"Does that mean the white tiger married the lion?"

My students say funny things. Like really funny things. Like I have a hard time holding it together sometimes. So it sparked an idea. I'm going to start writing down the funniest things (similar to my quote book, for those of you familiar). Yesterday I was explaining to my kindergarten class that I saw a white lion on TV (One student is obsessed with white tigers so I wanted to see his reaction to a white lion). Honestly, the idea that a white lion exists totally blew their little minds. "Teacher, really??" and "Does that mean a white tiger married a lion?" This was one of those aforementioned moments that I simply couldn't not laugh.

In my last class on Thursdays, I received a new student yesterday. He was shy at first, but quickly began bonding with the other boys over Nintendo DS and whatever else it is 11 year old Korean boys bond over. We had a lesson where they had to name 4 people, and 4 animals. One of the people they named was "teacher." The next thing they had to do was use the word teacher in a sentence. I was happy when one boy exclaimed, "The teacher is genius!" I had to correct it to 'a genius,' but he was still correct. (I AM a genius). So anyway, I often peer down to their papers to make sure everyone is writing something down. I looked at new boy's paper, and was mildly offended though not really, to see that he had written "The teacher is not handsome." What other reaction can you have to that?? Kudos to him.

Yesterday was a good day. My students were funny, I was in a general good mood, and I had a 2 class in a row break. So I went to the gym during this time. I always stretch in an empty studio when I complete my workout. I was just finishing up when a little man with a crop of white hair came in and sat beside me on a yoga mat. The following is the conversation that we exchanged:

Man: Your first time?
Me: No, no. I've been coming here for a couple weeks.
Man: To the class?
Me: Oh, what class? No, I meant to this gym.
Man: Stretching class! 30 minute! Stay! Is good for your body.
Me: (after several long glances at my wacth, knowing I had to be back at work in 50 minutes) Ok! Why not?

Wow.

What I thought would be some light stretching turned into impossible positions I couldn't hold, more lunges than anybody should do in one month, and being continually picked on by the instructor because I was obviously the only white person in the room, and the only person that didn't have a clue what was being said! It was hilarity, for sure. I definitely think I'll be going back, simply because it was so fun to be in a position where I literally had no clue what was going on. But the studio is full of mirrors so I can at least attempt to follow along. The white haired man told me at the conclusion of class that he better see me next time. Why not? :)

I can't believe it's the weekend, AGAIN! Going hiking on Sunday. Pretty excited for that!

the Korean Stomper

On the KTX train from Seoul to Daegu.
Lots of mud!!! This is around a palace we went to in Seoul.

Forgive me but I do not know what mountain that is!

Shoe Alley! Tons of shoes. My feet, a women's US 8, are one of the largest sizes here. Unfortunately even I have a hard time finding shoes big enough!

My schedule here has been very far off what it used to be in America. Half the week I don't work until 1pm, and my earliest day, which is only once a week, is 10:50am. So I've gotten into the habit of staying up til 2am (partially so I can chat with folks back home while they're sipping their coffee, avoiding at all costs doing anything resembling work for the first 2 hours of their workdays- and partially because I just don't feel like going to bed at a reasonable hour). I've never worked a job in my post-college life where I get to wake up on my own accord, and not rely on the harsh startles of a cell phone alarm clock, so I'm taking advantage while I can. I think in a month I've only used an alarm clock to wake up maybe once.

In Brooklyn, before I was living with Greg, I lived in an apartment on the first floor, beneath the tiniest yet loudest stomper in the world. Little did I know that when I would move to Korea 4 months later, that she was not the loudest stomper in the world. The man (I don't even know if he's a man- I've never seen him- so I'll refer to this person from now on as the Korean Stomper, or KS for short) who nows resides in apartment 301 takes the cake. I have been awake today since 7am (I don't work until 1 today so I am not pleased). I was still awake at around 3am last night, watching Sex and the City because for some reason it pops up on an otherwise all Korean channel from about 1-2am every night, and generally just avoiding going to sleep. KS's stomping began at precisely the moment I decided I would slumber. It continued steadily throughout the early morning hours, and long after I finally roused myself from a fitful sleep to stumble to the laundry room, where I grabbed an old mop left by the previous tenant, and tenaciously thrusted the handle into my ceiling to no avail. (sorry, that was the world's longest sentence, but it needed to be, for effect of what my struggle with KS has been, and will continue to be I'm sure). With my heart racing and unsure how to handle the situation, I wrote my boss a desperate email claiming I just can't live like this. Perhaps a bit dramatic, but I honestly don't know A) why KS is only around and functioning between the hours of 12-8am and B) why in a country where shoes are not worn inside how anyone could walk so heavily.

