen a more perfect wedding in a more perfect location. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves:

A Travel Blog Worth Reading

2009-09-24T21:05:00.000+09:00

Travel Stories Suck

A couple of weeks ago, my best friend shared two of this guy's posts with me, and while I trust said friend's opinions probably more so than anyone else, they stay tabbed on my browser for weeks - unread. Reading travel stories usually bores me - they're either boring, pretentious, poorly written, or of places and things that I have no interest in and might have no ability to afford doing. However - this guy is different. If you read the link above, he talks about the same thing. His posts are usually interesting and about the nitty gritty of traveling. The quirky anecdote, the tip on a place, things people should do at certain times, etc. etc.

I've traveled a fair amount this year, and have hopes and dreams to keep it up (assuming my bank account continues to approve such expenditures), but would like to give the ol' blog a face lift. So you may notice a new layout, and with only 2.5 months left in Korea - I plan to end this thing with a bang.

Two Years+ in the Making

2009-09-21T21:00:00.001+09:00

I don't entirely recommend uprooting your life to come to Korea and do what I'm doing - and while it has its fair share of ups and downs, I've found myself in a pretty sweet deal for the moment (with an expiration date).

When you make the decision to quit everything and travel abroad [to teach English] you have to know that you'll be in for a world of the different and unexpected, and of course it'll be life changing hopefully for the better. I celebrated my two year anniversary August 21, and as of today have been here for 25 months with only a brief 2 week vacation back to the States somewhere in the middle. The plan is to head back to the homelands at the end of December and stay there, but I'm not entirely sure my feet have stopped itching yet.

If you've kept up with my inconsistent blog posts, you'll know that the job situation has been interesting this year and right now I'm currently freelance teaching and living in Seoul. I'm a tourist and have to leave Korea and reset the ol' visa every 90 days - and that has allowed me to see Canada, the U.S., China, Hong Kong, Japan, and Greece all in one year. Right now I determine how many hours I work, where, when, and for who and how much. Generally I teach 1-3 hours a day (yes, even weekends) and make enough to pay rent, pay bills, travel, and save a small amount. I work on referrals, setups from friends, and by researching sites on the interwebs. Will this last forever? No. In fact, the end date is tentatively set for December 20th. This gig is a very inconsistent way to make money, and sometimes a lonely existence without coworkers to spend time with and company politics to talk about. It has to end sometime.

The next few months will be interesting. I'm enjoying this position of technically being a small business, and the ability to come and go as I please - but there's more to life than teaching English and I'm determined to find it. ;)

An Article to Describe Korea Better Than I Ever Could

2009-07-31T12:29:00.003+09:00

Koreans very much live in a competitive, "I want what my neighbor has and more" society. This is very evident by the simple fact that I am here with thousands of my western comrades who are getting paid handsomely for doing something that comes naturally.

However, today in the Washington Post there happens to be an article that talks about South Koreans and their atrocious savings abilities. While I'm not entirely interested in financial matters, it does get at the heart of how and why Koreans do what they do.

Take a second to read it... I absolutely love living here, and I think that education IS the most important thing in any culture, but does this kind of thinking actually lead to something catastrophic?

RIP Passport. Feb 2007 - July 2009

2009-07-19T01:02:00.005+09:00

Born in New York City, February 2007 - Died in Tokyo, Japan July 2009.
4 visas for Korea and China, multiple stamps for Korea, 2 for China, 2
for Hong Kong, 2 for Japan, 1 for Canada, 1 for the Philippines....
You were full of life and color and will be missed.

There's never a dull moment around here that's for sure. I had this
plan of Tokyo for 2 days, visiting a friend who would be working on the Simon
& Garfunkel tour. I'd fly in with my roommate Dan, crash for a night
at the Ritz, and get a room somewhere for the next night and be home
in time to not miss a beat.

Then a traveler's worst nightmare happened. On the subway between the
airport and the hotel I somehow managed to lose my traveler's folder
which had my passport and 100,000w. I guess it just happened to fall
out of my bag, but of all the things to happen this was not what I was
expecting. I got off at Roponggi station and then the very helpful
staff tried contacting stations but to no avail. Luckily the little
notebook I always keep in there with my friend's number was in another
pocket so I was able to call him. After that and talking with the
embassy there really was nothing else I could do but wait and go out
and enjoy Tokyo.

We headed to the Tokyo Dome and enjoyed an amazing Simon &
Garfunkel show. I sat next to a guy who writes for Billboard magazine and
just seemed to be such an uber fan that it was great. After the show
we headed backstage to meet up with Craig*** (one of my bestest
friends and savior this week) and then headed back to the hotel. I
gotta tell ya, of all the places to be stuck for a week the Ritz
Carlton Tokyo is not the worst place one can be. This hotel is better
than most houses I've seen. Craig's room was on the 50th floor over
looking Tokyo Tower and the view was breathtaking.

We spent our night just hanging out drinking vodka in the hotel. James
Garfunkel, Art's son, came in and our little group had some amazing
conversations and laughs. We left for a bit to go out in Roponggi to
get some Ramen and man, do the Japanese know how to do ramen. Of
course you'll pay around $10 for it but it's worth it - absolutely
delicious. Afterwards we just moseyed back to the hotel and after a
long day called it quits.

The next day Craig and the tour headed out to Osaka and Dan and I
headed to Shinjuku to get a hotel. We visited Shibuya and Harajuku
which are two of the most famous areas of Tokyo and notoriously the
most crowded in the world. The people there are just otherworldly. The
style of clothing and hair is just so fantastic. The men have hair
that is laughable and closely related to Bon Jovi circa 1988. We
walked around Shinjuku just getting the lay of the land and people
watching. We ate at a tiny little noodle shop and were back to the
hotel fairly early. Shibuya:

Monday at 6am we parted ways - Dan back to Korea and me to the Tokyo
police station and U.S. embassy. Three hours and $100 later all of the
paperwork was finished and I'd get my emergency temporary passport the
following day. I wish I could say that I went off to do amazing things
with my newfound time in Tokyo, but I was so tired, stressed, and sick
(btw, I had some sort of allergic reaction to something, so my skin
was all messed up the whole time) that I just went back to my hotel
and watched movies all day. Pathetic I know, but I had all week and
very little money in one of the world's most expensive cities.

As luck would have it another friend who performs every summer in
Japan with a touring group called Blast just happened to be landing
that afternoon for one night in Tokyo. We met up for dinner and he
took me to this amazing little shop in Ginza and then showed me all
around the area. Randomly the hotel he was put up in also happened to
be in Shinjuku so we went back there and got some drinks at a Family
Mart and sat in a small park catching up (gotta love that no open
container law). The drinks we were consuming were called Chuhi and
they came in tall boy cans and tasted like a wine cooler or a hard
cider but were 8% alcohol. After 2 I was quite hammered. Since we had
no idea how to navigate him back to his hotel and mine was a block
away we made our way back there. Along the way we found batting cages,
so somewhere circa 1am we were drunkenly knocking them out of the
park, as ya do. Shinjuku:

Tuesday and Wednesday were easy going days. Got my new passport and
headed back to the Ritz to meet back up with Craig. We got some wine
and that night hung with one of the guys from the tour and Wednesday
just got some food at this great little place they had found for
lunch. I also decided to take in another Simon & Garfunkel show (why
not right?) at the Budokan. The venue was significantly smaller than
the Tokyo Dome (45,000 vs. 14,000). Not surprisingly the show seemed
more intimate, but was just as good as the Saturday performance.
Tokyo Dome:

Thursday was Craig's day off so we were off to Ginza with Michael, the
tour accountant, for lunch. Ironically after I couldn't find the place
I ate at a few nights before, we stumbled across a Korean restaurant
that wasn't amazing but did the job. We headed to Asakusa which is old
Tokyo and home to a nice little market and Buddhist temple. We
wandered around for a few hours and shopped and then headed to Shibuya
to see the crosswalk and get some coffee then over to Shinjuku, got
some beers and sit outside.

When all is said and done this has been an amazingly ridiculous and
seriously lucky experience. How do I wind up losing my most valuable
possession and being forced to stay in a country, seeing two of my
closest friends thousands of miles from home, seeing a legendary music
group twice for free, and staying at the Ritz Carlton for a week? Oh
and on Thursday I learned that the ceiling in my Korean apt collapsed
which, maybe my being in Tokyo saved my life since it would have definitely
landed on me? This all has my mind sufficiently blown on almost every level. Just goes to show how important friendships are; this whole thing could have been much
worse if it wasn't for my old (and new) friends. As far as Japan vs.
Korea... It's been tough. I loved Japan, but I think Seoul might just
have it over Tokyo. Yep, I said it. It has more going for it, and at a MUCH better price.

One last thing before I sign off... there is nothing funnier than
being known around the whole Simon & Garfunkel operation as the girl
who lost her passport. Almost any time Craig introduced me to a tour
staff person or band member the first thing was, "oh so you're the
one..." ha.

Ahhh only me.... (and I guess I wouldn't have it any other way). ;)

***If he reads this or not, a gigantic thank you goes out to Craig for
making it all possible and being my hero :)

Busy Little Unemployed Bee

2009-07-01T01:59:00.005+09:00

Well, I've been quiet this month... and its time to break the silence. Sure, losing your job, your apartment, money, visa, another job possibility, boyfriend, and living in a country with the constant threat of World War III from the neighbor to the north, hasn't been easy. Best part about it all is that whole work business and then being offered a job by the same boss that let you go. Ridiculous. BUT when you hit rock bottom you can do nothing but try and crawl your way out of it.

It's actually been pretty good - moved into Seoul and living with a friend of mine, Garak Market to be exact in the Songpa-gu Region. I'm so close to so many things, its great - only 10 minutes from Jamsil on the bus. And this area is above and beyond Seongnam, and even in some cases better than Suji (even though Suji will always be my first home in Korea). I joined a gym here and that's made a big difference. Nice to have a goal to work on. I've been temping at a school for the past 2 months and the money has been excellent. Actually ended up making more money in May and June than I did in any month I've been here. Korea's amazing for that actually. I finish up this week with the school and will be piling on private lessons hoping to save as much as I can before heading home in the fall.

As a tourist now, I have to leave the country every 90 days to reset the tourist visa. In two weeks I will be heading to Tokyo for 2 days to see one of my most favorite people from home, who's hooking me up with some tickets to see Simon & Garfunkel. It is going to be nothing short of a blast. After that there's the annual Boryeong Mud Festival with Matthew's Club, and then the Jisan Valley Music Festival. SO it'll be busy summer, but a fun one. If all works out I may even have a visitor! I'll also be helping out Syracuse University's Study Abroad Program, when the Hong Kong Director comes to Seoul in July for some meetings. All I'm looking forward to now, is Greece in September, and home sometime after that. Life's funny sometimes... unexplainable, but funny. I'm looking for jobs at home, and also into doing some free lance writing MAYBE. Just trying to keep moving... and watching a lot of TV ;)

One of the things I've been working on is creating some advertisement for Matthew's Club. A language group I've been apart of almost the whole time I've been in Korea. If you're reading this, and curious, check out the Matthew's Club Group on Facebook. Always a good time.

And since these are the last few months, I'll attempt to blog a bit more when something comes up. Sad to think I might not be an ex-pat for much longer... OR even scarier to think that I could maybe wind up an ex-pat somewhere else. The world is full of delicious possibilities...

Hong Kong - The One True Love of My Life.

2009-05-30T23:39:00.005+09:00

Oh Hong Kong, How I Love You, Let me Count the Ways...

In all seriousness, when you're going through some serious junk in life, there is no better city in the world to be in than Hong Kong. You can't help but get caught up in its vibrancy, bright lights, gorgeous islands, and excitement and forget everything else. This was trip #2 for me to this vivacious city and it was just as good, if not better than the first.

We had just about 5 days to spend in this city, and we didn't waste a minute. First, after checking into the Marriott Courtyard on Hong Kong Island, we went down to Central via the trolleys, which are just so fun. We walked around a bit, gazed at the skyscrapers, as ya do, and then walked over the land bridge and watched all the construction of the land reclamation. Amazing that they can just build something out of nothing - and make the harbor smaller at the same time.

Took the star ferry over to Kowloon and had a few pints at Delaney's Irish Pub, before heading out to have dinner with some Hong Konger friends. We had an amazing night of Chinese family, Chinese food & beer, and catching up with friends (and a new baby!).

Ferry away from HK Island

New Baby! Good Friends!

Day two found us getting up early and heading out to the islands. Do yourself a favor - if you ever get to Hong Kong, don't stay in the concrete jungle the whole time. While HK & Kowloon are amazing, HK's real fun lies elsewhere. We took the ferry out to Cheung Chau and walked around the whole island (takes about an hour and a half or so) where we met a man in his 60s from England who told us about living in various countries during his life in the army, and being the author of a few books, his his crazy life, then and had lunch by the water. Next, we took another ferry to Peng Chau, which is much smaller, and has less to offer, but still beautiful and has some good hiking trails. To end our night we ferried over to Discovery Bay, which is where the richest of the rich live and play. Five star restaurants and Irish pubs in an area along the beach, where we stopped to have dinner. The owner of this steakhouse we went to, ended up giving us free liquor all night and after having my first go with Grappa, we were all pretty smashed and ferried back, drunkenly, to HK Island. Let me just say that this ferry was so amazing - high speed hydrofoil - completely set up with free wi fi. THAT'S how you know you've just spent time on the richest island... most ferries don't come with such luxuries.
View atop Cheung Chau's highest point:

Cheung Chau's Main Street/Fat Guy Little Bike:

A long walk off a short pier in Peng Chau:

Anyway, Day 3 we had brunch with the Director of the Syracuse Study Abroad program near HK University, and then we ventured to try out the new Crystal Cable Cars on Lantau Island to head up to the Giant Buddha. While I saw this last year, its such a cool area that it's worth seeing twice. We took one of the world's craziest bus rides down the island and headed over to Tai Wo, a village completely on stilts. We had lunch in one of the shops, walked around a bit, and then got on one of the boats to go on a Dolphin Watch. Hong Kong is home to pink dolphins that are actually the color of bubble gum. They're unique to the area and their color is unexplained. We were unlucky in seeing them though. Tai Wo was one of the coolest places I've seen though - the tide comes down so low that its a trickle of water, but comes up so high that the houses must be built on stilts many meters high just to keep the villagers dry. We came back that night to Central Hong Kong and went out in Lan Kwai Fong to some swank clubs and bars with some local girls that my friend had met previously... but being exhausted from all the hiking we had a few beers and headed back to the hotel.

Cable Car & Buddha:

Tai Wo:

Our last full day, we headed out to have some delicious Mexican Food at Taco Loco in the Mid-Levels, play some cards at the diner in Lan Kwai Fong, and then headed out to the New Territories to have dinner at a local seafood place where you pick the catch out yourself, bring it to the restaurant, and they make it in any style you want. First we had tea with an SU professor, who before dinner drove us out to the HK Wetlands. UNbelievable that an area as small as HK has one of the largest most important wetlands in the world.

We enjoyed a night out playing Chinese card games with our friends, and drinking in Kowloon. The next morning was our last, and we woke up for massages in Central HK, and then had Dim Sum with our friends before heading to the airport to return to our various places.

Oh Hong Kong, you steal my heart every time... I'll be back soon enough.

The Adventure Continues On: CHINA!

2009-05-29T14:56:00.011+09:00

It was nice to get away from all the drama of the past couple months. In April I spent nearly two weeks in Southwestern China & Hong Kong. Flew into Chengdu, met up with friends a day later, and then we overnight trained it to Kunming. Afterwards, we flew to Shenzen and walked over that beautiful, beautiful border to Hong Kong.

Chengdu was an unexpected delight. I got in a day before my two friends did due to their lack of understanding numbers and dates, but it worked out really well. I stayed at the Sim's Cozy Garden Hostel, and it might have been the best hostel experience I have personally ever had. First, I booked a 3 person suite because I assumed there would be 3 of us, and since there wasn't was just going to eat the cost. However, since the hostel was not full, the staff was so sweet that they just put me in a single room for the night which was much cheaper. And having a huge double bed with my own bathroom was a nice way to start my trip. Woke up bright and early and decided to walk around the city. Just took a map and asked them to point me in the direction of town. Now, if I had been smarter I would have done the Panda preserve this day as I learned it was definitely an early morning activity, but instead I had a wonderful day of walking and sight seeing. I stopped by the WoLin Monastery, one of the 4 largest buddhist temples in China and had tea for a few hours while reading my book in their tea garden. Beautiful weather, incredibly nice Chinese people... couldn't have asked for a better day.

Sim's Cozy Garden as seen from my room ^^
WoLin Monastery Grounds vv

My friends showed up that night and we walked around and drank a bit (gotta love that Tsing Tao) on some street corners and set off the next day to wander around town a bit more. We spent the next night at the Sichuan Opera at the recommendation of Sim (the Hostel owner) and he swore by it so much that he said if we hated it, he would refund our ticket price. Well, the man from Singapore did not lie. The Sichuan Opera was incredible, and perhaps the word Opera is a bit strong. It's more reminiscent of a 1920's vaudeville act with Chinese flair than a boring ol' Opera. There were fire breathers, and puppeteers, and bands. Excellent experience in an outside theater with tea & peanuts at your seat, and offers of ear cleaning and massages while you waited for the start. We spent our last day renting bikes and biking out to one of the people's parks in the main area of town and finding food. My counterparts might not agree with me, but Sichuan food is some of the best food I have had in the world. The spices they use are just otherworldly and delicious. I had these cold noodles in a red spiced glaze twice in my 3 days, and still crave it. They were just at street food stands, and super cheap.

