Congratulations!

Congratulations Daryle! I just got wind of that fancy award you received! Well done sir!

The Missing Pictures and Gyeongju

Mike and Diana make it to the Gu

It's Friday, and Mike and Diana have been here (in Korea) since Wednesday. We picked them up from one of four bus depots yesterday. It was a trial and error situation trying to find the right station. Eventually, there was success when there were two waegookins waiting for us. We took them to the motel, and there was a nice situation trying to figure things out, but thanks to Jae Won, we got it settled. The room is fantastic! It's better than the hotel that we stayed in in Seoul. It even comes with complementary razor, toothbrush, and condom. There's even some sexy mood lighting. Yesterday, we took them for lunch and acquainted them slightly with the main drag we frequent. Today, we took them to Seomun Market and discovered many an alley and random crap. Mike and Diana also watched two of Luc's classes and one of mine. My kids were completely freaked out by my boyfriends parents. They were telling me yesterday, certain ways that I should address them. I have to be extremely formal, demure, and mouselike. Its a little late for that I think :D Mike's been having some fun with the metal chopsticks. It's not going to well. Diana told me that he was practicing this morning with toothbrushes !

Tomorrow we're heading out to Gyeong Ju, the historic captial of Korea. Jae Won is driving us. Should be quite a lovely time. Getting the camera ready currently. I am posting some pictures of some of my kids. There is one girl, Hyo Ji (Annie) in her girl scout (not girl guide, this is a different organization) uniform. The one that the two boys (Nam Hyeop and Young Wook) are holding is Min Seok. He is the cutest little bugger, he literally comes up to my hip and is one of my smartest kids in the school. i want to take him home. He wouldn't let me get a decent picture though, which is sad.

okay, the picture thing isn't working, i'll try to do it in another post

I'm breaking down, I am finally going to go to a Korean doctor. I'm in week two of this nasty cough, and I cannot lie down without coughing myself to nearly getting sick. I finished off my cough syrup that I brought with me, and went to get some Korean cough syrup, only to be surprised and sorely disappointed. It's the viscosity of water, but tastes like vanilla. Did nothing. So then I was told, "why don't you get pills?". So I did, they did a little. Not enough. So here I am, waiting for my ride.

Now, I am back from work, back from the doctor. He gave me a grab bag of drugs. Here, they package all your pills together, in serving size. I have 5 pills in one bag... Back home there would be a pill that covered it all. He also gave me amoxicillin. I'm glad that the package had English on it. I told the doctor I was allergic to Penicillin, and he still gave me this. way to go doctor. Trying to kill me?

Diana, could you please bring some cough syrup (Contact complete) and Fishermans Friend? Anything but cherry flavour. Luc and I are so excited for the visits! He's working on his report cards now so he doesn't have to do them while you are here. I finished mine on Thursday. I'm so efficient.

Aren't my kitties cute?

Erin got a Perm-a. Aye cap'n. I have wavy hair now. The day I decide to do it, it rains too. Oh well. Yes, i went for it, almost chickened out.

So here are a couple shots. Seomun Market, Bev trying on jeans at Seomun market under a skirt becuase there are no change rooms. And my babies. Koy and Boots immediately came up to me and were sniffing sniffing sniffing. "Are you my mommy?" My hair smells like the perm a bit, so they don't really recognize me. And one picture that Toria and Scott sent me for my birthday, i love it! Luc and I are in search of the raddest english shirt we can find. You can find kids walking around in shirts with swears, and vulgar sayings but they don't know what they say. I found this one, and was tempted to buy it. When i took a picture of it, the lady at the shop was not pleased.

Waegook in Daegu

Sometimes it can get pretty tiring being a waegookin in Daegu. I'm constantly stared at and criticized. I'm considered obese here, I wear the largest size pant, IF I CAN FIND THE SIZE. Yesterday, on the subway, som lady was blatantly staring at me. I'd look at her now and again to find her still staring at me with a stink eyed look. Finally I stared back at her, and gave her the "okay now, you can stop" look. She still stared for a few seconds then looked away. When I looked back again, she was staring. When I'm walking down the street, the ajumas (old ladies/married ladies) look me up and down out of the corner of their eyes. When they see me looking at them, they usually quickly look away. Even the really old women who sell their veggies on the street point and laugh. awesome. Makes me feel real good about myself.

