The Break Up

We’ve been together since the end of my freshman year of college – making it a five year relationship. I have never experienced anything like you – you were my first. It wasn’t on a whim that we got together – I thought long and hard before committing myself to you. We’ve spent countless hours together, on bikes, in the gym, walking through all kinds of weather. Never was I disappointed with you – not even when others decided to move forward with the new generation. I stuck by you because of you were reliable, responsible, and filled with wonderful music.
I can’t tell you how sad it makes me that we can no longer share that music together. But you just don’t work for me. I’ve tried everything possible to reboot our relationship but the truth remains that you are broken beyond repair. It’s okay, I won’t cry or beg you to work it out, I’ve accepted our fate and I’m ready to move on. Let’s say our last goodbyes this fateful morning before I leave for school. I’m ready to make the walk alone without your sweet music filling my ears and my heart.

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RIP 2nd Generation iPod

What's Christmas without....

.... the smell of a fresh cut fir tree. Who doesn't want to admire the twinkling Christmas lights on the tree and inhale that yummy, fresh, crisp tree smell? Unfortunately, our fake tree was lacking that special smell. So, I went on a small mission to find some sort of air freshener that would make our little apartment smell like Christmas. And what do you know, 20ft into E-Mart*, there's a Christmas display with aromatic candles and air fresheners. The scents were lavender, peppermint, rosemary, eucalyptus, and PINE. I'm not sure why, but the pine scent was twice as expensive as any of the other scents. However, my commitment to the Christmas spirit never wavered and I shelled out $20 for our Christmas smell, crossing my fingers that it would smell like a Christmas tree.

So, does it smell like Christmas? Sort of....I think it smells like a mixture of Old Spice and the blue Lever 2000 bar soap. Whatever, close enough, it now sits discreetly underneath our fake Christmas tree emitting "pine-like" vapors. And, as a well prepared Christmas enthusiast, I bought a back up peppermint candle. Which definitely smells like peppermint candy canes. Yum.


*E-mart - is kind of like the Target/Walmart for Korea.

Christmas in a Box

After a very non traditional Thanksgiving celebration - which was fun nonetheless. I made a decision to celebrate Christmas with more gusto than Thanksgiving. I've been streaming Christmas radio 24/7 (V has learned to play it when I'm grumpy hoping it'll cheer me up). And of course we had to buy a tree - unfortunately not a real one - but only a grinch would let that ruin Christmas. It's decked out in tinsel, lights (that have 7 different flashing/fading/twinkling settings), plastic bows, and completed with a silver star at the top.

Turkeys

Sunday Treasure

Guess what I found.....





There's a shop called the, "Underground Grocers", in Gwangju. It's tiny, a real hole in the wall place - just big enough for a few shelves and a small freezer section. This shop carries a number of food items found back home. I think most of the items are purchased from Costco - lots of Kirkland brand stuff. I can't say that anything from that store is cheap - however since I have no knowledge of what the shipping and handling costs are I also can't say that it's unreasonable. That being said, I'd like to shock and awe some of our readers by listing some of the prices.

1156 won = 1 US dollar
-Block of cheese (baby loaf): 19,000won
-Can of beans: 5500won
-3lb bag of ravioli: 24,000won
-costco size box of oatmeal: 36,000won

It may not seem SO extravagant - but since food is so cheap here we have a hard time justifying a 19,000won block of pepper jack cheese. V and I can eat a cheap, delicious meal (sit down) for about 6,000won. So, that block of cheese is really three dinners for both of us.

And, yes we did give up three dinners. We couldn't pass up the baby loaf - it was either that or the 3lb bag of ravioli. It was delicious and worth it.

Guest blogger

DB Visits V & N
I rolled into town from Beijing, after a one week China trip, to visit V & N, 2 of the best English teachers in the Yangsan residential area of Korea. My English speaking skills had regressed after a week in China and I found myself telling V that they had “a no very much apartment” and asking N, “Do we have to go far and far to the Kim Chee Festival?” But my English interpretation and listening skills were enhanced as I was able to determine that “Stoll is Los” means that “the store is to the north” and that “low lain,frying” means that “it is not raining those are insects hitting the windshield”.