No Trip to China is complete without a viewing of Mao^^

The Sichuan Opera ^^

Funny Grass Signs are the Park vv

We booked an overnight train from Chengdu to Kunming that totaled 22 hours. We chose the soft sleeper cabin, and in my mind there is no better way to travel in China. The three of us had our own 4 person cabin, and enjoyed the unbelievably surprisingly gorgeous countryside views of China. The only thing that ruins it is the sporadic factory dotting the hills and fields, but eh, such is China.

Kunming is almost tropical. It's fairly close to the border of Laos and has red dirt and palm trees everywhere. It's a small city, but has been rated the most liveable in China (Chengdu being #2). We stayed at the Cloudland Youth Hostel, and while no where near as incredible as Sim's Cozy Garden Hostel, it did offer clean rooms, free wi-fi, a convenient location, and a decent restaurant. We stayed in a dorm since their private rooms were all booked, but it wasn't a terrible experience.

We did a tour of a number of Kunming's parks and did some hiking in the 3 days that we were there. Kunming is vastly green and mountainous and is truly beautiful. We even went up to the tomb of the man who wrote China's national anthem, and it was much more lavish than the tomb of the man who wrote the Star Spangled Banner, I can tell you that (his grave being in Rome, NY and has very little fanfare surrounding it).

After spending a significant amount of time in these two cities, I would never again recommend Beijing or Shanghai to anyone. Those cities are great don't get me wrong; they're worldly, beautiful, and the epitome of China's future & history. However, if you want something that's distinctly Chinese, a place where English is around, but not enough to be used, cleaner air, natural beauty, and has an abundance of traditional culture, head to another part of China. I mean - this guy looks relaxed doesn't he?

Sloppy St. Patrick's Day!

2009-03-15T17:12:00.006+09:00

Told you I'd be back more often. ;) This weekend was the usual St. Patrick's drunken fiasco. In some ways it was better and some ways it was worse than last year. The venue had been moved from the spacious Cheoggye Stream area to the more compact Hyewha Station / Park area. It was a bit colder than last year, but the entertainment was much better this year.

There was a Korean U2 Cover band that was actually QUITE good. There were also more areas to find beer and the like, so it kept things nice and consistent. It was nice that I got to see more of my Korean friends and their families as well.

My group happened to have missed the parade but I guess it wasn't much of a parade. Just some people walking in a small line around the park. Due to the economy and all, a lot of the sponsorship was missing and the city was forced to scale back the celebration. In my opinion it was still an excellent day and hey... there was even an actual leprechaun runnin around:

HAPPY 2009! (In March....)

2009-03-12T17:07:00.003+09:00

Yea, Ok, shut up. I've taken quiteeeee some time off of this blogging thing. I started a new school in December and went home for two weeks over Xmas, and then have spent the last 3 months just attempting to get my gameplan going on top of basically helping to rebuild this school that I currently find myself at (that I currently don't like).

Basically - expect me back in action pretty regularly from here on out. The cold, disgusting, depressing winter is over and I'm ready to get going on things I've only been talking about. I have quit my job as of this week and have less than 30 days here. I will be coming back to Korea - it is absolutely stupid to leave this kind of lifestyle and go home to the economic woes that everyone else seems to be going through. Even though the exchange rate blows (1000w = 64 cents right now) it is still worth it to stay.

I've got my batteries recharged, new things that I'm going to be doing, and goals for this year. I'm gonna go some much needed traveling, and do some more hiking and things. I've got some friends here, but not too many, and that'll do me just fine.

Now... anyone want to employ me? ;)

Moving & Starting a New Job at Harvard

2008-12-27T18:31:00.007+09:00

Ahhh don't let the name full you... Harvard University does not have a presence here in Korea (that I know of at least). However, true to Korean ways they do massive amounts of copyright infringement and have just "borrowed" the name. Actually last year the school finally got in trouble from some random other company and now go by "HLS" professionally.

Aaaanyway, December 5 was moving day and the Friday night beforehand I just did a nice, casual, chicken galbi dinner and didn't drink knowing that I had to wake up very early to move. Well, didn't matter cuz I woke up with massive food poisoning and could barely stand. Did NOT make for a fun moving day - but with the help of my favorite Kiwis I was able to move in the afternoon across town into my new digs.

The location is better (for Suji anyway) - right around the corner from my favorite restaurant that I lovingly call 'sticken' (chicken on a stick) - but I now sleep in a twin bed, and have a completely broken bathroom. Ah the fun of working for a low-budget private, private school. They say they'll fix it for me soon, but we'll see how that goes.

First week was kinda rough... no real training, thrown right into the fire my first week and I was thankful that I had someone to at least show me the ropes for 10 minutes before class started. There's a ton of drama at this place b/c the director is leaving and the management has NO idea what they're doing, but we'll see how it goes... a lesson in life I imagine. Wish me luck...

My Last SLP Days... Bitter Sweet

2008-12-05T18:31:00.000+09:00

Working at SLP for 16 months was incredible and incredibly frustrating (but what job isn't, right?) It was my first job here and I was so fortunate to work with excellent people, and an understanding boss, and not really ever have TOO many problems. I could have had it a lot worse.

And the kids definitely spoiled me. They were just so cool and I will miss them more than I ever could have imagined.

Time to move onto bigger and better things though.

Thanksgiving Part Deux

2008-11-27T18:31:00.000+09:00

Nothing special about this year's Thanksgiving... just a small dinner of 4 Americans who've found themselves on this side of the planet for a really big holiday.

We did go to Butterfinger Pancakes in Jeongja and stuffed our faces full of whatever was on the menu. I had a Louisiana Beef Stew that was absolutely excellent, and recommend this place to anyone in the Bundang or Apujeong areas.

Piano Man, Seoul Man - Billy Joel comes to Korea!

2008-11-20T22:58:00.003+09:00

I worked in the Music Industry for about 5-6 years during and then after college. Music was my whole life, and I was going to on average about 3-4 concerts a week - some for fun, some for work. And it got to be so annoying having to deal with rappers that needed to be babysat, or industry peeps that were just so overly full of themselves, that I got the hell out and came to Korea. In the 15 months that I've been here I've seen ONE concert, and it was the Basement Jaxx at a club in Gangnam, and it wasn't even a concert, it was a DJ set.

However, Billy Joel came to Seoul and it was incredible. So cool to see a large production in Korea, and Billy's always been a favorite. I last saw him at the Dome 10 years ago and he's still got it. Actually I saw him perform a Syracuse commencement speech 2 years ago, and I swore he was drunk. This time, he just seemed to be having fun. Either way... an excellent evening, a bit too expensive, and the Olympic Park Arena was a pretty sweet place to see a show. Word to the wise though - Olympic Park is NOT located near Olympic Stadium. Made that mistake and wound up traveling a bit longer than anticipated... worth it though!

New Contract!

2008-11-12T10:58:00.001+09:00

Well... as of right now, I will be officially ending SLP on December 5. I have just signed a contract for the Harvard Language School (HLS) in Suji, will move, and then start on December 8. The school isn't the greatest, but it should be an interesting experience, and at the very least I'll have two jobs in a foreign country and will be able to speak on the positives and negatives and compare and contrast for future jobs. We'll see how it goes... SO, expect me here for the next 6 months.

Obama Wins!! The World Seems Happy

2008-11-04T10:57:00.000+09:00

What a day. What an incredible feeling. After 8 years of watching America go down the tubes, it feels so incredible to have a significant change. Unfortunately, I did not get to vote as my absentee ballot never came. However, it wouldn't have mattered much anyway as New York State always goes democrat anyway. I feel more productive having voted in the world's first online primary vote anyway.

Being in another country was nothing short of amazing. At the time there was only one other American on my staff and she was kind of a wet blanket about everything in life so I couldn't celebrate this with her. But the canadians on my staff were really excited, as were the koreans, and it just felt nice to be able to see reactions from those in other countries. Most everyone here was ecstatic, so it was just a nice vibe to be around. I even got lucky and got to watch Obama's acceptance speech live on my computer during one of my breaks. Here's to hopefully a good next 4 years...

Fukuoka, Japan - NOT Just for a Visa Run!

2008-10-27T10:56:00.000+09:00

My list of places to visit is about a mile long, and Japan was always somewhere on it, but never really near the top. It's a 3 hour plane ride from Seoul to Tokyo, and once you get there its just insanely expensive and let's face it - Japan's just a super cool, trendier version of Korea. BUT - this particular opportunity arose and well, its now whetted my appetite for more Japanese travel.

This might be one of my most favorite trips in life purely because of how I get to tell it. So it's Thursday night, and I have plans to go see a late movie with the boyfriend, and as I'm getting ready to walk out the door, said boyfriend calls and cancels because he needs to look up Visa information since his expires soon. If you've had to experience Visa stuff in Korea lately, you know that it's virtually impossible to find any answer to any question. So our solution on a late Thursday night was to hop on board a high speed ferry on Saturday and spend the night in Japan, so he could get rid of his visa.

We do some finagling and some research and sure enough we're on the KTX train at 8am Saturday morning - VIP all the way down to Busan, have a nice fresh seafood lunch at the Jalgachi Fish Market, and then hop on the coolest thing I've ever been on in my life - The Beetle.

What's the Beetle you ask? Well - it's only an insane jet-fuel powered hydrofoil that gets you from Busan to Fukuoka in less than 3 hours for less than 250,000w (fees/taxes included). This thing comes OUT of the water, and skims the top of it going at a sweet 80kmph over some of the roughest seas I've seen. It's just like riding on an airplane too - the announcements are the same, there are "flight" attendants, and really comfortable seats with actual life preservers in them that have a chance of being used (unlike in an airplane where they should maybe supply parachutes instead).

Anyway, we wind up at the port in Fukuoka, go through customs (my first time coming into a country by boat) and then go off to find ourselves a hotel. Fukuoka is a very cute little city - extremely clean, trendy, tourist like. We got in around 6pm, showered and went off to go explore. We found that Asahi beers out of the vending machine were pretty cheap, and found some malls, and temples, and even a little river area overlooking what's basically the downtown area. My only regret is that we didn't get some Japanese food at any point because we just spent too much time walking around and enjoying the great fall Japan weather, BUT we did find a Wendy's, which made our nights. We got up the next day and did some more walking, unfortunately in the rain - only to have to get right back on the ferry to head back to Korea. But overall a great weekend trip - maybe a bit too expensive for 2 days, but hey, you only live once right? The life of an English Teacher... always unpredictable. Pictures Below:

Birthday Fun

2008-10-12T10:54:00.000+09:00

Another birthday rolled around, as they do, this year. I turned a nice solid 26 (or a shakey Korean 27, whatever you wanna call it) and it still blows my mind that I spent my entire 25th year in Asia, living in Korea. It was one of those decisions that looking back on it now as a bored 23 year old I can't believe I actually up and did, but after the process of it all, having a 25th birthday and now a 26th birthday with no huge desire to get home any time soon, I still believe it to be one of the best things I've ever done. If anything it has given me immense perspective on so many things such as myself, my friends, home, America, other cultures, other people, and the list goes on.

It was a lowkey birthday overall... a nice night out on Wednesday at the local Exit Bar (which to this day I don't think there's been one Post about Exit - so look for that sometime soon). Saturday was the day of observance since one can't party TOO hard on a Wednesday, and it was spent in Seoul having amazing burgers at Smokey's Tavern, playing games and drinking at Gecko's Terrace, walking around the Korean War Memorial, and spending an evening playing games at The King's Tap. No flash, just an overall good day. It's funny though - I have absolutely NO idea where I'll be spending the next birthday...

Int'l Fireworks Show. THEY LIT THE BRIDGE ON FIRE.

2008-10-04T17:26:00.003+09:00

After a really nice night in Wolmido, the following night was spent in Yeouido Park, on Yeouido Island in Seoul for the annual International Fireworks Competition. I attempted to go to this last year but only caught the last 15 minutes or so. This year we did it right.

Getting to the park around 4pm, we laid out a few blankets, secured a big spot, and popped open about a half dozen soju bottles and wine. We had magazines and newspapers and enough stuff to kill a few hours until the boomies started. And let me tell you, it was worth the wait.

Rumor has it that China, Japan, the US, and Korea sink money into this and call it a competition of sorts. Basically - its an hour long firework display with a 10 minute intermission. The first half was what you'd expect from a pretty good show:

The second half did something I've never seen done before. Sure, crazy fireworks of all shapes, colors, sizes, and sounds - BUT - Korea took it one step further. This city has about 20 bridges over the Han River that runs through the middle of it - and it took it upon itself to LIGHT ONE ON FIRE. Traffic is still pretty heavy over this bridge during the show and the next thing you know, its raining fireworks from the bridge into the water along the whole thing (at least a kilometer long). Seriously one of the coolest things done, well, ever.

If you're around next year - make sure you plan this out well in advance.

A Trip To Muuido.... err I mean WOLMIDO.. Oops.

2008-10-03T17:27:00.005+09:00

Goal: Use three day weekend for Korea's Foundation Day to go to Muuido. The tiny getaway island that's south of Incheon off the Northwest Coast of Korea.

Transportation: Seemed easy enough... take the airport bus to the airport, hop on a local bus, take the ferry to the island.

Accommodation: Beach huts all along a beach where the tide rolls out so far you can't tell the difference between ground and sky.

What actually happened? Well, we did ALL of that, except somehow either wound up at the wrong ferry terminal OR we got there so late there might have been the ferry we wanted and didn't realize it. But the one we took had a nice view of the sunset...

Either way, we wound up at WOLMIDO now MUUIDO. And to the average reader that might not seem like a big difference, BUT Muuido is an island whereas Wolmido is a little coastal wharf town on the mainland west of Seoul. SO we went all the way to Incheon island for nothing really. But it's always random when you pull up and see this:

BUT we ended up making the best of it. Found a hotel (there are only Korean Love Motels in the area, and they were all rather expensive at 60,000w for the night considering they're love hotels), and then went on our way. We walked around the boardwalk for awhile, playing carnival games, and then riding rides (bumper cars being my favorite). This place LOVED its pirate ships, btw:

The hardest part of the evening was finding food. We wandered into a couple of restaurants, hoping for some really fresh seafood, but after getting quoted 80,000W for King Crab (which can be bought in Busan for 20,000W) and then not having any english menus around as far as knowing what we're ordering, we gave up and just went to a bar and had beer and barfood.

It was a quick little trip, just one night really, but definitely a fun thing to do on a weekend evening. And Saturday we just took the subway back into Seoul for a nice lunch. A getaway without really getting away...

Oh and did I mention this place was home to the only Korean drag queen I've seen the whole time?

The Philippines - Cities, and Hobbits, and Islands - Oh My!

2008-09-20T17:31:00.004+09:00

This time last year I was a wide-eyed and bushy-tailed newbie to Korea. I had been here for about 3 weeks by the time Chuseok rolled around and took advantage of the 5 day vacation by heading down to Gyeongju - a veritable museum without walls. While it was a really interesting couple of days, for the most part it was pretty quiet since Korea basically shuts down during their version of Thanksgiving. Getting food was a bit difficult, and the transportation on the way back was the worst trip I've ever encountered. THIS year I vowed to get the hell out of Korea and that's exactly what I did by heading down to the Philippines.

We flew out Saturday morning into Manila and we had just missed a pretty big storm from the looks of how wet everything was. We walked around to find a hotel in the Malate area of Manila and ended up getting a room with no windows but a giant mural of London. It was only for a night, so it wasn't a big deal. We went out in search of food and found some of the best Filipino food I had all week. This amazing rice adobo stuff wrapped in a banana leaf - incredible.

We just spent the day walking around, trying to find the Hobbit House - the jewel of the Philippines as far as I'm concerned. The entire waitstaff is comprised of Little People. It's a quiet little place with a stage that hosts really good acoustic cover bands. Can't wait to get back there someday.

On Day 2 we left Manila and went to Tagatay/Talisay/Lake Taal/Taal Volcano (a place by many names really) and then Day 3 we went to the island of Puerto Gallera and Day 4 was spent heading back to Manila and the Hobbit House before flying out. It really was one of the coolest places I've ever been to.

The thing I loved about the whole trip was the fact that it was kind of unwritten. I had bought a Lonely Planet book (which came in handy more times than I can count) but the locals were the ones that made the trip. They told us how to find things and where to go. And the transportation options were incredible. We took a $2 bus ride 2 hours to talisay, and then a tricycle ride to the lake, and then a jeepney to the next bus, only to take a ferry in these boats that are completely unique to the Philippines to get to Sabang. And then we hired a van to take us back to Manila so we didn't have to take a 4 hour bus ride. The whole thing was just incredible and I'd do it again in a second.

