2011 Year End Meme

2011 - the year I failed at being punctual!

2011 | 2012

1. What did you do in 2011 that you'd never done before?
Joined the Peace Corps! Visited Africa! Lived with a host family.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
My 2011 goals were 1) lose weight/be healthier, 2) Travel more, 3) Be more fiscally responsible and 4) Blog/write more. 1) A resounding yes. 2) Also a resounding yes. I was basically a professional nomad this year. 3) Not so much. I wouldn’t say I spent that irresponsible, but there was a lot of travel and Peace Corps related purchases, and I was either unemployed or working a minimum wage job for most of the year. 4) Haaaaaaa, that would be a no.

My goals for 2012 are 1) continue to lose weight/be healthier, 2) Travel, especially around Morocco, 3) Become fluent in Darija and 4) Take photos, blog, write, be more active in documenting my life, 5) Keep my apartment clean and organized the majority of the time.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My friend Blair had an adorable little girl. She’s the first of my college friends to start procreating, which means I might be approaching becoming an adult.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No, lHamdullah!

5. What countries did you visit?
Bzeef! I lived on three continents this year (Asia, North America and Africa) and travelled a ton. I started the year living in Korea, and spent a week playing tourist in Seoul with Pru in January. In March I moved back to the US and went to Chapel Hill to see two friends from high school get married. In April, I went to Costa Rica to see Sarah and some monkeys and then to Mexico to work in an orphanage with my parent’s church’s mission trip. In May, I went to Washington DC for a week to see Riah before she left for Tanzania. In July, I went to Mexico for a long weekend. In August, I visited Blacksburg, VA to see Amber before I left for Morocco. In September, I went back to Chapel Hill to see friends and then to Charleston for Labor Day with my family. Then I moved to Morocco and have visited Fes and Marrakech (in addition to the two towns where I’ve lived).

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
I spent a lot of 2010 waiting. Waiting for any news from the Peace Corps, and then waiting to leave. I was unemployed for a few months and then picked up minimum wage job working at a summer camp while I waited, which isn’t exactly what I thought I would be doing when I was 26. I feel like most of 2010 was spent in transition: I quit my job in February, didn’t swear in as a PCV until November and after February 28th, didn't live alone for the entire year. In 2011, I want to be doing things, not waiting for them to start.

7. What date from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
June 15th: the day I got my Peace Corps invitation
September 14th: the day I arrived in Morocco
November 17th: the day I was sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Either getting into the Peace Corps or not going crazy while waiting to get into the Peace Corps.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Hmm, not sure. Maybe learning Darija. I’m actually doing pretty well, considering that 4 months ago I knew nothing and can now carry on conversations, but I also could have studied more, both at home and now that I’m in Kalaa, and I wasn’t satisfied with my LPI score.

Also, I didn’t always handle stress as well as I could, and ended up saying things I regretted later.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Yes. I’ve been suffering from an unknown wasting illness (probably a parasite) for the past three months. I’m on meds now, so hopefully I’ll start feeling better soon.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
My lovely DSLR camera!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
The New York State Legislature for legalizing same-sex marriage. I'm pretty proud of everyone in my staj.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
I was certainly frustrated by people in Peace Corp's bureaucracy, but I don't know if I would say they made me appalled and depressed. Well, maybe depressed. I avoided paying attention to the Republican primary for a reason.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Travel (see question #5) and buying things (including pretty much an entirely new wardrobe) for the Peace Corps.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Joining the Peace Corps! Guys, I have wanted this for so long, and for a while this year, I really didn’t think it was going to happen, so that fact that I’m writing this in Morocco, and that this is real and actually happening fills me with so much joy and excitement.

16. What song will always remind you of 2011?
Right Now – Psy, Furr - Blitzen Trapper, Head Full of Doubt, Road Full of Promise - The Avett Brothers, Schizophrenia – Jukebox the Ghost

The theme song to Secret Garden will always remind me of my last few months in Korea. And also the lolz.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Happier
ii. thinner or fatter? Thinner
iii. richer or poorer? Poorer

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Writing – much of this year went undocumented and I regret that. Studying – I have an entire new language to learn

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Worrying over things out of my control and wasting time, like always.

20. How will you be spending Christmas/New Year's Eve?
Christmas was spent in Marrakech with Lucia, Mike, Sarah, Bryant, Kim, Sairah and Shannon. We stayed in a beautiful riad in the medina, went to a French Catholic mass (I didn’t understand anything, and when we tried to sneak out early, we got stuck line for a communion station, whoops), and went back to our hotel and sat on the roof and ate cheese and smoked hookah and drank and talked. I called home on Christmas Day and watched my siblings open presents via Skype, then went wandering through the medina with friends and bought scarves.

New Year’s was low key, since I was pretty sick and asleep by midnight. One of these years, I’m actually going to celebrate New Year’s Eve.

21. What was the most embarrassing thing that happened to you in 2011?
No idea, although that has more to do with me having low standards than me not doing embarrassing things.

22. Did you fall in love in 2011?
Nope

23. How many one-night stands?
Nada

24. What were your favorite TV programs?
2011 – the year I got hooked on Kdramas

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Hate is a strong word, but I definitely dislike a bunch of new people.

26. What was the best book you read?
I read 65 books this year, completing my Goodreads 2011 Reading Challenge at the last possible moment, since book number 65 was finished the morning of the 31st.

My five star (non-reread) books are: 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, The Hunger Games (and sequels), The Queen's Thief series, The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death, the Most Devastating Plague of All Time and Gaudy Night.

I also read and really loved: Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex, The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, Snuff, The First Americans: In Pursuit of Archaeology's Greatest Mystery, The Wordy Shipmates and The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie.

You can see the complete list (and I’ve written reviews for about half of them) here.

Like always, my list is heavy on non-fiction (mostly history and science) and YA fantasy. Next year, I want to branch out and read more adult fiction and literary fiction.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Jukebox the Ghost and The Avett Brothers

28. What did you want and get?
I wanted to join the Peace Corps! I also wanted a nicer camera.

29. What did you want and not get?
As much as I love Morocco and now think things worked out for the best, I spent a lot of this year wishing I had made my original Peace Corps nomination in June and didn’t spend most of the year waiting to leave.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Lord, what movies did I watch this year? Probably Deathly Hollows: Part II, although I enjoyed X-Men: First Class a lot and though Bad Teacher was hilarious.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 26. I celebrated my birthday with friends the weekend before. Riah and I went to the Seoul Museum of History to look at the dioramas and then went on an epic glasses spending spree in the underground market at Myeongdong. Then I headed south of the river have dinner at my favorite Indian restaurant in Seoul with Siobhain, Caroline and Audrey.

On my actual birthday, Pru was visiting from London. We went to Gyeongbokgung, tromped around Insadong and had tea at a tiny little teahouse in a back alley that was filled with more plants than I thought could survive a Korean winter. Then we went back to my house, ate mac & cheese and candy, finished off a bottle of vodka and watched Secret Garden.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Does anything else think that a lot of these questions repeat themselves? I spent most of this year waiting for something to happen, which was stressful and depressing (and expensive). However, I’m happy with the way things turned out, so I wouldn’t change anything.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
Can I answer no to a non-yes-or-no question? No actually, I have an answer. Head scarves. While I don’t technically have to cover my head in Kalaa, most women do and I do feel a bit more comfortable when my hair is covered. Plus, let’s be honest, right now, I’m washing my hair about once a week, so it’s usually a grease slick and a brightly covered scarf is much nicer to look at.