So being forced awake before 8am by something I deem worse than a screeching alarm clock, I decided what better to do than to make myself a delicious tofu scramble for breakfast. It was by far the best meal I've eaten in a month, and I'm extremely excited to have found something I can easily cook, with no recipe, and for very cheap. I've already admitted I don't like the food here. I will use this to my advantage to nurture my love for cooking. I'm being really adventurous and trying lots of new things, no longer solely relying on recipes, but making things up as I go. Last night I decided I would make a curry, with what I thought was just a general curry powder that I picked up at my local grocer (packaging written entirely in Korean, of course). After prepping the vegetables and ripping open the cardboard box, I became immediately uneasy when the "curry powder" appeared to be more liquid, and I could feel chunks within the bag. After tearing along the perforation, my worst fear is realized. Hunks of beef (?) mixed in with the pre-made curry! Into the garbage it went immediately. Every little thing is an experience, from finding beef in my curry to hiking up a mountain. Funny how in a foreign country the simplest, most mundane every day acts become stories I will repeat for years.

I haven't had any funny stories about my students lately. I'm feeling like this is my job now, and it's less of a novelty. It's making me pull characteristics out of myself that I always wondered if they existed or not. I find that I have way more patience than I ever imagined. In a way it's creating a confidence in me, too. This is something more. Something less obvious. It's fulfilling in a way that I haven't really felt before.

However, this week in particular I'm living for the weekend! Hiking, mountains, new friends and new experiences. And of course Greg on Monday. I hope everyone is having a great week! Oh, I'm adding various pictures just for something for you to look at.

trip to Seoul

I got back to Daegu a few hours ago from a trip to Seoul. Kathryn and I left Friday evening after work. taking the KTX train was very easy to figure out. Once we settled into our seats and began chatting, we were in Seoul before we knew it. Kathryn's friends Ian and Dan met us then we headed to our hostel. It was run by a man called "Bong." The hostel shared the same name- "Bong Hostel." It was a quaint little place that felt more like a home than a hostel. Kathryn and I were in our own room, complete with bunk beds.

Most of our time was spent just wandering around, soaking things in so we'd know better what to do when we come back. Highlights include shopping (I've already said before but need to reiterate- the shopping here is phenomenal. And I am NOT a shopper. It might be that every single thing I see is my style, and I might be partial, but I don't care what it is. I love it!) Ok, so shopping, the juxtaposition of modern with traditional, stumbling across some traditional Korean dance, seeing a palace, feeling like a tourist even though I live here now, meeting other like-minded people and hearing their stories, it goes on and on. Seoul is just simply too big to have seen very much of it. That's why I didn't make much of a plan (ok, I made ZERO!!) before going, but that's just because I wanted to see things then maybe pick out some things that I would like to come back and see. When you rush and try to pack 30 things into a day, you don't end up doing half of them, and the half of them that you do accomplish might not even be what you wanted to do afterall. So I was content to just walk around and see things.

It's kind of unfortunate that I am a vegetarian because there is so much meat being cooked in stalls on the street, and a lot of it looks and smells really good. It would definitely make things easier, except when I see things like some of the photos I'm posting...(not sure what these pics are going to look like on the blog, but you get the idea). I came to a very critical realization last night at dinner though. I've been getting really frustrated with the food, and feeling forced to eat vegetables and rice for every single meal (which is why I love cooking at home so much, because I don't have to wonder whether or not there are fish bits in my dinner). I got a rather lousy meal last night. But in that moment I realized that it's not being a vegetarian in South Korean that's frustrating- I think I simply do not like Korean food!

I've been playing dress up in my new clothes all evening. It's funny, I go crazy over all the cute little floral print skirts and giant sweaters and weird nonsensical English tee-shirts they have here, and all the Korean girls are carrying around Forever21 shopping bags!!! I guess it's that 'grass is greener' mentality, because there is no way I'd choose Forever21 over everything they have here! Maybe it's the novelty of it being American, too. I'm not sure, but I suppose that goes both ways. I may not be working in fashion anymore, but if any of my fashion friends are reading this, try to persuade your boss to let you come on a shopping trip to South Korea!!!! Seriously, Seoul's got soul. I mean fashion.

Almost daily I am getting more excited about what this year is going to bring me. All the laughs and tears and moments and joy and periods of sadness I've already felt tell me that I will remember every bit of this year forever. It still feels hard, and it still feels crazy that I'm here. It's almost been a month!! My boyfriend gets here next Monday. I hope he's not as jetlagged upon arrival as I was, because it took me nearly a week to feel normal! Sorry Greg, but you better sleep on the plane and feel like a million bucks when you land!!! xo

Seoul!

