Year in Review (Yes, One of Those =p)

In 2010, my New Year's Resolution was to move to Korea. Mission accomplished.

I spent New Year's Eve this year with Stella and Jessica, which was eighty thousand times better than my original plan of pizza and cleaning my apartment (which still hasn't happened). Stella pointed out that New Year's is a projection of your entire year, so for me, 2011 will involve losing at Pop-o-matic Trouble, The Game by Milton Bradley ;), seeing Calvin, knitting, spending way too much money (*ahem* 70만원) on clothes and shoes, and laughing way too much. And eating Indian food. Of course :)

So, in review - moved to Korea at the end of January (i.e., Happy Birthday, Mom! Your daughter is moving to the other side of the planet!). As I have overcome a lot of culture shock, I don't really remember what initially traumatized me. Lots of getting lost was involved. Met Lisa, and friendship was immediately formed. We may or may not have become absolutely insane when we went shopping together and realized that we had way too much in common.

Early spring didn't raelly bring warm weather, but it did bring Beck! I hadn't seen her in years, and we had a night I will probably never remember (well, what parts of it I *can* remember). Beck introduced me to Tim, who became my every-weekend buddy in spring and summer....and who introduced me to the fun of Korean department stores. And Coach. And to the idea that I really don't have to take crap from people if I don't want to. And to Park, which was ehhhh, but Park introduced me to Calvin (이선구) who ended up becoming one of my favorite Korean friends - even though he is the busiest person on the planet (sorry, Obama, you have nothing on this kid).

Tim then introduced me to Siobhain, who introduced me to Siobhain, a fellow knitter, who introduced me to Cait, Caroline, and Riah....and to Dongdaemun. When the tragedy of TIM LEAVING FOR AMERICA occurred, Sio helped me fill my sorrow with yarn. Lots of yarn. At first, I was really good about being responsible and buying only what I could knit.....but now I have a giant container of it on the floor of my laundry room.

Fall brought much closeness to Siobhain, Cait, Caroline, and Riah. I don't think I was what they expected and vice versa, but they are now my family here. Thanks to our awesome common interest my knitting leveled from Giga to Eagle (yay for CDI level references).

Winter brought the end of Lisa, my BEST FRIEND IN KOREA (^^^) :( However, I'm not too sad because it's really obvious that she will be back.

This year's resolution? Don't get caught up in boy drama. And knit a positive amount of yarn (in other words, have less yarn in my collection than I do now). And, you know, lose weight, stay in touch with family better, learn Korean, blah blah blah ;)

메리 크리스마스!! :D

A few questions I'm being asked by the folks at home:

1. Do Koreans celebrate Christmas?
Yes. Kinda. Not like we do. Back home, if you aren't religious, it is still a family holiday (however you define family). Here, it's acknowledged, but not quite with the fanfare that westerners give it.

2.....So, what do they do?
Stores were open. There were no big Christmas sales (at least, not in Gangnam). Kids still had to go to academies. The religious families do go to church on Christmas, but the non-religious ones treat it like a normal day. Definitely more attention was given to Chuseok (which is as it should be). I asked my kids about presents to and from their parents - they were kinda eehhh about it. Definitely not as excited as a kid the same age in America would be. Most of them looked at me strangely when I asked them what they got their parents, but a few had answers. If it's not spent with family, Christmas is a pretty big couples holiday, too.

3. Any special foods?
Kimchi. I'm sure =p

There was some homesickness for me. Especially when I was on the bus on the way to Gangnam to meet up with Sio, Cait, Care, and Riah (not that the expected company was giving me reasons to miss home - just that I'd just talked to Mom and it was so weird not to spend today with her). It also didn't help that I've been sick. I have no clue what I have, except that it started with a sore throat and turned into lots of snot. No fever. I took Korean mystery cold medicine again, which took care of it (and made my heart race....love those side effects).

I finished my Slytherin gloves on the bus! The roads were extra crowded, so our driver felt the need to push the scooter-driver impersonation even further (the result: I took the Tilt-a-Whirl to Gangnam); however, that didn't stop me from finishing my gloves - an activity that involves a darning needle - nor the woman beside me from applying eyeliner. She and I were such pros in our respective tasks ;p

As American tradition requires the family-less to order Chinese on Christmas, we decided that the Korean equivalent was Indian (that and....we just love Indian food). Taj was wonderful, as usual. Gangnam was packed, but Taj was thankfully not. They seated us in one of the private rooms and we ordered possibly everything on the menu.

