Jon: Big Cheese Story

So this is a story dealing with one of my more advance classes that are about 11 years old.  There are three boys (William, Soby, and Dennis) and two girls (Helen and Lilly) in the class.  All five of them speak pretty impressive English for being so young and they are all very smart.  The three boys, however, like to have judo fights and William loves to tell the other two how they're going to marry Helen or Lilly (which is immediately followed by Soby karate chopping William).

Anyways, we we're reading a new story that day as I walked into class as Soby was shouting "BITCHESSS".  I really didn't know what to do or what to say so i just asked Soby rather mortified "what did you say?" Soby then went to the open window, stuck his head out, and explained to me "I said I want 'BITCHESSS' teacher."  I immediately told Soby to stand in the corner and that I was going to call his mom.  He looked rather surprised as did the other students and William then spoke up and said "teacher...it's in the book."  I quickly assured him that it was not in the book and that Soby would be losing all of his stamps (a form of reward system where the students are given stamps when good in order to buy things anywhere from pencils to Nintendo wii's).  It was then that Lilly agreed with what William and that "bitchess" was in the book.  I walked over to the open book that Helen had and she pointed it out to me:  "Big Cheese".  

"See teacher, 'bitchess" Helen quickly told me.  As you can see, pronunciation is not exactly a strong suit of Korean children.  All you can do in a situation like that is apologize and laugh really hard (as well as give about a hundred stamps to Soby and say sorry).  

Lisa: A Korean Wedding

My school director's wedding was November 22 and all of us foreign teachers were invited.  I'm a pretty big fan of cultural events, so I was really excited to go, with Jon going as my date.  It was a cultural eye-opener, but probably not in the way you are thinking.

The wedding was held in the Gangnam district of Seoul on 

Saturday evening at 5pm.  For any of you that have experienced rush-hour travel in a city of over 10 million can guess, getting there was a huuuuge pain.  We left around 3 the metro from Suji which was quite hot and crowded.  After about an hour, we arrived at Gangnam station and proceeded to find the shuttle bus that would take us to the venue.  It then took us another 50 minutes to go less than a mile.  We travelled in comfort though, as you can see.  This is my friend/co-worker, Phillip, crammed into a very small space.

Koreans usually have two ceremonies, a Western style ceremony and a Korea ceremony.  The western ceremony is the one we were able to go see as it isn't exactly an intimate affair.  First of all, it was on the 6th floor of one of the huge shopping centers.  It certainly had something of a Vegas feel to it.  We walked in and were warmly welcomed by the wedding party all dressed in their traditional Hanbok.  The bride and groom were in Western style clothing, however.  Sadly, I don't have any pictures of this as I forgot I had my camera.  The bride was sitting in a sort of throne room where everyone could go in and look at her before the ceremony.

The ceremony itself lasted about 30 minutes and apparently this is extremely long by Korean standards.  Overall, the style was similar to ours, with some readings, a sermon of sorts, and a hymn.  But of course, this was all in Korean so it was pretty difficult to get much out of it.  What was really strange for us Westerners to understand, however, was how noisy it was.  In the states, the bride and groom would have walked into the congregation and punched people if it were this loud.  Laughing, talking, talking and/or texting on cell phones...but apparently it isn't a big deal here in Korea.  The ceremony went on as planned.

I think one of the strangest things was that this room had big tvs up so that people in the back could see, even though the room was pretty small.  The bride and groom also spoke their vows in to microphones, I guess so that they could be heard over the crowd.  They also read their vows, or what I think were their vows, from a book.  The only other notable cultural difference is that when they were finished they went and stood in front of each of their parents and both gave very deep bows, with Mr. Lee (my director) kneeling with his forehead on the ground to show respect.  It was a really enjoyable affair, excepting the fact that a) we could not hear and b) even if we could hear, we wouldn't have understood anything.

After the ceremony, most guests went to eat dinner at what was basically a reception without the dancing and boozing.  There certainly was alcohol provided at every table, but it was nothing of the all-night affairs that we are used to.  People pretty much ate their fill and then left.  While we were eating dinner, at least for a little while, there was also a traditional Korean wedding ceremony, however this remains a bit of a mystery since it is only for family.

