Assignments already...

Just got done with a online orientation test for one of the clinic simulation courses.. we have 5 attempts to take it. The first time I took it a week and a half ago, I got a 65. -__- Although to be fair, I took it at 3 in the morning when I was jetlagged (mind was not exactly in school mode), plus I didn't take it too seriously since I had a lot of chances... just didn't think I would do that bad HAHA. So I got freaked out and procrastinated on retaking it until today when I got really sick of the cloud over my head. Anyway, tell me why, when I opened the window, my old test with corrections all over it was available? Hip hip hooray! So it was easy. I actually prayed right beforehand because I was stressin.. gotta give thanks!

With that done, I'm going back into summer vacation hibernation.. peace out school. Do not bother me until next week.. and make it LATE next week..

US politics

This circus going on in Washington right now just makes me want to go back to Korea and live blissfully in ignorance. Please get your act together, Congress!

Coex Aquarium

My second to last weekend in Korea, I made a trip to Coex Aquarium! I'm not the hugest lover of sea creatures (they aight), but it was something cool to do, and I have a ton of pics that I thought I might as well post. Also, I'm still jetlagged! I don't know what the deal is...

 

 

There was this little display and one of the props was this straw bed that was used for babies to pee in back in the day. Naturally, we thought to pose with it.

I tried to take a pic of just the stingray by itself, but this little kid would not move her hand away! When she finally did, another little kid put her hand up so I gave up and just took the pic again. Now I think these pics are cute haha

shark shark shark

And that's that! Oh my goodness, thankfully I think is this the last post with a lot of pictures.. slow uploading is no fun.

This is getting ridiculous

I'm still so jetlagged! It's been 4 days!

I have one goal today: do not go to sleep during daytime. No matter what it takes.

On another note, upon coming back to the states, I really craved crunchy foods. I realized that I barely ate anything crunchy in Korea. Interesting..

So. This is jetlag.

It's 2:20am EST and there isn't the slightest chance I'm going to be sleeping soon.

Safely made it back home early yesterday morning! My first observation upon coming back to Virginia was how spacious it is.. even NoVa seemed like rural countryside compared to crowded Seoul.

As nice as it is to be home, I miss Korea already! Even as I was traveling back home reflecting on my trip, the whole thing kind of feels like a dream. Like did that really happen? At baseline, I think I would have enjoyed being there. But I was really blessed with family (esp family) and friends who went over and beyond to make sure it was a good experience. I am indebted.

But of course, I do realize all good things must come to an end. :)

Since I have nothing to do for the next couple of weeks before dschool, I figured I would reminisce and post pics I never got a chance to while I was in Korea. I got super lazy about taking pics towards the end though.. and this is going to be chronologically backwards.. oh well..

My last breakfast in Korea.. this is what I ate every single morning. My aunt runs a sort of boarding house for some local college students and feeds them breakfast/dinner so this might be more variety than normal. In the US, I'm used to eating a piece of fruit and maybe cereal/oatmeal in the morning so this was sometimes too much, too early for my body to process haha. But it was good!

Random performance on the streets of Insadong.

Met up with M and her mom in Insadong on Sunday. Lots of handmade crafts and shops. This is the last day we got to see each other so ajumma bought us matching bracelets at one of the stores. lol.. like I mentioned, she really wants us to be best friends. Good thing it turns out we do get along pretty well.

My second week at school (work) was quite different from the first. To be honest I don't think I put as much heart into it as I did the first week. Even still, on my last day (and the students' last day as well, since the school gets new kids every week) one of the girls in my homeroom gave me a present and wrote me a note in English. So sweet.

 

Ate at this woodfired pizza place that also served 떡볶이/라면 with J one evening. It was ok. Maybe this is Captain Obvious speaking but yeah. Don't go to Korea for pizza. Not even Mr. Pizza. But that is another post for another day..

Signing off from the motherland

It's been a crazy crazy few weeks. This will probably be the last post until I'm back stateside. I'm already beginning to process this trip in my head.. gonna be up for a while. I'm not sure how I expected to feel, leaving Korea.. maybe homesick, or just happy and ready to come home. But I kind of feel sad. I'm going to miss this place. I honestly didn't think I would form any kind of real attachments...

-Waking up and being made to eat breakfast, Korean-style
-Riding the 08 village bus down to Hyehwa station to go to work, or play with friends
-SEOUL METRO SYSTEM. I HEART THEE! So efficient, so cheap, clean. It got me to so many places that are now memorable to me. Though rush hours were not always the most fun, with all the standing against sweaty people and such..
-In the same vein, easily meeting up with friends, no matter where in Seoul
-Thankful for said friends, for being super super accommodating by taking time out of their schedules to play with me and show me around
-Daehak-ro which Jenn and I nicknamed "the hood" because we hung out there all the time before she had to go to the neighborhood gym to pump iron
-Having a complicated relationship with the taxi system.. on one hand so cheap and will get me straight home, on the other hand risking getting into trouble for using them by my aunt/uncle because they think it's dangerous
-Living with my aunt/uncle. More my aunt, since I didn't see my uncle too much. There was a point where I was talking on the phone and accidentally referred to them as my parents, as in "I have to ask permission from my parents", which is even weirder because I don't really use the word "parents" at home. But at certain times, I really felt like I was their overprotected daughter.. like any time I wanted to go out with friends I would have to tiptoe around and gather up the courage to ask them if it was ok to go out at 10pm (was tempted to just sneak out but I'm a goodie goodie). And if the slightest bump or rash or anything popped up, I was whisked away to the doctor to get it checked out. A different relationship from the one between my mom and me but still.. parental.
-Living with my grandma/cousin. My grandma was also my roommate. She was also a bit protective of me and worried a lot for the family in general. She's cute. My cousin was super generous with and gracious about everything.. really thankful.
-Meeting my mom's friend's daughter Minjung (weird spelling it out in English) my one KOREAN-Korean friend. I had to learn how to text/type in Korean bc of her, which was stressful at first but turned out to be super fun! She introduced me to her other friends and we all played at noraebang until 6am one time. Twas fun. Hopefully we'll keep in touch.
-Being forced to speak Korean with family members/most people here.. a lot of times, English was not an option at all so I would have to say things in a roundabout way to get to the point since my vocab is limited. But I think by constantly using it, my speaking has slightly improved.
-The cute cute cute items. Cute notebooks, cell phone chains, jewelry
-Cafes!