Enjoy some pictures ;)

Suwon Bluewings! Suwon Happy Happy Goal!

2008-08-31T23:22:00.000+09:00

One of my favorite things to do in this country is to go to any sporting event. It's one of my favorite things to do at home too, but it's just as fun here too. There difference is that I can go to soccer games here and it's cool. Our closest team would have to be the Suwon Bluewings and the games are seriously fun, and they play in the Suwon World Cup Stadium about an hour south of Seoul.

We went to one in June before the season took a break for World Cup Qualifying Games and the Olympics. We were lucky enough that time to get hooked up with some free tickets from a friend who is a journalist for the team and we got to sit in the crazy fan section. The game we went to this weekend we weren't as lucky but the tickets for the game were only $10 and we were still in the thick of things for the 2nd half.

My favorite part of being there is the cheering. Suwon Happy Happy Goal is a crowd favorite as well as "Suwon Blue-i-wings" because everything in Korea has to have 3 syllables.

One of the funny things I noticed at both games were all the ginormous flags being tossed around. Someone has huge flag that is the colors of the team, Blue and White, and a very large Che Guevera picture on it. Just doesn't seem right being that this country supposedly hates their brothers to the north for communism.

Either way - its a fun time. I recommend it :)

The King's Tap in Sinchon - a Gamer's Paradise

2008-08-24T20:35:00.003+09:00

Seoul is most definitely known for its nightlife. Areas like Itaewon, Gangnam, and Hondgae are the big hot spots catering to mainly foreigners, but even most party hard Koreans. Every now and again though, a bar will go above and beyond that I just need to write about it. The last time I did this I spoke of the Occult Star Bar in Sinchon that was home to Doctor Fish and hookahs with an excellent atmosphere. This time, I have to talk about The King's Tap, oddly enough - also in Sinchon.

The King's Tap was formerly the London Pub. It was a rather large bar on the 5th floor of a building and it was always pretty quaint. BUT now that it has new owners, FOREIGN owners I might add, the bar has stepped it up quite a bit. It has a professional foosball table, dart boards, touch screen games, a pool table, and probably the most impressive aspect - a shuffleboard table. The menu is also quite good with western food and at good portions for a decent price.

Anyway, the bar caters to the foreign crowd and it does a great job with it. If you find yourself in the Sinchon area, I highly recommend it. Stop by and say hello to the owner, Matt who works hard behind the bar and wears a shirt that says, "King."

A Leisurely Stroll up Mt. Inwangsan

2008-08-24T20:34:00.005+09:00

Being that I've been here awhile I'm starting to search out more and more things to keep myself occupied. Mainly I'm trying to pick up some more private lessons to get some more cash as well as fill up my time, but the weekends I'm still trying to explore Seoul and really just see what's out there.

I've basically exhausted Lonely Planet and might pick up some other rough guides just to tide me over for my last 3 months, BUT there was one interesting thing I've managed to overlook. There were two "walking tours" of two parts of Seoul that seemed rather interesting. So one Saturday afternoon a gal pal of mine and I decided to take a stroll before heading out on the town that night.

The walk, entitled "Inwangsan Shamanist Hillside Walk" starts by turning left down an Alley at Dongnimmun Station (exit 2) and walking for 10 minutes up a hill.
THEN you get to the gate and an incredibly steep incline heading up towards a buddhist temple.
THEN you get to some carved out stone stairs before heading up to what's referred to as Zen Rocks where mothers pray for their sons.

After viewing the rocks you can walk towards the right - let it be known you're now entirely in the woods and walking along a rather narrow path alongside natural spring waters. Oh, and a little bit further on up the mountain there is an area for you to stop and rest- partake in some of the spring water AND use some fitness equipment. I kid you not:

Just a bit further and you'll get to the top of the mountain where there is a buddha carved into the stone. If you walk a little towards the left you'll come across a clearing with one of the most beautiful views of Seoul I've seen yet. Entirely worth it.

Along the walk you'll see many women camped out praying for various reasons (mainly their sons - with good reason). They're very friendly so say hello. Just don't bug them WHILE they're doing their bowing and praying, obviously.

Anyway, all in all roundtrip it took about an hour and a half. It's a beautiful walk and one I'd think about doing again. But it's a hike - not a walk.

My One Year Anniversary - Time Flies In Asia

2008-08-21T20:03:00.002+09:00

One year in Korea...(prepare for some sappy cheesy 'life is great' stuff - you've been warned)

In a lot of ways it feels like I just got here, but in most ways I have a hard time remembering life before Korea. I'm healthier, I'm more active with outdoorsy things, I feel like I have a better perspective on life, and yet I still find myself in some sort of bar a lot of nights with close friends having good nights and bad.

Korea is a uniquely beautiful place, and I am very happy to have spent 12 months here making good money, teaching fun kids, and getting an experience very few people back home will never even begin to truly understand. I'm also very grateful to have had my best friend visit, as well as a few other unexpected guests to show around. Don't get me wrong, Koreans as a culture can be extremely frustrating, but they're also pretty generous and sweet too.

Being an ex-patriot has meant a lot to me - and not because I don't love the good ol' U S of A, but as an American it is very easy to never leave the country. Realistically a very small amount of citizens actually have their passport, and if they do, something like only 1% of those people actually use it. America's lucky in the sense that every culture in the world somehow makes its way to us. If we want great Indian/Thai/Balinese/Turkish/Italian/Mexican/whatever food, go to your nearest city and pick from any dozens of places for example. The country is also so big that you can literally escape into some remote part of it and it can be an entirely new and different lifestyle. New Yorkers for example are extremely different from those say in Boston, Seattle, Memphis, Atlanta, New Orleans, or Denver. You can live in the beautiful state of Maine full of its gorgeous forests, or move to Arizona with its hot deserts, or go buy a house in Miami and enjoy palm trees and one of the world's best beaches.

Although as an American, while those from other countries are desperately trying to immigrate, you have the luxury to always come back to it whenever you want. There's no reason why you can't go out and see what the world has to offer. Marriage, jobs, kids, all of that stuff can wait while you go off in search of what life is like elsewhere. How can you settle down without knowing all of the information first about where to settle? Nothing is stopping you from getting married to the love of your life and settling in some place like Hong Kong. Not to mention there's never been a better time to get up and go what with the economy tanking, politics being what they are, and a never ending war.

I'm staring down the barrel of my 26th birthday having spent all of my 25th year on this planet in Korea. I've had the chance to see Seoul, Busan, small towns in Korea, Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, and pretty soon Manila. I went to an excellent University, I worked for a company that was the best in the world for what it did, I had amazing friends and family. Leaving all of that behind was an easy decision to make in order to see what's on the other side of the world. What I found changed everything and also reaffirmed some things I knew about myself. I plan on going back home, but I'll go back knowing a lot more, having friends all over the globe, and a bigger appetite for whatever else life throws my way.

So even though I've extended and have a few more months left here, and this blog is more about information giving and sarcasm - consider this my one reflective post on a decision and a year that couldn't have been any better. Certain people have made that possible - I'd be kidding myself if I didn't say that those I met didn't have a significant impact on life here - and if they read this they know who they are. The traveling community are some of the best people in the world... and here's to them and Korea.

The Boardgame Cafe!

2008-08-16T13:15:00.000+09:00

Korean Independence Day was Friday, August 15th and we had a nice 3 day weekend. A lot of us are pretty poor these days from world travel, or just too much general merriment and boozing. Plus the weather has been kinda iffy lately anyway and that tends to ruin some things.

We did find the time to go and try some new Indian food in Gangnam (Baba India) and man is that place one of the best I've had in Seoul. After that we wandered over to Coex Mall to just walk around and stumbled across the Boardgame Cafe - one of the most unique places I've seen.

It's a little coffee shop of sorts - coffees, smoothies, etc. But also has a menu for board games. While 85% of it seemed to be games in Korean (obviously) there were quite a few that were pretty entertaining.

My competitive partner in crime and I discovered a game called Blockus where you have to try and out 'strategerize' the other person and limit them from making moves with blocks. Quite entertaining if you have the patience and a competitive nature ;)

Anyway, I highly recommend this place. Although it will run you about 3,700won per hour per person just to play the games, it is worth it. Did I mention that its directly across from the (fake*) Apple Store? mmmm Apple.

*It's an authorized apple retailer store. It has everything Apple would have, but Apple is not yet officially in Korea. Sad. Koreans don't know what they're missing.

Visa Extension - Because I Just Can't Get Enough

2008-08-08T13:55:00.000+09:00

A few months ago I decided that 12 months here just isn't enough. The money is really nice, the people are great, there are SO many things to do in this country, and really - the US economy is so bad these days that there really isn't any real reason to go home.

My visa ends August 9, my contract ends August 16th, and my alien card expires August 23rd. I will be extending until December 5. The process is entirely different now than it was a year ago apparently, so I've jumped through a bunch of hoops so far. The new Korean President decided to change the requirements for anyone trying to teach in Korea starting January 2008 - so here's what to expect if you are looking to teach OR even if you just want to extend:

- Once you've been hired, or you've agreed to extend you'll need a signed contract from the school (hasn't changed)
- A physical is required including a clean drug test, and an AIDS test (new)
- *Clean criminal records as stated by the police department of the city you last resided in (new)

*If you are in Korea you can have these mailed to you but you will need to go to the Embassy to have an Apostille Seal stamped on it before giving it to the immigration office. The embassy sent out a notice at the end of July that said it would no longer accept any criminal records printed off of the internet. However - this has yet to be verified as I have had friends continue to print theirs off line.

My Korean coordinator went to the immigration office last week with my signed criminal records that were also notarized, and they said a seal would not be necessary. After getting all my tests back and such, my Korean coordinator went back to hand everything in and was told by the guy that the seal is 100% absolutely necessary. SO I will be taking a trip to the Embassy pretty soon. An extra step for no reason whatsoever.

So much work to lead the good life...

Seodaemun Prison - Not a Museum for the Weak

2008-08-07T01:18:00.004+09:00

One of the more interesting things I did over my summer vacation (and that's not saying much) was to visit Seodaemun Prison. I didn't even know it existed until a friend recommended it, and now I see it mentioned everywhere. Funny how that works, right? Anyway if you have a weak stomach, I wouldn't recommend you continue reading.

Seodaemun Prison was created in the early 1900s by the Japanese to imprison, torture, and kill Korean Patriots fighting against them. Lets just say that Japanese were not a friendly people at the time, and had some pretty gruesome tricks up their sleeves. Walking through this place made me think of how it must feel to walk through something like Auschwitz - same dark, eerie, death like feeling.

The grounds of the prison includes multiple buildings with various purposes. One of the buildings takes into its basement where you see torture rooms with specific goals. One room shows sexual torture, and another demonstrates life size and life like mannequins being flogged or having sharp rusty metal objects shoved up their finger nails. Oh, and screams can also be heard echoing through the hallways.

Another building shows the cells that look actually pretty spacious until you realize that 8-10 people were crammed into these rooms that aren't much bigger than your average studio apartment.

One of the buildings had rooms where the patriots would go up against panels of Japanese Judges - with a noose around their neck - and if they were found guilty there was a trap door under your feat where you'd be executed immediately.

Perhaps one of the most interesting things I had seen all day was the standing coffins. These closet looking contraptions were not much bigger than 5.5 feet tall, maybe 1.5 feet wide and a foot deep. They would put someone in this thing standing upright for 2-3 days and by the time they would open the door you'd be completely paralyzed. I stood in one and it was unbearable for even just a few moments.

It was a fascinating way to learn more about Korean culture and why they have such a hatred for the Japanese. It was an enlightening couple of hours to show you what lengths humans will go to in order to acquire something. I recommend it, and for only 1,500won - it's something everyone should go and experience.

Ssssss-trike!!! Bowling in Korea

2008-08-02T15:49:00.005+09:00

One of my favorite past times at home is to go bowling. I got roped into joining a bowling league 8 years ago in High School as something fun and random to do on Sunday nights. I was NEVER great, but its always been one of those things that just screams fun to me. At home bowling alleys are dark, dank, smoke ridden, musty places that offer endless cheap pitchers and fried food. Not so much in good ol' SoKo.

After months of talking about it, we finally went to a bowling alley. Now, this MIGHT not be representative of other bowling alleys in this crazy country since we were at Lotte World in Jamsil. This place was family friendly and oozing wholesome, clean, good time fun. Next time if we go, we're definitely loading up on the Poju Cocktails (Powerade + Soju). Games were only 3,600won and shoe rentals only 1,600won.

Overall 3 games and some shoes cost about 12,000. Can't complain now can we? And I might add that I did win all 3 games ;)

Korean Couples and Their Matching Clothing

2008-08-01T15:50:00.001+09:00

One of the funniest things about this culture is the clothing. Fashion rules here and I don't even mean that in a name brand sense. Of course, you'll see every store you'd see in NYC's 5th Ave all over the place, but the best shopping comes from places like the subway underground malls where clothing can be like 5 bucks (don't even get me started on the hobby that is finding crazy 'Engrish' shirts). Every style exists here, and right now the 80s are definitely back in full force for some of the Korean College Kids. We're talking fluro and high tops, and funny hats and sunglasses with baggy shirts everywhere. It's amusing actually. The women here will also wear heels to every occasion - even to hiking or the beach!

But one of the greatest things to witness here is the matching clothing by couples. Everyone here has some sort of story regarding this phenomenon and it's great. A Korean once told me that it's a test from the girl in the relationship. If the guy doesn't wear it then that means he doesn't love her. SO the poor guy is trapped into wearing something he probably does not want to wear. I heard another story once where a couple was witnessed at an airport and a woman broke into hysterics because the man was not sitting on the right side of her so their t-shirts could make sense.

I saw one recently and I actually followed the couple and asked to take a picture of them and their shirts. They were walking (in the correct order) and a stick figure is holding a can to his ear and the line stretches across his shirt to the girl's shirt who's got the other end and has a heart. Absolutely adorable. And something I would never, ever ever subject my significant other to.

(This girl does not look and was not happy about this whole thing - the guy found it hilarious though).

A Week Long Summer Vacation Not Spent Wisely

2008-07-31T15:30:00.000+09:00

Remember as a kid, growing up and getting something ridiculous like 3 months of summer vacation? They could be used in so many different ways and usually all spent outside enjoying being a kid? Yea, those were the good ol' days.

Well Korean kids don't get that luxury. They go to school all year long and their summer vacation is generally about a week or two. AND because they go to so many schools their vacations might not sync up right. For example, my school's vacation is this last week of July but some of my kids don't get off from their public school until next week. SO its LESS school, but possibly never NO school. What a sad life for these kids when you think about it.

Either way, I did jack during this week. I wanted to travel somewhere BUT current funding levels are at a low so I just stuck around the Suj. I got a haircut, did some shopping, ate food I haven't had in months, and watched an AWFUL lot of Prison Break. Relaxing has been nice actually. Tomorrow I may do some touristy things and go see an old Korean Prison and maybe a palace. I have realized I am a creature that needs routine in order to be productive. Laziness does prevail with me. Also, this is how you know you've been in a country for too long - nothing seems entirely new anymore.

Need a Job? My School Got Screwed.

2008-07-27T15:11:00.001+09:00

Teaching in Korea is like any other job really. You work so many hours a week, you get an expected paycheck, you have your ups and downs everyday with the job, the subject matter, the staff - just like you would at any normal job. The differences are anyone can do this once you figure out what's expected of you and you're in a completely different culture that does things ass-backwards sometimes and you just have to roll with it. And the idea is that you're using it as a means to do other things like travel, or write, or just kill time and make money.

While living in Asia or teaching a second language, may not be for everyone if you've signed up for it you should at least give it a chance. Why do I say this? Well last month one of the girls on my staff was getting ready to go home since her contract was finished. My school hired another Canadian to replace her. The girl leaving left detailed instructions on all of her classes, was very organized, and helped the newbie with the lesson planning and such. The newbie was in Korea for 5 days, had training only and hadn't even taught a class yet, and did what we here call a 'Midnight Run.' She left Friday night with a note saying she couldn't take the heat (it was pretty hot the week she was here), the school and the kids seemed great, but she had personal reasons for going back home. I will not begrudge anyone for their personal reasons, but you're telling me you didn't have these reasons 6 days ago before you got on a 14 hour plane ride after 2 months of planning?

It takes anywhere from 1-2 months to secure a Visa to teach in this country now with all the new requirements. So in that one decision a person made to leave her responsibilities she has now created at least 2 months worth of extra overtime work for the people still here.

SO if you're reading this and want a job I have one for ya. If you've read this blog before you can see the kids and the field trips and such are pretty fun. Here are the specs:

Pay: 2.0 - 2.2 Million Won per Month (Roughly $2,000 USD)
Work hours: Up to 21 units per month, overtime if more (units being 80 minute classes)
Hours: 9:30am-7pm MWF or 9:30am-6pm T/T
One Month Bonus Pay at the end of a 1 year contract
50% health insurance
Round Trip Airfare
Single Apartment very close to the school, shops, subway, food.
Pension
10 days vacation + all major Korean Holidays
Staff includes 7 foreign teachers and 8 Korean teachers
Children ages are 5-13 all speaking levels.
Location: Suji (Yongin City) - 40 minutes south of Seoul (very cheap by taxi/bus/subway to go anywhere).

