In Which Life Has Exploded

Or Kindies Are Exhausting.

So, a bunch has happened since I last got online to post. We had 추석, Chuseok in Roman letters, which, if you'll recall from this time last year, is basically Korean Thanksgiving. I went up to Seoul for it and made new friends from Germany and Malaysia and some other teachers here in Korea, except different cities. Yay new friends~! As always. That aside, it was a fun time. I wandered around a bit with a friend I made the first time I was in Seoul. We had fun even if the one thing I was looking for was probably closed and we couldn't find the other thing I wanted to see. Yay, non-existent planning skills. I eneded up at the National museum again, which was awesome, they had some new things which were wicked cool. I compared Mediterraean pottery and Korean/Asian pottery in my brain and felt like a complete geek/nerd. I'm probably going back because there's an exhibit that wasn't there yet that I want to see. So I'll be there again next weekend (it's a three day) probably.

Rosh Hashanah is almost here so I will say Shana Tova to everyone now. Yom Kippur is on a weekend and I'm ridiculously excited about that. I just looked at my calander so I felt the need to add that in.

In other news, my boss is friends with the boss at a Kindergarten school, ages 3-6, I think, so I'm now part-timing there three mornings a week. Monday and Tuesday it's 11-1 and Thursday its 1130-1, and they feed me lunch with the little ones. Its so freaking frustrating. The language barrier is ridiculous, their attention span is non-existent, and they take up so much energy. It's not all bad, I do enjoy the little kids, I love small children, it's just hard. After I have to go to ELC and do my normal classes, ugh, so much energy, Haha, I'm enjoying it. I had been complaining about too much free time, I guess this is a case of "careful what you wish for." I can't teach them, though, because they're so young, it's mostly playing with the hopes of them learning as we go. Also, they don't seem to understand that I don't know Korean very well so they'll say something in Korean and then looked expectantly at me. On the plus side no swearing in those classes like I have to deal with in my normal classes.

Work is going well. we're doing this special review class thingy for the middle school students because they have midterms coming up. It's boring for all involved, but it helps them and that's all that really matters. As an update. I do not work Saturdays. I got a new, rewritten, contract about it and everything. They're playing around with the schedule and that's one of the things they're playing with. Van and everyone else still has to go in, but I don't. I feel kinda bad, but I'm not going to complain because, even though I got a bit of a pay cut, no Saturdays! It's worth less money and a little guilt.

Insomnia and I made friends again, but I'm really trying to end the friendship firmly this time. It just can't seem to take a hint. I ended up not sleeping on Friday night, and then I drifted in and out from 8:30Am until a bit past noon with fake sleep. On Saturday, after being social downtown I went to bed at midnight and woke up at noon-thirty. Which was bad because I was volunteering at brunch at the First Alleyway restaurant. I was supposed to go in at 11. It ended up being ok, and I got there around 1 and helped out until closing. Tim gave me cooking things so all I need to do is rearrange my furniture a bit and I'm all settled in for the year. That's all for now.

Happy thoughts~
~Lyn

In Which Tempus Fugit

Or, I Can't Believe How Fast August Passed

Wow! August just flew by. After a few months of time dragging by at a snails pace and then WOOSH! August disappeared. Part of it is that I was so busy. Moving apartments, getting settled into my new job at ELC and so on. I feel like I blinked and suddenly it's September.

My perception of time aside, I feel like getting adjusted to ELC is a lot easier than getting adjusted to MunHwa was. It's amazing what having a year experience under your belt can do. Things make a little more sense. Not that's it's been a 100% smooth transition, I'm still a bit confused by my schedule and I have to re-write it out to make sense of it. I'm still getting used to teaching straight from a book and having a syllabus to follow. I really like it though. I'm given the book and a syllabus to follow. I mostly focus on speaking or writing, which is similar to at MunHwa, but it's more structured. We have different books for each class, each class is split up based on level more than grade. My classes are generally around the same level, I don't have any major splits which were a headache to deal with at MunHwa.

The students are much the same. I wasn't really expecting that big a difference with them. I like them though, I already have some favorite students and classes. I feel like I'm a better teacher than I was at MunHwa, and I'm not sure how much of that is just my brain acting strangely. I have less free time, which I'm sure my friends have noticed. I work from 2:30 pm until around 9:30 at night. It's a long day, but worth it. I supposedly work on Saturdays too, but that hasn't happened yet, so I'm just confused about that part. I started meeting with a tutor for my Korean, so I have that two mornings a week and I'll be helping out at a Kindergarten three times a week. I think. Still getting all the details figured out.

The apartment is MUCH smaller than my apartment before was. It's a one room, and I'll have pictures up just as soon as I finish re-arranging everything to my satisfaction. We have a break coming up this weekend and I'll be going up to Seoul for that. I can't think of what else to say at the moment. My insomnia has been acting up for a variety of reasons so I'm to exhausted to think or write more. I'll keep the updates coming as often as I can :D Promise not to disappear now that I'm the only one posting!

~Lyn~

In Which Lyn Proves Her Uncle (and Father) Right

Or What I Did For Summer Vacation.

Sorry! This is two weeks later than I meant it to be. For once I have a small excuse (not a fully strong one though). Last week my Saba (my mother's father) passed and it's been rather difficult to deal with all alone, away from my family. However, I am dealing as well as I can .

Sad news aside, I'll get to the fun stuff. Now, as I mentioned before I went to Japan for five days to visit a college friend, Hanako Aoki. I've never been off the main island of Japan so this was very exciting for me. Also exciting was the ferry I took. It went so fast it literally lifted out of the water a few meters. We weren't allowed outside on deck because it was going so fast. On a normal ferry the trip is 13 hours, on the Beetle with the hydrofoil it was only 3 hours. I met two new friends on the trip over, one from outside of Gwangju about an hour and the other from Daegu (near Busan). Both of whom made plans to climb Mt. Fuji. They had hiking and winter gear. Once we got into Fukuoka port and through customs I used my awesome observation skills I got from my daddy to totally miss seeing my friend standing in front of me. She was worried it was because she'd changed, I had to reassure her I'm just that observant. Anyway, a quick train and bus ride later we arrived at her hometown an hour later. Her family was amazing. My limited Japanese with Hanako's amazing translating abilities made communication fairly easy. My Japanese improved throughout the trip. Her family had planned out some amazing things for us to do. On the first day we went to an amusement park with awesome roller coasters (I only managed one of the big ones, this green one, before I got heat-sick because it was too hot outside and couldn't handle any other ones. Lame). On the second day her mom took us to make Japanese style pottery, and then we went to this neat little Soba restaurant. Soba is a Japanese noodle made from a kind of wheat. The couple who own the restaurant grown the plant, grind it by hand, and make the noodles themselves. Everything was from the plant, even the tea and dessert. It was delicious. The third day was amazing. We went to see her older brother's rugby game. Then we went to a traditional hotel and hot spring. We spent the night there. We met her aunt and uncle and they treated us to a delicious dinner (too much food for me...I did manage to try everything). The hot spring was an interesting experience for me, though not as embarrassing as I thought it would be. The room we stayed in was so cool. Very traditional, and I got to try on a Kimono (I ate dinner in it, it made me feel very special), and after mentioning I wanted to buy it, her father bought it for me. I was surprised and happy. Her family was incredible for the entire trip and really made me feel like part of the family. We stayed the night at the hot springs and then the next day her uncle took us around the Yamaguchi prefecture. He's a pretty big travel agent (I think) there so we got to see a lot of things that we may not have been able to without him. We ate more delicious food, saw some pretty awesome sights (all my pictures are up on facebook). Then we took a bullet train through the mountains back to where she lives (which I forgot the name of, again). After a delicious final dinner, and some presents, I went to bed for the last time on the futon. I really had a great time and plan on visiting her family again, they were amazing. I know I overused that word. Sorry.

