Ten Pin Korea

Finished

2009-06-14T13:35:00.001-04:00

Well, this blog is over. We're done with Korea, and we're done with the relationship. You can continue reading Tiffany's solo posts at here carolina blog, link provided on the right of the page. See ya.

2009-04-28T14:37:00.002-04:00

The pictures in our last blog update, in addition to the video posted, are from the Gyeongnam FC soccer match we went to this weekend. We went with Meagan and Nick, our Canadian friends whom we've mentioned here already before. It was a fun time. The home team is pretty terrible, but we drank with some Dutch people who know how to have a good time. Maybe the home team was drinking before the game, who knows.

Anyways, here's an email I recently sent to my dad.

The Caps are do or die tonighit. I am very excited, as you can
imagine. I've been trying my best to follow the games online
(sometimes I can find a video feed, sometimes I'm stuck with radio
broadcasts). They've really built an exciting team.

Tiff and I are excited as well. We really miss home and our family
and everything. Tiff and I are even considering taking a short trip
to Pennsylvania before we leave for costa rica. Nothing's finalized
though. We'll let you know.

I do have lot's of time to read. Besides novels, I've really been
enjoying Nietzsche. You know, he was the one who basically coined the
term "whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger". Really
interesting guy, and his writing is really fascinating. I'm also
keeping up on game theory, listening to a Protege' of the late John
Nash named Scott Gomez, who is a professor on the subject. Gomez is
actually a really enthusiastic and fun professor. The only problem is
he sometimes is referring to charts that you are only listening to,
which can be hard to follow on audio. Luckily you can just rewind a
little (I often have to listen to a section a 3 time to understand,
but if I don't get it by then I just give up and move on) I also
really like wired.com, tnr.com, news.bbc.co.uk, washingtonpost, nyt,
foxnews, huffingtonpost, and foreignpolicy.com. I got kind of bored
of politico.com after the election, and only check economist.com
occasionally. It's just been kind of depressing reading too much
about the economy lately, I suppose. So I guess I've had a whole lot
of free time lately but I feel very fortunate to be able to access any
information, really. But, I'm coming home soon and from there I'm
going to be making a decision about what to do with the next year,
narrowing it down to probably 3 choices - Japan, Korea, or government
work as a Contract Specialist (which seems to be hiring in almost all
sections. One thing I noticed about that job is that there is alot of
turnover year to year, which means there's often job openings, meaning
it's pretty safe. It seems to still be in demand on usajobs.gov).
Each option has it's advantages and disadvantages. I'm in the
enviable position that I can probably get a job no matter which option
I choose, although worst case scenario I will get a job at my second
choice.

These are my thoughts. I realized some of this email other people
will want to read, so I'm just going to put some if it as our blog
post, I think.

Nothing too private in this email, just wanted to share a bit. I know I'm not a big contributor when it comes to writing on the blog, so I thought I'd post this.

~Evan

Gyeongnam FC Soccer Fun

2009-04-26T18:19:00.005-04:00

T&E

Birthday part two and three sort of :)

2009-04-26T09:42:00.003-04:00

So, movie with the Korean teachers. Ji Young (probably my favorite teacher as she's pretty funny and probably the nicest) picked me up at 8:50am. Tired, yes. But all that beside we drove off to pick up our other teachers. Ji Young has just gotten her license so she's still new at driving. In the positive light she errs on the more cautious side of things, rather than going nuts as most drivers here do. So off we went our first stop was Su Leh, but she was still sleeping and said she'd meet up with us later.

We kept moving in the direction of City 7 in Changwon the next city over. We met up with the other teacher with a car Kyung Hee, and made out way into the parking garage. I think for me the Korean parking garage is an experience all its own. The parking at City 7 is under the entire facility so it's huge...absolutely ginormous. We go down a big hill and into the darkness...I mean there are lights everywhere but for about five seconds it's really dark. The floor is sort of a laminate material so as you drive around it's all squeaky. Compare it to wearing tennis shoes on a brand new rubber floor. There are two levels to this garage and we happen to be on the 3rd. We park and head towards the theater. funny thing is when we get there the theater is dark still and the employees are still getting ready for the day!

The movie I was going to see was "Knowing" with Nick Cage. I had seen it the weekend before with Evan but the sound was so high and it was on an IMAX screen, and I hid my eyes a lot. Finally we get out tickets (mine was free! Yay birthday present!) and popcorn and drinks and go inside. I wont go into details of the movie but I kept my eyes open the whole time.

After we went to lunch at a sort of grill restaurant. We all ordered Galbi cheese bokoombap. It's fried rice with chicken and cheese. This particular place made it a bit on the salty and spicy side. However, despite these set backs we ate the entire dish. All in all the plate it was fried on was probably 18in in diameter. In Korean style we went to coffee after the meal, STARBUCKS!

We ordered (another birthday present!) and sat down. Two of my teachers ran away for a moment and came back with two pieces of cheesecake and candles. Then all my teachers sang 'Happy Birthday" in English, with clapping (Korean thing...I like it it makes it more fun to sing) and a bit quietly since we were in a public place. The cake was great and I couldn't have asked for a better start to my day.

...except...

On the way home we got veered off course by a truck because it wouldn't let us merge into a ramp so I got to see some back roads which was super fun with all sorts of bumps and hills. At school I had all my classes, but it was fine. I got a goodbye card from the sweetest little girl Annie. She has a broken arms so for the past month has been doing everything with one arm...bless her heart it's adorable. My bad kids weren't that bad; Elena one of my smartest students in the best class I have brought me a birthday muffin with candle. It really made my day. I'm not sure if I mentioned it but mid-term exams are going on and most students don't come to academy, especially the older students. So it's was really great she came, her school hasn't had the English mid-term yet so I wasn't expecting it at all.

Later, we went to Jazz. I found out who my secret birthday present was from and had a Sam Adams from Mr. Lee. I never really tell people about my birthday, its always been more of an intimate thing with me. I'm not too big on having a huge crowd or doing something particularly special. Just being with people that care is enough.

The best ones I've had were my 16th which I spent with my swim team and family, 18th when my family and best friends "surprised" me. All of my birthdays in college were special for different reasons. Either my parents came to visit, or my friends treated me out or surprised me. I don't want to go into my 21st...lets just say my friends really wanted me to have fun...even my 22nd was perfect.

The birthdays (all two of them) that I've spent with Evan have been great. This one especially was wonderful. I'll remember it always and am glad to have such a happy day begin the conclusion of my Korea adventure.

T&E

Birthday, Korean style, Part I

2009-04-23T12:59:00.003-04:00

So its only been my birthday for two hours so far but it's off to a good start. After school Ev and I went to GS Mart and got materials needed for a delicious spaghetti dinner. After watching the new episode of South Park and enjoying the meal I got to open my present! Someone decided to be clever and use duct tape as wrapping paper...I can't figure out who but it's fascinating that they knew I loved duct tape.

After opening my present and seeing it was my very own Big Bang (a super popular and not too shabby Kpop boy band. I jam out to it.) card wallet, I was a bit disappointed. I know that's not what you're supposed to say but I went through all that duct tape, it was a hard fought effort. Although, looking at it now...it's pretty sweet.

Well I didn't have to say anything when Evan, a.k.a. Trickster McGee commented "Oh you thought that was your only present? Well, if this is what I got my mom (holding up the gift) then...who is this for?" Upon which I got all giggly and excited. Again it was a duct tape wrap job. Under the tape was a bag. Under the bag was another bag. Under that bag was...another bag. And under that bag was, yes, another bag. But this one was white with pink polka dots; inside was a pretty pink box with a bow (I love ribbons and bows) and inside was a gorgeous gold necklace with diamonds surrounding an opal. I absolutely LOVE Opals. I love it so much! I don't make a big deal out of birthdays since you're only as old or young as you feel and act. But I've had two birthdays which Evan has been a part of and both are equally special for different reasons. We're best friends and I'm so happy to have him with me especially on my birthday.

So that's it for part one. I'm going to the movies tomorrow with my Korean teachers (the ones I work with, I declare if I had Korean teachers I'd probably be fluent by now) so I feel there's going to more of a story since from what I've seen of birthdays there's cake, singing, clapping and candy giving. Awesome.

Till then,
Tiffany

T&E

Weekend Wedding

2009-04-13T12:00:00.003-04:00

This Saturday Evan and I were invited to our friend Shaun's wedding in Jinju. I remember meeting Shaun our first week here, he had a Korean girlfriend (her English name is Ellie) and was always really stand up guy.

Jinju was about an hour away from Masan and we left that morning on a bus. Arriving in Jinju was a refreshing experience. It's located on the edges of a river (they have a lantern festival every year and float paper boats) so there is a beautiful view and just not something we see in "Dream Bay" all the time.

We got out of the bus station and made our way to the riverwalk. It was a gorgeous day with lots of sunshine and an occasional breeze that made it perfect. We were wearing our best wedding outfits and strutted up to Jinju Castle, where the wedding was to be held.

The castle wasn't the type of castle you think of in the Western sense. There were sprawling grounds and lots of people went just to enjoy the day or paint pictures. Normally you had to pay a small fee to enter due to the fact that there were several building of historical importance and a museum to up keep. However, because we said we were going to a wedding they just let us right inside. There were a lot of temples and a lot of areas to sit and relax. Evan and I started wandering around just looking at the scenery. The castle is right on the edge of the river and is really pretty. We saw a group of traditional re-enactors getting ready and practicing their formations and drums. We walked to the back of the grounds where we met our friends Eric, Steve, Jeff, Johan and the groom himself. They told us that we had passed all of the preparations by walking the back way. we all walked together towards the wedding area. As it turned out they were the groomsmen, which meant that they got to wear sweet traditional outfits and carry Shaun in a traditional sort of carrying seat.

The wedding itself was held in a sort of outdoor amphitheater. There were lots of kids running around and lots of places for them to play. All of our friends were standing around on the stone steps that surrounded the middle where the wedding was going to take place. We found a nice spot and waited.

We didn't have to wait long until we heard drums, which meant that the bride and groom were on their way. Traditional drummers led a procession of sorts into the middle. These guys (and two girls I think) were so cool. First of all they had this hat that had a rod and ribbon on it so if they moved the head the correct way the ribbon moved in the desired direction. The costumes were beautiful and they were really good at the whole choreography while drumming thing. Then the parents of the bride and groom were led in.

And that's the end of that chapter.

T&E

Just a few tiddly-bits

2009-04-08T18:14:00.002-04:00

I got a new camera yesterday, which is very exciting to me. I've taken some pics around my town of Masan, but in the coming days I'm going to continue wandering around town taking more shots. It seems like a nice camera, and I got a glowing review from someone at a bar last night when they told me they had a similar model and it's JAWSOME! He didn't use that word exactly, though. In any case, that's something to look forward to.

Tiff and I are looking forward to our journey in Thailand that will begin at the end of April. We'll stay in Bangkok till May 6th, then on to Pattaya, then probably to Phuket, then travel north and from there into Laos and/or Cambodia. The second half of the trip isn't planned entirely because it will be contingent on how long we spend in Pattaya and Phuket and then how long we stay in Thailand overall.

Hope we still have a few occasional readers after leaving you out to dry so long with no updates. For that, I apologize. If you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them. For example people often ask why they get lost in my eyes, like staring into the endless ocean or at a perfect sunset. That's probably the number one question I get.

