I wonder how much lessons cost?

This is why you ALWAYS should hire a proofreader, even for small things. Or at the very least use spell check.

Potpourri

Here are a bunch of random things that I have taken pictures of lately. Even though I've lived here for over a year and a half there are still things that surprise, puzzle and entertain me every time I leave my apartment. This is what has caught my eye recently.
Some funny billboards/ads. I have to say, Sizzler is NOT Tastier Good and is super expensive.
Next up are also food related. The Brasilia restaurant's ad was deliberate and I just thought it was funny. And the other is just for interests sake. You can get a beer combo at movie theatres here. A large beer is only $3!

The same day we visited the theatre (we saw Wall-E and it was excellent!!!) we had some dinner at a nearby Vietnamese place. Matt got a set that included this! Look at the CLAW! Now that is hardcore.



Also hardcore is this emo pastel panda shirt. It laments, "I want to be a colorful panda". Poor panda. You need to hang out with the panda from Art Box. Now he's ALWAYS relaxed (this reference will only be understood by people who are familiar with this Korean store). Also, have you EVER seen a piano flute before? Now if that isn't the most bad ass thing I've ever seen... Wow. This band was playing a free concert at Jamsil station the other day.

The last thing just confuses the hell out of me. I really don't understand the logic here sometimes. You may recall back in January when we went ice skating at Lotte World for my birthday it was required that everyone wear gloves while they were skating. It didn't matter if you were a professional skater or that 3000 people were skating at the same time and therefore you were going at a snail's pace. EVERYONE had to wear gloves or they weren't allowed on the ice. If you didn't have gloves they had glove vending machines handy.
Flash forward to the present. It's summer and since it's an indoor rink you can still skate at Lotte World. And gloves continue to be mandatory. However, if you want to skate with BARE LEGS, this is completely acceptable. I wasn't able to get a good picture since the batteries in my camera died but there were several people skating with bare legs. But don't worry- their HANDS were protected. Wtf?!? Can someone explain this one to me?

Book Club Happenings

Here are some pictures from our last book club meeting. We ate a late brunch at Suji's in COEX and then browsed Bandi and Luni's for awhile. I didn't capture everyone in the pictures but the ones I took are pretty accurate to how things roll. Mitzi is goofing off and being a bit outrageous, Matt looks dismayed and Veronica is taking pictures with her sweet camera.

They had the COOLEST salt and pepper shakers at Suji's and I was really tempted to snag them. If you can't tell from the picture, they are shaped like a fried egg. The yolk was the salt (but I think it should have been the pepper) and the white part was the pepper. Susan was kind enough to pose with them (she also looks hot in her new glasses). Why must everything be so cute in Korea?



After the meeting we met up with Dana and Curtis in the mall and did a bit of shopping. We popped into the Hello Kitty store where we admired this sweet scooter. I wonder how much that costs considering lunch sets were $28. Heheh. It was a good weekend and now we're reading Persuasion by Jane Austen for our next meeting. Matt is finished but I've still got a long way to go. Maybe I should be doing that instead of blogging. Hmmm...

Other School Stuff

This month I've started a new challenge- I am teaching a class for the parents of students at my school who are interested in learning conversational English. It's exciting and really great experience for me but also totally nerve-racking and frightening at the same time. It's held on Mondays and Tuesdays so I have survived my first week of class with them. I've never taught adults before so this is a completely new thing for me. I think it's going okay so far, but I guess we'll see how many people consistently attend the class. Hahah. Anyways, this is another reason why I am so busy. Today's highlight was asking a mom what her favorite piece of clothing was and her replying "I love to wear my hot pants!". I thought I was going to pee my pants. She did add that she only wears them at home after everyone stopped laughing. I have to say, that is an answer I've never received in any of my classes with children (thank goodness!).

September also means that I have new classes starting, including a HUGE new A1 class (these are the lowest level students in the school). It meant that I had to say goodbye to some of the kids I'd taught for the last four months, including these cutie pies.
This is James, Ashely and Yunseo. They were all really cute and well behaved so I will really miss teaching them. The girls were a bit nervous about moving to Garrett's class because Garrett is a giant, scary man (at least from the perspective of a tiny little Korean girl). I am sure they will do just fine though.
On the last class I was greeted with this on the board. So sweet!

