There are three things I like in this life...

...to paraphrase Liz Lemon in the Season 5 opener of 30 Rock. One most certainly is sweater weather.

It seems like I got back from Jeju, and the weather decided immediately to switch over to fall (PS opinions on this matter from Alaskans do not count)...the last couple days, it's been pleasantly cool in the mornings, a welcome change from the months of dripping sweat on my way to and from school. This morning, it was in the forties, so I decided to break out the sweaters again! Woo!

Of course, it'll be up near 70 this afternoon, so I will regret wearing a sweater. BUT I DON'T EVEN CARE RIGHT NOW. I AM WEARING A SWEATER AND IT IS SO GOOD.

Sweaters really do make everything feel better. It's like a hug from an old friend that lasts for 3-6 months, and I love them. I love them so much. Even when Korea is getting me down (say, because cheese is so expensive and crappy here, or because my school has decided to take away my overtime while still insisting I work my 11 afterschool assache classes), sweater weather really brings me back up again.

It's cloudy, chilly, and I'm sitting in my icebox classroom with a mug of green tea and a piece of Jeju chocolate. Life is pretty okay right now.

School's out for the summer!

Well, almost anyway. But for me, I only have one more day of teaching, and then it's off to America for a wedding (not mine, of course). And I'm pretty excited about that. Even though this semester has only been about 5 months long, it's seemed MUCH longer than that. It feels like an eon of attempting to corral kids who don't speak English and just want to play; of repeating the same damn sentence 8000 times with the kids and then getting stunned silence when they are asked to reproduce it on their own; of being shocked at the English they know; of actually realizing that it's not that they don't know English - they just don't want to talk in class; of being frustrated with administration; of ultimately enjoying (most) of this job. But you guys, I'm ready for a break.

Not that I'll have much of one! I will basically arrive in America and hit the ground running. AND I'll only be there for a week, which is not enough time by far for the amount of travel time it'll take. And then I come back to Korea and - SUMMER CAMP. Summer camp, for the uninitiated, is a little different here in the ROK. It's not the fun, lazy days involving crafts and swimming and campfire songs and all those other horrible things from our childhood.

This is not summer camp in Korea.

No, summer camp here is an entirely different animal. Korean summer camp = school. Yes, that's right. Just when they thought they could have a break from all the school they have during the normal year, what do they  get? MORE SCHOOL!!!

This is Korean summer camp. Please ignore the implicit racism of me using a photo 

of Chinese children. I couldn't find a good one of Koreans.

Yep, summer camp here = school. Poor things. Same thing in winter, too. Fortunately for them, their camps are usually only a week long (though many of them will also go to academy/hagwon in the summer for double classes. If you know a hagwon teacher, ask them about their summer schedule! It SUCKS). Unfortunately for me, I get to teach the same lessons 4 weeks in a row! Hurray!

So I am busy with the end of my semester, trying to regain my focus for teaching, and making worksheets. I just finished a powerpoint presentation on Shapes and Colors using Bauhaus/Neoplasticism art. I am REALLY excited for this. Because I am a giant nerd.

The other thing I am doing for summer camp (and hopefully next semester as well) to ensure my success is actually planning ahead. I want to have worksheets ready and powerpoints done so that I can be relaxed and at ease in the classroom. I want to plan some games for the students to play so they will have more fun in my classroom - apparently I am just not fun enough. The good news, though, is that I think I've got some good plans that should be relatively easy to implement. Also, the fall semester is about a month shorter than the spring semester (September - Christmas as opposed to March 1 to the end of July). And after the fall semester, is winter break! 6 glorious weeks of downtime (aka winter camp and vacation). Hurray!

So I suppose this is a much more update-y post than you've become accustomed to. But it's what you're getting this time, so enjoy!

