1 Inch of Snow

*** New Photos are up in "South Korea II" and "Korea III" ***

Tantalizing times abound in the Far East and the absent-minded author broke a pledge to have photos up for you— whoops. Every day, 17 hours ahead of his friends and family he wakes up, and sets forth to find and explore something new, not unlike a modern Marco Polo—you know, like if Marco Polo taught English to little kids and spent a lot of time avoiding his beloved blog. But like summer, he has come back to shed more light upon you (summer will come back right?). So having no noodles to share as Mr. Polo did, the rambling writer has instead tales so incredible, unbelievable and downright unimaginable he shall not even attempt nor endeavor to communicate them through this clumsy and awkward medium known as the written word. Instead he shall tell you stories of a lesser quality, so ready yourself for a few stories instead so credible, believable and downright imaginable; prepare yourself to be bored out of your mind but at least this former part-time model has updated within a week’s time!

A few weeks ago I was invited to go to a temple with my friends David and Abby (who spent Christmas in Paris—lucky them). I invited my buddy Alex, a name which all too many of my friends have had, and we set off to meet them at Jogyesa Temple in the Insadong/Jongno area which is the main Buddhist temple located within the confines of Seoul. I hear that it’s quite the scene on Buddha’s birthday. Well we found our way there but David and Abby who had arrived before us were eating and we decided to explore a bit on our own. We found a whole lot of people all gathered in the main courtyard with bags of kimchi that they then started loading onto the trucks. I found out later from David and Abby that the people had been making the kimchi right there in the cold—and kicked myself for not getting there earlier to witness the making of one of my favorite foods that this wonderland has to offer me—at every meal.

 I was eventually approached by a tour guide (in training), who had spectacular English, located Alex and we began a tour of the temple grounds. We were soon joined by David and Abby and saw and learned a bundle about Buddhism that we would not have known otherwise, except Abby who apparently took a class on it and is totally an expert. Our guide explained the paintings on the outside of the temple with great detail and while I knew that there were many similarities between Buddhism and Christianity, I was stunned to realize how many there were. Both the Buddha and Christ were tempted by demons, preformed miracles, their fathers were gods, they both were teachers, and both had large followings of disciples. All things I suppose I knew already but it was still so vivid to see it all within the context of the murals at a temple with a guide explaining it to us who I think had little knowledge of Christianity himself. Another interesting tidbit was an explanation of the drums and giant bells which are used to start and end every day—which went back to see and were not disappointed. One is for all the land animals, one for the sea creatures, one for the birds and flying creatures and one for all the human souls stuck in hell. I wasn’t aware that Buddhism had a hell, good to know. Anyway, there should be video of the drumming and I would advise you to check it out.

Christmas was good; my mother sent me medicine (thank you!) and anyone else who wishes to send gifts may do so… ha. I spent Christmas Eve working (bah humbug!) and then went to my friend Dan’s house (of Seoul Eats fame) and had turkey and all the fixins’ all prepared by the army base here in Seoul. There are some advantages to having a large American presence here—even if it does come with lots of tanks, jets, and guns. The weirdest part is where the MPs come into the bars at about 1pm and round up any soldiers who are breaking curfew. I swear all the MPs are the biggest soldiers we have; I wouldn’t wanna cross ‘em.

Next day went and attempted to go ice skating down town, which feels like a massive valley made of buildings straight out of Blade Runner. Turns out my Korean coworker friends didn’t realize that you needed reservations to go ice skating downtown.  So we gave up and wandered around looking for food, ate at the Outback Steakhouse (the Korean teachers’ request) and then rode off into the sunset…

This weekend I’m off to Pyeongchang for ice fishing, snow, sledding, ATVs, and fresh air! So expect slightly more interesting stories worth the five minutes it takes you to read all of this.

PS It’s really flippin’ cold here right now.

5 Stories to Make Your Stomach Jealous

The author would like to again bring you up to speed while his life has finally slowed down. This downtime is a precariously tense truce at best between the enjoyment of life and its many decadent pleasures, not excluding any species of squid, and a real need to rest the writer’s weary bones so that he might feel the desire to resurrect his celebrity here on the internet. The last entry was one of catch-up and this might include that as well. And without further adieu the author will shed the third-person that are his clothes and bare all with the raw honesty that is the body:

So several weeks ago in a country far, far away (from you) I was checking out a food blog I like called www.seouleats.com and noticed that they were having a “meet-up” at a Canadian pub in Sinchon. I emailed the author of the blog and I now had Friday plans that were with people other than coworkers or my college friends. Finally after 3 months my social circle would finally grow! I went to Korean class that Friday and afterwards made my way to Sinchon to find the Seoul Eaters and see what was what and if they had any nachos left because I was famished. Indeed there were nachos left (with jalapeños!) and the owners of the bar are all from Vancouver, so I was like told them I was from Bellingham, scoring me some points: West Coast Best Coast.

The next weekend I found my way to another Seoul Eats meet up at an Uzbek hole-in-the-wall where I had amazing mutton meatballs, mutton filled pastries, and mutton shish kebabs. They also had delicious non-mutton options like spicy shredded carrots, amazing beats, and bread—oh lordy the bread, real bread!  All washed down with cheap Russian beers, all Soviet era-named. I liked the dark one, number 8, the best. Number 9 was like soju + beer and just as strong.

Deliciousness continued the following weekend at a place I actually had been before, the Wolfhound, and Irish pub, located in that Mos Eisley of places: Itaewon. We all ordered lots of food and spilt it between us. My favorites were the fish n’ chips and the Irish stew. Yum.

This weekend I treated myself to  more curry in Dongdaemun—if there is a god, I think he eats curry. I also had Paraguayan empanadas in Itaewon. Suffice it to say, this country mouse is okay with the big city. Though I do miss the simplicity of Bellingham once in a while—not to mention real tacos…

Plans for the holidays include ice skating at city hall on Christmas, ice fishing for trout on the east coast for New Years, and anything else I can think of.

Photos will be up soon—by my tomorrow night.

Also my friend David, who I have mentioned before of course, made this video and CNN may show it during their New Year’s programming: http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-369408

1 or 2 Things I spent 3 weeks not telling you

What wondrous and envy-inspiring things the author has been up to lately and if you weren't lucky enough to be his skype-enabled parents you would have very little knowledge of any of it. The writer sits here in his office trying to find any amount of time that he isn't tired from adventuring or adventuring while not tired to hammer out a paragraph or two, while you, now are able to sink your teeth into the juicy kimchi that is this, your favorite blog on the internet. The humble writer understands that it is indeed your favorite blog, is it not? For if it is not then he will take another 3 week long vacation from these forthcoming accounts which are to run the gamut from awe to awful, better to benign, and spicy to sweet. He now takes you on a three week run from Thanksgiving to Hanukkah. One of aforementioned holidays he will be teaching about in a few hours to 6 year old Korean children who barely have a concept of Jesus so really, how are they going to know what the festival of lights is all about?

Major Jewish holidays aside, for now we begin our journey into the recent past with Thanksgiving-- turkey, stuffing, and pumpkin pie to boot! My college friends, who many of you may know at least through their presence on my blog, hosted a Thanksgiving celebration at their apartment in the "suburb" of Anyang where an ample number of people (including several of my coworkers) became plump and merry on an American style feast to satiate our kimchi-coated stomachs. I say "suburb" because it's just as giant and high rise feeling as any smaller area of Seoul. I’ve yet to see any rural area of this country. I’m hoping to do that soon enough.