Then we went to Dr. Fish and had the most political cake ever consumed. I wish our consumption of it had been recorded because I'm sure one day I will have to teach a lesson on current foreign relations, and our divided segments with appropriate country names were fantastic symbols. I was North Korea (why am I always North Korea?) and I kept flinging cranberry bombs (and missing horribly) into Riah's South Korean section. We didn't take down the chocolate barrier between us (as we ate into the cake, we just continued to re-fortify it - although Riah did dig a few secret tunnels to keep getting at my icecream). My section also got narrower and narrower. Siobhain/China pretended to be on my side but was really just intersted in what Cait/America was giving her. Someone did give me cranberries, but I just used them to create more bombs to send over to Riah's section.

The entire time, we were being stared at by this Korean guy (who looked like he was trying to be the next K-Pop sensation but with terrible teeth). Normally, this would be attributed to the fact that.....we just fail at being in public, but this guy started staring before we really got into the Us. I responded by waving at him. He waved back. And they continued to stare. His girlfriend spent the entire time putting on makeup. I'm not sure how it is possible, but I think Korean girls wear more makeup than they have skin.

The night ended with me catching the 6800 and then, as usual, getting off at the wrong stop. Yes, I did cry - but then I found a cab and, instead of telling him my address, just told him "energy building" (it's the same in both languages). He figured out that I didn't really want to go to the energy building, but to the apartments behind it, and took me right to my door. I was much closer than I was the last time I got lost - and had I kept walking (instead of hailing that cab), I would have made it home after a few blocks. But, now I know where I should get off the 6800 (just like after last time I know where I should get off the 5500).

It's 3:30 am. I should possibly sleep.

Oops...Did You Just Hear That?

If you're a foreigner in Korea, you're an eavesdropper. Don't be ashamed - we all do it. We're not used to living in a place where most of the conversation is in a foreign language (and, even if you do understand Korean, most of it is so fast or riddled with so much slang, that it's often hard to follow), so when you hear it, your ears naturally perk up, and you listen along.

Another thing about being a foreigner in Korea is that you also get used to not being understood by the people around you - which means you can have some pretty interesting conversations in crowds.

And sometimes there's an indescribable mix of these two phenomenons.

The scene: Siobhain, Cait, Caroline, and I are at On The Border. Being that it is a very western restaurant, the Korean/foreigner mix was pretty even. Fortunately, the four of us were in a corner. We'd been yarn shopping all day (because that's what we do), and were ordering our various courses slowly to give us time to sit there and knit (yes, we did sit at On The Border on a Saturday night and knit; haters gonna hate). The table next to us had a much faster occupation flow. When we originally sat, there was a couple sharing some queso. They were replaced by a group of Korean university students...

Then, the stars of our show walked in. Three caucasian males who weren't bad looking; however, upon closer inspection, we realized that they were orthodox Mormon (name tag and all - not sure "orthodox" is the right word..). One of us - who shall remain nameless - suggested we order a round of drinks for them. That idea was quickly vetoed (nope, definitely not by me) because we were sitting right next to them and it would seem a bit obvious. Being that we were two groups of foreigners, we of course tried to listen in onto their conversation. However, they weren't speaking English. Cait guessed Russian, and we left it at that. And, of course, we continued to eavesdrop for the occasional hint of English because, let's face it, we were curious.

(At this point I should mention two things: one, foreigners in Korea are especially curious about other foreigners who do something other than teach or serve in the military; two, although foreigners love to eavesdrop, we tend to have this mental block that keeps us from realizing that others are probably doing it to us, too.)

Sometime later, the guys all start speaking English. Very unaccented English. At this new tidbit to pique our curiosity, we of course started to listen closer. One of us (okay, me) was caught when, like an idiot, there was eye contact made during some intense information gathering.

Finally, the three men got up to leave. One of them was INSANELY CLOSE to my chair, and I kept looking over at him....well, partially because of the above mentioned curiosity....and partially because he was REALLY CLOSE TO MY YARN STASH AND OMG I'M LIKE A PROTECTIVE MOTHER BEAR. He looks over at us and says,

"How's the sewing going? Sorry if we confused you. We were practicing our Russian."

Our only response? "It's not sewing - it's knitting!" and a whole lot of laughter after they left (but, as things had proved that night, probably not when they were out of earshot).

Welcome to Suji - A Brief Look at the First Two Weeks..

Not having internet makes updating this a pain. It took longer than I expected to move into my new place, which happened finally on Wednesday, and I've been too busy learning CDI structure and setting up my crib to ask the school about helping me to set up my own internet account. I'm kind of using February as my irresponsibility month, which I think is perfectly acceptable and I will freely pass on the torch of not-having-to-do-anything-but-live-in-Korea to the newcomers next month.

