Beach bummin'

by Jenn

Since I had the day off and Karl got out at lunch time, and it was a gorgeous day outside, we decided to hop on a bus to one of the closest beaches. After eating a quick lunch, we took a taxi to the bus terminal. Taxis are so cheap here that it costs the same amount for us to take a bus to the bus terminal, so I see no point in denying ourselves a little luxury. Anyway, we got to the terminal right after a bus to Buan, our destination, left. Of course. So we found ourselves with an hour and a half to kill before the next bus left. Not to worry, though, there is a Family Mart right across the street from the bus terminal with a well-stocked ice cream freezer and tables in the back. 

I took some pictures of the bus terminal because it just looks like something from a much poorer country than Korea. Korea has all of these super high-tech things like the KTX (Korea's version of the bullet train) and crazy fast internet and neat cars, but some things are really stuck in the past. The bus terminal is small, grimy, not air-conditioned, and has no screens or even doors. It seems like something from a Chinese village or maybe one in the Philippines.

 

I would have taken some pictures of the inside where you buy tickets, but it's constantly packed with people and I don't really have the guts to whip out my camera and start taking snaps of random people. They will spit in your face here without restraint, and I wasn't in the mood for it. By the way, the construction you see in the above picture that looks like a Greek church or something is actually a huge wedding hall. The most extravagant structures we've seen in Korea have been, hands down, wedding halls. Weddings are big business in Korea. If you think Americans spend too much and get too frivolous with their big day, you ain't seen nothin'!

Anyway, finally our bus arrived and we hopped on. The ride was to a small city about an hour south of us, and then we hopped on a local bus for a 30-minute ride to the actual beach. The rainy season has come to an end at long last, so the countryside looked pretty today. The rice fields are just so green!

That last shot is from the outskirts of our city. Again, I'm just surprised at how dirty everything looks. It's like things fall into disrepair and they just let them stay that way. Is it a money issue or just that no one cares?

Anyway, after what felt like a very long time, we made it to the beach. It was beautiful! The sand was really squishy, more like a lake, since the west coast of Korea is mostly mud flats. There were so many tiny crabs (about the size of ants!) and minnows and shells. Some dead jellyfish, too, yikes. There weren't many other people there at all, and only a handful of them were swimming. Now, I know that most Koreans can't swim (which is strange to me, but that's another story) but there were tubes and life jackets for rent, so I wonder why it was so empty. Jellyfish, maybe? There were even two lifeguard boats out. Then we started to wade into the water and realized that it just didn't get deep! We went out quite a ways and it never got past our knees. I wonder how far you would have to go to do some real swimming?

So, we amused ourselves by walking around and splashing and checking out the rocky areas jutting into the sea.

We came back feeling a little worn out even though we didn't do much. The heat from the sun and the humidity here just seem to sap your energy if you're out for very long. Luckily, we were able to walk to Subway near our apartment and get a sandwich to revive us. It's comforting that you can order a spicy Italian or a meatball marinara all the way over here. Even if the salami is more like bologna.

On a cooler day, we'd like to go back to Buan and take a local bus to a nearby area because the beach itself and the mountains behind it are part of Byeonsan National Park. Apparently there is a nice day hike in the mountains that has a waterfall and a temple. I'd like to tackle it once the leaves start turning. And when it's not, you know, a hundred degrees. Call me a wimp if you must.

Hot weather? Cool down with hot soup. Obviously.

by Jenn

The most popular food by far this week here in Korea is samgyetang, a chicken and ginseng stew that also has jujubes, sticky rice, garlic, and other ingredients. When I first heard about this dish, I thought "oh, that sounds like a nice meal for winter to warm you up." Imagine my surprise when I found out that it's used for just the opposite- to cool you down in the hottest days of summer. The theory is that hot soup inside your body will make the outside of your body feel cooler. I'm not sure I buy this, and, judging from the throngs of Koreans I see eating ice cream and cold noodle dishes, I'm not sure they do either. However, samgyetang is also supposed to replenish nutrients lost from sweating too much, and it's supposed to treat the lethargy that often accompanies these dog days. I prefer the Japanese idea of fighting summer fatigue with barbequed eel. Thank goodness they sell that here too!  Anyway, seeing as how we're in Korea, we decided to do what (some) Koreans do and fix a pot of samgyetang from a kit sold at our local grocery store. I enjoyed it. But maybe that's because the air conditioning made me a little chilly before I dug in...  It's tasty to be sure, but it certainly won't replace ice cream, watermelon, potato salad, or hot dogs as summer foods in my mind.


