Fun in Summer

Here's a few pictures from some fun events I attended late this summer: white-water rafting, church anniversary BBQ on the army base, and servant's retreat (where we had a bonfire!) By the way, has anyone ever played the game "Bohnanza"? It's a card game about beans, and is fun despite how it may sound! I learned to play it at the BBQ. Well, fall still hasn't "fallen" in Korea, but I would expect it any day now. I'm hoping for a couple of free weekends in October for hiking and enjoying the scenery, so hopefully more pictures to come! Next weekend is Chuseok, the Korean Thanksgiving holiday, so I have a couple of days off of work, and will be traveling to another city to visit my roommate's family. More to come...

With love,
Alison

Pretty tame for white water rafting, but also really fun.
Our guide was nicknamed "Bear"...pretty appropriate.

The army base feels like being in America but in the middle of Seoul.
They even had veggie burgers at the BBQ~

Some lovely ladies: Jessica, Sharon, me, Julianna *Note the bleachers
in the background...not a common sight in Korea.*

Amused by this sign at the army base entrance.
This is one of my roommates, Sharon.

Roasting marshmallows! I miss camping...

The New Pad!

Hello! So, it's been a few months of some major adjustments. After a wonderful 5 weeks in the States (home, beach reunion, D.C., Boston...) I headed back to Korea. About a month after I moved back, I finally moved out of the church and into this glorious apartment! I have 2 roommates, Sharon and Sarah, who are both Korean Americans though Sharon lived in Korea until the end of middle school before moving to Ann Arbor, MI. We absolutely LOVE our apartment because it has a living room, a nice big kitchen with an OVEN (very rare in Korea!) to satisfy my love for baking. It also has a washer and DRYER (also, not to be found in Korea), and a bathtub (another rarity). It's in an area called Noksapyeong, which is near the army base and thus became a district with a lot of foreigners living around here, but also a lot of great ethnic restaurants! We even have American electric outlets as well as Korean ones in our house. I have a cute little room and it really feels homey now. Here's some pics & I tried to do a video of my room since it's small and hard to photograph. Anyway, I thank God for the blessing of this house and my roomies, and it really feels like a haven after a long day of work, etc.

View from our veranda

View of Namsan tower lit up at night

My bedroom video:

Things at the school are going well. We have filled up a lot of our classes and are still growing. My hours are long and not the best, but I am trying to be positive and to take care of my health as much as I can. Hope you're all doing well, and I'll be back sooner than 4 months ;)

Swine Flu

So...I am wondering how the swine flu hype is affecting everyone in the States and elsewhere?

Last year in Korea it was protests against U.S. Beef because of non-existent Mad Cow Disease, or "Crazy cow" as they called it. Now, here in Korea, there are definitely some cases of swine flu, brought back by both Koreans and foreigners, and it seems to be spreading a little bit. Still I don't think it's a huge cause for concern at this point. Interestingly, a MAJOR English academy here in Seoul called C.D.I. (Megan used to work for a branch of this academy) is under quarantine because some of the teachers had H1N1 flu. They have branches all over Seoul, all of which are shut down, and the offices where the infected teachers trained and taught are under quarantine. Teachers are forced to stay in their apartment buildings, and there are checkpoints and everything in the lobbies to see if anyone else in the building has fever or symptoms as they come and go. Actually, this includes one of my friends who isn't able to go out for 10 days, though so far he has no symptoms. Apparently they have been treating them kind of rudely, and their internet connection was down for a long time, pretty much isolating them.

As of now...I am considering wearing a mask when I go to the airport in a couple of weeks to fly home. Although, it might almost be better to have the flu now when it seems pretty mild rather than later if it starts to become more virulent. These masks are pretty popular in Korea for average colds and yellow dust season anyway, so I will fit right it!