34. What kept you sane?
My iPod, as always. Sarah and Riah did a lot to help keep my crazy under control while I was waiting to hear from the Peace Corps. Sam made work bearable this summer. My mother listened to my crazy ramblings and fears and doubts and I will always be grateful. I dealt with the stress of moving to Kalaa by listening to all the old episodes of Pop Culture Happy Hour in about two weeks.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Andrew Garfield, Nathan Fillion

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The death of Kim Jong-il. The Arab Spring, although not until I was invited to Morocco. The Republican primary is the issue that I tried the most to avoid paying attention to.

37. Who did you miss?
My friends from Korea (Riah, Siobhain, Marie, Audrey, Caroline), friends from home (Blair, Amber, Erin, Sarah) and my family. The downside to being this nomadic is that I leave a lot of people behind.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
The people in my staj, especially my CBT sitemates and my current sitemates!

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.
Ugg, probably something about patience and good things coming to those who wait and don’t have hysterical crying fits from stress for a solid month, but I’m not sure I actually learned that last part.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

Decide what to be and go be it - Head Full Of Doubt, Road Full Of Promise, The Avett Brothers

Packing, Part I

I had my first Peace Corps related packing nightmare this morning. I never used to have any packing related anxiety (and I still don't once I actually start packing), but before I left Korea, I kept dreaming that I got home and realized that I had forgotten to pack half my apartment. I would wake up in the middle of frantically trying to reach Siobhain and asking her to save my yarn/books/clothes/super awesome SNSD coffee mug before my replacement threw them out, see the familiar walls of my apartment and think Oh thank God, I still have time to pack everything. (Incidentally, the dreams stopped the moment I started actually packing.)

Today, I dreamt that I arrived in Morocco without any shoes or my Arabic workbook/flashcards/notebook, saw the familiar walls of my room and thought Oh, thank God. I still have six more week to deal with that.

I think this is a sign that I should at least start reading packing lists.

No Longer Friday Five

Remember when I use to post here regularly? Yeah, me neither. Friday round up, posted on Saturday because I got tired and went to bed.

1. My grandmother turned 84 in June and to celebrate we hiked up to Big Rock in Dupont State Forest for a picnic dinner and views of the full moon. I made a spring quinoa salad and a broccoli pesto with orzo, Mom made sauteed leeks with goat cheese, Leah made chocolate chip cookies and we hiked up just before sunset. It rained briefly and part of the meal was eaten huddled under a tarp, but then the clouds cleared after a short shower. We found out after we arrived that the moon wouldn't rise until close to midnight, but there was a lovely sunset, and we played cards by the light of the many headlamps I still have floating around in my purse and no one tripped on the hike back to the car in the pitch dark.
   
   


2. We also celebrated the 4th of July with my grandmother. I had my traditional Independence Day meal (Indian food and non-American beer), we played more cards and then watched the fireworks from her backyard.
   
   


3. I've started going to trivia night at a local bar with my brother and some friends. We do okay (one win, a couple of second places and we would have won last night if I could have remembered that the '92 summer Olympic games were in Barcelona), but mostly I just enjoy the chance fix my hair, wear something besides yoga pants and a t-shirt, have a drink and made sarcastic comments about Chuck Norris with friends. (So far, there have been two Korea related questions [which city was chosen to host the 2018 Winter Olympics and who is the Secretary General of the UN] and both times, I insisted on writing the answer in Korean [평창 and 반기문] because (a) I'm TOTALLY that person and (b) I spent a whole two hours teaching myself Hangul by reading subway signs and, so help me God, I will use those skills whenever possible.) (Trivia caller: Man, someone is a dork. Me: YES, WHAT'S YOUR POINT?!) (I bet you thought I would stop writing in Hangul know that I'm no longer in Korea. THINK AGAIN!)


4. Speaking of Korea, people following me on Twitter or Google+ (or, you know, real life) know that I can't freaking shut up about how much I want some kimchi jjigae, because (a) kimchi jjigae is really 맛있어요 (which, even after five months back in the US, is still my default way of saying delicious) and (b) I really miss Korea, guys. It snuck up on me; at first I was busy enjoying being back in the US and seeing my family and friends, and then weeks turned into months and I realized how much I miss it. I miss laughing with Audrey about the name of the stations on the Bundang line and I miss the 4th grade cleaning crew who kept giving me Korean homework. I miss Seoul and SnB and seeing the cherry blossoms with Siobhain. I miss my apartment and my neighborhood and, God help me, I was looking through photos from Pru's visit in January and I got nostalgic because omg, that was my Paris Baguette, the one where 친의 convinced me to buy her a kimchi pastry in exchange for a terrible ugly pillow she had made in home ec which I will cherish forever. I miss Nicole teasing me about my terrible Korean while I refrained from mocking her ridiculous ridiculous shoes. I miss having co-workers I didn't actively want to stab in the eyeballs.
   
   Moving to Korea was one of the best decisions I've ever made for myself.
   
   


5. And hey, look, I'm on Google+. I'm unclear how well I'll use it, since I routinely forget I have a Facebook, but I am a big fan of all things Google, so there's hope.
   

Friday Five, or March in Review

1) I left Korea on February 28th and the culture shock of returning to the US was both easier and harder than last time (i.e. the time I ended up with my hands over my ears in line for security at San Fransisco because I'd lost the ability to tune out other people's conversations and was going into sensory overload). It was easier because I knew what to expect and harder because Korean habits had had two full years to form. It took me a few weeks to stop bowing at people and I'm still muttering in Korean. The one thing that I didn't have trouble adjusting to was having a car again. I still make sure to hand cashiers my money with both hands and slip my shoes off before entering a house, but I'm loving being able to drive again.

2) No sooner had I made it home than I left again. I got home Monday night and left Wednesday morning for Chapel Hill to go to a wedding and see friends from college. Unfortunately I didn't get to see much of my university friends, but the wedding was lovely and I got to meet my senior year roommate's new baby. I also bought a new computer. (In my first 48 hours in the country, I went to the bakery, the library and the Apple store. I have my priorities in order.) My old computer had been slowly dying for the past eight months and I'm loving having a computer with a working mouse again.

3) Being home has been really nice. I've spent a lot of time with my family, specially my little sister, who is now 16, holy crap, when did that happen? I've also been cooking a lot, taking advantage of my mom's kitchen, which has all sorts of fancy utensils I didn't have access to in Korea, like a blender, measuring spoons and an oven.

4) I've also been to the library at least a dozen times. I have a Kindle, which was easily the best purchase of 2010 and is great if you live in a country where English isn't spoken, but not so good if you want to build a fort out of books. I also have a new library card for the first time since high school. I've never been good at returning library books on time and by senior year, my fine had reached an amount so large that I stopped using my card and started using my mom's instead. For years, I've been convinced that the fine was eighty or a hundred dollars, but when I finally checked, it turned out I only owned twenty four dollars, which might have seemed huge to me ten years ago, but is easily payable now.

5) Being home has been nice, but also a tad boring, since I don't know anyone in Brevard anymore, so at the end of March, I left for two weeks of vacation in Costa Rica. I spent the first week with a friend who lives here, and now I'm on my own, trying to remember to speak Spanish instead of Korean.

The Trip Home

Musings on my trip home, AKA, no I wouldn't like to talk about it, but I'd sure as hell like to yell about it.