Highlights included a turkey that was cooked in a crock pot and a mega rice cooker since most small apartments like the ones we live in do not have ovens (the rice cooker totally worked). We asked my friend Minha, who had come down for the beginning, to see if that might work, he called a friend and they said go for it, which turned out to be a gamble that paid off. Minha had to leave early due to “ancestor worship” that I don’t quite understand and won’t attempt to act like I do but from what I know he had to leave to remember the day that his grandfather had died.

We also had pumpkin pie from Korean Costco, Stove Top stuffing sent to us by Abby’s mom, I made deviled eggs-- using kimchi powder instead of paprika, and North Korean beer that I picked up at the border (which wasn’t bad) apart from other libations that were on hand. Minha was possibly the most excited to try North Korean beer. He had never seen it before.

On a run down to the convenience store to find more “maekju” I found a young Korean couple (?) and invited them up (using my underdeveloped Korean skills) for an American style Chuseok (Thanksgiving) thinking they wouldn’t come. Proving me wrong they came and consumed copious cups of “maekju” with us and even ran and got some fried chicken for everyone to share. I think they had a good time and will tell the tale of their experience of an American Thanksgiving…

Anyway, I ended up sleeping over and had eggs and American style bacon for breakfast with a slice of pumpkin pie. Not a bad way to spend the day after thanksgiving.

More updates to come… Seriously if I’m not busy I’m tired from being busy. The updates shall come, oh yes, they shall come.

And a side note, I ended up playing the “Hanukkah Song” by Adam Sandler, twice, while my kindergartners colored menorahs. I like this job…

38 Things Other Than the 38th Parallel

So this a Part II of sorts, since the honorable author wanted to split up the post and if you haven’t read the post previous then you should go do that at a point before you, a reader feared and respected by other readers of blogs for how passionate you are for checking this, your favorite blog, forget about it. Follow? Good. The author, other than liking to refer to himself in the third person, likes commas, which separate his thoughts, sometimes his thoughts from his thoughts, and then allow you to reenter the normal stream of continuity that you were really hoping for, and making any English teacher the author ever had, assuming they read this, cringe at his willfully, flaunting disregard for the proper usage of punctuation. Now on to the excitement of Filipinos, fish, and Pepero!

So post DMZ, on 11/11, as a nation, South Korea celebrated a holiday more corporate, capitalist and frivolous than Christmas, Easter, Halloween, and yes, Valentine’s Day combined: Pepero Day. Pepero, also known as Poki in Japan I believe, are kind of bread stick lightly coated in chocolate. Well on 11/11 every year since whenever someone had some sort of mad-genius epiphany, little old South Korea has been celebrating a holiday in which you go buy one brand of candy and exchange it with friends (and teachers) just because 11/11 looks kind of like 4 Pepero sticks (or one could argue 4 sticks of dynamite, or 4 buildings, or mathematically the number 1 since 11 by 11 is 1.) and somehow this god amongst men was able to sell the idea to an entire nation so now every November the stockholders of Pepero Inc. do very, very well. One of the boxes I received, under the name of Danny Teacher, is featured as a photo in the photos on the right. ----------->

I still go to Korean class and to do so I must take the subway to get to class and I have to transfer in Dongdaemun which is a fairly large station. Rushing through the station is akin to being in Logan’s Run, underground running to see Carnival, while dangerous ajuma, little old Korean ladies, elbow you and ride the trains for free so you’re like, “Yo lady! What’s your problem? I had to pay to get on this train and you ride for free so stop giving me death stares after bruising my rib cage, what did I do to you!?!?” At least that’s what goes through my mind.

So today, today today, not a day from two weeks ago, which means this entertainment is more current than movies at the North Bend Theater growing up, I went to the No Rayng Jin fish market in Seoul with my buddy Minha. Pike Place in Seattle: Get a life, you ain’t a market or if you are you’re a mere child. I have been to several major world markets and Seattle is hurting for something so wonderful as this temple, this Costco of seafood. I want my readers to think of ANYTHNG from the ocean and that, whatever you’re thinking of, is something you can get and eat at the market. King crabs, lobster from Maine, sting rays, clams, mussels, tunas, salmon, and virtually anything that isn’t a mermaid and edible is available at the market. I even saw two fish chosen by a consumer and then beaten on the head with a pokey stick on the ground by a helpful fish vendor. Not for the animal activists out there. Unfortunately I didn’t get video of this.

Minha and I wandered around taking photos, avoiding the aggressive fish hawkers, and eventually decided to buy a whole halibut to eat raw. As shown in videos on the photo link, they killed it—more humanely than the other vendor, and cut it up right in front of us. They then put it on a plate of radish shavings that soak up the toxins that may be in the fish and wrap it in plastic. This plate, along with a baggie of the skin and bones, is then brought up to a restaurant of your choosing where they compliment your fresh, fresh fish with kimchi and side dishes and make a spicy fish soup from the non-sushi parts. We ate the fish raw, known as hwea in Korea—crazy delicious and if you haven’t had just-live halibut raw you haven’t had one of the top ten best dishes or fishes I have had the pleasure of consuming. I can still feel the texture in my teeth and it is good. Other dishes in the top ten in case you’re wondering are tacos in Mexico, baguettes in France, fried clams on Cape Cod, steak in Argentina, and empanadas in Chile. Admittedly, I gets [sic] around.

Last and probably least on this epically proportioned blog entry times 2. I went to Hyewa to get coffee with Minha after the fish and visited a Filipino market on the sidewalk which had sausages, pork rinds and people who spoke very good English and said excuse me!—which is kind of a big thing here in South Korea since the Koreas don’t seem to have a word for it. I enjoyed it and will be going back. Also to the fish market if you can’t tell that I was in love with that place.

Anyway, again the photos I took can’t in anyway make you seem like you were there with me but the videos might do a little better job. Last I leave you with a question: Have I been here 3 months already?

Please drop me off at 38th and N. Korea

This humble raconteur has let another week go by without updating you, the loyal reader, to his whereabouts and otherabouts that have been going on here in east Asia; this of course is all you, the loyal reader, have been thinking about since you remembered that the author had a blog and you should probably check it but then when you finally got there, there was nothing to see. The author offers an apology and will not waste more text in third person as so that he might get to the meat of the entry, known in literary terms, as the “body.”

This body will be filled with tales of excitement, intrigue, and awesomeness and will no doubt be knee deep in extraneous commas, to boot. To start things off, I went to the 38^th parallel last weekend! I went with two coworkers and met up with David and Abby and some friends of theirs for the tour. While the tour is entirely worth doing and one of the most bizarre and surreal places I have even been, it was just plain odd to be frank.

For one, Koreans aren’t allowed to go on any tours that get all that close to the actual middle of the Demilitarized Zone, or DMZ, which just in case you haven’t kept up with major world events from the 20^th century or watched an episode of MASH on the Hallmark channel with my mom… then you should know that the 38^th parallel is where the Korean war came to a ceasefire and a truce is held between UN forces and North Korea. Set against this backdrop tours of westerners and Chinese come through every weekend and take photos. Photos have been uploaded and they have promised to try and can’t quite do it justice.

We were led around very quickly and the whole thing was only a couple of hours long. We got to go to a stone’s throw of the actual line between the divided nation, though I wouldn’t recommend throwing any stones near the line. There we saw UN soldiers half-hiding behind UN buildings staring down one or two North Korean soldiers who would come and look at us through binoculars and then hide behind pillars on their building, repeat. After this we were led to a see a video with the most stereotypical, shop class safety video of a narrator telling us of the importance of the DMZ, least of which is the fact that it is a default nature preserve (filled with landmines…).

