Everything is still weird

     Gamcheon Village:

Gamcheon Village was a fairly spectacular experience. I spent the day with my new friend Catharina, the angelic human being I met at the international party. She was an awesome tour guide and her abilities to speak Korean, English and Chinese all came in handy (we ran into some Chinese tourists along the way). Gamcheon Village is basically a really poor area where many people moved during the Korean War. Someone decided to turn it into a tourist attraction by painting everything in bright colours and turning it into a massive art piece, really. It’s a good thing I suppose... turn somewhere poor and run down into a place where people will come from all over to see (and spend money at!). The weather wasn’t at its best but luckily we left just as the wind started picking up. We then went to Catharina’s hometown where we ate a late lunch together... I had this amazing curry, perhaps even the best curry I’ve ever had, but I’m sad to say that the heat got the better of me. Korean food is often spicy so I should have known better. I didn’t want to stop but the embarrassment of the sweating and runny nose eventually caused me to call it a day! As soon as I got back to my home in Jangsan the rain started pouring down. A successful outing and well-timed too!    

Strange Korean Compliment of the Day:

      Student: Teacher... your nose... like Pinocchio.
Me: Ah... I see. Well, thanks.
Student: No teacher. It good!
Me: To have a nose like Pinocchio?
Student: Yes teacher. Many Koreans... um, silicon nose to look like your.
Me: They have plastic surgery?
Student: Yes, plastic!
Me: Ah, well thank you.
Student: Yes, teacher very handsome.
Me: *plays it cool* There’s a spelling mistake in your answer to question 4. *walks away*

       April Fool’s Day:

April Fool’s Day is apparently a pretty big deal in Korea. At least, they certainly seem to take it more seriously than we do in South Africa. My co-teacher fortunately alerted me to this fact earlier in the week so I could be sure to remember that if anything strange happened it was probably because of the date! I was (fortunately) excluded from most of the activity but my co-teacher had an evil plan... with our best poker faces on, we would tell the students that I would be returning to South Africa in a couple of weeks and they would be getting a new native teacher to take my place. To be perfectly honest, I was worried that the reaction was going to be whoops, cheers and a small party... but solemn faces were the order of the day. I wasn’t sure I would be able to pull it off but I gave a pretty convincing performance if I do say so myself. After telling the students the bad news, my co-teacher whispered to me that we would only tell them the truth after class; how successful this was I can’t be sure, as we still had a lesson to do and the classroom atmosphere was completely dead after that! Nevertheless, it was worth it for the reaction at the end – my co-teacher let them believe it right up until they were lined up and ready to go out the door. Their reaction when they realised they’d been duped was priceless! I still had some students coming up to me days afterwards giving me dirty scowls and calling me a “bad liar”. Mission accomplished!

 Lotte Giants baseball game:

This was something I just knew I had to do. A few friends went a couple of weeks before and it seemed like a really awesome experience. And plus, I’d been missing my live sport over here so I figured it would be fun either way! While my enjoyment of the experience was significantly lessened due to the fact that I’d just visited the ENT doctor earlier in the day and received an unusually large bag of medicine, the baseball was still everything I thought it would be. The experience can be summed up quite nicely in this video:

Birthday bowling celebrations:

This was perhaps the best night out I’ve had in Korea yet. For once the activity was taking place close by to me, in Haeundae, and the plans were simple: hit the bowling alley and partake in the W10,000 (R100) unlimited beer special. While my interest in the bowling itself was initially quite minimal, I soon realised that luck was on my side as I nailed three strikes in a row (with a couple of them admittedly bouncing off the railing) and won myself a pair of socks. While I wasn’t able to maintain that form throughout the round, I did enough to snatch a win despite a nerve-wracking comeback from Tom, the birthday boy, who took it to the final ball being bowled. The proclamations of me being an “awesome bowler” were short-lived, as I finished near the bottom of the pack for the next two games.

