Snowballs and a green Christmas

Christmas in Korea... I will get to that, but first, here's a summary of my last week or so. Well, part of it at least. We'll see what interesting stories I can remember.

These first couple pictures are of a walk Kris and I took on the hill/mountain next to the park I go running at. This was after one of the snows we had last week. We no longer have any snow which is really disapointing. No white Christmas for me! But then, no white Christmas for you guys either so I am not quite as disapointed as I would be if you guys had a white Christmas!

Crap. so I just accidentally deleted the next picture which was another one of the walk. I have deleted six pictures in this post already and it was a pain to upload them again and get them into the right spot so I give up and I'm not uploading that one. It was just another sunset picture from the park. I will put it on facebook if you really want to see if that badly.

This is of part of the walk way in front of my apartment after one of the snows.

My school after a snowfall. Sachung gets more snow than Gwangju does. As of this past week I have officially had snowball fights with every single school. Usually it involved me being covered in snow by the end. The day of this snow, Cindy and I got into a snow fight as soon as we got to school in the morning. There were students hanging out the windows cheering for us. Later, when I was teaching third grade, one of the boys says "Teacher, I saw you and Jae Kyung (Cindy's Korean name) teacher having a snowball fight this morning". I denied it. He persisted. The rest of the class then took his side saying they ALL saw me. Eventually I admitted that I did. So at the end of the class him and his friend come up to me and tell me that we should have a snowball fight together. Him and his friend verses me. I agreed. He was shocked that I agreed. So we said after lunch. Going to lunch that day Cindy and I snuck through another building to avoid them and on the way back he was already inside. Unfortunately for us the grade 2's were still having a snowball fight which we got stuck in the middle of. Cindy, being one of the least athletic people I know was getting creamed so I had to dodge snowballs being thrown at me while catching the ones being thrown at her. The students were surprised I could actually throw a snowball which was rather amusing when I saw their faces after being hit by a snowball thrown by me. The boy who I had a snowball fight date with saw me, yelled something out the window I said "ok" to even though I have no idea what he said. We still haven't had the snowball fight.

In the end though, I was covered in snow and spent the rest of the day kicking myself for being so stupid because I was freezing. I now bring extra socks to school when it snows.

Lucky for me, I didn't learn from the first, second, or third time and last wednesday I had a snowball fight with my kids from Samseo. They weren't sure how I'd react to snow so at first they were just throwing it at my feet until I grabbed a snowball and threw it at them. Pretty quickly the other teachers bolted it for inside and it was left at me against all the boys in the school (only about 15, but still, I was alone). In the end, to make a long story short, I came back to the teachers office with snow dripping down my face, all over me, and in my ear. I lost. In my defence though, the teams weren't exactly fair.

Ok, here's the last of my class pictures. This is the only grade three class at Samgye that I was able to take a picture with since the other two classes over half the class was at some trip of some kind so I couldn't get pictures with them. I have class shots of them on facebook though. This is 3-1, I think. This is my favourite class. But then I always say that about almost every class. They are also the one that is always late. Go figure.

Samgye 2-3. The boy in the middle wearing the hat is actually wearing my hat. Cindy gave me the hat at my Christmas party. It was from Baskin Robins and came with the cake she bought. I wore it to school that day, much to the delight of my students, and he wanted to wear it for the picture. He used to be a pain in the ass in my classes, but we understand each other now so it's all good. The other teachers complain about him though.

Samgye 1-4. This class is one of the best behaved and are very good at English.

Three of the students in Grade three painted pictures of all the teachers. I was told she picked my green shirt because she likes it the best. She also either started this before I got my hair cut or likes my hair better the way it was before!

Christmas! On our way to church and me not being impressed at the greenery. I wanted a white Christmas... After church at the pizza/amazing better than KFC and much less greasier chiken party/gift exchange.
Joelle and me during the gift exchange. Kris won a massive bag of chocolates for one of the trivia questions and both Kris and Gabrielle got their names picked for the bike that could be won, but they didn't get it in the final draw. Everyone brought 10,000 won gifts and we played this game with them. I wanted a hat that some guy got, but I never rolled an even number so I couldn't switch my gift. I ended up with a book of some kind and a picture frame. Not the worst there was (I really didn't need an umbrella or bottle of olive oil). It was a lot of fun though.

So I'm pretty sure I have other stories that don't have pictures with them, but I'm going out tonight and I really need to shower (really need to shower). Plus my neck is sore from writing this.