I MADE DINOSAUR SOAP

One of the bizarre perks of this job are the random trips you get/are forced to take with other English teachers. This leads to large groups of (largely white) English teachers roaming the Korean countryside awkwardly, generally having adventures. Take yesterday, for example. Yesterday, all the teachers in Osan and Hwaseong were pulled out of classes for the day to take a bus tour of some Historical Points of Interest that Should Not Be Missed in Hwaseong-si. These included the tomb of King Jangjo and Queen Hyoui, a memorial to the Jeam-ri massacre of 1919 (by the Japanese occupation, of course), and a visit to a soap-making herb garden.


Yes that's right. I got paid yesterday to take a field trip to go make some soap. Aren't you jealous?

Naturally, the soap-making was turned into a contest to see who could sculpt the best soap. Can you guess who won? It was not me! But shockingly, for those of you who recall how much I HATE arts and crafts, I took second place! By crafting a surprisingly good dinosaur. LOOK AT HIM IN ALL HIS MAJESTY!!!!

So majestic.

H

He is from Jurassic Park! Probably!

RAWR!

New dinosaur home

And now for the dilemma: So I have this really awesome soap dinosaur residing in my bathroom, generally threatening to eat the faces off of my enemies, and he needs a name. So I am going to ask you, fair blog reader(s, though that may be a little hopeful), to help me choose a name!

VOTE VOTE VOTE VOTE VOTE!!!!

Or you can just leave a comment. Whatever, loser.

Bees: nature's violent killing machines.

I am being completely serious. There are not many things in this world that really scare me, but bees are ABSOLUTELY one of them.Sharks? Not a problem. Get me a cage and let's go diving. Dinosaurs? Sign me up for a trip to Jurassic Park. But bees? ABSOLUTELY NOT.

I have always had a problem with bees, ever since I can remember. I recall going on a picnic with my school in elementary (and this must have been early elementary, since this happened in Oklahoma), and a bee landed on my back. I was so terrified, I couldn't do anything! Well, that's a lie. I could do two things: I could do a nearly-perfect imitation of a statue, and I could weep softly. I was rull good at that.

You would think that things would change as I grew older and more worldly. YOU WOULD BE WRONG. So very wrong. Way back in 2005, when I was a freshman in college and our campus was still infested with bumble bees. I was walking back to my dorm room from class one lovely spring afternoon, when all of a sudden I looked up...and there it was.

The Bee.

Not just any bee, mind you, but the BIGGEST EFFING BEE I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE. It was flying in a doorway, lazily roaming about the place, trying to make sure no college freshmen crossed its deceptively wan path. I thought to myself, "ya know? I've had a good run. I bet I can get around this monstrous leviathan." So I stupidly attempted to duck to one side of the bee, but sensing my moves, it swung to the left to block my path. I was NOT going to be bested by a bee, so I tried to maneuver to the right, but the bee was too wily for my tactics, and blocked me again. Not to be outdone, I tried a right-left fake, but the bee was just too good. Defeated, I slunk off to walk the long path around to my dorm.

And yes, I am aware that bumbled bees do not sting. THAT WE KNOW OF. Probably anyone who's ever been stung by them has just vanished into a puff of terror and pain.

My bee troubles don't end there. After several years without a significant encounter with one of God's Stinging Menaces, I moved to Korea about 4 months ago. I knew there would be difficulties associated with a new country, new language, and new customs. But one thing I did NOT expect was a sudden resurgence in my life of BEES and their various Evil Stinging Counterparts (wasps, yellow jackets, hornets, Satan, etc). One day recently, I was in class teaching some elementary students, as is my wont, when a bee decided it would make our classroom its new home. I, blissfully, did not notice it immediately, and was alerted to its presence by a student shouting "Teachuh! Teachuh! Buttahfry!" I looked up, expecting a lovely butterfly to be flitting about the room, but ABSOLUTELY NOT. It, of course, was a terrifying bee, lurking about the fan, trying to decide which one of us to murder.

"OH HELL TO THE NAW!" I exclaimed. "You need to get the HELL out of my classroom, bee!" I pleaded with the bee to quietly exit the classroom, but to no avail. The bee was intent on remaining. I was in the process of mentally deciding which child to sacrifice as a peace offering to our new Bee Overlord (yes, Dahae looks pudgy and delicious!), when one of the students stood up on the desk, and with ice in his veins and nerves of steel, bravely shooed the bee outside. Crisis over.