It was great to see N & V in their new digs in the north end of Gwangju. I got into Seoul Saturday afternoon and they met me downtown in time to watch the Gwangju Kia Tigers win the Korean Baseball World Series with a dramatic 9th inning, game 7 walk-off homer. We watched the game in a small diner while having some Korean food (imagine that!?).
We then met Anne, Amanda and Billy, some teacher friends, downtown Gwangju after a KTX train ride at up to 200 mph from Seoul. We toured some of the night clubs in Old-Gwangju and drank some varieties of the local cocktail called soju (kind of a weak vodka).

Sunday morning, Vann made some ham, garlic & eggs, garnished with some Korean pepper paste and N got a variety of pastries from the local bakery and we fueled up. We then cabbed it down to the World Cup Stadium to partake of the Gwangju Kim Chee Festival. We sampled all kinds of Kim Chee and its accessories, including kim (seaweed), SamPong (honey-filled rice balls), dried squid and other scary stuff. There were hundreds of vendors and many, many, more, very much kinds of Kim Chee. We met some local Koreans and V & N practiced their conversational Korean. It was the best Kim Chee Festival EVER!!

(DB sorry about the late post - V only just sent to this to me and only b/c he saw that I was halfway through a post about the kimchi festival...duh)

the list

Top Ten things I miss about Seattle!
(in no particular order)

1. Whole Foods grocery store - overpriced and over organized, a lonely college student's best friend, the best salad bar for vegans, vegetarians and carnivores
2. driving a car - jeepy how I miss you.
3. my mom and dad - thank god for skype
4. being able to eavesdrop on people ... weird right?
5. John in the Morning - I'm never awake to stream you!
6. Seattle Transit - with the calmest drivers where riders can almost always find a comfy seat
7. Campbells tomato soup (it like, doesn't exist here)
8. the rain - really I promise I do
9. Trophy Cupcake/Cupcake Royale - I miss you overfrosted pumpkin and devil's food cake!
10. you! - you know who you are.

Halloween with 호박

호박 = pumpkin

Ji Sook (the lovely lady who takes me across scary bridges and feeds me delicious Korean food) presented me with the cutest little pumpkin in all of Gwangju. The students in my after school class had a design contest for the carving and helped me scoop out the insides (I did the carving). We celebrated with candy and the phrase "Trick-or-Treat!".

*(picture by Soo Jin)

What is Vann listening to?

I know all of you are super curious about Korean music. Allow me to provide you some of the kpop that I've been exposed to via my students, the radio, passing cars, clubs, and mp3 players turned up too loud on the bus. These 2 songs are super catchy and way overplayed. And yes, I am a fan. enjoy

This is g dragon, the leader of big bang. Everyone will look like him in the year 2062. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOXEVd-Z7NE.

The boybands/girlbands are popular. They throw in some English lyrics for style. This was the first Korean song I heard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFjP-OJ7Bh4

It ain't Judy Fu's

Last week for the Korean Thanksgiving (Chu Seok) we made dumplings (mandu). I watched this video on utube : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zECZXmDmHR0 and thought it looked easy.

Step 1 buy ingredients at store:

We went to our local grocery store to buy all of 5 things - mandu wrappers, meat, onions, tofu, and noodles. I think we left with about 11 things. We walked by the deli and thought about making kimchi dumplings - the lady wouldn't let us buy anything less than a WHOLE head of cabbage kimchi. We considered buying some panchan (side dishes) to go along with our mandu - the lady wouldn't let us buy just one, we had to buy THREE. We were going to buy one container with premixed/preseasoned meat - the lady suggested we buy pork AND beef.

------ so much food for so few people --------

Step 2 make mandu:

It went well - with the exceptional floppy mandu and lack of kitchen space (we made them at our dining table)

Step 3 cook mandu - fried and in soup:

Step 4 eat and enjoy mandu:

We forgot to add mushrooms and buckwheat noodles - making the our mandu's more like meatloaf balls with a thin noodle covering it. It was fun... but they aren't nearly as good as Judy Fu's dumplings.