Upon my return came a very hectic time. I arrived at my apartment in Bongseon Dong at 5:20 PM, my friend who was helping me move (he's amazing and has a truck) arrived at 5:45 PM and thus began my frantic move. I finally got to my new apartment in Shinchang and all the boxes and suitcases by, like 8:30 PM. I was exhausted. I rearranged a little bit and then passed out. I will cover my new teaching in my next blog entry (hopefully tomorrow, it's getting late so I don't think there'll be a double post tonight). After my first week and a half we had a three day weekend. For that weekend I went with my Korean friend Hye In, to Busan, the port city I had left from to get to Japan. I didn't have time to sight see then, so this trip was for that.

We were there for Saturday and Sunday. Most of the sight seeing happened on Saturday and we ended up wearing ourselves out. First we went to a temple that was right on the water. It was gorgeous! I forgot the name (I left my notebook that I wrote it in at school), but it was gorgeous. It was so hot we made our way straight to Haewondae Beach, the most famous beach in Korea, or so I've been told. It was ridiculous crowded, it didn't feel like Korea really at all because of all the foreigners. They had this cool system where we gave them some money and we got a bracelet that had a barcode on it that worked as money so we didn't have to carry around wallets. It was nifty. We got an inner tube and while I frolicked in the waves Hye-In rode the tube. I towed her back to where we were sitting after we drifted. Then we switched places a couple times. It was wicked fun. However, all the swimming and the waves ended up wearing us out. So after a trip to the aquarium (which was awesome, HAMMERHEAD SHARKS <3 and sad because of the small tanks) and seeing the nifty fish car they had outside, we headed to the Jimjilbang for the night. the Jjimjilbang is similar to the Hot Springs in Japan. However instead of natural water, it is normal water. That came out wrong, but I think you can understand what I mean. There's a place for people to sleep. It was an interesting experience, but not too weird. When we woke up on Sunday we were still physically exhausted. We shopped a little bit and then headed home. The whole trip was a cool experience.

All in all my summer vacation was pretty awesome. In my next entry I will cover my first month at ELC (my new school) and my trip this weekend. I hope I wake up for it. Stupid insomnia ;)

~Lyn

In Which a Preview Appears

Or, I'm Too Tired to Write and Will Tomorrow

Japan Trip (me and Hanako's family)


Busan Trip (me and Hye-In)

In Which Lyn Babbles About Baseball

Sera, Hye In, my forehead

Or, You Can Skip To the End if You're Not Interested in Baseball, There is Also My Last Day at MunHwa.



Hey,

So on Tuesday night I went to a baseball game in Korea. The KIA Tigers (Gwangju's team) V the Samsung Lions (Daegu's team). At least I'm pretty sure it was Samsung...I will add pictures when my iPod stops being a whiney child. It didn't get a lot of attention today so it's upset with me. Anyway. Baseball. Now, I like American baseball as much as the next Red Sox fan, though maybe a bit less than the hardcore fan, but I love watching Asian baseball games. They're awesome.

For those of you who don't know, I went to Japan my freshmen year of college. While there I had the opportunity to see a baseball game there. I was amused because it was so polite. Before that game I had only been to a Red Sox game (or half of one) and only watched the Red Sox on TV. Those games are most definitely NOT polite. The fans took turns cheering, each had a special group cheering section who knew these songs and chants. They did dances in the stand (or at least that's what it looked like to me) and it was so cool. They also had cheerleaders who came out between innings (I knew the 7th inning stretch, but I think one before that too...), and a very cute dancing mascot.

Needless to say, I was excited when my Korean friend Sera invited me to a baseball game. Britton and I went after work (my second to last day), and got to see the last half of the game. Not even half. KIA was winning until we got there T_T but it was still fun. There were cheerleaders, and a small section for Samsung cheering, but there was one guy with a megaphone leading the cheering for everyone. I didn't get a lot of it as my Korean is still not great, but I had a great time anyway. It was not as polite as the Japanese baseball game, people got into the game a lot more, but still far more polite than I'm used to with baseball.

Then, the next day, the end came. I had to say good-bye to MunHwa. In some ways it was harder than I thought it would be, in others it was easier. Saying good-bye to my classes was easier. My grade 4s I said good-bye to last week and that was difficult (they're so cute~) but this week was easy. I thought it would be more difficult because this week I had to say good bye to two classes I've had for my entire time (and almost entire time) here, but it went smoothly. Saying good bye to the office was a bit harder than I thought it would be, though, and I will miss working with all of them. I'm going to try to keep in touch, but as you probably know, if you know me, I suck at that. I'm currently sitting in my friend's room in Japan, on vacation, I'll write about that next time, but I'm ready for my next adventure in Korea, at my new school. I move the day I get back to Gwangju from Japan. I'll post baseball pictures in this tomorrow, if my iPod cooperates, other than that, my next post will be next week.

Laters

In Which Lyn Reappears Again

Or A Year in Review

Hey all!

Sorry I disappeared, again, for so long! I'm very bad at this blog thing apparently. I'm working on it. Hopefully next year will be better. I'm staying in Korea for one more year, though, do to circumstances, I'm switching academies. I will be working at ELC, still in Gwangju, just another part of the city. I'm often told that where I'm moving (Suwan/Shinchang) is it's own little mini-city (or suburb). As I get ready to leave MunHwa and start my second year here I'm looking back on my year here. I can't believe it's been that long. It feels both longer and shorter at the same time. So much has happened.

When I got here I was excited but didn't know what to expect really. Everything was so new and different. There's very little Roman letters anywhere and the language is nothing like any that I know (well maybe a little like Japanese, but not enough to help). Teaching has been my dream forever, so that part of it was what I was looking forward to the most. I don't remember when I first decided I was going to be a teacher but I know it's been since at least 7th grade. I still don't really feel like a real teacher. I probably won't even in 20 years when I'm at an American High School teaching Latin. However the experience has been very rewarding. I've dealt with classes that have outright hated me and weren't shy about showing it (just said good-bye to them on Friday, YES!), I've dealt with classes that adored me and made it difficult to punish them because of them (also said good-bye to them on Friday, sad), and everything in between. There were times when I really questioned what I was doing. However, I've loved almost every minute of it.