Going to Seoul this weekend, so no posts until Monday! Have a great weekend everyone

xo

so I joined a gym...

This may be hard to believe, but I went to the gym tonight in my new city for the first time (that's not the unbelievable part...) this is- and I got more stares than I ever got from the middle aged black men when I lived in the Caribbean ghetto in Brooklyn. Gyms are intimidating, especially gyms where you can actually see people nudging other people, then 6 sets of Asian eyes are watching you do squats. But whatever, I'm not gonna let that stop me!

The gym is quite expensive though. More than I paid in NYC. But it's really nice. They have a full spa area as well, complete with bade pools. If I'm feeling shameless and comfortable I can even have a Korean lady give me a body scrub. I'll definitely have to let that happen one day. All in the name of full cultural immersion! They also issue 'uniforms' to workout in. You can bring your own clothes if you want, but I already stand out so I opted to wear the uniform.

Oh, one more thing- It was nearly impossible to actually join the gym, as none of the front desk workers spoke English. Finally though, the man working called someone else, who I assumed was on a different floor in the gym. We chatted for a few minutes on the phone, then I asked her if she was free to come speak face to face. She told me to wait ten minutes. So I waited... and waited... then, a woman came in through the front doors, purse in hand. She came up to me and said hello. It was now obvious that she had come from home to talk with me!!! She didn't even act like it was an inconvenience. Again, I'm amazed.

I need me some hiking boots!

Today has by far been the most inspiring day I've had here. Kathryn and I went to Mt. Apsan (which I can see out the window from the school I teach at) to do some light hiking and mostly to take the cable car to the top of the mountain. It was gorgeous!!! These are the kinds of things I want to spend my weekends and free time doing.

Hidden from the main path was this buddha and temple. We just kept walking up some stairs and came across this. I've seen things very similar in Hong Kong. But this time I am living minutes from them! This is really amazing. As I was showering this morning I had an emotionally overwhelming feeling of, "Wow, I'm really here!"

I've received the following comment more than once: I didn't really believe you'd ever actually leave NYC and go to Asia. I know it seemed like a giant leap, but I never had any doubts once I first got the idea in my head. It was definitely terrifying, but today was so inspirational that I am regaining confidence that I did the right thing. I feel very light. In the months before I left NYC I was feeling very run down and very stressed. I haven't felt anything resembling stress in almost 3 weeks. It's very refreshing. I've felt many other emotions, sure, but thankfully stress hasn't been one of them.

I get the feeling this will happen a lot

I was just wrapping up my week at school, putting away the last of my textbooks, when a little girl I'd never seen before ran up to me and handed me what I thought was a piece of garlic bread. I've been told time and time again that it is impolite to refuse gifts here, and I was starving, so I accepted. A couple bites in I thought I tasted something I haven't tasted in years. Upon closer inspection my doubt fully rose.

Yep, it was bacon. Tiny little flakes of bacon.

I've got to stop accepting food from strangers.

Hobby! Hobby!

One more thing from my van ride with Mr. Park.

We were talking about various things, and I heard him ask me, "What is your heartbeat?" Assuming he was tying this question to the physical I'd just endured 10 minutes prior, I responded, "Oh, I didn't look, but it's usually about 54."

54?

Yes, uhmm, 54 beats... per minute?

54?

-silence-

Mr. Park: Ah! 54! Noooo hobby! Hobby! Not heartbeat!

1st Korean hospital experience

I had to meet my boss's husband today at my school at 9:30am. He drove me to a hospital to get my physical done for my alien registration card. I need to point this out: I really do love all the forced awkwardness I daily stare directly into the face of. Riding in a van with a man I've hardly exchanged 10 words with, who speaks pretty good English but I still had trouble understanding him, was hilarious. I felt like a jerk when I asked him to repeat nearly everything he asked me, though.

The unfortunate thing about language barriers is that so much time is spent trying to simply formulate sentences that personalities get lost, and it's really difficult to pick up on all the little nuances that make people who they are. Mr. Park is a very funny man, but it took an hour of being in an enclosed vehicle with him for me to see that he is one of the funniest people I've talked to in a long time.

I want to talk about my actual experience at the hospital. And I want to say that I had a full physical done, bloodwork, urine test, eye test, blah blah blah, in approximately 20 minutes. I was ushered through about 6 different stations, very very efficiently. It was almost to the point of pushy. But it was welcome- as in the US this process would have been around 30 minutes of wait time, followed by another 30 minutes sitting in a paper gown in a cold room flipping through a tattered copy of Field and Stream Magazine wondering if you were supposed to put the opening to the front or to the back. And, 'Crap! Was I supposed to remove my undergarments?'

