Later

So my seven month ESL saga in Korea is coming to an end.  I'm current sitting in the Incheon airport by my gate waiting for a flight to China (Guangzhou to be precise).  One neat thing about the Incheon airport is the free wifi in the place... makes spending time here not terrible.  Also, I found some Engrish in the bathroom.

Anyway, I'll probably be mentally processing everything during my very long flight that will supplant the Greyhound trip of Evil as the longest time traveling I've ever had.  If everything runs on time it will be something like 33-34 hours of time in planes and airports.  Thanks to the magic of time zones I believe I'll actually arrive in Tampa before I left Korea (assuming things run on time).  Incheon to Guangzhou to Los Angeles (my first time in California actually, second time in China if you count a night in Hong Kong) to Houston to Tampa.  I get the feeling it will be weird for me to be among so many... non-Asians again. I guess one perk is that people won't assume I speak a language that I don't... they'll assume I speak a language that I do indeed speak.

But yeah, it was fun.  Korea is an interesting place.  Has it ups and downs, plenty of cool people, plenty of not so cool people. So... kinda like every other place in that regard.  I've sat looking at the last two sentences for a few minutes and I can't think of anything else to say.  My brain isn't really working at normal capacity right now.  The only sleep I've gotten in the past 28-29 hours or so was a few minutes on the bus here.

Speaking of buses, I enjoyed a bizarre pseudo-car chase while I was getting to the bus.  I was being driven to the airport bus stop in the neighborhood but was a little late to make it at that stop... so we followed the bus to its next stop so I could get on there.  It was interesting... kinda amusing.  I'm pretty sleepy.  But hey, I have a billion hours on planes to sleep... by billion I mean like 25 or so over the course of my voyage.

I just got a great idea... going to look through some pictures and post random ones that I like and I'll ramble about something that might be loosely related to it.  Let's go!

So the one to the left is Gyeongbokgung (경복궁) Palace in northern Seoul.  A friend suggested I go there and told me that it's rarely open at night so being there then was fairly special.  Some of my pictures didn't turn out too badly given that I was taking low light pictures without a tripod.  Tried going there once before but it was closing so I guess it's neat that I managed to go.

The dude in question.

Also saw this dude:

He's King Sejeong (세정... I think).  That's within easy walking distance of Gyeongbokgung Palace and he's famous for... well... besides being a king... inventing Hangeul, the Korean writing system.  Coincidentally I went by his statue on... Hangeul Day... is that it's name?  That day Google also changed their main page to feature... Justin Bieber.  Not really... the Google logo was changed to feature the company's name written in Hangeul.

Gugeul.

Pretty neat... well... sure... yeah.... word... something.

Anyway, this went from me talking about leaving Korea to... me just writing stuff.  I think I'll watch something on my computer while I wait for this flight that's running late.  I wonder if Guangzhou has free wifi... I suspect LAX won't because... it's 'Merica.  Not really, it's just America.  Soooo... yeah... I might write something else for this when I get the chance... or I might not.  Who knows... I certainly don't.

So how was NARPI?

It was pretty fun actually.

For those outside the know, NARPI is the Northeast Asian Regional Peacebuilding Institute.  If the name isn't a hint, NARPI does pretty much the same thing I studied.

People from, mostly NE Asia came.  In no particular order, the represented countries were: South Korea, Japan, Mongolia, China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Canada, the US, India, and Russia.

This one didn't come out well....

I ended up taking the month of August off from teaching to work on NARPI stuff.  That NARPI stuff ended up being collecting flight information, helping people get to and from the airport, photography, and some media work.  Some of the photography can be found here and here (albums labelled "NARPI" are mine).  I say "some" because I took 2,968 photos over 14 days for an average of 212 photos a day.  If you include photos I took of Howard Zehr's lecture the weekend prior to NARPI, it's 3,005 pictures.  Of course some of the photos suck...

This could soooo be on a brochure.

Others were, if I say so myself, pretty awesome from a "this can go on a brochure!" perspective....

I love the shadow in this.

Meanwhile, others appeal to my amateurish artistic sense....  Trying to format this is getting a bit obnoxious.

Before anyone decides to be annoying about spelling... very few people at NARPI, staff included, were operating in their native language.  That is to say, English was often the second language for people who might not have had many chances to practice... or their third language.  So don't sweat the small stuff kids.

In the full-size picture you can pretty easily see the threads.

Some were of a spider outside the building I was staying in... I especially like the ones from when I saw a bug fly into its web...

Other pictures, were pretty amusing.  Though I think there might be some people who might hire some international assassin to come kill me if I post them so... I won't.  You know who you are.  Bwahahahahahahahaha.  I'm not sure if an evil cackle works when you already say you won't post take advantage of the leverage.  So... STAND IN THE WAY OF MY WORLD DOMINATION AND ALL SHALL KNOW OF YOUR DEEDS!  ... or something.