I'm working on learning the language and I'm getting further than I have in any other language. I have a bunch of new (and old) Korean friends who are really helping with that. I've made better friends with the foreign community here and they're awesome. I found some geeky friends who I get to table-top with, and I was really missing that so I was very excited. One of them is awesome and helping me with my knitting, which I started doing again. I started volunteering at a foreign restaurant and it's great. I love helping out there. The friends I've made here are amazing and I know that I will always remember them (and hopefully the friendship will survive me coming back stateside). The whole experience has been amazing. I've had a great time and most of my doubts about my future career have gone away.

I am sad to be leaving MunHwa, but at the same time it'll be nice for a new experience. MunHwa is very open-ended about their curriculum. I got to make it up (sometimes as I went). ELC has a set curriculum that I have to follow. The difference is one I'm looking forward to because it's nice to have practice with both. As I look forward, instead of back, I'm excited.

I know this was rather short after my long absence, and not much of a review, but it suits my purposes. I'll try to keep this up better than I did last year. I will definitely be writing again shortly as I'm going to a baseball game on Tuesday and will want to talk about that, and the differences between here and home and Japan. I am going to Japan (by flying boat!) and I'll update after that too. So hopefully it'll be more often than it was! Hope you all keep reading even though it's only me here now.

~Lyn~

Figured it might be nice to give you all a short update:

I'm sitting in Josh's house in upstate NY right now, relaxing and eating leftover Easter jellybeans.

My flights were smooth and were great for me, although the flight to Detroit got a little scary as one passenger had a pretty serious medical emergency midflight. They actually did the "if there's a doctor or nurse on board, please come to the front of the plane!" thing.

SO for those playing along at home: I left Incheon at 520 on June 2nd, and then thanks to some speedy flying and tailwinds I arrived in Detroit at 430pm. I felt like a Time Lord.

I had a long layover in Detroit which was mostly spent feeling dazed. I did get some Wendy's for dinner, for one because it just felt right to eat America fast food. It was also my cheapest option. While I think Korea's inexpensiveness is exaggerated, it was kinda annoying to have to pay $2.30 for a bottle of water instead of the 70 cents I got so used to paying!

Suffice to say I'm very happy to be back. It was great to wake up at 4am this morning and hear birds. I'll probably get sick of that really fast. But birds and the occasional coyote is a welcome change from cat fights, dog fights, revving motorcycles, and of course: early morning construction.

I feel as though this will probably be it for me, as far as posting goes. Maybe I'll do some comparisons here and there as I think of them, but my journeys ended.
To quote an amazing children's book ('Pigs in the House): Although it had been fun to roam, it was good to be back home.

Thanks for reading along, I hope you enjoyed it!
~Hannah

Korea In Retrospect

This is it, my last day in Korea. I leave for the airport tomorrow morning, and my flight to Syracuse (via Detroit) leaves at 520pm. Today is my busy day bouncing around and getting things done. Well, I've done all the outside things: I got my pension from the Korean government (you pay into a pension from your pay check every month and then if, like me, you're not retiring in Korea, they give you that money back), I canceled my cellphone (they seemed very to confused as to why I would want to cancel my phone), and then I closed my bank account and transferred my last paycheck to America. What's left now is just a lot of cleaning and some last minute packing!

Since the DMZ trip I've just laid low and tried to organize my life. Packing, shipping, and cleaning. Last Friday was my goodbye lunch for the office at a really nice vegetarian restaurant. Saturday night the lovely ladies in the photo at the top of this entry surprised me with homemade fondue and a night at Gwangju's most infamous spots.

I made cards for all my coworkers and exchanged email addresses, so hopefully they will keep in touch. It was sad leaving some of my students (mainly my third graders and two particularly awesome 7th graders) but most of the students seemed as apathetic to my leaving as they were to my existence. I did get some sweet and heartfelt letters, some chocolate and two very thoughtful gifts: a little beaded fish from a third grader who remembered how much I love the animals, and some blue nail polish from the aforementioned seventh graders, who somehow managed to remember that blue is my favorite color. I was also given a wilted clover, but that will not be coming back to America with me.

My time here in Korea has been roughly a bajillion times harder than I ever expected it to be. I know now that one of my biggest mistakes was not allowing myself to build a support system until it was too late. I hid much of my unhappiness from absolutely everyone, both here and at home and that meant that when I finally snapped there was no going back. I'd let myself be too miserable for too long without telling anyone what was happening. I thought people only wanted to hear about the good, so that's the only thing I focused on, but I wasn't doing a good job of convincing myself that what I was saying was true. If I've learned anything from this experience it's that I can never keep myself that closed off again. Despite what some people might try to tell me it's not worth acting happy all the time if you don't mean it. I think it's far better to be honest with your feelings, because then people can help you. I convinced myself that no one wanted to listen to my negative feelings and allowed myself to fall into a very, very deep depression that no one realized I was in because I put all my effort into showing up with a smile. Now I know better than to EVER do something like that again. It was possibly the stupidest thing I have ever done in my life.

I have met some very amazing people while here, and I will miss all of them. My coworkers were fantastic people, and even just some everyday people at my favorite places. Like the packing genie at the post office, or the Paris Baguette girl who made sure I always got my favorite blueberry pastry, even if there were none on display and even if I didn't ask.

It's been a challenging year with A LOT of changes all across the board in my life. It's been a huge challenge. I'm not sure if I'd come back and do it all again, but I know that leaving know is undoubtedly the right decision. I may miss my adorable little third graders calling me a hippo but leaving now is a decision that I'm very at peace with, and very happy about. Of course, I still can't believe it's ONLY been ten months! I feel like I've been here for three years!

To quote the Grateful Dead, a band I've never actually listened to: What a long, strange trip it's been. To quote Lykke Li, an artist I listen to a lot: I'm good, I'm gone.

Hannahfish out!

DMZ

Busy, busy, busy!

I'm in the last 10 days of this great big adventure, 7 of them teaching. I've got all my souvenirs bought, my bags almost packed, I've got my flight itinerary set and things are going smoothly.

Last weekend was the group DMZ trip. Everyone mentioned in the Busan post went up to Seoul on Saturday and then Sunday we toured the DMZ. We didn't go on one of the trips that takes you to technical North Korea, which is of course a bummer, but it was really neat to see the observation towers and what not. It's weird because you don't usually think about it, but the Korean war is still, technically, on going. So visiting these places you aren't visiting the remnants of a war gone by, like when you tour civil war battle sites in the states. There are a lot of restrictions about where you can go and what you can photograph, and theres a large military presence, because the war is really only at a pause.

The coolest part of the tour was walking into the giant infiltration tunnel that was (supposedly) dug by North Korea. I say supposedly because each side says that the other did it.

