a Korean Christmas

*sigh* and so passes my first Christmas away from home. I'm not gonna lie, I missed it BUT I didn't cry. I came darn close though. Mostly after talking to my family while they were at Christmas dinner at Aunt Donna's house. After getting off the phone I realised they were about to embark on the journey of traditional Christmas dinner complete with children screaming in the background, christmas wrapping paper flying in every direction, and my mom fighting tooth and nail for the wing of the turkey and then strutting around with a smug look on her face and a piece of turkey skin dangling form the corner of her mouth after she, once again, beat my uncle Herb into submission...

Then second time I got teary-eyed was when I was opening the package from Sari and Christine, which arrived on my desk at school on Boxing Day, which was Christmas day at home. Thanks bunches Sawi and Tini!! I lerve it! (For those of you who aren't Sari or Christine, they sent me, among other things, a webcam!)

But now, onto happier things as I did not spend Christmas down in the dumps - NAY! - I was as jolly as Santy, as rosy as Rudolph and as gaseous as Will Ferrel in Elf after he drank 2L of Coke in one go.

Friday after school I began my journey to Seoul, which was 6 hours on a bus. I drugged myself up big-time on gravol and blissfully slept through the first few hours. After that is was listening to music and trying to forget how badly I had to pee. Once in Seoul we decided to splurge on a nice hotel for the weekend. We camped out on the top floor in the nicest room they had...which was just big enough for the three of us (myself, Carol and Roberta, both of whom teach in Suncheon). Here's is the view from our window:

Yeah, Seoul is quite a ginormous place, but thankfully my experience wasn't really overwhelming. After a good sleep, we all woke up and hit Itaewon which is a popular shopping place for foreigners. All the shop owners spoke some English and there were stores that catered to Western-sized women. For a place as over-populated as Seoul, the shopping on Christmas eve was no where NEAR what it is like at Limeridge or The Pen.


That night we got all dolled-up and went to see the Ballet at the Seoul Arts Centre. None of us had ever seen the Nutcracker before, so it was quite the lovely experience. It is always so amazing to me when I hear music that I know so well from recordings (Tchaik, Nutcracker Suite) played live. Even after 4 years of studying music at University, I'm still astounded at how the instruments really CAN sound like the recordings. I'm a nerd. Here are some pics from the ballet:
That first one is a gratuitous picture of me in case y'all have forgotten what I look like. The second one is an aerial view of the lobby of the Seoul Arts Centre.

After the lovely ballet, we were all feeling quite famished. Instead of a traditional Christmas dinner, we enjoyed a meal of traditional Korean food called Samgyupsal. DEEEEEE-lish! To keep in the festive spirit, we referred to the meal as "Pork with all the trimmings". Each table has it's own individual grill where you cook your own meat. Along with the pork we also grilled garlic, mushrooms, carrots, onions and kimchi (which is pretty good when it's grilled). Next, you take a tiny piece of meat, dip it in some sauce or bean paste put it in a lettuce leaf, add some more things like a slice of garlic or onion, wrap it up in the lettuce and then SHOVE IT ALL IN YOUR MOUTH!! When I was eating this with Korean teacher one time, I took polite little bites of my lettuce ball and was pomptly told to do it in just one bite...it's quite fun! Anyway, this happened to be the best Samgyupsal I have had so far.

Oh man, we gorged ourselves...but hey, by that time it was past midnight and officially Christmas day!

The next morning (or the same morning, depending on how you look at it) we took our time getting up, then I spent the rest of the day on a bus. A bit anticlimactic for Christmas Day, but hey, I had a great time in Seoul so there were no complaints.

Now I'm just finishing off my last few days of work before vacation. Interestingly enough, I actually get MORE busy once school ends. The first three weeks of January I am working in various English camps. Then, the day after the last camp ends, Carol and I are skippin' town to Singapore where I get to have a glorious reunion with Arieh!! WOOOOOT! and then to Thailand for some elephant riding.

So, I will probably be AWOL for a good long time. Don't worry though, I'm just off becoming "worldly" :P

Happy New Year to everyone!

snow - the ultimate excuse

It seems, after 2 weeks of snow (not heavy by any means) and sub-zero temperature, that South Korea is having a "unique" winter. All signs point to the fact that they only deal with snow once or twice per year, rather than, say, constantly. The points mentioned last post aside, snow is also an ecellent excuse for poor drivers to instantly become worse...but that's OK, because they turn on their 4-way flashers :D. Last Friday I had a meeting in Gwangju and had to be there by 1pm. No problem I says, I'll just hop on yonder bus at an appropriate time and off I'll go, tra la la. The appointed hour arrives and I learn that the bus is running 40 minutes behind due to the snow. I must emphasize at this point that it was not snowing in Boseong, but there was snow on the ground, and it very well could have been snowing in Gwangju (Gwangju is a 1.5 hour bus ride and lies north of Boseong). Well, this f's up my schedule horribly and so I do the only thing that will get me there in time - I took a cab. 50,000 Won (approx. $50) and an hour later I arrived safely in Gwangju having been driven through clear weather. That's only a slight kick in the pants. The plus side is I got to enjoy the luxury of a private ride to Gwangju rather than endure the vomit comet. Half full I tells ya, half full.