The past week has been pretty tough. We have been dealing with the bureaucracy of two offices of education since our schools are not under the same one. Yes, I know that makes no sense as we're in the same small city. As with so many things here, Western logic need not apply. One of the major problems we've been having is the fact that we're not really allowed to talk to anyone at either office directly despite the fact that they speak English; instead, we are supposed to ask our co-teacher something, who then asks the head of their department, who then relays it to the principal, who then contacts however many people at the respective office of education. It's a frustrating game of telephone, and someone, or several someones, don't seem to want to answer our questions. I have asked the same question three times and it is still unanswered. There are many other specific problems we're having that I'm not going to get into on here, but I will say that this has been an immensely stressful week. 


Adding to that stress is the existence of racist, "foreigner"-hating Koreans working within this system. The Korean government wants at least one native English speaking teacher in each public school throughout the country, but there are many people in the individual offices of education who are, well, racist. And they make sure you know it, too. Jackasses like that need to find another job. Can you imagine someone in the U.S. telling another person in their company "No, I'm not doing that because I'm sick and tired of being a f*ing slave to all these f*ing foreigners."  And all we asked was something that is promised as part of our contract. I've never been treated with such unmasked racism in Asia. Frankly, I don't know whether I'm more astonished that so many of these people are in positions where they work with "foreigners" (note: I hate that word.), or that it's completely acceptable.
 

Teacher! Teacher!

By Karl

So it's been about 4 weeks into my teaching career and I think I'm beginning to get the hang of it. I think I mentioned once before in a post that teaching seems to be kind of hit or miss. Sometimes you think something will work and it doesn't. You figure out what went wrong and make the necessary adjustments so that if you ever try the same thing again, it'll work out better. This happened to me the first time I tried playing a game in one of my classes. This post will be long enough already so I'll cut to the chase on this part: the way I explained it the first time wasn't so great, nor was the way the game was executed. So during the next class I made a few adjustments to the flow of things and it worked out a little better. The class after that went even better than the second one.

I would like to think it did have something with the way I explained and executed the game but then again, it could just have been the mood of the class. I've done bingo now several times with classes and sometimes they are really into the game, sometimes not so much. So I do what I can and if it doesn't work, well, there is always tomorrow.

At any rate, all in all I think I like my job. It's certainly no dream occupation but compared to previous jobs it ranks pretty high. I'll probably feel a lot more comfortable next semester. I think I'll feel more like I'm working with the students right from the beginning instead of coming in as an interloper. Plus it'll allow me to set some ground rules of my own. This isn't so much a problem at DE My Co-teacher (Co-Y) can be kinda strict and really seems to have a handle on the students. Even the 6th graders don't pose a problem. At GE, the story is a little different.  My Co-Teachers teach alternating classes. So Co-B teaches 3rd and 5th while Co-J teaches 4th and 6th. Kids at Ge tend to be a little more roudy and excitable. And the 6th graders can be a tough crowd. Some of them have attitudes coming to the surface and they seem to like to push it a little. They know they're above the elementary school mentality and they're ready to move on (which is why in the U.S. we put the little brats 6th graders in Middle School). In fact, last time I was with Co-J I had to bring the hammer down. And it worked.