Requirements:
Native English Speaker
4 year Bachelor's Degree
Clean Criminal Records
Physical
Resume
Signed Contract
Picture of yourself

contact me if you're interested.

Field Trip: Kids Sports Club

2008-07-18T14:30:00.001+09:00

I've been SO lazy about updating this blog lately. For the summertime you are probably expecting more out of me, but due to a few circumstances life has been pretty slow. We did however take a field trip with the kiddies recently and it was actually pretty hilarious.

We hopped on our school buses, braced for a ride lasting an hour (it's what we were told) and about 2.4 minutes later we got off the buses to head into the Kids Sports Club to take the childrens swimming. Sounds like harmless fun right?

For the most part it was pretty entertaining. At the Kids Sports Club everything there is built for kids. The pool is in this room that I even had to bend down a bit as to not hit my head. They all went into their respective locker rooms to change and they came out in what looked like a parade of children in their stylistic bathing suits. I took a few pictures but it seems wrong to put photos of kids in very little clothing up on line.

I feel that the kids got gypped because once we got into the pool they had maybe 30 minutes of pool time? And I only got to play with maybe 6 kids in the "deep end". We were back at school by noon and we weren't supposed to be back until 12:30. They had fun though, so I guess that's all that matters. And I know I love field trips, especially ones where I don't have to do much babysitting and actually get to play. Plus I got to spend the morning with my favorites (and I do play favorites). I mean, look at these kids - how could you not?

Getting Down and Dirty at the Boryeong Mud Festival!

2008-07-16T13:55:00.009+09:00

(For More Information go to worknplay's website here:
Boryeong Mud Festival )

I got to Korea at the end of August 2007 and missed a number of fun summer things to do being that I was such a newbie. However, there are a few things that people have discussed over and over in the past 11 months, and one of the most common of those things is the Boryeong Mud Festival in Daechon Beach.

The discussions started a few months ago with attempting to find some rooms, and transportation but no one ever really seemed to do anything about it. Well, with one month left before the opening day after a quick search through all of the tour groups, a friend suggested worknplay.co.kr which had an excellent tour package all set up. I'm a big fan of planning events, and having to do as little thinking as possible so it was perfect. After a last minute scramble to wire some money over to them, my group of about 15 secured their spots and were on their way.

We met at 8am Saturday and were welcomed with coffee and delicious, cheesy focaccia bread from California Pizza Kitchen, we boarded two nice coach buses down to Daechon and watched some movies, and 3 hours later got to our quaint lodgings at this little hostel type place about a mile down the road from all the crazy action.

The festival was actually rather intense. Everything is free, and there's mud wrestling, mud water slides, mud pools, mud massages, and so on.

All of the mud is used in making cosmetics and if you signed the guest book at any of the booths you got some free mud soap (which is incredible to use by the way). I spent all day on the beach going from getting all mudded up to hanging out, to washing it off and swimming in the ocean only to do it all over again. They had tables and brushes set up all over so it was pretty easy:

And man, was there drinking. Basically Daechon goes from this tiny little sleepy beach town into this massive sprawling spring break-esque party town for a week. If you never participated in a traditional spring break back in the states, and always wanted to - Boryeong is where you gotta go.

Even though I'm explaining it as a party-town, hook-up-a-thon, crazy good time - there were actually a ton of Korean families sprawled all down the beach. I have to tell ya, Korean children all mudded up are absolutely adorable.

If you didn't want to be part of the insanity, you could easily go a 50 meters or so in either direction and get some peace and quiet. Sunday morning actually, I wondered over to my little portion of the beach, got all mudded up, and just hung out. It was kinda nice actually - AND there were no lines at the mud slides!

The weather for this upcoming weekend looks rather terrible so I doubt I'll be going back, but this past weekend was one of the most fun I've had in Korea. Saturday night we didn't even need a bar - just get some beers from any of the conveniences stores, pick up a handful of roman candles, and hang out on the beach until the wee morning hours. Nothing more fun than that. And going through worknplay was one of the best decisions we made as well - hell - even got a free t-shirt out of the deal and some of the best food I've had in months. If you're reading this - and plan on doing ANYTHING in Korea next summer - book with worknplay and just go experience it for yourself. If nothing else, man does that mud make your skin feel about 5 years younger.

I Don't Want To Be Illiterate Anymore...

2008-07-15T17:31:00.000+09:00

So I've been in this fantastic little Asian country for just about 11 months now. My Korean language skills are pretty null and void (but to my credit, it is a rather difficult language for most foreigners). I have been able to get by as far as getting food, giving directions, and even asking for discounts and shopping for the most part. Conversation is generally where I'm lacking, and if I can impart any wisdom on some newbies it would be to take a free lesson or two.

However, if there's one area that I felt could make up for this, it would be in reading the language. Hangul is actually pretty easy to understand if you know the rules. King Sejong back in the 1600's created this very easy to read little system of symbols. If you can read it, you can speak it. Hangul isn't like Chinese where you have to memorize thousands of characters - it has roughly 24 characters that get read clockwise in each little pictograph for each syllable of a word. Every symbol basically correlates to a sound that can be found in the English language, and a lot of the time if you can read Hangul, all they've done is put an English word into the Korean writing so it helps sometimes IF the actual English letters aren't present.

Here's an example of all the consonants:

People have been known to learn this in about 2 days. I on the other hand just tend to learn it as I'm riding the subway, or staring at random buildings. I'm still a little fuzzy on some of the characters that aren't so common, but I'm getting there. It's like breaking a code that you're not meant to know, and the Koreans are so surprised and impressed if you can actually read what they're writing.

The trick is understand the word that you're reading... BUT that's for another time. Seriously, if you're thinking about coming here - its one of the best things you can do for yourself. And makes you look better ;)

Carribean Bay - Pirate Themed Water Park Fun

2008-06-23T21:35:00.002+09:00

Everland. Korea's largest amusement park is just a short cabride away from where I live in Suji. It's located a little south of Seoul near Suwon and it is composed of a few different areas. The main part being the rollercoasters and everyday rides, and then the second part being Carribean Bay - the largest waterpark in Korea.

In the early part of the summer the ticket was about 45,000w, but it goes up to about 65,000w in July/August for peak time. The park opens at 9am, and I recommend getting there around then to avoid lines. We tried sneaking in some food too, but we got caught and they made us put it in a food locker (at these they're nice enough to supply free ones). Of course, its on the honor system so you can always sneak it back in - which I did.

We walked in, and set down our stuff on some rentable beach chairs and then went to hit the water slides. Well, after an hour in line we got down the tallest bobsled in the park in seconds, and I definitely caught some air that freaked me out, but the lines were too long to do anything else.

The highlight of the whole day was easily the "Perfect Wave" ride that allows any idiot attempting to do some fake surfing. I thought I was gonna ride this thing and be a pro off the bat, but after about 3 seconds I fell off. But don't worry, I was a pro by the end of the day... staying on for the full time - posing for cameras (videos to be uploaded later). I'll be looking for a pro-surfing contract by the end of the summer...

Overall - I recommend it. Best part is that July 15th sees Carribean Bay open up a brand new 2nd half of the park. Dozens of slides and random things to do. I'll definitely be going back...

Busan! Pusan? Busan!

2008-06-11T01:19:00.004+09:00

Koreans combine the sounds of a few letters... b/v, f/p, l/r, and p/b just to name a few. You'll see the name Pusan on maps and such, but people mostly say Busan. Sometimes you'll get this crazy b/p cross sound where people will try and sound like they're saying both, but I prefer to use the b for Busan.

Aaaanyway the first weekend in June gave most people a nice 3 day weekend for that Friday was Korean Memorial Day. At home Memorial Day is the beginning of summer marking point and a rather hefty amount of time off - however in Korea - its just a day. So 9 of us packed up our swim trunks and took the train down to Busan on the south eastern coast.

Busan is Korea's 2nd biggest city at 4 million people and the world's 4th busiest port because its conveniently located on the coast/beach. Busan is definitely a breath of fresh air after spending nearly a year in Seoul, I mean - look at that beach:

First we took Korea's high speed train - KTX from Seoul to Busan and it topped out at a nice speed of 302 kmph (187mph). Equipped with a few bottles of wine, we overtook a VIP car and traveled for 2.5 hours down to the coast, complete with our party hats on:

Once we got there we of course didn't have any place to stay (we took a risk) and wound up looking left after getting off the train and staying at the first place we saw. It was the Hotel Arirang which was as seedy as it sounds. BUT for 9 of us in 3 rooms, it was only $40 each. Roughly $14 a night? Cannot complain.

Our nights were spent drinking, but our days were spent at Hyundae beach. There was a sand festival with hundreds of large sand sculptures littered across the beach, and a fireworks show on Saturday night. Oh, and true to Korean form there are snacks and food operations everywhere including a little seafood village. I did happen to partake in some live octupus... squishy and squirmy all the way down.

A highlight of the weekend was the Jalgachi fish market, Korea's largest. We walked into this place and a fisherman tossed a small tiger shark onto the floor for our amusement. As we decided to walk on, the fisherman made it known that we had to fix his mistake, so I picked up the squirming tiger shark (which was about the length of my forearm) and dumped him back in the overcrowded tank. We perused the place with its floors entirely wet, and then went out to take a look at the port's container ships. We did go back on Sunday and partook in the freshest seafood I've ever had. Ordered up 3 king crabs from the first floor fishtanks and then on the 2nd floor they cook it and serve it.

Life in Busan is pretty good....

Witnessing a Shamin Ritual

2008-05-25T23:22:00.002+09:00

Shamanism: The belief that there is a connection and ability to communicate with spirits. A rare practice throughout the world

The day that I went to Namhansanseong, everyone I was with piled back into their two cars after a great day of mild hiking. However, a split decision to make a random right turn back up the hill and park near some statues brought on a once in a lifetime opportunity.

We ended up stumbling across dozens of stone carved statues of all kinds in a small area in the middle of the woods.

Some of them were beautiful:

and some of them were... inappropriate and unexplainable?

There was a tiny driveway that led back up the mountain that was lined with statues of men with various animals representing the Chinese New Year.

As we kept walking up and up we came to a smaller driveway in front of what seemed like a house, where people were banging a drum and looked to be setting up some sort of ceremony, wearing traditional korean hanboks and colorful robes.

My director stopped us all and told us that this could be a Shaman ritual, and that we were lucky to have come across it as it's very rare to actually see one performed live. She, herself had never seen one before. As we're standing in the small road, the group of revelers waved us to come and join them - something I would consider an uncommon honor bestowed amongst foreigners randomly walking through the woods.

In Korea Shamans are primarily women, called Mudangs. Occasionally, although rare, you will see a male shaman or Beksoo Mudang. We fortunately hit the double whammy and saw a Beksoo Mudang perform a walking on knives ritual. After a bit of research apparently this type of ceremony is meant to intimidate evil spirits. Shamans will work themselves into a frenzied trance with music and jumping and dancing in order to feel no pain, or drop any blood. At one point, the beksoo mudang use an extremely sharp razor to cut apples and handed me one during the ceremony. I barely wanted to get near this thing as it was noticeably sharp, and he had just then put it on his tongue. He was doing things that should have left him in excruciating pain, not to mention bleeding profusely.

The ceremony lasted about 10 minutes, all of which I captured on video. It ended with the beksoo mudang putting an entire butchered cow carcass on his back and jumping up and down on the knives. It was impressive and fascinating to say the least.

Shamanism is an interesting religion, if you'd like to call it that. It has no written scriptures anywhere, and it is extremely adaptable. According to an article found in the New York Times, when Korea hit the internet wave, Shamans were the first to jump on the bandwagon to create websites geared towards fortune tellings and events.

Also, one cannot become a Shaman, they must be called. Generally they will go through life normally until one day a grave unexplainable sickness will fall on either them, or someone they love, and once they give in a cure will take place. An interesting thing about Shamanism in Korea is that there are something like 10,000 gods that can be worshiped.

What I find more intriguing than anything else, is the fact that Korea has the largest populations of Christians in Asia (roughly about 25% of the country reportedly is Christian), a thriving Shamanist community, and a large number of practicing Buddhists all surviving and coexisting peacefully. It's endearing...

Namhansanseong or, Gate South of the Han

2008-05-24T23:21:00.005+09:00

Namhansanseong. Quite a mouthful, eh?

It has its own subway stop on the Bundang Line, but I never saw it. I had never heard of it before either, but my school director recommended it as a staff outing day. Now, we've only had one other of these to the Suwon Korean Folk Village in the fall, but I accidentally on purpose slept through that. However, I am glad that I did not sleep through this.

Namhansanseong literally means Gate/Fortress South of the Han River. It was a gate that was pretty important from the 1600s when it served a major role in defending a Korean king during an attack from the Manchus until the mid 1700s. It also has a few temples and such scattered throughout the mountain area. The gate eventually was left unattended and crumbled until the mid 1950s when the government decided to rebuild it, as they have rebuilt virtually everything else in this country.

It's a nice walk up a mountain that's not very steep for about an hour. It overlooks the Jamsil area and on a clear day you can probably see all the way into central Seoul, but it's never clear here. The interesting thing was at the top of the mountain, off to the side in the woods was a little community of hikers enjoying vegetables and Makali (Korean Rice Wine). I don't know about you, but after a pretty physical walk/hike booze is really the last thing I want - especially when you still have to go back down.

My head teacher wound up getting drunk, so we had to make sure she was ok to walk back down. It was slow, but she eventually made back into the little mountain town to have a nice Bimbibap lunch. Overall, a nice way to spend a couple of hours outside.

Suwon Fortress - It's There.

2008-05-20T23:21:00.000+09:00

About an hour south of Seoul is the decently sized city of Suwon. I believe it to be the capital of the Gyeonggi-Do region, and it is also home to my immigration office. BUT that's not all it has.

Suwon Fortress is a UNESCO World Heritage site (what that REALLY means or matters, I do not know). Basically its a rather large tourist site, but it is actually a pretty nice walk on a very nice day. The fortress wall has been compared to China's Great Wall (perhaps you've heard of it), and I can assure you it can't be any more UNlike China's Great Wall. The wall goes most of the way around Suwon (I believe it used to go all the way around, but as time has gone it the city has gotten bigger and grown around it. It's roughly 5km (about 3 miles) long. There are a few guard towers at various corners which give you interesting tidbits of history in Korea's uneasy past. It only costs between 1-3,000W to do multiple parts.

Getting there is a bit of an annoyance if you're not directly in Seoul at the start. If you ARE in Seoul - take the subway Line 1 to Suwon Station and then hop in a cab or you could even walk about 20 minutes. Bring something that has Hwaseong written on it in Hangul, because the cab driver did not understand me whatsoever when I tried to say it in Korean. The exchange went something like this:

Me: Hwaseong, Chuseyo? (Fortress Please)
Him: Ehh??
Me: Hwaseong? Paldalmun? (South Gate)
Him: Ehhh?
Me: I give him my Lonely Planet Book...
Him: AHHHHHH HwaSEONG!!! (emphasis on a different syllable).
Me: Ne. (Ugh, Yes.)

He brought us to where we wanted to go, for about 3 bucks, so I can't really complain. Overall - I recommend it if you're looking to get out of Seoul, but not if you're looking for a big change of scenery. It's just a wall in a city.

Teacher's Day - Best Holiday EVER!

2008-05-19T13:46:00.000+09:00

As you may or may not be aware - Korea has some random holiday every month. They've actually planned it out this way. Sometimes its fun (Pepero Day, November 11th) and sometimes it's dumb and redundant (White Day - March - Valentine's Day part deux). However, in May they have Children's Day, Parent's Day, and Teacher's day - which are all brilliant.

Children's Day means the kids don't usually have to go to school (which means neither do the teachers). Parents day is a combination of mother's AND father's day which is very convenient. And the gem of them all is Teacher's Day - where all of the kids bring pretty incredible presents for their teachers. I made out like a bandit and so did most at my school. Western friends of mine at other schools didn't get anywhere near the schwag that we got at SLP, and one of them didn't even get so much as a "Happy Teacher's Day" so he wasn't pleased.

I made out pretty well though, don't ya think?

Tiger World! No Tigers - Only Waterslides

2008-05-17T22:48:00.005+09:00

I've had a busy couple of weeks lately and it's stemming from the realization that I've got roughly 6 months left here in Korea (I've extended my contract from August until Nov/Dec). So I'm now trying to do as much random stuff as I possibly can. One thing that wasn't on my list of things to do but somehow wound up doing anyway was a trip to Korea's biggest indoor waterpark - Tiger World.

Tiger World isn't really that big, but what's oddly fun is the fact that it really is entirely indoors. You walk away after a day of water fun with absolutely no sunburn - which is rather fantastic. It boasts 7 water slides, a lazy river, a children's area, and the best part - a spa including aromatherapy pools, a pool bar, hot spring waterfalls, sauna areas, and a very large hot tub pool with various full body jets.

