First day of school!

Korea 06/15/11 Night

Successfully rode the bus and subway to school ALL BY MYSELF today! Yes, I am proud. Made the correct transfers and got off at all the right stops. Even though the commute is an hour, it isn't too stressful and time goes by quickly. I was thinking about why, because in the states, the idea of taking an hour to get to work would make me go crazy, but I think it's because I do zero driving here.

This is the school I work at.. so far, so good, but between me and this blog, I hope that they're not pulling a fast one on me.. yeah. I'll keep it at that.

Teaching wasn't too bad. I ate cafeteria lunch (I made the cardinal mistake of not having my camera with me at all times), then made one class journal about their day, and then for the after school classes, administered tests. The kids are chaotic but sooo cute. They kept asking if I was Korean and trying to speak to me in Korean though. -____- I repeatedly told them that it was English class and to speak English, but at one point some of the kids were doing something that I wasn't sure if they were supposed to, and they couldn't explain in English, so I let them just tell me in Korean. MISTAKE. Because then they all thought it was ok to speak Korean in class. NO. But at the same time, they were so eager to communicate with me that it made my heart melt. :D

They all have English names, and one kid is totally named "T-Rex" HAHAHAHAHA. It is even more hilarious because the kids all think it's a normal name and refer to him as T-Rex with the straightest faces.

I don't go back until a week and a half from now so this is all the school I have until then.

Training day

Korea: 06/14/11 Night

Relatively easy but still active day today.. went to my first training session for work. I'm rarely around kids, so it was refreshing to see them joking and having fun, completely unselfconscious. Their enthusiasm was quite contagious.

Some observations:
-Maybe it's just my family, but they drink coffee here after every meal. A few years ago I couldn't have cared less about this but because I love coffee now, I've noticed this little ritual.
-I forgot to mention this yesterday, but when you shop in stores, they are on you like white on rice! I started to get mad offended at this shoe store when this worker was following my every move. I even walked, and stopped abruptly to check if she would do the same. Yep. But apparently this is just how they roll here.
-Drivers don't care whether there are human beings in their pathway and will keep driving until you 1. get out of the way or 2. get run over. It really doesn't matter to them. And they like to drive in small alleyways and on pedestrian sidewalks.

Running around Seoul

Korea: 06/13/11 Night

06/12/11
No pics from yesterday. Lots of family time with people visiting the house, including one of my cousins and his wife/kid (never met the wife/kid before). Later some of us went to go eat agu jjim and then I took the bus with another cousin to Daehak-ro, where there are streets lined with stores/restaurants/etc, to shop and take sticker pics. Bought a pair of peep-toe heels. I think they might be normal here, but scandalous back home. Haven't decided.

06/13/11
Navigated the big bad world of Seoul transportation.. did a practice run to the school where I'll be teaching. Seems simple enough, but it's going to take me about and hour and 15 mins to get over there. :( Need to remember to bring my ipod. Listen to some podcasts or something on the way.

Then I met up with A in Myungdong! Getting familiar with the place.

We ate shabu shabu kalgooksoo. I thought it was just ok at this place.

Huge ice cream cones! GREEN TEA <333

Since Namsan Tower is really close to Myungdong, and the weather was really nice, my mom wanted to go ride the cable car up. It was pretty cool... minus the fact that Lee Min Ho was not with me! I immediately started craving watching Boys Over Flowers after riding the cable car HAHA.

Let them eat cake

Korea: 06/12/11 Night

06/11/11 recap!

Woke up really early Saturday morning (thanks, jetlag) and walked up this mountain behind my grandma's house. Did not expect this to be so close to where I'm staying, but it's seriously such a breathtaking view.

According to my mom, these walls have been here for thousands of years. They were used during war to shoot weapons through the holes in the wall.

Namsan Tower in the distance.. I think I'm going to visit this sometime this week, but we shall see.