This is one of the 6th grade classes. I snuck the shot while they were busy doing a workbook activity. Anyway, out of frame is one particular young man who thinks he's way better than this stuff. So when we started playing a matching card game towards the end of class, him and his buddies decided they were going to goof around. When I asked them to play it correctly, they faked it long enough until I walked away. Co-J even went over to have a word with them but they wanted nothing of it. They were going to do what they wanted, even if it was folding the cards and throwing them around. So I told them, "If you don't want to play the game, I will give you a test." Co-J even translated to make sure they understood but they seemed to think I was bluffing. So I sat at the computer and typed out a quick 5 question quiz and printed off a few copies. Unfortunately, class was almost over so I really couldn't administer the punishment. Instead, before class left, Co-J announced to the class that I had something to say. I congratulated those that had fun playing the game and admonished those who wanted to goof off. Then I told the class, "The next we play a game, if you don't want to play it the proper way, I will give you a test." As I held up the copies of the tests I printed the class got very quite and their jaws fell open and their eyes got wider. Co-J, I think, was trying not to giggle at the site of the shocked faces. I was quite stern in my tone and I repeated myself saying, "next time someone wants to misbehave during the game, everyone will take a test." I looked at the kid and his friends who started the shananigans and so did everyone else. They got the point.

We'll see if they remember it this week since I have another game for them. But that's part of being a teacher. WG (a Professor from BGSU) told me that when he first started teaching he quickly realized that it was easier to "bring the hammer down" right from the start and then ease up as the semester went on. It's a lot harder to be the nice guy from day one and then try to be a hard ass when things get out of hand later. I definitely agree with his philosophy and it works the same with children as it does with college students. So at the start of next semester, I may just have to bring down the hammer on day one. Especially with those little brats  6th graders.

This is the hallway of the English Adventure! classrooms at GE, with Co-J's classroom to the right and Co-B's classroom behind me and to the right (which you can't see because the camera only faces one way).










Here is my classroom at DE. You can see the grey cubicle wall, on the right side of the picture, that hides my office.

Here standing outside my "office" you really can't see much except for the storage closets. But one inside....

I have my own little hideaway. I just need to get something for the walls. It's pretty stark at the moment.

Sometimes I do get tired on the walls around me so I'll stand and look out the classroom windows for a while and day dream.


But not during class of course.

Sick & tired of being sick & tired

by Jenn


Something my grandma used to say, and that's definitely how I feel today.

Our apartment isn't air-conditioned, which is really beginning to get to me as the dog days of summer set in. We finally caved and bought a fan, which helps. However, it's been so hot all the time that we had typically been sleeping with the window open- the window being basically the whole wall that our bed is pushed up against. Last Sunday night, we slept with it open, and it got cooler and windier than usual, and I woke up with a sore throat. The next day it was still there, and my voice started disappearing. Of course throughout the rest of the week, I was feeling progressively worse. One of Karl's co-teachers even sent some medicines home for me! How nice is that? Unfortunately it didn't do much, so I ended up going to the pharmacy to see if they could recommend any OTC medications. I was nervous about doing this since hardly anyone in our little city speaks any English at all.

Karl and I walk in, and the conversation goes something like this:
K: Hello, do you speak English?
Pharmacist: Ah..... little bit.
Me: I need medicine for my throat. My throat hurts, and my voice...
Pharmacist: Ah... cough?
Me: Yes, coughing, a little bit.
Pharmacist: *turns around and looks at several meds on the shelf, picks one and puts it on the counter* This medicine for throat. It is.. anti-inflammatory. Two pills, three times. *writes down instructions*

He put the box in a bag and tossed in several strawberry-flavored lozenges and we paid a whopping W2,000 for the whole kit. About $1.75. Wow!

I took the medicine and it seemed to help a little, but this cold or laryngitis or whatever it is still hasn't gone away. And the cough is definitely more than "a little bit" now, keeping me up at night. I'm sure my mood hasn't helped since I feel homesick, but I've been trying to be positive and I've been doing yoga almost every day. Who knows, maybe the yoga has been too much for my body this week. I don't know, but I'm worried that I will need to see a doctor if this doesn't go away in a couple of days as it's going on a week now. No insurance yet + probably non-English-speaking doctors = nervous Jenn. I assume that since the pharmacy and vet's offices are so darn cheap that even without insurance it wouldn't be that expensive, but like so many things here, maybe my Western logic won't apply. Cross your fingers this thing goes away.

On the bright (?) side, we've officially completed one month of our sentence adventure. And we had a cheese pizza last night to celebrate. It didn't even have any corn! You know you've found a good pizza place in Korea when they don't put corn on by default!