But it's not just my kids I routinely embarrass myself in front of. I also gave a glimpse of my ridiculous fears to my coworkers while we were hiking a few weeks ago. My coteacher and I were lagging behind with a few other teachers, enjoying the scenery, when one of them spotted a woman selling honey. Delicious! I love honey, with absolutely no trace of irony whatsoever! So we decided to go check out her wares. I got about ten feet when I heard the sound. The evil sound. The buzzing of a thousand bees no doubt plotting the destruction of humanity for our wicked ways. With terror in my eyes, I begged off, insisting that I would stay and wait for them to return (if, indeed, they ever would return). Concerned, my coteacher asked me what was wrong, and I was forced to admit that I was indeed terrified of the creatures lurking just atop the hill. Probably controlling the poor honey woman (whose skull has likely been converted to a beehive in which they store their evil queen), luring unsuspecting hikers to their certain doom.

I'm not sure how much of my legitimate concern was lost in translation, because my coteacher gave me a look like I was some crazy escapee from One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.

Those of you who know me know that if I am anything, I am a respect-commanding figure. And I think you can see from the photos in this blog what a truly intimidating person I am. But there is nothing - NOTHING - in this world that will strike paralyzing fear and induce such paranoia in me as those effortless murder-bugs, the bees.

Except commitment. AMIRITE, LADIES??

PS apologies to Josh, who just wrote a similar post, and Meg, who will write it shortly. We were all having the same conversation/devising a bee-emergency action plan together.

It's Canada Day!

Today is Canada Day! Happy Canada Day to all Canadians.

I'm going to avoid too much snark here, because I am a Sensitive New Age Guy who Respects Other People's Cultures. I will just add, though, that if you see these guys (jeez could I pimp their blog any more???), please sing to them a rousing rendition of O, Canada. It annoys the hell out of them. Especially her. I don't know why. I think Canada maybe murdered her parents or her beagles once.

Anyway, that really has nothing to do with anything, except to mark the four-month-iversary of when I first left America to embark on the journey called Teaching the Children. And it's been...well...a journey. I've gone through periods where I hate my job and periods where I love my job, and as I finish up my last lesson plans for the semester, I have to say I'm pretty impressed I got through it at all.

I'm just that awesome.

I mean, really. 4 months in a COMPLETELY foreign country, starting out knowing NOBODY? C'mon. You're impressed that I managed to survive AND STILL TEACH CHILDREN. Nevermind that literally thousands of other people do this all the time.

So I'm a third of the way through the year, and the weird thing is I feel...nothing. Well, nothing in particular aside from OH GOOD LORD WHY WON'T THE SEMESTER END YET??? (I am as antsy as my kids are). I don't feel particularly accomplished, nor do I feel excitement at my 4 month-iversary. Probably because 4 months is the LAMEST THING TO CELEBRATE EVER (looking at you, obnoxious couples), but also because I think I'm getting into a routine here. Get up, go to work, teach, hang out with friends, blog about it.

Holy crap I am every other 20something out there. GO ME.

Yikes this is not the greatest blog post ever. And it occurs to me that I have no real way to end it. So...here is a video of some dancing robots.




Shaking & crying.

Ridiculous

Yesterday, I was given a cucumber.

No special occasion, I was just leaving school yesterday and one of my coworkers came up to me, handed me a cucumber and said "for you". Which...yay? I was just thinking the other day that I needed to introduce more fruits and vegetables into my diet. And I do rather like cucumbers. But I am pretty sure this is the first time I have ever been given one as a gift.

My life here is pretty...well, ridiculous. Recently, a friend of mine asked me how life was here in Korea, to which responded "ridiculous as normal." I didn't mean this in a necessarily negative sense, though. It's more like...standard? I guess? Like someone gives me a cucumber for a gift, or I see an old ajosshi peeing on a street corner and now my brain goes "oh yes, that is the expectedly ridiculous Korea. This is perfectly normal."