All in all I don’t know what to really say. It was filled with soldiers and tourists who outnumbered the combined armies of North and South Korea and I thought a lot about Alan Alda, whose show ran for longer than the war it portrays. It was a weird contrast from the UN Memorial Cemetery in Busan. There we surrounded by the ghosts of the past and in the DMZ we were surrounded by a weird commercialization of a conflict over 50 years old now defended by the grandchildren of that war. Besides the CCTV which is everywhere in South Korea and watching your every move, you couldn’t ask for a more perfect, living example of Orwell’s 1984 in which the 3 nations of Earth are constantly at war with each other.

More updates with a more cheery tone above to break this up and for gettin’ ya down, up top.

3 Weeks Late/ 2 Rag

Illness, lethargy, and toil are possibilities that the author would possibly proffer for why neither he nor a suitable ghost writer has been able to recount the accounts of late, lately. It has been a long few weeks but the man behind the keys has now finally gotten around to tapping them for you once more and will do his best to tell at least one anecdote of note that he finally got around to and wrote.  So coughing and waiting to go to the doctor at least one more time, this sophisticated, soju drinking Seoulite will get scribbling so that you can be finally up-to-date with his fate.

So about two weeks ago I had acquired bronchitis from some unknown entity which left me coughing and hacking like an 80 year old smoker. The doctor was great apart from having the thickest accent in English imaginable—at least he spoke and understood English. He prescribed some medicine which I picked up at the pharmacy downstairs. The whole process (from the check-in at the doctor to the pharmacy) took 30 minutes and cost $6.50. If that is considered socialized medicine then I want it! They didn’t need to know a extensive history of all the medical problems of my entire family. They just prescribed medicine and it works. I wish I had that in the US. I really do.

In school news I had my open class—which promised to be scarier and more dramatic than a Twilight novel. It wasn’t. Open classes are times for the parents to come see what we are doing in the kinder program to see if they wish to continue to send their children to our school, basically a commercial for the school. My bosses were terrified and very nervous for especially for me since I seemed to not feel the same sense of fear that they did. It went very well however; I made jokes, the kids did good and the parents seemed to enjoy it. I ended up getting high fives from one boss afterwards and all smiles from the other one—so I think it went okay enough. Highlights included playing “red light, green light” and making jokes about how one kid was on his cell phone texting which is why he wasn’t moving during the “green light” portion of the game.

Since then I have gotten sick again and had monthly evaluations due for the majority of my kids. This has also kept me from writing you, my adoring fans who don’t leave enough comments for needy blogger in me. Halloween was fun. I dressed as Zorro, using a du-rag I picked up in Itaewon for the mask and a plastic sword I acquired in Sadang.  I was a really cool Zorro—though I wish I had had a hat or a cape to go with the outfit because as you can see from the photos I could have been the “Dread Pirate Roberts” from “The Princess Bride” just as easily. The kinder kids did a good job dressing up considering there are almost no costume shops in the Republic of Korea. We went trick-or-treating as several of their houses which was fun. I’ve never had fruit and cake while trick-or-treating before…  I was also the host for the costume fashion show which primarily consisted of me talking gibberish while the kids posed for a photo. I earned my pay that day.

Halloween weekend we went out and had a lot of fun which was nice but didn’t exactly improve my health. My friend Colm, who I hear is an avid reader of the blog, was a horse and quite popular with the kids as well as the bar crowd. To paraphrase one of his stories: one fellow bar guest was not surprised to find out that indeed the horse was Irish. I want what he was drinking, seems to have been working.

Since then I have gotten more medicine and felt better but not perfect, contemplating going again. They will only give you three days of medicine. All of which is divided into individual servings in little easy to open plastic baggies making it ludicrously easy to figure out what you need to take. I feel bad for my grandmother and anyone else who has to take quantities of pills and the real trick is dividing them up yourself.

I promise I will write more soon. I will try and not have any more lapses.  For I am but a man.

Anyoung he kay seo.

10 Second Toast

Admittedly this is the greatest and most well-written blog you have ever laid eyes upon; despite this fact today's entry will be kept shorter than the members of the lollipop guild, for our champion of the English language is still feeling kind of sick. Sick still after several days, he cannot help but sing the praises of sudafed and must find out if they sell it here in the Orient or if our fearless author will succumb to the use of elk horn shavings mixed with ginger and other meticulously weighed and chosen ingredients to heal his sinuses. We now continue our epic along this yellow brick road, better known as South Korea...

Today, Sunday, I did absolutely nothing except sleep in, nap, and eat and drink things that are good for me. So we should look at the rest of the week for something slightly more entertaining.

Other than going to the gym once and trying a bowl of absolutely terrible Vietnamese pho soup this week flew by. Taking Korean classes means that I have even less time to myself but slowly I am starting to understand Hanguk-mal, literally translated: Korean talking. I really enjoy the classes and it should become pretty helpful when taking taxis, ordering food or when I get invited to go hang out with Kim Jong Il and he gives me his favorite pair of sun glasses and it's totally cool and we have mojitos. Enough about my fantasies of sugary rum-drinks with narcissistic dictators-- I have much more interesting things to talk about.

Friday night I went out for a little with some coworkers, exacerbating my symptoms slightly, and during the taxi ride over and in the midst of our trying to communicate which bar we were headed to the taxi driver randomly asked if we spoke Spanish. I was more eager than one of my students, I was like: I do! I do! You've got to be kidding a Korean taxi driver who speak Spanish?! Better question, why not English? It turns out he has been listening to Korean--Spanish language lessons on tape while he drives around all day and spoke Spanish fairly well. Using Español I was able to get us to the right place much more efficiently than if we had used very broken Korean and hand gestures.

Saturday was the wedding of one of the receptionists of the school and it was held at a Catholic church and was not dissimilar to a Catholic wedding anywhere else in the world. We arrived a little late but snuck in and sat next to our other coworkers and sat through an hour mass that culminated in the part where they say they do and they kiss and all that stuff. I take it you understand the concept of wedding and I don't need to go into too many details. 100% in Korean so we only knew what was going on due to the rythm of the chants or through certain motions carried out by the priest. Colm and Rosie were both raised Catholic and took communion while I just watched from the ubiquitous hard, wooden pews.

Shuffling outside we were part of some photo ops before going down to a banquet hall to have some delicious foods. I'm sorry that I didn't take more pictures but I think I would have gotten a LOT of weird looks for taking pictures of their food. Options included prawns, sashimi, jellyfish noodles in a mustard sauce, chestnut noodles, small baby octopi that may have been boiled but they tasted pretty fresh as well as the less exotic like spaghetti, salads and egg salad sandwiches.

After we had sat down with our food we were treated to the first toast and strangely the only toast of the wedding which lasted for all of 10 seconds. It was not your standard toast after toast after toast and you're not sure if you can be eating or what. Great! More time to socialize and eat with my coworkers. Wrong. The whole lunch hour lasted maybe 45 minutes and most people sat, ate, and got the hell out of dodge. No dancing, no drinking bottles and bottles of champagne, no awkward speeches, a lot of things which I guess I kind of liked about the American style weddings I'm used to. It just seemed so anti-climactic. After, we had coffee then hopped back on the subway back home.

I'm not sure if this was all that short but compared to some other posts I think it was.