Hmm... what are some of the highlights of NARPI?  Went to the House of Sharing, a home for victims of sexual slavery during WWII.  That was, well... depressing.  That's a pretty blunt way of putting it but I can't say I can think of many positive ways to describe learning about that kind of stuff.  Maybe informative, educational, uhh... a thing we did.  We met three of the women who live there.  They were pretty interesting people.  One was quite vocal on her experience, another enjoyed the singing of NARPI participants (she also happened to know... I think 4 languages), and the last one to join us didn't really say much.

We also went to an observatory that was just inside the DMZ.  I still don't full understand the whole rule against taking pictures of North Korea.  Especially considering the presentation the soldiers at the observatory gave us featured a live feed from cameras a floor below us.  I won't post any pictures from there... mostly because we weren't really allowed to take pictures of anything interesting (North Korea).  Not that North Korea was really that interesting unless you just want a landscape picture.  The lens on my camera isn't nearly strong enough to take anything more detailed than that.

We also went into a tunnel the North built under the border.  Apparently South Korea managed to detect the tunnel and dug one of their own to intercept it.  The North Korean tunnel was pretty crude, according to our guide it was dug by explosive blasting.  South Korea's intercepting tunnel using some German drill and was comparatively more... well... tube-like.  But this was outside the tunnel....

The South is so protective of it's territory they even labelled it!

Hmm... a crazy Russian dude also stripped down to his briefs and went swimming in a river.  That was... well... unexpected.

Oh yeah... the first week was in Yeongdeung-po, an area of Seoul.  It was at the Hi Seoul! Youth Hostel, a city government ran hostel that was more like a hotel.  Minus the rotating groups of kiddies it was pretty nice.  First time in awhile I had sheets to sleep on.  But the other place, a venue just outside a village called Inje, was pretty epic.  It's the Korea DMZ Peace-Life Valley Education and Training Center.

It deserves a larger picture even if the formatting is messed up.

Except for the need to hand wash laundry it was absolutely perfect.

What else can I say?  The people that came to NARPI were pretty cool (Otna eallyra... ustja iddingka!).  Yes, I did just do that.

Seriously my brain isn't really doing much right now.  Any questions?

So... vacation plans

Fighting zombies, hopefully, will not be something I will be doing.

I may or may not have a vacation plan for my week of vacation.  This is next week mind you... the week of August 3.  So I was wondering... with no promises of actually doing something suggested, what are some things you, my handful of known and anonymous readers, would like me to do?  This can be something specific (ex: eat 50 hotdogs) or a vague goal (ex: eat hotdogs).  Please leave your comments below.

P.S. Keep it PG.

So... it's been awhile....

Yes I know it's been a long time.  By long time I mean almost three months.  Geez I hope my blog's popularity hasn't dropped.  Can't afford to lose my Iranian readers... or something.

Here's some quick updates... went to the DMZ, at least an observatory on the South Korean side of it, not inside.  Bought a souvenir turtle (made of stone) there.  Named the souvenir turtle (made of stone), Deemz.  Deemz the souvenir turtle (made of stone) is currently sitting above my desk.

iPod picture so the quality isn't that great.

I've also gone to Namsan Tower which, if you've been to other similar towers, is remarkably similar to that.  One of the beliefs associated with Namsan is that if you and your beau or belle lock a... lock... to the fence there your relationship will be eternal.  Fittingly, you see a lot of couples there.  Ironically, a decent number of locks are combination locks.

Hmm... what else have happened.  New teachers are at the 학원 now.  With two teachers leaving next month we have the full teaching staff for the X amount of time until our contracts end.  Between those departures and the transition of a long-term part-time teacher/part-time NGO worker to full-time latter, I'll become the most senior of the teachers.  That's kinda scary isn't it?


This past weekend there was the Boryeong Mud Festival.  Boryeong is here:

View Larger Map

There will be mud.

It was pretty fun.  The mud attractions covered about an acre of space... not enough for the however many people were there.  Tons of GIs.  Certainly pretty foreigner heavy, but there were still a decent number of Koreans there.  The thing in the background of that picture is a slide.  There was also the beach, which was similarly crowded.


I went there with the hagwon where I've started Korean lessons (Hi CLS, Jiyeon, Amy, Eun Young, Hyo Jung, and the various Noonas).  My class, B, is the second _______________ (fill in the blank: lowest OR highest OR antidisestablishmentarianism) class at CLS.  My hagwon (the one I work at), has 5 teachers learning Korean there.  Go figure.


Interestingly, Firefox's dictionary tells me "antidisestablishmentarianism" is spelled incorrectly.


I've been debating this identity question.  One of my possible pursuits in Korea that I envisioned was a search for my birth parents but I've started the question whether I care about answering it.  Will it change anything about me?  I doubt it.  Will it give me more insight into who I am?  I'm going to say no.  Will I learn more about where I'm from?  Probably.  But do I care about that?  Meh.  Considering how much I've changed in the past 5 years I don't imagine what my birth parents were/are like is relevant to who I am.  Besides, I tend to dwell on the past enough as it is... I don't really care to pointlessly worry about something else about my past.


Speaking of possible pursuits... perhaps graduate school?  Who knows.  There are some programs taught in English here and tuition here seems to be lower than in the US... though cost of living might be an issue.  Research will have to be done.