The main area:

The only outside area:

Tiger World is open all year long and has a daytime and nighttime session. It is a rather large complex that also boasts indoor skiing as well as a golf range. During the day you can do the water park and spa for 38,000W - and if you buy 3 tickets you get 30% off. The best part about this place is that its only been open since 2007 and there weren't any lines anywhere until about 6:30pm. The best slide there is easily the biggest one - a straight shot tube that spits you out into a rather large bowl and spits you down into a deep pool. I highly recommend it...

Hong Kong - My Newest Love

2008-05-11T00:56:00.002+09:00

As I stated a few posts ago, one of my best friends came to visit me. Korea was never on his list of places to visit, but then again it wasn't on mine either - they just happen to pay me a lot of money. However, he stopped here to visit me before we both headed onto Hong Kong. He had lived there for 6 months a few years ago for school and this of course was my first time.

(Before you get any further - this post will be long and probably not as entertaining as others. You've been warned.)

Hong Kong is one of those magical cities that just blindside you. You of course go and think it's going to be a good time, but you wind up leaving it begrudgingly and figuring out ways to come back. It is a captivating city, and you can feel its energy and that people are there and getting things, important worldly things, done.

You also never forget that you're in a Chinese area, as things are still slightly off... case in point - a street of dried seafood with fresh shark fins on the side of the street:

We got there early Wednesday afternoon, hopped on the excellent Airport Express Train and were in central Hong Kong within 24 minutes.

We checked into the Marriot Courtyard and as we entered our room on the 25th floor and looked out our gigantic floor to ceiling windows we were pretty pleased with ourselves.

We wasted no time, and once we got over the happiness of the room, we took the trolley (yes, amazingly fun trolleys) down to a plaza in central Hong Kong. We walked around there for a bit to see all of the buildings and then subwayed it over to the Kowloon Peninsula to site see.

As we walked around we came to the Peninsula Hotel - an old time British luxury hotel - so we stopped in for a bit of afternoon tea. We took the Star Ferry back to central Hong Kong and took a trip up one of the longest escalators in the world through the mid-levels full of shops and restaurants. Once at the top we headed over to Lai Kwai Fong - the foreigner bar area - and had a beer and some food before heading back to the hotel for the evening to crack open the mini bar and stare out the window (yes, we just sat and stared out the window).

Thursday saw not too much action as there were some meetings to be had, but I did get to see a bit of the Syracuse University program at the City University of Hong Kong. SU is the only American University presence in HK which made me feel pretty good for my alma matter.

Thursday night we did stop on the Kowloon side for a bit to watch the nightly Laser Light Show that HK puts on from their skyline. They play music and each of the buildings light up and its a nice little flair that they add for tourists.

We then took a walk around the lit up area and saw all of the Olympic craziness around. Hong Kong is helping Beijing to host the Equine part of the games this summer. Plus all of China is crazy about it all anyway...

Friday we took a little trip over to Hong Kong Disneyland, and being that I had never before been to a Disney anything it was a really fun afternoon. The highlight for me had to be the Philharmagic Show - which was a 3D theater performance complete with water, smells, wind, and smoke. It was excellent. Also we did the It's a Small World Ride which had only been open for about a week, and the song is forever burned into my brain. The park is very very small though, and took us only about 3 hours to go through the whole thing. It's just hilarious that Disney has a presence in HK.

After Disney we went on one of the craziest bus rides through Lantau Island and wound up on top of a mountain at the Big Stone Buddha and the Po Lin Monastery. Truly a site to see, so if you're there - I recommend it.

We of course went out for a bit of drinking with some of my friend's old friends in Lai Kwai Fong and returned home at 5am, only to wake up and check out at 9am. For our last night in Hong Kong, I was surprised with a night at the Mandarin Oriental - one of the world's premier hotels. We had tea in our room on the 19th floor, overlooking the harbor and central Hong Kong that our concierge herself brought to us.

We headed to an excellent Dim Sum lunch in Kowloon with a few Chinese friends and then went to the Tsim Sha Tsui area to pick up our newly made clothing. Hong Kong is an incredible place to go shopping, but what you should definitely do is go and have clothing made. My friend got a suit and some shirts made, while I had some shirts and a skirt made cheaper than you'd ever get at home.

Saturday evening we took a long trip out to the New Territories and had dinner in Tai Po with a British Syracuse Professor who has lived in Hong Kong for 30+ years. The stories he had to tell were fascinating and he took us out to one of the best Thai food dinners I've ever had. He drove us back to the train station and when we returned to our hotel, we headed to the top floor for an evening in the hotel spa - WHICH happened to be ranked Asia's best spa. This was a title that is well deserved because for 60 minutes I was in pure unadulterated bliss. I've seriously never felt that good in my whole life, that I'm sure of.

For our last night in HK we once again sat looking out our window overlooking the harbor with all of the lights before meeting up with the same friends from earlier to have drinks in the hotel rooftop bar. We sat in this classy establishment enjoying martinis and such before calling it a drunken night around 2am.

Room serviced breakfast woke us up at 6:15am. It was a cloudy rainy morning which fit our moods perfectly being that neither of us wanted to go home. I didn't want to take my 3 hour flight to Seoul and my friend definitely did not want to take his 15 hour flight back to New York. Most people would say that life could be worse, but we now know that it could be better...

Happy Birthday Buddha!

2008-05-06T00:56:00.001+09:00

Perhaps the biggest holiday in Korea may just be Buddha's Birthday. It's one of the few national holidays and has about a week's worth of events planned. From what I've seen holidays tend to be very family oriented and quiet, but not for Buddha. Buddha's birthday this year was May 11th, but Seoul put on a parade of parades on Sunday May 5 in the Insadong area. The parade lasted about 2.5 hours and it featured every imaginable and unimaginable type of lantern.

Before the parade on Sunday the Cheoggye Stream near City Hall had quite a few lavish lanterns set up that were all lit up at night. Also the temples and palaces around Seoul gave out lanterns to those who walked through their doors. Unfortunately I didn't get one, BUT they don't condense so it'd be hard to take home anyway. The day of the parade there was the Lotus Lantern Festival that took place down one of the main streets near Insadong where people could make their own lantern, watch performances, and eat all types of Korean food.

Basically it was one of the best celebrations I've seen here, and wish that they would go this all out for all of their holidays. Oddly enough, the closest I saw was when the westerners took over and celebrated St. Patrick's Day.

Anyway - enjoy the photo highlights:

A Tower by Any Other Name...

2008-05-05T00:48:00.000+09:00

On Sunday we decided to head up Namsan Mountain to go to Seoul Tower. The funny thing about this tower is that its considered one of the top 10 tallest in the world, but its actually a very tiny little thing. What winds up pushing it towards greatness is the fact that it stands atop the center of one of the biggest mountains in the area in the middle of Seoul.

I also think the tower suffers a bit of an identity crisis as it goes by 8,000 names. You'll see it called Seoul Tower, Namsan Tower, and N Seoul Tower. The official website calls it N Seoul Tower, but once you get up there you'll see all three names in various places.

To get to the tower take the subway to Myeondong and leave out exit #3. Walk towards the hotel and then walk about 15 minutes past it up some stairs and then walk to the right towards the cable car. In order to get to this tower you can do one of three things - A) walk up the many many many stairs B) hike up the trails or C) take the cable car right to the top. My friend and I of course being the lazy SOB's that we are, opted for the cable car. It was about an hour wait to take the cable car - but it was also a Sunday afternoon of a 3 day weekend. The cable car is a great little ride, so in essence its worth the wait.

Once on top of the mountain you'll walk up some more stairs and pass a huge stoned enclosure that used to be a smoke signal area to warn Seoul of an emergency or an attack. This thing must have constantly been smoking for as many times as Korea has been invaded throughout its history.

We bought tickets to go up and had to wait about 20 minutes. There are little shops and snack bars everywhere so we got some tea and waited. The tower has two floors - the top floor which as you walk around shows you the customary distances to other cities in the world, and then the second floor which has various places of Seoul on the windows with little histories.
(Long way away from home)
If there's one thing you do when you visit this tower it should be to go to the bathroom. Being that there's absolutely nothing in front of you the whole bathroom is one gigantic window. It's the same in both the men's and women's bathroom:

Overall its an excellent way to become more aware of this sprawling city and a good way to spend an afternoon. We ended up walking down the mountain afterwards and it wound up spitting us out somewhere near Seoul Station. Not what I intended, but it worked out. Get a map or something before you head out.

Unconventional Stay in a Traditional Korean Hanok

2008-05-04T00:15:00.001+09:00

One of my best friends flew halfway around the world to come and visit little old me this past week so I thought I'd attempt to do it up a bit. After our tour of the DMZ we headed back to Seoul and stayed at the Tea Guesthouse near Anguk Station and Insadong.

Now, most people when they travel want to find the best hotels possible, but when in Asia why not do things a little differently?

The tea guesthouse was one of the most unique places I've ever stayed. It's down a quiet street and a pagoda filled area. When you walk in, you enter a small courtyard filled with knick knacks and small houses.

We stayed in the double room which had two andols (mattress on the floor), antique looking furniture, heating/ac, and a desk and computer/tv. When you opened up the back door to the room it opened up into a backyard with a small pond and access to the puppy that was running around.
(The double room)

(The pond in the back)
It was a very nice, secluded little haven in the middle of the city, but it felt like it was miles away from everything (which is a good thing). The staff was helpful, they offered an excellent western breakfast in the morning, and there were plenty of brochures and magazines around to help plan a day if need be. It was nice to spend a night in a traditional place that had paper thin walls like you'd see on tv. We both really enjoyed it and it was a come and go as you please kind of place.

The DMZ - A Toursity Kind of Warzone

2008-05-03T20:34:00.000+09:00

Ah the DMZ. The De-Militarized Zone. A span of only a few miles between two warring countries. One at the forefront of modernism and the other led by a madman who may or may not have extremely dangerous weapons. In between the two lies this space of farmers and military co-existing in an active war zone state, BUT also runs daily tours and sells knick knacks and tasty treats.

Specially made DMZ rice.

At a first glance, its thought provoking and fascinating and frightening all at the same time. There are two countries that have been so against each other for so long that they actually have to have miles between them to keep each other out. There are people living in South Korea that haven't seen their family members because they're stuck in North Korea and vice versa. They've been at a standstill for years, and the North is still trying to figure out ways to break into Seoul, as is evident with their digging and finding of tunnels underground. The 2nd most recent tunnel, the 3rd tunnel, was found when they were only 52km (about 32 miles) away from Seoul in the 1980s.

Looking at North Korea, this is the border between the two countries.

At any given time you never know what those crazy North Koreans are up to. The DMZ was built as a temporary barrier between the two, but as they continue to build more permanent structures and keep things freshly painted, its very clear that there will be no resolve in the near future.

However, after all of that goes by the wayside in your brain and you realize you're sitting on a United States Organization (USO) Tour Bus, that you paid $44 to get onto with other tourists, that there isn't exactly any imminent danger. They take you to snack shops, rest areas, banquet halls, and gift shops. I bought some souvenirs for my parents. We joked about walking out the door when we were standing in North Korea and seeing what happened. We were also told not to make any communicative gestures towards the North Koreans and we openly talked about how we were gonna get thrown in jail for waiving furiously at them.

The sign as you head into the 3rd tunnel explaining the stupidity of North Koreans

The whole trip for the USO first takes place in Ballinger hall for a debriefing, then onto the Joint Security Area (JSA) to see where the peace talks were held, then to lunch, and then the Dora Observatory, and lastly the 3rd tunnel where they make you put on hard hats and walk down a steep incline to get to the tunnel that's very wet and dark and short. It was a long day, and extremely informative, and we met some cool people on the tour that were mainly just passing through Korea.

South Korean Soldier guarding the door into North Korea

It is most definitely something everyone who lives here should see, if only to see something that is so definitive in history. It really is some of the most beautiful countryside I've seen here, and it is home to a lot of rare wildlife. Once the countries become united (if ever) there are plans already in place to keep it a nature wildlife preserve. Not to mention it has some of the most fertile untouched soil in the world and grows ginseng, rice, and other various important crops. So much so that the farmers who live in the DMZ are there to farm and making an untaxed living of about $80,000. Yes, dollars. It's unbelievable actually.

North Korea

If you're going to take a tour, make sure you take one through the USO and you book it about a month in advance. This is the third time I've tried to book a tour, and the first two were unsuccessful due to the popularity of the tour. All of the information you would need can be found here.

Olympic Torch Relay Insanity

2008-04-28T20:07:00.002+09:00

This whole Olympic Torch Relay thing has taken on a life of its own inciting riots and controversy everywhere it goes. First, this race has been happening all over the world for years, but its just supposed to be a way for everyone to be involved in it. I read in the NY Times the other day that this was actually a Hitler idea in order to shift the public eye to a fake vision of peace while other atrocities are taking place elsewhere. Fascinating idea if you think about it.

The torch came through Seoul on Sunday April 26, and I actually just happened to accidentally see it. We were heading to Smokey's Tavern to try their delicious Burgers in Itaewon when we got off the bus at Hannam to see hoards of Chinese people and flags all lined up along the street. The torch was supposed to come through Seoul on Saturday, but due to security issues they changed everything and the route to be on Sunday instead. I was on one of the last buses to cross over the Han River, which was pretty lucky for me.

We waited about 15 minutes before we saw dozens of police filled buses come down the road, along with the the coca-cola and Samsung floats and then hundreds of runners surrounding the one guy holding the torch.

It was all over in a matter of minutes, but it was still interesting to be apart of. It traveled past us down to City Hall where it met up with 5,000 more fans or supporters before heading onto North Korea for the first time ever. It is interesting to say that North Korea was the only country to have absolutely no protests. A North Korean in Seoul however did try to ruin the festivities by dousing himself in gasoline and running towards the torch attempting to light himself on fire, but the authorities saw and stopped him before he could do any damage. He was of course, protesting China's policy of finding North Korean defectors and sending them back to North Korea which is against UN refugee laws.

Whether or not I think China should have the Olympics, I can never remember a time of the games having this much attention. It is extremely fascinating to see the world's reaction to all of it though. It's also interesting at the rate that we are truly becoming a global community...

Korean War Memorial

2008-04-27T18:37:00.000+09:00

If there's anything you do when you get to Korea it should be to see the Korean War Memorial. Roughly 60 years ago Korea fought in a war to gain its freedom from basically everywhere. Japan had its hold on it for years, China did at some point, and then North Korea has tried again and again to get into Seoul.

I recently learned the basics for the war. The US helped Korea to gain its independence from Japan but only because it wanted to be in control of the peninsula for at least 15 years. This wasn't in Korea's plan so the US left the country in 1949 with virtually nothing. However, the Soviet Union had given tanks and money and trained personnel to North Korea and then that's when South Korea was invaded. The US then came back to bail out Korea and it has been here ever since. Basically it was a mini proxy war between the US and Russia that was fought on Korean soil. However, Korea has climbed nicely out of its past life and is now enjoying the modern life and doing quite well for itself.

It however, has not forgotten its past and has sunk a considerable amount of money into one of the most beautiful museums I've ever seen, and I haven't even been inside of it yet. Walking around the grounds at sunset is something I whole heartedly recommend. If you choose to go, it is just outside of Itaewon next to the Yongsan Army Base.

Field Trip - Train Museum!

2008-04-26T18:21:00.000+09:00

Every month we go on a field trip. The last field trip was terrible as it was to the Land Museum - but at the end of April we went to the Korean Train Museum and it was actually pretty entertaining. Not to mention it was a well taken care of, huge and beautiful place.

The exhibits were well put together and had every piece of every train you could ever imagine. A good portion of it was in English too, which was pretty impressive. The tour ended with a 15 minute show in the Panorama Room where they had model trains set up and a model of Seoul that each train went around to give you a working view of the various types that go around Korea. It was even accurate in telling which trains were the fastest (KTX - Korea's newest high speed train) and slowest (freight as you'd expect).

Afterwards we went and had a picnic lunch on the grounds with the kids and even got to play around with actual old train cars later. I actually wish we were able to spend more time there, but what can ya do. At the end of the day everyone had a pretty good time.

GO BEARS!!! (Baseball in Korea)

2008-04-13T23:02:00.006+09:00

I had the luxury of going to my first Korean baseball game today, and I have to say - Well Done, Korea. I am now a tried and true Doosan Bears fan.

The KBO (Korean Baseball Organization) has 8 teams throughout the country. Each team is sponsored by a company such as the Doosan Bears, LG Twins, Samsung Lions, etc, etc. It's run somewhat like the setup in the US - as far as having a spring training, and a 126 game season, ending with playoffs and a championship.

The Doosan Bears and the LG Twins are the two Seoul Teams and they play out of the same Baseball Stadium in Jamsil, right next to the Olympic Stadium (which is gi-normous):

Today's game was a Bears vs. Twins game and it was great fun to see the "home" teams duke it out. I imagine this would be something akin to the Yankees/Mets subway series, only they just share a city, not a stadium.

There are a few cool things about these games...
1) Tickets are only 8,000W.
2) Said tickets are general admission (or at least they were today). Seriously you can sit anywhere you want in the whole stadium.
3) There are Burger Kings, KFCs, and GS25s directly inside of the stadium so its not just normal stadium fare. Well, if you call this normal:

4) The fans are absolutely insane! They have cheers, and cheerleaders, and tons of songs, and those awesome balloon stick things that you bang together to make lots of noise - which I love and now own to be used again and again.

