Waygooks Wandering

Ever since the grade 2's finished their exams, they've been kind of bad. I, honestly, did not think the grade 3's were that bad, and they've been done with their exams for much longer. Gianni and I have both been doing our best at our respective schools to do fun things with the kids despite the lack of enthusiasm. It's basically just been weeks of games and videos. We are in the home stretch though because the week of Christmas is our last school week of the term! After that, we both have English camp where we have maybe 20 students for a few hours per day, and we can do whatever we want. Niall and I are teaching a cooking class and a scavenger hunt class together. We're making pancakes! On my own, I'm doing a 2-day Harry Potter camp and a Sherlock/Murder Mystery camp. I'm really excited for both of them, and I have them mostly planned out. Aside from camp, we are going to do what's called "desk warming," where we do just what the name implies--sit at our desks ALL DAY. We are required to be at work even though we aren't teaching. It's different at every school though, so sometimes they might let us go early or whatever. So we'll see how that goes.

As far as what we've been up to, I've actually had some bad luck and been sick for the last week or so. Last weekend, I felt really nauseous and achy, and it carried over into the next week. I started to feel better for a few days and was eating normally, and then I got a cold this last weekend! So it's been a little bit unlucky but I've been making due.

We finished our Korean classes on Friday. I'm going to miss our teacher. She was really funny and a good teacher. We might take more Korean classes in the future, but that class gave us a nice base and taught us a few more useful phrases. Now, we just need to practice. I really appreciate that the Daegu Office of Education offered us the opportunity to take the classes because I really think I learned a lot, and we didn't have to pay a cent for them.

We've also been preparing for Christmas. Last night, I realized the advent calendar Mom sent me with Lindt chocolate inside had a mistake! Gianni was looking for the 16, but instead of the 16 we found another 10! Oh well! We also have a 4 ft tall, fake tree. It's pretty cute. It came with some ornaments, and I bought some more colored ones. One of the ornaments is a lotus flower, which is a Buddhist symbol (I actually bought it at a temple), so our tree is part Buddhist :) I also have a "Merry Christmas" sign tacked on the wall, and we bought little stockings that are hanging on the wall as well. The apartment has a bit of Christmas flare. Downtown there are also a lot of Christmas lights. It's really funny actually. They set up these light displays for you to take your picture with.

On Saturday, we went to see The Hobbit with Maria and Matthew and the old English teacher from Matthew's school. It was fun, but I had gotten up early to skype with Mom and Dad, so I was a bit tired and fell asleep at the end. It was an ok movie, but I'm not a huge Lord of the Rings fan anyway. Maria and Matthew are though. The movie was a little unsatisfying because it ended kind of abruptly and didn't seem to go anywhere, but it looked nice, as those movies usually do. When I spoke to Mom, she opened the box I sent with presents for everyone from Korea. She wanted to wait for me so that I could tell her what everything was and who it was for. I sent home presents for tons of people, and Mom wrapped them all up with me watching. I had Dad take her presents away though. She's playing Santa this year and will be delivering them to the respective people soon. Saturday night, we went over to Serena and Max's for their potluck dinner. There was delicious pulled pork and mac n' cheese! All the food was wonderful. They and their friends really know how to cook. Gianni and I just bought a cake and brought that. At their house, we also did a yankee swap. We played with different rules we used to play with when we did it in Canada with our cousins and family up there. You could either choose to steal a present from someone or choose one from the middle. If you stole from someone, then that person gets the same choice. One present can only be stolen 2 different times, and the person who went first gets to go again at the end. It was kind of a cool way to play, actually. I liked it. Gianni ended up winning 2 reese's peanut butter cups that were a half pound of chocolate each! It's insane. We're going to cut them up and use them in baking. I stole a box from someone that contained 2 large scented candles and 3 big packs of sour gummy worms! The two of us ended up with more candy than we can handle. Serena and Max are leaving to go home for a month, so it was kind of a going away party for them as well. I'll miss them. It's always fun to hang out with them and see them at taekwondo. Since they are leaving, they bought ziploc containers for us all to take food home at the end. They were like "please, just take it all!" So Gianni and I both went home with a nice haul. Thanks Serena and Max!

Sunday was more of a relaxing day. We went down to an English used book store and restaurant called Buy the Book that I've been hearing a lot about because they were having a flea market. It ended up being kind of small and just a few people were selling their art of jewelry. It was good to check it out and know where it is though. I got a chocolate cupcake and a molasses cookie from the KAPS booth. They are the animal shelter here in Daegu, and they do a lot of bake sales for fundraising. The cookie was amazing! I needed some molasses, and the person who made them told me where to get some molasses, which I have now ordered so that I can do some of my own baking! I'm really excited. After stopping by there, Gianni and I decided that we would go to the underground mall and each get $100 to spend on Christmas presents for each other. We split up and did some flash shopping so that the other person wouldn't see their presents. It was actually kind of fun! Might do it again next year. All his presents are now wrapped up and under the tree, so starting to look like Christmas for real.

One of the groups of "cool guys" playing and singing together. Adorable.

One of the girls doing a traditional Korean dance.

Thursday was the last day of exams for the first and second graders at school, meaning that all the students have now finished their exams yet they still have about a month left of school. I don't understand the Korean education system, but whatever. I'm hoping it goes okay until then. I've been a little stressed this week trying to plan out lesson for the upcoming weeks for the kids. I can do whatever I want, which is both nice and a little daunting. I also have been planning my camps for the winter, and I think I have it mostly planned out. Niall and I are doing a scavenger hunt with the kids together as well as a cooking class together where we are making pancakes. The other three days, I'm doing a two day harry potter camp and then a Sherlock/murder mystery camp the last day. I think I've got some good ideas, and the Harry Potte r camp is almost set. I've been doing blogging classes with some of my higher level students, and I'm almost ready to get some of the answers to your questions posted. I'll post the kids' answers and then maybe you can comment back. On Thursday, some of my students I guess wanted to practice their English by doing presentations for

cool magic trick from one of my kids

me. I didn't know they were planning something, but one of my co-teachers told me at lunch. I got a lecture about street food from a group of boys and one about Dokdo island from a group of girls. Dokdo island is an island on the southern coast of Korea. Japan and Korea both claim it as their own, and the Koreans are really adamant about it, even teenagers like my students. It was nice to see that my kids wanted to practice their English. I need to figure out ways to do things like this to get the kids talking more. That's one of my goals for the new semester.

the guy in the middle is Psy :)