*I should pause here to note that really, ALL cultures have their ridiculousness. Because humans are ridiculous creatures. You just don't necessarily notice how ridiculous your own culture is, because it seems perfectly normal to you - after all, it's what you've known your whole life.

Back to the story, though. I think this acceptance of the ridiculous is part of becoming more integrated to my surroundings. Which is a good thing! But sometimes, things just stand out.

Last week, as I was coming back to my househome from an evening jog along the river, I was walking in front of this middle aged guy, listening to my music. Now I'm not really sure what happened, but all of a sudden I felt something wet hit my leg. I briefly lost my stride, PRAYING that it was rain, or maybe even bird crap, but no. Of course it wouldn't be.

I had been spat on.

It didn't connect right away. I wasn't exactly expecting to be spit on just at that moment in time. I mean, really! Who (aside from possibly teevee star New York) would expect that?? So I didn't check my leg until I got to the streetlight to confirm my worse fears. I looked back, but the culprit, whoever he was, had gone.

I'd like to believe that it was an accident, a tragic byproduct of the excessive (and SERIOUSLY nasty) spitting culture here. But maybe not. Maybe I had done something to piss the guy off. Regardless, you'd better believe that if I had immediately recognized the loogie for what it was, I would have turned around and let holy hell loose on this guy. I REALLY wanted to have gone all VH1 reality star on this jackass...and not the juiced up testosterone gorilla alpha male kind. I'm talking about the weave-snatchin', nail-clawin', cat-fightin', brawlin' Classy Ladies they showcase on their Sophisticated Entertainment Programs. I think New York would have been proud.


Caution parents: The following video contains language not suitable for minors. Also some crazy-ass bitchez up in heah.




You $#@(*&%@^&@in' wh*re! You put your @#$(in' fingers in my face?? You spit in my $&%*#$&%*in' hair???

PS sorry for the formatting, but I am just not talented enough. Tom, if you want to help feel free.

Doctor Who? Doctor FISH!

OH MY GOSH IT'S BEEN LIKE 4 DAYS SINCE I POSTED I AM SO SORRY GUYS!!!!


To make up for it, here is a post about a gross thing I did (AND I LIKED IT!):


Every once in a while, we all just need a bit of pampering. Some of us want to watch a day-long marathon of Golden Girls, some of us want to read a book, and some of us want to get our feet eaten by fish.


Wait, what?


You heard me! Can't you read?? Well Capt. Illiterate, let me spell it out for you: there is a new spa treatment taking Asia by storm called Doctor Fish. Basically, they take these small fish, put them in a pool of water, and then you stick your feet in there. And the fish eat off all the dead skin. It is simultaneously horrific and awesome. And I did it this weekend! Totally randomly, too...I had no plans to have organisms consume any part of me, but sometimes things just work out that way. 

So without further ado, here are some pictures of me being eaten alive.

This feels like a Bond movie.

So when we got there, there were a few people already in the pool...and the whole thing had this terrible air of inevitability, like when James Bond is being lowered into a lagoon filled with sharks by whichever evil S.P.E.C.T.R.E. henchman is doing it at the time. I was about to willingly let myself be consumed by tiny sea monsters. So, steeling myself with thoughts of Bond, I took the (six-inch-deep) plunge.

 

Oh crap! Here they come!!!

The first couple of bites were the worst...so shocking. So unpleasant. And I could watch it all happen. I imagine this is what shark attack victims feel like during the process of their attack.

 Clearly I am delicious to demon sea-monster-fish

And then the swarm came. Like lions to a weak gazelle, the fish just kept coming. In droves. It was not long until most of my feet were covered. The above photo is only representative of about halfway there.

  WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME????

I think this an appropriate face to have made. It actually felt okay after a while, just like having put my feet in seriously bubbly water. Until I looked down. And realized THAT MY FEET WERE BEING EATEN WTF IS WRONG WITH ME???

 Most delicious feet ever.