Anyway, I'll cya in three months.


I'm kidding.  Maybe.

Now that we can all stop worrying about terrorism...

... we should move on to the important issues.  Like fan death.  A fairly common belief in Korea is the existence of this phenomenon where having a fan on, in a room where the door(s) and window(s) are closed, while sleeping can lead to death.

This isn't a picture of a fan in my apartment (I've been forgetting to take a picture of it) but fans in Korea tend to come with these timers so you can set it before you go to sleep so you will reduce the likelihood of death by fan.

This isn't a belief held by a few people, but a widely held fact.  Some of my students, when I've mentioned I've slept with a room while just asking for fan death and have obviously survived (unless of course I'm Bruce Willis and everyone else is Haley Joel Osmont) they have been fairly surprised.

Here is a Korean news report on a fan death incident... obviously it's in Korean so... yeah.  I think you'll understand who the alleged murderer is when the camera acts like it's hiding from the killer.


Those brave reporters tempted the wrath of the dreaded fan.  From what I've heard, especially in the summer, there will be several stories on the news about the death of someone caused by a fan.  Korea can build smart phones, ships, cars, and various other pieces of technology but still reports on the physically impossible phenomenon of fan death.

I also found a video taken by an expat who talks to a few Koreans on the subject.


A Wikipedia article on the subject identifies some odd explanations for fan death.  These range from changes in air pressure to hypothermia to the cutting of oxygen molecules.

Does anyone know of any other strange widely held beliefs, from anywhere, that are hugely illogical?

So I guess I'm doing requests now? Sort of? Let's end sentences with question marks?

So a fan was wondering what the eats are like.

Generally I eat lunch, during the week, at work where people volunteer to cook lunch for the staff.  So has ranged from a Texas Chainsaw Massacred Denver Omelet (a.k.a. scrambled eggs with stuff in it) and fried potatoes (I promise nobody died when I cooked) to Kimchi Jjigae (김치찌개, a kimchi soup) to Burritos.  It was actually pretty amusing to see Koreans make Burritos... one of my roommates just balled it all up, and told us not to look when people noticed.

In the Gangnam area, where I work, there's a decent amount of food that fits a Western palate.  Like... Popeye's Chicken, Subway, Starbucks, McDonald's, Burger Hunter, Taco Rico, Dublin (a pub/restaurant) and some others.  Korean food, while it has a deserved reputation for spice, has a pretty solid array of foods that lack it.  Donkass (똔깟?) is fried pork, Bossam (보쌈) is steamed pork, and Samgyubsal (삼겹살) is grilled pork.  Donkass is actually Japanese but seems to have endeared itself in Korea.  And yes Koreans do love pork.


Pork aside, there's a decent array of food and I don't imagine it would be terribly hard for someone to find stuff he or she likes here.  Though, it doesn't seem to take very long until you're a bit numb to spice.  I had something with Tabasco in the sauce... it was tangy.  I guess it could be that there just wasn't much in it.


Street food is kinda interesting.  Go to 3:45.





The first item, which he mispronounces, can be romanized Tteokbokki (떡볶이) was voted the most popular street food by expats in a recent-ish survey.  Sundae (순대) isn't too bad... but it's still blood sausage.  I had a somewhat humorous encounter in a class with Sundae.  Myself and another teacher were playing a take on Pictionary and one of the words, Sundae as in ice cream, was misinterpreted as blood sausage.

A street food staple not found in the video is Odeng (오뎅), it's... kinda like Spam but fish instead of ham.  I can't say it's my favorite food but it's not terrible.  I don't think I need to discuss Bundaegi anymore.


For someone in search of something pretty benign there's always Kimbap (김밥).  Think California Rolls with some fish (cooked) or some other meat.  It comes in a pretty wide range so yeah.  There's also the standard fare that people are usually aware of, Bibimbap (비빔밥), and Bulgogi (불고기).  I'm kinda tired of listing foods already.

So...

For the picky ex-roommate there's a bit of news I know you'd appreciate... pretty much every restaurant will either place a jug of filtered water on your table or have some self-service filtered water.

Pictures!

So I posted some pictures of my life in Seoul on Facebook.  If you can't see them it can be discussed.  I'm hesitant to use my Picasa for it because of the limited storage space.

Splitting Hairs and Cultural Imperialism

Yeah I know it's not the best picture.

Important things first.  I gave myself a haircut for the first time.  I think the motivation came as a combination of wanting to be cheap and seeing one of my roommates doing it.  Admittedly he has a much simpler haircut than mine... not that mine is complex.

I think a part is slightly shorter than the opposite side but two of my Korean roommates don't think so.  Maybe I'm just paranoid... or maybe it is and I'm still paranoid.

As I work on this a female coworker (I trust her opinion more than my roommates') stopped by and said it looked good.  Mission accomplished!

Disclaimer:  Not all Koreans are like this.

You know it's good when it starts with a disclaimer.