On Friday, I think as a treat after exams, the school rented out the auditorium at the culture center, and the kids did a talent show! It was awesome! Not only did we get a half day because we left after it, but I also got to see some of the cool things my kids can do. Although all the kids were great, some of the girls were doing dances that I consider to be pretty inappropriate for school. I shouldn't know that some of my middle schoolers can move like that. Pretty ironic considering the teachers had done a sexual harassment training lecture earlier in the week. Anyway, there were some really cool acts. Most involved some sort of music--singing, dancing, playing an instrument--but one group of kids did MAGIC! It was really impressive! I'm editing a video, which I'll post soon of as many act as I could tape, but the quality of the video is bad at times. My good camera died half way through, and I had to switch to my phone. Woops! Even some of the teachers sang a song and the principal played his saxophone! He's apparently really good sax
player, and the teachers are always talking about it. My favorite performance was a PSY compilation featuring one of the larger middle school students as Psy! It was hilarious, and the kids did a
really good job of it. If they choreographed their own dances, I'm
really impressed. Anyway, it was a fantastic talent show, and I'm really proud of my students for performing! Also, I feel I need to say something about Korean audiences. We've observed people at parade and various performances inside and outside as of now, and all of them I've noticed similar things. Korean audience members are the best anyone could ask for! If you're a musician, come here to perform! They love it all. They dance, they clap, they scream! It's amazing. At the parade people were waving and clapping at all the people going by, and at the talent show, all the kids in the audience were cheering on ALL the acts (especially the sexy dancing girls and the cool singing and guitar playing dudes sitting down). I was seriously astounded by the way they seemed to support each other.

This week was the first week in probably over a month that we went to taekwondo training three times! It was nice to get back in the swing of things. The holidays kind of took priority for a bit, but hopefully, we're back in it. I definitely need to be training because of all the snacks I keep eating, and we both need to do it if we're going to make black belt by the end of the year.

Our Korean class Friday night was good, as usual. Next week is our last class, believe it or not! Where has time gone!?

It was a good week, and now we're having a relaxing weekend at home. Today, we watched movies all day. Tomorrow we might go out to Duryu Park with Maria and Matthew, but we aren't sure yet. We are watching our friend's dog this weekend also. She's a little dog named Maia, and she's really adorable and low maintenance. Her mom, Simone, is taking a weekend jaunt to Seoul, and I've been missing my furry companion, Trixie, back home, so it's nice to have a dog around again, even if it's just for a weekend.

I celebrated Thanksgiving with my students by doing a lesson about Thanksgiving and then showing the Thanksgiving episode of The Simpsons. It was a pretty fun lesson, and I think most of the kids like the episode. I played it with Korean subtitles, so I at least know they understood it! I taught them all about Thanksgiving traditions, like the Thanksgiving Parade, football, and giving food to the homeless. When I taught them about the food that we usually eat, they kept thinking that the turkey was chicken...they really haven't ever seen a wild turkey here, which is weird to think about considering in Newton they flock in people's driveways! I also told them the story of Thanksgiving--I should say both stories because I told them the traditional story and then what really happened to the Native Americans. I got really creative with pictures and gestures in my attempts at conveying small pox, murder, and religious intolerance (of the King, forcing the pilgrims to leave). One of my students asked why I didn't go home for the holiday. My response was writing how much money it would cost (in won) to fly home. He went, "ohhhhhh."

We weren't able to celebrate Thanksgiving on actual Thanksgiving Day because we had school. We did go to taekwondo and watched Serena and Max pass their belt tests. Serena passed 2 belts! She's brown now, and Max is blue. Master Hwang heard us talking about Thanksgiving and basically invited himself over to Serena and Max's on the weekend for some turkey! He's hilarious sometimes. After taekwondo, we went out for MacDonalds. Hardly a Thanksgiving feast, but at least it was a little piece of home on Thanksgiving with some of our lovely friends. As I was rushing off to school the next morning, I called the house briefly and interrupted Thanksgiving dinner to talk to Mom, Dad, Ben, Catherine, and Uncle Richie. It was nice to get to talk to everyone and wish them a Happy Thanksgiving even if we only talked for a second.

On Friday, I had a lovely surprise at lunch. The package from my mom came!!! I was so excited, but I didn't open it until I got actual clearance that I could open it before Christmas. She sent a beautiful advent calendar for me to hang up, and the best part is that it was stuffed with lindt chocolate balls! She also sent me some hot chocolate and chocolate spoons to go with it. I got some beautiful earrings and a Canada charm for my charm bracelet. I also got a pair of Canada mittens, Canada booty socks, and a Canada magnet. There will be no mistaking that half of me is Canadian! The presents were really amazing, and it was great to get something from home. It's really terrible being away for the holidays. At least the last time I was away for Thanksgiving I was in Arizona with my lovely cousin. I spent all night on Friday baking for our Thanksgiving weekend! It's really hard having only a very small toaster oven to cook with, but at least I have that. I think everything came out really well. Corn bread, apple crisp, and banana bread! 
The real Thanksgiving celebrations were this weekend. We got 2 Thanksgivings! It was awesome! The first was on Saturday at Serena and Max's house. We got there a little early to help out, but Serena had everything under control in the kitchen. She made both a turkey and a ham! There was a huge amount of food and all of it was delicious! I brought some banana breads made with Mom's recipe, and I think they came out perfectly. They tasted just like hers! I also brought an apple crisp, which isn't exactly up to her standards yet but was a million times better than the first one I made. Serena and Max had delicious chips and dip and American candies around the house too! We got peanut butter cups, 

Watching Koreans try turkey for the first time!

which we haven't had in a long time, and mint chocolate kisses! A bunch Serena and Max's friends came as did Master Hwang and Dae Eun from taekwondo. Gianni and I spent a good deal of the time talking to the two of them. We taught them about the food we were eating. Master Hwang didn't like that most of the food was sweet because he likes spicy food, but I think he enjoyed the ham, turkey, and banana bread. He even brought Serena and Max some toilet paper, which is a traditional gift you give someone when you go to their home for the first time. It's to wish them good luck and happiness as far as I understand. We had a great time chatting and eat until really late at night. Master Hwang was kind enough to drive us home. He wanted to see our sock collection. Ever since he saw me buying tons of socks in Seoul, he thinks I'm a "socks maniac," in his words. I've tried explaining that they were for family to no avail. We showed him the socks, and I also got him to take a look at the TV. He tried to get the cable working, but it turns out I only have one line to use for bot the cable and the internet, so I have to get the landlord to come fix it. Ugh! I feel terrible for all the problems we've been having with the place, but it's almost all set now!



