Why so Many?

It's funny how I thought my life in Korea would be. I remember having conversations with many friends saying these exact words: "The teaching part will be easy because I've done it before and it's my trained profession. The hard part will be getting around, figuring out the subway system, learning the language because I haven't done that before. And I'll be doing it alone." The exact opposite is true. The teaching part is so hard - way harder than I expected. Getting around here is so easy. The subway system, although it has many lines, is very easy to follow. You buy a subway card which you reload and just swipe in and out. The card also works on the bus and even a taxi. They have an app that tells you the exact minute the subway arrives and how long it will take to get to your destination. It's incredible. I wish more transit systems were this efficient!

I had great intentions of learning Korean because I thought I would need it to get around. It is my one regret so far, but I just haven't needed to. At restaurants I can point to what I want and at tourist destinations people speak English. The subway announces in both Korean and English and most signs in Seoul have English words on them. I am learning some more words, but it's coming slowly.

Here are some things I'm loving about Korea so far:

• It has four seasons when it's supposed to. Right now it's Spring and it's actually Spring-like whether. Where I live in Canada there's still snow. 
• Most Koreans are helpful. One time I was with a friend who's subway card wasn't swiping properly and a Korean man just took her to the kiosk and explained what happened. Most public bathrooms I've been in have a call button in each stall. I'm not sure if it's for asking for more toilet paper or what - but it's there! 
• There is dessert everywhere. I wasn't expecting this. Little dessert shops EVERYWHERE! Cake places, donut places, little tiny kiosks that only sell one kind of cake, a cafe called A Twosome Place which I'm guessing by the name is THE place to share cake with your date. My business plan is to open one beside it called A Single Place that serves cake with a side of salty chips and a bottle of wine to cry into. 
• I feel safe here. I kind of knew this coming in because people who've taught here before told me this, but I didn't know how it would be until I experienced it. The street I live on kind of looks a bit sketchy. In the morning there's cards on the ground with half naked girls and phone numbers on them (kind of like Vegas) and one time I saw a girl go to our corner store with no pants, just a blanket wrapped around her waist. If you are too lazy/high to find your pants from last night and are willing to go out in public without them, you are living a certain type of life. Anyways, what I'm trying to say is I'm not scared to walk in this neighbourhood, even when it's dark. On Monday I got into a cab where the cab driver (after asking me where I'm from and if I'm here teaching English) kept asking if I was married. Normally that would freak me out but I think he was truly just asking. When I first got here I walked half an hour in the complete opposite direction of where I should have been going. But, I didn't realize it. I thought I was close but I just couldn't find it, so I jumped into a cab thinking he would drive me around the corner and it would be there. Instead, he drove me really far across town! I thought for sure I was being kidnapped (because it was a taxi he was driving really fast and weaving in and out of traffic). Instead I was wrong and he was just taking me to where I needed to go. (Do I have trust issues or what?)
• Koreans are boldly honest. You're probably thinking - so are you Alli! I am in most situations. It's a hard trait to have because people only like honesty when it's nice, but if you're honest about something uncomfortable then people don't like hearing it as much. Koreans do both equally and although it is uncomfortable, I can appreciate it. A few weeks ago I was standing behind a student sitting in his chair who leaned back and put his head on my stomach. He turned around and asked, "Why so many?" as he patted my stomach. I said, "Too much cake and candy." Then I failed him for not asking in a proper English sentence. 
• Things are priced appropriately. I thought things would be cheaper here, but they aren't. But at the same time they aren't marked up crazy. I think it's because when you have millions of people in a city you will get the money to make the thing survive. I don't know if that makes sense and people who know business better might explain this differently. But, I've been to many places with reasonable entrance fees. I always think - if this museum were in North America it would be twice that, because they wouldn't be getting the same amount of foot traffic. The food is more expensive than I thought, but not as expensive as it is in Edmonton. There's also no tax and no tipping. You pay what it says on the tag/sign/menu and that's it. 
• Koreans like being outside and being active. I have a giant window that looks over a river with pathways on both sides marked for walking and biking separately - I love efficiency and order! Anyways, that pathway is always busy. I love seeing it. And I love how accessible it is to me. On the weekends when I'm taking the subway somewhere there's often Koreans dressed and packed for hiking. It's very popular here. Lots of the tours I'm looking at involve walking, hiking, biking, canoeing, exploring caves, etc. It's just part of life here. 

That's a short list, but I'm sure I'll come across more things in the next 10 months! Here are a few things I'm excited about coming up short term and long term.

This Saturday I have a massage booked and I can't wait! I am not sure what the process is here, what to wear or not to wear, etc. so I'm sure there will be a funny blog post about this coming up. I did book with a place that has English massage therapists, so it should be fairly smooth. The following weekend is when the cherry blossoms should be fully bloomed. A friend I met on the temple stay, Dawn, has a Korean friend who is going to take us around and show us the best places to see them. I'm excited for that!