Un-am Dong and Sachung

For some reason I now have a ton of pictures. Here's a sample of the most recent ones I took. The first bunch are of the park that I go running at ALL the time. It's about a five minute walk from my apartment and is a great place for me to clear my head and get some exercise. However, my running days have come to an end today because we got our first snow and the temperature has dropped. My ears and throat don't like it when I run in the cold so I'll have to find a gym now. Or else just get fat for the next couple months until the weather warms up again. Either will work. Jung-oe Park. My home away from home.

It was so peaceful the day I took these. The two days later it snowed (today). Now I'll have to get winter pictures of it!

There's outdoor exercise equiptment and an archery pitch just to the left of this picture.

View from the other side. Behind me it the kids equiptment too.

At a UNESCO (United Nations something something seomthing Organization) family friendship international something-or-other FREE dinner. I wouldn't have gone if it wasn't free, but it was so I went! Amazing cultural entertainment which I didn't feel like putting pictures here so look on facebook for those.

Laura and I wishing it was time to eat. This dinner had the best Duc I've ever had in Korea so far. Duc being rice cakes (but not the ones you think of in Canada. These are actually good).

More classes!!! Yay! My last small school class picture. Samseo grade 3. I love these kids to death and my last time teaching them is next Wednesday. Forever. I will cry. Inside me of course. That would be awkward if I cried in class. Not sure what my students would think. "uhhh what do we do? Teacher is crying. Maybe she's more weird than we thought...."

Samgye (my main school) grade 1. I have four grade one classes. This is 1-2.

Samgye grade 1. This is the 1-4 class I think.

Samgye grade 1. This one is 1-3, I think. Classes were switched around this day so I got confused which was which. Either way, they're grade 1.

Samgye grade two. I have three grade two classes. (missed one class so that'll be posted later. Same with the 1-1's. Forgot them!) This is the 2-2's.

Samgye grade 2. The 2-1's.

I'm really tired. I told myself I'd go to bed on time tonight, but like usual that didn't happen. the grade 2 and 3 boys at Sinheung tried to hit me with snowballs today. My co-teacher, James, was trying to protect me though I think he made it worse. He almost got me hit. Thankfully I saw the huge snowball hurdling towards me and stepped out of the way in time. Looking at the boys face though was hilarious! He had this look of eager anticipation for the snowball to hit me and when I moved his face looked crushed! The rest were either way off target or I'd catch them. The grade 1's gained up on one of the teachers. They had shovelful's on him. He was loosing badly. James told me to help him out, but I wasn't about to underestimate those kids. Plus, I didn't want the grade three's sneaking up on me and getting me.

Korean's are definitely paranoid when it comes to snow. They ended my workshop early when they realized it was snowing again. I could hardly see the snowflakes. They were also wet so they melted right away. They should come to Canada and see what we drive in, I think.

Our Christmas party is this Saturday. I can't wait. It's going to be awesome. You're all invited of course. Bring snacks.

Ok, now I really need to go to bed. Enjoy.

Two Weeks Later...

So, I definitely didn't realize that I didn't post last weekend. I wasn't even busy so it's not like I didn't have the time. So, here is my last two weeks summed up. First, last Wednesday Kristen, Gabrielle and I had an English Town camp meeting in which we did no planning or talking about the actual camps and instead went to see this really cool ancient school where this famous teacher taught so all students wanted to go there. It was beautiful and in the moutains. I'd want to go there too, but not because of the teacher! Here's those pictures.

The front entrance to the school. We had to duck to get in. Even our Korean friends had to bend over. We made jokes about how they were shorter then and are still short now. They said it was because it's so that you're forced to bow when you enter. Makes sense.

Next to the entrance was a 200 year old tree and we became tree huggers for a little bit. There was a lot of really old trees there actually. That's what made it so beautiful.

The library. Very small in my opinion, but this was also in use in the 1600's, not the 21st century. But then, they had a ton of books then too, but they were worthwhile books, not the stuff we have in our libraries where any blow joe can publish stuff now a days...

The dormatories. Notice the fire extinguishers... They were EVERYWHERE. Apparently they are more concerned about the school burning down than the apartments we live in now...where living humans actually live... I wonder if they have fire alarms there? Probably not. I don't think those exist in Korea. (seriously. I haven't seen a building with them yet).