Anyang hi ka seo!
Photos on the right------------>

2 Dudes Nude

With such a tantalizing title the author assumes assuredly that you will not be but drawn to read on to get to the unclad lads that is all but promised in such a provocative title. The writer of this rather humble internet entry device writes this as the sun sets silently almost unnoticed in such a teeming metropolis like Seoul; while on the other side of our small planet many of those kind enough to decipher the rants of a foreigner in need of attention, rise to a lazy Sunday morning which will apparently be spent, in part, reading this "web-log." So the man behind the keyboard will try and not start you off with something boring and hopes that you are not only here due to lewd references already alluded in the title.

Friday night finally came! Happiness is a word reserved for emotions far less powerful than what I might have been feeling when the weekend arrived one week too late. I have 10 classes on Fridays which only serves to motivate my feelings of flight. This week was however very interesting since I had two Korean language classes which I wasn't expecting to even have since nobody got back to us after we had expressed interest in taking them. The classes were very good and I am looking forward to learning some of this mysterious tongue which shares none of the qualities of the few languages I have tried my hand at. I hope soon to be able to order food and maybe even be able to count above the number two. Let's be honest, this is a tough language although the alphabet is pretty sweet and very easy to learn. The classes were also turnabout since I spend all days pounding English into children's heads and now I have willingly signed up for the same treatment with slightly more embarrassment since I am taking the classes with two of my better friends from the school, Gabi and Rosie.

Friday night I saw the movie Gamer at a very nice theater near the school and had an easy evening which was just fine for me since I was looking forward to a less exciting weekend with no crazy fish ladies or jaundice-men vying for my attention or money. Gamer was okay for the first half but the second just gets weird and lost me.

Saturday I hung out with a Korean guy, Minha, who works at the school as an aid of some sort and we went to an area called Insadong that is pretty touristy but we had some great food, lots of squid, pork, and kimchi, and some delicious traditional Korean style tea.

Though tea and squid is not why you have forged this river that is my babbling blog. The nudity! Yes, Danny, get to the part where there are naked  people! Talk about the naked people! Fear not young padawan for I will do so. This weekend I invited David and Abby to go to a jimilbang, which is essentially a Korean bath house. My friend Rosie is a big fan of the jimjilbangs so she came along as well. So after a hearty dinner and several bottles of liquid courage we headed to Yongsan to have yet another new experience.

We walk in and first lock up our shoes and are given some pajama shorts and shirt and several towels along with a wrist band that will charge us for anything we buy inside of the bath house. We part ways, David and I going to the mens' floor and the girls heading to the ladies'. Upon exiting the elevator we see at least half a dozen Korean men naked, just hanging out, watching TV or talking, stretching-- basically whatever they feel like doing. This is the part for which we have imbibed a few beers but also very curious about since the "bath" portion of the bath house is done completely nude. We go to lock up our things and both try and muster enough energy to not giggle too much or make things weird for when we both know that we are getting nakeder than we ever expected to be in the same room. We put on the pajamas and look around the area, discover the baths, and aren't really sure what we're supposed to do or when we have to disrobe.

We follow a friendly Russian guy down to a different floor that is coed and everyone is wearing the pajamas, we follow the Siberian into a sauna which made me feel like a pizza since it was essentially just a large oven. After the oven we head back upstairs and figure out that we were supposed to lock up the pj's as well and decided just do it. So we got to the business at hand and wandered over to the baths naked, naked, naked. I mean, David is a good friend, I just didn't think we'd ever be this unclothed together along with 2 dozen Korean men who seemed to be really comfortable with the whole situation and only startled by our presence because we were foreign.

I didn't feel as awkward as I thought I would but that's not to say I didn't feel completely strange at first. In that baths there were several pools of different temperatures: hot, cold, very hot. There was a wet sauna which made me sweat like nothing ever has and several other rooms for body scrubbing and massage which seemed pricy so we just stuck with being naked in hot tubs with lots of other dudes. Also I don't know if I'm comfortable getting scrubbed down by some nice jimjilbang employee just yet-- no, not just yet.

After seeing more Korean men in their birthday suits and not their business suits than I had ever wanted to see we changed and headed downstairs to find the womenfolk. We tried out the saunas again and even an ice room which felt very pleasant and sat in some massage chairs which were pretty fantastic for $1.80 for 10 minutes. We found the women poked around a little more and then went out for some drinks to debrief our brief experience of brieflessness.

In short-- when in Rome do as the Romans and when in Korea do as the Koreans. You'll like it.

Today I went shopping bought some things and also got a cool haircut. That's right, Danny changed his hairstyle which has largely been the same since late high school. It looks similar but the "designer" took some artistic license with it and I'm actually really pleased with the result-- especially for a haircut/shampoo/scalp massage that cost $13 and no tip!

I end this admittedly over-hyped entry with some idioms I read recently. The first which is for my friends, "Even if you have to crawl on your knees, get yourself to Seoul!" The second being for my parents is, "Send your ox to market but send your son to Seoul."

Anyang and good night. Comments are encouraged... :P

5 Days of Chuseok: Part II

The author would like to state that he has just come back from his first Korean lesson and was not aware that he would be having the lesson today since his employer, from whom the classes are offered, did not bother to inform him or his two friends that the classes began today. He is thoroughly confused but thinks that he is getting a handle of the 3 dozen kinds of “U” sounds but is feeling uneasy about the consonants whose sound seem to change with the wind.

But you the eager and well informed reader of this classy, little “web log” has not come here to necessarily hear about the author’s unplanned joust with the Korean language. No, not at all; you are here to complete the saga, the epic, the odyssey that was the Chuseok vacations here in the “land of the morning calm.” Fear not for we find ourselves in a new city, the city of Busan where anything can and does happen…

So Day one went down like any day in a new city; Rosie and myself asking each other where we think we should head and since neither one of us had ever been to this particular metropolis that didn’t seem to get us very far. We found the subway and were pleased to find that it worked very similarly to the system that we have in Seoul but not before I went up to a Subway attendant and asked a question in slow, English teacher English thinking he wouldn’t understand me and only to have him respond in fluent West Coast English. We then explored some, found a map to guide us, got lost and eventually decided to head to the beach since it was a muggy 70 degrees outside.

We took a taxi since the subway in Busan runs nowhere near the beaches and were pleasantly surprised to find that the rates were much less than in Seoul. We arrived at Gwang-alli Beach which makes a huge case for Busan being better than Seoul. See the link on the right for photos. We eventually started to hunger and made our way to a cheap looking noodle house with a very friendly elderly couple beaming at us as we entered their restaurant. Since we have little understanding of the Korean language, both of us, we rely on pictures and bad translations to order food. So we ordered #4 since they were all noodle varieties and everyone seemed to have soup and that seemed fine to us. We did not get soup. We received cold noodles. I’d like to state a fact: warm noodles > cold noodles. Okay, enough about the noodles.

After slurping up a reasonable about of spicy but very cold noodles we headed back to the beach area and took some amazing pictures of the bridge (and by amazing I mean I am still figuring out how my camera works so please forgive me) and the surrounding areas which give Busan a lot of charm—including its colorful “Millak Raw Fish Town”.

Come evening we headed to a bar on the beach and had some beers, played some darts, and eventually found a taxi back to our hostel to start again Friday.

Friday morning we explored the area around the hostel and eventually found ourselves starving but I love food so that was okay. We found a Korean pizza place (some of the tastiest pizza in the world is here) and split and overpriced half-shrimp and half-potato pizza. We ate the pizza with forks and knives (Koreans are the biggest fans of eating with one’s hands) as our neighbors are theirs out of little paper cups which seems to be the style especially for take-out pizza.