While In Seoul I was able to visit the National Folk Museum, which was tiny and kind of a bummer. However the National Palace Museum is pretty cool, even though their wasn't much in English. I was not able to see any of the Palaces, I almost went up to Seoul this weekend to see one, but rain was forecasted. It didn't rain in Gwangju, I sure hope it rained in Seoul.

Unfortunately I'm really uninteresting now, unless you want to hear all the trials and tribulations of suitcase packing, which I'm sure you don't.

I'll do a round-up post before or right after I leave here.
Take care everyone!
~Hannah

Busan

Blogger is currently NOT letting me upload any pictures, so I apologize, I had a really nice one to head this entry with. I'll try to edit it in later.

Also, this entry might get a bit long, there's a lot to catch up on!

We'll start with Cinco de Mayo, which we had off, because in Korea it is Children's day! There's no school, and apparently the children get presents. I enjoyed having the day off. Unfortunately I had to work that Friday, while my friends didn't. We were all heading to Busan for the weekend and they got to head out a day early. I left for Busan immediately after work and arrived at about 1 am.

Busan was the first time since I'd been in Korea that I was reminded of South America. Coming into the city and seeing colorful buildings creeping up the hills reminded me of Quito. The city on the beach reminded me of Rio, right down to the wave pattern on the sidewalk. Of course I felt about 1000x safer in Busan than i did in either Quito or Rio.

I met up with Mieka, Shanna, and Angel at our love motel, where I promptly went to bed. Love motels are for one of two things: prostitutes or a cheap place to stay. Our love motel seemed mainly to cater to the latter. It was actually pretty nice. It was right on Haeundae beach, which is a big foreigner hangout in Busan.

Saturday I woke up with a sore throat and a stuffy nose. Two advils later I was up for a delicious American brunch and then a trip to the Busan aquarium. Rather than bore you with all the fishy details I will say that the highlights for me were the silver arrowana and the oceanic sun fish!

From there we went to Haedong Yonggungsa Temple. This temple is unique because it is built on the rocks overlooking the ocean, as opposed to the traditional forest and mountain locations. Because of Buddha's birthday (which is today, the 10th) the temple was decorated with hundreds of brightly colored paper lanterns, which added to the amazing visuals of the temple. Ironically though, the lanterns proved problematic as they blocked the view of the East Sea (or Sea of Japan, if you're not in Korea) and of the temple's golden Buddha statue. Even with large crowds of people surrounding me, this temple still felt serene and peaceful, and it is right up there with Mont St. Michel on my list of incredible places.

Unfortunately by the time we finished the temple I was fading fast. I now know I have a sinus infection, and that's what was knocking me out, but at the time I just felt inexplicably horrible. We all headed back to the hotel and while everyone else got ready for a night out I lay down and felt awful. I pulled myself out of bed to get dinner with the group. We went to an Irish pub where I got fish and chips and would've enjoyed myself and the food immensely were it not for the fact that I was starting to feel feverish. As soon as I finished I gave Mieka the money for my portion of the bill and went back to the hotel, where I was in bed by 10.

I felt better on Sunday, but do to cosmic shenanigans we didn't get the chance to do anything. Still, I would consider my first and only trip to Busan a success.

We had to work on Monday, but we have today, the 10th off, because it is Buddha's birthday. I thought about going to one of the local temples, but it's been really rainy, and I have a lot of things that I can get done here around the apartment. I also need to rest up and get healthy, because this weekend is my final trip to Seoul and a DMZ trip with the aforementioned friends. I really don't want to be all sick for that! It's back to work tomorrow. I only have 23 days left in Korea! Exciting!

I'd also like to just send a small note out to the Elmira College community. Dr. Kiskis was an amazing man and fantastic professor. The school will truly not be the same without him, he will be dearly missed. I hope that everyone is holding up well, and you're all in my thoughts.

~Hannah

May 18th

Statue at the May 18th Memorial Park

I've been so busy trying to complete the dreaded grad school funding applications that I haven't really done ANYTHING since my last post, except write letter after letter after letter. Well, I have started packing, shipped boxes of stuff back to America and slowly but surely began to clean and sort through the apartment and my stuff. In the very near future (IE any minute or so!) I'll be getting a new desk, courtesy of Mr. Kang. I only have 32 days left, so I don't really care about the new desk, but it will be nice for the next person. It also gave me the forced motivation to clean the entrance way, and do a complete clean of the bedroom, complete with dusting, sweeping, and mopping.

Yesterday Mieka and I took advantage of the nice spring weather (even if it was SO WINDY) and crossed another site of my 'things to do before I leave Korea' list. We went into Sangmu and visited the May 18th Park. Both of them.

A little bit of history: May 18, 1980 is the day that pro-democracy demonstrators started taking to the streets in Gwangju to protest the corrupt government. The protests quickly turned very, very violent, with thousands of people of all ages (including children and the elderly) imprisoned, tortured, and killed by the local military. People who had no involvement in the protests were still taken into custody and tortured until they confessed. It was a horrific time in Korean/Gwangju History, and in the 90's the government came forth and decided that the sacrifice of these people needed to be recognized. No longer where they rioters, the people who died on and because of May 18th are labeled as martyrs, people who sacrificed their lives for what they knew was right. The government acknowledges that this happened and is making sure that the history is remembered. I'm thinking of some other governments that could learn from this example (Hi, Turkey...).

There are two May 18th parks, something neither of us knew when we started this adventure. We began at the May 18th Liberty Park, which is the restored site of the police barracks where the prisoners were held and tortured. It's not really much of a park, but it does have a nice visitor center that gives a chronological recount of the events surrounding the May 18th protests. Neither Mieka nor myself new any details about the history, just that something had happened, so it was great to actually LEARN about the event. We were then given a guided tour of the barracks by a kind old man who didn't speak English, and communicated almost entirely in gestures. Fortunately each building had a placard that was translated in English, telling exactly what each building had been used for. After we finished there we got directions to the May 18th Memorial Park, which is where we had intended to go in the first place.

The Memorial Park is much more of a park, with pagodas, flowers, and fountains. It also has two monuments, one commemorating the May 18th events in general, and a second honoring the middle and high school students who were killed. From the monuments you can hike up to the top of the hill and then climb the observation pagoda, which looked out over Gwangju. From there we hiked back down to the city and searched for dinner.

We ended up eating at a delicious restaurant that served Naju Baehanwoo (if I'm remembering correctly) which is a traditional soup from the city of Naju (if I remember I'll replace this text with a link to the blogpost where I talk about Naju). It was pork in a broth with TONS of delicious vegetables, cooked at your table a la galbi and sangyapsal. It was incredible!! After eating Mieka and I parted ways, and I managed to catch the bus right as it started to pour! Good timing!

Prior to adventure we stopped in the Gwangju cat cafe downtown, where beleaguered cats looked cranky as people harassed them. It was kinda sad, but really nice to actually have the chance to pet a cat. One cat decided that he was just going to eat my paper shopping bag, and he did a pretty good job of it.

I don't know if I mentioned this in my last blog, but I'll be flying out of Korea at around 530pm on June 2nd and arriving in Syracuse, NY around 1130pm on June 2nd. Then, slowly but surely, I'll be working my way across the northeast to NH!

