Settling in

So I've been here just over a week, and had two full days at school.

I have to say so far it's been awesome.

I live in a great area. Though it's the 10th most expensive area in the world, there's affordable alternatives, such as 24 kimbop shops, and enough 7-11's that you'd think Korea invented them. I'm right next to a subway station that's pretty central, and a ton of bus stops that will take me anywhere the subway won't.

A mosaic in Apgujeong Station

I've had things to do every night for the past week. I've been able to see several of my friends that I hadn't seen in ages, mostly because they'd all moved to Seoul and were now quite a trek away.

My apartment could be better, but it's not bad. It's the smallest and least furnished of any place I've lived or seen in Korea. I was given a bed, table, two chairs, a tv, and a fridge. You'd be surprised at how much more "stuff" you need beyond this. I've been living without a lot of "stuff" for a year, but I didn't realize how much of it had simply been handed to me. I used it, but it didn't really belong to me, so I didn't consider it as part of my stock of "things", like dishes, pots and pans; horizontal space (like a desk for my computer), or even garbage cans!

My living area - just about everything you need within arms reach!

My kitchen - I covered some old mis-matched wallpaper that had been taped up with the checkerboard.

The job itself so far seems to be pretty straightforward. I have a decent amount of downtime during the day to grade papers or do lesson plans, and most of the lessons are supplied for me. Some things I'll have to do on my own, and this will probably end up taking more time than I'm spending now, but I expect that as par for the course.

Me introducing myself to the 7-year-old classes at Spirit Day on Friday.

My kids are good for the most part. I've only had them for two days, and they already know my three rules by heart, and are excited about the rewards program that I started (just a sticker chart with the promise of a treasure box dive for anyone that fills in their board). I've got some kids that always know the answer, so getting the quiet ones to answer is probably going to be the trickiest part. I've got one boy that's, well, quite verbal. He managed to earn three stickers today, and then subsequently lose not only all of the stickers but his sticker board as well. Luckily he had an after-school class, so I was able to sit down one-on-one and talk to him about what happened, and what he can do tomorrow and in the future so he doesn't lose anymore stickers. We shall see if he remembers.

Tonight I headed out straight from work into the heart of Gangnam. I've been on the hunt for sheets for a week. My school said they would supply me with sheets, but it seems as though the Korean definition of sheets does not equal the western one (i.e. there are no top sheets, only fitted sheets - if the store even sells them at all). I thought I'd try the COEX mall, thinking it was a possibility albeit a slim one. I didn't find any stores that might possibly sell bedding supplies, but I did happen upon a great water/light/music show as I was leaving the mall.

A light and water show set to music at Samsung Station in Gangnam.

I enjoyed watching the show, taking pictures, watching people watch the show, and just being there in general. I couldn't help but think that this was the sort of thing I'd been missing out on by living so far out of the city - things you just can't see during the day or on a weekend.

Don't count your octopi before they've spawned

I don't even know if what octopi do is called spawning, but I thought it more appropriate than chickens.

I have a job. And I am UBER excited about it. But I haven't actually signed the contract yet. I do that tomorrow.

I've been wresting over this whole job things for about two months now. I thought I had found the perfect company to work for (Poly School), and that was going to pay me loads of money. And then I found myself playing the waiting game with them. And THEN they said two positions had opened, but they were .4 million less than what was originally offered, and they were night classes. So I kept looking for another job, kept taking phone interviews and going to interviews in person, always turning down offers because they didn't feel right. I thought they didn't feel right because I was just waiting for this high-end school to tell me they had a position open.

And then, as I was searching the job offers on an ESL board, I came across an ad for a gifted and talented school for 2.7million won per month in Apgujeong, which is part of Seoul. And my heart skipped a beat. I LOVE teaching gifted. I started my Masters in gifted, and if it hadn't been for the less than ideal circumstances, I may have even completed it. I was in the gifted program as long as I was allowed, until I entered IB. My mother has been teaching it for most or all of her career. The funny thing about this posting was that I had already sent an e-mail to the same address asking about another position within the company, and had never heard anything back. So I didn't really have high hopes for this one.

But then I got phone call from the school, asking me to come in for an in-person interview around 5 or 6pm. I told them that I was pretty far away, and since my school ended late I wouldn't be able to get to the school until 8pm. She told me she didn't mind waiting at all, and was eager to meet me. And then. And THEN I got the pictures.

Pictures of the school.





Work samples.


The kids.