A Day for Kids - Young and Old

This year I celebrated Children's Day, not with a trip to Japan like last year, but just hanging out in Seoul with my favorite Korean family. I am still close with my old coworker Hyo Sung and her family, who I also went to Lotte World with. Her 2 daughters are adorable and they were sweet to invite me to join them for Children's Day (a national holiday in Korea). First, we went to "The Drawing Show" which is an entertainment show based on drawing (I would compare it to Blue Man Group, but for art). It was really impressive! They recreated a lot of famous artwork as well as some original stuff using all kinds of crazy methods. They had a ton of tricks up their sleeves and were pretty humorous over all. Best of all, I didn't need to know any Korean to enjoy it! :)

The main characters of the show

Final drawing (made it in about 2-3 minutes)

After the show, we headed to Gangnam area where they took me to a vegan buffet for lunch (if you don't know, that is extremely rare in Korea). Usually vegetarian food is Buddhist temple food, but in this case it was based around something called "Supreme Master" which apparently is not a religion according to a man working there, but is based on environmentalism and followers agree that being vegan is necessary to stop global warming and save earth. They had supreme master TV playing on the wall...which was...interesting. Definitely seemed a bit religious, but people define religion in different ways I suppose. Nonetheless, the food was great and I could eat everything without worry! They were so sweet to go out of their way to take me there.

Finally, we finished the day by going to Achasan (mountain in Seoul) to relax and hike. Hyo Sung's sister and her family joined us there as well, so it was nice to get to know her sister a bit. It was a full day, and really did make me feel like part of a family on a pretty important family holiday.

With the kids on Children's Day

Flat Stanley

Recently I had my very first visitor come see me in Seoul! She happened to come in an envelope in the mail, and her name is "Flat Stanley" :)

My cousin Elise sent me this doll for her 3rd grade school project based on the book "Flat Stanley" in which a boy is flattened by a bulletin board, and then gets sent in the mail all over the world. I had to take Stanley around with me and take photos and write about our adventures. I think Stanley may have been a bit bored because I pretty much just went about my daily life, but we did take some photos of the things I experience on a regular basis, so I'll share some of these photos with you guys too. I had so much fun showing Stanley around, so now that I have some tour guide experience, feel free to come visit anytime :) haha

Riding the subway...not too crowded tonight.
Asaaaa!! (That means "YESSSSS! in Korean)

Four 3rd graders I am tutoring once a week privately. They are a lot of fun! From the left: Cindy, Stacy (with Stanley), Me, Edward, and Sunny (English names). I had them write a short letter to Elise in English too!

The view from my new (temporary) home...a definite contrast from the last place! The north part of Seoul is older and less developed, though it is changing too.

I posted the rest of the pics here.

Now Stanley has gone back to be with Elise, but it was a fun visit while it lasted!

Why I Like Korea

Jess, Ness, & I try out "street mail" in Gangnam

Well, this is just one, rather superficial reason why I like Korea. Recently in Gangnam, a busy area of Seoul where I spend a lot of time generally, they installed these really tall pillars with interactive screens that do all kind of things. They have maps and all sorts of other features. You can take a picture, add a border, write something, and email it to yourself too. Plus, these pillars also give off wireless internet to the entire area. Sweeeeet! When I thought about why Korea has things like these in public places and the U.S. doesn't, I realized it's because sadly in the States somebody would take a baseball bat and vandalize it nearly immediately, whereas Korea doesn't have this kind of problem at all. There's all kinds of technological gadgets in public places like malls or on the streets and nobody damages them.

In a Nutshell :)

Hmmm, I pretty much exactly hit the one month since update mark, which means I have been thinking of updating for about 3 weeks ;) whoops!

So, here's the summary of a few weekends...
1) Moved my apartment around Feb 24th, so I packed for one whole weekend (how did I accumulate so much STUFF in 1.5 yrs??)- pictures of the new place to come if it's ever clean (fat chance!) haha. It's a little bigger than my last place, but really far north in the city, so I will move again in the summer.

Like I never lived there...