The next day was more of a potluck Thanksgiving that Matthew and Maria hosted at their place. They are our married friends, and we always play quiz with them. They have an apartment with a kitchen, bathroom, and small living room downstairs, and their huge bedroom is upstairs. They had heard that you could order a turkey through the Daegu Compass, the foreigner magazine. The Compass brought turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce I believe. It's really nice that they have a service like this because you really can't buy whole turkeys here. Our friend, Marie, brought them a toaster oven and was in the middle of heating things when we arrived (late! because we got lost) with plates and cups for everyone to eat with. First, we went around the room and everyone said what they were thankful for. I said, "employment!" Everyone brought a dish, and boy are there some good cooks in the room. We had creamed corn, green bean casserole, and mashed potatoes. Gianni and I brought corn bread muffins, which Serena had to buy us the mix for because they don't have corn meal here. We also brought sweet potatoes. While we were making them, we realized that Korean sweet potatoes are not orange like at home. They taste basically the same, but they were this ugly, green-brown color by the end. We also had to eat them cold because the toaster oven was too small to heat up the big bowl we had. Still, several people said they were good, so that's okay! It was lovely sharing food with everyone and talking. We watched a little football and some Ohio State marching band shows. Maria and Matthew went there, and their marching band is incredible. After dinner, we had pumpkin pie, our extra banana bread, and Sian's milk tart for dessert. Sian is from South Africa, so she brought a South African dessert. It's like a custard pie, and it was really good! After dessert, we got into playing some card and board games. I learned to play some new card games and bananagrams! It was a really excellent time. Everyone left at around the same time in order to catch buses and trains home.

Despite the fact that we only met our friends here 4 months ago, it's been incredible getting to know them all. Having great friends who are in the same situation as you makes it so much easier to be away from family and friends back home. Thank you to Serena and Max and Matthew and Maria for hosting Thanksgivings this weekend, and thank you everyone for being such amazing friends to us!

This weekend was just what the doctor ordered. Both Gianni and I got in a bit of talking time with our parents, which was nice. But, primarily, we spent a ton of time sleeping! This was the first weekend in about a month that we've been able to sleep in as long as we wanted both days. Saturday, we got some errands done and went grocery shopping before going to see Catching Fire with Lily and Jonathan downtown. It was fantastic! I love the second Hunger Games book. I think it's the best story. I found it more interesting than the last movie, and I like that it gets into the politics a little. On Sunday, we cleaned the apartment a little, and Maria and Matthew came over to play Settlers of Catan. We played like 4 games. It was funny because Maria won practically all the games the last time we played, and she didn't win at all this time. We got pizza at Pizza School with them for dinner, and got some snacks for dessert at the convenience store. All in all, it was a great weekend. Just what we needed. I feel at least a bit more relaxed. Also, our bathroom is finally fixed! The maintenance man fixed our sink pipe, both drains are cleared of hair, the shower is in now mounted on a wall, and it's all clean. The boiler also got fixed so that it, hopefully, doesn't drain water all over everything on our porch area like it had been. I'm really glad everything in the apartment is finally settled.

Gianni and I  breaking the boards

Almost forgot! We basically forced Master Hwang to test us for our orange belts on Thursday. He definitely told us that is when he was going to do it, but when we came in on Thursday, ready to go, he said next week. We complained a bit, and I think he realized he told us the wrong thing, so he felt bad. In any case, we tested for our orange belt and passed! Gianni didn't make any mistakes, but I made 2 :( WOOPS! I know the forms too. I just got a little nervous. Also, he sprang a sparing thing on us that we hadn't learned yet and breaking boards! Granted they are plastic boards that have breaks in them, so they don't take much force to break, but still! We were like, "umm....Master Hwang, we've never done any of this before. You didn't teach us." But we passed, so we're officially orange belts now!!!

This weekend we took the wonderful opportunity to do a temple stay at Jikjisa Temple for free. Typically, temple stays cost around $50 and give you a chance to relax and experience life like the Buddhist monks live it. Our experience was a bit different because it turned out this was a special foreigners trip to basically promote the idea of temple stays and tourism for the area. It was completely funded by the Gimcheon cultural center. Gimcheon is only about an hour away from Daegu, and it is where Jikjisa temple is. So despite not being the peaceful, relaxing weekend we were thinking of, we still got to do some wonderful cultural activities.

We found out that a bunch of our friends were going as well, so it was nice to see them-- Marie, Erin, Emily, Sian, Maria, and Jake. Our train ride to Gimcheon was easy as was figuring out which bus we had to take to the temple (hint: it was the one all the foreigners were trying to get on). We got off the bus and started following people towards the temple. It was probably a 15 minute walk, but we got to go through the culture park for part of it. We didn't get to really check it out, but it had some cool sculptures and looked like a really relaxing little park area. On the way, we crossed over a bridge over a small stream that was like the playground ones you can jump up and down and bounce on. Not sure the name for them or why it was there, but it was fun.

We arrived at the temple where we were given orange, baggy uniforms to change into and wear for the weekend. They also gave us these little gift bags with information about the temple and the area as well as souvenir gray polo shirts (in sizes way too large for the girls--might be a present for someone later), a sewing kit, a tape measure, and a toothpaste/brush travel set. It was a really sweet thing to put together. As we were signing in, there were even these little people mascots! So cute. First thing we did was get changed and do a little temple stay orientation. We watched a video about what temple stays are usually like and the etiquette to follow and promptly realized that our temple stay was not going to be like that. They usually take your phones and things away I guess, 

This is a stupa, and that's a blue roof.

but not for us. I forgot my camera anyway-- :( You also aren't really supposed to talk unless it is necessary throughout the weekend, but we definitely did the entire time. Oh well! I'd like to do another, more traditional temple stay at some point. From the video, we also learned about the structure and buildings in a typical temple. At the entrance to the temple is a 1 pillar gate. It is open and has no doors to signify openness. It is also called the gate to truth, and you should bow with prayer hands when you enter it. After that gate is the gate of the 4 guardians. These are 4 kings who decided to guard the Buddhist faith. Each one represents 1 direction (North, East, South, West) and is holding a different object. These are the massive statues of the guys with crazy faces I've taken pictures of and seen at other temples, so I'm glad we learned what those are finally. After orientation, we got a brief tour around the temple. There was a Korean man doing the tour and another woman who I really don't think was Korean. She seemed to have trouble understanding the man speaking Korean and, thus, an even harder time translating his Korean into English for us. The tour made no sense, and we all just resorted to reading the signs posted outside the buildings to see what everything was. I did hear that the temple was built around the year 400 though! So it is really old! One of our friends from taekwondo did tell us before coming that this temple is significant because it has a building with a blue roof. Blue roofs mean the temple is old and important because the blue roof tiles are not very common anymore, now they are mostly grey or black. Another interesting aspect is that in the main hall where the Buddha statue is kept, there are 1,000 small, Buddha statues behind the big, gold statue. All of the statues except for 1 is sitting down, so it was cool to get to see the one that is standing up. It is a very beautiful temple.