I'll see you all soon!
Hannah

Yeouido Flower Festival

Saturday the 16th I day-tripped to Seoul. I went to the Yeouido flower festival and saw the cherry blossoms in full bloom. along with some amazing displays of experimental flower art. It was a beautiful day, sunny and in the mid sixties, and it was fantastic to walk through all the wonderful flowers. I started my day in the Yeouido Park, where I enjoyed a picnic lunch of takoyaki (the delicious octopus batter-balls I tried in Japan). They weren't as good as the ones I ate in Japan, but still tasty. I walked along the park before walking through the canopy of cherry trees that line the Han river, before finally finding the REAL flower festival and working my way backwards through it.

I was at the flower festival from about noon until 3 just wandering about, and then I decided that to make my trip to Seoul worthwhile I would go to the National Museum and cross something off my "to-see" list! It was a bit of a haul on the subway and I got a little bit turned around, but made it safely to the museum around 445. Luckily the museum was open until nine, so I was able to walk through and see the entire thing before walking around the gardens on the grounds at sunset. Then I headed back to the subway, then to the bus terminal, and then back to Gwangju. It was a busy day, but amazingly relaxing and I am so glad that I went!

Sunday I went into Damyang, which is on the other side of Mudeong Mountain with a group of friends. We took the bus up and around the mountain and then went to a beautiful little tea house where we relaxed and enjoyed a traditional Korean tea. We also walked partially down the mountain until we came to a bus stop and enjoyed walking through the cherry blossoms! We took the bus partially back but stopped at a restaurant up on the mountain with an observation deck and we were able to snack while over looking the whole city of Gwangju. Then, being the adventurous folk we are, we hiked the rest of the way down and into the city before taking taxis back to our apartments. Another beautiful day!

In other news, I'll be flying back into the states on June 2nd. I'll arrive in Syracuse around 1130pm on the second and will be spending some time with Josh before heading to Elmira and then back to New Hampshire. It will be a lot of traveling, but I'm excited to be coming home!

~Hannah

Giraffe-Teacher and the Battle of the Hippo

One of my students may or may not be short an eye...
He came into class the other day with his right eye covered in bandages. When I asked what happened I was told "I fell and hit the corner of a desk. Now it's gone." It wasn't an April fool's joke as he was clearly drugged up on something. I'm hoping that "it's gone" is just an exaggeration/over-reaction. I guess we'll find out the answer in a couple of weeks. This past week was alarmingly full of children with injuries... mostly just bleeding, but yeah.

I'm involved in an ongoing battle between my B-week third grade class, well, with one boy in my b-week third grade class. He made the 'H' association between Hannah and hippo, and has begun calling me hippo teacher. Now, I find nothing insulting about being called a hippo. They're adorable creatures that are also very capable of putting you in your place. But I am not a hippo, I am a giraffe. In fact, most of the students in the school "believe" that my mother is a giraffe. After a week of us arguing (the girls were on my side) I wore my giraffe-ears headband to class. Hopefully I won. We'll see.

I really enjoy the B-week third-graders, as they are making clear progress. The A-week third graders aren't doing quite so well. Part of that is because they have a very short attention span. They're not even at the point where we can play games together yet though, as their English is so limited.

Not much else is happening. I'll be leaving sometime in June, but I don't know when. I have found my replacement, which is nice. I've started packing (winter clothes only) and trying to organize my next two months as much as possible so that I'll be able to get everything done that I want to without feeling too stressed right at the end.

It's already nice and springy here, hopefully the weather holds! If there's one thing I can say about Korea, it's that I really do enjoy the weather (except the thunderstorms). Sorry for all of you stuck in the snowy northeast! I hope spring comes to you soon.

~Hannah

South Korea: Blessedly Free of Earthquakes

The Wikipedia page for "Natural Disasters: South Korea" Only shows 2 earthquakes, 1 in '07, 1 in '10. As for this one in Japan, not even aftershocks. Neither of the Koreas ended up on the advisory list for earthquakes or tsunamis. Heard from my mom that some people were worried, so no worries here. I've also confirmed that all 7 of my friends in Japan are ok, as are their families.

Classes switched at the beginning of March, the only major change for me is that I have the new baby third graders! There English is almost non-existent, making teaching them a real challenge, as my Korean is also almost non-existent. There are two groups of them, one marginally better than the others. It's hard to teach them, the first day of class they didn't understand when I dismissed them!, but it allows for fun. A lot of picture drawing, charades... and they seem to be responding well to me, even if they don't always know what's going on. The other classes I have, 5th, 6th, and 7th graders, are all par for course.

Not much left report, slowly but surely counting down the days. It'll be about 4 months or less until I'm back in the states!


Stay safe everyone,
Hannah

My Mom Said You'd Care

Two posts in a row? How excessive. And when was the last time Lyn posted? Ok, not that long ago. I swear I'm not commandeering this in an intentional fashion.

But seriously, when I phoned home in a frenzy this morning my mom told me I should put this on the blog. At least I think that's what she said. I was busy watching my hamster practice her parkour moves while I danced around squealing like a beached dolphin.

I was ACCEPTED into U of Oregon's folklore Master's program. HUZZAH!


If you're wondering about the other schools, Berkeley said no (it's ok though, California is too poor to give me money). I haven't heard back from Albany, but I far prefer UO's program, so unless Albany gives me a free ride and a pony that poops diamonds I'll be moving to Eugene. I don't know anything about finances though, as all I received was a chain "you got in!" email, all the other info will come via mail.

I'm using my day off to bake cupcakes. That is all.

~Hannah

Level Up!

Today is the last day of the traditional Korean school year. Tomorrow we have the day off for a national holiday (I THINK I remember being told it was Korean independence day) and then on the 2nd everyone goes back to school a grade older and wiser. We haven't seen any kind of class schedules yet so we'll have to see how these changes work for us foreign teachers, which classes we keep, which classes we don't, and what the redistribution of students is like.

So as some of you know, my Dad's been working in Taiwan for... about a year now, assuming I can do my (I can't.). Last weekend he had to leave the country for a long weekend due to stipulations with his work visa, so he came to Korea to visit me!

Friday he came into school with me, and the reaction of the students was... incredible. When Josh was here they just acted like their normal out-of-control selves. But my father... his sheer present scared them poop-less. Even on a test day I have never seen them so quiet and well-behaved! Although there was a pig-pile of third grade girls who proceeded to scream "WE LOVE HANNAH-TEACHER!" and then ask my dad and I if we liked each other. Mr. Lee, our supervisor, also took my dad on a tour of the school. WE HAVE PICNIC TABLES ON THE ROOF. The things I still don't know after six months...

Saturday I took my dad to the National Museum and the Folk Museum. Then we walked to Emart and check out the market behind my apartment. You can buy live weather loaches to make soup with for like, a dollar a scoop. If you didn't know, a weather loach is a type of fish. Emart was a little disappointing as they did not have their squid tank out.