A look across the courtyard into the next section. Our director was droaning on in Korean about this, that and who knows what. Sometimes a teacher would be kind enough to translate, but other times I'd just nod pretending I knew what he was saying. I was actually really interested in it, but the language barrier was a bit of an issue.

Beautiful scenery all around. I love it.

We went to "lunch" (which turned out to be dinner because it was 4pm before we got our food) and saw a tractor! Ok, so I've seen them before in Korea, I do teach at three very country schools, but those were all in use. This one wasn't so of course we had to get a picture. You can see a Korean man to the left of the picture. Him and another guy and girl were looking at us like we were crazy or something.

In the resturant where randomly one of Kristen's students Mom's worked. It was funny. The lady went all excited like when she saw Kristen and realized she taught her daughter. Can't say the meal was the best I've had in Korea, but it was decent. Lots of beef and no live octopus so I guess I can't complain! I missed a Samgye teacher's dinner for this excursion though. That made me sad.

Then afterwards the three of us went and got Gelato... huge gelatos. The guy thought we were all sharing one and the look on his face when we EACH bought one was priceless. When Gabrielle ordered he gave her three spoons. Then Kristen ordered and he gave her two spoons. Then I ordered and they finally realized we all wanted one to ourselves! Yes, we love ice cream. Can't say I'm a big fan of gelato though. Give me real ice cream anyday.

Oh, these aren't in order. These should be the last pictures, but I uploaded them wrong. Oops. This is baskin robins ice cream from last night. We got our hair cut and then went there. We're doing a love shot...with ice cream.

Then we had a bake sale party. There's a bake and book sale at the Speakeasy, a foreigner bar in downtown Gwangju and the regularly put on events and fundraisers and stuff. This one is for a girls orphanage in Gwangju where a lot of foreigners volunteer at. We baked for it and it's today at 1:00pm. I made fudge puddles. I might buy some back at the sale... so good! ANyway, at our baking party we took pictures. Duh. Kristen and I have a slight obsession with the Korean actor Lee Byung Hun of the Korean drama IRIS (we watch with subtitles online) and he was on posters on our apartments advertizing Missha so since Koreans throw the on the ground all the time anyway we went around to all the apartments, up all the stairs and collected them and made collages in our apartments. Think what you like about it, but we love it!

I'm taking class pictures with all my classes. I've only done five classes so far and they're all at my small schools. Warning: Korean kids don't like pictures and hate smiling in pictures. They just don't seem to do it in Korea. No matter how much I beg them to smile, most won't do it. so I'm usually the only one smiling.

This is Sinheung Middle School, grade two. The ones I always complain are little asses all the time... the boy who always disrupts the class is the middle boy. The girl behind him sometimes does too, but usually she's good.

Sinheung Grade three. I love these kids. The boy in the blue jacket is the one who complained about James trying to take my class away from me and said he really missed me. The boy who's beside me is taller than me and just before this was taken I was going on my tippy toes to be taller than him, but then he went on his too and was taller still (obviously) and then as soon as we stood on flat feet the picture was taken which is why I look like a loser here.

Sinheung grade one. These are the best kids at the school when it comes to English. Some of the girls as shy as anything, but the boys always joke around so it's fun.

Samseo grade one. The middle girl and the one kneeling are hilarious and really good at English. The boy on the left ALWAYS wants to play games and loves making fun of me. These kids are the best. We have a lot of fun in their classes because they always want to learn. Samseo Grade Three. Some of my favourite kids are in here (yes, I know, I have A LOT of favourite kids. I just love them all!)The boy in the red jacket is the one in the red dress from the last post and the boy kneeling on the right is the other one in the dress who won the competition. Those two boys also seem to have a competition to see who can get my attention the longest in each class. The boy kneeling won last class. The girls are the sweetest things ever. The one in red made a flower thing for me this week. It was so cute. Then it got wrecked in my purse on the way home, but I fixed it so it's all good.

So that's been the last two weeks. Today is the bake sale, paying for my plane ticket, and dinner with friends. Tomorrow night is a foreigner Christmas dinner. I'm so excited for that!

I hear at home there's snow. Here, I still go running outside and sometimes don't wear a coat. Although it's rained a bit the last two days which kinda sucked. I just want snow soon!

Festival at Samseo

Here's a picture show for you. Monday was Samseo Middle Schools festival and my co-teacher picked me up after my classes at Samgye so I could go to it. It was amazing. My students are talented and hilarious. Here's a small sample.