Next, it was time for dinner. For monks, even meals are ceremonial, so, even though we were all starving, we had to do it in the proper way. You get a set of bowls called baru gongyang. Each of the bowl is meant for a specific food with no mixing--soup, rice, vegetables or side dishes, and clean water. You unpack the bowls using only your thumbs so as not to make a lot of noise. The smallest bowl (the side dish bowl) goes on your upper left, the water bowl on your upper right, the rice bowl on your lower right, and your soup bowl on your lower left--I think! It goes smallest bowl to biggest in any case. It was a little hard to follow when I couldn't see the monk very well from the back. You aren't supposed to talk during the meal, and you have to sit up straight. The monks had to keep reminding us of these. So you eat, and you all try to finish at the same time. When that happens, you pour some of your water into the smallest bowl and use a yellow radish to clean the bowl. You then pass the water to each of the other two food bowls in turn and clean those with the yellow radish. After cleaning all the bowls, you drink the water that is left in the largest bowl. That is supposed to be all the cleaning of the bowls that you need to do if you've done it correctly, but because it was our first time, and they didn't trust us to be properly sanitary, some of the guys (Gianni included) were made to help wash them with soap the next morning. You aren't supposed to take a lot of food because you have to make sure you finish all the food with no waste. I thought we'd be able to take more if we needed it though, which was not the case, so I was still hungry after dinner, and I had to wait until the next morning to eat.

After dinner, we made lotus lanterns using petal-shaped green and pink paper and a paper cup with wax and a wick in it. They were really pretty. We also wrote a wish or a hope on a piece of paper and hung it from the cup. We all lit the lanterns and walked around the stupa (large, stone monuments--see photo above) outside the temple with the Buddha statue in it. We walked around 3 times so that our wishes would come true. It was a nice, peaceful way to end the evening. We were told to go to bed at 10pm, so we all had a few hours to walk around the temple and hang out together before bed.


How many people can say they were woken up by a monk!? We can now!!! He came in at 5am saying "anyang haseyo," which means "hello" in Korean. We had plenty of time to get washed up and dressed for breakfast. Breakfast was much less formal than the dinner the previous night. We could take as much as we wanted, but, again, we had to eat it all. There was this yummy fruit and yogurt salad that I enjoyed a lot, but at one point, Maria goes, "the kiwi in here is really delicious." My immediate reaction was, "WHERE'S THE KIWI!?" Gianni is allergic to kiwi, and he had eaten some of the salad. He stopped eating it right away, and luckily he probably didn't have any of it, but we were both a little freaked out for a while, hoping he wouldn't have an allergic reaction at a temple in the mountains!

After breakfast, we participated in a Buddhist prayer/exercise ritual. They do 108 prostrations and pray for something with each prostration. It is a mental and physical training exercise. A prostration is a full bow. You begin standing with your hands in prayer position. Then you bend your knees and kneel on a mat. Then, you put your forearms on the mat and touch your forehead to the mat so that 5 point of your body are touching the mat (knees, elbows, and head). The last part of it is to flip your hands so that your palms face up and you raise your hands up slightly. After doing all of this, you put 1 bead on a necklace. You do this 108 times for 108 beads on a necklace. There is a significance behind the number 108 that involves multiplication. A certain number of prayers for a one thing multiplied with prayers for another thing...I can't really remember. Gianni and I both have nice prayer necklaces now that I feel like we had to work hard for! We all did them together as a group, waiting for the last person to stand up before doing another one. One of the times the hole in my bead wasn't completely open, so it took me entirely too long to get it on the strand! I was the last one to stand up that time, and I was totally mortified! We filled out surveys about how we found the temple stay before changing out of our orange uniforms and back into regular clothing.

The rest of the day was spent doing cultural activities organized by Gimcheon culture center. They took us out to lunch at a san gab san (Korean BBQ) place, and that was really delicious. Afterwards, we went to a cabbage field and picked out our own cabbages. They are surprisingly easy to pull out. We stuck those in a bag, thinking we would be using them to make kimchi next. Turns out, they had cabbage at the kimchi place for us, so AGAIN we get stuck with two huge bags of cabbage! How does this keep happening to us!? This is the second time! The next activity was to make summer kimchi. I think the cabbage they had was already lightly pickled, all we had to do was put some red pepper paste all over each of the leaves of the cabbage and stick it in a bag to take home.

Making kimchi was our last activities, so the buses took us right back to Gimcheon train station. On the way off the buses, someone was handing out bags of plum jellies. Apparently, Gimcheon is known for it's plums. They are yummy candies. We were earlier than expected, so we got in the huge line of people to try to change our tickets to an earlier train, and we were successful. We had to pay $2 more because it was a nicer train than we had been booked on though. The nice train is the same as the nice bus we've been on before. It had wider seats with more leg room and an adjustable leg rest.

We made it home around 4:30pm and made plans to see Gravity in 3D with Maria and Matthew later on that night. We went straight home and put our things down so that we could go buy the tickets at the theater downtown. We got the tickets and had some time before the movie, so we played some games in the arcade on the same floor as the ticket office. Gianni was really excited to have his first Korean arcade experience since he loves games, and we hadn't found one for him to play in before this. We also got some quick dinner at KFC. It was a wicked tense movie, but really amazing! The 3D didn't bother me too much the way it normally does, so that was good. I am really glad we saw it. It was a nice end to another great weekend here in Korea.

Last week, we were too lazy and tired to go to quiz, so we slept instead, so last night was our first quiz night in a few weeks. We started out with a free pitcher of beer from one of the two Halloween quiz beer challenges that we won. The first round theme was "JC." It was about people with the initials JC, so, of course, JC Chasez from NSYNC was one of the answers! We didn't think we did too badly on it, but apparently we did because we ended up in 10th place after that round. The second round was famous people's body parts, so there were pictures of hair, eyes, abs, backs of heads, etc. We did really well! We climbed up to second place after that round! Why knew we were so good at body parts! One of the questions in that round is going to kill me though because it was a picture of Randy Jackson hugging someone. You had to tell who's head it was, and you could only see the back. I thought it was Samuel L. Jackson, but Gianni disagreed. I then suggested Jamie Foxx, but that was denied also, so I ended up just writing Samuel L. Jackson. Turns out, the answer was Jamie Foxx!!! UGH!!! That one is going to haunt me for a while. The last round was 7 deadly sins. We didn't do too terribly, and we actually stayed in the same place. We managed to tie with another team for second place. The tie breaker was name as many words as you can that start with Z (scrabble rules). Maria did all the writing, and I blank on stuff like that anyway. The other team had multiple people writing at once. They beat us by 3 words! Three words, and we would have won money! Or if we had gotten the Jamie Foxx question right, we would have won second without a tie breaker! DAMN! Oh well, free beer again!