• Dear people who asked me how my trip was,
  Think of Monday. Think how fun Monday usually is.  Now imagine a Monday that lasts for THIRTY FOUR HOURS. THAT was how my trip was.
  Love,
  Cait


• Things started so well. I allotted myself so much time to get from my apartment to the airport bus stop that I was actually able to catch an earlier bus than planned. I was at the airport three hours before my flight, check it only took fifteen minutes, neither of my bags were overweight AND since my school didn't force me to overstay my visa this year, I didn't end up in a small room filling out reams of paperwork while being yelled at by immigration officers. I was sitting at my gate two hours before my flight.


• Incheon has free wireless for the entire airport! This is the last time on this trip I can say that, and one of the reasons why I love love love Incheon, my all time favorite airport. I sent my mom an email saying, "Already at the gate, two hours in advance. Totally going to make my flight!"


• On the flight to Narita, I discovered that the downside to having a Kindle is that your book is an electronic device that must be turned off during take-off. I read a lot of SkyMall and was cranky. Next flight, I'll make sure I bring a paper book too.


• Also speaking of books, I bought The Hunger Games for the flight and it was omg, so awesome. I was told that it would be hard to put down, that I would end up finishing it at 4:00 in the morning, tired and exhausted, but too caught up in the story to stop, so I bought the book to read on my 24 hour trip from Korea to the US and ended up being the furiously cranky girl in line at customs because she had to stop reading briefly. My full review at Goodreads is here.


• My flight to Narita was uneventful. I didn't have yen, didn't want to deal my card being flagged if I used it in Japan and also, my carry-on bags were really heavy, so I didn't buy lunch during my layover. My flight out of Narita was delayed an hour, but I got a seat at the gate, so all was well. Man, this trip is going well.


• We board the airplane, buckle ourselves in and sit. And then sit some more. Finally, the pilot announced that we were waiting for a delayed flight from Taipei with several passengers who were making a connection to our flight. The Taipei flight was suppose to arrive "soon" and folks, we're just going to wait a short bit for them to arrive, but we'll be gettin' on our way real soon. You could tell it was an Atlanta based flight crew. We finally left an hour and a half later, bringing our total delay to two and a half hours which, consequentially, was about how long my layover in Atlanta was.


• The flight, omg, the flight. The flight from Narita to Atlanta was terrible. There were turbulence THE ENTIRE WAY. ALL TWELVE HOURS OF IT. Some were mild, some were more serious, but the fasten seat belt sign was never taken off. I don't mind turbulence, they're like a mild roller coaster which is welcome entertainment on a long flight, but eventually you need to use the restroom and stretch your legs. Luckily, the flight crew was understanding of people ignoring the fasten seat belt sign and the pilot warned for mild turbulence vs. severe turbulence.


• Somewhere over Colorado, the pilot came over the intercom and asked that anyone on the plane with medical experience please go to the back of the plane, there was a passenger of need of aid. I'm a little disappointed he didn't ask if there was a doctor on the plane (Hollywood, you lied to me), but relieved to see several people responded and even more relieved that the passenger wasn't ill enough to necessitate an emergency landing.


• We finally reached Atlanta, several hours late, and were put in an holding pattern. Luckily we only circled Atlanta for thirty or forty minutes, but the weather was terrible and the landing was even worse. I've flown on a lot of planes in a lot of different weather and I have virtually no fear of flying, but this landing was rough enough that my stomach turned over and clutched my armrest a little tighter.


• I reached Atlanta, cleared customs and immigration (filling out my customs form was a delight after having lived in Korea for two years; I have acquired a lot of stuff) without problem and rushed off to the gate for my connection to Asheville, only to get bowled over my exhaustion (I didn't sleep at all on the flight to Atlanta), hunger (turbulence interfered with food service on the flight from Narita and plus, it was airplane food) and the weight of my carry-ons (I was worried my checked bags would be overweight, so I crammed as much as I possible could into the bags on my back). I staggered up to the nearest eatery (a Burger King), was stunned by the idea of ordering food in English, took two tries to find the correct currency to pay with, carefully handed my money over with both hands and then bowed to the cashier. Culture shock, I has it.


• I arrive at my gate, ten minutes before my plane was suppose to depart. Lucky for me, the flight was delayed an hour and I didn't have to go running to the gate, shouting and waving my arms, to catch my plane. (You laugh, but it's happened to me before.) I borrowed a cell phone to let my parents know I was delayed and they told me the delay was because of the torrential rains and a tornado watch in Asheville. I looked at a weather map and the forecast of the weather front in Asheville making its way south to Atlanta and swore. A lot. And not under my breath (I'm still adjusting to the idea that people around me can understand me). All in all, I was only stuck in Atlanta for four and a half hours, which could have been so much worse, but I had been away from home for a year and traveling for over twenty four hours and I just wanted to get home, hug my mom and go to bed.


• I made it home! Eventually. It took 30 hours from leaving my apartment in Korea to pulling up at my parents house in America, but I made it and I'm home.

Korean Officetel

Tonight is my last night in Korea. I finished packing Friday night and spent the weekend searching for the corner of my apartment I surely forgot to pack, because there was no possible way I was finished packing two days in advance. I've been having nightmares of weeks where get back to America and realize that I had completely forgotten to pack up my apartment, but I think I'm finally done.

I spent the week before last last week cleaning my apartment, partly because trying to pack a messy apartment means you end up packing the mess and partly because when I was cleaning, I didn't have to be packing. I ran out of things to clean on Saturday, but I took some photos of my apartment before I started to tear it apart and stick it in boxes.

So, my apartment. I live in an officetel. Officetels, which comes from office + hotel, are usually one room studio apartments. The first four floors of my building are commercial (a pharmacy, a half dozen clinics, a billiards hall, a couple of restaurants and a butcher shop), and the top five floors are apartments. Some people complain about noise or smells from the businesses below, but other than getting the side-eye from clinic patients in hospital gowns hooked up to IVs taking a smoking break by the back stairs when I take my trash out at night, I've never had any problems.


This is the main room of the apartment, looking from the door. The bathroom and kitchen are to the left and right. On on the left side of the room is the table, couch and bed. On the right side is the closet type thing, the dresser and my desk. The far wall of the apartment is all windows, which was nice during the summer and really cold during the winter.


Standing next to the bed, looking back at the door. The recessed area by the door is the only part of the apartment you're suppose to wear shoes in. The light over the shoe area is motion sensor, but it's erratic and I sometimes trigger it when I walk into the bathroom or the kitchen.


A closer look at the closet thing. It was put up by the previous teacher, and while I'm grateful for somewhere to hang my clothes (the dresser isn't very big), it did severely limit how I could move furniture around. Underneath the clothes are my crafting stash bags, luggage and spare bedding.


A closer look at the desk, which is the only part of the apartment I really decorated. The red box is full of stationary products which, yes, I know, I have a problem. Stationary is ugly and overpriced in the US, so it's a get-it-while-you-can situation. The painting was done by my little sister. The trashcan has pandas in airplanes quoting R. Kelly lyrics. Also, my light-up devil horns from the World Cup.


This kitchen isn't technically a separate room, but it's tucked away in a corner and if I pull out the counter space from under the stove, it almost has four walls. I have a hot plate, a rice cooker, a electric kettle, toaster, microwave and, after I absorbed Margaret's spices while she was in America this winter, a spice rack with four different containers of curry powder. The contraption above my sink is the sterilizer, so I can UV my dishes after I wash them.