Moving on to the subject of cultural imperialism.  From what I've seen and heard from expat friends, Korean culture has some not too nice parts to it.  Specifically, this ugliness is in the treatment of strangers.  Early in my stay here it was explained to me that Koreans (especially more old school ones) see Westerners and wonder why they're so friendly to strangers and cold to their friends.  A less charitable characterization that I've taken to using is, Koreans view people on the street as obstacles rather than people.  This is more an issue with the ajumas and ajushis, the women and men in their 40s-50s, I suspect it's because they're old enough to be fairly high in the age hierarchy but not so old they can't push someone a bit.  For instance... I was told a story about how a friend's fiancee, while she was getting out of a seat on the subway, was grabbed by an ajuma and pulled up.  Or those people who stand in the doorway to a subway car and, by doing so, block your attempt to get on the train.  Not because there is no room mind you... but because they want to stand by the door.

Hmm....  There's the standard of feminine beauty that is pre-feminist movement America with modern technology and fashion.  That is to say, there are billions of ads for plastic surgery, very high standards for how women dress (I've been told some women wear heels when they hike) that aren't mirrored for men, and a image of what an attractive woman should be that is remarkably shallow:  Cute and docile.

For the sake of fairness, compared to older generations the modern Korean woman is much more likely to have a meaningful career.  Is this a male dominated society?  Yes.  Has it been getting better?  It seems so.  Does it have a long way to go before it's even to the standard of the US?  Definitely.  Not all Korean women fall within the older expectation of what they should be like and there are those who fight against it.  One of my students mentioned a feminist rally where women walked down the street smoking (apparently it's a bit of a taboo for women to walk while smoking).  He disagreed with it... because it involved smoking... and he's a doctor.

One thing I saw in the Philippines that bothered me a lot was the presence and use of skin whitening products.  While they don't seem as common here, there is still whitening makeup available here and on some occasions I've seen people skin that looked a shade or two too white (and on one person you could see where the makeup stopped).  As a brown person who grew up in Caucasian neighborhoods, that REALLY bothers me.  To be perfectly frank I'll go ahead and say it... the American image of a beautiful person is, more often than not, white.  It has been getting better with the rise of various attractive celebrities of color but I wouldn't call it fixed.  To come to the other side of the world, to the place of my birth, and find that people use whitening makeup to make themselves beautiful makes me wish to use language that would prevent my niece from reading this blog.

This post is getting bigger than I expected.  It's 2:14 a.m. right now so it's a bit late but I will soldier on... I can always sleep on the weekend right?  Anyway....

Korea is extraordinarily homogenous.  I went to the CIA World Factbook to pull their data on the racial demographics of Korea and found:

homogeneous (except for about 20,000 Chinese)

So yeah.  I think Asia gets away with racism more than most other places.  In Korea, it probably helps that there isn't really anyone to complain about it.  When I've had conversations with friends about dating between Koreans and foreigners the hierarchy is something like: 1. Korean 2. Caucasian.  After that it sounds like it's pretty much a list of light skin to dark skin.  I suspect Japanese and Chinese are lower than their skin tone would normally place them considering the history between the countries.

Before I continue I think another disclaimer bomb would be nice here.  Not all Koreans are like that.  This is a problem with traditional households who, by the way I'm characterizing them, sound like the Korean version of the Tea Party... the Green Tea Party!  Wow that's a horrible joke.

There are some problems with borderline xenophobia.  By that I mean restaurants/bars/clubs that won't permit foreigners.  Awhile back, before I came to Korea, my fellow foreigner roommate went to a restaurant with a Korean friend.  Another day when he went with another foreigner they weren't allowed to enter, presumably because they didn't have a Korean with them.  For some of these places it might just be a reaction to negative encounters with foreigners.  I've heard some places near/in Itaewon won't allow foreigners to enter so, given Itaewon's reputation, the negative encounter theory probably has some weight to it.

So before I sign off for tonight and I'll leave you with one more wonderfully uplifting thought.  I've been told that people who visit Korea love it here and people who live here end up hating it.  Interestingly, I remember someone saying almost the exact same thing about Boston.

Later.

Hmmm time for ketchup.

I made a pun!

But on a not so serious note it's been awhile eh?  Last Friday was my first Korean lesson; between that class and studying Hangul I can, with some patience, read Korean.  I don't really know what I'm reading most of the time but yeah... my pronunciation of some characters can be kinda iffy still but yeah.  Apparently most Koreans don't pronounce some of those characters differently anyway.

On Saturday I met Pres. Obama...

Though he seemed kinda inanimate!  Because he was wax.  This was at a place called the 63 Building on Yeouido Island on the Han River.  Went to dinner with a friend and then to another friend's house... ate chicken....  Koreans really seem to love their chicken.  Like.. a lot.

Today (Tuesday for me) I cooked lunch for the office and... it seemed to be a success.  Denver scrambled eggs (Denver omelettes would be too difficult to cook for a dozen people at one on a 4 burner stove) and some fried rosemary potatoes.  Wish I had more potatoes but had the exact amount of eggs necessary for the people at the office at the time so it went well.  Hopefully nobody wakes up tomorrow puking their dinners.  But I'll go ahead and fly the mission accomplished banner now.