After the potato pizza (trust me, you want some) we got lost again but in 70 degree weather you can’t complain. I decided I needed to take out some more cash only to find myself in a similar position as I was in at the beginning of my time here in South Korea: hardly any ATMs accept foreign debit cards! I began to stress out as Rosie was also running low and had been covering things for me for the first half of the trip with the assumption that I would be reimbursing her. We tried what seemed like hundreds of different ATMs—even the bank that works for me in Seoul but only to be rejected by every single one. We made our way to the train station hoping that something there would work but even there none of the ATMs would give. We then asked some random foreign-looking girl if she knew of any international ATMs and she suggested down in the subway. I was about to give up all hope when alas! It worked! The nice lady candy vendor next to the ATM also celebrated my being able to take out cash and so we bought $2 worth of her candies. It was the worst tasting candy that either one of us has ever had but even that couldn’t ruin our elated state.

We decided we needed some coffee or tea to wash out the bad tasted from the candy and to regroup our thoughts as well as to wake up a little. While drinking some “southern sweet tea” we found on our map a large Buddhist temple that was nearby and promptly took a taxi right to the entrance. We took a ton of photos but I’m not sure that I did it justice given out big and grand it was and how terrible my photos make it look. Inside I was able to take photos of some people chanting and from what we had read we think that this was prayer to the Buddhist goddess of mercy. It was pretty cool and we were delighted that we were able to take photos inside of the temple.

Again we found ourselves with that condition known as hunger and decided to head back to Gwang-alli so that I cook take part in Korean style sushi. We wandered around for a while and were recommended an area, by some young police officers (all police officers in Korea are young), which turned out to be the “Millak Raw Fish Town.” The first place we went to had a small platter starting at 80,000 won which is in the range of US$70 so we decided to politely back away slowly and look for another place. That totally would have worked except this particular fish lady seemed to have some sort of bet with the devil that she could get us into her restaurant or she’d lose her soul because she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She became a little louder and we tried to leave but found ourselves unable. Eventually I began mumbling at her in some Spanish and a fair bit of gibberish which confused both her and Rosie; so she turned to Rosie assuming that she understood what the crazy fish lady was saying. Rosie did not and soon the woman was grabbing Rosie by the arms hoping that she would understand, “eat my over-priced, uncooked fish” through the scientific principle of osmosis.

Somehow we MacGyver’d an escape which involved a paper clip, a hair pin, our collective shoe laces and some terrible tasting Korean gum. To be honest, I’m not sure how we made it out of there alive. We checked another restaurant—with a much less high pressure staff, only finding the price 20,000 won cheaper so I used the power of my imagination to remember what raw fish tastes like and decided that chicken was the meal for me. We found a small chicken restaurant, recouped from the crazy fish lady and had the world’s spiciest chicken along with the world largest pitcher of yellow Korean beer. All for less than the sushi would have been, especially considering that Rosie doesn’t eat fish.

We then headed back to the beach to join in the Chuseok festivities which were slightly underwhelming but ducked into the bar from the previous night to use the rest room. While having a beer at the bar we met a man with the English name of Terry who works at a savings bank in Busan. He was a lot of fun and had very good English. Several beers later he took us to his friend’s restaurant where we tried North Korean style dumplings with the owner of the restaurant. The dumplings were 4 times larger than normal and wrapped in chicken skin instead of dough. They were delicious. The pumpkin tempura is also something that I would recommend.

The next day, Saturday, was Chuseok and also our last day in Busan. In morning we were examinging a map confirming our way to our destination of the UN War Memorial at Busan and thinking about breakfast (since virtually everything is closed on Chuseok) when jaundice man appeared as if a specter off my right cheek. He was a pale color almost yellow-tinted and very thin. I didn’t notice him, given my love affair with maps, until he asked in near-perfect English where we were headed. I then noticed him hovering just off the right side of my face and took a step back and told him assuming he knew something we didn’t, like that it was closed on Chuseok. He then volunteered to take us there, which was only a little bit creepy, when Rosie saved the day saying that we needed to get breakfast first and we had to meet someone and probably a few other lies. The then turned around and descended into the subway like some sort of HG Wells inspired morlock.

 The UN War Memorial was very moving and we learned a lot—a lot more than I had ever learned in high school or college about the war. Things like the nation of Turkey fought in the war and suffered some of the highest casualties outside of the US and the UK. It was a very beautiful cemetery and guarded by one UN soldier—my first time seeing a UN soldier in person which was refreshing to see. I can’t go on too much about the site but please see the photos on the right for only some of what I was able to see.

Upon becoming tired from mild sun burns we headed back to the train station to nap and wait for our train since all of Korea seemed to be inside their homes celebrating. We kept hoping that some nice family would invite us in for some songpyon or other holiday refreshments but was a dream never realized.

After a brief nap in the train station we found “China Street” which happened to be located inside of a good sized Russian neighborhood and eventually went and had some more coffee across the street from the train station.

It turns out that our tickets for the 3 hour ride were in “seats” for 1 hour and for 2 hours we would be hobos of sorts in between cars in the standing room only section. This turned out to be more fun anyway as we ordered beers every time the attendant passed by and danced outside of the restroom, Korean staring at us all the while—which they would have been anyway since we aren’t Korean. At one point we gave up our “seat” which was a luggage shelf to a family, who was banished to the standing room only with us, to be rewarded with dried squid jerky by their young daughter which reeked of squid and ocean a little much ever for me.

The rest of the weekend in Seoul was fun too but this entry is already longer than the Bible so I will force myself to stop.

Anyang!

Comments please!

5 Days of Chuseok: Part I

The author is tired, so very tired. He wishes to convey the holiday weekend as it happened and without forgetting anything super important or interesting but he fears that he may but he will endeavor to transcribe some of the stories and adventures of the Chuseok holiday and an entertaining and excellent experience to beautiful Busan and back.

This weekend was Chuseok which is more or less Korean Thanksgiving. It is still about family and the harvest and many of the things that we do in the US for Thanksgiving but with some differences. Many people, mostly children, dress up in traditional Hanbok clothing, they eat traditional foods, and they visit grave sites of their ancestors. That being said I will attempt to tell you how I spent this Chuseok and the five glorious days I had off work to do so.

By the time this weekend took its sweet time getting here, I had several travel plans with several people all of which fell through.  I wanted to get out of Seoul and see something out of the city so badly. Only one other person had this same desire and that was my coworker, Rosie. We both wanted to go to Busan, the second largest city in South Korea and a great tourist destination with lots of beaches, see why we wanted to go? To drop a colloquial phrase, “everyone and their mom” told us that travelling this weekend would be impossible and that we shouldn’t even attempt leaving the Seoul metro area since all the trains, planes and automobiles would be booked and the only salt water we would see would be from our tears as we learned firsthand at the train station the black hole that is travelling on Chuseok. What did we learn? Never say die.

We made our way to Seoul Station immediately after work on Wednesday and walked right up to the ticket counter after waiting in a small line and found two tickets to Busan via the KTX bullet train for less than $50 a piece. All, meaning every single one of our coworkers (Korean and American), said that this small feat would be impossible. Hear that kids? You never get anywhere without trying.

So we stocked up on provisions, which included some seaweed-rice snacks and several beers and some Soju—that vile, relentless liquor that is so cheap and so well-loved here in Korea and boarded our train; Busan bound. On the train, several beers in, we wandered over to a table with only one Korean guy about our age and asked him if he liked Soju and if we could sit down. As it turned out, he did indeed like Soju and we took our seats and soon his friend came and joined us as we all became quick friends sharing the drinks and grabbing some beef jerky and mixed nuts from the passing train attendant.  They explained to us that they were two engineers living Incheon, which is next to Seoul, and were headed to Busan for the holiday to visit their families. Their English was phenomenal and we were asked to quiet down on no less than 3 occasions—not a bad train ride.