And last but not least - the 5th coolest thing are the men walking around with kegs on their backs and taps in their hand ready to give you delicious (ok well, mildly tasty at best) Hite Beer for the amazingly low low price of 3,000W. Honestly - what an ingenious idea to carry around a mini keg on your back - it beats carrying a tray up and down stadium stairs spilling it all over the place.

Today's game resulted in the Twins beating the Bears, but I have faith that my team will seek revenge at some point. I'm now the proud owner of a sweet, sweet, white Doosan Bears hat, and have a newfound love for Korean baseball. I will most certainly be back...

She's Getting [More] Ink Done

2008-04-12T23:59:00.001+09:00

Well... this really doesn't relate much to Korea, but its more of an update.

I got some ink done by a korean tattoo artist back in February and it just didn't take. Now, my friend who went with me and got one at the same time had his heal just fine. We even used the same lotion afterwards. My other friend who used the same guy and went a week later even had his heal fine. I imagine because of a combination of things I just got dealt a crappy hand in this situation.

SO I went back and got it touched up. The guy used darker colors this time which I love, and my mom was kind enough to mail me over some A&D ointment awhile back. Don't ever let anyone tell you that a touch up job for a tattoo doesn't hurt - because reopening what is essentially scar tissue is NOT a pleasant experience. It's not unbearable, but it isn't something I'd willingly do again, that's for sure. The cool thing about it is that he gave me something called 'New Skin' to put on over it afterwards in the place of gauze or plastic wrap. It could have been kept on for 1-2 days, but after 8 hours I got ansy and wanted it to get some air. Very cool plasticy material that actually looked like a very thick piece of skin.

Anyway, I don't believe it was the artist's fault the first time around, and I don't think it was my faulty aftercare either. Just something that didn't work so I'd still recommend going to 2nd Childhood Tattoo Studio in Itaewon if you're lookin at getting some work done.

First Tattoo:

Second Time Around:

A Day at the Joo* (zoo).

2008-04-09T20:35:00.006+09:00

*Koreans tend to pronounce all 'z's like 'j's so words come out like joo and jebra instead of zoo and zebra.

Seoul's zoo is nothing short of incredible. And I know what you're thinking - it's a zoo - if you've seen one, you've seen 'em all. But Seoul's zoo has some interesting features that I haven't seen at other zoos...

First, the zoo is found at Seoul Grand Park about 30 minutes outside of Seoul, which is also home to Seoul Land (an amusement park), a camping ground, hiking trails, and apparently an art museum. The cool thing about the zoo is that its built on a mountain, so you can take a nice hefty uphill walk to the top, OR you can take this awesome sky lift up to the middle for the entrance, or all the way to the top and walk all the way down. The lift goes over some exhibits like the Lion Compound and that was pretty fascinating. The best part of the whole zoo for me was this lift on the way up - even though it costs a bit more. The zoo costs 3,000W to get into to, and the tram is 4,500W for each part (there 4 parts in all, but to go up is only 2).

Basically its your typical zoo - spacious exhibits, entertaining animals, but it had its Asian flair. I saw my first Kangaroo in the Australian pavilion (I think that was the first time anyway). I saw camels do nasty things to each other. I missed out on the Dolphin show because we didn't know you had to actually buy tickets. I even saw a beaver do things to himself I didn't know animals would do. And I saw all sorts of bugs I didn't need to see in the Insectarium Building - BUT I got to see a great mistake on a map in the same building:

And man, is there food everywhere. These people do not waste any space putting in vending machines, or restaurants, or snack bars so you'll never go hungry. All in all it was an excellent way to spend a day, and I couldn't have asked for anything more. There will definitely be a second part to this post once we've figured out how and when to go camping there... I have no doubt my friends will drunkenly try and stumble into the zoo after hours and ride an elephant.

English by the Hour

2008-04-03T22:39:00.000+09:00

It is 100% illegal for foreigners on an E-2 or E-4 Visa to teach English lessons to anyone outside of their schools and be paid for it. With that being said, do people do it? Allll the time.

I believe that this is illegal due to the fact that you could easily come here and ditch the school you were working for to make a lot more money elsewhere. This effectively screws over those who spent good time and money to get you here, so the government stepped in to help out the local businesses.

Although it is illegal, I believe that sometimes a blind eye gets turned. There is a website, workinplay.co.kr that helps people find jobs and private lessons. It has been reworked so its all up to date. Also, Dave's ESL cafe has a Korean Job Board which also will sometimes yield some possibilities. The great thing about these jobs being taboo is that if you're lucky enough to find one they usually pay pretty well. I've had 3 separate temporary lessons in the past, and they've paid $40-$45 an hour.

There really is something to be said for getting paid to talk. Literally one of my lessons was just to have coffee with a woman who was in her 40s and just wanted to conversate. I've had to do some planning beforehand, but not much, and definitely not enough that warrants getting paid as much as we do. Makes it hard to think about leaving this type of job, that's for sure...

If you decide to take a private lesson, just be lowkey about it, don't tell many people, and do not let anyone at your school find out.

'Daddy's Gonna Be Up Five-Hundy by Midnight'

2008-04-02T22:02:00.003+09:00

That's one of my favorite quotes from Swingers (a movie which I have just recently watched thanks to my guys in NYC last year) as Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau settle in on a night of gambling and womanizing in good ol' Vegas. This somewhat hits home for this particular post since last night a few of us made our way to one of the few casinos around this place.

Koreans aren't allowed to gamble by law, but yet there are still a couple of casinos throughout the country at hotels and such that allow all foreigners to partake. The great thing about the one we went to, which was in COEX Mall in the hotel attached to it, was that its not only free alcohol (which is supposedly customary) but also free food. You can be gambling at any of the tables, place an order off of the menu to the dealer, and within an average amount of time they'll come over and tell you that you can find your meal sitting nicely at a table in the restaurant area.

The place is open 24/7 and the betting is pretty cheap. I played the 1,000W (~$1) roulette tables for awhile and lost a nice 40,000W (~$40). I never hit the streak that my friends around me were hitting so I decided to call it a night. However, after getting a quesadilla and some mushroom soup for the sweet sweet price of free, and many, many gin and tonics also for free, I wandered over to the 3 card poker table to watch two of my friends just dominate and basically bring down the house. Walking away with $300 for one and $1000 for another isn't too shabby. They at least paid for the cab ride back to Suji...

This did spur a conversation to head down to Gwangju at some point during the monsoon season to do a weekend gambling trip. Two hours away from Seoul, and the only place in the country Koreans are allowed to gamble doesn't sound like a bad way to spend a weekend. BUT more on that when it actually happens...

Pretending to be Irish in South Korea

2008-03-16T23:52:00.003+09:00

St. Patrick's Day has always been an interesting holiday for me. In college it usually fell during spring break, and who wants to stay in the cold Northeast when there's warmer climates waiting? Even though Syracuse supposedly holds the 2nd biggest St. Patrick's Day parade in the northeast - and only 2nd to Scranton, PA (for some odd reason) I never attended. And usually I had to work during St. Patrick's Day when in NYC.

So, words cannot even explain the insanity that was St. Patrick's Day celebrations in South Korea. It was my best one to date, and I believe that to be so because of 3 reasons - 1) It was an absolute gorgeous spring day 2) I have surrounded myself with excellent humorous alcoholics and 3) Seoul has a very large authentic Irish population that know how to do it right.

The Koreans got into the spirit of the day and held a parade near the Cheoggye Stream in downtown Seoul. Started at 2pm, and went until about 3:15 followed directly afterwards by various performers including b-boys and bands until about 6. It seemed like nearly every Foreigner I knew was in this 5 block radius, and it was an incredible day of happy go lucky drunkeness.

Pictures can only explain the fun:

White Day?

2008-03-15T10:44:00.000+09:00

We all remember Valentine's Day right? That day of giving people flowers and candy, and girlfriends get to berate their boyfriends if they forget? Well Koreans love it so much they made up another day just like it - White Day.

I knew it was in March sometime, but apparently it was Friday. I walked into Dunkin Donuts as I do most mornings and a coworker happen to wish me a Happy White Day. From that point on I was showered in candy the whole day.

Valentine's Day here is meant for the girls to shower the boys in chocolate, but White Day here is the exact opposite with the boys showering girls with candy. I'd say its pretty fair to both on both days, but its cute to see the boys try on White Day. One of my friends even got into the spirit and brought me a lollipop to our local bar Friday night. The bar, Exit, even got into the spirit and handed out sparklers to everyone in attendance and it was pretty cool to see everyone indoors waving around tiny fireworks.

Not a significant holiday by any means, but it was cute nonetheless.

Ferry Riding and Spelunking!

2008-03-11T00:21:00.005+09:00

Ok, well not completely spelunking, but I did spend some time in some caves.

This past weekend I partook in another Adventure Korea trip - this time only for a day - and it was a blast. Got up at the ass crack of dawn, waited on the corner to meet up with a friend, and while I was waiting I got solicited by a Korean man; "You, Me, Money??" and he pointed to me to get into the van. Riiiiiiight buddy.

Anyway, grabbed some food at the McDonald's and headed on the bus, to the subway, to the AK bus and 3 hours later we were in Chungju. We took a ferry ride down a river for 2 hours and it was absolutely beautiful. My words won't do it justice so just notice some pictures:

After the boat there was some downtime and we of course, took more pictures of the scenery and took this is an opportunity to throw some rocks a very long way into the water. My first couple throws reminded me of something that my 8 year old self just wouldn't be proud of. BUT - after a couple practice throws it wasn't so bad.

The caves came afterwards, and it was pretty fascinating. I didn't see any bats, so that was disappointing BUT we did get to go a little off roading in the cave and walk over this tiny little bridge above people and jump ahead of the line. There weren't any signs in English or Korean so its always cool to be a little bad ass.

The caves were then followed by a little hike to Dodamsanbong Peak & the Stone Gate - a giant land bridge overlooking 3 rather large rocks in the water. According to the legend there lived a couple who loved each other, but had no child. They found a mistress because they wanted to have a baby, but once she had the baby, she began to mistreat and taunt the wife. The heavens saw them, and turned all of them into stones. And that's what those rocks are, and in an S shape. Gotta love Korean folklore.

After a gorgeous spring day, we hopped on the bus back to Seoul and spent the night hangin out with friends in Itaewon. It was an early one though - forgot how tiring fresh air is!

Just When You Think You've Got the Hang Of It....

2008-03-03T23:36:00.003+09:00

I've been teaching for 6 solid months now, heading into the 7th. I look back on how I was as a teacher my first month, and even say up until my 3rd month, and realized what a crap show the kids were getting. I have basically found a stride in my teaching methods, and gotten to know the kids pretty well for the most part. It hasn't felt new in awhile, and I appreciated that.

Well, then everything came to a screeching halt and life got turned upside down this week. Some time ago I went in and told my director that I really liked teaching my preschool kids, and that I'd like to keep them when they moved up another level. I also told her I hated teaching activities (science, art, etc) because I loved having that time to do my planning for the day. And last but not least, I told her I found I hated teaching our Hi Kids! curriculum (English beginners) because I just can't keep everything straight and I hate not being able to talk to my kids (I'm a fast talker from NY... its tough to slow down sometimes). She said she understood and everything would work itself out in the new schedule and that she'd try to accommodate everything I said.

Gotta love that language barrier because not only did I only keep half of my preschool kids, I gained activities 5 days a week, AND now have something like 4 Hi Kids! courses. Honestly though, I didn't complain. Life has a funny way of fixing things though...

Today was the first day of the new classes and it felt like my first day of teaching all over again. Didn't have the right books, didn't know the kids names, had no idea where they were in their levels, it was just awkward. Everyone else on the staff agreed.

However two things happened today that really fed my ego. The first being those two preschool classes I loved. Well, apparently the parents were not so pleased that the kids got split up into two different levels of English and wanted to be put back the way they were. AND also on their list of demands was to re-instate me as the teacher for both classes. Which, as sweet as that is, they just effectively took away my 11:30am start time. Oh well - I get one week of sleeping in. And the second, was in my highest level afternoon class, one student dropped and I couldn't figure out why. So when my head teacher spoke to his mother she said it was just because he was going to middle school next year and needed a break from some studies. But she made a point to say that he was too shy to tell me on Friday that he loved having me as a teacher and wanted to say thank you and if he finds time to study English again, he'll come back and want to be in my class. As English teachers its really easy to bitch about the obnoxious kids, but when something like this happens, it honestly does make you feel like you're doing something right.

Anyway, schedules often change from month to month, but I think this one will stick for awhile. Can't really complain.

FC Seoul vs. LA Galaxy!

2008-03-02T17:28:00.000+09:00

My first sporting event in Korea, and man did it feel good. I forgot how much I missed being in an arena - be it for a concert or sport. This was also my first soccer game ever (and I have to point out, that I actually hate calling it soccer now after being around so many internationals who call it Football).

I found out about the game two weeks ago via the Facebook event page. The LA Galaxy are on an Asian tour and playing the teams in friendly pre-season games. Tickets for FC Seoul during their regular season are 8,000won, but because the Galaxy are an American team sporting the likes of David Beckham on their roster this special game was a nice hefty 30,000W.
(Beckham)

They played at the World Cup Stadium in Seoul which was a hike to get to from my neck of the woods (hour bus ride to central Seoul and then a 20 minute cab ride). Tickets are always interesting to come by here in Korea for almost anything:

The language barrier usually poses a problem and you cannot buy anything on line like you can at home. You can reserve spaces and wire the money from an atm, but we didn't do that. Since there's a rather large foreigner contingent here we decided to just try our luck and go in a group and buy game day tickets. We were afraid that the game would sell out, but shortly upon getting there we realized that was almost an impossibility. The stadium holds somewhere around 72,000 people and I think, I THINK, maybe 10,000 showed up.

Either way, the game was a lot of fun in the cold weather, but cheap hot chocolate and beer makes it all worthwhile. FC Seoul was no where near a great team, and neither was the Galaxy, but they seemed equally matched. The Galaxy scored the only gametime goal, but FC Seoul tied it up with a penalty shot, and then when the game went into overtime penalty shots where FC Seoul took home the win.

There were oddities of course that I found as a foreign spectator. First being there are no replays. None. They have giant flat screen tvs with all sorts of bells and whistles,but there are no replays of anything - AND barely any announcements. Although when they did tell you they were subbing someone or something, they were in English - that was impressive. Another odd thing that struck me as an incredibly nice thing Koreans do was the returning of the confiscated goods you aren't allowed t bring in. At home, you're basically supporting the gate guard's drinking habit if they take away whatever you're trying to sneak in. Oh those Koreans... so nice:

Next up... baseball season opening day March 15! Doosan Bears all the way... GO BEARS!!!

SLP Graduation Coming Soon to Broadway!

2008-02-26T22:43:00.005+09:00

Graduation - a time of reflection, of accomplishment, and a chance to look forward to the future and what it holds now that you have knowledge. Right? SLP went balls to the wall this year with graduation (as I guess is the tradition). But what an odd thing it is to see a Korean preschool graduation that's as big a production as something you'd see on Broadway - and takes just as much work.

Last Thursday we went over to the church for a rehearsal and it was a special kind of hell. Seriously - three days before the actual graduation - and it couldn't have gone worse. There was yelling, and finger pointing, and miserable children and teachers everywhere. So, because of the disaster that was the dress rehearsal, Friday and Monday became non-stop graduation fun time at school.

What were we rehearsing you ask? Well the 3 seven-year old classes each had a 20 minute play to do, my 3 six-year old classes had 4 songs and 2 stories to do, and the 5 year old class had a little story/song they had to do. Some of the kids gave speeches, and there's the logistics of the whole thing, and props - in my opinion it was a bit too much for all of them to handle and I even took some of the songs out of my group's performance.

However I suppose all the hardwork paid off today, as the kids all did a really great job and they have never looked cuter in their little costumes.

I got to meet all of the parents too, and see some of the ones I've met a few times before. The only classes that actually graduated were the 7 year old classes and I'm happy to say that all of my 6 year olds are coming back for another year, so I'll get to teach most of them when the new session starts next week. However, even though they didn't have to, the parents of my Hippo Preschool Class gave me a $50 gift certificate to the Shinsaegae (mall) here as a thank you for the year. It was really nice of them actually. I bought all of the kids candy and pencils and balloons that I'll give them on Friday at our little "end of the year" party, even though they start back up again on Monday.

We operate under the premise that this is not technically a school as much as it is a business and that was never more apparent in the past few days. Graduation isn't necessarily about the kids completing a year of school and going onto the next step in their lives. What all of these hagwons value is saving face, prestige, and grandeur. Graduation is just another day where they are put to the test by performing what they've learned in front of their families. These kids are in for a lifetime of competition and education much more so than the majority of American children back home, and I almost feel bad for them.

It was a pretty entertaining day though, and now that it's over it's time to switch from missiles to guns and prepare for their upcoming year in their new classes.

Dance Monkey, Dance! Or Speak English...