I also managed to get a phone.  I tried to get one yesterday but the timing and limit options given to E-2 visa holders didn't mix well yesterday.  Had much better luck today... obviously.  Hmm... what else?  In two days I hit the one month mark

Anyway....

End of Month 1

It hasn't really been a month in Korea but my first round of classes have finished.

Some things I haven't mentioned before... because I'm absentminded.

My normal day-to-day expenses are usually pretty low... if I wanted to really kick it into saving mode I can spend about ₩2,000 a day during the week to cover my transportation costs and eating lunch and dinner at the office instead of a restaurant.  Right now Google is telling me that's about $1.81.

The area my hagwon (학원, the school/academy/place where theoretically learning occurs) is Gangnam (alternatively romanized as Kangnam, 강남) and includes some major financial buildings and a swanky shopping area makes me feel hugely underdressed.  Actually, I'm pretty sure I've mentioned this before but yeah... jeans and a t-shirt don't really fit in with suits.  When it warms up I'll start wearing shorts and all will be well.

Seoul is huge.  Well... with approximately 24.5 million people (thanks Wikipedia) to think Seoul would be small would be pretty silly of me.  On Sunday I went to Hongdae (홍대, romanized as Hongik University on subway maps) via car and came back to Seongnam (성남, where I happen to live) took something in the neighborhood of 1.5 hours.  Though, my wonderful iPod application, Jihachul, estimates the trip at about an hour... I don't think it calculates waiting time for transfers well.  But yeah... Seoul is big.

Anyway... I haven't posted many pictures.  I should start posting more pictures in the nearish future... hopefully, now that I have a way to take pictures of things I see in my daily life without having to carry my camera.  For special outings I'll probably stick to the camera because of the high quality pictures.

I've learned so much about English grammar from this job.  Last night two of my roommates and I discussed the use of "would," "have," and "would have."  Crazy stuff.  I've been learning more here than when I was supposed to be learning this stuff.

And with that... good night.

Thanks Immigration

Today I went to the immigration office about an hour away from my school to apply for my alien ID card and was almost turned away.  Luckily, I had left the paperwork from my adoption at the office so they were able to fax some of the documents needed to prove my naturalization and name change.  Despite this, they still require that I complete some additional paperwork officially renouncing my Korean citizenship... which I don't think I have... but yeah... it's kinda bizarre.

Hopefully my ID arrives in the 10 days or so the internet tells me it will take to process so I can open a bank account and get a cellphone... I'm kinda debating what kind of phone I want, a smart or normal phone.  We shall see.  What is complicating it is that I want to get an iPod which has some redundant capabilities with smart phones.

Let's see... what else... the T-Money card we use to pay for public transportation is extraordinarily useful.  Besides the shops in the subways (lotion stores, clothing, convenience stores, shoes, music, food, etc.) there are some other institutions that accept it, notably: cabs and McDonald's.

I'm sleepy... this time because I was only able to sleep for about 2 hours last night.  I'm surprised I haven't passed out yet.  I would say I'm about to go to sleep but I have no idea.

P.S. I was invited to someone's birthday tomorrow... I guess it's kinda far away so I'm not 100% on whether I'll go.  Maybe I'll just stop by to say hello.

Midnight Steamed Pork... well... 12:30am.

So yeah... I have some awesome/strange/bizarre/amazing roommates.  We just destroyed a plate of steamed pork that a couple of them decided we needed.  Tasty stuff.  Oh and it seems the romanization of its Korean name is Bossam (보쌈), steam pork wrapped in lettuce or sesame leaves (thanks Wikipedia).

A couple extra notes before I tend to my teeth and go to sleep.  Next week I start my Korean lessons... I haven't met my teacher yet but I've already been assigned some homework, I'll have to memorize Hangul.

Hangul is organized pretty logically... each character (for example: 댱, and no I don't know if that says anything so if it's offensive, my bad) is actually a cluster of characters, in this case three (ㄷ ㅑ and ㅇ).  The pronunciation is left to right and then top to bottom.  Each cluster forms a single syllable, so words in Hangul make it pretty obvious how many syllables are in the word.  And I discovered how to type in Hangul on my Mac so I'm pretty happy about that.

So what else has happened... my health check has come back.  I'm normal in the various things they tested.  I told my Korean coworker who translated it for me that it was the first time in awhile anyone has called me normal.

Night.

Have some confidence. Now with original photos (no promises on the originality of the original photos).

No this isn't alcohol. It's a vitamin/energy drink with a fantastic name.  There was another drink I had over the weekend that is probably a bit more well known among travelers to Asia for its bizarre and rather nasty name...

Pocari Sweat isn't nearly as bad as its name implies.  Think Gatorade/Powerade and you have Pocari Sweat.

Meanwhile...

Bundaegi (번데기) is hugely vile.  I will eat the evil that is Durian before I eat this stuff again.  It's silkworm pupae... and just... nasty.  It certainly doesn't help that pieces will get stuck in crevices of your mouth and pop loose to unleash the flavor again once you think it's all gone.