The bathroom was my least favorite part of the apartment. The sink-shower meant that the bathroom was *always* wet. I can't keep anything in the bathroom since it would get soaked daily, the floor stays wet for hours after a shower (or a load of laundry, since my washing machine drains onto the bathroom floor) and standing water on the counters means I risk electrocuting myself every time I blow my hair dry. Also, the hot water heater only runs at night, so once the hot water is used up, that's it for the day. It's more than enough for a shower but, let me tell you, washing the dishes with ice cold water during the winter was LOADS OF FUN.

So, that's my apartment. I actually really like it. It's small, but how much space does one person actually need. It's in a good area - buses to my school stop in front of the building, a subway station is three minutes away and a much larger bus stop is only a ten minute walk away. There's a Daiso next door, a market two buildings down and in that three minute walk to the subway, I pass six coffee shops and a ho-tteok stand. In good traffic, I can be in Seoul in half an hour. It's smaller than my last apartment, but the bed's a double, the ondol worked all winter and I don't have to stick the AC hose in a trashcan to keep from flooding the apartment, so I count it a win.

It was a good home.

Misconceptions

Yesterday was my last day at school. I spent the morning cleaning off my computer, and then left around 11:00 to finish packing. A group of my former 6-1 boys were playing soccer in front of the school when I walked out and they shouted hello.

"Teacher," they told me, "we going to middle school now."

"I know," I said.

"Where are you going, Teacher?"

"I'm going to America," I told them.

"Why?

"Well, I'm from America. My family is in America."

They huddled together for a quick consultation and finally the most advanced boy asked, "So, Teacher not Canada person?"

Turns out, my ENTIRE school thought I was Canadian all year.

Goodbye, Part 1

One of the hardest parts about teaching in Korea is how transient the expat community is. Contracts are only for a year and once their year is up, a lot of teachers go home. I was lucky my first year and none of my close friends left, but this year Omega left in May, Tony and Christine left in November and Riah left a few weeks ago.

On what was suppose to be Riah's last evening in Korea, we (Audrey, Caroline, Riah, Siobhain and I - the ladies I spent Christmas with) were sitting in Cold Stone in Gangnam, feeling morose, when Caroline suggested we make a scrapbook as a going away present. She had a Polaroid camera. I had many different colors of pens. We had a notebook and stickers. And scissors. And tape. Look, I'm friends with a very crafty group of people, okay!


I love that I'm friends with a group of people who, when someone suggests making an impromptu goodbye scrapbook, ACTUALLY have all the necessary supplies on hand.


Caroline and Siobhain examining a Polaroid.
And so we made a scrapbook. It was a rush job; Cold Stone kicked us out at 11:00, the Coffee Bean we relocated to kicked us out half an hour later and Audrey and I needed to catch the last train home at midnight. The first half of the scrapbook was detailed (or at least had interesting asides) and had introductions and dinosaurs and fun lessons learned in Korea (even in Korea, don't assume people don't understand English is an important one) while the second half consisted of unannotated Polaroid pictures hastily taped onto blank pages while the Coffee Bean employees gave us the side eye for still being in their shop ten minutes after closing.


Riah's introduction page. When pronounced with a Korean accent, Riah sounds an awful lot like the word liar, so Riah specified that her pants were not on fire. And, underneath No Pants On Fire, I added 불 바지 없어요, which says, in what I'm sure is truly atrocious Korean, No Fire Pants. It was hilarious at the time.
We adjourned to the street outside to say our final goodbyes, which were awful. Saying goodbye is never fun, but it's especially hard in such a ephemeral community because Korea, our common ground, isn't a permanent location for any of us. My group of friends from university still meets up in Chapel Hill periodically, but the odds of seeing this group of girls again in the US are slim. Also, for me, saying goodbye to Riah was the first on a long list of goodbyes I have to say this month.


Riah gave us matching bracelets from Cambodia as a going away present.
So, we were standing on the street of Gangnam crying and promising to write and it's awful and cold and then Audrey and I realized that if we want to get home, we have to leave RIGHT NOW, only we didn't realize the time quite soon enough and just missed our last transfer. I've just barely caught a lot of last trains home, but in two years of living here, this was the first time I actually missed it.

Luckily, we were both able to find taxis willing to drive out to where we live with minimal fuss.

I woke up the next day, Wednesday morning, to an email from Riah. The snowstorm that ate Chicago (are we calling this one Snowpocalypse?) meant that O'Hare was closed and Riah was stuck in Korea until Friday night. Suck it, Chicago. On Thursday, Riah, Audrey and I went to COEX, and during our shopping breaks, we finished the scrapbook. We captioned the photos and wrote lists based on our experience here: crazy English names Korean children give themselves, Things We <3 About Korea, Places we <3 in Korea, How to Anger a Korean, Important Konglish Words, Important Korean Words.

Our list of Important Korean Words is possible the most worthless list of Korean ever and contains such gems as kimchi dumplings, old woman, fleece lined pants and fish (the animal, not the kind you eat). Others - Samsung, Hyundai, soju (Korean rice liquour, like drinking rocket fuel) and bulgogi (Korean barbecued beef) - don't even have an English translation. We had more, actually useful, words, but it turns out we don't know how to spell the Korean we use the most. We spent five minutes trying to figure out how to write thank you, a word I say ALL THE TIME.

After several failed attempts, I said, "You know, we are surrounded by people who know how to write 감사합니다."

We looked around at the cafe, full of Koreans. "Yeah," Riah and Audrey said.

"We could, you know, ask any one of them."

"Yeah," they said again. We stayed seated and left thank you off our list.

Audrey and I said goodbye to Riah again Friday afternoon, after spending the morning at the jimjabang. It still sucked, and I still cried, but it was easier the second time. It was easier when we weren't rushed. It was also easier because, during her extra days, Riah and I made plans to take a road trip once we're both back in the States. Wisconsin and North Carolina aren't that far apart.


Me and Riah

죽을래, Blog?

Long time, no blog. Since I last wrote I have:

• Turned 26, which was anticlimactic since I had already turned 27 Korean age a few weeks before.*


• Pru came for a week and we went to many palaces and markets and ate lots of food. Some of it was in a tent and some of it was deep fried and on a stick.


• Pru also got me started on K-dramas. We mainlined Secret Garden in four days and now I'm watching a bunch of K-dramas, three of which are about cross dressers (I swear that was an accident) and something called Joseon X-files (oh yeah, aliens in 16th century Korea). *faceplam*


• Said good-bye to Riah, who left for the US. On Tuesday, we made an impromptu scrapbook in Cold Stone and cried on the streets of Gangnam and Audrey and I missed our train home. On Wednesday, I woke up to an email from Riah telling me that the snowstorm that ate America meant that O'Hare was closed until Friday and I got two and a half more days with Riah! Suck it, Midwest! [More here]


• Celebrated 설날 (Seolnal, lunar New Year) by making a spectacle of myself with Riah and Audrey at the aquarium, one of the few places that was open. Welcome to the Year of the Rabbit!


• Adhearing to the rule that you should be as clean as possible before getting on a trans-Pacific flight, the morning before Riah's flight, Audrey, Riah and I went to the bathhouse for a few hours. It was my first time at Dragon Hill Spa, which I liked, especially the outdoor tubs, but my favorite is still the green tea themed spa I went to in Boseong.