2008-02-24T23:10:00.007+09:00

Saturday February 23rd will forever go down as one of the most surreal experiences of my life. First off all, let me just start off the story by saying I left my apartment at 4:30pm Saturday with no real expectations for the night other than one or two plans and wound up returning to my place at 10am on Sunday without sleeping.

Maybe I'll piece this story together by going backwards. I will say that I have seen many an 7/8am night, or coming home after the sun has come up, and its something that just kind of happens here. There aren't any last calls, or any closing times for the most part, and when you're inside of a place you can never tell what time it is. Even if you're not drinking (which I tend to do) you just get caught up in music or conversation or the thrill of meeting strangers from distant lands.

Coming home at 10am happened after an hour subway ride which followed a breakfast at 730am at the first Burger King I've eaten at in about a year. Before breakfast we partook in the "Luxury Noraebang" (Korean Karaoke) in Hongdae for an hour and a half starting at 6am. This place had FREE ice cream that was phenomenal:

We wound up at the Noraebang only after spending a bit of time in the hookah bar called Nabi which is semi-hard to find, but was WELL worth the search at 5am:
(The lattern in the pool in the middle of the room)

We had met people there after spending a couple hours dancing the night away to excellent indie rock music at Club FF (Funky Funky) starting around 330am. This was downstairs from the bar GoGo's that we had spent the previous few hours watching music videos and socializing with most of the people I have come to know in this fair land. We had randomly picked Gogos at 11pm only after what had made this night get off to a bang for me.

Last week a friend had mentioned he knew of a Korean party that wanted some foreigners to come and attend. I assumed it would be a milling about mixer type party, but we walked in and it was apparently some sort of English club that meets for a party once a month for the Koreans to practice their English. When we got there we were told to sit at random tables and thats when the oddness started. Some were fluent, some were ok, and others definitely needed their cheat sheets - but you sit down and were immediately bombarded with questions and given beer and they just wanted to hear you talk. And they were so interested in everything that I had to say it felt like I was performing a show that they had paid to see (which they technically did).

In the middle of the evening there's a speed game where the Koreans have to give clues and the foreigners have to guess which word they're talking about. Well, I rigged it that since our group's category was fruit they just had to give me color combinations or specific words like 'Korean' for pear since they have a different kind here.

We tied for first b/c one of my friends also played the same dirty game. Since there was a 4 way tie they turned the tables and the foreigners now had to guess the word that the Koreans were acting out. I came in 2nd after that same friend had beat me to the punch and we received even more food for the table including a gigantic full squid (which was actually very tasty) and a dish of cold spicy noodles that had river snails (?) in them which were also very good. Hey, I'll try anything once.

Overall it was very odd to sit at the head of a table and be treated with such immense respect and adoration just for speaking my native tongue. It was difficult at first because I wasn't sure of what in the world I had just gotten myself into, but it got much easier. They were fascinated by American culture and the work I do and have done and my interest in Korea. This was the first real chance I've had to interact with a group of English speaking Koreans completely on my own that have had nothing to do with my school. I made some friends out of it and had a lot of free beer (which set up the rest of the night very nicely). The newfound friends have been sending me nice text messages all day. One girl was even an NYU grad and going back to NYU next year for grad school so we will have the chance to hang out there.

It just felt good to go out there and do something very different and rewarding even if it started out as being used for a service. In the end, I think that's a pretty common theme in life, but just as long as everyone's happy it all works. I imagine I'll even go back next month too because it was a hell of a lot of fun.

The Great Couch Theft of 2008!

2008-02-23T22:42:00.003+09:00

Before I came to Korea I scoured the interwebs looking for videos about foreigners in Korea. Looking for those comedic souls that put videos up of their apartments, or their travels, and sometimes I'd get lucky and find something. I specifically remember a video of a man who video'ed what his apartment looked like and his detailed account of everything within the place had been stolen from the street. I was inspired by this man and made it my goal that I would too, steal things from the street.

Up until now I really haven't had the chance or the real need. My apartment came equipped with everything I would need and its one of the nicest apartments I've seen in Korea actually so I can't complain. Although I did have limited seating upon arriving and I am a big fan of entertaining. A few weeks ago I managed to steal an everyday table chair off the street but there was nothing really fun or interesting about that - it was just kind of sitting there asking to be taken. Koreans really do leave a ton of furniture out on the street as they are obsessed with the proverbial "Keeping up with the Joneses" and making sure they have the latest everything.

The Great Couch Theft of 2008 was one of the funniest nights I've had in this country. Thursday night after leaving work at 6pm we discovered a pile of seemingly new-ish couches and chairs on the corner with stickers on them that we assumed were billing information for trash collectors. Well, we saved this company some money because after phoning two friends, we came back at 11pm and took what we wanted.

First trip was carrying a full leather couch down 5 blocks to a friend's place. We stopped every so often and of course documented the whole thing cuz it was heavy.

The second trip was to take a really nice leather chair into my apartment only 3 blocks away BUT up my 4 flights of stairs. I now have a nice little nook of my apartment where I can curl up and read a book or watch a movie. And lastly, the third trip was to take a two parter couch 6 blocks - which might have been the most entertaining because we quite literally carried the things on our backs since we were all pretty tired and sore by this point.

Lets take a look at the clip:

At nearly 1am after a quite a bit of lifting we all went back to our respective places and enjoyed the fruits of our labors. I feel I have gone through a rite of passage by stealing street furniture and now I have an even more comfortable apartment! The decision to eventually leave Korea is getting harder and harder...

Swimming in Chocolate on Valentine's Day

2008-02-14T23:17:00.002+09:00

Holidays are fascinating in this country, and every time one rolls around I cannot wait to see how the Koreans celebrate it. Valentine's Day was no different.

At home I could careless about this stupid holiday - and this is NOT coming from a bitter single girl place. I'd say this in a relationship or not. Sure, its cute, and a great excuse to get a flower or some candy or something, but overall Hallmark invented it and there's nothing else to it. The only thing I like about this day is that in 1929 there's some pretty interesting history that happened in Chicago featuring Bugs Moran and Al Capone.

But I digress. Koreans don't have Hallmark, but they sure as hell have a buttload of chocolate. My preschool class informed me yesterday that girls bring chocolate on Valentine's Day and the boys will bring chocolate on White Day in March. White Day being the Singles Awareness Day, apparently. So this morning when I walked into class they had huge bags of chocolate, and my other preschool class kept coming in to give me chocolate as well. Basically by the end of the day I had an entire purse full of various chocolates, cookies, candy, and even a bag of chips. If nothing else, Koreans are an extremely generous people.

Basically I "celebrated" the day like I would any other year - sending out a lot of sarcastic cards from www.someecards.com and going to watch a movie with a friend. Tonight's feature was Jumper featuring Hayden Christenson and Samuel L. Jackson - I highly recommend it. ;)

She's Getting Ink Done

2008-02-10T18:27:00.000+09:00

Well... I'm knocking down my goals here left and right as I head into my 7th month in this country. I finally did one of the things I wanted to do while I was here - get a Tattoo. My grandfather got some when he was here during the Korean Conflict, and I've already got two, and figured, why not get one more to commemorate my time here?

We attempted to go on Wednesday, but being Lunar New Year, everything was closed. We went back on Saturday to a place called 2nd Childhood in Itaewon that a half Korean friend of ours knew about. It is off the beaten path, and down a very crooked old alleyway:

There are only a few places to actually get this done in Korea, as the laws are somewhat fuzzy. Going in, we expected our tattoos to be upwards of $150-$200 because it's a somewhat unpracticed custom and that was what we were told to expect. However, when we got to the tattoo parlor we learned that it is actually OK to tat up foreigners but there could be massive fees involved if the guy was found to be tattooing Koreans. It isn't entirely against the law, but it is frowned upon for the locals.

I went first as there were three of us and the guy was as professional as the artists back home - used brand new needles, had an autoclave, showed us his portfolio when I asked to see his previous work, wrapped everything in plastic that he was using, etc. It took about an hour and twenty for mine, and wound up costing only 60,000 won - which was incredible to hear. My friend went next and his was about 2 hours and was just about as cheap. Our third friend unfortunately couldn't get his as it needed a bit more preparation so he'll go back. Overall it was a pretty fun day - my friends hung out and played Go.Stop. (Korean Card Game that we've picked up) and we listened to music - can't really complain. It was an experience to say the least.

(it didn't really hurt)

Oh, and what did I get? Well in keeping with my tradition it's something small and colorful, and of course tasteful and meaningful. The only difference is this time its a bit more prominently placed. The first one I have represents a childhood love, the second one I have represents a constant love for the ocean and music, and now this one adds to my collection and represents my overall desire for balance in life and my time in Korea:

I have contact information if anyone is in this country now and is looking to do the same... I recommend it ;)

Lunar New Year... meh

2008-02-08T19:19:00.000+09:00

Most of Asia got February 6-10 off this year for the Lunar New Year, although the rest of the world will know this holiday as Chinese New Year. And while my counterparts are tearing it up in China, Korea does things a little differently. Its a very low key, quiet holiday here. The Koreans all go home or back to their hometowns and eat traditional foods and pray. China apparently has parades and fireworks. Not fair.

I decided not to go anywhere this week, which is probably a good thing considering I'm injured and on the DL, but that doesn't mean I can't come up with my own ways of entertaining myself. Basically, the week was full of rest, relaxation, drinking, and movies. I kinda feel like I wasted 5 days, but sometimes rest is important too.

IF you're thinking of coming to Korea though - keep this holiday in mind when considering traveling - definitely go elsewhere.

Korean Taxation...is awesome!

2008-02-05T20:49:00.000+09:00

Well, only for foreigners, although I believe its not so bad for the Koreans either. As this may be part of a couple of posts about taxes, I am reminded of a quote I have seen a couple of times during tax season in America:

"It's income tax time again, Americans: time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax forms, sharpen up that pencil, and stab yourself in the aorta."
-- Dave Barry

As an American, there is no worse time than income tax time. Sure, there's the possibility of getting a nice tax refund, but there's also the looming possibility that somehow you could owe the government even more of your hard earned pennies. Some people just pay through the nose to find themselves an amazing accountant that might do some creative accounting and find you the most tax breaks. Some might take it to an online program and just hope they get the basics done. Others, those poor souls that might find this fun, might actually try and do it themselves. I myself, went the online route the past few years.

However, none of that is an issue in Korea. As an employee in the fine country, I do pay Korean taxes every month of about 3-4% of my paycheck. In January the country goes to work and figures out who should get what back. In February everyone receives their refund in their first paycheck. It is just that simple. Foreigners generally receive about 40% of the taxes they've paid so far back, and Koreans, while they don't receive much, don't generally owe either. Apparently I paid about $360 in taxes in the three months that I got paid in 2007, and received about $120 today. Can't really complain about those numbers, now can ya?

What's up, Doc? Healthcare in Korea

2008-02-04T20:23:00.000+09:00

So we know what kind of crap the American health care system is, right? I mean, you're probably gonna get the top treatment, but its gonna cost you top dollar, and that's even if you have insurance half the time. BUT, you generally will pay for top of the line equipment, and the most sterile environments anywhere (as you'd expect).

Well... none of that is really true here in South Korea. I finally got around to going to the doctor today, as I somehow hurt myself while running at the gym over a week ago. I of course didn't make it any better when I decided to go skiing last weekend or dancing this weekend. ANYWAY, I of course made it worse, and could barely stand without it hurting on Sunday - still walked around a bit that day I might add, so I went to the doctor today.

It was kind of a sketchy looking office. My head teacher was nice enough to escort me to the Orthopedic Surgeon's office and it looked like something that could only make me think of what an elementary school lobby would look like in 1972 - brown panelled walls, linoleum floor, uncomfortable orange seats, big wooden doors and I swore I smelled formaldehyde.

But while it wasn't aesthetically pleasing or comforting in any way, it was incredibly easy. I didn't make an appointment either, I might add. Just showed up and signed my name on the ol' sign in sheet, handed the receptionist my health card, and waited 10 minutes to see the doc. He kind of spoke English, he felt around my foot for a bit, spoke korean to my teacher and I knew enough of what she was saying to realize that she was telling him my stupidity of hurting myself and then going skiing and other various activities.

So he said that because I could have made what started as a bruise a lot worse with my idiot-like approach to these situations, he wanted some x-rays. We walked across the hall to this room that I swore should have housed old files and not an x-ray machine and took some pictures of my foot. There was no lead vest, no one had to leave the room, and I didn't have to take anything but my sock off. If this were home, it would have taken 2 hours to get this done, it would have been a gigantic room with a huge white machine, somewhere in the bowels of a hospital, and I would have been completely alone and wearing one of those gowns that makes you lose all of your dignity.

With all of that being said, I was in and out within an hour, including x-rays and picking up a prescription downstairs at the pharmacy. The whole thing - doctor visit, x-ray, medicine, and the doctor wrapping the ace bandage around my foot cost me 8,000 won. $8. Eight... Dollars. 8. 8!!! I still can't wrap my head around it. I almost wanted to ask him if I could keep my x-rays as souvenirs. If I didn't have insurance? It MIGHT have only cost $20. That would NEVER happen at home.

The medicine was simple too. The doctor visit/x-rays cost $5, and the meds cost $3. They come in this envelope, and individually wrapped packages for each dosage. Korea LOVES to individually wrap things I've noticed:

Overall, not a bad experience. I didn't break my foot, only tore a tendon or a ligament (communication barrier there), so we'll see if this all did the trick when I go back on Saturday for a check up. If you're scared about seeing a doctor in Korea - you really shouldn't be. I mean, doesn't this look like quality healthcare to you:

Skiing! Adventure Korea Style

2008-01-28T19:38:00.000+09:00

If you are in Korea and don't know about the travel group Adventure Korea, you should. They put together travel services geared towards foreigners all around Korea based out of Seoul. This past weekend 8 of my friends and I participated in their trip to PyeongChang/Phoenix Park in Gangwon-Do in the Bangdong Valley, about 241km (3 hours) due east of Seoul. It was absolutely gorgeous, and we couldn't have asked for better conditions.

After you signed up through their website and wired money from your ATM, 112,000W (~$120) bought you transportation to and from, ski rentals, ski lift pass for 4 hours, and a night in a hostel at the base of the mountain. If you needed to rent any extras like goggles it was only 3,000W, or snow pants/jackets for 10,000W each. The only thing you couldn't rent were gloves, but the AK Staff warned us about this beforehand, and I bought a nice pair of ski gloves at a rest stop on the way for 10,000W.

Everything worked like clockwork - we were on the bus by 8am, and were on the road and in PyeongChang getting our rental equipment by 11:30 and were on the mountain skiing by 12:30pm. The mountain had two peaks and a number of challenging runs. I was a bit cocky at first and attempted the intermediate hill even though I haven't set foot on a mountain in 6 years. It took many, many, many falls before I got my ski legs, but it eventually came back to me, and was a great time.

(The view from our room)

If we had wanted to purchase a night ticket or a morning ticket we could have easily done so for 40,000, but we all opted for a night of relaxing pool/sauna, dinner, and drunken debauchery. The interesting thing was the entire little resort town basically closes down at 2am, with the exception of the mountain. There were hundreds of people still skiing at 2, 3, 4am which was something I had never seen before.

However with it only being 2am, we were left to entertain ourselves. If you're ever found in this situation, I whole heartedly recommend talking a walk over to the Bleu hotel and taking an elevator up to the 26th floor. Walk up 3 flights of stairs past the penthouse and you'll find a door that opens up to the roof which gives you the highest view of the entire area - and its breathtaking. I'm sure its against the rules, but eh, everything fun usually is.

All in all, it was an amazing trip and I recommend using Adventure Korea for any of their services. www.adventurekorea.com - trips include DMZ, temple stays, hiking, skiing, and various other activities - all of which I hope to abuse.

January Field Trip... ZZzZzzzz

2008-01-24T19:38:00.000+09:00

Well they can't all be gems...

Thursday, January 17th we gathered up the kiddies and trudged them out into the cold for yet another classic SLP Field Trip. I'm in the minority at my school because I actually like field trips. I use it as time to enjoy being in Korea doing things I wouldn't normally do, and also to learn a bit of Korean from my kids without feeling guilty. This time I learned "What?" "What are you doing" and "How?" (phonetically: Ma, Mo Hey, and Oh-toe-kay).

This month we took them to Korea Land Corporation's Land Museum. Now, the last time we took the kids to a museum, there was a guide there to tell them all about what they were about to see (in Korean) and to take them around to see all that there was to offer. This time, not so much.

First off, museum is a bit of a strong word here. We were taken to the Land Corporation Office Building in Migeum and their bottom floor happens to have a rather large 3D model of a new city that is being built and a small circular room consisting of some old pottery and rocks. It took a solid 30 minutes to really see what there was to see, and the rest of the time was spent playing photo shoot.

Overall, I was looking forward to learning more about how Korea builds what they build (they do it at an alarming rate), maybe a bit more about Korean architecture (which is lacking) and watching my kids have some fun. None of that really happened, and everyone kind of agreed that this one was a bust. Oh well- can't win 'em all. But at least we entertained ourselves somehow:

Vote From Abroad! (on line!!)