Ok. My tiredness is overcoming my sentimental-ness. A lot of this is just because I was on vacation, I know, and actually living here would be different.

But I am looking forward to going back to my regular diet, and losing some weight!

Spoiled

Just did a load of laundry by hand. It wasn't fun, but I now realize how spoiled rotten I am in the states since the only way I clean my clothes over there is by washing machine and dryer. My 81-year-old grandma got pissed, saying I was doing it all wrong and how it's beyond her how I lived 25 years without knowing how to wash my clothes (this is the way nicer version of what she said) and started doing it herself while muttering under her breath about my mom's parenting.. in my defense, how was I supposed to know that I had to put my soapy garments in a pot and boil it on the stove? o_O

Grandma and me are cool now though and I was laughing my way through this episode because it was too ridiculous.

Tour of my school

Some of the pics I took this week..

I work at an English center that is its own school within a bigger elementary school. This is the GDEC section of the school.

Cubicles in the teachers' office. The one I use is the one with the big paper birthday cake tacked up on the side.

Field in front of the school. It's pretty nice.

One of the lunches that I ate at school. The one time that I actually brought my camera, and the meal turned out to be one of the least appetizing and least typical. Usually it's rice, soup, and random sides.

Kids eating lunch in the cafeteria.

My lovely homeroom class this week! <3 I took this right before I showed them a movie as their last activity for the week. They were a good group (for the most part).

My desk this week. I took this while the kids were watching the movie.. I also want to note the Hershey kiss that one of the kids gave me. They give me all kinds of random things over the week (yesterday after school this girl gave me some dduk from her dad's dduk store) but the students got fake money to spend at the gift shop on Friday and one of the boys used a part of his money to give me a chocolate. So cute.

Adventures in teaching

I've never really been in a teaching position before, so this has been a quite interesting, yet exhausting experience. I want to fall asleep by 8:00pm!

I actually made a girl in my homeroom cry yesterday. :O She wouldn't come up to the board
 to participate in my activity, and when I made her, she burst out crying! I took her outside of the classroom and calmed her down, but in my head I was like "OMG she is going to hate English, she probably hates me, this must be a traumatic experience for her, blah blah blah". But I've learned that kids bounce back quite quickly. She is probably the student that loves me the most at this point, strangely.

I've also learned a few things about myself. I kind of feared that I would be walked all over by these kids, but it turns out that I'm more authoritative than I thought. Kids get unruly, so in those cases I have to call them out, assign seating when necessary, stare at them silently until they figure out that I won't continue the lesson until they are quiet. And surprisingly, they listen. I forgot that for kids, adults' words are law. It's a powerful position. :)

I also now know that teaching English as a second language is definitely not for me (Lots of repetition, lots. And it gets old), but teaching in itself is pretty rewarding. I love when my kids see me outside of class and are like "Teacher! Teacher!" and are excited to see me. I love when I teach them something and they're eager to follow. It's pretty neat.

I have a lot of pictures I need to upload but I'm tired!

Fast vs. slow

Korea: 07/05/11 Night

My time in Korea is running out! Officially less than 2 weeks until I go home.. it seems like time is going by quickly in this respect. I actually thought that my trip was too long, and that by this point I would be super homesick but I feel like it's just enough time.. although I wish I could stay maybe a smidgen more.

Work! It's amazing how activities with kids can fly by.. leaving me with 10-15 minutes to spare sometimes. In real life, this is nothing, but in school life (even from personal experience as a student myself) this can feel like ETERNITY. I have to come up with things to do/play with on the spot and hope that it fills time.

Anyway. I am exhausted. Good night.

Miss Independent no more.. for the time being

Korea: 07/04/11 Night (Happy 4th! I actually forgot that it was today until 3pm or so)

I'm experiencing a steep learning curve when it comes to living with a nuclear family, and one that is a bit overprotective of me. Back in Richmond, I'm used to living on my own, doing things without having to answer to anyone. Even when I'm at home, my mom is pretty relaxed, and I don't do anything that would be considered worrisome.

Here is a different story. And it's understandable in certain respects.. I'm a foreign kid and they assume responsibility for me. But also, they have a pretty set schedule as a family and I'm constantly having to keep them in the loop about any changes to my own schedule. But sometimes I forget, and then there are consequences to my actions. Minor, of course, but for some reason it's such a foreign way to live for me. Maybe it's good that I'm here.. to learn to not live so selfishly..