~E

2009-04-08T08:32:00.003-04:00

2009-04-08T08:04:00.003-04:00

Okay, so the last update didn't post the pictures that I uploaded. So I'm going to do the same thing again. It better work, or I think I am the definition of insane.

Seoul, Man!

2009-04-08T07:01:00.002-04:00

TSo, by popular demand, here's a few pics and even a video from Seoul. I just got a new cammy-cam today, and I'll be posting a few shots around town in the coming days. Enjoy!

Goodbyes

2009-03-08T01:47:00.002-05:00

Our friend Sunil had a going away party last night. It began at Seven Springs Buffet, which is sort of like Sweet Tomato if anyone knows about that. They have all kinds of salads, fruit, gourmet pizza chicken, ribs, pasta and dessert. It's 22,000 won or probably now like $13 USD for all you can eat. And did we eat. I did at least. I'd get a plate and say it's my last then want something different. It was just all so good. My favorite was a Smoked Salmon salad and make your own ice cream waffle.

The party was also James Bond themed. Evan even won a prize for his costume, which I helped with. It was a great dinner lots of good food and friends, and some real cute kids. Sunil made a speech and after dinner we went to a really, REALLY nice Noraebang upstairs. I feel they should have given everyone a questionaire asking if they had epilepsy because you definitely could have gone into seizure in that room. There was a light wall and lazer lights everywhere when a song was on. It was a bit overwhelming. One thing I really liked was that unlike most NB's where they let you smoke inside: the smokers had to go outside to smoke, so nonsmokers didn't become nauseated.

It was a good time. I sang a song with out friend Stephanie and we got a score of 100! A feat only one other song was able to acheive. Evan decided to try his hand at My Humps by the Black Eyed Peas but quickly forgot that it had a lot of fast lyrics and I finished the song, taking one for the team. It was a really fun time. Probably the best time I've ever had at a NB.

After, we went to O'Brien's. It was a sort of odd experiancce because we were all way over dressed. There happened to be a lot of middle aged men in the bar as well and I felt continuously awkward. Especially after a way too drunk Sweede was passed out and dropped his beer on me...after only an hour or two we called it a night and headed home. It's amazing that even after all the buffet food we still had room to stop at Gim Bap Nara to get two orders of Mandu. And it was delish.

So all in all it was a really fun night. I got to wear a fancy dress, Evan won a prize and we all were fat and happy.

Tiffany

T&E

Just some pics

2009-03-02T05:41:00.002-05:00

Here are a few pics from the snow, and then a fun night out in Busan.

My family is famous!

2009-03-01T06:48:00.002-05:00

I went to a Korean Professional League Basketball game today. Apperently my family is famous because the local team is called the LG Sakers!!!!! I wasn't able to get any real quality pictures because my camera didn't have a lot of battery. I'm planning on going to another game next week; so planning for that my camera will be ready and I'll be wearing my new shirt I got today to show team and family pride.

There are a lot of things to tell but I'd rather have pictures and video to go with it so I guess I'll just have to wait until next week. Lets just say there was a lot of director let cheering with noise sticks...those things you blow up and then beat together, and us foreigners yelling out random calls about the refs and rebounds.

On a super cool highlight I got to do a meet and greet because I was one of the first 100 to buy a piece of merchandise. It was cool and scary at the same time. I was all by myself because my friend wasn't able to get one and some of the girls and fans were a little strange (taking off the shoes they were wearing to have them signed strange) but it was fun. I didn't really know any of the Korean players and only really wanted to get to the two foreign players. I had a small conversation with one of them who played ball for Tennessee. The other guy didn't really respond, but he also was wearing headphones. I'm sure it's strange after games to just have a line of Koreans, whose language you don't speak go by you and you have to sign stuff. It was cool though.

More on this later as it seems boring without visuals. Until then goooo SAKERS!

T&E

Random weekend

2009-02-27T11:22:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow we may or may not go to Busan again for a party one of Evan's friends is having. Technically it's more of a gathering at a club but because it's the foreign community it'll probably more likely be a party with Koreans hanging around us, or I suppose my Euro looking counterparts. I'm looking forward to that, sleeping all day Saturday and perhaps a Korean Professional League basketball game on Sunday.

I really want to go the the game because the team in Changwon is local so whoo for that annnd their team name is the SAKERS!!! Which if you don't know is my step dad's family name. Wow, I sound Korean using "family name" instead of last name. It's amazing how phrasing something differnt changes a whole view point when you're working with different languages. Or at least when a language is not someones first.

Anyway, that's my/our plan. A lot of people are leaving this weekend. Two couples and another girl from Canada so I guess we'll be seeing some new faces.
T&E

Please help me countdown the days!!!

2009-02-24T12:15:00.003-05:00

So if you have or have not heard or read on my personal blog, I have about two and a half months to go here. I'm slowly driving myself crazy, or is it this place...due to cold weather, lack of outdoor activity (at least at home I had to walk to my car and from my car to my house or a restaurant) and the ever declining situation that is working at the school. Now, my brother and sister in law and friends are teachers. I know not everyday is a cake walk and fun parade. But, I don't have a single teacher here that I'd really call a friend and it gets super lonely. The curriculum is really bad and I'm teaching grammar instead of reading and speaking, the later two I'm SUPPOSED to do, not verbs, nouns and adjectives. The lack of support from the administration is also draining. I'm teaching all but two classes at the school and the director is the worst.

I don't want to be a downer but because of all of this outside stress I just feel my life has become this waiting game and so I feel as a planner to begin with I'm just turning into a nut because that's all I have to look forward to. I don't want to do anything, I don't want to go to the gym I just want to be in warm weather, not have to slave away at work and be happy again. I know that it'll be over soon and I'll be working at home to save up for Mexico so I'm happy about that.

I feel bad about all the super planning though. I just feel like such a bum here that at least planning lets me have some goal in mind. I don't really know what I want to do with my life. I like teaching and I love languages and culture. As I mentioned on Carolina Love, I think I want to do something with history, it's a passion of mine and makes me happy, I'm good at research and organizing things and note taking. I do know I want to work with languages I'd like to get German, Spanish and probably Korean into my retention. I jsut feel so lazy here, waiting for the day to end. It's odd at times it's sort of like being in some sort of confinement. I'm speaking all day in English yet 99% of the time all I hear is Korean...

Again, sorry for being such a downer. I do like it here and in a different context would even appreciate learning about my at least ethnic history, although knowing what I do know about the culture I can respect and appreciate it. But for me, there are too many things that morally I don't agree with, to ever have a long term stay here again, but you never know.

And so...64 days and counting

T&E

Jackhammer across the street

2009-02-22T02:58:00.001-05:00

I haven't been blogging on Ten Pin that much since I've started my new blog (Carolina Love) just because Evan and I take turns. I do have a lot of reflections that will surface on either or in the upcoming months as my time here winds down. For now, I can't really concentrate because there is construction going on right next to my building and all I can hear is a banging in my head and outside. So I'll write more later. Due to the amount of typos I've done in the past minute I'd say this is a good idea.

Tiffany

T&E

I'm a liar. So Sue me.

2009-02-21T00:39:00.002-05:00

I know sometime last week I said I would blog tomorrow about the Jimjilbong. Well that never happened. I got bored of the subject. Yes there's alot of weird stuff that goes on there. But my advice is just go there yourself for a night. It's weird and fun and delightful and terrible all at the same time. Well, maybe at different times. It's quite an experience, one that I'm just going to say if you get a chance, try and experience it for yourself.

I got my scooter fixed today. It's an unusually sunny and warm day, considering theres still remnants of snow from a few days ago. Tiffany even made a little snowman. To celebrate the day, I got a tuneup for the motor scooter. They pumped the tires (thanks to the inspiration of Barack Obama, I'm sure) and fixed the rear view mirror, and changed the oil. I had the exact same procedure done when I first got the scooter and it cost 20,000 won. This time, out of coincedence, I met a Pakistani friend named Zubair who happened to know the owner of the shop and was there visiting him. 6,000 won, or approximately $4.50. It's nice to have a connection here in Korea, otherwise they really stick it to you. Relatively speaking.

Same kind of price gouging goes on with the cell phones. You can pay for pre-paid minutes, but the rate for a Korean is 1/3 that of a foreigner. A frugal resident here might have a Korean friend pick up some minutes for them. Or you could do like us and use skype, which is cheaper though admittedly far less convenient.

Those are my brief thoughts for now. I'm going to attempt to wake sleepyhead Tiffany so we can enjoy the warm sunny day. Hope everyone has a terrific weekend.

~Evan

Signs of the times

2009-02-16T13:01:00.003-05:00

So one day I go to class as usual. It's the second to last class of the day on a Friday and all my students are already in the room. I usually do attendance as soon as get to the room. So I'm looking around placing the faces and names together. I stop on this one girl and have to take a few moments to let what I'm seeing sink in...she was wearing a pretty normal outfit but with a orange Star of David on the upper left corner of the sweatshirt. I had seen it before but hadn't really "seen" it I guess.

Because I've been reading several books on the Nazi occupation of Europe and Nazi Germany (The Book Thief and Number the Stars) I felt a bit uncomfortable the rest of class looking at her shirt. I'd suppose that the thing that bothered me the most was the fact that a shirt like that had been manufactured by someone, somewhere. I can't blame my student she was only 11 or 12 and definitely hadn't learned all of Korean history, and didn't expect her to learn of world history yet. But, the fact that an adult who should have a small understanding of world history would think that is a good idea (granted they probably didn't know anything about WWII Europe because they don't learn about western cultures at all) is sort of sick. It's also ironic a symbol used to condemn others is being worn in a country that went through a bit of the same thing during Japanese occupation, though considerably on a much lower level.

Symbols are powerful: the Swastika, the cross, Skull and Bones, middle finger, stop signs, Bhudda...all are symbolisom for something larger than themselves. They all represent something more. The abuse of symbols waters down the meaning until they are meaningless.

It is said that history is recorded by the victors. This is very much true since we don't read a bout many first hand accounts from the natives when the Europeans started moving in...only of the settlers point of view. Yet, probably some of the most read accounts in American history are those of the losers. There is a great interest in the soldiers and motives of the Confederacy than there is with the Union. The Diary of Anne Frank is read in numerous languages and loved by the world over. These people wer enot the victors, but their stories speak to us.

Because I'm such a history nut (my parents can tell you how I'd run around the battlegrounds at Gettysburg reading about everything from formations to arms used, LOVED it) and eventually want to teach history at a possible collegiate level I plan on opening my eyes more to the subtle symbols around me. I believe that without history nothing would be possible and that is everytime anyone, anywhere writes something down to remember for later, they're recording history. In my opinion history is just a different word for remembering. What if no one decided to remember any mathematical equation or chemistry formula? My point exactly. History is definitely under appreciated. Especially in situations like this. I'm a definite advocate of "If you don't remember the past history is destined to repeat itself." Which in the case of Korea actually happened when Japan invaded in the last 1500's then in the early 20th century as a part of imperialism. Sometimes it seems to me that the Koreans don't want to remember the past and move onto a future. However, the problem is, if you don't know where you've come from; if you don't ask the questions "Who am I, what do I want, where have I come from?" then you might as well be walking in a circle attached to a lunge line like a horse because not knowing your past most definitely means you're not ready for your future.