This weekend, Gianni and I joined a group of 10 other people on a trip to Seoraksan National Park with Waygook Travel. Seoraksan is a mountain in the northeast corner or South Korea. It is actually on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites that are under consideration right now. Our friends Jonathan, Lily, Sian, and Marie were in our group, but everyone else was new to us. We had an excellent time getting to know these people throughout the weekend. They were lovely :)

The tour started when the bus picked up us by Dongdaegu station at 5:30am!!! It was actually about 20 minutes late for the pickup, which was scheduled at 5:10am, so we were up at 4am. We had to take a taxi to the station because the trains weren't operating yet. It was way too early to be alive, but apparently not for our tour leader (and the owner of the travel company) and his friends. They were all drinking already and encouraging us to drink! It was completely ridiculous. We got them to leave the music off and let us sleep for a few hours, but as soon as we made the stop in Pohang to pick people up, he made an announcement saying, "now that the sun is up, we are going to play music. Come and buy drinks at the front of the bus." It was absurd! It was still only maybe 7:30am! We didn't stop to see anything special along the way, but we took frequent stops for bathrooms and convenience store food, but, primarily, for the tour leader and his friends to have their smokes. It was a little frustrating, honestly. Also, we didn't get real food all day! The place we ended up stopping for food was the smallest rest stop ever, and we attempted to get things to tide us over that weren't cookies and chips. We ended up with "pizza hotdog," which was basically a pizza hot pocket and not at all satisfying. As we approached Seoraksan, the tour guide decided it would be really funny to sing a made-up, tuneless song about the mountain into the microphone on the bus. He and his friends thought it was hilarious, but all the paying guests thought it was totally awkward and stupid.

After a really long drive, we made it to Seoraksan (san means mountain is Korean, by the way). It was beautiful! Absolutely marvelous. The national park had all the amazing fall foliage. We walked around a bit, drank out of a well at the temple in the park, and took the cable cars up to the top of the mountain. The cable car ride was even steeper than at Palgongsan, but this time they were the cars that fit about 50 people, so it was a bit cramped. Luckily, we got a spot by the window, so I could take some nice pictures. The views were amazing. Seoraksan was cool because the mountain was all jagged and very high up. We walked down a trail by the cable car station, and ended up at a look out point at the top. We took some pictures there, and then literally mountain climbed to the top of a massive bolder. From there, you get an even better view. It was really scary getting up there though. There are people who help you out and watch to make sure you're ok, and there are some ropes to help you get down, but otherwise you're on your own. No gear or anything. I seriously felt like I was going to die, and I'm not scared of heights or anything. Getting up there was really steep and scary though. We made it up, and Gianni and I got some pictures together. At the top of the bolder, there was a man selling medals for $10 for getting up there. He would carve your name into them. I laughed to myself because they would totally do the same thing at home, except at home they wouldn't be personalized, and they would cost at least that much, if not more. Getting down, we had to shuffle on our butts the whole time. At the base of the mountain, we got some makoli, which the area is known for. It was corn flavored, which was pretty interesting...



After spending a few hours at the mountain, we drove 20 minutes to our accommodations. It was a beach-front hotel. The 12 people in our group shared one room with two bathrooms (although the lights in one of the bathrooms didn't work). How do we fit 12 in a room you ask? Well, it was our first Korean style sleeping experience. We all had sleeping mats, which we laid out in different places on the floor of one large room. It was actually really nice, like a slumber party.

After getting settled, we had a BBQ! It was delicious food. We got both steak and lamb and some potato salad. Unfortunately, we had to eat inside because it was raining, and it took FOREVER for the food to be finished. We were already famished from the day of not being taken to a real place to eat, and I was kind of fed up. Also, the tour leader asked the males on the tour (and the paying guests!) to help unpack the food from the bus. He asked nicely, and this wouldn't have been a problem, if he hadn't also asked us to do EVERYTHING ELSE! First, we all had to collect wood from Seoraksan for our bonfire later because they only had enough for cooking with. Later on, he also asked Sian and MJ to help cook, and he made everyone else carry the bonfire wood (which, again, we collected!) to a place on the beach for a fire. When the first place we put the wood down wasn't good enough for him, he made us carry it to where he wanted to go. He wasn't even carrying a stick or helping in any way! We also got a free cocktail included in our package, and that was strong enough, thankfully. It seems like the only thing these people do really well is drink and make drinks. The rest of the night, we hung out on the beach, playing with fireworks (we got some more roman candles and a heart-shaped sparkler), and drinking with our friends for a bit before we hit the hay.

In the morning, we found out that the tour leader actually got into a fight with two of the people in our group, and it almost came to blows! He actually threatened them and made derogatory comments about their being British (he was South African, so were all his friends, but they all had Korea wives and girlfriends it seemed). We also realized that our friend, Lily, was really sick all night! At first, she thought she had the flu, but now she's thinking food poisoning. None of us got sick, but she had to leave the trip early because she couldn't even keep fluids down.When we woke up with the rest of us, she went to a pharmacy, and, luckily, the man was really nice. He got her some medicine and helped her and her husband get a bus home because she was feeling so bad. It was really too bad because we like hanging out with them, but I think she's feeling better now. None of the tour guides were around at the time, which is annoying, because she and Jonathan had no help in figuring out what to do. Another example of just how terrible this tour was.

Cool dragon carving at the temple

Giant stone Goddess statue

We got up fairly early in the morning to visit Naksansa Temple, which was about a 15 minute walk from the hotel. Despite the fact that this was a planned event, none of the tour guides were around in the morning when we were scheduled to leave. They had been drinking for over 12 hours, so we figured as much, but it was completely unprofessional. If there is a scheduled event, someone should be there to take you on it. Anyway, we asked the hotel manager who pointed us in the right direction. I'm glad we went because Naksansa Temple was really beautiful. It was a built on a mountain, so there were beautiful views of the ocean. We got our first experience seeing the ocean in Korea this weekend, which was nice. The temple has a massive stone statue of the Goddess Haesugwaneumsang in a clearing on top of the mountain. There were beautiful colored lanterns decorating the temple as well. I really enjoyed it. We walked back to the hotel for our breakfast. Again, the food was really good. I had tons of eggs and toast. It was yummy! 1 of the guides was making breakfast, which was good of her, and her husband made an appearance and seemed in better spirits in the morning without the alcohol in him. He was much nicer and more helpful, refunding the money for Lily and Jonathan's ATV trip since they had to leave because Lily was sick.

Gianni driving cautiously

We got back on the bus and drove to a spot where we were going to ride ATVs. It was really fun, and we had both never done it before. It was on a track, and some courses were more challenging than others. We got to do it for a half hour, and it was awesome. I took my camera on part of it, and I tucked it in my coat when I was driving. I think I got some good pictures.

Sian and MJ singing on the bus

Present for Ben

After ATVs, we drove all the way home and were back in Daegu in time for dinner. During the last half hour or so of the drive, they decided to make the bus into a noraebang (노래방)! I had heard of this, but I haven't experienced it in Korea before. Apparently, work retreats are very popular, and they typically rent a "party bus" with karaoke (or norae) capabilities. Again, the tour guides were a bit nicer, apologizing to the guys in our group who they got in a fight with the night before and giving them free drinks. I don't think the guys thought that it made a difference, but at least they tried and were actually sort of nice the second day. I also want to mention that I found Ben the most amazing present during this trip. For some reason, they sell poop with faces on it. You can whack it like a mallet, and it laughs! Hopefully, he'll find it hilarious!