• Break is over and students are back for eight whole days before the end of the school year. Yesterday, the 3-1 boys filed in a few minutes ahead of the girls. "Where are the girls?" I asked.
  
  I was solemnly told, "In Seolnal, they is DIE!"
  
  죽을래, which means do you want to die?, is a common expression in Korea and I've heard countless variations of it in English in the past two years, but it still kills** me every time.

All of these bullet points deserve their own entry, but it's unlike I will actually get around to them.

* Sokay, in Korea ages are counted differently than in the West. You're one when you're born (none of this X month business for the first year) AND you age on New Years instead of your actual birthday, which means your Korean age can be up to two years older than your Western age. On December 31st, I was 25 US age, 26 Korean age. The next day was New Years, which meant I turned 27 Korean age while I was still 25 US age. Since my birthday is in January, my Korean age is normally only one year ahead of my western age, but my little sister, who just turned sixteen in December is already eighteen in Korea. Somewhere my mother just blanched at the thought.
**Zing!

The reoccurring theme here is "cold"

Why are my Five Things Friday posts never on Friday?

• Last weekend, I went to COEX for a haircut and dinner with Audrey and Caroline. There was a thirty minute wait for dinner, so we settled down to knit in a coffee shop until our buzzer rang. I shrugged off my coat, a novel experience during a Korean winter,* and in the rush to gather our bags and get to the restaurant when the buzzer went off, I left my coat (which, incidentally, had my T-money card and iPod in the pocket) at our table. I didn't realize my mistake until an hour later, when I was sitting in the salon after dinner, waiting for my appointment to start. I rushed back to the coffee shop in a panic, only to find my coat still hanging off the back of my chair where I left it, everything still in the pocket. Some days, I really love Korea.


• Speaking of the new hair cut, I like it. It's short, although not as short as the last time I cut it (and man, the stinkeye I got from the stylist when I admitted that I had last had a haircut in July), but short enough that styling it mostly becomes an attempt to corral the curls. It does mean I need to blowdry it in the morning, which is usually not a problem, but I've spent the last week deskwarming and decided I couldn't be bothered to wake up in time to fix my hair when all I'm going to do is sit alone in my office, which has led to some epically bad hair days.


• Actually, I haven't been bothered to wake up in time to do anything, not even get to school on time. I keep leaving my apartment after I'm already suppose to be at school. I would feel guilty, except a) deskwarming is stupid and b) on Friday I ran into one of the second grade teachers who was also walking to school half an hour late.
  
  "I'm late," she told me as she ran past.
  
  "Me too!" I said.
  
  "But my students are waiting for me," she explained.
  
  Lady, you win at being late. At least I was on time when I had kids.


• So, deskwarming. People who have to do it hate it and people who don't have to do it tell us to stop whining. And I guess it's better than having to actually work, but it's punitive and a waste of time. I'm not suppose to be doing anything while I'm here, but I have to be here for eight hours (well, more like seven) a day. I know all jobs have their annoyances, but in this case, I'm the only teacher who has to deskwarm. The Korean teachers only have to come to school during the breaks when they're teaching. I don't complain when I have to come in and sit during exams or other days when I don't teach because the Korean teachers also have to come it. It's only during the school breaks that it feels like a punishment. Also, my office is really really cold. At least at home I have some control over the temperature or, in worse case scenarios, blankets.


• Tomorrow is my last day of deskwarming! One more day and then I have nineteen days of vacation. I thought of fleeing somewhere warm over my break, but I've (probably) opted to stay in Korea and save money (fiscal responsibility for the win). Pru is coming to visit (two days until she arrives!) for a week and I'm going to spend the rest of my break savoring my remaining 42 days in Korea.

*The public schools aren't well heated. On the good days, my classroom/office are tolerable so long as I'm wearing a heavy coat and leggings under my pants and boots and maybe a hat. On the bad days, well, I have a reoccurring problem of liquids freezing in my office. Suffice to say, I've not taken my coat off much for the past few months.

2010 Year End Meme

That end of the year meme that's been going around, although you'll notice I waited until 2010 was good and over to finish it.

1. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before?
Applied to the Peace Corps! Took an overnight train across China.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
My 2010 goals were 1) lose weight (nope) 2) travel more (yep) 3) save money (not as much as I would have liked, but yep) and 4) organize my computer (that would be a no). Next year I want to 1) lose weight/be healthier 2) Travel more 3) Be more fiscally responsible and 4) Blog/write more.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My co-teacher Yeong Eun had a little boy.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No

5. What countries did you visit?
China (for a second time), Korea (not sure if it counts as visiting since I'm living here)

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
More definite plans for the future.

7. What date from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Eh, none? It wasn't really a momentous year. A good year, but not momentous.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I applied to the Peace Corps. I became a better teacher.

9. What was your biggest failure?
I didn't get my Peace Corp medical paperwork finished.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Thankfully no, although I do now have an extensive amount of paperwork documenting exactly how healthy I am.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Kindle and plane tickets to China

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Congress for repealing DADT.  My broadcasting club kids worked really hard and I'm super proud of them.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Look, I pretty studiously didn't pay attention to the US elections for a reason.  That much rage isn't healthy.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Travel, books, Indian food, 문구점....

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Traveling. The Peace Corp. Life in general.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
OK Go - Here It Goes Again; My Chemical Romance - Na Na Na; Lady GaGa - Alejandro; The Sounds - 4 Songs & A Fight; 이효리 - Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? happier
ii. thinner or fatter? same same
iii. richer or poorer? richer

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Cleaning my apartment, exercising, studying Korean, keeping in touch with people

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Wasting time (especially my afternoons at work), following celebrity gossip.

20. How will you be spending Christmas/New Year's Eve?
I spent Christmas with friends (lots of friends) and I spent New Years at home. I think I technically rang in the new year by reading about the Black Plague.  I never want to do anything on New Years and I always feel slightly guilty about it.

21. What was the most embarrassing thing that happened to you in 2010?
My sister got locked in my bathroom which was more embarrassing for her, but I was a bit red faced when I had to beg the adjoshi to break down my bathroom door so she could get out.

22. Did you fall in love in 2010?
Nope

23. How many one-night stands?
Nada

24. What were your favorite TV programs?
Doctor Who, White Collar, Leverage, Castle

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
No.  I don't really hate anyone.  Sustaining the anger to hate someone is too much energy.

26. What was the best book you read?
I read 60 books this year: 12 re-reads, 11 non-fiction, 18 Agatha Christie. My favorites were:

Leviathan and Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
Country Driving: A Journey Through China from Farm to Factory by Peter Hessler
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford
Whose Body by Dorothy L. Sayers

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Oh hell, probably my continuing love affair with K-pop. Basically, my year sounded a lot like this and it was ~awesome!

28. What did you want and get?
To come back to Korea for a second year, see the Terracotta Soldiers, my family to visit me in Korea

29. What did you want and not get?
I really wanted to be finished with the Peace Corps medical testing by the end of 2010.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Inception or Deathly Hallows

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 25. On my actually birthday Sarah and I went shopping and out to dinner, and then that weekend a bunch of friends from college came to Brevard and we spend the weekend having Wii tournaments and touring the yarn shops of the greater Asheville area.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
To have finished my Peace Corps medical paperwork.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
Most days I made it out of the house looking vaguely presentable? I sometimes matched my glasses to my knee socks? Actually, socks in general. I own so many cheep Korean socks now.  Knee socks, plush socks, ridiculous ankle socks.  If they're sold from the back of a truck on the side of the road in Korea, I probably own them.