And then I allowed myself a little bit more excitement. This was exactly kind of environment I had wanted to teach in back home.

So last week I asked my director if I could leave after my last class today (3:45) instead of at 6pm for an interview, and she nicely said yes. And as I am ever tied to my computer, I checked my e-mail at 3:50 as I was walking out the door.






I hadn't heard from the Poly School in almost three weeks. And there, just as I was about to leave for an interview, was an e-mail, offering me a job in a good area in Seoul for 3.0million per month for morning/afternoon classes.

I felt like I was being tried or tested by someone. Here I was, ready to discount the Poly School altogether and try to decide between the public school position (which still hasn't contacted me with a decision) and this gifted school which so far seemed to be right up my ally, and they send me an offer that was, on the surface, much better than this gifted school I was going for. I was quite frustrated at having yet another school to add to my decision list, but I sent a quick response to the e-mail saying I was interested and asking a question about the location before heading off to the interview.

I got to the school around 6, and was asked to wait in a small room outside the office since the principal was on the phone when I arrived. The walls were covered in both student work and certificates that the principal had received, as well as research papers (in English) on how to work with gifted students, differentiated curriculum, and other terms that had almost completely left my vocabulary since I stopped teaching back in the states. There were even certificates of attendance for the past 4 years to the CAG (California Association for the Gifted) conference, the last of which was attended in Feb 2009. After staring at this wall, I realized that this school was where I wanted to be, and I knew with certain peace that not only would I love the job here, but that they would offer it to me and I would accept it without thought of the other positions I had as a possibility.

The interview lasted almost an hour. It was more of us talking than an actual interview. She explained a lot about the school, and the more she talked, the bigger my smile got. Everything struck a chord with me, even down to the names of the classrooms (I'll be teaching Sapphire class). The school feels that each child is a gem, and when they enter the school, they have been mined from the earth, and that each day spent in the school is a cutting and polishing of a rare stone. (I'm sorry - how awesome is that??). I'll get to do science experiments, theme units, current events, and I'll get to continue my penpals for another year. Shortly before I left, she asked me officially if I wanted the job, and I replied absolutely that I did. She asked me twice if I promised I would accept, as she would stop looking for a teacher for the position now that she had interviewed me.

The teacher that's leaving's contract ends the third of August. She wanted me to come a few weeks before that so I could shadow and train, but I told her it was impossible because of my family reunion at the end of July. So at this point, she wants me to start the first week in August, which means it'll be crunch time getting all my documents ready and sent as soon as I get back home so I can get a visa number before my position is supposed to start. This also means I'll only be in Florida for a little over two weeks total before I go back to Korea.

So... this also means that all the blogging I've been meaning to do (I've had a draft blog up for two weeks of the second leg of my weekend trip that I've uploaded all the pictures for but haven't finished writing about) is probably not going to get done. I'll do my best, but it seems that the longer I stay here, the busier I get, and I have less time to actually write about all the stuff I spend my time doing.

And seeing as how it's 1:22am and I have work tomorrow, I will now say goodnight. 잘자요

Lotus Lantern Festival

This year Buddha's Birthday fell on a Saturday. It's a big deal in Korea, and had it fallen on a weekday, it would have been a day off for most Koreans. The celebration begins a few weeks earlier with people all over the country hanging lotus lanterns in the city, and especially near Buddhist temples, to remind people that it's coming. There is a Lotus Lantern Festival the weekend before, which I attended with several of my friends.

The main event for the festival was on Sunday April 26th, so I canceled my Korean class for the week and headed out late Sunday morning for Seoul. I had planned to meet up with friends later in the afternoon, but I got there around noon, so I wandered around to look at the area by myself.

A mass of lanterns in Tapgol Park in Insadong, in front of the remains of the Wongak Temple.

I wandered through Tapgol Park, and discovered that the station I got off at was an easy walk to Insadong - the ancient cultural tourist trap where I purchased all my traditional Christmas presents last year. I came across some ajumas making mini lotus lanterns for donations.

The ajumas hard at work making mini lanterns outside Tapgol park.

There was a woman standing near the ajumas, trying to get people to buy the lanterns for only 1000 won (about a dollar). She pointed to the sign that she had written, which said something to the effect of "meals will provide to men are old". I was able to tell the woman, in Korean, that I understood what she was asking for, but that her sign didn't make sense in English. So I offered to write her a new one. I wanted to write something along the lines of "The donations you give to purchase a lantern will go towards purchasing meals for older men", but it was too far away from the original sign. So this is what she ended up with:

Photo courtesy of a Chris Chien, who I didn't see at all that day, but who saw my sign later on that day and thought it was awesome enough to take a picture of.