Finally, in only 3 hours, we had traveled across the entire length of the country and had arrived in Busan, barely finding room at a hostel and waking up Thursday morning to begin our adventures anew on the southern most part of the Korean peninsula.

I hate doing blogs in installments but I am still pretty tired from this weekend and would love to write more tomorrow.

Anyang!

3 Days Until Vacation

From the mysterious Orient comes yet another tale of intrigue along with new photos from our reveling, rambling writer-- who may or may not be all about alliteration. We last learned of his attempts to break free from the monotony of his indentured servitude here on the Korean peninsula with this entry being no exception. He may also be inclined to tell you some tales of teaching. Fortunately, you have acquired enough free time to read what the author deems is important or interesting enough to write down in hopes that you read his meager attempt to describe his daily life to you, his loyal readers.

So as the title references, Korean Thanksgiving, Chuseok, is this weekend and I have Thursday through Monday off and couldn't be more excited. All tickets for buses and trains are presumably booked but there is talk of standing room only trains or possible space in Noraebang rooms (Karaoke) on board the trains where we could ride. "We" is still up in the air considering everyone is still sorting out their plans and since none of us speak Korean all that well we have to rely on our Korean friends or Korean partner teachers to help us book things. More details to come next Sunday.

One of my lessons on "multiculturalism" was on Chuseok which forced me to learn about it and compare it to American Thanksgiving. I found that it is very similar to Thanksgiving but with different foods and people here visit the graves of their ancestors. Half of one of my preschool classes all jumped out of their chairs and began doing this (Buddhist?) bowing ritual that is common on Chuseok, not shy at all.

I love teaching the classes on multiculturalism but this month is transportation; I'm not as stoked at all on the subject. I teach anywhere between 6 and 10 classes a day. The hardest ones are the beginners that are in the afternoon who we don't get to see everyday like the pre-schoolers. I'm pretty sure one kid "Brian" either doesn't care or just has no idea what I'm saying, he just copies off the other kids.

When I punish a kid by sending them to the corner or out in the hall, invariably they will throw their hands in the air which causes them great displeasure. They also screw around a whole lot less when their hands are in the air, big plus. Another teacher found out that I sent a kid out to the hall for speaking in Korean after I had just chastized the whole class for the very same thing and it turns out he had turned to his friend to say, "The teacher is really funny!" One, I didn't know that. Two, I have a strict zero tolerance policy on Korean. I can even now say "No Korean!" in Korean which is really fun to do.

In my favorite pre-school class, "Samuel" asked me what a target was, since the word was in their Phonics book, and I indulged him, drawing a target on the board. Si-Jun who has lived the US then began talking to me about how he knows what a "Target" is and how you can buy snacks and hot dogs there and other things. I was confused for a moment but he was definitely talking about a Target store he must have gone to while living in the US.

Fun fact: If you ask a Korean student to draw "Korea" they will usually draw the whole peninsula with no border. If you ask for South Korea they usually draw the whole peninsula but with a border and then label the southern half. The geographer in me loves this. Also, all the world maps here have Korea in the center and the Americas are on the right side of the map and Europe on the left. They also don't say "Sea of Japan" but rather the "Eastern Sea," I love seeing stuff like that. Also, don't speak too positively about Japan, they are still pretty pissed off about the whole violent occupation that the Japanese Empire did to Korea and Northern China before and during WWII.

My coworker Rosie and I decided to go hiking this weekend. We attempted to navigate our way around Bukhansan mountain located relatively close to my apartment here in Seoul (and is worth Googling for better photos than I have provided). Once we got there we became lost in a sea of Koreans decked out in the best hiking gear that money can buy. I'm fairly certain that none of them were going to be camping but they had huge, brand new backpacking backpacks that couldn't have held all that much for their small day hikes around the mountain with 4000 like minded countrymen and a handful of foreigners lost in the confusion of an REI catalog on steroids.  At the base of the mountain are roughly 100 restaurants and hiking stores all catering to the throngs of weekend warriors battling the mountains who had the unfortunate destiny of being located so close to such a capitalist metropolis-- though litter was not an issue surprisingly. I do want to go back however and see if I can't make it higher up on the mountain since we became a lost in a maze of trails and encountering stunning Buddhist temples everyone once in a while dotting the mountain along with the occasional pop machine. Please see the link for photos of some of the chaos that we encountered.

Saturday night I made my way to an area near Korea University and what I found was a really cool, happening place where I think I will be going back to since it isn't as busy and Hyewa or Hongdae or that Mos Eisley of neighborhoods, Itaewon.

The rest of this weekend was easier spent with a small excursion to Hyewa and dinner with my coworkers, Gabi and Rosie, at a restaurant here in Seongbuk that we like. We then went to the top of a gynourmous building near my school that you may recognize in the photos. I'm not scared of heights...

That's all for this week folks, keep checking the blog and leave me some comments. I always love reading them.

Anyang!

*Editor's note: They are kindergarten, not preschool sorry for the confusion (Rosie...)

4 Weeks in?

*** Link to photos on the right à ***

When our agile and ardent adventurer isn’t defending the English language against a formidable army of child warriors, hell bent on throwing articles where they don’t belong and assuredly refusing to put them in places that would guarantee fluency, he also goes out and sees the metropolis that surrounds him; but he mainly, a white board marker his only weapon, attempts to thwart calls of “Teacher! Teacher! Teacher!”

This week went by more or less uneventfully—which was OK by me. I got sick. I got better. I am getting better at breaking out the Purell every time one of those germ covered hands touches any part of my person.  We did have a kid pull the fire alarm this week—which sounded like an air raid siren and almost influencing me to lose control of certain bodily functions. My kids, the smartest in the school, just started giggling and asking, “Fire?!, Fire?!” no help to me at all. Upon walking out in the hall I find the rest of the foreign teachers on the floor equally confused but maybe less scared since they likely watch less science fiction than I might.

Friday is my long day and I have two classes who were sent by an angry, vengeful god who I have indeed offended to test my patience and my will. However, to paraphrase Star Trek, every moment of pleasure is balanced by an equal moment of pain, giving my Friday nights all the more reason to head out and find that pleasure with my teacher buddies having already experienced those moments of pain.

Itaewon was my Friday night destination to celebrate Chilean Independence Day. I found empanadas, Paraguayan not Chilean, but delicious as always.  Itaewon can’t be adequately described to the reader, despite said reader’s impeccable taste in blogs, the reader would just have to experience certain things here for themselves to really know what I’m talking about. I might give it another go in a future entry. It’s to foreigners what a Chinatown is to Chinese anywhere else in the world. It is the foreigner district located next to the military base, harboring massive amounts of foreigners, GIs in particular. One bonus was that I met some nice dudes from a Peruvian flute band ordering kebas in line with me.

Saturday night was my friend Gabi’s birthday and we spent the night in Hongdae and Hyewa with a visit to one of the nicest noraebangs in the area; leather couches, big screen tv, AC, not bad.