You should have seen how delicious the fish thought my feet were. I suppose technically you can see above. All the fishes loved my feet WAY more than the other feet in the pool. Which was just fantastic.

  The result.

Was it worth it? I'm not sure...it was weird, but also awesome. And it was mostly effective...I think one or two more treatments would do my feet some serious good. We'll see.

Young Love in the English Room

Today was not shaping up to be the greatest of days. The day dawned cloudy (though that might have been the thick layer of pollution) and seriously humid for about the fourth day in a row. Another day of threatening rain, but receiving none; one of those days where the atmosphere is pregnant with expectation and everyone seems just a little thrown off. Add to that the serious loss of South Korea to Argentina and my continued struggles to transfer money back to America, and I was in a very unpleasant mood. I wasn't snapping at people, more a general lethargy combined with a scowling depression. 

The morning didn't go particularly well, either. The atmosphere in the classroom was leaden from the humidity, lack of circulation and general disappointment, and it seemed like pulling teeth to get my students to participate in anything. But trudge on we did, and I made the decision to skip my lunch and try once and for all to do something about my money transferring problems.

One of the scarier parts of that particular issue was the fact that I had been carrying around 3,000,000 won in cash with me for about a day - yesterday I had tried to transfer the money, but was handed the cash from my bank and told "We can't wire money overseas here. Try the other bank next door". So I went there, and thinking my ARC would be better than my passport (we had to have our passport to get the ARC, after all), did not bring my passport. Of course the one thing I actually needed was my passport. So stuck with nearly $2500 in cash, in my bag, I raced home assuming every passing stranger was secretly a bandit who could smell the money and terror on me and would rob me in an instant.

So no lunch. Which did not help my mood any - I am a VERY unpleasant person when I skip meals, as many people who have ever known me can attest. Instead, I tried in vain to find a cab, walking most of the way to the bank before one would stop for me. Now I know what minorities in New York City feel like. But I got there, sticky-sweaty mess that I was, and got the money wired. Which was a huge relief. I picked up a sangwich and found a cab and headed back to school for my afternoon classes.

Which actually turned out to be a pretty decent part of the day. It was as if someone had flipped a switch - the kids were energetic, probably too energetic. My second class of the afternoon proved VERY difficult to control. But my second class of the afternoon also has my favorite students - namely, Goatcheese.

Now his name isn't actually Goatcheese. It's Gum Gongmin. But I call him Goatcheese. Not to his face! But when I am talking about him to friends. He's my favorite student, and I think I am one of his favorite teachers - he's basically a small anime character come to life. Every time I see him, it's "Hi Teacher!" and some sort of attack (the other day he tried to knock me over with a bear hug). When he came into class today, though, he was SO EXCITED to tell me about the result of his math test. He'd gotten a 100! I was seriously proud of him, even though I have never talked to him about math, and probably would have ruined his perfect score if I had.

But what made this especially exciting for me was that he was clearly excited to tell ME about it. I felt like Sally Field winning her second Oscar for Places in the Heart. You like me, you really like me! That was such a cool feeling.

AND THEN. He was equally excited about his result as he was for Kang Eunyoung, who had also scored a 100. Now Goatcheese and Eunyoung (I need to come up with a better name for her. You know, better than the one her parents gave her) have spend most of the semester "fighting" with each other - but the kind of elementary school fights boys and girls have. The kind that just give them an excuse to be close to each other. So I have been teasing them for the better part of 3 months about how they are in love - and you know what? I think I'm right. For Goatcheese, at least. He just seemed so genuinely excited about Eunyoung's result that it seems hard to come to another conclusion. 

Goatcheese is the class clown. And Eunyoung is definitely one of the pretty girls. So while they play now, I just don't see them going anywhere in the future. It'll be one of those John Hughes romances, only without the nerdy girl getting the jock or the nerdy best friend getting the girl whose nose he's been under since, well, forever.