So we made it back to Daegu on time. Some of the members of our group were worried about making it because they had trains to catch back to other cities, and I was really surprised we actually did make it on time because, again, there were frequent smoke breaks. As we got off the bus and got our things, the tour manager and his wife (who I didn't have a huge problem with, but some people in our group did) decided to wear their professional hats, hoping that people would forget the rest of what happened. They hugged people and thanked everyone for coming. As if we want to hug people who have done a horrible job the entire time!

For dinner, Gianni and I went out to eat at a Japanese place by our house. We had udon noodles and onigiri, which translates into rice ball in English. I am addicted to tuna triangle kimbap and onigiri. It's delicious for some reason, and all it is is canned tuna! I can't explain it.

So to sum up this weekend: Seroaksan, Naksansa, and ATVing were all excellent. So, the events on the tour were amazing, and I'm really glad we got to do these things. But let's be real; all the tour guides had to do was plan to go there and take us there. The food was also really good, but I only give half the credit to the tour guides because I saw their friends helping with most of the cooking and even some of the paying guests helped, like us. There was a huge lack of professionalism on the part of the tour guides, who are also the owners of the tour company. True, they did turn it around a bit for the second day, but some of the things that occurred were, in my opinion, inexcusable, and it was too little too late. I understand that there are some tour companies that cater to more of a partying crowd, but I had no indication of this from this tour company before boarding the bus. If I had, I would have chosen another company. The tour guides really needed to gauge their audience right from the very start and be able to see what kind of a group we would be. That's half their job! They should have known we weren't a partying group and toned it down. They were not able to do this, so the mood wasn't something I wanted to be a part of. I will never be booking with Waygook Travel again. I can do a much better job planning on my own. That being said, if you're looking for a party tour, then this is the tour for you.

Gianni and the giant Pepero display outside the store

Yesterday was Pepero Day in Korea! It may possibly be worse than even Valentine's Day because its specifically to give out Pepero sticks, which are cookie sticks with chocolate on the ends. It is a manufactured holiday created by Lotte (the company that owns practically everything in Korea--department stores, a fast food chain that is, arguably, better than McDonalds, a baseball team, etc.) to sell more of it's candy.  In Japan, these are called Pocky. It's celebrated on 11/11 because the pepero are sticks, so they look like 11's if you put 2 next to each other. They sell a whole bunch of different varieties, and kids give them out to their friends. A lot of times students give them out to their teachers, and today, I'm giving some out to my co-teachers. I wanted to take part in the Korea holiday, even if it is totally made up. The oreo kind if my favorite with a close second to the almond and chocolate ones. I tried the melon ones...and they were really cantaloupe-flavored...not my favorite.

We've been slacking off about going to Taekwondo for the last two weeks. We only went once a week for both weeks. Last night was our second time this week, and boy was it fun! (sarcasm folks.) He started off the warm up telling us that we would be doing circuit training. Max and Serena were like "oh no!" and a few of the Korean students joked about leaving. I knew something painful was going to happen. We did our basic warm up and then he gathered us all around and gave us letters A, B, C, or D. A is the hardest level with he most reps. Gianni and I were C's, thank God! He put out these laminated sheets of paper all around the room--there must have been around 20 along the walls. Each paper had an exercise on the top and the number of reps each level had to do. All of the exercises were calisthenic-type things, like jumping jacks, sit ups, squats, push ups, burpies, etc. He gave us all Korean partners because the exercise name was written in Korean. One partner had to do all the exercises from one station to the next without stopping and then the other partner had to. I went first. I was already really tired coming into class, and this definitely did not help. I did it though! By the end I was beat red (and stayed that way for the rest of class! Master Hwang kept pointing it out, making me even more red). It was a fantastic workout, and I'm definitely feeling it today.

This weekend, we had an engagement photo shoot scheduled with Kristen, a photographer who has been a teacher here for about a year and a half. Her cousin, Marie, is a friend of ours and suggested we talk to her. I wanted to have our engagement photos in Korea as a kind of memento of our time here. I want people to be able to recognize that we're in Korea, so we decided to go to Cheongju, where Kristen lives, because there's a beautiful fortress on the mountain there. It's about 2.5 hours away from Daegu, and we left on Saturday morning at 11am. We meant to leave at 10am, but that bus was full by the time we got to the station. We got to take one of the luxury buses to Cheongju like we did to Andong. It was fantastic, again! The US really needs to get on board with this. On the way there, the weather got steadily more gray. By the time we got there, it was spitting rain. It continued to be gray, foggy, and rainy all day! Fortunately, we spent a few hours at the fortress taking pictures with it and the beautiful fall foliage before the fog got so bad you couldn't even see the trees anymore! It was insane, but very cool. The foggy pictures actually had a cool effect. After our shoot, we got lunch/dinner with Kristen at an Indian place, and it was delicious.We took a few pictures in the downtown area just to show off a little bit of Korea at night. We also got the fried dough in the shape of fish with cream inside. We had previously only tried the red bean kind. The cream ones were good though. We headed back to the station and caught the last bus out of town. I think the pictures turned out very nicely. Kristen has already posted 3 online, and they look really nice.

On Sunday morning, I had a nice chat with my dad and my aunt while my mom cleaned the house, and Gianni and I talked to his friend, Caroline, also. We are much overdo with a skype call to some of our friends from home, so friends, if you're reading this, schedule something with us. In the afternoon, we went to Daegu Opera House to see Tannhauser, an opera by Wagner. The opera was a part of the Daegu Opera Festival that has been going on for the last month. The Opera House itself is a beautiful building. We got the cheapest tickets with a few of our friends, so we were sitting all the way in the top balcony at the front. We had to lean forward to see over the railing, so that was kind of a pain. The opera is German, and it was captioned in both Korean and, thankfully, English. It was a pretty boring opera though. I'm not sure if that was due to the staging of it or the play itself. One of the people in our group knows the opera, and she said this was a bit of a tamed down version. It is supposed to start with an orgy or something, and it definitely did not. Anyway, there wasn't a lot of action or movement happening. The visuals were interesting, but the sets didn't  change during the acts. It was minimalist sets and staging with a kind of boring plot, so it made it even more boring. Oh well! First time seeing opera on a live stage was a bust, but it's ok. Outside the Opera House, there were all these booths set up where you could take pictures and experience opera. One of them was a stage you could take pictures on, and there was another where you could try on costumes. It was kind of interesting.