Though when you try and speak Korean with them, they usually are suprised, and compliment you profusely on your good Korean. Yesterday, at Seomun, Bev was trying on some jeans, and becuase there are no changerooms in the marketplace that doens't have enough space for you walk, she had to use a tiger striped stretchy long skirt. It was quite entertain, and there are some things that are universal. I was doing the pornstar music, and the seller was laughing. Bev and I were talking the limited language we know, which is mostly numbers, and i was interpreting some things, just based on what we were doing and he hand gestures, but I think the lady thought I could understand everything she was saying. I got maybe a word (a number). Even when sellers are telling me about their product, I pretend like I understand, that way they don't try to repeat it over and over, because I don't know where to start to understand the details of the language. I know enough to roughly get me buy. Charades is the biggest skill one needs to have to be in a foreign country.

At Seomun, I wanted to see the animals, they usually don't bother me. It sucks they are in cages, but I know what to expect. This time as another story though. When we got there, so guy had a cat by a chokestring pole, and was holding it up buy it's neck. The cat was clawing in the air becuase it was choking, the string was so tight. I had to get out of there fast becuase I was starting to cry. Even the people who were buying the cat were telling the guy to stop. Bev told me that the cat ended up passing out in the end after I ran away. It was horrible. I was crying as I was hurrying away. I had to get out of there fast. I've never gotten like that before. I can't believe it. I came home and spoiled boots and koy with treats, hugs, and kisses. Any time before I saw was they sellers picking the animals up, not choking them almost to the point of death. You hear about this all the time, but it's quite another thing seeing it. I kept thinking about it all last night. I love my kitties.

I'm looking forward to Diana and Mike coming out, and then Mom and Dad. I can't believe it's been nearly five months here, we're almost at the halfway mark. It's gone so fast, but yet, thinking about it, there's still a lot more time to go. I need to see my family again. Luc and I have been talking about coming back again. I want to be home for Christmas, and then in January, we're going to Disneyland with Toria for her birthday (SUPER excited about that). I'm going to break even when I get back. Just making enough to pay off my student loans. No money made for me. Lucas will be ahead though. Student loans kicked my butt, they suck. Have to come back just to make some money! There are other countries that would be good to teach in, but you can't make as much money as you can here. We'll see what happens later.

Now it's time for baseball in the middle of Duryu park. It's a large park across from Woobang Towerland (amusement park). We play in a collesium like place, and many people watch the crazy foreign baseball league for an afternoon's entertainment. Last week, one of our team mates almost beamed a family with his hit (he can hit real far).

I am alive!

Hopefully this is the start of more blogging for me, but we’ll see. Thanks for the long comment Monic! Hopefully the anonymous thing will encourage more comments, but we do have to blog more ourselves. You should come out to Korea Monic, everyone with a four year University degree should, it’s a great experience and an opportunity to make some money. Oh and yea, of course I have the better students.

I am pretty angry at the Canucks for missing the playoffs, they completely blew it. It didn’t even look like they were trying for the last 10 games. Though Trevor’s send off was great. I thought it was handled very well by both the Flames and the Canucks. It was one of the only things the Canucks did right all year. I wish the Canucks could have played with more heart on Trevor’s last game though, maybe honour him that way…. I guess not though. Dad, what are Grandma's thoughts on the Trevor Linden sendoff?

A month or so ago I told Neal that I would join Hapkido if the Caucks missed the playoffs, cuz I was pretty sure they were going to make it… now I guess I have to join Hapkido. Hapkido is “a form of self-defense that employs joint locks, pressure points, throws, kicks, and other strikes) (Wikipedia). From what I know, it’s a combination of a few of martial arts known to Korea. I am looking at is as a way to get into shape. It could be fun, but it’s an every day commitment. It will be intense I guess.

I had Foosball last night and it was pretty fun. It’s a great time filled with drinks, Guitar Hero and me kicking ass. Well, they put me in the lowest division because they didn’t know who I was, so I tend to win most of the games. We play best out of three every time and my team has only lost one game, but never a series. And we only lost that one game because the bartender was filling in for a missing opponent; the bartender/owner is good. I wish I could go into a higher division, but I guess I’ll just practice in non-league sanctioned games. Dad, I told them you were pretty good and that you would come one Thursday, so you better get practicing. Oh and I said I might be able to get you guys to bring some foosballs. They’re not easy to get here. So could you guys bring some with you when you come? Balls just like the ones you have at home. We have this one ball that’s way too light, and it’s hard to play with, so don’t any that are too light. Apparently we can get free drinks if you bring some foosballs too. So a pack or 2?