Also, take a look at Ashely's hands!! There is a flower here that the kids use to dye their nails with (although Ashely was perhaps a little overzealous since her fingers are also stained). This does NOT wash off and takes at least two-four months to fade away. Crazy!! I still haven't figured out which flower does this. Anyway, work is going pretty good other than it being ridiculously busy. I'll be really happy if they find someone else to teach the Screen English classes (even though they are a breeze) because it would free up some of my time to do all this marking and phone testing, etc. We'll see what happens though.

A-team Shenanigans

I can't believe it's September already! I know I have been really slacking on the blog entries and basically the reason is because work has been frantic. The end of August was insanity and I am pretty amazed I survived it at all (and got all my paperwork done on time). September looks like it will be much of the same since my classes are getting bigger and bigger. I went from having 36 students to 55. That means extra essays to mark each week, as well as extra phone tests, reports cards and stress in general. This is modest compared to how many students some of my coworkers have but it's still a big adjustment for me, especially when the kids are at the beginning level and understand minimal English. I think Matt has more students but he can communicate with them much easier so I think it balances out.

Anyway, my job isn't always hard work- last week we decided to have a dinner with the A level teachers. We're a small group and we ended up having a pretty wild time. As a result we're all super close now. My coteacher is Minjung (her English name is Claire but I don't call her that) and then there is Garrett and Kelly (Yongwoo- she's wearing black in the picture). We had a really fun time chatting, laughing and eating lots of galbi and gimchi. It's so important to have a good relationship with the other teachers. It was a bit of a late night but was totally worth feeling sleepy the next day.

Later in the week Minjung brought some special mandu in for Garrett (and the rest of us). One of Garrett's favorite things to eat here is mandu (Korean dumplings) and it has become quite the joke. As it turned out, that day Garrett had brought his own mandu to work as his snack! Bwahaha! So we had FOUR kinds of mandu: gochu (hot pepper), gimchi, gogi (meat) and fried. Delicious!

A Quiet Long Weekend

Last weekend we had Friday off (mercifully since work has been more hectic than usual this month). Originally we had planned to go on a trip with Dana, Curtis, Eddie and Gisela but things weren't going to work out. It was okay though since we had a lot of fun hanging out in Bundang. On Friday Dana and Curtis went to a big concert in Seoul but they left us the keys to their place so we got our fill of playing Wii and computer games. Yes, we are a little pathetic but it was so fun! Death Cab for Cutie were playing at the concert so I asked Dana to pick me up a shirt and she did. It's currently my favorite. The rest of the weekend consisted of watching episodes of the Office, eating yummy food and playing lots of games. We also slipped in a session of norae (of course!). One of the most exciting parts was stopping at a store that sells Western goods and scoring these rare and exotic items.

I am most excited about the Miracle Whip. There are not many things that I miss from home but Miracle Whip is one of them and we were fresh out of the supplies we'd brought from Canada. This is a pretty huge container so it should last us until we leave. Yay! We also picked up some mini Reese Peanut Butter cups (not pictured because we devoured them too quickly). If anyone is wanting to send a care package we are almost out of Golden Italian salad dressing, Dentene Ice Gum (the green package is the only kind I like though), taco seasoning packages and, of course, Reese Peanut Butter cups. Really I have to say I miss decent chocolate in general since they don't sell anything made by Cadbury here. Oh well, the price you pay for living in another country I suppose.

Margot Teacher's Goodbye Party

A couple weekends ago we had a big goodbye party for Margot Teacher. She's already back in the US and she will be missed by many over here. Her friend Joia planned a great night and there was a good turnout. The evening started out at the Hard Rock Cafe, chosen mainly for it's user friendly menu (there were people with extreme allergies in our group) and ability to accommodate a large group. Once everyone showed up it was really excellent, although probably it was the company rather than the food or service. The food was okay but really overpriced (as you probably know) and the staff didn't really have their act together. We contemplated renting the Hard Rock's norae bang room but then they told us that it was $30/hour PLUS you had to buy a $280 bottle of whiskey. Uhhh, no thanks.









So we escaped from the Hard Rock (who had a terrible band playing live that night) and headed over to the Hongdae area. We ended up at one of the Ho bars (there are at least 5) and in a moment of crazy we decided to order two bottles of tequila (we were being budget savvy I guess). Usually when I'm out I am really well behaved, however, this time we were the loud, obnoxious foreigners. We didn't get kicked out (or even reprimanded) but we did have an ice fight or two. You know what they say, no one wins in an ice fight. ^^











Next stop was norae bang (after stocking up on secret beverages). It was a long walk but well worth it since we went to one of the Luxury norae bangs. This one was lovely and included free ice cream! Yum! Just what a group of drunk foreigners needs. We got busted for having outside beverages but they let us keep the soju and just took the bottles (luckily we'd grabbed cups from the GS Mart) which I thought was a little strange but I didn't complain about. Sadly our time was up all too quickly. Since it was already a ridiculous time in the morning we decided to carry on with the festivities.