Tiffany

T&E

Our strange and unusual tour of a Jimjilbang

2009-02-11T11:40:00.002-05:00

This weekend our Canadian friends Nick and Meagan took us to a Jimjilbang in Changwon, a 20 minute taxi ride from our apartment. It was a strange, albeit mostly enjoyable time for us. You get in and pay the 8,000 won cover charge (approximately $5) that is good for a 24 hour period. Yes, that's right, a 24 hour period. I've heard of people taking long baths, but that is ridiculous. Well, it turns out they don't take a bath the whole time. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Paying the cover charge gets you a bath house suit. For men that meant a bright orange tee and shorts. People looked like prisoners. The women had what Tiffany described as puke colored.

At this point the men and the women had to separate. We went on to lock our shoes in a special shoe locker. Then we tediously went to our full size locker and changed into our birthday suits. The bath sauna section had 6 hot tubs of varying size, temperatures, and water contents. Some were 37 degrees farenheit with minerals, some were 40 with lemon, some were 44 with just hot water, bamboo tubs, and one tub was always cold. There was even a rose tub, fully pink, with rose particles. They vary the temperatures and contents of the hot tubs throughout the day, seemingly randomly, although I cannot say for certain. It was a relaxing 30 minutes.

In the hot tub Nick was contemplating ways in which he could open up a Bath house in the US. In Korea they are wildly popular, and cheap. My personal thoughts are it would be a challenge in the US. You have to sell the idea of a bath house to a culture that is less accepting of nudity. There are many who are fine with being around others in a nude setting, especially athletes who routinely share locker rooms with others. But as a population Americans and Canadians are much less accepting of that concept. I mean, Koreans are really comfortable naked around each other. Too comfortable. Kids play around and wrestle naked. I even saw them having pullup contests, doing pullups right in each others faces. It was a bit strange.

But that wasn't the only strange thing. But for now I'm really sleepy, so I will finish the rest of my story tomorrow. Stay tuned!

~Evan

Family Movies

2009-02-04T23:45:00.002-05:00

I remember growing up when my dad would tape family events, like Christmas and Thanksgiving, the Fourth of July, etc. It's fun to look back and reminisce. I even occasionally watch some DVDs my mom tirelessly converted for me of all our family movies.

This kid's father has an interesting take on the family movie idea. I can't decide if it's sad or funny.

Japan...of course

2009-01-31T08:34:00.007-05:00

If anyone has seen our pictures from my facebook, already you know about the "of course." If you haven't it goes something like this:

"Of course it's snowing now, rain just wasn't doing it for me."
"Of course we missed the departure for our ferry."
"Of course we have ended up at a somewhat abandoned guest house that reminds us of a scene from Hostel."
"Of course there's a Hello Kitty store here."

It seemed that even though we prepared for the cold mother nature decided to have some fun, and that we just couldn't seem to get the ferry schedules right. But in the end it was a great trip. Personally I loved being in Japan: Japan was like going to a different planet compared to Korea. Though we were only there for two days I just felt people were nicer and had slightly more dignity ex. no one shouted "HELLOO" to Evan or looked at us as if we were aliens because we were speaking English. I think a huge difference was the humility, at least in my point of view. Whenever we asked if they could speak English the answer was always "a little." However, they always seemed to be able to carry on a full conversation with us without problem. It was familiar and new all at the same time. The city set up was more of that of an American city (excluding Baltimore, anyone who has driven in the city knows what I'm talking about) really organized and straight forward.

Additionally, we saw some really beautiful things in the city as well. Temples and parks were everywhere, it was a great infusion of nature and city. It snowed for a bit which normally would be fine, even pretty; except for the fact it was slushy and we were not well prepared for it. Evantually Evan found a Sega store which I wasn't surprised about. We walked through some shopping areas upon which we decided we were niether dressed for the occasion or situation. The stores were super high end Louis, Tiffany were there as in Tiffany and Co and Louis Vuitton. Looking like the street rats we were headed out. I feel Evan and his only pair of pants were having an awful time and so we decided to eat something. Being the travelers we are we decided to eat like the locals which meant going to a conveniance store and getting a microwaved meal. Things are a bit more expensive so we tried to cut corners wherever. By the end of day one we had been relying on my compass on my backpack to get up around...however, at somepoint in time it decided to get out on it's own.

We did a pretty good job of finding our way around, I feel we know the city as well as we know Masan due to the fact that we walked it at least twice in full. Ans so as Evan said soggy boots and all we ended up at Smile Hotel for two nights, which for me was fine. I guess since Evan summed up the trip I'll just add my own thoughts. I had been reading a book called The Book Theif. I had started it before we left maybe 30 pages in. I had started getting really into it on the boat over and by the second night in Fukuoka I couldn't put it down. as a fan of classic novels (Jane Eyre and Frankenstein being my favorites) and really thought provoking stuff such as what Chuck Palahniuk writes, I wasn't sure if I would enjoy it. It's based in Nazi Germay and starts out a bit confusing. It takes some time to figure out the narrator and although I had read a lot of historical fiction before, I had no idea it was going to be one of those once in a lifetime reads. The style of writing and research that went into the story was absolutley gorgeous and very appropriate for the situation we were in at the moment.

I wont give the story away except for the facts I have never been so emotionally involved in any novel before The Book Theif. It made me think about how fragile and resiliant humanity can be. So many extremes in one. Japan for example has a lot of pride in their past with the temples throughout the city and special way of doing things, however, they keep moving forward with the future somehow finding a mixture of the two.

I'd say the most moving part of the trip and a complete parallel to my book happened when we were walking down an alley way the second day. It was still miserable and raining, we were just sort of going through the motions on walking when we heard a bicycle bell ringing behind us. Since we weren't taking up a lot of space on the road or were in the way of the man we had no idea why we were getting rung at. Then beside a parking lot he stopped his bike and it became clear. The sight was so moving to me it's hard to describe. Four or five stray cats came out and the man took bowls of food out from his basket and set them down for them. From a physical perspective it didn't look like the man was too well off, yet he was spending money and giving some stray cats food. It's just always so inspiring seeing the kindness of man. Too many people care about themselves and not others, I suppose it makes me feel more human to know that other people care about those less fortunate than themselves as well.

The day we left of course it's sunny and not raining at all. I loved being in Japan and hope to go back someday. Overall I had a great time. Korean customs was super easy. We got to even go in the Foreigner line! Evan made it through O.K. which was wonderful and we ended the Lunar New Year with an Indian dinner in Busan. Perfect.

Till then,
Tiffany

T&E

2009-01-30T04:34:00.004-05:00

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January 30th Blogojevich update

Tiff and I recently did a little trip to Fukuoka, Japan. We wanted visit Japan for awhile, and lunar new year was the perfect time. Tiffany had a 4 day weekend and I continued to be without work. In fact, going to Japan was necessary to stay in Korea, as I would need to renew my visa or face deportation on January 31st.

I'm not sure how that goes down. Deportation, I mean. Does police come and arrest you, and send you on a plane back to the US? Or do they just get you out of their country? Maybe they would send me to China or Japan, just because it's convenient. Or do they throw me in a box on some container ship back to the US. I really don't know, but I'm not curious enough to find out. If anybody reading this knows, leave a comment.

Anyhoo, we went to Busan to take a boat to Fukuoka. When taking a boat to Japan you have the option of the 3 hour hydrofoil boat, which is set up like an airplane. We chose the slower, overnight boat that is a bit more spacious. We chose this not because it was cheaper (it was only 10% less) but because we could sleep on the boat, and save even more on a for that night. We're still trying to save money for our vacation.

The boat ride went rather smoothly. Tiffany got her seasickness out of the way early, throwing up her previous meal in the bathroom. That was preferable to one of our roomates, who kept me up all night with her constant vomiting. The room smelled like stomach innards. It was the most awful semi-sleep. My weird dreams (ed : nightmares) all involved throwing up. It's like, oh, you want to have a cool dream about being a racecar drive? How about we include your racecar passenger vomiting in your car until the entire interior is filled with green half digested food and you drown in it.

Thankfully this abysmal night ended at 6 in the morning when the lights went from off to supernova. I go outside and there's a line of about 15 people for the showers. No thank you. It's an hour and a half until they start unloading people, and they start with first class. The waiting took awhile. But when we finally got out, there was a beatiful morning snow in the city. It was really nice, and we were quite thrilled by the possibilites that the day might hold. We had no plans, not hotel reservations anywhere, no idea how long we would stay. We took the bus into town (Tenjin Station) and started walking to Ohori Park. This is literally the map that we used to get around the city. This is in one of those little tourist pamphlets we picked up, along with 3 others, that we used to get around the city.

Ohori park was really beautiful. It was really nice to see it snowing there, although the snow didn't stick and the ground was mostly puddles or mud. The city hosts really amazing ravens. I don't know how common these birds are in Japan, but we saw at least a dozen or so around the city. The last time I saw so many of these majestic creatures was visiting the Tower of London.

Despite our optimism, things did go poorly the first day for us. We were not prepared of precipitation of any kind. We did not wear shoes that kept water out, and packed lightly for 2 nights. I only brought one pair of jeans and they were slightly long, getting wet quickly. Travel tip - just because it's dry season in Southern Korea does not mean Japan has to follow that trend. Also, just because the weather says cold but dry, do your best to prepare for a worst case scenario. Our mood throughout the day was in decline.

We had trouble finding a place to sleep for the night as well. The first hostel we got to did not have any vacancies. Together. They had two separate rooms. No thanks. Then we found a hotel that was 7000 yen, or approximately 90 dollars. Not bad, but we decided to trek it to the tourist center and find another hostel. We walked quite a ways and found an abandoned hostel. The lights were on, but there was nobody at the place. It was really creepy. We kinda felt like this guy would jump out at us.

Despite being well dressed for the cold, we were wet and miserable. Both our shoes were soaked through to our wet socks. We both changed our socks at a restaurant (a mildly pleasant, but far overpriced curry restaurant) but dry socks were a luxury that did not last. We finally found a reasonably priced place to stay in Smile Hotel. They also had free internet on every floor. I played my first online game of Fifa 09 on my Skype Phone and twice started beating up on opponents until they gave up. As a side note, I've been playing entirely too much Fifa 09.

Anyway, the hotel gave us shelter, time to get a hot shower, and the ability to blow dry our shoes and get dry socks on. We finally had some relaxing times. We were put off by the weather thus far in our trip, and the rain continued non stop into the next day. We decide to go back that evening for Busan. We get to the Port in the afternoon to get tickets early for the evening schedule and are surprised to learn that the boat leaves at 12:30 in the afternoon, daily. So we missed the boat, literally. We would stay one more night at Smile Hotel, and explore the city one more day. Which we did alot more walking, despite the cold and wet weather, that persisted the entire trip. Uninterrupted freezing rain. Fukuoka!

Anways, we saw a whole bunch of cool stuff that's worth mentioning. But I chose to spend my time complaining publicly about the weather. There should be some kind of ban on crap weather. Can't the UN do something about this crap? Is Al Gore the only one crazy enough to fight a war on weather? Maybe I should just move to San Diego. Tiff probably has more to add in the next blog about more of the cool stuff we discovered, experiences, food, cultural differences, etc. For me, the most notable thing was the weather. And the foul mood it put us in throughout most of the trip.