 Today I spent the day cleaning my studio and then went back to the Hyewa area with my friend Rosie stopping for galbi, the tastiest of tasties: Korean short ribs. Cooked in front of you and cut into small pieces, wrap them in lettuce and cover them in hot sauce. We have a winner. I need to learn more Korean however, asking for pork short ribs was an embarrassing and funny experience for both Rosie and me and two of the cooks and an English speaking college student on a date with his girlfriend… After devouring the ribs, now residing pleasantly in our stomachs, we headed to a place called O’Sulloc which has traditional Korean green tea from the island of Jeju. I’ve wanted to try the green tea for a while and I wasn’t disappointed.

The author wishes to respectfully acknowledge that this entry was really, really long and you have a job and should have been working. So go back to doing that and know that the author has every intention of writing more edible sizes of text. Adios.

80 Cents to Make Danny Happy

As much as the humble raconteur of this poorly edited blog loved being unemployed, opening his eyes when he had had enough sleep, having no schedule, calling no man mister and working only 4 hours a week timing 3 year olds run the 100 meter dash, and drinking growlers of local brew on any night he chose, he think that he might have made a good decision flying far west to the Far East. The author's friend here in Korea, Rosie, thinks he might like talking about himself in the third person. Danny would like to conjecture that she's full of it. 

So I do enjoy working, I really do. The hours can be long and the kids can get tiresome but classes are 40 minutes and soon they are over and I hope they have learned something and that they will someday choose to respect me and my ability to rock the English language in ways they only wish they could. Some of my kindergarten kids will be fluent soon. I suppose you could argue that they already are but they make a mistake every once in a while... I am so jealous of their abilities to speak so confidently in English. I never have to remind them not to speak in Korean-- just to zip it for speaking too much in English. They even bicker in English. At times I might forget that they are Korean and not little American children.

Apart from work I have been having plenty of fun-- in some cases maybe too much fun. Careful with the local water, Soju, it can be tricky and still there in the morning. The last two nights I have been to two different noraebangs (noraybongs) which is the Korean version of karaoke. You are entreated to a private room so that no one but your singing companions can hear you sing butchered versions of Nirvana or Snoop Dogg. Very fun and a lot less embarrassing than the karaoke I have done in the past.

I have been eating so well here. I wish I had a camera (coming soon) to document the what can only be described as ambrosia that you can purchase for between 80 cents to $10. I have eaten seafood lasagna with shrimp and squid, tempura shrimp, tempura squid, tempura octopus, tempura hard boiled eggs, spicy spaghetti with squid, fish on sticks-- not to be confused with fish sticks, curries, kimchi, and 13 other things that I can't tell you what they were but they were not in anyway not delicious. I have yet to go to a restaurant where they have fish tanks out in front filled with live crabs, lobsters, small squids, fish, bottom feeders, eels, sea cucumbers, snails or their younger sibling the street cart with fish tanks filled with the smaller but still very much live sea creatures. I love this country.

A note on kimchi: kimchi is fermented vegetables that have been lathered in hot sauce and left for different amounts of time in clay pots, the most common of which being the cabbage variety. I eat all my vegetables here. I would have eaten all of my vegetables in the States if they were spicy and lip-smackingly crazy good. I don't know why no one in the US ever introduced me to the wonders of kimchi before. If you knew about it and didn't tell me then we can't be friends anymore. Shame on you. I had to eat lunch with "D class" all week and the kids kept complaining how spicy their kimchi was-- but ate up every bite of it. Kids eating their vegetables... 10 points for Korea.

Apart from eating delicious food I am slowly picking up some Korean but I can now say bathroom and have used it several times! I need to learn numbers next; I think I have most of the alphabet under control except for the 10 different yuh/yah/yeh/yoh/yyuhh sounds masquerading themselves as useful and distinct letters.

I think there was something else I had wanted to add but I think this was sufficient information and hopefully still entertaining. Please comment! More comments will get me to post more and I'm pretty sure that you don't have to register with anything to do it, so just leave your comments and I will be very happy to read them.

And yes, I yell at my kids in Spanish to get their attention. Nothing easier.

Adios and please get that health care thing passed! I am sick of hearing about it on the news podcasts I watch and would really appreciate healthcare when I get back if I can't get a decent job right away. So call or write those representives and senators and utilize that democracy thing us Americans are always so quick to defend but reluctant to practice!

3-1 Korea!

We last saw our antagonistic protagonist on his way to see the South Korea, Australia game at the megalithic World Cup Stadium here in Seoul. 20 subway steps and 1 subway transfer and I found one of my college friends Abby waiting for me at the humbling exit from the underground-- which was shaped like a huge amphitheater and was filled with soccer fans all scrambling the 75 feet of steps or the few escalators up to the top where the vastness of the stadium awaited. Abby called David, my other college friend, who had been looking for me because I guess he didn't expect me to be able to follow 40,000 people in the right direction of a 60,000 person stadium... maybe I did something really stupid where he doesn't expect much of me?

I guess this is a good point to add that David chipped his front tooth, now fixed, on some metal chopsticks while eating. Okay, I think we're even now.

So as we made our way towards the stadium David and Abby, who had been riding bikes around the Han River and this area, pointed out the free beer samples. The line was long so we headed to the stadium where they took the caps of our bottles but not the actual bottles. Which was weird because when I ordered beers at the game they gave me entire cans of beer, so it wasn't trying to avoid fans using the bottles as projectiles I'm sure-- and yes, I know how to say beer in Korean, its one of the few words I can say. Though I still have no idea what the word for bathroom is-- one might think the learning of the first word would lead to the learning of the other...

--Pause, right now a truck is driving around my neighborhood with a megaphone advertising fresh fruit, thought you should know---

Once inside David, his newly minted smile, and Abby informed me that our tickets had only been W10,000 or about $8.50 and they were right behind the Korean goal. It was amazing to be in a sea of red (team nickname is the Red Devils-- shown by all the gear with angry looking devils and cute devil horns on all the women) and we were even covered by the largest South Korean flag ever during the national anthem.

The match was won by Korea of course, much to the dismay of the sizable number of Australia fans in attendance-- inflatable kangaroos not discounted. We were ecstatic, but mostly because we made it to the subway before the majority of the fans did. We made our way to their town of Anyang, which we're not sure if it means "hello," and hung out for a while downtown, avoiding wandering groups of wegugin (foreigners), in this case dumb Americans and Canadians, before I crashed on their couch which is 5 times more comfortable than my bed.

Apart from soccer this week has been relatively uneventful, apart from a "motivational" email from my boss directed at all of the foreign teachers. I like teaching more and more which is good. Two of my brighter 9 year olds got in a fight on the floor of my classroom as I was walking in yesterday. I directed them to the nearest Korean teacher and they got chewed out by no less than three Korean teachers in what I can only describe as something that I NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER want to happen to me. Even the mild mannered, unassuming man who picked me up from the bus got nastier than I think I could have ever been to them.

Other things of interest, because all of this other stuff was really, really boring, is that if you look on any map or any temple there will be a swastika or 10 to let you know its a temple. I had learned that it was a Buddhist thing a while ago but you have to see it to believe it. Yesterday I was trying to teach the word "to pray" and I giddily drew a cross next to a swastika and my kids didn't bat an eyelash but instead understood exactly what I wanted them to! Ha! I don't know about ya'll but that was fun for me.

At this time I say Anyang gi ha seo. I should head to work and prep for my day.

Adios

2 Days into Teaching

Anyang ha seo!

Wow, so much has happened since the last time we joined our handsome, young adventurer and his tales of the mysterious orient. Humility is huge here, hence I have to vent it all on here, lucky you.