2) 3 weekends ago went to Lotte World, an indoor/outdoor amusement park in Seoul, with my ex-coworker and her family, including 2 young daughters. It's basically a very scaled down Disney World imitation, but it was so fun to spend "family time", and I am really enjoying continuing our relationship after changing jobs. I am also tutoring her older daughter and some friends still, so I see her weekly. I'm surprised she's still friends with me in spite of making her go on the "Gyro Spin" ;)

With Hyo Sung's younger daughter, Su Min

3) 2 weekends ago, I spent the whole time in the hospital. Actually Wednesday to Sunday I was pretty much there, because my friend Vanessa was sick. She's had an ongoing problem with terrible stomach/chest pain that was undiagnosed, and they finally discovered a large gall stone and gall bladder infection. Friday they removed the whole gall bladder, and she went home on Monday. I became her coordinator and mommy during that week, staying at the hospital as much as I could, and coordinating people to stay the rest of the time. It was hectic and hard to be in the hospital for so long, but it was so much harder for her, having surgery and all of this pain, far away from her family, and where the nurses pretty much only spoke Korean to her. Yikes! She pulled through wonderfully and is gonna be like new soon. So glad I could be there for her! Korean hospital was interesting as well. We were in a room of 7 people, so there was a lot going on, and it was surprising to me how all ages were put together. There was an infant in the same room, which was also very sad, though most people were older. Other children were mixed in with the adults, and the atmosphere was just not catering to them at all. I know childrens' hospitals do exist, but perhaps they are more expensive.

Pre-op...hehe this was a tight squeeze. The eye mask says "cute devil" on it.

Post-op visitors...in good spirits, all things considered!

4) Last weekend...I recovered! I was playing catch up all week after that week in the hospital, so I really needed the rest.

Hope you feel updated at least a bit! I'll post a few pictures from Lotte World and the hospital and a few others on my photo site soon. I don't have a lot from Lotte World because I am still waiting for my coworker to share them with me.

Love to all!
Alison

English Zone

So my public school just created an English classroom to be opened for the next school year... just in time for me to leave! What a difference it would have made to have a classroom so that I didn't have to make everything portable, deal with 11 different classroom set-ups and computer systems, and set up everything time and again in each homeroom class. But, I am excited for whoever the new teacher is. He/she will have a great co-teacher (she was the 5th grade English teacher when I arrived, and a 5th grade homeroom teacher this year) and a nice new classroom. Here's a few pics I took of the new room. Pretty cool! They have a lot of English picture books, so I hope they actually make good use of them for the students. These days most school are creating an "English Zone" though I'm not sure it makes any difference in effectiveness since the curriculum is still lacking. Time will tell!

Window shades & little robot stations

English conversation robots...

These little rooms will be role-play stations (like pharmacy, grocery store, etc)
They aren't finished quite yet though.

Books! There's a whole wall of picture books.

This year they added English phrases to all the stairwells.

What's Up

So, I haven't actually said much lately about what I'm up to in Seoul, job-wise, and when I'm coming home! Things have been up in the air for so long, which is part of the reason. The other part is probably an avoidance issue, knowing how long it might take to explain!

As you may know, my public school job just came to an end today! I only went half-way through my second year because I need to be home in June for a family reunion (as promised in 2007! haha). I also felt ready to move on. But, I was offered another job teaching English at a Korean church, with a ministry focus. This would involve after school programs for younger kids, teaching all aspects of English (conversational, reading, writing, etc) most of the week, and then Fridays doing special programs in a Vacation Bible School style - songs, plays, games, stories, crafts, etc. I have complete freedom here. Also, in the mornings I would teach classes for adults, in reading the Bible in English and "Mommy and me" classes for moms and babies, mostly music-oriented.
After MUCH deliberation and prayer, and after saying "no" a couple of times, I finally decided to take the job and stay longer in Korea, really feeling that it is the best decision for me right now, in spite of a desire to be closer to family and friends too.