They'll go their separate ways when middle school starts, she with her friends and he with his. They'll probably meet again one day, twenty years from now, and smile at each other. But it will be like two ships passing in the night. With a flicker os something once lost, they'll remember the carefree days of elementary school. But of couse they will be just too far apart by now. Already on their separate ways, down different paths. They'll be starting on their own lives by then, and there's no going back to those days. 


So maybe that was the promise of the morning. That what we have is the burden of the past, the oppressive knowledge of better times gone bye. But I'm not sure. I think that keeping those times with us - by remembering the past - we allow ourselves a more enriched present. For them, the memory of their lives way back when - not wishing they could go back but remembering - will be what they hold on to. 

Because that is something to hold on to. 

The ajumma landlady

Anyone of us spending some time teaching here in South Korea will, at some point or another, have an experience with our landlady (and I have yet to meet someone with a landlord, just in case you were wondering why that noun is so specifically gendered). The experience, in a word, will almost certainly prove to be...dynamic. For example:

Yesterday morning, I woke up, had a piece of toast-

Sorry, you don't want to hear about that part. What happened was I went into my laundry room to grab some clean clothes when I noticed there was an alarming amount of water pooled on the "floor". So I lifted the "floor" (because it is an inlaid linoleum that isn't even glued down), and I was SUPER excited to find that there was a quarter inch of water underneath my "floor"! EXACTLY HOW I WANTED TO START MY MORNING.

Photo courtesy

So my coteacher called my landlady and she said she'd be by between 5 and 7pm yesterday evening. Apparently the ajumma landladies here are in cahoots with the cable guys in America, because 7 rolled around and...nothing. Nothing at 7:30 either, and so I decided to go for my already-put-off run for the evening. I got back, and was walking up the stairs to my building when there she was! My ajumma landlady, shining in all her tiny ajumma glory (no visor, though :( ), only two hours late.

So I let her in, and she pokes around my laundry room, and through a series of wild gesticulations, she was either yelling at me to not lift the "floor" (which I did to try to prevent mold, thank you very much!), or telling me that she could not fix it tonight. Probably it was both, as she will be coming back today to (hopefully) shopvac all the water out from there and FIXITFIXITFIXIT!!! She also told me (I think) that the hose needs to be out the window to drain condensation (sorry for never having used a lame wall unit air conditioner before!) out of my househome. So.

Anyway, it will hopefully be fixed soon, and likely with lots more crazy gestures.The upshot is, it's making me clear out all the boxes I was "storing" back there. It'll be nice to have a free and clear (and dry!) laundry area again.

To prevent from being injured, please take off your earrings while running

More on this in a minute

As countless other Korean bloggers have mentioned, yesterday (June 2) was election day here in the ROK. The campaign season here is marked by trucks blaring campaign songs, campaign dancers, banners everywhere, and a blissfully short two-week period. As opposed to America, where campaign season lasts for infinity (and somehow, in spite of myself, I still love it). You can read other peoples' takes on the campaigns themselves on other blogs, but my sense is that it ultimately is not that much different from anywhere else. If you're curious, the elections were for provincial and local offices, and the opposition Democratic Party far outpaced expectations, likely indicating some dissatisfaction with the ruling Grand National Party. The DP won unexpected governorships in several provinces where polls had them trailing by double digit margins, and came unexpectedly close to winning the Seoul mayor's office, despite being some 15 points behind in polls. If you want to read a more thorough write up of the results, you can check out what the Korea Times has to say.

As someone with a degree in international politics, these elections were of keen interest to me. So I did what most people with my background would do on election day: I went to an amusement park. Not just any dinky ol' amusement park, though. No, sir! Nothing but the (second) best for this afficionado. Rather impromptu (aka the night before), my friend Chris and I decided we'd head to Lotte World, a (mostly) indoor theme park in Seoul.

Lotte World is not just an indoor theme park. It is, in fact, the LARGEST indoor theme park in the world, boasting several roller coasters, a flume ride, a rapid river ride, games, a kid's area, and an ice rink (and that's just the inside!). It is also connected to a 11-story department store because that is just what you do with indoor amusement parks.