2008-01-22T18:49:00.000+09:00

As we all know, it is a presidential election year back in the good ol' US of A and we are knee deep in the primaries that occur all throughout the country. We will FINALLY be able to be rid of that bumbling buffoon 'dubya', and either be confronted with yet another failure, or maybe, just maybe, someone who knows what they're doing. One can only hope.

Either way, I will be the first one to tell you that being thousands of miles away from it all has been kind of nice. I don't have to watch the empty rhetorical debates unless I want to, I am not subject to the onslaught of character discussions on public radio, and I can choose not to click on the links of the news sites I read everyday.

While this may sound like the endless drivel of a jaded former New Yorker who has spent 1/3 of her life with W. as the president, I am here to forward on valuable information. Voting is an important right as an American, and as traditional as apple pie and baseball. It is something people before us fought so hard to get and the least we can do now is take a minute to register and then cast our ballots for whoever the lesser of all evils turns out to be.

Just because someone is abroad does not mean they give up their right to vote. In fact, it is quite the opposite. We all know that we can send in an Absentee Ballot, but we also all know that the odds of that ballot being counted for something is slim to none. However, technology has come to our aid. This morning My Way News reported that you can now vote on line while living abroad. The group, 'Democrats Abroad' have conjured up a way to register with their site, and then send in all votes via internet through a website called votefromabroad.com.

For the first time, on line ballots will be cast. Sure there are probably a million bugs within the system, but hey, at least its a turn in the right direction. Happy Voting!

Tricky Thermostat

2008-01-22T01:54:00.000+09:00

Of all the things I could write about Korea, this was not something I imagined being a topic, but yet something that confuses me daily; how to work the thermostat.

At home you can turn the dial and just put a pointer on your desired temperature on an old style thermostat or punch in the numbers of the degree you want on a new fangled digital thermostat. If its fancy you can maybe even set it to kick on and off at various times of the day knowing that you're at work or sleeping, right? But overall, keeping a place warm/cold is pretty simple.

Here I'm finding its a bit of a daily adventure. First, the little box on the wall is in Korean. Luckily I'm one of the few I know that have it also in English. Second, it's in Celsius, which for an American always provides a bit of a problem. Third, there are quite a few buttons on it.

This box contains your heat and your hot water and both cannot be on at the same time. The red button in my case is the hot water, and I must turn the dial all the way to 45 degrees celsius, and wait 10 minutes in hopes of having a hot shower - which proves difficult in the winter time. I must also remember when I leave the shower to turn the heat back on by pressing the "thermo" button. If I leave the apartment I must hit the Outing Button, and if I'm sleeping obviously hit the sleep button. I think the only difference is the Sleep option will turn the heat back on after 8 hours. But all of these become null and void if the temperature is above room temperature.

Basically there are days I have woken up to sweltering heat/freezing cold and come home to the same thing. While heated floors are kind of nice, sometimes I miss the good ol'steam heat from the archaic radiators in those tiny New York apartments...

Some Fun English Reading...

2008-01-20T19:25:00.000+09:00

I was told about this book earlier last summer, but recently found it here in Korea and decided to give it a shot. "Eats, Shoots, and Leaves" by Lynne Truss is a book about punctuation and grammatical correctness. WAIT! Before you stop reading this post, and this blog, I swear to you its a funny book. If you're going to come here and teach English you will surely develop a great sense of humor about the English language and subsequently feel bad for any that have to learn it.

It's a short book of about 200 pages that takes a look at how punctuation can change the meaning of any written statement/passage. It pokes fun at misplaced commas and apostrophes and does so with a sarcastic humor that you can't help but love.

It starts off with the joke about the Panda who comes into a restaurant, eats some food, takes out a gun and shoots two shots into the air, and walks out. As he walks out he throws a badly punctuated wildlife book at the waiter and says, "I'm a Panda, look it up." The waiter reads the book and sees, "Panda. Large black and white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots, and leaves."

Which, if you're good, you should know that the statement should read something like, "Panda. Large black and white bear like mammal. Native to China, eats shoots and leaves."

Regardless, I find this kind of stuff amusing and it is a pretty quick read. The book points out everyday misuses of punctuation that will make you realize that you don't even notice this stuff half the time, but maybe you should be more careful. I thoroughly recommend it.

Oh Yea, We Teach Too...

2008-01-14T23:13:00.000+09:00

I was running a little low on the ideas for this blog, when it dawned on me. I've been in this country now for I think a little over 5 months and have not once talked about the act of teaching itself, and its the whole reason (or excuse) for coming here.

However, maybe having a bit of perspective on it all makes it better. If I had posted my original thoughts in my first month of teaching, it would have been pretty negative. I also had absolutely no idea what I was doing.

I have a pretty decent schedule, MWF 10-7 with some decent breaks in there, and then TT from 10-12:40 and 3:20-5. The most draining part of the day are my IP classes (Intensive Preschool) as I have 2 in the morning. I'm the reigning queen of the 6 year olds (5 western age), and I am bound and determined to mold them into my own little personal army. So far so good, as two of them were taken away from my class this month and now scream my name anytime I'm in their line of vision and come running with hugs. It also breaks my heart to see any of them cry, which is an effect I did NOT expect to happen prior to coming here (if you knew me, I really wasn't a fan of children in the least).

We foreigners head to a little gimbap shop we lovingly call Sharon's for our 40 minute lunch break everyday to enjoy some hearty and cheap Korean food to refuel before heading back to teach various activities to the little kiddies. If you're lucky enough not to do this like me, you get some free time to do some lesson planning or worksheet making. Which, I have now gotten into the art of lesson planning on one day for an entire month, therefore actually limiting the amount of work I have to do.

The afternoon classes are the kindergarten/elementary school kids that come after they've finished their regular school. Korean children can attend like 6 schools in a week between Elementary School, English School, Music School, Math School, and whatever else their parents decide to send them to. I will be at my gym at 9pm and see kids in some sort of class studying right across the street at some random school. I have no idea how they do it.

Teaching basically involves no thought. I let the kids entertain me, and in return I try and fix their broken English. Some of them want to learn, and some don't, but it really isn't a bad way to spend a work week. The problem is constantly being creative, which can be a chore. I always think back to the boring classes I had as a child and try and liven it up, but sometimes you just can't. How does one make learning English grammar fun in a class of 1 or 2 kids? Lots of general conversation I suppose. And of course, the classes where the kids speak absolutely NO English is very tough as well. Basically you become a walking thesaurus trying to find any English word that they will understand for the concept you're trying to convey. It's a lot of, "What is it? It is a pencil. What is it? It is an eraser" for weeks on end. It's always a work in progress, and the whole year is definitely a learning curve.

All in all I get paid to do this. And if you have no idea what you wanna do with your life like I do at this current moment, you might as well get some entertainment out of something for the time being. Would it help if I knew Korean? Sure. But not knowing enables me to make funny faces at them when they talk and that makes them laugh. And they're so impressed when I bust out a Korean word or two. Can't really complain about that, now can I?

*(this post will mark the beginning of the 'Carefree Korea' label, which follows Young Korea and Intermediate Korea. It will be a period of roughly 6 months of knowing the country and having fun, but without making any big life decisions)*

Holy China! Part 2 of 2: Beijing & The Great Wall

2008-01-10T22:36:00.000+09:00

After 4 really incredible days in Shanghai, it was time to leave it all behind and head onto Beijing by way of the rail. Our tour guide brought us to the station, and right up to the waiting room where after a bit of waiting we eventually boarded the 12 hour overnight train from Shanghai to Beijing. We had a 4 person soft sleeper car to ourselves (there were 3 of us) and after we ran around a bit in utter excitement we got down to business: charging up all of our electronics and playing some cards. I'd love to say that we did something wild and crazy but realistically we were all getting pretty sick so we called it a "night" and I for one had an amazing night's sleep in a warm train car regardless of how incredibly awful I felt. We were then woken up to a pretty awful "western" breakfast around 6:30am, and then after all of the announcements were in Chinese and the train stopped and everyone got off, we realized we were the last ones ON the train when they turned off all the lights. Ah well, these things happen.

We waited in the coldest weather I have felt in years in front of the railway station for our 2 other friends to get off of their train and head to the hostel. They found a pretty great hostel in the 365 Inn near Tianneman Square that had separate rooms with bunk beds in them, and private bathrooms - all for a hefty $6 a night. Not to mention the downstairs had a full service restaurant/bar that was pretty amazing. It comes HIGHLY recommended.

After settling in we didn't waste a minute of our short time in Beijing together. First was our official Chinese meal at some hole in the wall place that was pretty damn good, and then doing a bit of haggling for some Chinese schwag. We headed to Tianneman Square where we effectively froze our asses off, onto to the Forbidden City (officially sponsored by American Express now) where we made one to many 'it's Forbidden!' jokes, walked a bit to the hutongs (the oldest neighborhoods of the city that are so close together cars and just barely fit down the streets), and off to some frozen lake that people were stupidly running around on. After attempting to be one of those idiots and feeling one step away from frostbite, we decided to regroup back at the hostel to wait for our last friend to arrive. Hot Chocolate and cakes all around.

Once our final friend showed up, we spent some quality time drinking in the hostel with random old and new friends - an Israeli (friend of the group) and some random Parisians. That's what hostels are for right? We all parted ways and the core group went onto meet another friend from college at a really nice dinner of traditional Peking Duck. It might be good to say here at this point we are officially on New Year's Eve Day/Evening time. The dinner was incredible, and the duck was delicious, but not something I'd ever crave again I suppose.

Our group once again, now full, and one or two of us being just this side of death, and another one or two of us feeling especially drunk from Chinese Bai Jiu, cabbed it back to the hostel at 11:30pm to ring in the New Year with water and promptly be in bed by 12:30am awaiting what will go down as one of the absolutely monumental days of my life.

A quick 5am rolls around and all but 1 of us spring into action. A 3 hour bus ride to the wall for a 6 mile (10km) hike along the Great Wall of China from JinShanLing to Simatai. The most touristy area is Badaling and while I did not see it, I would NOT recommend it. Too many people and the wall is entirely rebuilt. The trek we did was not only beautiful, but physically challenging, and unbelieveably rewarding, and completely devoid of people. The whole thing cost 270RMB (~$39) and it included 2 portions of the wall, the toll on the bridge at the end, transportation to and from our hostel, breakfast and lunch.

At 1pm Beijing Time, 12am midnight New York time, 5 New Yorkers popped open a bottle of champagne and toasted to it officially being 2008 on the Great Wall after 3 hours of grueling hiking with a good ways still to go. Don't let me fool you, we bitched and complained every step of the way - but it was all for comedic purposes. At one point I considered not going to the wall because I was feeling so horrible from being sick, but I powered through and do not regret that decision in the least.

I cut it pretty close in time as we returned from the Wall at 6:45pm and I had a 9:15pm flight back to Seoul to catch. However, I made it with plenty of time to spare and I wouldn't have changed a thing. One of the best trips I've ever taken, hands down.

Holy China! Part 1 of 2: Shanghai

2008-01-06T16:08:00.000+09:00

I spent one whole week in China after Christmas, over New Year's and what a vastly different world from anywhere else I have been (which, to be fair, hasn't been too many places yet). BUT with that being said, I fell head over heels in love with Shanghai. Started off the trip completely solo and then added more people as the days went on.

I flew in on a Thursday afternoon after a nice little 2 hour flight on Korean Air (perfect experience there too, btw), and followed the directions my hostel had given me to The Bund area (the skyline part of the city). It was all relatively painless - 16 RMB (about 2 bucks) on a bus, and then another 2 bucks for a cab. The only bad part was that it was pouring and just mud was everywhere. I stayed at the UCool International Youth Hostel for about $5 a night and it was a pretty, uh, cool place in all of the senses of the word. It was very big and spacious, the staff was incredibly friendly and English fluent, and the location really was minutes from everything. The travelers that came through were respectful and awesome, but the only downside was the fact that the place is FREEZING. There's a small heater in the room, and big blankets, but it just was NOT warm enough. Bring extra clothing should have been written all over the site. BUT anyway...

Day 1 was kind of a wash... it was pouring and muddy and i was tired so I napped a bit, and then went for a nighttime stroll to see the skyline. However, Clouds were ridiculously low and heavy so there wasn't much to see. I ventured a little bit away and found a nice shopping center for all intents and purposes - the Yu Gardens. I didn't buy anything as much as I just walked around to get the lay of the land...

Day 2 was much better. Woke up late... attempted to go find the Shanghai Museum. However, due to my own miscalculations on a map, I wound up at the Shanghai Natural History Museum instead and was thoroughly disappointed. One of the worst museum experiences ever because the whole place was falling apart, all in chinese, and nothing interesting. It was like walking into a 7th grade science class. So after a disheartening experience I went back to the hostel to regroup, go on line, and reattack the city. Wound up getting an email from a friend from home who lives in Shanghai and we made plans, and I re-ventured out into the unknown. Went to People's Square (Shanghai's version of say, Union Square in New York City, or even Tienneman Square in Beijing). I was approached by some really nice college students from Qing Dao and after some nice conversation they offered to take me to a Tea Festival.

Now, rumor has it that this is a very very popular scam in Shanghai where people take you to some tea, and make you pay an absurd amount. However, I refuse to believe that this is what happened to me, as it was all in my own volition AND there has been email communication since then. Also, authentic Chinese tea and its customs were always something I was particularly interested in. I had everything translated for me, and had 6 amazing kinds of tea, I took home 2 of my favorites, and even got a really nice tea set that changes color and has special meaning behind it. Yes, I may have spent more than I had planned or even wanted to, but the experience was worth it, and I didn't have to buy what I bought. I walked around a bit with my new Chinese friends, wandered around a mall, and then we parted ways.

That evening in Shanghai was my favorite night as I went to Xian Tin Dei to meet my friend for Thai Food, and then headed to 3G (I think that was the name) for some authentic Jazz music - hell the singer was from Harlem, and we chatted her up a bit. We then left, attempted a club, but eventually wound up at the City Diner which happens to have a Blues club underneath it. The best part about the bar? $3 Brooklyn Lagers. Two kids who spent a fair amount of time in Brooklyn took a moment to truly appreciate the good beer fortune.

Day 3 was pretty interesting as I did the Oriental Pearl TV Tower - the biggest tower in Asia, and 3rd largest in the world behind towers in Toronto and Moscow. I've done Canada, now asia, and next up will be moscow, hopefully. After taking the ferry over (I paid 2 RMB so if you go do NOT take the commercial ferries for 30-80RMB). The packages were pretty expensive for the Pearl, but worth it in some cases. I paid 85 RMB (about 11 bucks) to go up to the 2nd highest part of the tower - 269 meters up (About 883 feet) and saw an incredible view of the Huang Po river and the city itself. It also included a History of Shanghai Museum which to me was one of the most interesting things I had done all week. Such a fascinating history as it's a town that was closed off to the world until the late 1800's/early 1900s when the entire western world converged on it and just changed it completely. After watching the sunset over the Shanghai skyline, I called it a night.

Day 4 saw the epic meeting of two friends from college who had flown in from Hong Kong. We saw more Bund walking around, an excellent chinese food lunch, a tour of the Yu Gardens, a Pearl Factory, Jade Buddha Temple, and Nanjing Road. Our tour guide was very entertaining and knowledgeable and taught me a thing or two about Chinese culture. We used Dragon Delights Tour Company, and I thoroughly recommend using them if you EVER go to china. No complaints whatsoever.

And that basically concludes Shanghai... a top notch world city, that is for sure. The three of us got to the train station that evening, and boarded a 12 hour overnight train to Beijing - which will be written about in the next post. Til then... happy travels. ;)

Christmas in Korea!

2007-12-26T00:00:00.000+09:00

This was inevitable - holidays away from the family. When leaving for a country for a year you know you're going to miss some very important things. While being in that country for the actual holidays it is important to remember that you chose to do this and that these same holidays will be there next year waiting for you to celebrate them the way that you've always done and to embrace this year as different.

SO that is exactly what we foreigners did. If you're lucky enough you come to Korea and you fall into a group as great as mine. These people have become like family over the past few months so spending it together just was the natural way of it. One of us made a nice Christmas Eve dinner in his apartment before we all headed out to the bar we always go to, where we waited for the clock to strike 12 and make it officially Christmas Day. I was playing foosball at that exact moment, by the way. Due to the fact that I was getting over being very, very sick I called it an early night at 2am.

Christmas day couldn't have gone any better either. I had people over to my apartment where I made everyone french toast for breakfast, and we then had a large Polyanna gift exchange wherein the spirit of Christmas we open presents and then steal what we want from those that we love. I wound up with a nice Guinness set, so I can't complain. There was an intermission in the day for people to go clean themselves up, and we headed into Seoul for a nice, traditional, Moroccan Style Dinner. Wait, what? Moroccan? Yes. We tried for the Irish Pub BUT it was all booked up and this was the next best thing. Honestly - it was a perfect random fit to our day in my mind, and it was actually pretty tasty too (Marakech Night, in Itaewon).

So now, after a successful Christmas comes to a close, I would like to thank all those that were apart of it, and wish all those that weren't a very, very Happy Christmas. I'm really missing friends and family, but I will home in less than a year now, and that's kind of a crazy thought.

Happy Holidays!