34. What kept you sane?
iPod and Kindle

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Kim Yuna, Johnny Weir, Alex O'Loughlin, Simon Baker

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Relations between North and South Korea, the DADT repeal

37. Who did you miss?
Family and friends back home.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Audrey, Caroline and Riah

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010.
If you want something and work hard enough, you can get it.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
There are jobs and chores and questions
And plates I need to twirl,
But tonight I'll take my chances,
On the far side of the world.

-- Far Side of the World, Jimmy Buffett

Christmas in the Land of the Morning Calm

Merry Christmas! Christmas can be hard when you spend it away from family and all the traditions that make holidays special. All last week, students and teachers asked me if I was going home for Christmas and when I told them no (even if I could afford a flight to the US right now, there is literally not enough time in a weekend to fly to the US and back, and I had class on Friday and Monday), they asked if I was sad about spending the holidays alone, which, way to bring up that thing I was really pointedly not thinking about guys. I kept busy though, and had a good holiday.

My celebrations started last Saturday when SnB held a curry party & yarn/book white elephant gift exchange. Riah and Caroline made curry, Audrey made cookies, Siobhain made naan using a wine bottle for a rolling pin, and Jen and Robin helped to empty said wine bottle. I wrapped presents since we wanted dinner to be edible. Everyone brought nice things for the swap, so it wasn't very white elephant-esque, but we had fun and I have a quite a few new books to add to the pile of books I need to read before I go home.



Top: Siobhain making naan with a wine bottle; Left: Caroline showing us her new apron and festive Christmas nose; Right: Riah sampling the curry.
Then, on Christmas Eve Eve, I went to Ansan after work for pho, spring rolls and Vietnamese coffee with Marie and Greg. Traffic was horrible, but I made friends with the six year old sitting next to me. I was the first foreigner he had ever seen, and at first he just stared, but he grew more confident as the bus pulled away from the station and he started making faces at me. I started copying his faces, which he thought was hi-larious. After a few minutes of crossing his eyes and rapidly shifting his jaw around, he decided to stick his finger up his nose, watching me with bright eyes to see what I would do. I briefly though about copying him (standards, what are those?), but we were being watched by the ajeosshis sitting across from us and I was going straight to dinner, so I settled with sticking my finger beside my nose, which luckily was sufficiently funny enough for my friend.

Friday was Christmas Eve and I wished my 6th grade classes a Merry Christmas, but I was corrected. "No, Teacher. Merry Christmas Eve." After school, I went to a candlelight service at the Seoul International Baptist Church near Itaewon. It's next to the base and a lot of parishioners were soldiers and their families. Most of the foreigners I see are teachers in their twenties or thirties, and this was the first time I had seen a non-Korean family in almost a year. American children are giant compared to my wee, slight students. After the service, we took a cab to Itaewon, hung out in What The Book until they closed, then went to the Thai restaurant upstairs. Mmmm, Christmas curry. I've never been a fan of traditional Christmas food and I was thrilled for the excuse to spend my holiday eating SE Asian food instead.

Then on Christmas Day, Caroline, Siobhain, Audrey, Riah and I went for Indian and Doctor Fish in Gangnam. We bought ourselves a Christmas ice cream cake, sang Christmas carols (different ones, at the same time), and then used our cake to reenact the current political situation of the Korean peninsula. The cake was divided into five sections. Riah was South Korea, Audrey was North Korea, Caroline was China, Siobhain was the US and I was somehow Sino-American relations, which meant that I spent a lot of time supplying North Korea with rice and cow (decorative cranberries) which North Korea turned into bombs to throw at South Korea. The chocolate decorations served as the DMZ. Tunnels were dug beneath it. I started making "Phew Phew" noises to simulate bombs, which is when the Koreans sitting next to us started taking our picture. My parents called me while I was waiting for the bus home and I pulled a Waegukin Smash to talk to them while they opened presents.


Failboats in public. From (left → right) Siobhain, me, Audrey, Caroline and Riah


Mid-conflict on a delicious peninsula
Merry Christmas, one and all.

de Bello Gallico

The best thing about owning a Kindle is that when I get my annual hankering (brought on by listening to the reading of the Gospel) to read about Caesar's conquest of Gaul at 12:30 on Christmas morning, I can buy de Bello Gallico immediately and start reading before the realization that this is probably the geekiest thing I've ever done stops me.

Even better is getting home at 12:30 on Christmas morning after Thai food with friends to find a Amazon gift card from said friend with which to buy de Bello Gallico.

Merry Christmas, everyone. Hope it's a good one.

Five Things

[+] Tomorrow is Christmas Eve! Christmas isn't really an important secular holiday here. It's a red day, meaning I would have the day off it wasn't already on a Saturday. Christian Koreans treat it as a purely religious holiday and everyone treats it as a couple's holiday, almost akin to Valentine's Day. A few of the bigger department stores lights up and there is a massive coca-Cola sponsored Christmas display along the streets of Gangnam, but there are no Christmas decorations in my neighborhood, I'm still teaching class (winter break don't start until next Tuesday) and I've almost forgotten it's almost Christmas. However, I was linked to a cover of the Little Drummer Boy yesterday and I've been listening to it non-stop. It's really excellent and a nice bit of Christmas cheer.


[+] Well, when I say I'm "teaching classes," I mean I finished the textbook last week, so this week I'm showing Up dubbed in Korean with English subtitles. My co-teacher and I take turns sitting in the back of the classroom and occasionally saying, "Quiet" while the other stays in the office and works. Of course, this means I've watched the first twenty minutes of Up twenty times now and if anyone needs me, I'll be weeping in a corner because all happiness will grow old and die or get crotchety and deaf and we all end up alone and sad and *sob*. (Class is only forty minutes long, so I only see the depressing beginning, not the uplifting and happy ending. The students don't seem nearly as affected as I am.)

[+] I've finished my lesson plans for English camp. Well, I've mostly finished them. The last day is a movie day and I really should come up with actual content to teach, but I don't want to. I still need to finish prepping for camp, but this is by far the most prepared I've ever been. I'm sure this will blow up in my face somehow.

[+] I bought my ticket home yesterday. I leave Korea on February 28th, just over two months from now. I was adding money to my T-money card (subway/bus pass) yesterday night and I had to pause and think if would actually use $50 on transportation in the next two months. I got a bit teary about how I was leeeeeeeeeaving, although it might have been because I'm going to have to start buying gas again and there's no way $50 worth of gas could ever possible last two months.

[+] I had a completely gratifying moment on the subway home yesterday when someone asked me what I was reading and I was able to answer with "a survey of political and social forces during the late Roman Empire." I mean, I was reading about the political and social forces that lead to the fall of the Roman Empire (Justinian's Flea, good if a bit pedantic), and I'm not actually ashamed of anything I read (okay, maybe that needle-point based mystery), but it's nice to asked that question when I'm actually reading something impressive.

It never rains, but it pours

I'm busy, which is unusual. I work forty hours a week, but only fourteen of those hours are actually spent teaching, and class prep, grading, extra classes and miscellaneous child wrangling are not enough to fill the other twenty six hours. I normally have an hour or two of free time in the afternoons, which is why going from having nothing to do to more than I can possible do practically overnight has left me reeling.