Lessons learned:

one side dish is better than three, no kimchi is better than a whole head of kimchi, use a light hand when filling mandu with meat, Judy Fu's dumplings cannot be recreated.

Some things

Here's another update on some things in Korea:

Pizza in a cup! Pretty easy to understand.

There are animal cafes - where you can pay a little less than $5 to go and pet cute little doggies and kitties. Isn't he handsome!?

Everyone brushes their teeth after lunch to get rid of that kimchi breath. I also brush my teeth after lunch so that I don't offend the students with my breath.

We've been hiking

We've been on two trips hiking and plan on going hiking again this Saturday. When I read in "Frommer's guidebook to Korea" that the most popular Korean "sport" was hiking I didn't believe it. But now I believe that this applies to everyone in Korea. Everyone includes the following people and accessories: old and young, fit and seemingly unfit, hiking boots and high heels, people with heavy hiking backpacks girls with designer handbags, umbrellas for rain and umbrellas for sun. People really enjoy hiking and lucky for us fall is the perfect season for it.

Our first hiking experience was at Mudeung Mountain - just southeast of downtown Gwangju. We went with a few other EPIK english teachers and we decided on a trail named "wind" - we had a choice of "wind" or "rabbit". It was an uphill battle followed by a treacherous downhill trip-and-stumble. The viewpoint we stopped at was beautiful and the fresh air was a nice welcome from our usual city smell.

Our second experience hiking was much different. We went with two teachers that work at both of my respective schools (they are actually best friends) Ji Sook and Chan Yo. They're both very funny and outgoing. They picked us up at 10am sharp and drove us out towards Sunchan (I think) or maybe it was Gochuchang (which means red chili paste). We ate at a delicious restaurant that served us traditional Korean dinner - lots of side dishes and fish. V's favorite was the quail egg (mechuri al, al = egg mechuri=quail). And once we were nicely stuffed we drove a bit farther to a Buddhist temple for hiking.

The weather was a little rainy but for us it was comforting and really peaceful. The air was fresh and there was a little river that the trail followed for most of the way. We walking along a very flat trail until we reached our final destination. A hanging bridge. We walked up a large hill with steps and climbed up to this hanging bridge:

Eeek! It was scary for a number of reasons : it was really narrow, the metal was slippery with rain, there were tons of people on it so it swayed, and lots of people kept stopping in the middle of it. I'm not really afraid of hights but I kept picturing that scene in Indian Jones Temple of doom where they have to go across that bridge... oh and i kept looking down :( But we made it safely across and back.

Here are the lovely and talented teachers that took us:

V, Chan Yo, Ji Sook

One last picture :

Things Change

Our first Korean dance club experience involved fruit trays, a dance contest, and one naked dude. When 2am hit, it was dance contest time, and our friend Billy (shown with finger on face) was hustled out of the prize money. His stuff was no match for a backflip, a girl who finished topless and pantyless, and a dude who stripped off all 3 pairs of underwear (1 at a time of course). Yeah, we think it was rigged too. Well, 4th still wins free beer. Nice work B.

some things never change

I went to one of the three Starbucks in Gwangju yesterday with my co-teachers. Its next to a dunkin' donuts, krispy kreme, kfc, and outback steakhouse. Its weird how the Starbucks in Korea is exactly the same as the Starbucks in the states. It has the same furniture - you know those semi-comfy, purple, plushy armchairs even the same sell-out musicians are featured in the Korean Starbucks (Taylor Swift and Sia). And yes they were playing Dave Matthews Band. My co-teachers even told me their favorite drink at Starbucks was a carmel macchiatto. I confess that the green tea latte from the Korean Starbucks is more delicious than ones that I've ordered in Seattle. It was less sweet and more green-tea. Sorry Seattle....

let me count the ways

Top 10 reasons why I like Korea this week:
1. Taxis are cheap - dirt cheap
2. I have to wear slippers in the school
3. My front door has a keypad - so I never have to fumble for my key or remember a key
4. Clothing shops stay open until 10pm
5. The commercials on t.v. are wacky and have really catchy songs
6. Food is dirt cheap - eating out and buying food
7. Everyone is always overdressed
8. Shopping on a Sunday is like trying to get passed a mosh pit at a concert
9. All the students bow to their teachers
10. Paris baguette - a shop that only sells pastries and baked goods b/c no one has an oven.