Sunday we grabbed breakfast with some of my friends and then went up to Wonhyosa Temple on Muedong Mt. We took a taxi to the top, and then hiked the entire way down before grabbing a bus back into town. Monday morning he had to fly back to Taipei to keep working.

Other than that bit of excitement it's been pretty routine. I'm getting by and counting down the days til I'm no longer a teacher. I'll be finished in a little over four months, and I am very, very excited for that day to get here. We got our new schedules today, and I have almost entirely new classes, so it will be interesting to see how everything works out. There's also CCTV in our classrooms now and while I feel generally apathetic about it, hopefully it will prove helpful in getting the students to behave. Now I have tests to grade and an apartment to clean before my single vacation day!

~Hannah

If only all my students were third graders....

I received this note on my desk today:
Teacher~ happy blantine day!!! Teacher! sorry~ I dont have clcalate!!!


Now I'm going to do some grading and fail about 15 6th graders who didn't do the assignment! I am still finding the classes harder and harder to get through, and the countdown to July is in full swing. I'm afraid that my frustrations are showing through and the students can tell just how annoyed with everything I am.

In other news, my dad may be coming to visit this weekend from Taiwan, which is something to look forward to.

The Korean Hospital Experience

Well, I guess this counts as a culture experience, right?
The anthropology of upper respiratory infections! YAY!

It's funny being the only foreigner in the hospital, especially one with an appointment. The entire staff pretty much knew who I was. They took one look at me and would say "oh! You're Hannah!" (except they say my name more like "hey-na")
So here's how the hospital waiting room is set up:
First, you check in.
Then you sit down.
Then you wait.
Then you wait.
Then you keep waiting.
Then they call your name.
After they call your name, they point you to a waiting room, which has between two and three chairs set up outside it. You sit in the chair farthest from the door, and as the two people before you move through the room, you have to move chairs, or you get yelled at.
When you finally reach the door you duck behind a curtain and viola! There is your doctor and you get to talk to them.

My doctor spoke decent English, but a lot of her English medical knowledge was jargon. So when she asked me if I'd had any major surgeries, and I said I had my gallbladder removed, she was like "oh, a supertechnicaltermectomy?" Yeah...
She listened to my lungs, asked me a couple questions, and then prescribed me five pills. Initially she prescribed me tylenol, but I quickly explained I was allergic. Actually, and I didn't think of this at the time, but she didn't seem surprised by the allergy. She simply asked "vomiting or skin rash?" From there she showed me the English information about all the pills she was planning to subscribe me and let me ok the ingredients list, which honestly gives me an amazing peace of mind because I was so afraid of not knowing what was in the medication I was taking.

Then I was whisked away to bloodwork and the xray room and sent on my way. I was told I could come back at 2 for my test results, so I jaunted around downtown until two, when I hoped another bus back to Chonam.

Then I waited.
Then I was called to the chair.
Then I worked through the chair line.
Then I entered the room and was told I had to wait for my doctor to come back.

Fortunately she showed up shortly after and lead me through the labyrinth of a hosptial to get me my updated prescriptions and show me my chest xrays. The xrays were clear, but the inflammatory agents in my blood were elevated to three times the normal level. Not 100% sure what the means, but I'm guessing it's a viral upper respiratory infection. Whatever it is I need the antibiotics to fix it.

So that's part one!
Then I went to the pharmacy!!
The pharmacy involved three steps.
Step 1: Hand over your prescription, then sit down.
Step 2: Get up, pay your bill ($5!), get a number, and then sit down again.
Step 3: Disregard your number, listen for your name, receive your pills and your instructions, and then peace out!


And that's my hospital saga. Before I close out this post I will close with two fun facts:
Fact 1: The pharmacy I went to was the "NEW YORK PHARMACY" and it's emblem was the statue of liberty.
Fact 2: EVERYTHING in Korea is done on a number system, like a deli. The post office, bank, hospital, and pharmacy all function on a pull tab number system. On the one hand, it's way more convenient then standing in line, you just pull your number and relax til it comes up. On the other hand it makes me want to finish every interaction with "and I'd also like a half pound of provolone."

Hopefully, this is the last I'll have to experience of hospitals in the next six months!
~Hannah

Doctor Fish, Fish, Calling Doctor Fish

Mieka, Angel, and Hannah in front of what I am told is the only Hangul Starbucks sign.

I went to Seoul for Lunar New Year. The highlight of this trip was going to the aquarium, seeing the awesome fish, and the sample fish manicure tank. Basically you stick your hands in a tank and then what appears to be your standard Chinese algae eaters suck off all your dead skin. Was it the best thing ever? Yes. Will I be finding a spa that will let me cover ever exfoliatable inch of skin in fish? Absolutely. Is anyone surprised? If you are, I'm thinking you're one of Lyn's friends, not mine.

So Seoul was fun. Did some shopping, found pants that fit me, and checked out the main areas of Seoul. We stopped to get tea in a little tea house, which was awesome. The tea was very delicious, and even though it was somewhat traditional, it was nice because they didn't make you sit on the floor (which I still find to be very uncomfortable!). We skipped over the museums and the palaces on this visit.

One of the best parts of the trip was a breakfast stop at a place called The All American Diner, where I was able to get a super tasty Belgian waffle.

Intensives are now over so it's back to the 4-9 schedule. My least favorite 5th grade class has been removed, which makes my life a little easier. Of course, these past two days have been really hard given that I am, yet again, sick.

I'll have to update everyone on the whole saga when it concludes, but the long and short of it is that I keep getting spontaneous fevers (two in the past two weeks) and when I take deep breaths it burns. So I figured I'd do myself a favor and go see a doctor. Basically you have to go to a hospital here, "going to the hospital" is completley synonymous with "going to the doctor's." So I made the attempt today at the same place we had our health checks done, and if I may be frank, Chonam University Hospital is the most frighteningly unorganized medical institution I ever did see... I have an appointment for 11am tomorrow... so let's see if round two yields any results... or if they actually let me see a doctor this time...

That's about it. I hope everyone in the states is enjoying the snow, we never did get our One Good Snow Storm here in Gwangju, and now it's up in the 40s.
~Hannah

In Which Lyn Writes a Shorter Post

Hello again!

This is just a shorter post about the end of my vacation in Seoul. That is to say, Saturday. Oh Saturday. What a day. So, Ellen and I woke up with a plan. It was a good plan, a pretty plan, and like all plans it went out the window fairly quickly. Originally we were going to go see this artificial river thing (stream!), and then go to Hongdae (which is near a university and has a cool flea market like thing, and some other interesting places), and then I was going to go see a movie with Michael and she was going to....I forgot. So the first wrench in the plan was the movie was not showing, which was sad, but not too bad, it just mean that I got included in Ellen's other plans (which I still can't remember). Then Ellen said it would be better to see the river at night because it apparently lights up cool (or something, maybe that happened first and I'm just confused. Doesn't really matter the order). The point is, we went to Hongdae first (I really think I'm spelling that wrong).