The semester ends on December 27th and two weeks of English camp starts the next day, which means I have six days finishing planning and preparing 28 hour-and-a-half long lessons from scratch. I probably should have started planning before last week, but I had a training conference the week before last and I wanted to wait until afterward to start planning. I don't have a text book for English camp, so I've chosen stories to base the lessons on. The 3rd and 4th graders are reading Eric Carle books. The 5th and 6th graders are reading fairy tales, which I'm going to write myself because I can't find decent easy reader versions using the vocabulary I want to target.

This is my forth time teaching English camp and each time, I oscillate from being unprepared to being too prepared. My first English camp was a disaster of epic proportion, mostly because my co-teacher and I didn't plan at all (and then my co-teacher just stopped showing up, leaving me to deal with the mess), so when it came time to prepare for the second English camp, I spent a month freaking out and working late and creating hours of extra material. It worked - the camps were a success - but I barely escaped with my sanity intact. This summer I had only planned the first week of the camp, which blew up in my face when the it turned out that, due to a schedule mix-up, what I thought was the first week was, in fact, not the first week, and I spent the next two weeks frantically playing catch up. I'm hoping that by my fourth try I will have found a happy medium.

To further busy things, the broadcasting club has started practicing again last week after a month and a half hiatus. I love those kids to death and I'm so proud of the work they're doing. This time, we're making them write their own articles about their week at Seongnam English Town, and only Ji-won and Ji-yeon turned in articles written entirely in English. The other girls' articles were a mix of Korean and English. One went 한국말, 한국말, 한국말, extreme weather systems, 한국말, 한국말, puppetry 한국말, 한국말, water festival, leaving me very curious about what she was talking about. Last week, each student came by during their lunch for one-on-one help editing their essays. I helped Ji-won and Ji-yeon fix the mistakes in their essays and my co-teacher Nicole helped Hye-ryeong and Han-som translate their articles. Then, on Friday, Jeong-yun (whose article was only 60% in Korean) and her friend Ye-sol (who isn't even in the Broadcasting Club, but is super smart) showed up before Nicole finished lunch and the three of us, with minimal assistance from Jeong-yun's cell phone dictionary, wrote an entire page . I'm ridiculously proud of how well she did and how she kept trying at something she thought was impossible. So yes, I love the Broadcasting Club and I'm glad they have one more report this year, but it does take up a lot of time.

This Winter Is Going to Suck

It snowed Wednesday night and when I woke up Thursday morning, the sidewalk in front of my apartment was covered in ice, as was the crosswalk by my bus stop, the hill my school is on and the entire school grounds. Basically, my entire route to school was one icy slick. I know Korea is allergic to snow days, but if ever there was a time to close school, it would be when the hill the school is on is so icy that it's physically impossible to reach by car and students can't get between the buildings without falling on the ice. The weather was a bit better today and parts of the Ice Hill o' Doom had been cleared, but it turns out the plus to it being too icy for vehicles is that I didn't have to watch a car try to gun it up and hill and fish-tail on a patch of ice a mere foot from a pack of oblivious students on their way to school. I spent the entire walk to school pulling children away from oncoming traffic.


This winter is going to suck.

The Amazing Race: Seoul

So, yesterday morning Amber IM'd me to tell me that the latest episode of The Amazing Race was set in Seoul and they went rafting in the DMZ. My response can best be summed up as "..." since I'm pretty sure I would remember an American reality TV show causing an international incident by crossing into the DMZ, an area that is best known for the fact that people CAN'T go there. Even though I don't watch the Amazing Race, I figured this episode would be worth watching.

The teams arrived in Korea and it was raining, which, of course it was raining. The rainy season was abnormally long this year, and by abnormally long, I mean it rained for five straight months. We went weeks without seeing the sun. I thought my shoes would never dry. That weather was what I saw practically ever day from June to October.

On the drive to Seung-il Bridge, Nat or Kat complained that "most of the signs are completely devoid of any sort of English characters." An interesting observation since, in fact, ALL OF THE SIGNS are in English and Korean.

So, I understand why Amber told me the teams were rafting in the DMZ. The teams constantly referenced the DMZ and claimed to be in the DMZ or the DMZ area. I wonder how much of that was added for rating due to the recent tensions because, really, no. They weren't at the DMZ. They were rafting at a popular tourist destination. If the teams were in the DMZ, then so is Seoul. So am I.

Can we talk for a moment about how RIDICULOUS the third challenge (getting from Camp Casey to the World Cup Stadium) was. Like, seriously, they took the subway. The subway where every station is labeled in English. There was ONE transfer. The name of the station they were going to was WORLD CUP STADIUM STATION. How is that a challenge? If I only have to transfer once, I count it a win. Also, Jill and Thomas (the couple) kept sitting the seats reserved for the elderly or the handicapped. Seats that are clearly labeled as such in English and with pictures. I kept cringing because way to Waegukin Smash and give the rest of us a bad name, guys.

The Mokdong Ice Rink (home to the fourth challenge) is one of the two evacuation spots for Americans in Seoul should the Norks invade. The more you know....

I'm sad none of the groups opted for the Namdaemun challenge because Namdaemun is pretty awesome. It's also a lot more authentically Korean than an ice rink. Plus, I've had the ginseng tonic (the nurse at my school gives it to me whenever I'm sick) and it's not half bad.

I LOVED the shots of the teams trying to hail a taxi and failing. It's next to impossible to hail a taxi on the side of the road in Seoul You have to go to a taxi stop and wait in line.

The Pit Stop - the Temple of Heaven - is a super obscure location. I had never heard of it and according to Google, in 1968 the Westin Hotel was built on the site and the temple is now part of the hotel complex. It's essentially a knock-off of a Chinese temple build by the dying throes of Imperial Korea. There are so many better places that could have been chosen.

I enjoyed this episode, but I don't think I could watch the show on a regular basis. Too many of the contestants act like arrogant, entitled assholes and embodied every negative sterotype people have about Americans. When they were searching for the statue of the airplane at Hangang Park, Thomas gripped, "How does nobody know what an airplane is?" and I had to pause the show so I could shout, "I don't know, maybe because airplane is ENGLISH and you're in KOREA, jackass. Try asking for the 비행기, but wait, you don't speak in Korean. You just expect everyone to speak English." I might be overly sensative because I do live in Korea and know enough about the culture to notice when the contestants are overtly rude, but it was still a constant sorce of annoyance for the entire episode.

Colorful Daegu, Day 2

Daegu, Day 2 (which is technically day three, since we left on Friday and this is about Sunday, but a vacation doesn't start until you arrive). I woke up on Sunday as sore as a creaky old man, although I did figure out how to work all the extra gadgets in the shower, which was something. We checked out of the motel, bought our bus tickets back to Seoul, stored our luggage at the station and headed off to a different bus station to catch a bus to Haeinsa.

Haeinsa is the main temple of the Jogye Order, the primary order of Korean Buddhism, and home to the Tripitaka Koreana, the oldest complete version of the Buddhist canon. We had about four hours before we needed to be back in Daegu to catch our bus home, and we thought the bus to Haeinsa took an hour, giving us two hours at the temple. Turns out, the bus to Haeinsa took an hour and a half, a fact we learned only after we had been on the bus for an hour and still weren't there. We ended up having about 40 minutes to see the temple, and after the hike to Gatbawi, Margaret and I decided we weren't up for another forced march. Instead, we went and climbed on the rocks in the river.