Some news about what I'm doing in the immediate future. I'm going to stay in Masan bumming around in Tiffany's apartment for a few months until vacation time. Probably going to Thailand for a bit to do some scuba with Tiff.

Hope you like the pics. More pictures and video on the way in Tiffany's blogpost, so stay tuned.

~Evan

We like puppies, scratch that LOVE puppies

2009-01-16T05:39:00.005-05:00

We love puppies. I've had a dog my whole life and not having a furry friend around has been a little sad. This picture was taken back, way back, in I believe November. We were going hiking on Muhaksan and Evan had to stop and tie his shoes. being the animal whisperer I am this little puppy came running out from a house and just started lovin' up on us! It was the cutest thing I had seen possibly ever.

I can only say that it was adorable and it put us in a great mood for hiking. There are many more adventures to come however considering the amount of procrastination I've been doing with this and my pictures don't hold your breath.

I'm actually trying to get back to my scheduled self mostly in part to get back into super awesome shape so run another half or even full marathon and for a future goal which will not be mentioned at this point due to the breadth of explanation it would require. So on a good running note I got my Christmas shoes from Evan and they're amazing! I've been doing 4-6 miles a run and hope to get into the 10-13 mile range soon.

Hope everyone is well,
Tiffany

T&E

So I'm going to have to leave Korea...

2009-01-15T09:20:00.002-05:00

Sup fools? This is Evan, checking in after 22-or-so Eons of inactivity on this blog. So, it turns out I am being forced to leave Korea. My Visa expired on Dec 31st. I got my release letter, meaning I can work again in Korea without them having to wonder why I ended my contract early (the release letter is kind of a guarantee to other schools that my employer and I left on good terms). I do have to leave Korea by January 31st, however.

Tiffany finishes her contract either April 18th or May 12th, depending whether she exercises an option to work a bit longer and get paid a bit more. An option that I am mulling over is leaving to Japan on January 31st and getting a 30 day tourist visa, and continuing that until Tiffany finishes. Right now I just found out that my one chance to get a relatively short term contract has been declined (although they would like to offer me a long term contract, which I'm afraid I cannot accept). Thus, I'm really not sure what I should do yet.

Anyhoo, on a lighter note, here are some much delayed pictures. The top picture is Tiffany, Krista Leigh Watson, and I at her going away party. Four quick facts about her: she's real smart, fun, from California, and has the best middle name EVAR!!!

The next pic is Tiff with her Christmas sweatshirt that the Korean Cindy Lauper would say "Girls Just Wanna Hawaii Fum". Next is the official Joe Flacco jersey, also featuring Snoopy. Next, you have Tiff holding her picture frames. They came with two random pictures of Marilyn Monroe and one really random picture of a bunch of people playing golf.

Finally, you have a picture of Tiff and I. She made really good pepperjack Mac-n-Cheez and BBQ Chicken while I have a new haircut (albeit messy) and my favorite T. It's a super classy Pink Floyd tee and it's super soft. British men always hit on me when I wear it for some reason. They want to buy me Gin and then later ask if they can take me home. But I'm not that easy.

Anyhoo, hope you enjoyed the update. Any Ideas on what I should do?

~Evan

The Half Marathon

2008-12-09T08:02:00.004-05:00

So word has it that on November 23rd I ran a half marathon (13.1 miles) and yes, it is true. I still haven't up loaded my pictures but I do have some a friend posted on facebook, so for now it'll have to do. I think for my first it was actually a good experiance. I didn't go the time I wanted to but it got all of the things that could possibly go wrong out of the way for future races.

The race was in Changwon a city about 15 minutes away. because I get super nervous we stayed the night in a hotel for $30 USD and it was more than we could have asked for. Due to years of swim meets I knew what to expect out of myself nerves wise, i.e. waking up early and getting ready super fast

1. I had to go to the bathroom and there were NO BATHROOM STOPS along the way. I tried before the race but a million Korean women kept knocking on my flimsy idea of a door (that's what they do to see if anyone is inside rather than just waiting) so I got too anxious to get out of there.

2. It was a really nice day expect I dressed up for cold weather. Running tights, long socks underneath and luckily my top was meant to be worn for controlling body temperature or I feel I would have probably passed out.

3. I was wearing really uncomfortable headphones...and started way too fast...just like in swimming.

But all in all besides a giant hill of death the last half mile of the course...it wasn't too steep, it was just giant...I finished at 2:02.40 so not too bad, a bit off from the 1:30-1:40 I wanted but considering I also didn't train for three weeks in between...I'd say Mission accomplished :)

p.s. I got a free leg massage and stretch after...bonus!

Tiffany

T&E

Hey Guys!!!

2008-11-11T00:55:00.003-05:00

Sorry for the late Halloween post. It's now officially a new holiday, 11/11, or Bebbero day. I have some Halloween pictures still for you guys to see if you want. Halloween was fun. Tiff and I threw a Halloween party which was a great success. A great success being defined in this sense in the way it was alot of fun and nobody threw up anywhere (to the best of our knowledge).

Tiff didn't get any Halloween party at her school, but my party did costumes and candy and pictures. It was fun. We will finish uploading the youtube videos soon, then post them for your reading pleasure.

Gwanusan Adventures

2008-10-22T07:55:00.004-04:00

So recently we've become avid hikers and were introduced to a new trail a few weeks ago by our friend Tall Dan. He's about 6'7'' which is why we call him Tall Dan, not to mention there are about three other Dans here so we need special names to differentiate.

Anyway, this new hike is amazing and brutal. The way to the trail was nice and went through the town we live in. We saw how they set harvested rice in the sun on tarps to dry out. Just rows and rows of it was just chilling on the road. We saw a lot of farmers and two really nice houses the were very western in style...we think people in the mafia live in them.

The first time we hiked up we decided to go the "Bushwhacking" trail. It started out walking up a dried out river bed which was fun because we climbed over stones and saw traces of a wild boar (the guys were excited, I was really scared because of all the Discovery Channel I'd watched on boars) and even saw another hiker taking pictures. Unfortunately we had to veer off of the river bed due to the fact that we didn't know how much longer it would go and we needed to get to the actual trail. So we started up the mountain. Literally we walked off of the riverbed trail and started walking up the side of the mountain, brambles and everything.

For a good two to three hours all three of us were fighting our way to the top. Dan led the way, I was next and Evan brought up the caboose. Usually Dan was only three to five feet in front of me but in the pictures you can hardly see him because the brush was so thick. The same with Evan making sure I was ok. At one point both of the guys had problems because of this one tree that we too tall for them to climb over but too short to have an easy time getting under.

Anyway, besides Dan accidentally pushing a rock that almost crushed us the rest of the bushwhacking part ended and we finally made it to the trail and down the mountain. We all ended up with bump, bruises and scratches from the brambles and rocks but it was definitely worth it. On the way back we found the cutest puppy and momma dog. We would have played with them all night except that we were super hungry and with the help of Evan and Dan I overcame my fear of eating Korean barbecue.

It took about six hours but the entire hike, bushwhacking and all was completely worth it. The feeling of being so high up and the fact that we were like real explorers was just a great feeling.

Note: Later that evening Dan came over and taught us how to make schnapps...it's a long process we're working on a pear recipe. We'll let you know how it works out.

Tiffany
T&E

In case you're keeping count

2008-10-06T02:04:00.003-04:00

So today is Monday, October 6, 2008, 3:05pm. In case anyone has caught onto why this is important it's because we have to be at work at 2pm...so why am i writing this now from the comfort of my bed???

Well it just so happens I have what we like to call Gastroentenitis. Pretty awesome I know. I feel fine them BAM! The amount of pain is ridiculous. The worst part is that it comes and goes so I never know if I'm feeling better or a spasm (for lack of a better word) is just around the corner.

It's amazing how being in a different place and eating different things can change your body's ability to function so differently. At home, I ate anything and everything. I never got colds and if I did get sick it was either because of allergies or it happened once in a blue moon.

On the plus side if someone could bottle this and get an infomercial spot they'd have one hell of a diet pill. I'm not even joking the amount of people who do stupid things to lose weight like the Chili pepper diet where you drink water, maple syrup, cyanne peppers and stuff all mixed together would totally go for this.

Anyway, I suppose this will be a great time to study the LSAT and Korean. I love silver linings :)

Tiffany

Also, next blog should be about or hiking trip of nonstop adventure. Get pumped

T&E

Hello Long Weekend

2008-10-01T10:15:00.005-04:00

This weekend is National Foundation Day. So to celebrate we get Friday, Saturday and Sunday off...or that's how our director put it. To most other people we call it a long weekend. Anyway we'll be hiking with our friend Dan who is about to leave in October.

In regards to our past blog posting, Evan would just like to say that he used to work for the government and had no previous exposure tobackstabbing ladder climbers. I on the other hand worked in an office of all women who hated their jobs and decided to push their inflated ideas of their self worth onto me.

Anyway, I've been training for the half-marathon for a month now and am getting in really great shape. I'm planning on an 11 mile run tomorrow. The longest I've run has been ten which was really hard. This has definitely made me feel more healthy and given me something to look forward to. I miss swimming a lot but there aren't a lot of pools around and without a team to practice with I'd be very bored.

The weather has been getting quite a bit cooler so we're in need of our longer sleeves and jackets lately. I also found a place to do some hemming for some dresses and pants which cost me all of $12! I get the stuff back on Friday so I'll let you know but the shop owners were really nice and tried their best to help.

We're trying really hard to start learning more Korean. We got several text books and have been starting to study. It's a bit difficult however just because you have to train your mind to get used to reading Hangul instead of romanized letters. It's going slowly but surely so we're happy.

All in all it's been a good week so far...ohhhhh except for some people not telling us we didn't have a meeting today at 1pm until 8 at night.

Also here's another video from our speech contest.

Miss you all,
Tiffany

T&E

Reflections in a shallow pool

2008-09-30T22:34:00.002-04:00

Saturday morning we went to a speaking contest at Changwon College. Getting there was terrible for Tiffany, as she was getting motion sick. Ad that to the way she was shoved in the back of a tiny car with three other people, and the way we had no idea where we were going so we kept doing u-turns over and over, almost comically. When we were there, someone tried to sabotage our coaching of the students.

Tiffany hadn't eaten breakfast and when we arrived (already motion sick) we set out to get her some food. One of our coworkers said that we could find a cafeteria in a nearby building and be back at the meeting point in 10 minutes. There were many buildings where she pointed so we never did find the cafeteria. It was a big place with tons of kids and teachers and parents, so we only searched around for not even five minutes before we turned back. We were only able to find grape juice (which she greedily comsumed) we approached the meeting place only to find it empty. a bit confused and upset we decided to get cotton candy while we figured out what to do. as luck would have it, we decided to just start walking around looking for a familiar face when the assistant director Mr. Jung came running towards us from across the street. He led us to where all the speech contestants were and coincidently where the sabator was "teaching" our students, right in front of their parents. This particular teacher was not involved with the students for the week while we were training them for two hours every night, but lo-and-behold, on the day of the contest, in front of their parents, they are trying to take credit! Which would normally be okay, if this conniving teacher didn't try to intentionally ditch us (trust me, she pulls this kind of stuff on me 3 days a week, like where I marked someone as late who was actually absent so she told our boss on me, who then told me that I made a mistake...whereas she doesn't even bother with attendance half the time...) Furthermore, all her credit-hogging in front of the students parents was not so benign as to only annoy us. She also managed to devolve the studenets pronunciation that we thoroughly trained and practiced, from a perfect r in river, to an r/l combination livel. That was by far the most disappointing part of it. Also, their perfect memorization of the speeches (they practiced it at least 20 times without a mistake) was marred by the new "instructions" the students were given, therefore they forgot portions of their speech. UGH! If they wanted to teach the students, where were they all week while we were teaching them? They were at home, with a tall glass of Cognac, while we were staying late at the ol' Hagwon teaching the kids, over and over, drilling correct pronunciations in their head.