She seemed very pleased, and after I gave her 1000 won for a lantern, she gave me another for free as a thank you. At this point I headed back to the subway station to meet up with Kathryn. Kathryn and I chatted over chaumchi-kimchi-jiggae (tuna and kimchi stew - yummy!) in the Jongno area.

Kathryn took a picture of me in Topgol park with my two lanterns, which I later lost.

I took Kathryn through the same areas I had been, and we went through Insadong as well. We had forgotten it was the Hi Seoul Festival as well, and we came across these lovely dancers, who broke out into dance in the middle of the very crowded street:

And right after the dancing, I ran into one of my students from my morning classes and his mom. She spoke no English at all, and he knew no English two months ago when he started, so communication was rather difficult. I had to explain to the rather worried looking mother that I was his English teacher, and not just some random foreigner talking to her son. She indicated with her hand for us (myself and Kathryn) to follow her, and then she proceeded to walk away, without a glance back to see if we were following, or even if her son was still with her. She ended up buying us a box each of some traditional Korean spun sugar candy (that I also lost later on in the evening), but it was a good distance away from where we had been and the whole time Kathryn and I were watching her son to make sure he didn't wander off and wondering where she was taking us, and even if she had meant for us to follow.

Little wooden statue men in Insadong. They're traditional, and I have no idea why.

After wandering around we went for coffee, but apparently it hit Kathryn wrong and she said she needed to go home just as James and Dayna got to the station to meet us. So James, Dayna and I went to look at the festival.

The first part we saw was an area with a bunch of tents that had everything from grinding your own coffee, to painting hanji paper crafts and meditating with monks.

Well-Being is Korea's version of the health craze. This is Well-Being Yoga. With plates.

Dayna talking about fair trade practices while grinding her own coffee.

The coolest version of double dutch I've ever seen. Look closely, and you can see the ropes form a cross that the person is jumping over. So you need 4 people to hold the ropes instead of just 2.

The penultimate Jenga game.

After wandering through the street of tents and such, we ended up at Jogyesa, which is the largest Buddhist shrine in Seoul and the headquarters of the Jogye sect.

The entrance to Jogyesa, which was overly adorned with lanterns. We thought they might have spelled something with the colors, but we couldn't tell for sure.

More lanterns just inside the entrance, with the seven-tired pagoda in the background to the left of the tree.

How can you take a scolding seriously when your mom is wearing a lotus on her head?

The white lanterns are hung for relatives or friends who have passed on.

The architecture of the temple was amazing- even the doors were beautiful.

A happy Buddha statue at the temple, seemingly asking you for money.

We stayed at the temple for a while, and watched a performance with dancers from the traditional Hahoe masked dance, though it wasn't the original dance itself but rather just the characters from it. After the dancing we met up with some other friends, who had just had dinner. We recommended to them that they watch the performance, and then Dayna, James and I went to get something to eat.

Girls in Hanbok, traditional Korean clothing, waiting for something.

James knew a small place in a back alley in Insadong that served home-made mandu (dumplings) that was delicious.

My favorite Korean food - steamed mandu.

After dinner we headed back to the main street by the Jongno subway station, which is where the lotus lantern parade was to be held.

Lining up waiting to start the parade

It started drizzling right around this time, and since the sun was going down it got rather chilly as well. We decided to move from where we were to get a better view, so we switched to the other side of the street. And before we saw anything, we heard this:

The parade was fascinating. I sat next to James the entire two hours, and we talked about all the different floats, people, and just random weird stuff that kept passing by us. After the parade was over, we headed to the subway to go home, at which point I realized I'd left my bag with my lanterns, my candy, and my brochures under my seat by the parade route. But it was late, I was cold, and I just wanted to go home, so I didn't go back for them.

Here are the photographic and video highlights from the parade:

I tried to catch the peacock on film while it was breathing fire, but it didn't want to cooperate.

Up and coming events and such...