A group of about eight students played guitar and sang a k-pop song "I don't care" which is really popular here. So much that the students will sing it to you in class to try and get out of stuff. It never works, but they try. Kristen's taken to singing it to them as well which makes the students go crazy that she actually knows a k-pop song.

A bunch of students put on a skit which was about a carnival. A boy was showing a girl around the carnival and she was trying out all the different things. The boys in the coloured sweaters were the rides and inanimate objects.

This was that game you play where you try to grab the toy.

Dancing to a song called "superman" (a k-pop one. Not the one you're probably thinking of)

These are a couple of my favourite grade three students. The boy in the middle was progressively eating hoter and spicier foods. Here he's eating a jalapeno pepper. Students were going crazy over the stuff he was eating. I think I could give him a run for his money though...

My grade one girls dancing to a k-pop song. Out of all the songs danced to, theirs was the best in my opinion. They danced it for me in class last week and it was 100x better on festival day. I was so proud of them!

The boys all dressed as girls and had to answer questions. The audience then picked who they thought was the best girl. It was really only a competition between the boy on the far right and the boy second to left. I couldn't tell which of my boys they were at first either. The boy second to left won.

Although as you can see here he really got into his role. Some of them were pretty good at walking in heels too. They were high too. He probably walked better in heels than I can!

So that's my Wednesday school of 34 students. Between them they managed to put on a three hour production. I was impressed. At the end, like every other school festival, they brought out the karaoke machine. I had disco (my co-teacher) mentioning it all afternoon and how I should sing. I ademently refused, but when some of my boys told me they really really wanted me to sing I gave in. Let me tell you, when the whole school (student, teachers, parents, and siblings) suddenly goes dead quiet when the English teacher comes up to sing it's a little intimidating. Thankfully there was a song I knew well enough and was in my range to sing so I pretended I was at the norae bong with my friends and sang and danced. Yes, I put on a show for them. They were all clapping along and some were even trying to sing because they could see they lyrics too. Thankfully most of the people there don't speak much English so I doubt any of them understood a word I said.

In the end, the day was awesome. That will be my only school festival since Samgye's was cancelled because of the H1N1 scare. The parents complained so they cancelled it. Stupid parents. I would've loved to see Samgye do one. But, I got Samseo's so I'm happy!

P.s. I GOT MY SOUND CARD!!! I am currently listening to Christmas music. Almost four months with no sound. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I had it back!

Cream Cheese Cookies

... mmmm so good! That is all I have to say on that matter.

Story Time with Tara:

Today in school my co-teacher comes to me after first period and tells me that the elementary school, which is right next to the middle school, called and asked if I would be willing to teach one class at their school. He assured me I was allowed to say no, but because I had met the Korean English teacher at that school before and really wanted to help out the students, I said yes. He was so relieved! But then my co tells me that because the class would be during my one period break in the morning, I would no longer be teaching the grade threes and he would teach them instead. I LOVE my grade threes at Sinheung and had I known that before I said yes then I probably would've said no to the elementary school. I told him that it was fine if I taught the grade threes as well, but he insisted that it would be "too much work" for me to do and I should have a break during that time. I figured I'd let it be for this week and next week I'd argue my point. Besides, it's the grade threes who really should have a native English teacher because they're the ones who need good test scores to get into a good high school. The grade 6's have three more years to learn good English.
Anyway, I sit down at my desk to do a whole lot of nothing, but the computer wasn't working and there was no one I could ask. I had left all my papers in the class room so I couldn't even do text book planning or study Korean. So I went back to the class. When I went in, the whole class looks at me and went crazy. My favourite boy goes "Tara! I miss you!" so I said that I missed the class as well. I turned to James (my co.) and told him quite sternly that it would not be any more work for me to teach the grade threes because I use the same lesson plans anyway so the class was already planned. I don't care about down time, I'd rather be busy (Koreans don't seem to understand that... they like their breaks and naps!). I guess the class had made a big deal about not having me anymore when he told them earlier because he gave in right away when I said that. So my co tells them that I am now teaching them again and the whole class cheered. So I told them it would be a really hard class with lots of writing. I don't think they understood my joke...even when I said I was joking. Oh well. I had a ton of movie clips to show them anyway so it was a good thing I didn't have a hard class planned or they might regret asking for me back!
So, for a grand total of five minutes I no longer taught my grade threes. I also now have an extra class I am not getting paid for, but that was my choice for refusing to give up my grade threes. I get to run between two schools twice to make it in time for each class, but I'm fine with that. At least I get to walk around.
I almost told James I'd give up my grade twos to teach at the middle school, but I'm pretty sure even HE doesn't want to teach them more than he has to. (incase you forgot, they're my annoying class).