So how did I get this seemingly random job? It literally fell into my lap, when I was introduced by my friend Annie to the pastor's wife at this church (they are Korean American, and the husband was her pastor in CA, but they recently moved to Korea). She talked to me about the English ministry she was starting at their church. After getting to know me, she offered a teaching position, starting in March when my job finished. She knew upfront that I would need to go home for most of June, and was fine with that as well, so I will be home in June for quite awhile. I was not expecting to stay in Korea so long of course, and maybe you are surprised too. A few months ago, I said I would only stay in Korea if a really different job was available to me, assuming I could pretty much only teach in a public school or Hawgwon (academy). Instead, this job showed up. While it may not sounds different...(it's still teaching, right?), what I am excited about is the working environment and vision for teaching at the school...it's not about making a buck, and I won't have classes of 32 kids of different levels all in the same class with no Korean speaker! The pastor and his wife are both amazing, kind, smart, and accommodating. They aim to serve students who can't afford to study English at a regular Hawgwon (these places cost a fortune, and are often really ineffective!) I am also confident that my work relationships will be very positive, and there will be less communication issues since the pastor's wife is fluent in English!

For awhile it looked like the licensing for the school would be delayed so we would have started in summer rather than spring, but now they decided to go ahead for March again, so I am set to move & start the new job soon. It may be slow at first, so I am going to audit 2-3 classes in the mornings this semester at Torch Trinity Graduate School of Theology, an international seminary in Seoul. I am excited for this opportunity to work and study at the same time. I am auditing because as of now I have no plans to pursue a degree at seminary, but I am just interested to take some practical ministry and Bible related classes.

So, whew!! It's been quite a process to make this decision, and a lot of back & forth on whether or not I was staying, and when the job would actually start. I hope you understand this doesn't reflect a desire to escape or avoid anything in the States, and I was actually looking forward to going home for many reasons. This just felt right personally and professionally as well. I have a strong community here, close friends, wonderful coworkers, and a great church, so for now I can enjoy a little more time in Korea, and we'll see what happens from there.

Fertility Dreams

One really interesting thing I learned about Koreans is that they commonly have and recognize what you could call "fertility dreams" or vivid dreams that would indicate the sex of the baby according to what was in the dream. Most people know what their mother's dream for them was, if she had one.

One teacher in my office is currently 7 months pregnant so this came up as a topic of conversation at our recent outing. Apparently she and her husband both had the same dream about grapes, which would indicate a daughter. Fruits generally represent daughters in these dreams. They still don't know the baby's sex though. Other teachers in the office shared either dreams they had or dreams their family had about them before they were born.

Hyo Sung dreamed of 2 snakes made of flowers when she had her second daughter. Flowers would represent girls, and maybe snakes too. I think she said her mother had a snake dream for her.

So Jin said her mother dreamed of a child on a tiger, which would normally indicate a boy, but then the child fell off of the tiger, so she was a girl. Haha! So Jin said this also explains why she has the character of a man (which I don't really think is true at all!)

I was told that sometimes the grandfather or grandmother has a dream instead of the parents themselves too.

So now I am curious...did anyone with kids have one of these vivid dreams when you were pregnant? I guess if you're not on the lookout for it, maybe you wouldn't remember, but it seems funny that they would only occur in Korea.

I'm famous!

OK, not really, but I had to hook you somehow. I was quoted in an article about the Korean music classes I took. Just thought it was kind of fun.

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/NEWKHSITE/data/html_dir/2009/02/06/200902060056.asp

There's the link! Someone in my class is a writer for the paper, and interviewed me.

CHEEEEEZ!

The name of a convenient store near my school...love it!
In Korea, they say "kimchiiii" to smile for pictures.

Meh-ri Keu-Ris-uh-mus-uh!

If you can read the title of this entry, congratulations! You can understand Korean! (or at least Konglish). In other words...Merry Christmas! And Happy New Year for that matter! So this update is a long time coming, but here are some details about my second winter holidays in Korea.

