Spring!

Before I write anything else, I should officially appologise to my Mom. For two reasons actually. First, last I wrote that Mom better not forget about our skype date again or she'd owe me an SLR camera. She didn't forget. I slept in. Oops. Instead I got to talk to Stanley when I finally woke up at 7am. I still think Mom should owe me a SLR camera. Just because.

The second reason is because I played the best April Fools joke on her. I'm not actually sorry about that one though because if I had to do it all over again, I still would do it. To make a long and hilarious story short, I sent an e-mail saying I just signed a contract to stay in Korea another three years and wouldn't be coming home. She read it while I was on skype with her. The look on her face...priceless! I almost wrote the same thing in a post on my blog, but decided that would be too much damage control to do afterwards.

Rain sucks:

For about a week it rained and rained and rained. My co-teachers said that it usually doesn't rain this much in the spring. Lucky me for getting to experience a rainy Korean spring! So far though, I think it's still beautiful. My dong is full of cherry trees and they are all covered in blossoms right now so it looks gorgeous! It looks like it's snowed on the trees only.

The road leading down to my apartment.

The past week has been beautiful though! In preparation of a hot day on Monday I wore 3/4 pants and a t-shirt to school. It didn't take long to notice every Korean gaze would slowly move down to my bare legs. They thought I was insane. My students joked that I thought it was summer already. The next day though, I got sick and I could see them thinking that it was because of my outfit choice when it was still "cold" out. It was 21 degrees. What would you wear? That's what I thought.

What I learned in March:

- You can't make whipping cream in a blender. It turns out looking like milk from a cow with really bad mastitis.

- If someone calls you and you don't hear their name properly and they're not on your contact list, ask them to say it again. If you don't and then they say it's very important to meet with you that week to discuss something, you won't have any idea who you are meeting until you show up at the agreed meeting location. Before you freak out, I knew it was someone from church. He wanted to take me to dinner to ask if he could put my picture on the new church business cards.

- Don't take on more extra classes than you can handle. I'm insanely busy this semester.

- Don't agree to teach genius kids classes until you know exactly how smart they really are. That way you can prepare yourself for them to be better at English grammar than you are when you start teaching them.

- After seven months of trying to find the best way to avoid eating all the food Korean's serve, the easiest way (other than straight out refusal, but that's sometimes hard because refusals go in one ear and out the other. It's like they think I'm joking when I refuse) is to surreptitiously hide the rice in the soup bowl while you are talking to them. So really, what I actually learned then is not to eat the soup because if you do you have no where to hide the food you don't want to eat!
- Don't give your number to random Korean guys who want to practice their English. They will call you everyday for absolutely no reason at all other than to speak in English.

- Clean your apartment more than once a month or you'll forget what the floor and table top look like.

- When you start to clean, finish cleaning because vacuum cleaners hurt when you trip over them in the middle of the night.

- Don't leave lesson planning to the day of or two minutes before class. Oh wait, I didn't learn that. I still do that.
- If you don't want it to rain when it forcasts rain, take your umbrella to work.

- Don't blog when you should be lesson planning.

Damyang bamboo park:

I have Wednesday and Friday off this week because of two of my schools going camping. Sinheung isn't though so I teach tomorrow. I went to Damyang with Jae Kyung (Cindy)today. We walked through a bamboo park (different than previous ones I've been to) and texted our co-teacher bragging about the beautiful weather while she complained about the cold weather in Wando where she was stuck with our 300 adolescent students.

At the park entrance.

Carving our names into the bamboo.

We wished Kris was there with us so I carved her name in as well.

Trying to get the best self photos to send to our co-teacher. We wanted the sun to shine off our faces so she'd be jealous.

Classroom stories:

Yesterday in class my principal came to my class to talk with me. His English is alright, but for the life of me I couldn't figure out what he was asking me. Then when I got back to my desk after class and had no computer I realized what he was asking me. Guess they finally decided to fix my stupidly slow computer and he wanted to know if I had anything to save on the hard drive. I understood that much and had said I use a USB. Good thing too or it'd have all been erased.

Also, yesterday in the same class I was walking around the class taking up a handout when I looked out the door to see six or seven of the most misbehaving kids in grade one being punished in the hall. They were all on their knees with their hands in the air. It made me laugh in the middle of class to which my students were utterly confused. I was quite happy to see the grade one's being punished. They are a pain in the ass. Grade one has no respect for any teacher and we all complain about them on a regular basis.

Accupuncture:

You probably all know about how Asians swear by accupuncture. Well, this past week Kristen and I have been getting accupuncture. I never thought I'd actually do it, but I'm sick and tired of my stupid heels (yes, both of them now) hurting that I'll try anything. Kris sprained her ankle a while back so that is why she's there. It's really cheap too. 5,000won a visit (about $4.50). It's actually really cool what they do. So far only my one heel is showing progress though.

Air Force:

I love planes. I love how I work in a military town. I love watching the fighter jets tear through the sky. Today, I'm home from school, but I guess they are practicing over Gwangju because I've been hearing them all afternoon. Maybe we'll start seeing tanks driving around again too. Unless that was just a one time deal. Who knows. I've only seen that once.

Sick:

I am sick. It's gotten worse after getting better. I think I accidently took night pills this morning because I crashed for three hours around lunch time. I didn't actually know what med's I was taking because it was from a previous time I was sick and it's all in Korean so I just guessed. Oh well.

Stay or go?

I have until May 3rd to decide if I want to stay another year. I hate decisions.

Church:

I love church. I love the people, the fellowship, and the things we do. I especially love worship band and decided that joining was the best thing I did in Korea. This Sunday we're having another picnic. Last week we decorated easter eggs and handed them out to people on the streets (also attached were the business cards with my face on them!).

Kris and Joel decorating the eggs. I managed to convince some Koreans I knew Korean by writing Korean on my egg. They didn't know I copied it until Joel told them.

Daegu. Kris, Gab, and I went to Daegu last weekend for two days. It's the last of the six largest cities in Korea that we hadn't been to. Now we've been to them all. Seoul, Incheon, Gwangju, Mokpo, Pusan, and Daegu.

North Korea:

- North Korea told South Korea they needed to stop conducting tours to the DMZ or something might happen. This happened after it's been speculated that the explosion on a South Korean navy ship and the death of many soldiers was thought to be from a torpedo from North Korea. I don't know what they're saying now though. Kris and I quickly decided we need to get to the DMZ SOON! I think we're going in May.