Since we're on the subject of food.  Chinese-Korean fusion food is pretty popular here... and tastes better than in the US.  I've also had the opportunity for some more traditional Korean meals (both in content and style).

This was much tastier than Bundaegi... considering how much I despise Bundaegi you could say I enjoyed this meal about ∞ times more.  This was about half of what was on the table.  And yes we were sitting on the floor... and yes my legs did fall asleep.

An interesting note about meals in Korea.  You'll usually only be given a spoon and a pair of chopsticks (metal ones... I've been told Korea is the only place that widely uses metal chopsticks).  Though my experience from my first night in Korea would imply that at least some places keep forks around for the foreigners for whom metal chopsticks may be difficult.

Most food in Korea, and presumably much of east Asia, is prepared in way where knives are unnecessary.  On the occasion that you need to cut some food in Korea... they'll give you a pair of scissors.  It actually seems to be easier than using a knife, at least in most cases.

So I also went to a preseason baseball game between the SK Wyverns (Incheon, red) and the Doosan Bears (Seoul, white).  For those who missed one of my past posts, the names of Korean baseball teams feature sponsors rather than geographical locations.  In this case, both SK and Doosan are big conglomerates that do a bit of pretty much everything.  Anyway, the home team (Doosan Bears) lost 5-1 and generally just didn't play very well.

At a couple points, where it looked like Doosan might put something together (I was sitting on the Doosan side, you can see the SK fans on the far side in the picture) it would get surprisingly loud for a preseason game with a 1/3 full stadium.

There was a St. Patrick's Day festival in Insadong (an area of Seoul with some traditional goods/restaurants, one pictured above, popular with foreigners) on Saturday.  I think every non-Korean in the country went there.  It's so strange to see that many obvious non-Koreans.

It proved to just be pretty obnoxious.  A bunch of people partaking in "traditional" methods of celebrating St. Patty's Day.  So yeah... I ended up walking into the one half block of negative American stereotypes in the whole of Seoul... outside Itaewon at least... I almost don't want to go there.

So now for some random notes that I don't think I've already mentioned.  My name, Jared, is kinda awkward for Koreans to say because Korean words end with vowels.  What seems to be the common, more comfortable, Korean pronunciation of my name is something to the effect of Jehraadu (three syllables).  My attempt to transliterate it isn't really making me happy because the "raa" part sounds more like a halfway between a "R" and "L" sound that I don't know how to write.

I don't think KFC uses the original recipe here.  A couple of the guys grabbed KFC at the baseball game and there was some red spices in the chicken (think kimchi spices).  Though I don't know if that's their default chicken or something else.  Chicken is very popular here... chicken and pork.  One of the phrases I learned relatively early on (thanks to my roommates) was "han maree" (again, I don't trust my transliteration skills), "one bird"... for ordering chicken.

It's almost bedtime so good night people.

Edit:  I forgot about Bill Cosby!

St. Patty's Day

So St. Patty's Day was kind of boring.  Well... it was a Thursday... a night where my last class ends at 9:45pm.  So not much was done other than hanging out a little with my Korean roommates who, for obvious reasons, don't really observe St. Patrick's Day traditions.

Supposedly the Irish Embassy is putting on a St. Patrick's event this weekend so we'll see.

Later.

About the pictures and some random things I haven't mentioned.

So yeah there's been a distinct lack of pictures.  Sorry about that.  I'll try to carry my camera around a bit more than I have and hopefully I'll be posting some pictures of the neighborhood I live in, the one I work in, and the apartment... maybe the office.  Last weekend I had the opportunity to make use of it on my bike ride but I didn't have it on me... thought I was just going to see a movie with the roomie.

Anyway... earlier today I asked one of my classes why Koreans might think I look younger than I am... apparently a contributing factor is the length of my hair.  Korean students (primary and secondary) will have short hair like mine.  Most young adult Korean males have longer hair than me... Bieber length-ish... I think I'll start a new unit of hair measurement... the Bieber.  Maybe I should grow my hair out some?  If I do... that will be such a huge break from tradition.  Now I'm imagining my Dad shouting "Tradition!" in an allusion to Fiddler on the Roof....  But yeah... I don't remember the last time I wore my hair longer than a couple inches unless I was just putting off a haircut.  This will require some thought.

I'm also a few days into my plan to totally corrupt the Korean language.  I'm in the habit of saying "천만에요" (chun man e yo, you're welcome) in response to my Korean coworkers saying anything in Korean I don't understand... which is everything.  This of course leads to many bizarre conversations.  Maybe you should try to respond to comments with "you're welcome" and see what kind of response you receive.

Speaking of corruption... I introduced my roommate to Justin Bieber tonight.

This weekend I believe there's a plan for a bunch of us to get together and go to a free preseason baseball game.  No idea who is playing but it sounds like a lot of teams incorporate sponsors into their names (SK Wyverns, Samsung Lions, Kia Tigers, etc.).  Maybe I can be a hipster and complain about them selling out?

I need to wake up early so later.