Sorry, I hate to rant. So I usually don't...it's not pleasant to read and it's certainly not fun to write. But you're stuck with it, sorry, it's not being deleted.

Anyway, here's a youtube clip of our talented student, who would have won first place if not for some last minute changes. Enjoy.

T&E

Hey Y'all

2008-09-25T05:03:00.004-04:00

Just wanted to let you all know how we're doing. We're good. Work is good. Very busy. We've been going to lots of birthday parties lately, and we have another one tonight from a really cool Canadian guy who got here not too long ago. Nick, from British Columbia, is turning __ today. So yay!

This weekend Tiff and I are going to a speaking contest...Korean students are reciting speeches in English and we want to be there to help the students do well. They've all been working really hard all week to do well. They have to memorize these speeches. It's not easy for them...yesterday one of the students broke down crying while she was practicing. She's a really smart student, too, it's just for some reason they only got 10 days to memorize these speeches. In a language different from their native language. Tough. I will let you know how it goes.

Happy Chuseok

2008-09-12T06:03:00.002-04:00

Happy Chuseok,

For those of you not accustomed to Korean holidays, Chuseok is a harvest festival to commemorate when the native americans taught the Koreans how to harvest corn. Or something. Either way, we get Monday and Tuesday of next week off, so we already reserved a hotel in Busan called Lord Beach Hotel. As you might be able to tell by the name, Lord Beach is where lords stay when they come to Busan. Poor lords. But it's not that bad. The beds are real comfy, and the TVs are real sleek and new. If you can stand the pounding base from the music in the club in the basement, you will be just fine.
In any case, now we just have to figure out how to get there. We can try to take a bus there on Saturday, which would take an estimated 4 hours because of crazy crazy traffic (It's normally 50 minutes). Or we could ride our brand new Motor Scooter, which we acquired last night, in the middle of the night tonight when there is minimal traffic. The downside is this is our first time riding the scooter. And we will most probably get lost. And at night people speed, really really really fast. Last weekend on the way back our bus drove 120km an hour, getting us back in an even 30 minutes! It was ridiculous how fast we were passing cars...so reckless...yet so satisfying and fun! You could really tell that bus driver had better things to do.
Anyways, I will update again soon to let you all know how it went.

~Evan

Haeundae pics

2008-09-08T23:03:00.005-04:00

We've spent the past two weekends at Haeundae Beach in Busan. I can't tell you how much I've missed the beach. My parents and anyone close can tell you I'm a complete beach girl. Not being around it was making me feel a bit bummed, especially knowing how close it it.

Last weekend we didn't really plan anything and just packed our bags and went. It was a great time. We ate a beautiful and delicious Turkish restaurant and were able to experience the beach and boardwalk at night. There were so many people just hanging out and walking along the boardwalk, it was really cool.

We found a casino in one of the hotels and1. Because we got free drinks and food, 2. We didn't really have a place to stay and were pulling and all-nighter, we decided to stay a bit. The one thing that was cool/ridiculously annoying was they were playing a video of music concerts. The only problem was they only played the same three in a row. Britney Spears when she was "normal" Beyonce and Usher8701 tour. Not to mention, they didn't play the music that went along with the concersta so I had to try and guess what song they were singing...

After a Black Jack session we were hungry and went to find food. Unfortunatley the size of the food on the menu wasn't described so we each got our own meal. The pizza pictured would have been more than enough except Evan also ordered a hamburger that turned out to be huge. We weren't hungry until the next day!

All in all, our first beach experiance was great. We did crash for about 14 hours on Sunday from being so tired but it was worth it.

Tiffany

T&E

Random Thoughts

2008-09-08T04:55:00.002-04:00

Now that I am back to writing blogs, I thought I would update more often to make up for my long hiatus. The reason I have taken so much time off is because I have gone through a difficult hospital trip. I've been meaning to write about that, but it's a long, difficult ordeal to write. I have written several pages but have not finished the story.

In the meantime, I will write about much more positive developments in our lives in Korea. Tiffany has begun training for a half marathon that she will run in November. My job is to keep her motivated in her training, and to keep her behaved nutritionally. She already has been going to the gym and running quite consistently, but now she is going though a workout plan designed for this half marathon.

Yesterday the Baltimore Ravens won a game they were not supposed to win against the Cincinatti Bengals (Bungles). They have a rookie QB behind a young, inexperienced offensive line and their starting running back was injured. Flacco led them by not committing turnovers and having an inspiring performance. He was outshined by the other rookie QB Matt Ryan who had a 62 yard touchdown completion on his first NFL pass on the way to a rout. Overall, a very fun NFL opening day!

Hyundae Beach

2008-09-08T01:52:00.002-04:00

Hey guys,

Just got back from Busan for the second straight weekend. We also reserved 2 nights at a hotel for next weekend. We have that much fun!

We went to the Busan Aquarium this time, which was so much fun. They had penguins, sharks, seaturtles, and all kinds of cool fish. The best part was the otter exhibit. It was a family of otters that just run around and play all day, swimming and fighting and chasing. So much fun to watch them. We also went on a 3-D ride that was a blast.

One of the interesting things was our search for a reasonably priced massage place for Tiffany and I. We would pay 30$ an hour, but no more. The first two thai massage places looked really nice but they were about 80$ for 100 minutes, their cheapest offering. Tiffany saw a building with a sign in Hangul letters that said "massage" so we went to inquire about what type of massage, price, etc. The first thing we noticed when we walked in was the large fish tank with sharks. The next thing we noticed was the mountain of towels behind the receptionists, it looked like a towel factory or something. We asked about the price and type of massage and the two receptionists looked at each other uncomfortably and told us it's a sports massage. So I explain that's perfect, tiffany is having troubles with her back as a result of swimming, and I play soccer so a sports massage would be perfect. Then the younger receptionist leads us back outside and explains to us, quietly, it's a 'sex massage'. She was helpful enough to point us to one of the expensive Thai massage locations. So, now you know, in Korea 'sports massage' is code. Weird.

Oh we also discovered a real great Thai restaurant near there, we ate there twice in two nights. It also probably seems better than it is because we ate a Bennigans for lunch on Sunday, which was mediocre and overpriced.

Pictures will come. Soon, I think.

~Evan

Weekend update

2008-08-31T06:28:00.002-04:00

Hey everyone, not a lot going on. we just got back from Busan and have a super awesome story to tell but I haven't downloaded the pictures yet so that's no fun. We stayed or went to Haeundae Beach this time not by the one university. Basically we did what we always do when it's just the two of us. We eat a lot of food until we are stuffed, go on random adventures and meet people.

On a side note, I'm becoming quite the Black Jack player thanks to my mentor. Pictures soon promise!

Tiffany

T&E

Ahemmmm

2008-07-21T10:48:00.006-04:00

To Our Dearly Devoted Readers:

We (Evan and Tiffany) have come to notice a few sad things about our blog...mainly the amount of comments we receive post to post is quite scarce. Now of course we're not begging for comments but we will say that it's your comments that give us the courage to keep going and posting new things for you to be entertained by.

Comments to bloggers such as we are crucial to keeping us updated on what you'd like to see in the future, and how well we have done our jobs bringing information to you on our life. We feel a bit neglected when there are no comments and it's nice to know when people have read what we've wrote.

That being said pictures and another post will be up soon about my recent visit to Changwon and our own little bit of Espanol in Korea a.k.a. Mexico which is absolutely FABULOUS.

Till then,
Anyeonghikaseo

Tiffany

Busan Details

2008-07-14T19:14:00.004-04:00

The Busan trip went as follows. After a 50 minute bus ride ($3), we take a 20 minute subway ($2) ride, then proceed to get lost for about an hour looking for our guesthouse. The sign is small and hidden by another bigger sign that's in front of it. No big deal. We go into the guesthouse ($15 per person), which is fairly nice and includes free internet use and bicycle rental. They do have mosquitoes in the room. Tiffany got bitten pretty bad that night. And by pretty bad I mean these "mosquitoes" might as well have been Nosferatu. I have not ever seen anyone bitten so badly.
Anyway, Tiff was having back issues (from the knots in her back from swimming all those years) and we decided to try to find a massage place. After literally hours of wandering the streets we found no massage places (with a sign in English, although we were assured there were massage places all around us. Is it too hard for a massage place to have a picture of a massage on it???). We did find tons of bars near Kyungsung National University. To which we needed nobody to twist our arm to enter. We were stressed from the travel, the getting lost, and the lack of finding a massage place.
To make a long story short, we got drunk. Too drunk. The next day, I swore off alcohol for a month. As of writing this, it has been over 3 weeks I have been sober, Tiffany too. I also tried giving up coffee, which I did for a week but ended up back on the wagon. I need it to stay awake in class.

This weekend we are going to the Boryeong Mud Festival. This is a link of a promotional video for the festival. Despite the fact that the festival actually looks awesome, the announcer manages to make it seem extremely boring. I'm not even remotely kidding when I say I've seen more exciting toilet training videos. Anyways, I suppose we will give you some kind of report from there. Although I don't want people confused thinking the incredible hulk is suddenly brown. That's actually just me, in mud.

Stay tuned for our Boryeong post next week!

(Update - Boryeong never happened.)

Buddhism in Korea

2008-07-12T20:46:00.002-04:00

Nothing that I am going to write about is on topic insofar as the title is concerned. The story starts with an interesting night in Busan. I actually have uploaded on youtube the complete saga of videos from our trip to Busan. The videos, while short snippets, tell a very large story. The story that you missed is also very sprawling. It's a sprawling adventure. Not unlike that of Don Quixote, and his faithful squire, Sancho Panza. It also had very similar results (Quixote and Panza would often be battered and bruised from their unfortunate adventures, Quixote even got half his teeth knocked out, earning him the nickname Knight of the Rueful Figure. Our adventure was not nearly as violent). Check the videos. I have to go play soccer now, but I will include more information on this (soon to be) famous adventure soon.

Our Youtube Channel, where all our Busan Adventures, and more, can be viewed

Just Call Me Four Eyes

2008-07-10T10:27:00.003-04:00

So I decided to buy a pair of glasses today. I've been wanting to get a pair for a few reasons. They look super cool and make people think (key word "think") you're smart, and the frames I have are super small on my face and I had a sneaky feeling they were the wrong prescription.

So I went to the optical store 2 blocks from us I have no idea what its name is but it has an elephant mascot and a emblem that looks like 10<01 I think it's glasses on a face. I walked in and after the language thing explaining I could not speak Korean and helplessly looking in my phrase book we found common ground on the word test.

I went in had an eye test in about 5 minutes. It's all computer run no one is asking "Better or worse" ten times and all ten times they look the same. They asked me to read numbers like usual as well. My right eye was stellar as always apparently 15/20 my left eye was...I think 35/20 or 40/20. Either way it was bad. But together I have great vision.