It's amazing how quickly my life here went from rather boring day-to-day (though granted fascinating on the weekends), to a rather full and scheduled existence. I now have plans 5 days a week - Sunday through Thursday I have something scheduled to do after work, from meeting with friends to Korean lessons. And of course on Friday and Saturday I'm usually with friends out and about in Seoul or Uijeongbu (not Oingo-Boingo!). This week/weekend will be no different - I had a lesson this evening, I go into Seoul tomorrow for my movie night, Wednesday is lunch with friends, Thursday is another lesson, and then this Saturday starts the Yeiodo Cherry Blossom Festival. I'll probably end up going into Seoul on Saturday morning, taking tons of pictures, meeting some friends that moved to Seoul for lunch, and then on to a rooftop party elsewhere in Seoul to see some people I haven't seen since the last rooftop party in October. And of course I have to be back home by Sunday night for another Korean lesson.

I'm also making small preparations to come back home. I'm looking into other jobs in Seoul to come back to in August or September (I've found a possible one that I'm praying I get - it's everything I wanted in a new job and the pay is amazing!), and trying to set dates and such for coming back. The current plan is to leave Korea at the end of June and be in the States around June 27th or 28th and fly into Georgia since my parents will be there for the summer. So any friends who may live in the Raleigh/Durham area - make a note on your calendar - I'd love to see you again! And then it's back down to Florida for a Bahamas cruise with the family, and catching up with friends in Tampa, Gainesville and Boca before it's time to fly back to the ROK.

A very accurate view of life as a foreigner in Korea - those pizza guys go 90mph on the sidewalk when the road is completely empty.

What did you do with your weekend?

A few of my friends are leaving the Uijeongbu area within the next two weeks, and it's customary to do a "last night out" for ex-pats who are leaving. Emily-Jane is moving back to Canada after being here for three years, and Kathryn and Gary are moving into Seoul after having been in the Uijeongbu area for about a year and a half. So it was decided at Wednesday night dinner that we would go out for drinks and such on Friday night. At first it was just the four of us, but we were joined later by Chris and Stephanie. We decided to stay in Uijeongbu (thankfully, as I was really tired), and ended up bar hopping.

We started out at Tom's Ville, partially because Kathryn had never been there. I'd been there many times but wasn't thrilled with it, partially because they play the (bad) music so loud that you can't hear the person right next to you, and mostly because it's frequented by US military boys. After one drink, we moved outside, and saw a bar none of us had ever been to, called Mia's Western Bar (anything that says bar in English is usually a good sign).

Me, Kathryn, and Chris at Mia's Bar

I now think of that bar as Mickey's bar. One of the bartenders there was very... boisterous, and told us his name was Mickey - pointing at his shirt as he did so.

After that we headed to Garten Beer, or Beer Garden. They have the single, double, and triple beer glasses with chilled lit-up holes in the table to keep the beer from getting warm. I discovered some of the led holes actually had writing in them:

After Beer Garden, we went to Mix bar, a familiar place that has Jenga and a few other amusing bar games you can play (like a little shark that randomly snaps down on you when you press its teeth). At this point it was around 3am, so everyone decided to call it a night, and Chris and I split a taxi home, since the buses stop running at midnight.

Stephanie had mentioned to me that she was going to see an art exhibit in Seoul on Sunday and asked if I wanted to come along. There was a Baroque exhibit at an art gallery - I can't remember the name of the place. We looked around at the exhibit for a while, and then went exploring a bit in Seoul, which I hadn't really done since the weather got cold.

I can pretend to be one of the Three Graces, but I don't think anyone would be fooled.

The main artist on display was Rubens, a Flemish baroque painter.

Stephanie was as confused by the cute cartoon dog in the museum as I was.

He's just too cute to belong in a Baroque exhibit.

Street chestnuts being cooked by rolling them around in hot gravel. Not at all tasty.

A weird shell-cone thing in Jonggak surrounded by police buses.

The Cheonggye Stream, with the cone thing in the background being guarded by more police.

Another view of the stream. I can't wait till it gets warmer so I can come here to read on the weekends.

The police were out en-force this weekend. Apparently this area is where they hang out. I've seen them lined up with riot gear before, but never so many at once (this was just a few of them).

Old and new can co-exist rather well.

The Samsung Jongno Tower in Insadong

Piano street. Apparently it's like the piano in big, and it lights up and makes music, but it wasn't plugged in that night.

Afterwards we ended up in Insadong. We went to a vegetarian restaurant, then coffee, then home.

Monks eating at the table next to us at the vegetarian restaurant in Insadong.

A large white bird sculpture in a bakery. No reason. Just because.

Stephanie's White Swiss Chocolate, and my Mocha Latte. I thought the place was called Live Free - it's actually Lime Tree.