The Opera:

The Opera House, which is actually really close to where we do taekwondo, is already half way to Costco. My phone said it was only like 2 miles away from Costco actually. Being that we were so close, I decided for both of us that we needed to go there. We hopped on a very convenient bus from right outside the Opera House. I was probably the most excited person ever to enter a Costco! You actually have to take the rampscalator down 2 floors from the entrance door to get to the second shopping floor, then if you want to get to the food area, you have to take it back up one floor. It's kind of annoying. Otherwise, it's the same as at home, including a lot of the same food!
It was lovely! There were so many people, too! So we walked all around Costco, getting the things that are more difficult to get here. We got a huge pumpkin pie for only $8, some snack foods and cereal brands from home, the Costco muffins that are my favorite, crusty onion bread, Einstein's Bagels, and Heinz Ketchup. Probably the best discovery was the cheese section though! They actually had real, less processed cheese. I got a huge cheddar cheese block, ricotta to make lasagna, and feta! I'm sooooooo happy with all my purchases. We had too much stuff to carry on our own, so we ended up getting a taxi back to the apartment, and it only cost us $15! What a deal! I'm ecstatic. I needed a little something from home, and now I have it! :)

Since they don't celebrate Halloween in Korea, I've taken the opportunity to teach my kids about it, candy and all. The kids really like it. The swamp me for candy all the time. Some of them forget about saying trick or treat and just say "give me candy." Then I get to talk about being polite. I've been teaching it all week. Yesterday was actual Halloween though, so I put zombie makeup on my hand and on Niall's. The kids were loved it. They all wanted to touch it. At lunch, two boys came in and noticed it. Then, they wanted me to put some on them. I started, and soon after, 3 girls came in and wanted it too. I applied zombie makeup on 5 kids hands in 15 minutes! It was nuts! Some of them weren't that good, but oh well. One of the girls kept saying hurry. I was like I'M TRYING! Anyway, it was really cute, and they liked it.

On Wednesday, we talked about Halloween at teacher class then two of the teachers at my school went to coffee with Gianni and I. One of the English teachers really wanted to meet him, so we went. It was a realy nice evening. First, we went to coffee for a few hours then we went downtown and ate at Traveler's during special Halloween Quiz night. Hyun Joo came with us, and as far as I know, she's the first teacher from our school to see Niall do trivia. We came in 4th place and only 2 points off of 1st! Hyun Joo even got one of the answers for us! We may not have won in the end, but we won both of the beer challenges! First was a costume contest. No one really dressed up, but Hyun Joo had a cute horn headband, so Niall gave us the beer. The second challenge was a monster music mash up, and we named the most songs in the mashup. It was awesome! It was a really fun night.

For Halloween, Gianni and I were going to go to Costco, but I had to get my nails done for our engagement photo shoot tomorrow and didn't get back until later. Instead, we ate at Lotteria (like McDonalds) at Home Plus and bought candy and snacks. We watched The Poltergeist and Hocus Pocus. It was a relaxing and fun Halloween evening :)

*On an unHalloween related not, today I saw the cell phone portfolio that the students put their phones in at the beginning of the day. They explained that they don't get to keep their phones during the day; they have to put them in the portfolio slots. There's a special, big portfolio-like case for each class! They were shocked  to hear that they don't take the students' phones in the US. They said Korea is bad for doing it, and I explained what happens in class when students have phones. They disagreed, but it was a cut conversation with me and the girls in class. I'm amazed and glad that they do this!

As it's starting to get colder in Daegu--moving into fall--my apartment has been getting colder. When I moved in, I never learned to use the heating system, and my landlord told me to call back when it got colder, so they could show me. Last night, my coteacher came over and talked to the landlord for me to help me work out how to use it. My thermostat is located behind a patched section of the wall, so that's a little weird. I have to pull it back to get at the thermostat and controls. When we first switched it on, the thermostat didn't seem to work for some reason. The landlord then told us that it only comes on at 11pm. I think that was just the first night though because it was still on this morning. I'm at least hoping it was just tonight because I'm going to need it when I get home from work as it gets colder. It was soooooo nice waking up to heat and not freezing cold for once! I have had no desire to get up recently, so this was helpful. Also, heating in Korea is a system called "ondol," which is under the floor heating, so I kept walking across the floor hitting warm spots. Lovely morning already, and I only have 3 classes today--all before lunch!

We had another fantastic weekend! A lot of it was spent doing Halloween related things with the foreign community in Daegu. They don't celebrate Halloween in South Korea, so the waygooks have to do it for them.

Lish came to visit from Jinju this weekend. She arrived Friday night, and we headed downtown to get some food. I looked it up online, and apparently Daegu is famous for some sort of flat mandu (dumpling). We tried to go to a famous restaurant for that outside of downtown, but it was too late, and the restaurant was closed. So we walked downtown to try to get some food there. Banwoldang was like a ghost town! It was insane. We were walking around and all the shops and restaurants were closed, and there were hardly any people walking around. I know it was late, but it was a Friday night! So weird. We ended up at this food stall that Gianni and I have been meaning to try. It's always really busy. They sell fried things and duk boki mostly.

Hotteok

It's Korean fast food. I got some hotteok, which is the Korean pancakes stuffed with nuts, seeds, and a sugary syrup that Gianni and I tried and failed miserable to make last week. They are selling it around town now because it's a winter food, and the weather is getting colder. We got some mandu, flat mandu, and duk boki before going to get some ice cream at a place nearby. They get confused on ice cream menus here. They keep writing "cheese" flavors, like "cheese and raspberry." They mean cheese cake or something, but they sometimes get it mixed up. This place was strange though. Some of the flavors said cheese cake and others just cheese. We tried the orange and cheese just to be sure, and it tasted like creamsicle ice cream, so at least it wasn't like cheddar flavored or something. That would be nasty! After dinner, we went back home to rest because we had to get up somewhat early the next morning to meet Maria and Matthew and take the cable cars up Palgongsan Mountain.

Yes, we know how cheesy this is.

Palgongsan is a mountain in North Daegu. It has a lot of hiking trails, and there are a few Buddhist temples on it. It takes about 2 hours to get to by public transportation from our house because we're in South Daegu. We took the subway to Dongdaegu Station to meet up with Maria and Matthew at 10am, and then we all took the hour long bus ride together to the mountain. Bus drivers in Korea are INSANE! They drive like maniacs, and you put your life in your hands getting on them. We had to stand up for the entire ride there and back too, so it was doubly dangerous. Still, the trip to Palgongsan was worth it. We got to the base of the mountain and were a little mixed up trying to find the cable cars. We ended up hiking into the woods for just a second before realizing we were doing it wrong. The area at the base of the cable cars has tons of hotels and restaurants. It was a pretty busy place. We actually got there right on time though because, as we were finishing up our trip, we noticed a huge wave of people coming in. We found the cable car place, and the line wasn't long at all to get on a cable car and buy tickets--much nicer than when we did this in Seoul at Namsan mountain. The cable car ride was great! It was actually pretty long and, at times, steep. You got to go up with people just from your group, which was really nice. So Maria and Matthew and Gianni and I switched sides on the way up and down, so we could enjoy the view from all angles. When we got up there, you disembark yourselves. The views of all the mountains was AMAZING, especially with the beautiful fall foliage! There are two paths from the top of the mountain that you can take. One is called "Love trail" and the other one "Healing trail." Love trail is a kind of wooden structure built into the mountain. At the start of the trail is a
wooden tiger statue. You're supposed to buy a lock with a key and put the key in the tiger's mouth to test your love. If the tiger doesn't bite you, it's a good sign. Gianni and I ended up buying a lock without a key, so we couldn't do that one. Along the trail were places you can lock your lock. There were different stations for different kinds of love-- healthy love, beautiful love, eternal love, happy love. Gianni and I went for Happy Love :) . Healing Trail was more of a steep incline with rock stairs built in. We didn't go down too far because no one was really up for a good hike. Still, all the foliage was gorgeous. The weather has been much nicer in Daegu recently--cool and crisp like fall should be. We had lunch at the restaurant on top of the mountain. The hot soup was really nice to have on such a chilly day, and the view during lunch was amazing. After lunch, we headed back down the mountain on the cable cars. Matthew wanted to stop at Donghwa Temple. There are a series of temples on the mountain, but this one is supposed to be the main one. It's pretty close to the bottom, so the walk wasn't too long. There were two gates, and both gates had 4 huge, painted statues inside. I'm guessing they are supposed to be the temple guards or maybe they are Buddhist Gods? Not too sure, but they were really cool. The temple was decked out with lanterns all over, and there was even a lantern tunnel. After we got some good pictures, we headed back down the mountain to catch the bus and head home.