All kidding aside, though, Lotte World was pretty awesome. Let's go to the photos:

Raccoon-chipmunk hybrid?

My first taste of Lotte World. Big, blaring, and filled with some kind of raccoon-chipmunk hybrid. The house you see in the background is the location of the Desperadoes "ride" where you sit on mechanical horses and shoot bad guys on the screen. Not an auspicious beginning. We continued our way through the park:

Monkeys playing bongos? What is this, the 1970s?

An interesting thing one quickly notices walking through the park are the eerie similarities with a certain American amusement park system represented by a mouse mascot.

The performance stage inside

...Disney. I'm talking about Disney, folks.

Welcome to Disney Lotte World

We resemble, but are legally distinct from...

In true Korean form, on of the more popular roller coaster rides, the French Revolution, comes with a convenient mirror to make sure your hair looks good right before you get on the roller coaster. Where you will inevitably mess it up.

No seriously, does my hair look okay?

For all the weirdness surrounding the amusement park, though, I have to say it was pretty awesome. The rides were good, especially the roller coasters Atlantis and French Connection. There was a good tower drop, where my experience went a little something like "Oh look at the nice view! Hey the line for the Gyro Spin doesn't look too- WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH CRAP WE'RE GOING DOWN!!!!!!"

My terrified face just after a trip on the French Revolution

There was also lots of fantastic Konglish. My favorite was the warning for the French Revolution regarding earrings that titles this post. Just in case you were thinking about running with earrings on whilst on this ride. It's really good advice, people!

Awwwwwwwwwwwwww.

In all, it was a nice escape. I had a great time, and really appreciated what will be my last day off until summer vacation. And now I'm going to leave you with a picture of adorable Korean babies driving mechanized animal rides, often straight into other adorable Korean babies or their parents.

My seafood-venture!

Those of you who are at all averse to fish or other sea-dwelling creatures, be advised: THERE WILL BE NO ESCAPE FROM THIS POST.

So last night, I went to dinner with a friend of mine from college who is hear visiting her family. This was possibly my last opportunity to visit with her before she goes back to America, so I am really glad I got the opportunity. However, I might have been a bit more hesitant had I fully comprehended the tremendous undertaking this dinner would be.

I knew from the outset that it would likely involve raw fish, but I was wholly unaware that it would also involve five hours total in transit time. That was just a lovely surprise! Hurray! So I left my school at my normal time, knowing that it would take me at least an hour to make it to the station where I was to meet my friend Junghee. Once I arrived, I was informed that we'd be taking a bus to get to Sorae fish market near Incheon harbor, and that the bus would be about an hour. And let me tell you! I was super excited for all this transit time!

It turns out I should have been...guys, fish caught fresh from the ocean is just AMAZING. Especially when it's only been killed approximately 90 seconds before you eat it. So we started out with a quick walk around the fish market to see what was there, and also to get a few amuse-bouches, such as sweet black bean cakes or roasted boll weevils. I know, right? And yes, I did try some of the boll weevils. They tasted like meat-flavored lima beans. Not terrible, but not something I think I'll order on my own.

Then we began walking the outer stalls in earnest. These are the stalls where you select your fish that is swimming around in the tank, and the owner then plucks it from its temporary home, kills it, and fillets it for you to eat raw. I believe the Korean word for this is hoe (the hangul on this computer doesn't work so I can't write it out for you in Korean, sorry. You can see our delicacy here:

Our fish included whitefish, flounder, these gross pink things that looked like wangs, and conch

The darker fish on either side of the very white flounder was our white fish. He splashed us, so we ate him. SUCKA.The whitefish, the flounder, and the wang-looking fish were good. The conch was not my favorite. We also had, not pictured here, sea cucumber. It has a very interesting texture, much firmer than I was expecting, and not a bad flavor at all!

And then they brought out the surprise. Sannakji, which literally means "live octopus". This particular octopus was no longer alive, but that was a VERY recent development in its personal history. The tentacles were still furiously wriggling, and the suckers were still...sucking... It's a delicacy here, and one I was not sure I would actually try, and definitely not so soon!