So this weekend I went out with many of my new coworkers, both American, but1 Irish fellow, and Korean. I will tell you this, Koreans and foreigners in Korea like to have fun. I haven't been out as late as I was on Friday since New Years in Chile earlier this year but I didn't head out until much later in the night. Going out here in Seoul can be summed up pretty simply: the beer is cheap but it is worse than PBR and the street kebabs are fantastic. Wrapped in flour tortillas, the kebabs will be my drug of choice since they're roughly a taco... especially since they are wrapped in tortillas.

My ex college coworker David and his girlfriend Abby came up to visit this weekend. So far he's convinced both she and me to come to this strange and motor bike filled world with its $3.50 kebabs. I really, really like the kebabs if you haven't noticed. Back to David and Abby, they spent the weekend in Seoul, they live just to the south of here, and we hung out with some of my coworkers\, wandered around the streets of my neighborhood for a while finding an awe inspiring temple that was deaf to the city inside its walls, we saw some of the women's university, and we ate the most amazing curry at this Nepalese place, filled unsurprisingly with Seoul's Nepalese population, that my friend Nick Verbon, who taught here, had recommended. It was a great weekend but led into a busy, busy week.

Tuesday I began teaching! I had prepped a lot Monday and that had really paid off. My kids for the most part are all very bright and some of them were even born in the US so they know as much English as they should for a kid their age; on the other hand I have some kids who are brand new to English learning and their very first experience is with yours truly. I might teach them Spanish on alternating days and see if anyone notices. Anyone dare me to do it?

 I was also able to move into my new place! Its not bad, no oven or dishwasher but it has a laundry/dryer and internet already set up. The bed is hard as a rock but more like a sandstone and the motel bed was then more of a granite or diamond in hardness. All in all the place is big enough for me and has air conditioning so I'm fine. The oddest thing is the shower. The bathroom is the shower. Maybe its something you have to experience but the shower head basically just comes out of the wall and there are no walls. This might be hard to explain but its just odd and leave the whole closet of a bathroom wet when done. The motel was much the same way but it was a much bigger bathroom.

Bathrooms aside, today was my second day teaching and apart from a minor emergency in which I had photocopied the wrong test, which we didn't have time for anyway, everything went pretty well, also if you don't include me not knowing how to use the projector for one class.

There are a hundred other things I could tell you I suppose but Danny is tired and Danny is jealous of how close his comforter and sheets are. With luck, I will have my resident alien card soon and be fully legit here in Korea and have a cellphone and bank account and everything.

And before I forget, I think David, Abby and I are going to see South Korea versus Australia in soccer at the World Cup Stadium this weekend. Pretty cool, right?

Chao

Day 3 in Korea

Well where do I start? This has been a whirlwind couple of days and I wouldn't know where to begin to describe all of the things that I have seen, smelled, heard, tasted or what but I, the intrepid hero of the blog, will try.

I arrived at Incheon International Airport on August 25th, which is the 24th for anyone on the other side of the international dateline, and immediately had my temperature taken by the friendly airport staff-- looking for Pig Flu. The flight over had been nice and thankfully direct from Seattle to Korea. I watched some movies and tried memorizing some more Korean words but found it more interesting talking to the nice Filipino man next to me. Once through customs I need to withdraw money and as per my instructions from the school, make a phone call to the school letting them know I had arrived and then take a bus to a meeting place where I would then be taken to a motel where I would be in "quarantine"-- more about that later. I was able to find an ATM at the airport then take a bus (for $7) from Incheon to northern Seoul to the designated location, meeting several friendly English speaking denizens of this place along the way. At the stop I met "Jimmy," who talks as much as I don't, and we went to the motel and as soon as we walked into the room he told me to take off my shoes and put on house slippers because that's just how they roll in Korea. There are also separate sandals for the bathroom in case you were wondering. He left and told me he would be back at 8:30am to take me to the doctor for a medical exam-- but not without telling me not to eat the expensive corn flavored sodas in the mini-fridge.

Sleep was not what it usually is seeing as I had been up for over 24 hours at that point and I woke up at 4:30am Korean time which was probably 1 in the afternoon in Seattle. I then watched TV on my 27" LCD screen in the room (FYI that is pretty humongous) and hacked someone's unsecured network for my laptop since the computer in the room is not working properly. Once Jimmy arrived we went to the hospital where they drew enough blood to make Dracula sleepy, 2 cups of urine (one covered the other open), chest x-rays-- not sure why, blood pressure, height, weight, and looked in my mouth and asked me if I had diseases. Best medical exam ever! Actually, aside from the blood I'm not sure what was up with half of that. I guess I get my pig flu results back later. I hope I don't have it!

Speaking of the infamous pig flu that is why I am "quarantined." I use parenthesis because I can pretty much do what I like during my free time and I have visited the school several times in the last two days. Its basically a feel good thing for parents to think that we aren't coming in contact with their kids because I might be infected, maybe from the plane? Definitely not from the very densely populated metropolis of North Bend... So the last two days I have spent, instead of a thorough 3 day training at the head office, at a coffee shop next to the school with the director and sometimes teachers from the school, becoming overwhelmed with the strange new job that I am to undertake. I have about 8 different kinds of classes I am teaching and about 30 plus different classes in the week. We'll see if I can make it a week and remember it all. One day at a time? I know its al-anon's thing but I might need some serious drinks tonight or soon to relax. Its been one of the most intensive things I've had to do since my initial lifeguard training back in high school.

Last night me and my neighbor, Katie, who is also new, spent three hours wandering the streets of Seoul and not really getting that much wiser on how to navigate this place except to place all your faith in the metro.

Today I skipped breakfast and for lunch found some gimbop, Korean veggie sushi from what I can tell, and some deep fried squid legs-- delicious both! I've also had some Korean style chicken fried pork covered in cheese, had amazing kimchee and some pickled radish/turnip thing and on the plane had some bibimbap which I would recommend hands down. It came with a tube of hot sauce, which made the author extremely glad he chose Korea. I should also say that food is CHEAP!

Other things of note are the girls here are always wearing mini-skirts and high heels and on TV on two different stations I have seen broadcasts of former tournaments of the computer/video games of Starcraft, Warcraft 3, and Mortal Kombat-- all with live commentary from "sports" casters. I don't know if all of the readers of this blog will know what those are but lets just say that gaming in a big deal here and the superstars of these tournaments are professionals and make their living off playing these games. Holy cow.

That's too much to read or write for that matter in one sitting so I'll get back to chilling in my love motel.

Hasta luego

1 Day Left in the USA

Hello and welcome to my blog.

I guess we can call it a travel blog or maybe not since I am moving and won't be constantly "traveling." As you probably know I am moving to Seoul, South Korea and this will be the official source for all your inquiries on how Korea is going. This is a pretty big move for me even though I have lived and traveled abroad before just never for this long and never to any East Asian country. So lets do the list; I've been to Canada, Mexico, France, Argentina and Chile-- but not in that order. While I will be living in South Korea, I will probably hit up Japan, and am open to economical suggestions while I am in the so called Orient.

I will be teaching conversational English at a private academy, called a hagwon, through YBM in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul. Seoul is a city of over 10 million people (23 million in the Seoul metro area) and will officially be the most populated city to which I have ever even been.

More details to come once I am settled in Seoul and I hope that you either find this blog interesting enough to check out maybe once a week. I will try and update more often that that however. For fans of my last blog while I was studying in Chile, I hope this one is much better and more entertaining.

Contact info:
Email: sidebyrnes@gmail.com
Skype: sidebyrnes@gmail.com
MSN: escabeches@hotmail.com

Please write, comment, and or send me care packages filled with lengua tacos.

Sincerely,
Danny