They took me out and I chose frames. The big black ones the manager picked out for me. I chose the smaller green pair. I had a small issue in choosing frames because a lot of them were too wide for my face (it's small still) and he'd say "too big, too big" when I thought they looked great, oh well. I picked two frames out and then he showed me the types of lenses I could get. All in all the two pair cost $30 or $60 all together. $60 for TWO PAIRS OF GLASSES!. Now they're not my Kenneth Coles quality wise but they're really nice for the price. If I do decide I'm going to want a nice pair they have brand name frames as well.

Plus, I didn't have to show my insurance card or wait forever for the glasses to be ready. It took about a half hour in all for the entire process. I guess so many people wear glasses that the system has become really simplified, which is fine by me. Hope everyone is well!

Tiffany

T&E

Evan Plays Soccer

2008-06-19T11:22:00.003-04:00

Evan has become a member of the All That Jazz soccer team. Jazz is a foreigners bar in Masan. We've met a lot of fun people there. Really down to earth and fun. Evan has his own post on this...I'd just thought I'd put up the actual pictorial evidence that he has indeed played. I unfortunately as a feeble woman and can not play in a man's game...actually I haven't really played soccer ever except in gym where I was pretty darn good. If only there were weekly swim races or lacrosse games.

There'll be a video up soon, promise!

Tiffany

T&E

I can read it, but I have no idea what I said

2008-06-19T09:41:00.008-04:00

So it seems to me that Evan has been taking over this blog and so I'm back to claim my spot as co-writer. Quick facts about what has been going on in my life:

1. Today a Korean teacher said that I read Hangul (the Korean alphabet) well
2. Tuesday I got called fat, I think it was a joke but I'm not too sure
3. I'm absolutely in love with Nirvana
4. I'm applying to the National Geographic Glimpse program so keep your fingers crossed when I send my application in
5. Rainy season has officially began
6. I'm pretty bummed about the Yves Saint Laurent death

These are in no particular order by the way. I'm very excited about applying for the Glimpse program if not to open more doors for me career wise. You get your own editor and a chance to be published online. I've always loved writing and reading great writing. It's boring to about 99% of the world but I still think Shakespeare is one of the best writers ever, the fact that his writings have survived 500 years is amazing. Anyway, I feel that this chance if I get it or not will be good. I've never really let anyone since elementary school read my works. I let Evan read one of them and if he says it's good than I'm happy.

I'm reading the biography of Kurt Cobain called Heavier Than Heaven. Cobain was the lead singer, guitarist, songwriter of the early 90's band Nirvana. I'm not too approving of the huge drug addiction to heroin and crazy dark things he did, and in no way did I have a horrible childhood of that magnitude; but, I relate to the way that Cobain was a juxtaposition in himself. He had wanted to be famous since he was a kid but hated being in the spotlight. It's sometimes how I feel here. I'm a confidant person in my abilities and such yet can feel insecure about the standards I'm put up to here because of my appearance. I have to say I'm pretty comfortable in my own skin though and to feel that way at 23 is a pretty awesome thing. Nirvana is a little different than my usual Country and Jack Johnson but the genius behind it is still the same and the book is very well written.

And so we get to the fat comment. I, in no way think I'm fat. Sometimes I feel fat, and like all girls I'll say I'm fat. That doesn't mean I believe it or it's true. I'm pretty sure it was a a joke it's just that no one in my life has said anything to me about my weight, in that context anyway. I think it's so interesting how some ideas of beauty are universal such as good skin and hair and others are so different, such as body type. I've always been petite and curvy. Here I feel like an Ava Gardner or a 40's movie star since the women here are so tiny! Because the Korean diet and ideas about exercise are so different. Everyone at home will be happy to know that after this comment I did not decide to forgo food, instead I ate a whole box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese (Thank you Stomber!) and loved every moment of it.

Rainy season, the words just sound drab. Anyway, it's supposed to rain here for 3-4 weeks. Of course the day I really need an umbrella it's locked in Apartment B along with our food. Evan had the key and had already left for work in Hogye. So without an umbrella I scurried down to the DC mart to get an umbrella. Upon achieving this goal I was able to walk and get a well deserved Ham toast with cheese. If we haven't mentioned Ham toast before, we should have. Basically it's a store that sells toasted sandwiches. Ham toast is 1000 won or $1. It contains ham...an egg and a sort of sweet onion sauce. You can also get cheese which makes it exactly like a grilled cheese, ham and egg sandwich :)

Yves Saint Laurent was a great designer, not that I own anything by him or the label. I wasn't too big of a follower just because when you're in college you're not really thinking about wearing the latest designs from Fashion Week. Well, I was but I didn't have anywhere to wear anything. Personally and much to my mother and Evan's dismay :) I love shopping and quality goods which usually mean on the more expensive side. I just feel that people like YSL made fashion more than about clothes. Even the person who says they don't follow fashion puts clothes on every morning, and someone has to make them. I have no idea where this is going other than my favorite quote is

"Fashion is about what you wear, Style is about the way you live your life" Ralph Lauren.
...Take it or leave it.

So to end up I'm pretty awesome at reading Korean, I just have no idea what it means...we're working on it though.

Buenas noches,
Tiffany

P.S. these are random pics...I think they're fun though and who doesn't like fun?

T&E

Political Facts

2008-06-18T06:08:00.002-04:00

This blog is all about our story here in Korea. But since we are having issues with putting up pictures and videos, and I feel our story may not be fully told without such devices, I have decided to put up some facts about an often misunderstood American. His name is Barack Obama.

It is every American's duty to read this message and pass it along to all of their friends and loved ones.

Barack Obama wears a FLAG PIN at all times. Even in the shower. Barack Obama says the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE every time he sees an American flag. He also ends every sentence by saying, "WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL."

A tape exists of Michelle Obama saying the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE at a conference on PATRIOTISM.

Every weekend, Barack and Michelle take their daughters HUNTING.

Barack Obama is a PATRIOTIC AMERICAN. He has one HAND over his HEART at all times. He occasionally switches when one arm gets tired, which is almost never because he is STRONG.

Barack Obama has the DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE tattooed on his stomach. It's upside-down, so he can read it while doing sit-ups.

There's only one artist on Barack Obama's iPod: FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.

Barack Obama is a DEVOUT CHRISTIAN. His favorite book is the BIBLE, which he has memorized. His name means HE WHO LOVES JESUS in the ancient language of Aramaic. He is PROUD that Jesus was an American.

Barack Obama goes to church every morning. He goes to church every afternoon. He goes to church every evening. He is IN CHURCH RIGHT NOW.

Barack Obama's new airplane includes a conference room, a kitchen, and a MEGACHURCH.
Barack Obama's skin is the color of AMERICAN SOIL.

Barack Obama buys AMERICAN STUFF. He owns a FORD, a BASEBALL TEAM, and a COMPUTER HE BUILT HIMSELF FROM AMERICAN PARTS. He travels mostly by FORKLIFT.

Barack Obama says that Americans cling to GUNS and RELIGION because they are AWESOME.

All this information was copied shamelessly from slate.com and written by Christopher Beam. These claims are clearly true, because, duh, it's right there in print.

Internet Woes

2008-06-16T07:00:00.002-04:00

Sorry, dear readers, for the lack of updates.

You see, we have been having some difficulty uploading pictures and video.

This is a result from our lack of paying for internet. For some month and a week we have been using WiFi from a faraway distance, so our internet speed has been slow and unreliable. Uploading a few pictures would take upwards of ten minutes, if it even completed. Often photo uploads would "time out." Furthermore, we have some more videos that we wish to share with you that we deem impossible to upload right now.

We are currently in the process of trying to get Xpeed, which is promised to be extremely fast internet service. I think once we get that we will be able to post many movies and pictures, and alleve the annoyance that both us and you face; us with the uploading of pictures and you with the lack of multimedia.

Thanks for reading. I hope once we get back online we will post 4-5 solid updates per week.

We love bowling!

2008-06-06T03:44:00.003-04:00

As you can tell by now, or maybe you can't; we love bowling. It's quite convenient since it is right across the street and it's really fun, so what's not to love? The first time we went it was little hard to get shoes in our size because we go by inches and not whatever they go by in Korea. It's either the European way or the Korean way.I think my foot size is 246 in Korean standards...confusing I think so. The cool part was I felt like quite the big person when I had to send back the first pair of shoes because they were too small. Understandably it's usually the opposite and I feel like a little pixie.

So we get our shoes and choose our bowling balls. I usually like to go for a hot pink or one with sparkles; it seems here in Korea they like to have very wide finger holes though, so I had to make due with a sort of marbley colored ball. Evan got a very masculine blue one, lucky duck. So we start the game and for some reason I did ridiculously awesome and I got a strike! The funny thing is that when you're bowling in Korea, you're not just bowling with your friends, the whole place watches you and claps if you do well.

I was a little unsettled now that I knew I had an audience and because I was the only girl at the bowling ally at that point in time. Evan kept slipping on the floor because it was soooooo slippery and waxy. I'm pretty sure he beat me both times though so I guess the slipping didn't matter. Also after Evan had taken his turn we sat there waiting for his ball to come back because he had another turn coming up. However, there was no ball to be seen. It seems that the ball on its way back had decided to take a small pit stop, probably to grab a pint or a soft pretzel. So we stood there staring into the ball machine for a few seconds then went over to ask the owners of the bowling ally if they could help. The man took another ball and rolled it down the gutter so that it could come back to us. Once this happened up popped both of the bowling balls.

Now for most people the idea of being in a bowling league seems silly and very nerdy (sorry Ma'am mom and everyone else in my family that was part of a league...you know what I mean) BUT here in Korea even the most casual bowler will have one of those hand supports and when they bowl...they REALLY try hard. They do the crazy bowling stance and everything, it's pretty impressive if not on the side of excessive.

We ended our 2 games and took our shoes and by then 5 balls (I like to get different weights, and I think Evan got a different ball too to fix the "Evan's ball keeps getting stuck" issue) back to the ball rack. We've gone to bowling a few time since and it's always a good time.

Hasta Luego,
Tiffany

T&E

Apartment Tour

2008-06-02T00:12:00.003-04:00

Sorry it has taken nearly a month to get our apartment tour up, but first we had to clean and re-arrange our apartments and then we had a multitude of technical difficulties with the long videos. Finally we have been able to upload them to youtube albeit at a lower quality than what you may be used to from us. Check out Part I and Part II of our visual tour.

The second part of this update I will write two short reviews for a couple of things that I recently had the pleasure of enjoying. The first is Will Ferrell's new movie Semi-Pro. I'd put it in the same rank as the fantastically hilarious, instant-classic Anchorman. 'Nuff said.

The second review is of Dominoes Pizza in Masan, 2 blocks from Home Plus. Tiffany and I were starving and found it. We were a little shocked at the menu choices, which included such items as spicy Thai curry chicken pizza, cheese steak pizza, among many others. The prices were also expensive, at up to 30 dollars US for one of their fancier specialty pizzas. We decided to get the medium pepperoni pizza and a liter of Coke, coming out to about 13 bucks. It was fantastic, not only easily the best pizza we've had in Masan, but some of the best pizza I have ever had. It really was incredibly good. The service, too, was excellent. The staff spoke English and was inquisitive and friendly. I think it may even be worth taking the bus across town just for a taste of this amazing pizza...