Although I really liked Palgongsan and thought it was extremely beautiful, I thought that the buildup of tourist related building and the huge number of people who were visiting the mountain kind of took away from the natural beauty of the mountain. It reminded me of the Chinese poetry I read in my Asian Humanities class last year, all these people trying to get away and experience the beauty and serenity of nature and yet they were kind of making it impossible to truly get that feeling. I still had a very good time though and definitely want to go back in the winter to see the mountains covered in snow. 

people wanted to take pics with us

Lish and I went downtown for a bit on the way home, but Gianni was too tired. Lish loves shopping, so I showed her all the best places. We also bought a few more things to finish off the zombie portion of our halloween costumes for that evening's zombie walk. I found an easy zombie makeup tutorial, so I needed some glue and a little more face paint. As soon as we got home, we had to rush to get our makeup on in time. Gianni and I were both going to be zombie dinosaurs because we were also going to a onesie party afterwards. Using the information from the tutorial video, I made really awesome and realistic looking rotting flesh out of toilet paper, glue, and facepaint! It was awesome! Who knew it was that simple. I'm going to do it again on Thursday to freak out my students. I did some on my hand, and then I made my hand and forearm look kind of gray. Then, I did the same thing on my face, and I put my hair down, so I looked nuts. It was awesome! Gianni and Lish also did some on their hands. We had to rush though, or we all would have liked to do a bit better. We met up with the other zombie people by Daegu Station to start the walk to Banwoldang. It's not a far walk typically, but there were scaring stops, and we were zombies, so we had to slow walk. It was awesome! A huge group of people walking through the busiest area of downtown. Everyone was staring and wanting to take pictures. There were girls that were so afraid that they actually didn't want to stand next to me to take pictures. Their boyfriends had to coax them. Korean girls are so ridiculously easy to scare! Some people were going into stores and just staring at the people inside to freak them out. Ladies  actually closed and locked up their shops to keep people out. That's how scared they were! My scaring technique was to walk up behind people and wait for them to turn around. It was hilarious! They would turn around and just scream! Once, I went into a coffee shop. One girl scared the people behind the counter. I went up to a mother and daughter sitting down and scared them a bit. Then I leaned against a little wall. The people on the other side of the wall were only looking at what was happening on the street, and when they turned around and saw me, they freaked! It was so good. After the walk, we stopped in on the onesie party at MF Bar. The owner and all the bar staff had on cute costumes, and the owner was carrying an adorable little dog with pigtail. Typically, I don't like dogs like that, but this one was so darn cute. Then we went to Bunny's and had a drink in a bag and just hung out with some of the other zombies before heading home in a cab. Gianni and I had to get up mega early to go to Seoul with our Taekwondo academy the next morning.

It was really fun scaring Koreans downtown. That sounds weird, but rest assured they were also having a good time. I must be on a million different Korean facebook pages I took so many photos with people. I think the best part was watching some of the other zombies go into the shops and freak people out. A lot of people wanted to touch the wound I had on my hand and were asking us how we made it. The zombie walk was definitely some of the most fun I've had in Korea so far. There were so many awesome costumes and the reactions were just priceless. I wish there was a another one this week. 

Gym Hae Dong represent!

Grand Master Kim, Master Hwang's master, came back to South Korea for a visit, so all the gyms in his Taekwondo association came to visit, or sent people to visit, the main Taekwondo branch about an hour outside of Seoul. Grand Master Kim works in Boston now, so his English is very good. Before meeting with everyone, Master Hwang brought us to the traditional Korean area of Seoul called Insadong. We went shopping a bit and ate a noddle/bibimbap lunch. I learned that jeon is the name for the savory Korean pancakes. We had a spinach jeon and a kimchi jeon. It's still funny to me that you can't find stupid Korea souvenirs anywhere in Daegu, but they are everywhere in Seoul. Master Hwang also got us all ice cream horns. They are literally cones shaped like curly horns, filled with ice cream. They were delicious. The cone is just the right thickness that you can break it without it cracking into a million pieces and making a mess all over the place. After Insadong, we drove an hour to get to the Taekwondo gym. We arrived a half hour late, just as we were demonstrating chonggi to the Grand Master. Chonggi is the first and simplest form. After demonstrating, we split into small groups to practice whatever form we were working on. This next one is a bit harder because it involves a spin and then you do one arm with a high block and one arm with a middle block at the same time, and I always get mixed up about which arm goes where. Oh well. I am trying to learn to be more coordinated at least. After practice, we demonstrated the forms to the Grand Master. He said beginners need to work on having sharp, precise movements. Taekwondo is very much about quick motions. He did say that I looked like I had the right idea in that respect! After practice, we went out to a restaurant across the street. Master Hwang had some sort of taekwondo test with the Grand Master, which he passed! Hooray Master Hwang! I felt like I was sleeping the whole day because I was so exhausted. Every time we got in the car, I fell asleep. I did it again on the way home. It is about a 4 hour drive from Seoul to Daegu. We got back home around 11:30pm, and one of the other students was nice enough to drive us home.

Seoul was really fun. I feel like most of the trip was spent in the car, but it was still nice. We got to know some of the crew from Taekwondo a little better and ate lots of great food. Master Hwang is a really fun and nice guy so any trip with him is a good trip. He took us to lunch in Insaedong which was just so fun. Simple bibimbap and noodle soup, but there was so much bonchon and Korean scallion pancakes. Abbi accidentally introduced herself the way a king would and Master Hwang and the rest of the group laughed for a good ten minutes. 

It was another great weekend here in Korea. This week and next week, I'm teaching my students about Halloween, giving them candy and wearing zombie makeup. I'm very excited!!!