The meeting was about the Teacher Training Workshop that I will be doing during the winter vacation. For 2 weeks I get to teach Korean English teachers how to use MUSIC in the English classroom!! WOOOOOT! I'm a happy camper.

After said meeting, I decided it would be wise to spend the night in Gwangju considering I had to return the next day to meet a friend for dinner. Carol and I got a hotel room (correction, a love motel room) and then go out for dinner with some friends. We had some of the most delicious Thai food that I've experienced (granted, my experiences have been few). This was a precursor to our trip to Thailand where we get to eat like that all the time for ridiculously cheap. It can't come soon enough.

The next day, Carol and I roamed around downtown Gwangju shopping for various items. The weather was unbelievable. After witnessing it, I dropped all remaining complaints about Friday's cab ride. There were actual snow squalls and heavy snow fall. How is this unbelievable, you ask? Well, the snow fall was turned off and on like a tap. One minute, blizzard, the next clear. CRAZY! Being a Canadian in Korea I feel it is my duty to stand up to the cold and laugh in its face, but jeepers creepers, I thought I was back in London.

***Warning! Side Story***
Carol and I were checking out a random store that had a little bit of everything in it. Right smack in the middle of some Hello Kitty merchandise, cute plush pillows, and inscence was a display of many different kinds of condoms. Carol and I were pondering this when a uniformed korean girl (meaning she was in middle or high school) looks at the condoms, looks at us and then says "Very good!" Oh mercy, we laughed heartily! And now back to the regular scheduled programming...

The roads were pretty bad for driving and when we met up with our friends for dinner. A 15 minute drive to the restaurant turned into an hour and a half expedition! Dinner was delicious again and the company was awesome. Unfortunately, Carol, Betty and I had to kiss hours hopes of getting home that night goodbye. We realised that due to the unpredictable road conditions, we should take the train the next day. The train left Gwangju at 5:35 am.
oh. dear. god.
Thus, awakened by the beeping of the alarm at 4:30, I began my day today. The train ride was uneventful, and here I am, no worse for wear. Though unexpected, my weekend was wonderful yet again!

This weekend I am showing the students the How the Grinch Stole Christmas orginal animation. Last week of classes! Apathy! Heck yeah!

le bonhomme de Korean neige

*sigh* today was great. Wanna know why? Because it was Monday and it was a snow day. That's right...school was cancelled due to snow. To add to this lovely occurence, I got the call that it was cancelled on Sunday night. Mmhmm, I slept in.

Not only was today great, but my whole weekend was pretty top notch. On Friday I just hung out at my appartment and decompressed. Pajamas, warm tea and a movie...they make for good times. On Saturday I once again headed to Suncheon to spend some quality time with Carol and Roberta. Instead of the usual, which is accidentally finding ourselves drunk at a party, we opted to stay in and play "triopoloy". This is like monopoly only there are places all over the world and there are three levels. Canada made it on there (Toronto) and it was pretty sweet property to own. THIS girl owned it (or did I pwn it?...one never can tell) and exploited it as much as I could. The biggest capitalist of all was Roberta, however, as she risked most of her money on hotels and made tons of money back because of it. Poor Carol didn't get very far because although she had some property with hotels...they were in the slums (think Baltic Ave, only south of the equator) and so the profits were mediocre at best. We called her "El Slum Lordo"...I think there may have been some sweat shops there too (ooo, I'm bad). At any rate, one could save some money by taking a "Soju discount". If I owed a player $1300, I could pay them $1000 and take one shot of soju. We only started doing this more towards the end when the situation was desperate. And that's how monopoly becomes a drinking game.

I made my lazy way back to Boseong early Sunday afternoon. The air was crisp and clear in Suncheon. I fell asleep on the bus and when I woke up I was nearing Boseong and what did I see? The ground was blanketed in a thin layer of snow...it was glorious. After hearing so many people from home talk about snow, I was really, really missing it. Previously I had been told that Boseong doesn't get snow very often...maybe once per year. WELL, I practically peed my pants when I saw it. Thankfully incontinence hasn't hit me yet.

In a few hours the light dusting had turned into an almost-blizzard. I was safely in my appartment by that point, but unfortunately my furnace chose this point to BREAK. Yep, I had a tiny space heater keeping me unfrozen. I once again have to sing praises to Mr Son who came over post-haste in a snow storm to take a look. He went out, convinced a friend of his (father of one of my best students, Koh You Jin) to come and fix it...no other people would go out in the weather. A few hours later I had heat again and then was informed hat there was no school the next day. Oh mercy...I've got it good here.

Let me say something about snow in this part of Korea...people don't expect it, so people aren't ready for it. No snow plows, no salt, and no shovels. There were people "shoveling" snow with stiff pieces of cardboard and/or plastic scoopy things. No wonder school was closed.

At any rate, I woke up nice and late, lazed around for a while and then decided to go out an play in the snow, since it may not come again for a while. I made a snowman. That's right, I'm 22 and I went out and played in the snow and made a snowman. I can't tell you how much a bit of snow has made me feel...alive. It's like Canada was missing me so it decided to drop by and give me a present.

Thanks Canada...I miss you too.