Here is a picture of Jon and some of my co-workers at the wedding.  Left to right is Matt, Jon, Phillip, and Long.

Jon: Pavox

One of my favorite bars, along with my friend Russ, is Pavoxs. It's a small bar that often has more bartenders working than people actually there (usually 5 bartenders to Russ and I and maybe some random Korean).  We often come here to play darts because they have two dart boards, there's no wait for the board, and Russ bought his own Simpsons darts. 

 

The people working at Pavox are extremely friendly probably because we are two of the only patrons some nights (side note:  Russ frequents Pavox more often than I do so when his friend 

John who works in Seoul visited, John was given a flaming shot of something just because he was Russ' friend).  However, Pavox is more expensive than the other bars so we usually visit for the darts and Kazu and Miss Cleo. Kazu was the one who provided John with the flaming shot (which the flames didn't show up on the picture so you can just pretend) and is in the group picture with myself, Russ, John, and our friend Jake.  Kazu is also incredible at darts.  We occasionally invite him to play with us and we have yet to come within 150 points of beating him (we play 501 where all players start

out at 501 points and the first to exactly zero points wins).

In the last picture is Russ and Miss Cleo. Not really sure how Miss Cleo came up with her name, but she is pretty impressive at darts as well.  It must be the fact that they often have no one there and have many opportunities to practice.

  

HomePlus, Shopping, and Sundays

After telling you so much about HomePlus and Lotte Mart, we thought it would be a good idea to explain a little more and give you a look into the basic Korean shopping experience.  Here is the exterior of the infamous HomePlus.  Owned by Samsung, apparently it is the company Samsung uses when it needs to "move funds around."  Regardless, it has most things that westerners want.  As you can see, this building is pretty big.  The first floor is a food court type area and the next floor is the grocery store.  Next is the floor with most household goods, office supplies, pets, tvs, and furniture. No pictures of those yet, but someday...

So despite having so many western foods, it is still very much an Asian goods store...as you can see here from the whole isle full of red pepper paste and soy sauce.  Red pepper paste is added to most foods, so naturally they need 50 different varieties.

Equally important are the choices of soy sauce.  You may be wondering 

what could be so hard about choosing soy sauce, but again the variety is overwhelming.  There are different kinds for fish, chicken, vegetables, rice, and other meats; it's a big decision.  Here you can see Jon is bewildered by the important decision that lies before him.

Also important is the ramyeon, or the Korean equivalent of ramen noodles. Just in case the red pepper  paste and soy sauce don't provide enough sodium, one can always cook up one of umpteen varieties of these instant noodles and snack away.  Being that variety is the spice of life and Koreans do love spice, there naturally must be another entire aisle dedicated just these instant snacks.  

Sundays are the busiest grocery shopping days of the week, at least so far as we have been able to tell.  Here is Jon checking out after a tiring shopping excursion.  As you can see, HomePlus really is a large, very modern grocery store.  You can also see how crowded it gets.  It is nearly impossible to walk 3 feet without someone bumping into you.

After facing the hustle and bustle of Sunday shopping in HomePlus, there really is only one thing left to do...

Lisa: The other dong in the story...

So while Shute lives in Yeongtong-dong of Suwon, I am in Poongdeokcheon-dong of Suji. I am 30-45 minutes away by bus. It's considerably smaller, but still a good sized city I suppose. Getting to know my district has been pretty cool. There's a stream that goes right through the city with a paved path that goes all the way to Bundang, another city nearby. It's a nice place to go running. Bundang is one of the wealthiest cities in all of South Korea, but that is another subject for another time.

The Suji equivalent to HomePlus is called Lotte Mart. There's another "mart-uh" as they are called here called E-Mart, and both are multi-story shopping places with food courts, grocery stores, pets, clothing, and sporting equipment. There's also Shinsegae which has a very nice movie theater (where you can order beer and it comes with a straw!) and is a little more upscale. Lotte Mart even has a TGIFriday's in it. Don't get too excited though, quality isn't so great...sadly, Koreans believe that American beef will cause you to become sick with mad cow disease and die, so we are left with Australian beef. Not awful, but let's just say that my burger reminded me of cat food and leave it at that.