In May we have a 5 day weekend so a few teachers and I are renting a car and driving to Jeju Island (click here for info) which I am very excited about. It's a very popular Korean destination that is on my list of places to go! Normally we would fly there or take an overnight train, but it will be easier and more fun for us to go together in a car! (One of the teachers has an international driver's license.) 

For summer vacation at the end of July - beginning of August I've decided to go to Bali. (Click here to see why.) I was originally going to go somewhere like Vietnam, but Bali is calling my name. July will be my half way point here, and it will be a little bit of a celebration. Plus, I think I will want some major relaxing time, and Bali seems like the place. Put me on a beach with a drink and a snack and let me sit in the sun. I've already done a lot of research on where to stay, what I might like to do, etc. This weekend I'm going to pick up a Lonely Planet guide to Bali. If you've been, let me know! 

Lots of love,

Alli

Getting My "Ohm" On

As you know, this weekend I went on a temple stay. This post will mostly be pictures. The only thing I regret about this trip is going too early in Spring. This temple is up a mountain in a beautifully forested area that is still mostly dead. In about two weeks it will be blooming. It will be stunning! Oh well!

The itinerary for the trip started on Saturday morning meeting at three different pick up spots around Seoul on a nice chartered bus. My friend, Jean (pronounced the french way of John) and I met at the first spot which is about an hour from where I live. There were about 18 of us altogether. Then it was about a two hour drive to Sudeoksa Temple in Yesan County. South Korea terrain is very similar to Alberta/Saskatchewan. I often look out the window and think - I could be driving to Jasper right now.

Our "before" picture.

The drive was good for a few reasons. I learned so much more about Jean including the fact that he used to work for 20th Century Fox when he lived in West Hollywood for a year. He worked for their trademark department which handled the Simpsons. He said another country tried to sell Duff beer, so they had to shut that down. Another thing I liked about the drive was meeting some of the other people on the tour. Lots of us are here as English teachers, but some are nurses, or here for a few week vacation, doing freelance work, or studying. There was an Italian graduate student studying landslides.

When we got to the little town where the temple is located we walked around for a bit and had lunch. We were told to pack a lunch and then we got to the town where there is like 20 restaurants. So, I didn't eat my lunch so I could go out with a few people from the tour. But, not eating my PB&J, carrots, and apple slices would come in handy later when for the three meals we ate at the temple were the same. Rice and other cold veggies for all 3 meals.

There's so much glare it's hard to see but these are giant vats of aging kimchi. 

Various massage instruments. 

At first we thought this was honey but it's flavoured alcohol. There's bees in there! 

This town is made for tourists. It's like a mini Jasper or Banff. I bought my first souvenir from Korea! Something I've always wanted - a mortar and pestle. It's so cute! I wan't wait to bring it home and crush spices with it.

Once lunch was over we picked up our bags and hiked up to the temple where we would stay. Lots of stairs . . . .

I asked "Do monks drive?" And yes, because sometimes they go to

 visit people to pray with them privately. 

We got settled into our rooms, put our temple clothes on, was given a little bit of info on how to conduct ourselves at the temple (walk with hands in front of you in a resting position, no talking while praying, no holding hands or signs of affection, how to bend down to pray). Then, we made lotus flower lanterns that we would later use for the evening chant. That was really fun!

Some of our group 

Selfie with roommate Marilyn in the background 

After that we had some free time to walk around and see the sights. Then we met for dinner where we are supposed to eat silently, but there was for sure some talking. (Are we allowed to get more? What is this?)  After dinner we made the prayer beads/rosary. There are 108 beads which is a significant number in Buddhism. We had to bend down and pray, put a bead on, and then stand up and do it all over again. 108 times. My butt is so sore still. I wanted to do something special for each bead I put on, partly because it's a prayer, and partly so I could focus on something and not get bored or think about the pain while putting the bead on. Sometimes I would say a positive word (joy, love, courage, happiness) or I'd name a person I love. If you're reading this I probably named you! I'm glad I did that - It made me really happy.

After the beads we went to the evening chant which starts with drumming followed by praying in the temple. Then, we came back to a meeting point where the monk had us write down two things on a piece of paper: one thing we want to happen this year and one thing we want to stop happen. We grabbed our lotus lanterns and walked up to a place where the monk burned our papers to give these thoughts to Buddha in hopes we would feel lighter.