As I spend a good portion of my teaching encouraging students to identify a topic and main idea, I feel the need to include that here: My first two weeks in Suji have been a wonderful, and relieving, adventure full of good food, fantastic friends, and fun students. Be sure to underline the topic, main idea, major supporting details, and the minor details within each paragraph - also don't forget to circle transitions!

Each night, a good chunk of the staff (and with an 8-person staff, it's still a pretty small chunk) go out to dinner together, and this month will bring the departure of two of the key players of our nightly dinner rituals. These are the guys who've introduced me to such foods as chicken galbi (totally unsure of that spelling), pork bone soup (not my favorite at all, but worth the ehhhhh for that place's _fantastic_ kimchi!), bulgogi dobap, bibimbap in the stone bowl, the Korean version of fried chicken (which is quite similar to the American version), dopoki, and donkasu (again, totally not sure of the spelling of the last two...but I think the fact that I remembered them (!!!!!) should be celebrated as my coworkers have been incredibly patient with having to always reexplain what I'm eating!). Eating out here is so cheap - I think my most expensive Korean meal has been the equivalent of $5. Well, let me be a bit more specific: Korean food is cheap; American food is insanely expensive. Coffee shops are a good 20% more expensive than in America, and American restaurants are insane! Lisa - my HI - and I went to On the Border on a Mexican food craving, and things were about twice as much as they were at the OtB's in the States - plus they tack on this foreign tax..

Although, Suji is kind of the shaft when it comes to apartments, I totally lucked out with coworkers. They're all freaking awesome and, the best part, like to do things together (though, apparently this is new). Friday night, most of us gathered at Jen's and post-dinner snacked. It was a nice contrast to the staff breakroom. Somehow, I became the expert on how to prepare whipped cream (yeah, those of you who know me see the irony in this ;)), but it turned out, so I think I'll continue to let everyone assume that I know what I'm talking about when it comes to preparing milk products. Aaron brought these fantastic cookies and I'm refusing to ask him what they're called lest I purchase a giant package everyday.

Last weekend, two coworkers rescued me from purgatory in Suji and took me to Seoul. Saturday, Lisa and I had a girl's day at COEX mall as I decided that I really needed a handbag (do not ask why I didn't pack mine - I'm still confused as to what I was thinking when I was packing my suitcase). We searched all over the mall and eventually found one when we stopped at E-Mart on the way home. The day wasn't a total loss, though - there were lots of cute guys AND we found an On the Border. Expensive as all get out, but we found reasonable combo meals. I miss Mexican food soooooo much. On the subway back to Suji, we randomly got into a car that also contained one of my training buddies! It was so weird - out of all the subways in Seoul... Sunday, I was much more traditional with my Korean experience - Ben took me to a few street shopping districts near the Women's University in Seoul. I took pictures, which I promise to upload!! (Yes, I know I haven't been good on that promise..) That was the day I officially discovered street food, much to my mother's chagrin. When I am more confident in my Korean, I want to go back and look through the stalls for gloves and scarves.

To fund these shopping habits (including a very bad Lotte Mart hat addiction), I get to spend 6 hours a day with students who were *nothing* like I expected. I'm going to go ahead and break down stereotypes: Korean students are just as lazy as American kids, and many misbehave just as much, too. However, unlike Americans, they haven't really discovered the opposite gender...actually, the female students are usually my favorites (it was so opposite in America). They are the ones who usually find the right answer and participate the most. I often make reference to my "Birdie girls" - two classes of elementary students in what CDI labels the "Birdie" level (the easiest way to put this is to say that they are in the middle of the highest tier). They are the ones who have fun with the class and like to talk to me over break. One of my Birdie classes has decided that it's their job to teach me Korean so that I can read restaurant menus - they taught me the spelling for "bibimbap" and next week will teach me "bulgogi dobap". The middle school boys are one of two personalities: either they don't talk _at all_ or they do everything they can to cause mischief. One boy reminds me so much of the type of student I'd find in America that I sometimes forget that he is Korean. The elementary boys are more fun - they like to shout out answers and play hangman.

It freaking snowed last weekend and now I have to put forth a lot of effort at thinking about not falling. I tempted fate the other day when I slid (on purpose) across the basketball court that I cross on the way home from my apartment, as afterward I slid on accident and almost fell (and possibly would've brought Lisa down with me - I told her that if I fall, she's falling, too).

Must prep. Am an idiot and forgot to print out the teacher guide - I never use it except for the answer key to the exercises. I'm such a bad English major - I don't even know the correct answers to exercises made for middle schoolers!!