They are still wriggling around on the plate! It was mildly terrifying.

But as you can see, I definitely went for it. Really, it wasn't that bad! You just have to chew furiously as the tentacles are wriggling around in your mouth so the suckers don't stick to your throat on the way down and the octopus takes its final revenge. Death to the land-walkers!

I was scared. I think it's reasonable.

The taste was surprisingly good. Very mild, and it easily picks up whatever sauce you dip it in.

Following our raw course, it was time to move on to the main meal: GRILLED CLAMS.

I think this photo says it all

We had: approximately 2 and a half pounds of clams, plus oysters, and about a pound of shrimp grilled on a bed of rock salt.

It was delicioius!

And we ate the whole danged thing. The ajumma taking our money looked at our check and said "Yuk man won??" with a tone of incredulity that these three people could possibly have eaten 60000 won worth of seafood. Oh but we most certainly did.

Three hours later and I'm back at home exhausted, stuffed, and thoroughly happy with my decisions for my evening. It was a win if there ever was one.

On buying clothes in Korea

For those of you who have known me for a long time, you know that I used to be a much bigger guy than I am now. For comparison, then:

The thoughtful English major

And now:

The grossed-out English teacher

You can see, a drastic change, but it's not like I'm some tiny waif these days.

So this weekend, I needed to grab a new pair of jeans for reasons that are much lamer than you might imagine. I was in Pyeongtaek, and some friends of mine showed me this really nice little shop that basically sold nothing but denim (and some shirts, but it was basically a jeans bar). I walked in with my friend and the shop owner greeted me and asked what I was looking for. So I told him I needed a pair of jeans and he asked my size as I began rifling through the styles on display. I said "I'm a 34 in US" and he looked at me and quickly said "No, 32." Miffed (because I'm pretty sure I know my own size, thank you very much), I said "No, I'm a 34." And he responded "How about you try a 32?" So I decided what the heck, I'll just put them on.

AND THEY FIT. Seriously, this guy is MAGIC or something. It was amazing! He took a look at me and he knew my size! This was doubly exciting because I'd been shopping for a few new cardigans and whatnot the past week, and having no luck because my torso is apparently just inhumanly large for this country. Who knew? But now I have pants! And life is good.

Another teaching post! Hooray!

Sorry no pics this time, they refused to move from my camera to the computer. Jerks.

You guys! I was paid a really nice compliment this afternoon by my co-teacher, 뮹주 (Myungju, or Emjee which is her English name). She told me that not only was I doing well, but that I seemed to be a natural at teaching the children. Even the other teachers on the floor were impressed by me. So that was a great little ego boost that I just had to share with you, internet.

And the smallest children I teach are steadily growing into the most adorable little bastards I've ever seen! Class is still mostly a loud playtime for them, but I'm trying to inject some English into the playing so hopefully it will stick. Also, I was taking photos of them so you could see how obscenely cute they are (seriously, I think Asian babies win for "cutest babies in the world"), and they got a hold of my camera. And the results were...well, that's for another post.

In other news, this afternoon I left work early to go back to Suwon to pick up my now-ready Alien Registration Card. Which is basically a green card. It's even green and everything! And after that, I hustled over to a bank to open a bank account cause Shakespeare got to get paid, son. Of course, I had no idea where a bank was in the vicinity of the Suwon Immigration Center, I only knew that I had until 4pm to get to one. I got out of the immigration center at approximately 3:57pm. You know the scene near the end of Ferris Bueller's Day Off? Where Matthew Broderick is trying to beat Jennifer Grey and his father home? It was basically like that, only I had NO IDEA where the heck to go. I was, in essence, running around a few block radius frantically looking for a bank.

BUT I AM FILLED WITH AWESOME, so obviously I found one. And it was only like 10 after 4! Also, it turns out that the banks are open until 4:30. So that all worked out. And now I have a bank account. Which means I can get money from my school, AND I can get a cell phone account and an internet account. I am finally feeling like a real boy!