Cookies

Not just any cookies but GIRL SCOUT cookies! Thin mints are the sh**. Nothing like cheering up your Monday with a package filled with delicious cookies. Thanks mom!

One-way-ticket

V and I need a one-way ticket to Seattle, non-stop, 1-stop, Asiana, Korean Air, whatever. We’re on our way home on August 26th! See you soon! XOXO

synchronized bowing

In Korea, middle school students are trained to bow and say hello to their teachers in the hallway, in the cafeteria, in the bathroom, basically any time their teachers pass them. And although not all of them bow to me (instead they just say "hi", giggle and run away), I've been able to observe the many styles of bowing.

1. The "I have to pee" bow: I've only observed this type of bow with girls. The bower kind of stands like they have to pee with their hands clasped and bows timidly far away from the teacher, usually with their bum sticking out towards a corner.

2. The "Run and Stop" bow: Bower is running like really fast, hair flowing, they see a teacher stop short... and bow. After the bow their off again at top speed. Not to be confused with the "Run while Bowing" bow.

3. The "Flop" bow: A slightly over exaggerated bow, especially effective if the bower has a little longer hair and makes it look like their doing a very short headbang.

4. The "Sychronized" bow: Students standing in a group spot a teacher all at the same time and somehow manage to co-ordinate their annyong haseyos and bows.

5. The "Ham-it-up" bow: I've only seen the boys do this one. The bower stops short whatever he's doing (eating, walking, whatever), clears his throat, puts his hand over his heart, delivers the deepest annyong haseyo and almost scraping his nose on the ground, the deepest bow.

6. The "Ohhhh!" bow: Students often mistake me for a "real" Korean teacher and do a normal annyong haseyo and bow, then halfway through it they realize it's me. They pause, come out of their bow, make a little 'ohhh!' sound, giggle and say 'hello teacher!'.

col-pop, an UnBCombo

As I am now working at a middle school AND and elementary school I now get to experience a whole new teaching world. Among my many new discoveries in elementary school I have found one of the most brillant combos - designed especially for cute, hungry elementary school kids. The 'col-pop' - the 'col' is for cola and the 'pop' is for popcorn chicken. It holds your snack of popcorn chicken and your refreshing drink of cola all in the same container and allows access to both at the same time!

Lucky for me, the class captains' parents often bring these in for students during the first week of school. I've had 2 already this week! And like, the cola is cola - nothing really special, and popcorn chicken is pretty standard....but it's a col-pop. After eating two, the novelty has not worn off yet, it's seriously so clever that have to marvel it everytime I pop a chicken nugget in my mouth and take a sip of cola.

Those unbeatable combinations

The grilled cheese/tomato soup combo is a great, classic, American unbeatable combination. As I've said before tomato soup is hard to come by in Korea - as is cheese. However I have discovered a truly amazing unbeatable combination in Korea: the kimbap + spicy ramen combo. It is akin to the grilled cheese/tomato combo because it has the same sort of dipping theory. Except, instead of dipping the eater takes a huge kimbap piece shoves it into the mouth, chews a little, and then takes a large steaming sip of spicy ramen to help wash it down. Mmmmm. It's the perfect lunch. So, if ever in Korea and in need of a cheap and quick lunch, I recommend any local kimbap nara and ordering the plain ramen (it will most likely be the spicy kind - because I've never seen anything else) and any kind of kimbap (my favorites are the tuna kimbap, ham kimbap, and Tonkatsu kimbap).






*Although I've made kimbap at home, I've found it's much cheaper, easier, and more delicious to seek out the nearest kimbap nara and chow down.

kkotsaemchuwi

Koreans have been telling me about this special season, called kkotsaemchuwi (꽃샘추위). Which basically means winter is jealous of the flowers. 꽃 means flower, 샘 means jealousy/envy, and 추위 means the cold. And what do you know, this morning I wake up to winter's envy, an inch of fresh snow and still snowing.

Homemade Scrabble

On a day during our vacation when it was raining cats a dogs, V and I stayed indoors a made our own scrabble board game. Scrabble in Korea costs like $40...yikes. It took a whole day to make and we've only used it like 4 times, but it was a fun filled day of cutting and pasting.