Christmas was wonderful and also quite busy this year in Korea. It feels like it came and went so fast this year! Culturally, Christmas is very different in Korea than in the U.S. of course. You don’t have the same feeling of the “Christmas season” with media attention, big family gatherings, and multitudes of parties. As I have told some people, Christmas is another “cake holiday” in Korea. There are bakeries on every corner of Seoul, maybe because nobody actually bakes themselves, and for holidays they have huge piles of boxed cakes sitting outside of them, waiting to be purchased. For a day or two before a holiday, especially Christmas, nearly every Korean you see will be carrying at least one of these boxed cakes. Cakes in general are small, really elaborately decorated, and not cheap! I have also told some that it is a “Couples holiday” too. Being part of a couple is very important in Korea (thus the matching couple outfits), and on Christmas, couples are out in full force (of course, donning cute identical sweaters and jackets and scarves). It’s also common to hear statements like “You should make a boyfriend for Christmas” (haha, someone actually said this to a friend of mine), or “Oh no! I’m still single on Christmas.” Finally, Christmas is a shopping holiday, like in the U.S. but in a different way. People go out shopping on Christmas Day, because they have the day off of work, but non-Christian families don’t celebrate together, so they are more likely to go out with friends and hit the busy shopping districts. Also, it is very, very popular to eat out at Outback Steakhouse on Christmas! Every one I saw was just packed.

My own Christmas was wonderful! It kicked off a couple weeks before Christmas with a concert and worship service for foreign workers (mostly from the Philippines, but about 15 nations were represented there), where I performed with choir and body worship. Then the next Saturday was the Christmas Gala, which had a lot of awesome dance and musical performances, culminating in a 2 hour play written by an extremely talented writer at my church. It was brilliant, both touching and hilarious! I'll post some videos of my performances, so you can check them out if you’d like.



Christmas Eve there was a special service at my church, after which I did homeless outreach at a busy Station in the middle of Seoul. It was quite eye-opening how many homeless men and women were lined up in just this one place, knowing to expect churches to be there handing out food, blankets, and clothes. I couldn’t speak to them, other than “Merry Christmas” but we prayed for them and served food as well as gloves and hat sets. Afterward, I headed to my friend Vanessa’s to stay over night with her and Laina. We shared a quiet Christmas morning, and I cooked our family’s favorite “Victorian French Toast” - yummy!

My choir sang again at the International English service on Christmas Day for all the English ministries in Seoul together. After this I went to dinner at Heather and Alex’s again (same as Thanksgiving), and Heather even made almost everything meatless! Some wonderful pastas, and of course Christmas cake! haha
One highlight was the Nintendo Wii Fit they had just gotten. We all had fun trying out the games and testing our “real physical age”, though I didn’t actually do that one, not wanting to reveal my elderly physique to everyone ;) We also played an interesting card game that resulted in some cruel punishments, included taping up faces, apparently inspired by Jim Carrey from his latest movie. You’ll see what I mean if you look at my pictures. It was an ... interesting and different side to these folks, but quite funny as well!

So, Christmas came & went as such. It was wonderful and I was once again so grateful for my family away from family. The only down-side was getting the flu the day after Christmas, staying in bed for 3 days bored out of my mind and sick as a dog. Luckily, I was almost better by New Year's, other than a hacking cough.

Well, I hope that your holidays were all filled with family, friends, and love and unity. I pray that your New Year will bring many wonderful blessings!

Welcome!

Hi family and friends,

I have changed my blog address and location, starting for 2009. I think using e-blogger will be equally if not more convenient than using the iWeb software from Mac, and also...free! I will still be posting pictures on the same site, using Picasa.

I have spent the past couple of days catching up on pictures and summarizing a very busy past month.

Hope you're all doing well in 2009, and I hope to catch up with you soon!

Love,
Alison