So, we got out of the hotel and I wanted to get Japanese food for lunch. We decided to wait until we got there to eat and by then I was starving. So, in a fit of knee-jerk decision making we went to this burger restaurant called The Joe. BEST IDEA EVER! It was delicious! (oh, don't shake your head at us eating 'American' food while in Korea, sometimes you just want a taste from home, so there~!) Cheered by this happy development, and already feeling we were going to have an awesome day we promptly got lost (this may or may not have been partially my fault). So we ended up wandering around looking for this flea market, in circles, for a while. It was really fun though. The area was gorgeous, the day wasn't too cold, and we had a good time and took pictures. So then we went to a Cat Cafe (or was that before finding the flea market? No, I think it was after), called Tom's Cafe. For those of you who don't know. A Cat Cafe is the most brilliant idea in the face of forever! Basically, it's exactly what it sounds like, it's a cafe with a large number of cats wandering around for you to pet, cuddle and play with. There are large structures for the cats to play on, and you're given toys to entice the kittens to your side. The cats range from fairly young kittens to older more stately cats. SO MUCH FUN! Pictures are up on facebook (more to come from my iPod). So then we decide to wander around some more. And eventually decide to grab Japanese for dinner. We half-decided on Ramen, couldn't find the restaurant, and, half-an-hour (probably closer to an hour) later we go into a Japanese curry restaurant. Once again DELICIOUS!

So, after our adventure we head back to the subway to head for this river stream thing (I'm still unclear as to what exactly it was, it starts with a C though...). And what do you know, there's the Japanese restaurant we had been searching for! Much groaning was had, but we were pleased with our dinner so we just laughed and got over it. So then came the EPIC ADVENTURE OF EPICNESS IN THE COLD!!!! We got lost again. Turned around. Asked for directions. And got lost again. Called Ellen's friend who didn't know where we were. Ended up by Myeong-dong again and decided, Screw it, let's go get ice cream! Seriously, we wandered around for an hour or so trying to find this place, and we couldn't. So we went, got ice cream, and retreated, still fairly happy with our day, to spend our last night in our sketchy hotel. I ended up passing out early (oops, guess the walking tired me out a lot) so our full plans for the night went unfulfilled (nothing you would be interested in...just J-drama sillyness). All in all, it was a successful vacation, very fun, pretty relaxing, wish it was longer. Back to school tomorrow. Though, happily, I am armed with happy thoughts in the form of Audio books (Vol 1 and 2 of the complete works of Tacitus as well as Juvenal's Satires) and a podcast about the History of Rome. Let's see if I'm actually ready to go back to work....

~Lyn

In Which Lyn Reappears and Has Lots to Say (and Lots and Lots)

Hello one and all. Before I start this epic post I would like to say two things. First and foremost I would like to apologize to everyone for disappearing for a month. Intensives were far crazier than I remember them being and I went offline, almost entirely, for the month. Second and secondmost, I want to warn you that this is a month's worth of blog and I have a lot to say. This should be long, amusing and rather epic :D (and I'll try to keep the tennis commentary to a minimum. That said, the Australian Open ended last week and it was awesome and amazing (even if I had to follow it via radio rather than TV b/c there are no Korean tennis players in the ATP, damnit) and while my favorite tennis player did not win, my second favorite did, so I'm very happy).

Starting with New Years vacation...way back when. So, I, like Hannah, went to Japan for my vacation. Unlike Hannah I first decided to get in touch with my Jewish roots. I went up to Seoul on Dec 31st and went to the Chabad House for a very wonderful Friday night service. Now, this may come as a shock to none of you who know me, but one thing I have been vehemently missing is my Jewish roots. There is nothing and no one here that I can talk to about being Jewish. I've heard of friends who have friends who are Jewish (or rather, classmates who have friends) but I haven't met one Jewish person in Gwangju yet. This is terribly distressing to me, and I've felt disconnected and slightly at odds with my brain. So I took the opportunity to go up and celebrate Friday night. For those of you who don't know, a Chabad House is a mini-synogugage (excuse my lack of ability to spell right now) thing of the orthodox persuasion. It was a bit different than I was used to, the women were sectioned off from the men, it was super-fast Hebrew (though that might also had to do with the fact that the Rabbi is Israeli). All in all, the services, the dinner, and the company was incredibly fun and it was a good time. The after dinner singing was by far my favorite part, as was the Rabbi's wife trying to convince me that just because I could be polite in Hebrew I could speak it well. While there I met my new friend Sarah. She's an awesome, smart, scientist person who was in Korea visiting one of her friends, Keelah (who is now also my friend). She heard that I had no where to stay that night and offered me a floor. I accepted and after services we went out, with Keelah, to a club. It was really fun, there was dancing, and slight drinking, and I met two more new friends, Michael (from Germany) and Dido (from Rwanda) who I will talk about more later. After my most awesome New Years celebration I was ready for Japan.

My visit to Japan was more for catching up with my friends than sight-seeing. I did the sight-seeing thing when I went for Term III of my freshmen year. The plane ride over was fun, there was an adorable 5 year old Japanese boy who flirted with me most of the ride. I blew his mind when I thanked his father for helping me (the overhead compartments are not for short people) in Japanese. I stayed in a really nice hostel in Asukusa, right behind the major temple there. I forgot how big New Years was though. I made plans to visit with my old Japanese teacher, Mari Akane, on my birthday and since I was staying near the temple we decided to meet right out in front. BIG MISTAKE~! So, for three days (New Years and the following days) it is traditional in Japan to make a temple visit, and wouldn't you know, the major temple in Asukusa was a hotspot. SO CROWDED! There were police and everything to direct the flow of human traffic. They had to shut down the main road in front of the temple and everything! they even blocked off parts of the temple to control the flow of people. So, struggling like a salmon swimming upstream I make my way to the front of the temple. I am right at the gates, and there is roadblock there with a policeman. I try to indicate that I just want to slip through to the front of the gates, but he tells me, WAY TO FAST to go around and directions on how to do so. So like a stupid American I forgot how to ask him to speak slowly (for those of you who don't know, I'm passable in Japanese, sometimes). Luckily a mother and two teenage daughters took pity on me and led me around. We talked a little through my broken Japanese and their phone dictionary. I borrowed the phone to call Mari and we finally reconnected (only, about, 20 mins later than originally planned). We spent the day wandering around, window shopping, having a nice lunch (YAY Japanese food love!>