I work for Seoul Language Institute, a hagwon that teaches kids from the ages of 7-18. It's a pretty cushy lifestyle, to be honest. My first class is not until 4:20 at the earliest, and I'm finished at 10:30 at the very latest. So, as you can imagine, this leaves a lot of time for...well, I haven't quite figured that out yet, but something. The kids at work sure know how to keep life interesting. I won't lie, at first they all looked alike to me and it took me a good 3 weeks or so before I started to be able to recognize more than one or two students by face. They really know how to keep my life interesting though, that's for sure.

I have a single studio apartment. It's small, but cozy. Overall, not a bad place to live for a year. I do miss having an oven, however. In any event, here are some pictures of my apartment. This is when I first arrived...now it's much messier and the furniture is arranged differently, but you get the idea. The heating system here is kind of interesting, it's called "ondol" and there are some sort of hot water coils under the floor that heat the room. A bit different, but still pretty effective.

My apartment is about a 4 or 5 minute walk to school, less if I catch all the lights at the crosswalks. There are currently 4 other foreign (i.e. American) teachers at my school. Describing them could take a month, but overall I really like them. They're a lot of fun and have been really helpful. There are also eight Korean teachers that teach English grammar and reading.

As for a job description, foreign teachers generally focus on speaking, listening, dictation, and writing. I also teach TOEFL classes, which are test prep classes for the "Test of English as a Foreign Language" that middle school students must take to attend Foreign Language High Schools and that high school students need to go to boarding schools and/or American universities. There is an incredible focus on education here and acceptance to one of the top three Korean universities (known together as SKY) or an American school is seen as tantamount to success. Kids go to school as early as 6 or 7 and are finished around 3 or so, only to get to a Hagweon where they take another 3 hours of English lessons. This is usually 3 days a week, and the other days are filled with Chinese, swimming, Tae Kwan Do, art, and Korean lessons. And this comes from some of my kids that are only 9 or 10!

Well I think this is about it for the quick introduction to my life here in Korea. We'll get posts about food/drink, holidays, customs etc. up soon.

Jon: Let me tell you about my dong.....

I should probably begin by explaining......."dongs" are districts within the cities of South Korea, much like the boroughs in New York, but smaller and more numerous. So my "dong" then is Yeongtong-dong, Suwon and Lisa's "dong" (haha still funny even after four months) is Poongdeokcheon-dong, Suji. So whenever we talk about our respective "dongs" keep in mind they're our neighborhoods, not anything errrr.....anatomically speaking.

Suwon is a large city home to roughly one million people and is commonly

called the "greater Seoul area." Yeongtong is a bustling district with several large hagweons, a hugh movie theater, McDonald's, Dunk'n Donuts, KFC (which apparently runs out

 of chicken at times), Baskin Robbins, and the nerve center of Yeongtong: Homeplus.  Homeplus is essentially the Korean version of Wal-mart that has practically anything a Korean or foreigner would need. I can buy peanut butter, frosted flakes, chips and salsa, ketchup, and almost any other amenity that I could find back home. The one major exception, however, is deodorant. Apparently Koreans do not sweat or stink and have no need for deodorant which leaves me playing the role of the smelly white man.

Yeongtong is also home to some excellent eats as well as a few decent bars (which will be another blog unto itself). One particular restaurant that I frequent often, along with Lisa, friends, and coworkers, is fantastic as it is visited at least once, probably twice a week. The name, however, still eludes me.  (Here's the restaurant)

Other restaurants that we generally find ourselves visiting came as a surprise to us: fried chicken eateries. Koreans do incredible fried chicken and love to have beer accompany it; who doesn't it? What makes Korean fried chicken so great is that it often comes spicy. Food in Korea, which came as a surprise to me, as been some of the best I've had.

That's pretty much a quick synopsis of my "dong". Lisa will follow up soon with a post about her "dong" and we'll begin to fill in and piece together certain experiences and lessons we've had so far in Korea!

K-Town: A quick intro

We have been living in South Korea for close to four months before we finally decided on starting our own blog.  Sadly, we would have had one when we first arrived if Jon had not been so against it.  Yet he caved and has now been all about doing one (so thank him for making us take so long).  

This blog is primarily being done for family, friends, and anyone interested in South Korea or anyone bored enough to read our blog.  Feel free to contact us through Jon's email with any questions at all and we hope you enjoy it!