I don't want to be lewd, but the only confusing thing about this morning was when I was asked to do my urine test. I was handed the standard plastic cup, but inside the plastic cup was a long, thin vial. This vial was what I was supposed to hand back to the nurse. Erm... huh? With no explanations offered to me, I deduced what seemed a reasonable expectation. Without going into detail, I somehow managed to fill the vial. Having leftover in the plastic cup, I debated for a solid 3 minutes whether or not I should dump the remainder and toss the plastic cup, or exit the bathroom with everything in my hands. I opted for the former. Sidenote- never put yourself in a situation where you have a capless, pointed-bottom vial of urine in your hands and you still have the task ahead of you to pull your pants back up.

All in all, I'd say my evaluation of the Korean hospital that I went to is that it is an extremely well-oiled machine. Afterwards Mr. Park took me into a convenience store and made me pick out a chilled Starbucks drink from the cooler. "My treat. Drink one!"

"Oh my gosh! I thought it was branches!"

I went to dinner last night at a "traditional" Korean restaurant. My friend Kathryn is also a lactose intolerant vegetarian, so when she pointed to one of the many side dishes strewn about the tabletop and said, "This is so good, seriously... have some," I didn't give it a second thought. I was well into my third precarious chopsticked bite, mid-chew, when our friend Billy sat down at the table.

"You guys know that's squid, right?"

I nearly threw up.

After hastily chewing the remainder in my mouth and trying not to gag as I swallowed, I washed it down with some water. As much as I didn't want to think about eating squid- something I never even ate as a non-vegetarian- it was probably really funny for Billy to witness two known herbivores chowing down on squid. Needless to say, I'm pretty certain that this will be an ongoing joke of ours for some time.

This week at work started out a little rocky. I inadvertently made a boy cry. We made up by the end of class though, high 5-ing like old pals. Monday and Tuesday were frustrating because it seemed like over the weekend all my students forgot every word of English they knew. By today though they all got it back. One of the rather funny aspects of my job is giving vocab tests. It's probably inappropriate to say what some of my students have mistakenly written down, but it always makes me giggle nonetheless.

The BEST NEWS of the week is that my boyfriend booked his ticket to come see me! He'll be here in 2.5 weeks. Don't worry, I'll save everyone the sappy anecdotes on how I feel about him coming here. Just know that I am beyond happy :)

I'm starting to feel a lot more settled here. My mom asked me today the key differences that I was feeling between living in NYC and living here. That's a hard question. Obviously there's the language barrier. I want to learn some Korean, if for nothing else, so I can just not seem rude when people talk to me! I don't even know how to properly say hello! Also, there are no sidewalks in the neighborhood I live in, and the streets are very narrow. So every day walking to work it seems like I'm constantly within millimeters of being hit by a (slow moving) car. But so far, I traded one city for another, so it's going to take a little more time for me to have a nice long tally of differences. That should be an ongoing list I make. Noted.

Going to the hospital tomorrow morning to get my physical for my alien registration card. This is so bizarre!

free hugs!

I have always secretly wanted to receive a full on embrace from a total stranger holding a sign reading "FREE HUGS." (*Except in Union Square in NYC. That's a city where I'd always shove my hands deeper into my pockets, avoid eye contact, turn up Taylor Swift just a little louder and walk the opposite direction if necessary).

But in Daegu, my dream came true. After a few hours of wandering around downtown in and out of shops that I can't yet afford, Kathryn and I came across this assortment of eager teenagers. I walked right up to them, and all they said practically in unison was, "Oooohhhhh soo preeeetty!" What can I say? They love a freckled American over here. (A further note on freckles to come later...) So I managed to wrap my arms around each and every one of them. The 15 year old boys, not pictured, were more confused than eager but they didn't disappoint.

In 2 weekends (a triple celebration- my 27th birthday, Valentine's Day- though I'm a billion miles away from Greg, and 3 day weekend!) I am going to Seoul. I've only ever been there twice, making it no further than the airport both times, so naturally I am really excited to see what this giant Asian city is all about! I'll be taking the KTX train, which would take over 4 hours from Daegu to Seoul by bus, but the KTX train will take less than 2 hours! Take that, Long Island Railroad!

Ok, so back to the other note on freckles. No one at school has seen them yet because it's always negative 3 degrees in there, and I'm constantly buried under 6 layers of grandpa sweater and/or a scarf large enough to swaddle 4 newborns. Today, however, it was warm enough in classroom #3 for me to shed my layers and teach in only a single long sleeved shirt. I even pushed the sleeves up a little. One little boy queried, "Teacher, teacher!!! What is this? What's wrong with your skin?!"

Then I went into a rather proud explanation of what freckles are, and he didn't believe me when I told him they're all over my legs, too. And no! I didn't show him.