Midnight Fried Chicken

Not the chicken consumed tonight.

One of the roomies decided to lobby for fried chicken paid for by the communal house fund.  So we had fried chicken at midnight.

Yesterday (Sunday night) some of us went to this cool all-you-can-eat shellfish place.  It was about 14,000 won (about $14) for oysters, clams, crab, scallops, shrimp, and some other shellfish I couldn't name.  It was good... kinda expensive... but tasty.  I don't think something like that would happen in the US... at least not served like that.  We cooked it ourselves on a hibachi-ish grill at the table.  I haven't started throwing up yet so I think I'm safe.

I guess I haven't posted anything terribly relevant to my teaching.  I'll be teaching 5 classes this month.  The planning for each class isn't that bad.  We have a syllabus... Korean TV is distracting and weird... anyway... that outlines the content requirements and we're given a fair amount of freedom when it comes to specifics so it's not terribly difficult to make it work.  As far as planning is concerned I still have a bit of trouble gauging time usage... I tend to either plan too many things or too few but I guess that comes with experience.

Bit of a language warning here... so... Riley don't watch this... or else I'll be a bad uncle.


I bring this up because earlier today I had a class listen to a The Times They Are A-Changin' by Bob Dylan.  It was interesting... I underestimated the difficulty they would have with it but oh well... live and learn.  One of my students suggested I use an artist they're more familiar with... like Jason Mraz... I'm not sure how I feel like knowing my culture and language being represented by Mraz... at least it isn't Bieber.  Speaking of Bieber... I don't think I've met, face to face, a Canadian until this job... in South Korea... crazy right?


The ages of my students range from someone who I think is in college to a few who are in the 40s-50s range, the largest class is all of three people and my smallest is a one-on-one.  So far the biggest challenge is engaging with students, not so much teaching them vocabulary or grammar.

Some interesting culture notes... Koreans don't really people watch on the subway, they are either doing something with some piece of technology (tablets, iPods, phones, etc.) or just staring at nothing in particular.  I know this because I people watch.  Young Korean men might also carry purses... I guess that's something where the gender divide is pretty irrelevant... which is strange considering how Korea isn't the most progressive of countries when it comes to gender roles.  Manpurses aside, I've noticed young Koreans are very fashionable... think of me at my best dressed... now think of someone even better dressed being a seomwhat regular sight.  I was talking to my roomie/fellow teacher about it and apparently Korean men enjoy a looser dress standard in social settings.  That is to say, you're more likely to find a really casually dressed Korean man than a similarly dressed Korean woman.  Yesterday, the same day as my seafood trip, I went out wearing a blue t-shirt, GMU hoodie (I've been representing the GMU a lot lately), black running pants, and flip flops and nobody seemed to care.  Though I guess wearing flipflops was kind of weird.  I haven't seen a young Korean woman dressed in anything nearly as bizarre or casual as that.  The closest examples still seem to have fairly apparently time put into their appearance.  I suspect this mostly affects the younger generations because I get the feeling older Koreans don't care what anyone thinks.

Anyway, it's 1:00 am... time to sleep.

So it's been a few days....

So I haven't updated in a couple days.  Teaching continues.

Last night (Friday night for me) I saw what Gangnam looked like at night... kinda crazy.  Tons of people, full restaurants and everything.  And the occasional white guy walking down the street drinking.

Oh and my attempt at completing the required Korean medical check failed miserably as, this month, the office that handled it at Seoul Medical Center moved to another location.  All this means is that I'm 1800 won poorer and will need to make another trip next Friday when I have time.

Today was an aborted trip to the movies; replaced by talking with friends at a coffee shop, a ride on a rented bike (3000 won) along a river.  It was kinda cold out but the hoodie, shorts and flip flops combination held up through it.  That ride was followed by a group dinner with the coworkers at the apartment.  As it turns out, one of my roommates is a pretty solid cook.

Yeah this isn't my best writing ever.

In other news there was an earthquake off the coast of Japan that spawned a tsunami.  I imagine you've heard something about it.  The images we're getting on the news are pretty terrible and I believe it does without saying that I my best wishes extend to Japan.

I haven't noticed any tremor in Seoul and haven't heard of anything happening in Korea related to the earthquake or tsunami.  A wave map I saw would seem to indicate that the southern part of Korea might have experienced some waves but I haven't heard of any hitting.  Earlier, KBS (Korean Broadcasting System... maybe Service) played a story that seemed to be a piece that, to sum it up, was an explanation of what might have happened if the quake was on the west coast of Japan.

Anyway, later.

First Class!

About 10 and a half hours ago I had my first class!  The promise of small class sizes really held true... the largest class I'll have this month is a class of three.  It was just an introduction so it wasn't anything intense.  Though I found that I should have included another activity... only have two people meant I burned through the three I had planned pretty fast.  I also met one of the classes I'll be taking over next week, a writing class.

I've noticed that because my technical knowledge of English isn't particularly outstanding there's more than a few occasions where I know there's an error but can't seem to express why... I'm told they understand because it's true for them and Korean.