Thanks all you readers who were patient and put up with our newness to blogging and youtubing.

Part 3 of 3

2008-05-27T20:39:00.004-04:00

Recently I have been reading Jack La Lanne's Revitalize Your Life. In it, La Lanne inspires to change the way you live though exercise, nutrition, and good habits. He tells us to look at ourselves in the mirror the way we are, then imagine what you want to become. La Lanne is talking about physical characteristics - he wanted to transform his body to that of his ideal hero K.V. Iyer, much in the way some people today look up to Schwarzenegger's body as the prototypical ideal. I think the statement "imagine what you want to become" while looking in the mirror can have a much broader and more important question for people. Not just who do you want to look like, but who do you want to be as a person.

On Monday Dan, Tiffany, and I went to the local gym to check it out. It came highly recommended by some of our friends here who have been here a bit longer. Looking at the large room with long rows of treadmills, exercise bikes, elliptical machines and the multitude of weight training machines, I knew this was a place I could get a very good workout. They even have a great view of some lush mountains from the 6th floor of the buildings large windows that surround three quarters of the wall space. I was enthusiastic to get back to lifting weights after not working out since late January when I canceled my gym membership back in Maryland. Tiffany too was excited that she could do spinning and running every morning before class. Dan, too, has been itching to do some serious working out. He's considering working on an oil rig after teaching in Masan and could really use the strength. But when he asks himself the question "who do you want to be" he doesn't see himself working out in a gym. No, despite the multitude of windows looking out on a mountain, it's still an indoor setting, something Dan I think only puts up with when he's forced to. No he'd much rather do his exercising outside, in nature. He goes camping and fishing and hiking whenever he can. This is the kind of question that's important to know about yourself. What makes you happy? Who are you and what do you want to be?

Me personally, I find the gym highly rewarding. I've been going every morning this week, trying to get back into the swing of things as quickly as I can. I've even been watching Jack La Lanne's many Youtube videos after reading his inspirational book. He's an interesting character with obvious credentials. He broke the world record for pushups at 1000 plus in 20 minutes or so. I might be able to do 200 in that amount of time.

In any case, I'm trying to work out not to change what I want to be, but rather to drop a few pounds and get in shape. Maybe go down to 90kg or so. Right now I'm at 96kg and I'm a bit out of soccer shape. What is important to me right now is who I am, a teacher. I asked Tiffany how she ranks her job. "I know it's early, but do you think this is the top 3 most enjoyable jobs you've ever had," I asked her. She told me it's probably her best job she's ever had. I couldn't agree more. I love this job here. Yes, sometimes children can get on your nerves, either by being wild and unruly, or by their apathetic attitude towards the subject. The day, though, is so much more rewarding than any of the other positions I have previously held. So many student's I see every day really value learning and give you a great deal of respect. The student's generally work very hard, are well behaved, and many of my own students are extraordinarily smart. It's true that I am enjoying the city of Masan, and that I am loving the food, and that I have made many good new friends. But the real reason Tiffany and I have been enjoying our time here is that our 9-5 (or rather 2-10 as our school hours happen to be) has been so highly rewarding.

Oh and now for our final installment of go tell it on the mountain. Sorry this blog post has been so ADD and also a bit late. There's two reasons for that. First is that I've had a bout of writers blog and have written a little bit each day for the last two days. The second is that it's been a long day and I had half a bottle of wine while writing it. Okay, so back to the mountain story.

Coming down the mountain was different. It was about seven before we started our descent, and we felt the ominous prospect of a bad rain (the clouds that we were in were proof of that, we reasoned). Anyway, in our hurry to rush down, we ended up taking the wrong path. We started noticing that A) We weren't seeing any people on this path, and B) that we didn't notice any of the landmarks that we saw on the way up. Don't get me wrong, it was a nice walk, for a while. We even sat down on a lookout on some rocks overlooking a serene view of trees and nature. The great birds we enjoyed watching I think were ravens. Ravens are awesome. Not only can they live to 150 years and are extremely intelligent, but they are also one heck of a football team.

Anyway, I'm distracting myself again. Our route down turned from the path less traveled to the path overgrown. We were led down the side of the mountain on a windy, narrow, structurally unsound path that was overgrown with bushes and tree branches, and the spider webs were so numerous that we knew nobody walked that path at least that day...seemingly for years. Anyway, we eventually find ourselves at the bottom of the mountain, in the middle of a farm, by some railroad tracks. We also find a highway. We follow the highway back to Samgye where we live (probably about 3-5 kilometers, I'm not very good at estimating). There's the end of the mountain story. How anticlimactic.

Go Tell It On the Mountain, Part 2

2008-05-23T09:37:00.006-04:00

The well awaited part 2 of this several part post if finally here! Evan and I have been pretty busy teaching and cleaning our apartment. On a happy and very exciting note, I finally found out how to fix out water heater. Sometimes showers are very warm, and sometimes they are very chilly a.k.a. The Polar Bear shower of doom. So anyway way on with the fun.

So as Friday night turned into Saturday morning we woke up, went downstairs to get food from "our place" and promptly went back upstairs and took a nap until around 5pm. I think we did other things in between that time of waking and napping but they're not too important sooooo on ward. Our friend Dan stopped by around 5ish to take us street market shopping. Evan was still sleepy so I took it upon myself as the woman to find out where I needed to go to forage for food.

Basically you just sort of step outside and there are street vendors EVERYWHERE! So good old Danny boy took me on a tour of where you can get acorn tofu (it's kind of brown, looks like Jell-o and tastes sort of like jelly texture meets blah) it wasn't that bad though, prepared correctly I'm sure it could be a fabulous treat. You can also get cotton candy the size of my body for about 300 won or 30 cents ( I may or may not have mentioned it before but I love this picture taken maybe our second day here). All around our block are different vendors, we're really at the perfect location for getting food and such. Dan took me to see Pizza Bingo which has $6 pizzas, fish guy ho can clean in a fish like no ones business, egg guy, kimchi lady, omelet lady and veggie guy. We also got to see squid guy.

The next day we woke up bright and early around 11am to get ready to go hiking. Dan met us for lunch and we started on our way. Where we live there are a lot of mountains so to go hiking you really just need to start walking towards a mountain, it's that easy. So we head towards what is called Muhakson, a beast of a mountain. On the way we walked through a town built in the 1960s during the period when the war had just ended and it was a law that everyone had to build their houses in traditional style. It was like walking back into time. due to respect for people and their houses I didn't take any pictures, sorry.

Back to the mountatin, Muhakson is a mountain filled with steep inclines and a lot of people we saw had hiking sticks that were similar to ski poles for support. We began to hike up the mountain at a relatively slow pace, however, it was a good thing because the inclines literally had us gasping for breath. So just a little fact, we're not in the best shape of our lives right now. If anyone doesn't know I am a NCAA All-American swimmer and have always been really athletic (cheerleader, ballet dancer, karate black belt) and Evan has always been involved with athletics too (soccer, ice hokey, street hockey all around beast). But before we left we decided to eat as much American food as we could and not move around at all; so now on our hike, I'm not sure about Evan but I felt like I was carrying a small hippo or something, not good. There were many families out hiking that day as it wasn't too hot, and walking past people was a tricky task when there was sometimes only 6 inches of walking space. It was kind of fun to see parents bringing little babies hiking too, if it was me I'd be afraid I'd fall and squish them since they were being carried on their backs.

We would stop to rest every so often, maybe finding some nice rocks perfect for sitting or a lookout. We passed by some Korean graves which were very interesting. When someone dies they traditionally carry them up to a mountain and bury them in the hillside. As we kept getting higher and higher it seemed the clouds were getting thicker. We finally made it to the top of the mountain and it was a really great sight. No the sun wasn't gleaming off of the city below or beaming down on our faces. It was even better, we basically were inside a cloud. We could see the wind carrying the cloud over us and it was just a surreal experience, I'd choose that day over any sunny day. At the top there was an old sort of building and a flag pole with the Korean flag, Dan said they had replaced it recently since it wasn't worn out or tattered. Apparently on good days people hike up to the top and set up ice cream stands and food stands and stay for as long as their supply lasts then head back down. Sadly, no ice cream that day but we got some great pictures.

And this ends part 2 of a 3 part series. Look out for new stuff and we PROMISE apartment pics soon!

Tiffany

T&E

Just some pictures...and more!

2008-05-20T12:19:00.005-04:00

Tiffany was so very excited to find this dog mug at DC. It reminds her of her dog from home, Bonnie. Plus, the phrase, "I find, Oh! Oh!" is too cute. The next picture is that mug at Tiffany's desk at her school, Jungchul English Institute, in Masan Korea. Jungchul has 2 locations in Masan. Tiffany and I have desks at the Samgye location, a location that our apartments are right up the stairs from. Three days a week I teach at the Hogye location. It takes a bit more time because I have to shuttle across town, but the Jungchul shuttle bus drivers are nice and I get to see a bit of the city.

Today was a great day for me in class. I had five classes at Hogye, and 2 of the classes were very stressful last week. This week though I had more time to plan fun activities for the students that they could learn from. We sang "The Family Song" to the tune of "This land is your Land" that goes "This is my mother; this is my father; this is my brother, this is my sister..." and so on. We also had group discussion about our family, and we then drew pictures of our families. It was a really great activity that they hopefully learned from. I am now confident that any student in my 2nd grade classes can describe their families in English.

Coming soon are our posts (with pics and vids!) from the mountain, our date night of going bowling, and finally this Wednesday night where we are just about to meet with other English teachers to go drink Moccli (not sure how to spell it, but it sounds like Broccoli but with an M). It's a rice wine. Not sure how it's different from Soju or Saki for that matter, but I will fill you all in soon. Also on the way is details on how to find our apartment on a map. (I will give you a hint. We are right near the Lotteria in Masan, Korea. Use google maps and search businesses type "Lotteria" near Masan, Korea. Above is a picture of Tiffany eating a Shrimp and Avocado burger there.)

Sorry we haven't been posting regularly, we have had some long hectic days and have been busy. We left at nine today to go to the medical building to get our tests (We both passed!) and then to register for our alien card. We already got our insurance cards (good insurance too!) and then worked a full day. Oh and we got our cell phone. But we don't have a charger yet. I don't know maybe it's in the apartment somewhere. Oh well I'm rambling. I gotta run anyway. Stay tuned and I promise I will bore all my readers 25% less on the next post. I make big promises!

~Evan

Go Tell It On the Mountain, Part 1

2008-05-20T11:10:00.005-04:00

So, just a reminder for people at home...I have a very small face. I'm really not exaggerating the fact people here LOVE small faces, so if you have one, get yourself to Korea. Last Friday as I'm leaving for the weekend my class stops by and they all say "Teacher, you have a verry small face," then ask something in Korean and Yoona a Korean teacher says "They are very how you say, envious." I really don't know what to say to them, I usually do a thank you, and feel slightly awkward because I feel this face thing is a big deal and I'm making them feel weird. The more I study behavior I can see a lot of similarities and many, many differences in the women here and self esteem but more on that later. I have a story to tell.