I was disappointed - I have wanted to see Haeinsa since I got to Korea - but that's life and I wanted to not miss my bus back to Seoul more. We ended up making it back to the bus station with only a minutes to spare (literally; Korean buses leave on. time.), and that was with us begging our taxi drive to go 빨리빨리 (fast). That was the last bit of 빨리빨리 for the trip. We ran into a traffic jam full of leafers returning to Seoul and it was unfortunately close to midnight when we finally made it home.

I always forget how much I enjoy getting out of Seoul I always mean to travel more on the weekends, but usually, by the time the weekend rolls around and I'm weighing the relative merits of a trip versus sleeping in, I'm exhausted and cranky (the many flaws of my Friday classes, let me tell you about them), and sleeping tends to win out. It was a fun weekend and I'm glad I went.


Rest of the photos are here.

Colorful Daegu, Day 1

A few weeks ago, I went to Daegu for the weekend with some friends. Daegu is the fourth largest city in Korea and the only major city in Korea I had yet to visit. It's only 130 miles away from Seongnam (on the map, I live at the blue check while Daegu is the orange check), which is just a few hours by bus. One of the best things about travel in Korea is a) this country is small, about the size of Kentucky and b) almost everywhere has an express bus linking it to Seoul in just a few hours.

The plan was for Margaret, Veronica and I to meet at the bus terminal in Seongnam after school on Friday and buy our tickets, but when we arrived at 6:15, we discovered that Daegu was popular destination that weekend and consequently, the next several buses were sold out. The first bus could tickets for didn't leave until 8:10, meaning we wouldn't arrive in Daegu until close to midnight. Since we were free spirited ladies and wandering around the Daegu bus terminal at midnight trying to find a hotel didn't much sound like fun, we decided to pick a new destination for the weekend. We wrote down the name of all the cities with an express bus leaving from the bus terminal (including Daegu, because an hour and a half wasn't that long to wait) on pieces of paper. There were four cities with buses still leaving and three of us, so we each picked a slip of paper and decided to go to wherever the last piece of paper told us to go. The last bit of paper was Busan, the southernmost city on the peninsula. The next bus left at 8:00, just ten minutes before the bus to Daegu, but it would take us an extra two hours to get there.

We ended up going to Daegu. Fate, I can take a hint.

We pulled up in Daegu around 11:30 and set out in search of a love motel, which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like but, despite the seedy connotations, they are, hands down, the best deal when traveling. Love motels are everywhere - literally on every corner around bus and train stations - and while rooms can be rented in two hour blocks, they're also available for the night. Love motels are cheaper than hotels and even a basic love motel offers better accommodations than similarly priced hotel. Plus, you're almost guaranteed a fun and exciting light scheme. However, multiple beds are obviously not common and we had to visit four different motels before we found one with 방 하나, 침대 두개 (one room, two beds).


Missing from this picture are giant bathroom, creative lighting scheme and the tiny disco strobe lights. We looked at a few rooms that included a sauna, but went with the cheaper, sauna-less room.
Saturday morning we woke up, hit up a convenience store for breakfast and went to the Daegu Herbal Medicine Market. Before we reached the market, we stumbled upon Rice Cake Street. Seoul has these areas with a high concentration of shops all specializing in the same thing. There's no warming: one moment it's a perfectly normal street full of regular shops and then suddenly every shop in sight is selling shoe laces or socks or prosthetic limbs. Daegu is no different, it appears, and Rice Cake street, which dates back to the Korean War, has 37 different shops selling every possible variety of rice cakes. Rice cakes (떡, tteok) are "cakes" made from steamed glutinous rice flour. Because when I think of the word glutinous, I think delicious. There are tons of different types of rice cakes and they are part of many traditional Korean meals. Tteok has no actual relation to real cake, but I've been given many rice cakes in my time here because hey, it has cake in the name and foreigners like cake, right? I'm not a big fan, but it was neat to see the elaborate tteok creations the shops made.


Tteok
The Daegu Herbal Medicine Market, founded in 1658, is the oldest market in Korea. It's suppose to be one of the largest markets in Korea, but it was almost abandoned on Saturady morning. We only saw a couple of other people shopping and lots of the stores were closed. We did, however, see lots of ginseng and reindeer horns (good for stamina, heh heh heh) and bins full of what appeared to be bark (no doubt good for well-being, but please don't ask me how). We also stumbled upon the wholesale market, which was filled with sacks brimming with spices and herbs and bark and what I swear to God was twigs. Korea, I don't *understand* your mania about well-being. There were samgyetang (i.e. the soup with an entire damn chicken in the bowl) restaurants nestled between shops with antlers hanging in the windows. Veronica and I decided that breakfast samgyetang at 11:00 was an appropriate life choice, and while Margaret went to pick up her boyfriend Nick, we had an early lunch of chicken soup. 맛이 있어요!


Left: Jars of ginseng at Yangnyeongsi Herbal Medicine Market; Right: Bowl of samgyetang. Yes, that's a whole chicken in a bowl of soup for one person.
After lunch, we headed off to Palgongsan Provincial Park to hike to Gatbawi, a stone Buddha built in 638 AD. We were under the impression that it would be an easy hike. In Deagu, we were told it was an hour hike. Half an hour up and half and hour down, simple. When we got to Palgongsan, we were told it was an hour each way, not an hour total, but two hours is still a pretty basic hike. Over an hour later, when we finally reached Gwanamsa, a temple on the mountain, we were told that Gatbawi was at least another hour hiking up stone steps. All in all, it took us three hours to reach the summit and because the hill was so steep and steps were so uneven, it took us almost two hours to get to the base of the mountain. It was a pretty beautiful hike, though.



Top: Temple bell at Gwanamsa; Left: Main building at Gwanamsa; Right: Gatbawi. Gatbawi means Stone Hat Buddha because the 15cm thick flat stone atop the Buddha's head resembled a gat (갓), a traditional Korean hat.
When we finally made it back to Daegu, we were starving. The others wanted steak. I, while not begrudging their desire for steak, did not want steak. We all felt that, eh, you know, not sitting on the floor and eating with chopsticks might be groovy, and in downtown Daegu, the first combination of the three was an Outback Steakhouse. Again, 맛이 있어요 if, you know, a bit shameful.


The cheese fries are delicious, the onion rings are not and we were all a bit loopy by that point.
More photos are here.

A Korean Thanksgiving

My first Thanksgiving away from home, I spent the day blinking back tears and taught my classes through a tight throat before treking into Seoul for a turkey dinner with friends. This year, I figured the holiday would be easier if I just ignored it, and so I went to the dentist. I did call home the next morning (Korea is 14 hours ahead of the East Coast, so 8:00 my Friday morning was 6:00 Thursday evening back home), but I didn't even get dinner on Thanksgiving since my mouth was too numb from the dentist to chew.

I did, however, celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday with my Stitch n' Bitch group. We ordered a traditional dinner from Dragon Hill Lodge on the base and people brought additional dishes. We had turkey and potatoes and green bean casserole and walnut pie, which isn't quite pecan pie, but was closer that I expecting to get here. We opted not to go around in a circle and list what we were thankful for, but I am thankful. I'm thankful to have a job I enjoy. I'm thankful that I get to live in another country and I'm thankful that that country is Korea. I'm thankful I have friends to spend Thanksgiving with. I'm thankful that I'm here and healthy and happy.


Our hostess Caroline carving her first turkey. She did an excellent job.




Our Thanksgiving feast.