We found a club and started dancing the night away. The cover charge we paid apparently gained us entry to three different clubs so when the first one started getting a bit old we carried on to the next. That was where we ended the night. It was a long one and a late one but a really amazing time and the perfect way to send off Margot. And on the plus side, after the teary goodbyes we were able to take the subway home for cheap instead of springing for a taxi! Margot Teacher, we miss you already! To see all the crazy pictures you can go here.

Making Pottery in Yeoju

A couple weekends ago we hooked up with Eddie and Gisela in Yeoju to make some pottery. Eddie has already blogged about it, in fact, and did a really splendid job. It was a lot of fun and the woman running the place was really kind (she even called us after we left because Matt forgot his book) and we got to see an interesting ceramics museum for free. We ended up buying a really cool vase and a necklace for me. I would recommend doing this if you're in Korea. My only regret is that I chose to make a vase and not a bowl like Eddie, however, I guess I will just have to go back again and make one. ^^ Here are some pictures!









A Korean couple was also making some pottery but they chose to decorate them in a creative way... Covered in Gucci and Prada! Hahaha! Damn, they stole my idea! I thought we did pretty good despite that.

Funny Books

Here are a couple tidbits that we came across recently. The first is from one of Matt's textbooks. Like I've mentioned, I teach younger/lower level students so usually my material is really basic and boring. Matt gets all sorts of gems though. Like this unit on euthanasia. I mean, what else should 13 year old children be learning about in another language? I love the accurate picture too. So many healthy teenage girls are being euthanized these days. It's a crying shame, I tell you. Watch out kids for that giant pink, fluid-filled death needle. And you thought you only had to worry about fans!

The next is from one of my students' new notebooks. What does this mean? There was some Korean text and she said that the words were similar so I am guessing this one is just a bad translation. One thing is for sure, it's about love.

In other news, our school has decided to offer a new class- a Speaking class for the parents. Guess who will be teaching it? Yep, me. Wow, no pressure there. Hopefully it goes all right but they have yet to give me the books or any real instructions. I'm supposed to conduct interviews this week with the interested parents in order to place them in the appropriate level (beginner or intermediate). Things are never dull around here, that's for sure.

China Part Eight

So this is the last installment of our trip to China. I bet you thought I was finished, right? No I just got busy with work and life and lost steam. Pretty much this last entry will be a catch-all for the things that I didn't mention.

Our last night in Beijing we spent with our couch surfing friends, Curtis and Jenny. We went to their place (although it was tough to get in touch with them since we left our hostel and all the payphones required you to have a phone card- they didn't accept change!!) and had a couple drinks before taking a cab to a new part of the city. It was a really awesome place with a lot of bars around a beautiful lake. We enjoyed many beers for 10 yuan each (which is less than $1.50) and stayed out really late. It was the perfect end to a perfect trip. I tried to take a picture of them but my batteries were dead so this is all I have. Hahah. The first is blurry and the second one looks like I took it right before I stabbed them.
Other things that I might not have mentioned that were awesome: Dairy Queen. The flavor selection for Blizzards was limited but when you haven't had one in a long time it doesn't matter. We went to DQ twice and the second time we won a free ice cream cone. Which the worker insisted on giving to us right then and there. So we had a lot of ice cream that day and looked like giant foreign pigs. Oh well.



Also, I really enjoyed this overpass near our hostel. Check out the escalator! I wish they had those in Seoul!



The range of food available was also cool and interesting. The picture on the left is from when we ate hot pot (which was only okay but other meals we had on the trip were amazing). On the right you can see some typical street food that we did not try. Yeah, maybe I'll have scorpions on a stick next time I'm in Beijing. Or not.

Our trip back to Seoul also went smoothly. We picked up a bunch of candy for our friends and students and jumped onto one of the airport buses. Our flight back was uneventful and our luggage arrived with us back in Korea. What an amazing vacation! Here's a little video we made when we were out one night. Matt was really excited which is why he kept interrupting me. Also here's the link to the main page of our Beijing pictures.