The month of January was intensive schedule, we work from 1-7 instead of 4-9, and we get almost twice as many classes in the day. It was busy and hectic and so much work. I love it here, I love teaching, I could without that schedule. My main redeeming class was my class of Grade 7s. I adore them. They are smart, and smart alecks, but they listened, participated, seem genuinely interested in learning what I have to teach, and they mostly do their homework. I can joke around with them, and get into more in depth stuff with them, and it's so much fun. Unfortunately I only have them until the end of February T_T because then they level up to Grade 8, or as they call it Grade 2. Anyway, above Grade 7 they don't see foreign teacher anymore so I shall lose my favorite class. The main good thing about intensives is that you have the same classes every week for a month so you can do projects and teach them things that run over into other weeks. In one grade 6 class I did a fairly intensive debate unit, and then how to write a research paper (insert laughter from any teacher I've had to write a research paper for. I humbly apologize for everything I ever put you through in my writing.) They failed a lot at writing them. A lot. I'm going to have to curve my grades that I give them. Oy vey. Anyway, with the other Grade 6 class I did listening/speaking/acting unit with RPing. I modified (simplified) an easy RP campaign and ran it for the children. As it was my first time doing this for them it didn't work out perfectly or anything, but it did work. They got into it, had fun, and gave me helpful feedback at the end (now I just have to figure out how to grade it @_@ oops). I will never like Grade 5 (I've discovered) that age is just too difficult for them to be allowed to exist. This goes for all 5th graders, no matter the nationality, they are all evil (unless they are related to me, because all my baby cousins are too amazing to ever be an evil 5th grader). I'm so confused as to my schedule for February so I will update with how my classes look after I figure out what my classes will be @_@.

So, we got lucky this year. The Lunar New Year was on February 3rd, so we got the 2nd, 3rd and 4th off (that's Wed, Thurs and Fri for those of you without a calender in front of you), so essentially we got a 5 day vacation. I am in Seoul with my friend Ellen for the whole thing. We came up Wednesday (we got here in the afternoon) and we will leave Sunday afternoon/evening. So far it's been amazing. Wednesday, after checking into our kinda sketchy Hotel (it's a love hotel, but it's cheap and fairly nice, if rather sketch), we went out and explored Myeong-dong. We shopped, we wandered, we had a great time. On Thursday we split up. I met up with my friends Michael and Dido (who I met on the Solar New Year) and we went to this cool temple/palace thing that I don't remember the name of but it started with a G. I'll double check on Sunday when I post about the remainder of this vacation. Anyway, the history-geek in me loved it, and it was fun hanging out with two awesome guys :) We went to a lovely Greek restaurant for lunch (OMG SO GOOD! Yummy Slouvaki the best I've had since I came back from Greece), and I worried them because I don't eat a lot. Afterwards I went and met back up with Ellen at the COEX mall, and then we came back to our sketchy hotel (there are two mirrors on the CEILING!). Today we went to the National Museum of Korea (guess who's idea that was, MINE! *is a geek*) they were having a special New Years celebration thingy. There was traditional music, performances, and this really cool calligraphy drawing thing. There will be pictures on facebook (I forgot my camera cord in my apartment). After the calligraphy drawing (really, I can't explain it, I'll post pictures) I got interviewed for a radio show. It was nifty, and the guy was cute! Then we went into the museum and wandered a little, mostly in the paleolithic/neolithic/bronze age room. I missed all my classics friends when I wanted to crack jokes about pottery, or stone tools looking like normal stones, or the bronze age and vikings and mermaids. I took lots of pictures inside of the cool pottery and carvings. I had myself a nice little history geek-out. It was tons of fun. Then we went to two market areas, which I forgot the name of and Ellen is not sitting next to me anymore so I can't ask her, and we shopped. I got a messenger bag (finally), and new, really warm, sweatshirt, and presents for my three male cousins so I'm going to send the Hanukkah package finally (my bad...). In my defense it's REALLY hard to find something NOT cute. It's so cutesy/girly here. Anyway.

I hit my 6 month mark last week (I think). I can't believe it's been 6 months! It's flown by, but at the same time it feels like I've been here forever. I love it here, I'm having a good time teaching (most of the time), and life is pretty good at the moment. It's the year of the Rabbit in the Chinese Zodiac, so this is my year (as someone kindly pointed out I was born before the Chinese New Year, so even though I'm 1988 I'm not a Dragon, I'm a Rabbit). I will make the most of it and so far it's looking like it will be a good year! Happy New Year (both Lunar and Solar because I missed the Solar one)! I will try to not wait so long between posts again! Happy thoughts (and because it's the end, YAY KIM CLIJSTERS, YAY NOVAK DJOKOVIC! YAY BRYAN BROTHERS! YAY ESTHER VERGEER! YAY WONDERFUL AUSSIE OPEN EVEN THOUGH NADAL LOST IN THE QUARTERS) Ok, I'm done. Thank you for reading my epic post of epic proportions!

~Lyn~

こんにちわ- Konnichiwa!

"Wait a minute! That's not Korean!"

You're right! It's Japanese! Why is there Japanese in a blog about Korea? Well, from December 31st-January 5th I was in Japan in Tokyo and then Sano. It was less of a sightseeing visit and more of a friend visiting visit, but I did get to see some amazing things, eat some amazing food, and relax after a very stressful couple of months.

I arrived in Narita, Japan around 1pm on the 31st and immediately went to check into my hotel. I found a cheap hotel outside the airport for about 77USD a night. I expected it to be a disgusting cockroach den, but despite the fact that the room was about the size of the boat cabin I was in when I went to the Galapagos it was spotless and clean and comfortable to sleep in. I was unable to check in until 3 though, so there was some sitting in the lobby. After I checked in I called up my friend Brandi, who lives outside of Tokyo with her Japanese fiance. We met up in Tokyo and walked around a little, visited the famous Harajuku area, and then got some delicious Japanese food. Now, I love (certain kinds of) Korean food, but if I had to pick a favorite Asian cuisine, I would pick Japanese. Unfortunately New Years Eve in Tokyo was cut short due to sheer exhaustion. 2011 hit while I was riding the train back to Narita, absolutely exhausted after a very long two days.

On the first Meagan was in Narita dropping off her family, who had been visiting her for the holidays. We met up at my hotel and then grabbed a bus up to Sano, in the northern part of Japan, where she is teaching English. I stayed at her apartment, and we mostly relaxed. I got to see more of the day to day kind of life, ate some famous Sano Ramen, and enjoyed catching up with a close friend. We took one day trip down to the shrine at Asakusa, which was beautiful. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed my trip, and it was a much needed, if too short, break from work! Pictures are up on facebook, and I made several guest appearances in Meagan's vlog.

Thursday and Friday we were back to class. Classes have all been changed around and we're on the intensive schedule. Yup, the kids have to come to academy during their winter break! The 5th-7th graders meet with both the English and Korean teachers for double blocks of learning, while 3rd and 4th grade are on the normal A week/B week schedule. I have new third grade classes. We played games today and yesterday because on Monday they are with their Korean teacher and it seemed silly to start lessons. We did animal sounds and baby animals on Thursday, they seemed to enjoy themselves, although they're still scared of me. It should be an interesting month, we'll see how it goes. It is certainly nice getting out of work at 7 instead of 9, but surprisingly hard to get around for 1 instead of 4.

I hope everyone had a happy new year, and welcome to 2011! It won't be much longer before I celebrate my 6th month mark here! Take care everyone!
Hannah