Okay, so Korean grandmas and grandpas are no joke hardcore about their exercise on these machines! This one grandma was literally spinning herself upside down on one of the contraptions like it was nothing. The bottom pic is also evidence.. random workout class.

For lunch one of my aunts took random family members and me to this duck grilling restaurant (Shigol Jib, near/in Anyang). I'm gonna say this about all the food I eat but it was SO GOOD.

It was my birthday that day, and my cousin's birthday a month ago so my aunt bought a cake for us.. honestly, the best cake I have ever eaten and I don't say that lightly. Not too sweet, really soft, fresh, subtle blueberry flavor, and the icing was this yogurt cream. The only reasons why I didn't eat the whole thing was 1. I was super full from duck 2. I'm nice :)

 

 

Afterward we took a walk, and there were a lot of pretty roses around which we took as a sign for a photo op.

 

Lastly, I celebrated with yet another cake at home. I guess I'm getting so old that I need to divide my age between 2 cakes. >_<

Other pictureless highlights of the day:

-Saw the Blue House (equivalent to the White House in the States). Lots of police around, stopping our car and asking what our business was in the area.

-Drove through Itaewon.. for a minute I thought that I was looking at the streets of NY or something. Racially diverse, and a lot of the stores were American and had that look to them.

Getting acquainted with the city

Korea: 06/11/11 Morning (I'm 24 today!)

06/10/11 pics: First full day in Seoul!

The neighborhood I'm staying at. We are down the street from a bunch of restaurants and little convenience stores. If you keep going the shops become more varied. I got a haircut at a salon which was SUPER cheap compared to the states.. it was funny though because I passed for a Korean-born Korean there. I think it's pretty obvious that I'm American (looks/style and limited speaking skills) but I specifically had to tell him that I lived in the US, and then he thought I was an exchange student, to which I had to tell him that I was born there. Any and all pride I gained from this episode was lost when we took a taxi and the driver told me that my Korean sucked. HAHA.

Then we went to Deoksu Palace. Pretty cool. To be honest, I kind of just looked around instead of trying to get every historical detail.

Myongdong. I heard that this was a big touristy shopping area and that is not an exaggeration. Crazy amounts of people and lots of things to see! My mom took me to this kalgooksoo place that she used to go to all the time when she worked at city hall (we couldn't go into city hall because it's closed for renovations).. however, she wasn't sure if it was the exact restaurant.. it was still good though. Really garlicky and the noodles were chewy which I like.. the kimchi was to die for there. Fresh.

Then we went on the US Army base to pick up some groceries/etc. Not much to it though.

And that concludes day 1! I already have some pics for today, but this took forever to upload and I need a break. Hmm.. blogspot is not really efficient in uploading photos. :(

Aaaand I spoke too soon

Korea: 06/10/11 Night

It is only 9:00pm and I am exhausted! And I've been tired for the past few hours.. def was wrong about not having jetlag. Had a pretty full day today but describing it will have to wait.

The same but different

Korea: 06/09/11 Night

Safely arrived! After a looooong flight which included an emergency stop in Alaska bc a passenger became ill.

Actually haven't taken any pictures yet. As soon as I got here, I just wanted to slowly/quietly take everything in without trying to haphazardly capture every moment in a photo. Not ready to be touristy yet. It was about an hour drive from Inchon Airport to my family's house, but nice to see bits and pieces of Seoul along the way. Seems like there's lots to see. And eat. :)

My first impression of Korea is that in some ways, it's not all that different from the states. I thought I might be culture shocked at how things worked here, but haven't felt that way yet.

I honestly think I beat jetlag! I tried to take naps on the plane during Korea nighttime, and stay up when it wasn't, so I really feel like I would at 11-ish on a regular night in Virginia. Slightly sleepy but awake enough. The only difference is that I'm sharing a room with my grandma and mom so I should go to bed too.

Not sure what I'm doing tomorrow but hopefully I'll get to explore a little.