Afterwards we had a quick snack which was a chunk of sweet potato and headed to bed. Bed time was supposed to be at 9 but it was more like 9:45. We had the option of waking up for 3:30 am chant which I wanted to do because I wanted the full experience. The morning chant was only about half an hour so we went back to bed a bit before breakfast at 6 am. It's weird to eat rice and cold veggies for breakfast! (I ate half a PB&J before breakfast knowing that it would probably not be a breakfast I would love.)

After breakfast we had some free time, then went for a walking meditation. I've done that before which is just praying as you walk back and forth. This version of walking meditation was hiking up a very steep mountain, I made it about half way up before I realized I am terrified of heights. In fact on the way down I had a few moments of panic. I'm glad I stopped there because the tour guide told me there is a 70 degree slope up ahead which I don't know if I could have manged to get back down. Another girl with bad knees stopped with me. Her name is Dawn and she's a nurse with the army. We walked back down and took in the scenery.

Later, we met up with the rest of the group for a tea ceremony with the monk. That was my favorite part of the whole weekend. I loved asking her questions. She is so wise. She answered my most burning question which was if she is able to see her family. She said it's different for every monk, but when she started being a monk she became very sick and had to have surgery so she went to the hospital and her family took care of her. After that, she asked the head monk if she could continue to see her family because she realized it's so important to her. But, she said that some monks find their family too much of a distraction, so they choose not to see them. That shocked me - but I can see if you have a lot of family drama that keeps pulling you back into a lot of pain, it would distract a monk from their goals. She said the hardest part of being a monk is when people put so much expectation on them. Sometimes people call them and say "I'm about to hang myself - help me!"and she doesn't know what to do in that moment. She is so peaceful, you could see that it hurts her to experience that. I asked her if becoming a monk was hard for her because she couldn't have a family. She said that it wasn't a hard decision for her because her ultimate goal in becoming a monk is to find out who she is, and you can't do that while having someone so dependent on you, as a child would be. The way I wrote that isn't exactly how she said it because that sounds so harsh, but it made sense when she said it.

We left the temple after lunch and headed to an apple orchard to make apple pie, apple jam, and try apple wine. It was all delicious! I even ate the pie I made which if you know me, I'm not a huge fan of pie. Then, we boarded the bus back home. The tour guide asked if we wanted to watch a movie and just mentioned "Moana" which caused a shriek from most of us females on the bus. Yes!!! None of us had seen it but wanted to so badly. It was perfect. I kind of floated in and out of sleeping and watching, but I got the gist of the movie.

After picture 

I mean . . . . 

Apple brandy

No! 

There was much discussion around a slice of cheddar cheese on apple pie. Some had heard of it and some hadn't. They couldn't image it. I kept pointing out that fruit 

and cheese is a thing . . . just go with it.

When we got back to our home base I went to Jean's for pizza. He turned on the tv to some sort of singing talent show like The Voice but they wear bag/masks over their heads instead. I can't describe it, so you have to see a picture. 

Can you believe I've been here for 2 months? Sometimes I can and sometimes I can't. 10 more to go . . . 

Love,

Alli 

We Be Trippin'

Some of you are wondering if I came here to teach or if I just go from tourist spot to tourist spot eating delicious food. That's still up for debate. But, here's some pics of things we've done at school recently.

We went on two field trips this month and both went really well for my class. I was quite apprehensive as sometimes they can be a handful. In fact, my Korean supervisor looked at me one time and asked: Why are they being so good here?

The first trip was to the Seoul Children's Museum. It's actually a really cool museum and would love to go back again because we definitely didn't see everything. It was kind of lucky because we only had 7 of 9 kids, which I know sounds horrible, but it was much easier for us to manage. One of the kids away is the slowest person I've ever met, I know it would have been a problem.

The way there on the bus. Sue is wearing the mask. She wore it all day and only took it down once to cough in my face. Thanks for defeating the purpose of the mask, Sue.

Aaron is the one hugging me. He is the trouble maker from the beginning of the year. Can you believe this?

Look at Mini's hat!

 Class pic

Light and shadows 

Giant light bright

Typical lunch to bring on a field trip - literally every kid brought some version of this which is kind of like sushi but it's got cooked tuna inside with veggies instead. Some kids also bring a lunch for the teacher so I had two of these plus so much fruit that the kids bring to share.

So many nappers on the way home. Yay!

 Our second field trip was to a fire station. This was one that is built for schools to come. It's kind of like the Telus World of Science. There's an earthquake simulator, a smokey room to go through, and the kids can put out a fake fire on a screen by shooting little fire extinguishers. I was quite impressed with the set up!

earthquake simulator 

I'm generally not into cannibalism, but I would eat this child she is so cute. She is the thorn in my side on a daily basis, and often gets in trouble, but just look at her. And she still hugs me all the time even though sometimes she says: Allison Teacher angry. 

Really looking forward to tomorrow's temple stay. Updates to come on that!

Love,

Alli