Goldilocks

    I have come to realize that no matter where you are in Korea it is impossible to regulate the water temperature. What I mean by this is that it is either too hot or too cold. It is never "just right." I'm tired of burning my hands and body with hot water just because I'm trying to warm up! Anyway, I'm searching for my "just right" water temperature.

It's official!

    I'm officially a teacher. I know what you're thinking..hasn't she been there for over four months?! Yes, yes I have. However, today is the first day that I have made a student cry. He was goofing off all class and just being a real pain in the ass so after several warnings I gave him Daily Bridge (which is my school's strange word for detention). He then started crying and I kept on teaching. I'm actually truly surprised it took me four months to get this one checked off list. 

Re-dedication

     My life here is so busy. It just dawned on me this morning that I have more of a social life in Korea than I think I ever have. There is always so much to do and so much going on. However, I do have goals for being over here and it's about time that I start more adamantly working towards them.  Below is a list of my goals for the remainder of my time in Korea.

1. Learn more Korean: at least enough to be able to have basic conversations
2. Post a blog update at least once a week even if it's short and simple
3. Attend more festivals and cultural events to learn more about this amazing country
  
Ok, well for now that is it. Short, simple, sweet and doable.

The start of a good story: Remember that time I got naked with 100 other women?

     Korea is well known for their bath houses or Jimjilbangs. They are places that people go to relax, hang out and have a spa day of sorts. However, for some of us they are places to crash after a late night in Seoul after the trains stop running.
     There is a jimjilbang right next to Yongsan station, which I have been to on several occasions. It's a convenient place to sleep because it only costs about 12,00 Won ($11), which is much cheaper than getting a hotel room for the night. You sleep in a communal sleeping room on the floor with thin mats and strangely hard pillows. It's certainly not the best sleep in the world, but it gets the jobs done until the trains or subway start running the next morning.
    The main attraction of jimjilbangs is the communal bath house, there are separate men's and women's areas.  When you walk into the bath house it is very warm and very humid. In this particular jimjilbang, Dragon Hill, there was probably about ten different baths including three that were outside. All of the baths claim to do different things for your skin. One bath was called an Event Bath and since the description was all in Hangul  I had no idea what it did so I passes on that one. I particularly liked the sea water (salt) bath as well as the bath that was like a jacuzzi because it had a lot of jets.
    If you ever plan to go to a jimjilbang, as a non-Korean, be prepared. You will get a lot of stares. Let's face it, it's not everyday that a Korean sees a naked white person. I perhaps got more stares than usual because of how busty I am.  I just smiled and didn't let it bother me.
    Once you pay your entrance fee a lot of things at the jimjilbang are free. However, they offer additional services that you pay for.  They were actually really convenient to do because when you walk in they give you a bracelet with a locker key on it as well as a waterproof  bar code. Anytime you wanted to buy something you just swiped your bracelet and then you paid at the end.  I took advantage of this and bought some food. I also had a scrub while I was in the communal bath area. You lay down on this slabish bed and an ajuma comes and scrubs your naked body down. It's a very cultural thing. I tried to relax and enjoy myself, but parts of it got a bit rough. Especially when she was scrubbing down more sensitive area of my chest. In the end my skin was very smooth and I wasn't too much worse for the wear.
     I'm convinced that one could easily live in a jimjilbang. The one at Dragon Hill has six floors to explore that are filled with all sorts of excitement. For example it has several snack bars and restaurants, a PC Room, a proper swimming pool, a huge arcade filled with every game you could want(including 3 air hockey tables), a large common area for mingling with the men folk, and even a place to get your nails done. I highly recommend that if you are ever in Korea you take part. It's definitely an experience you will never forget. 

One down three more to go!

   I have now officially finished my first semester as an English teacher. Albeit, summer semester is the shortest semester out of the year. It has been a lot of fun getting to know some of the students and it has been less than fun getting to know some others. Overall though, it has been a good semester. The one thing I have learned from this semester is that no matter where you are in the world, kids will be kids. I was under some delusion that kids in South Korea would be so polite and overly respectful to their teachers, which is just not the case. However, it has been a challenging but fun experience. I have one day off and then alas the new semester starts. To get refreshed for the new semester myself and some other teachers are going to to to Caribbean Bay, which is a huge water park not too far from Suwon. Hopefully it will be a blast.

One of my students drew this for me on her first day in my class.

On the last day of the semester my awesome student Rachel gave me this card. So sweet!

Bunnies in Suwon Station!

Last weekend I was hanging out with some friends in Suwon Station. This is an area where there is an actual train and subway station, but it's surrounded by bars and restaurants. We were walking down this pedestrian street that is filled with all of these vendors. Most of them sell street food or different trinkets. All of a sudden in the middle of a street there was a man selling bunnies. Yes, bunnies in the middle of a bar district. How bad of an idea is that, drunk people buying bunnies!The bunnies were also wearing little colorful capes. A few of my friends I was with suggested getting a few, tying them to watermelons and dropping them off of our building. They were of course, thankfully, joking.  Boys have the strangest sense of humor sometimes.

My Vacation in Busan!

I know I have only been in Korea for a very short period of time, but I have already had a small vacation. I got three days off from work for summer vacation and the weekend, so a total of five days free from the tiny humans! A lot of the teachers I work with took trips out of the country, but I haven't been able to save up too much money since I've been here, so staying in Korea was the only option for me.  Busan is the second largest city in Korea. It is second to Seoul of course. It is located in South East Korea.  I went down by myself to just explore and see what this new city had to offer. For the most part I had a pretty good time.  The only downside is that I kept getting asked if I was Russian. Which, in Korea and a lot of Asia essentially means that they were asking me if I was a hooker. Proof that it's not always convenient to be pale, blonde and traveling by yourself. Some of my trip highlights included seeing a baseball game, having Mexican food at a restaurant called Hello Kimchi and enjoying the beach and ocean!

Jellyfish!

Broke back shark!

Quite a silly looking fish.

There were just a few people at the beach.

...and just a few umbrellas.

I got to see a Lotte Giants baseball game! It was really fun and made me feel like it was really summer!

Koreans love to sing at sporting events! It's quite entertaining, but a little hard to join in because go figure...it's all in Korean.

Go Giants! We did totally win by the way!

You are probably asking yourself, what the hell?!

Believe it or not, this is how you support your Lotte Giants.  These are two cool English guys I watched the game with.

Self portrait on the beautiful coast line walk to the APEC house.

APEC house

The conference room where the meeting took place.

Do I look like  I belong?

The Diamond Bridge at night.