Step 1: make board with pizza box

Step 2: cut our tiles until your fingers cramp up

Step 3: cut and glue some more

Step 4: beat V at scrabble with words like fungi

Hemmed and ahhhed

One of the best things about Korea that I have experience and also heard other foreigners rave about is Korea's ability to fast-track things. For example, almost all deliveries are one day, restaurants never take more than 5minutes before food is on the table, when you get your haircut TWO people will dry and brush your hair to minimize your time in the salon, garbage pick up is three days a week, to get from one end of the country to the next on the KTX takes less than four hours. Koreans really know their efficiency.

Anyway, one of my most recent encounters with Korean fast-track was at the department store called Shinsegae. I went to the Levi's store and tried on a pair a jeans, they were a little too long. So, the sales woman pinned them and offered to have them "cut" (hemmed). Why not? She asked me for my phone number and name and she told me she would call me in 40 minutes when they were finished. 40 minutes!!! And it was free!!! I mean Nordstrom won't even hem my jeans for free and it usually takes a few days. So, I go to kill some time by shopping a little more, and she calls me 25 minutes later to tell me they're finished. WOW! They must have a little old lady working in the back hemming jeans like a maniac... at least that's what I picture. How was the 25 minute hemming job, you ask? It was like they were straight from the manufacturer - perfect. See for yourself. Please excuse the lame house slippers.

catsup

Ko Lanta:

We took the train, two ferries and a van ride from Bangkok to the small Island of Ko Lanta. We found ourselves on an island filled with Swedish, Finnish and German families. Ko Lanta was beautiful and incredibly relaxing. I followed a grandma-like schedule : getting up really early in the morning to catch the free breakfast, read corny novels on the beach, slathered 50spf sunscreen on myself religiously (because seriously who wants wrinkly, sun spotted skin), ate dinner before 6pm, and went to bed around 9pm…I was kind of boring.

It wasn't all boring we managed to find a few things to do while in Ko Lanta. We rented a small scooter bike that ended up running out of gas in the middle of nowhere because the gas gauge was broken (curse you lady who rented it to us and said it was 1/2 full) – V drove it most of the time – for some reason I had a hard time braking. We went spelunking in a cave and saw some bats and a huge, fake spider the guide had rigged to scare tourists. Ate lots of fresh seafood and drank fruit smoothies. We took a cooking class and made a spicy, chicken salad, spring rolls, green curry, and sticky rice with coconut and mango. Swam in the ocean and in our hotel pool. Rode bicycles around the island until I refused to ride any more in the 90 degree weather. Drank some smoothies. Went to a hippy bar and drank some Chang beer.

Ko Lanta is very low-key and has really beautiful beaches. Even though it was peak season we often found ourselves alone on a stretch of beach. The locals were all very friendly and the accommodations were inexpensive and very nice. We stayed in bungalows that had small resort areas – pools, restaurant, rentals, etc. Ahhhhhh if only we were there now.

view from our resort's restaurant

spelunking

Thai Cookery School

one of our bangalows

After our 36hour airport adventure back to Korea we had about 36 hours to do some laundry, repack our bags and sleep until we left for Japan.

My school invited V and I on a 4 day trip to Japan sans students - only the teachers and administrative staff.

Summary:
- we took a long, overnight, ferry ride to Japan
- got our tangerine quarantined
- visited like a hundred castles, palaces, and temples
- ate some sushi
- went shopping
- drank some asahi
- rode the ferry home
- V entered a karaoke contest and won 2nd prize
- slept all the way home on the bus

The trip was fun and jam packed. You know those Asian tour groups you sometimes see on the UW campus or at famous landmarks - we were those Asians. Snapping pictures and posing with two fingers we were almost exactly the stereotypical Asian tour group, except we didn't have matching outfits. We might make fun of tour groups like this but I really underestimated them - we visited a 3 temples, one castle and toured a Japanese village all before lunchtime...

Anyway, it was a once in a lifetime experience one of these days we'll go back to Japan to visit it at slower pace.

ferry ride

tangerine quarantine

photo op

sushiiii