On that note, I’m beginning to put together a list of stuff you can bring (or anyone can send if they feel the urge). Here they are in order of importance:

Foosballs
Herbal Essences conditioner for curly hair
Hockey balls; the orange ones you get at Canadian Tire, not the hardest ones you can find, but the second hardest. Well anything will do, I’ll leave that up to you.

And

Chips; Ketchup, Dill Pickle and/or Doritos would be sweet; they only really have Pringles here in the potato chip department…. And some knock off Doritos.

Dad, Are we booking the hotel in Seoul? Or are you?

And the rain keeps falling, falling, falling....

We're on day two now of literally non-stop rain. This, I believe, is just a preview to what we will be expecting come the rainy season. I definately need to get some boots, as I don't even have waterproofed shoes. I do love my umbrella though, it's a clear plastic one. Brilliant. Last night we went out for dinner with Whitney and a couple friends for her birthday, and tonight, Lucas is going to head out for his Fooseball Tourney. I don't think I'm going to go this time round, we were there until 3 am last time. I went to play Guitar Hero 3, but I didn't like having to share it, so tonight, I'm going to have a night by myself, watch a movie, read a book, and just be. This week has been filled with many things. We went to Costco finally, we needed litter and some other things, and on the way, there was this hospital. I was reading the name of it in Korean. It was the She-Tee hospital. Read it fast. I don't want to go there.

MONIC! Hey! Nice post on the last one. You rock! Miss you tons! Come out to Korea, it's great! The kids are hilarious here when they try to explain something to figure out a word. And they love talking about blowing things up, and playing computer games (Starcraft and Sudden Attack). They have PC rooms here that the kids live in when they are not in school and just play games. I feel sorry for some of the kids though, when they can't keep their eyes open because they didn't sleep due to getting their homework from school and many hagwons done. The kids are completely overworked.

46th Annual Cherry Blossom Festival

Lucas and I just got back from an eleven hour day. But what a beautiful day! We went with his co-teacher Jae Won and Whitney and Neal to Jinhae, about two hours outside of Daegu on the southcoast. It was the weekend of the Cherry Blossom Festival and it was easy to see why this was the city to host the event. When you're on the highway, you come out of a tunnel to millions of cherry trees. It's absolutely crazy. Kids had little shovels and they were scooping up the fallen petals. Thousands of people were walking along the roads that are lined with Cherry blossoms. We did get lost in the city. Jinhae was where Jae Won's father was born, so he called him a couple times for directions. We passed by a military base that had soldiers out front just chillin' with their assault rifles. Awesome. The base overlooked the harbour and there were rigs and ships galore. The festival itself was on the Naval Base. As you can see in the pictures, there were a couple battleships, but we were 10 minutes late to be able to go on them. Jae Won tried to tell the guy a sob story about how we came all the way to Canada to see this festival, and how could he turn us away? He did. Oh well. Got some pictures of the ships, cute kids, and a pink and blue whale. We then made our way to find some food and I threw a couple handfuls of petals at Whitney and Lucas. It kinda made me think of in Sleeping Beauty, when Merriweather and such are trying to change the colour of the dress from blue to pink, and I just kept imagining that sound their magic made when I was throwing the petals. Anyway. After dinner, we climbed up a mountain that had a monument on it that was originally made as a memorial for the Russo-Japanese War, but then that was destroyed because it was made by the Japanese, and Koreans don;t exactly LOVE them. But it was rebuilt as a testament to Korean courage, or something along those lines. It was a good hike, I think there were 365 stairs, and then the pagoda style building. You could see the entire city from there, it was gorgeous. We tried some coconut. Some guy had a stack of coconuts and was drilling holes in them and then put a straw in it. You just drank the milk. It wasn't as good as I thought it would be...We stopped to watch the Army and Navy bands play some music. We were a little lost in the city, but eventually made our way back to the car, and back to Daegu. It was such a perfect day for the trip, the weather was lovely. The cats missed us all day though. They looked sad when we left. They know that Saturdays are the days they get more time with us :) So now they are both hanging out in the computer room with Luc and I making sure we don't leave again! P.S. Yes, I stalk Korean babies.

Kickin' it in Geumchon

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjBfy_HVoSM

This will make some of you laugh. It made Luc and I laugh. Some guys in Geumchon made a video rap about their time here. Enjoy!