Hmmm I have decided I write stories that could be told in three sentences and make them into a long ordeal. I just like details.

What else?

We went to Seoul on the weekend. Four days after the North Koreans got all pissed off at South Korea for apparently instigating the navel battle off the coast of Korea where a North Korean soldier died last week Tuesday. We didn't get bombed so that's good. I think I heard it's been quite a number of years since they're had a full out navel battle between the two Koreas.

Obama is also in Korea right now. The radio told me that incase I had any ideas of knocking on his hotel door I should re-think those plans because it's crawling with cops wearing mufflers.

I have no classes tomorrow. Grade threes have final exams. Then a month and half more of school. Whoever invented the Korean school system was messed. The grade threes aren't going to care about anything after exams are over. Good thing I love them so much (in all my schools too!) because then I can plan fun games and stuff and not follow the boring textbook.

Cherrah, Kristen, and I went out for Italian last night and ordered the family meal because it was really cheap and intended to take most of it home. When we were finished the waiter told us we can't get take out...only pizza goes in take out. We argued, but since he knew ten words of English and we knew the same ten words of Korean we didn't get anywhere. So we looked at each other and dug in. We were stuffed. I think Kristen ate at least half, if not more, of the whole meal.

Cindy came over last night to show me how to work my heater since I didn't know how (ie. Tara didn't pay attention when she was told in August) and I am no longer freezing every evening and morning. Lucky me the weather warmed up today too! At least I can work it now though.

yep. that's about all I'm going to tell you. I have no pictures. They are on Kristen's computer. Sad for you. Next time maybe!

Finding Love in Korea

I debated between two different titles for the title of this post and I settled on this one because I figured it would make everyone go "ohhh!!! there's a guy!" and I just wanted to crush your hopes in the first sentence. There isn't a guy.
The other title option was "The never ending stupidity of Tara who can't seem to do anything right". But that was too long.

So, first comes first: my stupidity. You know you don't usually use hair products or hair anything when the first time you use a curling iron you leave it on. All day. While you're at school. Oops. Good thing the curling iron was on the table with all my school papers and tons of other easily flammable things all cluttered around it. Well, I guess that's not such a good thing. Now in case you think I think it's funny, well you're wrong. You probably could've heard my heart drop when I realized I had left it on. Especially since I kept reminding myself to turn it off before I left and still forgot. It's only funny now that I know I didn't burn my whole apartment complex down. That would've sucked.