Speaking of Korean, I've had my first introduction to Hangul and it seems pretty easy once I get the sounds down.  My first attempt to pronounce a Korean word (tree, I think the romanization is something like namoo) ended up being dead on.

Sorry for the lack of pictures... been pretty busy.  Last night I came home at around 10:30pm and tonight it was around 9:20pm so right now my days are pretty long.  Hopefully tomorrow I will have some more pictures... my schedule includes a tour of the area the school is located.  It's just off a business/financial district among a bunch of bars and restaurants... next door to a place called the Jelly Hotel... they call it a love hotel and I don't think that's entirely a joke.

Anyway... I'm kinda tired... I need to stay up to finish dealing with my laundry but I don't feel like typing anymore.  Later.

P.S. Canadians are surprisingly normal.

Day 2

It's the end of day 2 and I think I might actually be experiencing jetlag... it's kinda new to me.  It's not so much being tired as it is the combination of the effect of bad fish on the plane and some body aches that are messing me up.  At both lunch and dinner I felt pretty queasy.

In other less self-pity related news I finished the plan for my first class tomorrow, the introduction class.  Normally Monday would have been the first day but my arrival didn't really time well with that possibility.  It's just a simple introduction with icebreaker style activities so nothing too intense.  I guess my orientation is a bit rushed because of the timing so it's been moving faster for me than it has for other teachers.

I found out in Korea I'm considered 24.  Koreans start counting age at conception and the Lunar New Year increases your age.  Meaning, at birth you're a year old and each time the Lunar New Year rolls around you're bumped up one.

Anyway, I want sleep.  I hope I feel better in the morning.

So I'm here.

I'm in Seoul now... as indicated by the picture... because I narrate the obvious.

So the flight was long but it's hard to get around that when you're flying to the other side of the planet.  Contrary to what I believed would happen and consistent with my short history of international travel I didn't sleep much on the plane.  I'm estimating about 6 hours of sleep between Saturday morning until now.  But I did watch:  The Social Network, Tangled, Easy A (I regret watching this), Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking: Time Travel, and another movie or two my mind isn't recalling.  One weird thing I noticed was that the movies were preceded by a short Korean Air commercial (in case you forgot what airline you're on?) that featured quite a bit of Japanese art... which is odd.

When I arrived at the Incheon airport I was pretty happy just looking out the windows and when I eventually made it through immigration and customs I was picked up by Yoon-seo.  Korean drivers are kind of crazy... I probably won't bother with an international driver's license... and I'll have to be careful on the sidewalks too, scooters can be found driving on them.

We went from the airport to the office where about 3 consecutive elevator loads led to handshakes (two hands and a short bow to show respect) and when I eventually reached the office I went out to dinner at a Chinese-Korean fusion place across the street.  The waitress felt sorry for me and gave me a fork... which I didn't use out of pride.  Then a pair of wooden chopsticks, which I reluctantly used to replace the smooth more formal chopsticks.  Defeat by noodle.

Anyway, everyone's cool.  I guess there was some excitement about seeing a new face around.

On the way to the apartment we stopped by a grocery store where I bought this cereal.  It just looked like the most amusing... though the weird turtle-ish thing was pretty competitive.  It's a little blurry but I'm too tired to walk to the kitchen to retake the picture.  The digs are kind of spartan but sufficient.  And I need sleep.  Tomorrow I work on preparing and Wednesday I am unleashed to teach English.

It's alive!

So the blog is once again alive.

Right now it's 2:00am, earlier today (or yesterday I guess) my passport arrived in the mail complete with the desired visa. When I turned to the visa there was this note attached, as seen in the picture to your left. Some might have already seen me comment on this on my Facebook. So apparently I need to be sure I'm not forced into military service by filling out some paperwork when I get there.

In other news, a couple days ago I found out international video calls on Skype were free... and it would seem I was the only one who didn't know. With that in mind, and making what I believe to be a safe assumption that my apartment (3 other guys live there now) will have wifi, I might be able to pull off Skype tours of what will soon to be my abode.

I've been thinking about what purpose this blog will serve. Is there something specific I want it to address in the context of my experience in South Korea? Perhaps my own exploration of my heritage and personal history, examining my attempt(s) to grasp Korean culture as an outsider, my time as a conversational English teacher, or just whatever I happen to feel like writing about. I suspect it will end up more like the latter with healthy doses of me just rambling.

But on the subject of my personal history.... Awhile back, after I originally accepted this position. I asked my father to mail me whatever documents he had on my adoption which he prompted obliged. I waited until tonight to actually read it and discovered, with the help of Google, that the adoption agency and orphanage I was placed in at the ripe old age of 10 days still exists at the same address in Seoul. So that is probably a place I will end up visiting. The documents, while they do not include the names of my biological parents, do name case workers and foster parents. I don't really know whether that's something I want to explore. Not necessarily for any negative reason... just that the same set of documents seem to indicate I was transported to the US in July of 1988 making me about a month and change.

Anyway, tomorrow I'll be in DC for the night and on Sunday I'm off to Seoul... and hopefully not military service.