Korea runs on Dunkin's

We went to Daejeon last week, which is the nearest "big" city to us. Even though it's big to us, it's still only the 6th-largest in Korea- in other words, nothing compared to Seoul or Busan. But those cities are adventures for another day. Anyway, one of the things that strikes me about Daejeon and Korea in general is the plethora of American brands. Behind the subway station in the picture above, you can see that Korea runs on Dunkin's too! There seems to be a Baskin Robbins on every other corner, 24-hour KFCs all over the place, and we've also spotted Krispy Kreme, Papa John's, Pizza Hut, Popeye's, Subway, McDonald's, and of course Starbucks. I've seen so many more American brands here than any other country I've been to (well besides Canada and the U.S. duh!). The ones I've been to here-- McDonald's, Subway, Baskin Robbins, KFC-- all seem to have the American standard products and some Korean twists as well. Like McDonald's. You can get a Big Mac or McNuggets and fries, and the fries mercifully taste the same here, or you can get a bulgogi burger. It's delicious, trust me! McDonald's even has 1,000 won sundaes, which is so awesome to us because we have made many a $1-sundae run, especially in the summer in SC. They have McFlurries, too, but here they have a green tea flavor. I have yet to try it, but I'm certain I will. If you know me you know how much I love green tea-flavored treats!

Here's a typical Korean lunch from a food court when you don't opt for the American brands. I have some sort of bibimbap going on there with pickled side dishes and a soup that didn't look to bad but smelled like feet. Karl wouldn't even touch it, so I took a pass. The main dish and pickles/kimchi were great though. Karl got a Japanese-style lunch: Omurice and tonkatsu, with salad and soup. However, the omurice had kimchi fried rice inside rather than the ketchup or plain kind you get in Japan.

One thing that is specific to Daejeon from what we've seen, although this is probably the case in other big cities too, is these bike rentals. All the bikes are the same and parked at little stations like this. Nearby there is an electronic kiosk where you enter your information and voila! you have a bike for the day. Not that it would be anywhere near that simple if we actually wanted to figure out how to do it, but it's nice that the option is there.

I found myself kind of wishing we lived in Daejeon. There is so much more to do, and the people just let you live there. By that I mean that we didn't get gawked at, and I don't think one single obnoxious person heckled us with "HELLO HELLO." I would estimate that 30% of the people I pass here where we live do one of the two, and often both. So many people here treat non-Koreans like mascots instead of people, and I'm sick of it. I might be able to understand if this was the 1960s and they had genuinely never seen a non-Asian before, but that's absolutely not the case. But I guess this is one of the things I have to put up with if I want to get the nice paychecks and live rent-free here.

Anyway, we did decide to explore more of our own city, starting with one of the biggest city parks in the country, Wolmyeong Park. It's really more of a network of trails criss-crossing some large hills on the north side of town, but it's covered in forest and you do feel as though you're in the wilderness rather than the city. I really enjoyed it. The only thing I didn't care for was the little convenience store/noodle shops that were along the trail every so often that each had music playing and a crowd of older people sipping soju. They're convenient if you didn't bring water, like us, but I think the park would be nicer without them.

We took some pictures in the park, but they didn't come out well because it was super hazy that day. There are some places that supposedly offer scenic overlooks of the city and the harbor, but you'd never know it this time of year. There's a haze that hangs over the city every single day, sometimes clearing up in the early evening, and sometimes lasting until dark. I remember southern Japan being like that too in the summer.

We also inadvertently found a Japanese Buddhist temple in town near the park that provided some decent pictures. It's really a beautiful place! It looks like they hold services there frequently. When we were there, there was a group of Japanese tourists there with their kids. The temple representative spoke English, so he explained in English what they were looking at and one of the ladies would ask him some questions in English and then explain to the others in Japanese. For a moment I wanted to jump in, but it looked like they were managing just fine without me. I'll save my mad interpreting skills for another day :P

At the entrance to the temple were these two little turtle statues covered in rocks. Aren't they cute? We couldn't resist snapping a few pictures of them.

And one more thing we've discovered in the past week is that Tama likes Super Mario World! We downloaded it on our Wii a while back and are still working on those final difficult levels. Tama thinks he can help us. I'm not so sure.