Now for the story I know you all want to hear. Adelle is the only person in Canada who has heard anything about this topic so far, but it is way to funny not to tell anyone else. Especially after what happened yesterday. In suspense yet?
There's this teacher at Samseo Middle School (Wednesdays school) who speaks very little English and only comes in after lunch the day I am there. Over a month and half ago he tried to talk to me, but his English is so terrible that he usually ends up just getting my co-teacher to translate since I never understand what he is trying to tell me. Well he did a couple magic tricks for me one day and found out quickly that I was very impressed. So the next week he brought in a couple more tricks and taught me a couple of them (which I so don't remember anymore!). Eventually I guess he figured since he couldn't talk to me he might as well impress me with magic tricks. I didn't mind since Wednesdays are usually really boring since I'm done at 2:15 and have to be bored until 5 when I can leave. So he spends that time showing me tricks. I'm not complaining.
About three weeks ago he brought in this massive box of magic tricks. What he didn't count on was that the students would find out that he had them so he had more of an audience then just me. So anyway, at the end of the day he's trying to talk to me, but my co-teacher wasn't around to translate. He wrote some stuff on a piece of paper, but it made no sense to me. I THINK he was asking me what I thought about him, but I'm not sure since I don't remember his name. (it seriously is hard to remember Korean names. You try it). I just said I don't understand over and over again. Eventually he gave up. I thought he would be done with everything, but no, he wasn't. He tries to say something else that sounded like "poop-ee". Natually, I had no idea what he was saying. So he rolls up his sleeves and shows me his muscles. I almost died laughing. Thankfully none of the other teachers were paying attention (they all keep telling me the guy likes me and it just gets really awkward at times and they really don't need any more ammo against the situation!). I thought he was saying the word meant strong. I was wrong. Again. He comes over and gives me a present of Popeyes. Not your regular popeyes, but these swirlly things with sugar balls in them. I know, bad description, but I don't know what to call them. They're very good though. So now he had given me a gift. Oh boy. Then just before we go to leave he whips out his camera and asks to take a picture of me. I couldn't refuse. He wouldn't understand anyway. So I said ok. Well to him "ok" meant he could take tons of different pictures going in a full 360 around me taking one from every angle. He could probably print them off and put them in a circle frame and if you spun it, it would look like I'm turning in a circle. You know, like those pictures you draw in a book and flip the pages and it looks like someone is running? yeah. like that. He probably took enough for it too.
Later my co-teacher comes and the conversation now turns to him wanting to drive me home. While I'm frantically trying to come up with a good excuse why I can't get a ride home with him, my co-teacher pipes up saying that he said he needs a new car first. I hope he NEVER gets a new car. Later I found out that he doesn't even live in Gwangju and it would be an hour out of his way to take me home. My co-teacher tells me that "he tried getting married before, but he failed". When I heard that, I had to hold in the laughter. I'm pretty certain that's not what she meant to mean, but the way she translated what she was thinking into English it came out this way. It was hilarious.
So anyway. Yesterday was Pepero Day which is basically valentines day in November except not because they have Valentines day in February too. On this say people give chocolated coated cookie sticks to each other. Some of my boy students gave me some and it was so cute because they wanted hugs for them. They got hi-fives instead. I was dreading Pepero day when I realized it would be on Wednesday. I was so sure that magic man would buy my a whole box of them. However, I got lucky. I had a meeting for winter camps at the Office of Education after lunch so I left before he came. I was relieved. After my meeting, Kristen, Gabrielle and I were waiting for our ride when guess who shows up? Magic man. He waves so enthusiastically and comes over giving me one single pepero and runs off again. Kristen was so excited to see magic man since she's heard all the stories that I didn't think to look at the pepero he gave me. I should've because the director of camps came over and asked me who gave me the pepero. I said one of the teachers at my school did and he seemed a little surprised. So I look at the pepero and it is covered in white and pink hearts says "I love you", "heart to heart", and "Please remember that I love you more than anything". I almost died. Although I'm pretty sure magic man has no idea what the English words on the package say, the pink and white hearts kinda give it away.

Koreans seem intent on setting me up with everyone. Today the owner of the corner store by my place asked if I wanted to get set up with the guy from England who I've run into a couple times in the store. Then a lady I met while running got excited when I told her I didn't have a boyfriend (of the four questions every Korean knows in English "do you have a boyfriend?" is one of them) and was trying to find a paper to give me her address. Don't know what I'd do with that.

So there's my week. Other then all that I just did student speaking tests in all my classes so this week was easy. I love giving speaking tests. I can scare the students easier by telling them I'm a hard marker and no one will pass! I know, cruel, but it's fun.
Oh, and p.s. this post is early because I am going on a road trip this weekend and probably will be too tired to post Sunday night like I usually do. So enjoy the extra post.




These pictures are from my second trip to Mt. Naejangsan that I wrote about last post. I didn't have any other pictures to put up since then so you get these.

Ordering Take Out In Korean

The view looking down from Sinheung Middle School (My Thursday school and also the school of of the horrible grade two's)

Sinheung Middle School

The driveway up to Sinheung Middle School

It's raining today. It hasn't rained very much since I've been here. Maybe two or three real downpours and one or two other rainy days. The last four or five days have also been really really warm. I even complained about the heat on Friday that they opened all the windows in the teachers office just for me! The only two cold days were Monday and Tuesday. Even then I was still walking around without a coat while my students were wearing winter jackets. I will admit the wind was cold, but not cold enough to need a winter jacket.

I found out this week that the two camps I was going to be doing for the first month of winter vacation were going to be cancelled. One camp found out I was doing two camps and thought that would be too much for me so they asked another English teacher (go figure, it was Kristen!) and then the camp at my school ended up being cancelled as well. So I had a minor freakout because even though camp would be five weeks so we couldn't travel around Korea in that time (they're supposed to be two week camps) I would rather that than be bored to death for five weeks and not making any money at all. So Kristen told them about how disapointed I was (playing it up a bit) and they asked me to come for the last three weeks of the camp. I figure, better some then none right? So at least I won't be totally bored although we only teach 3-4 hours a day so I'll still be bored, but I'll be bored with Kristen and Gabrielle so I know it'll be a blast!