Friday, Samgae- Poker night at Andrew and Robyn's. Our friends had a poker night which was a lot of fun. There are people from America, Canada and England here so it's always interesting getting different views. We both made it to the final table and we'll end it at that. I think the more interesting game was international Scrabble that was going on. Spellings of words and words used are so different even in English speaking countries that Scrabble turned out to be very entertaining. Later Evan and I went to Gim Bap Nora for some late night snacks with our friend Dan. BTW, Gim Bap Nora is our "place" to get authentic Korean food: it's open 24/7 which is AWESOME. Plus it is cheap. Two rolls of sushi or "gim bap" cost $4. We invited Dan up for some Jinro House wine (Dan by the way is our Canadian friend from Ontario, has a super cool accent and is about 6.56 feet tall) and talked for several hours. We made plans to go shopping on the street market and hiking for the following days to come.

On a random note we also went to the DC store again. If we haven't described in detail yet what the DC store is, you're about to find out. Think of your favorite store for random stuff filled with chachkis (knick knacks) household goods and electronics and other great finds shoved into a store the size of your living room. The aisles are so small if you're wearing a backpack you definitely will not have space to turn around. Evan declined going down a few aisles because of how narrow they were. However, great finds are inevitable. I got my new tea mug there featuring a picture of a cartoon Westie and of course an emotionless face saying "I find, oh oh" to a bone. We also found our new toilet seat there which says "Bear Family. Themselves happy, they made others happy too." We also found some "Sexy Mild" shampoo, presumably to compete with Herbal Essences. There was the toothpaste that hates math as much as I do. And of course a bear dressed as a different kind of bear. Our alarm clock Little pink also came from DC. Imagine an old time alarm clock, little and pink. It may be little, but it's loud.

Also, next post we will explain the title of this one and why the story of our weekend must be broken into parts. Until then...

T&E

Teacher, you have a very small face

2008-05-15T10:53:00.003-04:00

So Wednesday was our first official day of teaching. I finally figured out that each Korean teacher teaches the same classes everyday Monday-Friday, and that each class gets a lesson from us the foreign teachers once or twice a week. So Evan had to go to Hogaye another school owned by our director and I was a Samgaye the school we live above. I actually had more than 2 classes as well so that was fun.

While Evan had fun teaching young kids in particular one named Jack, my students were being brutally honest with me on all subjects. They ask you a lot of random funny questions and say a lot of interesting things as well. For example, when Evan walks into a room the kids usually put their hands all the way above their head and say "Oh so tall." We get a lot of giggles if any of the kids try and talk to us outside of class. You'll hear someone talking then you look up and they start giggling and say hi then run away. It's pretty funny. So the one comment my one class told me that really was great was about my face. Now, this class is full of 11 and 12 year olds who are very smart and sometimes can be a little noisy so you have to keep them under control but they love to talk to me and ask all sorts of questions and they remember a lot too which is great.

Anyway, this class loves me the first day I met them they told me I was very pretty which hey, if anyone wants to tell me that go right ahead :) So they like hearing about your family and what you like to do. Since Korean families are smaller than American families they think it's so interesting that I have 3 brothers and a sister and they're all in their 30's except Derek. So back to the comment.

This class is very honest and like all little kids they're not very tactful. This one little girl Ann at the end of class when we're having question time says "Teacher, you have a very small face." I reply back"...is that good" I mean when someone tells you something like that I'm not sure anyone knows what to say, and another little girl Jasmine says "Yes, it's very good" with a very matter of fact look on her face. It's so great what they'll say to you. So apparently if you have a small face and visit Korea, you're in luck. As for my comment "is that good" I've been using that a lot whenever someone says something because you never know what something will mean.

I have to say that I was a little nervous about living here because all of the travel books we've read and even blogs from people living in Korea say that you get the most indifference as a ethnic looking Korean and being a non-Korean. But so far I really haven't felt that way at all. I expected to maybe get ignored or shunned but, if anything I get more stares than Evan. Odd. I guess this small face thing has to do with the great hospitality we've been getting. Pretty much anywhere we go people seem excited to meet us and then I just say "Mi guk sa raam" which means American and upon hearing this it only makes them try harder to help us if we need to find something or do something.

Today was also Teacher's day, we had the day off and spent it going to the bank to exchange our American dollars for Korean won. For lunch we went to a Vietnamese noodle place. It was very good and it seemed that they had "Koreanized" the food as we would Americanize food from other countries. we both had noodle dishes. Evan had a friend dish that was very good and I got a coconut sauce noodle dish with little octopus' in it. It was actually pretty good and I would definitely order it again if given the chance. We also went to look at a gym some of our friends belonged to. The owner greeted us and let us look around. There were a lot of machines, it was kind of strange to see everyone wearing the same thing but a gym uniform is included in the membership fee. Hopefully when we get paid we'll be able to sign up and not get tired after walking up a few flights of stairs, more on that later.

We also went to a Tae Kwondo school and tried to see if we could get lessons. The Tae Kwando Masters didn't speak much English but we found out that if we wanted lessons we'd have to have class at 9:30pm. So tomorrow we're going to speak with Mr. Park about our schedule and if we can fit lessons in. Between the Tae Kwondo school and dinner was also met up with our friend Johan and tall Dan and had a little conversation before parting ways. I only mention this because I found it very odd that I was getting more attention from people then either Evan or Johan were. I don't really know what to make of it, either they're interested in how I got 2 white men to hang out with me or I do sort of stick out with my mannerisms and dress so idk, either way, it's kind of creepy.

For dinner we wanted to go to this Korean bbq place Johan had taken us our first Friday here. Seeing that it was very crowded we decided to pass some time at a place called Beers and yes, the name refers to what they offered, beer and anjou or appetizers. I had read about these beer houses and was excited to finally be in one. there was a language barrier which made us end up getting 2 beers a platter of finger foods such as M&M's peanuts and a Fritoesque chip along with one plate of dried squid. for a bit we just looked at it trying ti figure out how to eat it, then the owner and waiter came over to help us seeing we were in trouble and began ripping pieces of squid sort of like beef jerky. It was an interesting taste and I didn't want to insult them so i tried to eat my share of it, Evan didn't find it interesting at all and after a few minutes the waiter saw that the dried squid wasn't going over too well and brought out a fruit salad of cherry tomatoes and peaches. The squid was pretty tough to chew and I actually cut myself on the face trying to rip off a bite size piece...I'm not too proud of that incident. Finally we made it to the bbq place and again got a lot of attention from the owners and a lot of help.

So far Korea has been good to us whether it's people helping us order food or understand what to do. Everyone has been so great and we're looking forward to more adventures. Sorry this post is so long and there are no pictures. We promise more pictures and videos very soon, we actually just caught the elusive talking cart on camera tonight so be on the look out for that post.

T&E

First day of teaching

2008-05-13T23:46:00.002-04:00

fSo we had our first day of actual teaching yesterday. I was supposed to have 6 classes and ended up with 2. One of my classes was canceled (a Korean teacher said that no one was coming) and no kids showed up for another. I finally had one last class at 8:30. Evan had all of his classes and spent his day getting to know students. Most of the classes were quiet trying to get used to the way that we talk and understanding what we are saying. The other teachers said that they will start getting noisy and loud soon so we should start out a little hard so they will not be out of control all the time.

Mr. Park our school Director had a meeting with us before classes started to talk about medical insurance and things that needed to be done with the apartment. He seemed pretty excited to find out I was adopted from Korea (he thought I was Chinese) but we need to keep it on the down low because parents want non-Koreans teaching their children English. Whatever, also, the culture doesn't allow teachers to have tattoos because they're held at a higher standard, in general it's pretty rare to see body art of any kind. Except face painting...everyone has it.

The reason we had many canceled classes is this week is used for field trips in the children's public schools. Hopefully we will continue to have few classes as the Meetings and early morning medical tests are getting to be tiresome. This morning we met Mr. Park and he drove us across town to the hospital to get various medical tests that are required for our E2 working Visa. Among the tests are 3 different blood tests, urine analysis, chest x-ray, and of course our weight and height check. Not sure why our weight and height are relevant, but hey, if we're paying for our tests they might as well throw all they can at us, right? The blood tests are for drugs, HIV, and mystery disease. We then had time for a quick breakfast before going to our teachers meeting. The teachers meeting consisted of the Korean born English teachers speaking mostly in Korean on how to teach English. They all tried very hard not to ignore us by speaking to us in English, but you could tell they felt more comfortable speaking to one another in Korean. Besides us there were 7 other English teachers, all of them women. Two of them have had babies.

T&E

2008-05-12T11:09:00.006-04:00

It was Buddhas birthday today. That's basically like Christmas over here. Except they give presents to Buddha. What do we give to Jesus? A big fat nothing. Anyways, we decided to watch Iron Man this morning, but then we were startled by a knock at the door. This is the first time someone has come to visit us. Or were they here to rob us, we thought??? It turned out it was only our South African friend, Johan. He invited us for some shopping. Iron Man would have to wait (we later finished the movie and it was awesome)
Today we went to the fish market with Johan and Ginny. Ruairi had to go back after Home Place. It's like a 6 floor mix between Costco and a mall. They give out samples. We had bulgogi. Then we went to the fish market. Tiffany and I were hoping to eat some live tentacles, but unfortunately we had eaten a big meal earlier and didn't have the appetite for it. We will post the required video as soon as we do. In the meantime, we saw everything from prawn, frogs to eels, to puppy snatching and sea penises. Also, we saw how flounder die. It's with a knife. It's as morbid as it sounds. They basically chop it's face off. We do not have video of that. One actually tried to attack Tiffany. Not really, but it did slip out of the hands of the fish butcher and kinda slid towards her.
In summary, never go to fish markets. The are scary and you will get your dog stolen and you might eat a penis. Plus old Korean ladies might hit on your girlfriend. Or they might be asking her other questions and making her feel awkward, I don't really know I don't know Korean. All I know is to say "Mi-guk sa-ram" to any Korean. That way you will get the respect and courtesy you deserve. It means I am an American. God bless the USA.

PS- Jinro House Wine ROCKS!

T&E

Primero Post, hopefully not the last

2008-05-11T06:04:00.003-04:00

So after flying from D.C. to Detriot (where we almost got killed by some low flying birds) we boarded for Tokyo and spent a good 13 hours in the air next to a crazy Chinese lady who kept giving us her leftover food. Finally we made it to Busan where our director Mr. Park picked us and our numerous suitcases up in his little car.

We got our first look at our apartments which were pretty nice. We have 2 apartments one is going to used for living and the other, our entertainment and storage. We've been working hard to clean the storage apartment since it looked and smelled like a bunch of college guys had been living there for a year (Mom & Dad think of Dan's trailer). We've met some Expats here and apparently the Americans are grossly out numbered by Canadians and English.

We've been exploring the local food which has proven difficult at times since Tiffany can read Korean but has absolutely no idea what it means and well there ain't a lot of English thrown around here which, we're in Korea so I suppose that makes sense. We've become great at pointing to the food we want and yes, we get stared at a lot.

There's a bowling alley right across the street and we can hear bowling until the early hours of the morning. So basically 24/7. Also there are a lot of street vendors in front of our building and today we got a HUGE stick of cotton candy for 30 cents! Life is good. Shopping for food is fun since we have no idea what stuff is without pictures. They have samples here in their stores too, for example, today we had some tasty mushrooms and salt, oh yea.

So at this moment we're going to go down to one of our favorite places and hopefully order without too many issues :)

T&E