Home

Internet! Finally connected to the world from our home - we don't have to leave our apartment for the whole weekend... just kidding. Can you guess what we first did using the internet?

A. Look up our city bus schedule?

B. Use skype to call home to our families?

C. Sign up for Korean classes at our local university?

D. Other.
Answer: D. Other. hmm we bought the second season of Gossip Girl through iTunes (Sorry mom! I should have called you).

Our home is now in just about the most northern part of Gwangju - called Yangsan-dong. We live in a modern and pink apartment complex. Our apartment is a one bedroom with a small kitchen and a large living area. It came slightly furnished: a bed, a small wardrobe, a table and two chairs, a microwave, a washing machine, a large flatscreen tv, and a refrigerator. All the appliances work and we have an air conditioner for all the hot days... which is like every day.

the entrance to our house (no shoes allowed)

our bathroom (the shower isn't separated from the rest of the bathroom)

the tiny kitchen

the sunny living room

the bedroom with our princess net (Vann picked it out!)

Welcome to our home. It needs a few more things - like a couch or bedside table but it really is nice. aaaaaand we live next to this........

So, we'll never get lost - in life or in our town. We can only hope tomorrow morning we wake up to the same terrible singer from last Sunday.

The Place for Superstars

Orientation:

Last night review: Korean class -> local bar + kiwi and strawberry soju + lady gaga = norebang ->1AM curfew!

our friend T with a huge pitcher of beer

V and our new friends from Bellevue: L and M

V and L singing to Taylor Swift! Nice nametag L!

Woke up too early today - at least I thought it was early. Too much kiwi soju?! Stumbled into the elevator, jammin' to my ipod - didn't run into anyone. Yesssss, I might actually be alone for once! Approach the dining hall and hear voices (through my earplugs). Lots of voices. Hmm, I guess I wasn't the only one with an early breakfast in mind - oh well might as well get a jump on the day with like 200 other people. Better 200 than 500 yah? Sip my coffee and hang out with the mellow breakfast crowd.

The rest of the day was : lecture, lecture, lecture and silly videos with tall, blonde, claymation characters. I may end today with a relaxing epersode of GG and hazelnut pocky sticks.

And then they looked at me and were upset...

When's the last time Korean women took bites of your food to show you how to eat it? Mine was Sunday. Words were inaffective so visual aids came into play. Whole chicken, rice filling, bone bucket, salt dust. I think I managed not to upset them but it's hard to say.

The way our interactions went in Seoul: I say something in English to a Korean . They furrow their brow, turn to N, and speak Korean. N looks at me, furrows her brow, and tells the fellow that she doesn't speak Korean. I forget what happens then, but it involves a lot of humidity.

Kimchi and Chicken

What we've eaten since landing :
-delicious kimchi dumplings
-bulgogi and kimchi jigae
-seafood risotto
-bacon and spaghetti
-a whole chicken in soup
-more kimchi jigae
-tuna salad
-cold and spicy noodles
-more delicious dumplings the size of a fist
-street food: seafood pancake and pineapple on a stick
-a crepe ball

Since we've gotten here we have spent most of our time deciding what we want to eat, where we want to eat and when we want to eat.

The excess in eating is countered by us sweating in the subway, on the street, in palaces, while we eat, while we sleep, and especially when we drag our luggage around the city of seoul trying to find the airport limousine shuttle. The humidity here is so extreme that Koreans put air conditioning in porta-potties.

Our extreme change in environments in both culture and weather is kind of like a super strong concentration, luckily we have found a diluter....Gossip Girl! Yes, it the perfect nightcap for our adventures and excursions. We retire to our hotel room, sip sochu, and watch another mind numbing episode of the wealthy upper eastsiders. Does V like it more than me? That's a secret I'll never tell.