This week for my grade three students I had them presenting the posters they did two weeks ago in class. Since my grade threes tend to be very forgetful if there's a two week break between classes I had my co-teacher remind them to bring their posters. I knew a lot would forget or "forget" so they wouldn't have to present so I brought along chocolates for those that remembered. The looks on the faces of the students who realized they wouldn't be getting chocolates was priceless. I'm pretty sure they now know not to forget to bring stuff when I tell them to! I had students begging me all class for chocolates. Tough luck on them though because they didn't get any! My co-teacher thought it was hilarious that I did that to get back at the students who try to get away without doing the work.

Saturday I went back to Naejangsan Mountain with Laura who hadn't been there yet. It wasn't nearly as pretty as when we went two or three weeks ago. Many of the bright coloured trees all lost their leaves already. It was still pretty, but after having witnessed the mountain in it's glory, this wasn't as good! But that's ok. We hiked up to the top again even though after doing it last time I swore I wouldn't do it again! I seem to do that a lot.

I was supposed to be going hiking with the math teacher and his son (who I haven't met yet but his Dad tells me I'll faint at how handsome he is...), but that got cancelled because he had to leave for his hometown urgently. However, that didn't stop him from spending the entire lunch period on Friday telling me about his son whose 23 years old, 178 cm, 68kg and I'd apparently make the perfect match for him. Of course all this was said though Cindy since his English is limited. I'm pretty sure I found out more about his son then his son probably wants me to know. Actually, I found out more than I even wanted to know!

Last night Cindy came down to my place for a party of ice cream, pizza, and a movie. She arrived with a MASSIVE bucket of Baskin Robins ice cream and any plans I had of eating healthy left with when I saw that bucket. But first, I had to order pizza over the phone. I knew most of the words of how to order I just didn't know what to do if they asked me questions. Cindy just said to repeat myself over and over if that happened. So with my sentences rehearsed I called. Don't ask me what they said at first, but I figured it was "hello, how can I help you?" So I said, "Annyong haseyo, goguma pizza hana, ke re go, cheese pizza hana, ju sae yo" which basically means "hello, May I have one sweet potato pizza and one cheese pizza". Yes, cheese is the same word in both languages you just pronounce it "chees-uh" so that they understand it. So then my worst fears were realized and she says a whole line of something I don't understand. So I just answered "da" which is "yes" not really knowing what I was agreeing to. Then she repeats what I ordered (I understood that much!) and then says something else I don't get. So I go to Cindy, I have no idea what she's saying! and all Cindy can do is smile... so nice of her. Thankfully the lady spoke a couple words of English and I understood she wanted my phone number which becomes my second problem. What is my phone number anyway?! so after giving her what I think was my phone number we ended the call. When we got there I wasn't sure what I'd recieve, but we got what I ordered!

Then we rented S.W.A.T in VHS since that's all I have in my apartment and my sound card hasn't arrived from Canada yet (yep going on three months with no sound on my computer. Dare you guys to try that) and we sat down for some pigging out. I must say, sweet potato pizza should be brought to Canada. Next time I'm trying curry pizza. I can't wait! So we were stuffed but there was still ice cream which we almost made it through, but even Kristen couldn't eat anymore so we had to put that away (and I ate it for breakfast this morning).

After church today Kristen and I headed to the Gwangju International Centre downtown to see our friend Gabrielle at the photo show she was participating in. There was only one Korean participating in this months photo show and the rest were westerners. There were some really good photos there and the one Korean man had the sweetest camera ever. I'm so jealous! Anyway, there was all this free food there so me and Kristen spent half our time at the food table eating our free early dinner. Then when the offer came up to join some friends for an Indian dinner we had to refuse because we were full. And too cheap of course. So now I sit here watching tv. I'm not even sure what I'm watching since I'm not paying attention.

This week should be an easy week since I'm doing three days worth of speaking tests which means no lesson planning! With extra classes finished now I really don't have a whole lot to do. So yes, that means more bordom, but hopefully plenty of time to learn more Korean as well as figure out exact what we're doing for winter vacation and booking a flight. So far all we know is the countries we're going to, but even that's not set in stone as we might add a country to the list. Maybe. Who knows. We'll figure it out. Probably last minute, but it'll get done!