I feel like this would be a weirdly awesome photo if those
damn socks I won weren't in the way. Artistic.

As you can see, I enjoyed early dominance
(player D by the way)...

...and then almost lost it at the end. Fortunately I held on
and exorcised some terrible bowling performances from the
past.

     On-air reading:

      My debut television appearance was nowhere near as glamorous as I’d always imagined it might be. My blonde locks weren’t blowing in the wind and there were no cute girls by my side. Instead I held a children’s book in my hand as I nervously read and asked comprehension questions to an imaginary audience. Of course, that imaginary audience was in fact hundreds of students and teachers looking on at me from the TV screens in their classrooms. I read The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear which was quite entertaining for the kids I think; maybe if a reading coincides with April Fool’s Day next year I’ll introduce them to William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury. 

A very short, quick update - not long at all

Here’s the deal: I’ve had a blog post half-finished for over two weeks now. In fact, this is the third week I think. So if I go into detail about every little thing, this is going to be one very, very long post. Instead, allow me to give you the short version:

·         I had my first weekend outing after finally recovering from my cold (I honestly think my co-workers were starting to believe that I’m just the kind of person who blows his nose 50 times a day, regardless of the season or location). We went on a hike to Taejongdae which was just spectacular.

·         We headed to Gwangalli beach to enjoy some drinks near the water. The waves here are unbelievably pathetic compared to back home, I seriously don’t even know how there are (apparently) Korean surfers. But it was lovely all the same and it was actually nice to see a different kind of ocean to what I’m used to! Of course, despite being some of the best weather since I arrived, it was still way too cold to even consider dipping my feet in the water. I think I’ll wait until summer...

Gwangalli Beach

·         We went to a foreigners bar for St. Patrick’s Day celebrations. There was green beer just like there is back home (which apparently doesn’t happen in Ireland according to some Irish friends) and the bar was full of waygooks. It was awesome but I was quite thankful the subway stops running at 12 so I had an excuse to leave early! I then made myself some coffee and watched the Sharks game and for once I wasn’t disappointed I stayed up (I think this was when we played the Cheetahs)!

·         The school lunches are very... interesting. I’ve eaten squid (which actually isn’t all that bad – a bit chewy and flavourless though), seaweed, tofu (which I hate), cold fish (not raw... just cold) and of course kimchi and rice with every... single... meal. I’m slowly getting used to it all though and lately I’ve been cleaning my plate – what a shocker!

·         My principal has decided that he absolutely loves me now. I got lost on my way to school the one day (yes, even after all this time I can’t understand the announcements on the bus!) and ended up running late. I ran into the school entrance at 08:35 completely out of breath and was then terrified to see the principal walking towards me. So as confidently as I could, I bowed low and greeted him with “Annyeong hashimnikka, gyojang-seonsaengnim” which is the most respectful form of “hello” in Korean followed by his title of “principal” (i.e. “Good morning, principal”). He just laughed and gave me a pat on the back as I ran off to class. Later, at the lunch table, I was looking back and forth between teachers and principal as they had a discussion about me which I, of course, could not understand. Later, my co-teacher told me that I had made the principal very, very happy as he had never had someone greet him by his title before and he liked it very much. So now he apparently wants to buy some special Korean alcohol for me and do some shots... could be an interesting experience!

·         The next weekend we headed to Seomyeon to celebrate Simon’s birthday – he’s another South African. The pub was fun but all the action really happened at the noraebang. Noraebangs can be found around every corner in Korea as they’re hugely popular places to visit during a night out. Basically it’s just karaoke but you hire out individual rooms for you and your friends so other people don’t have to be tormented by your terrible singing. I must say, I was worried I wouldn’t enjoy it but it was amazing after the few drinks we’d enjoyed at the pub! Everyone sang and everyone sang really badly - we greatly enjoyed this communal experience.

It was getting out of control by the end...

·         On Saturday I was joined by my new friend Lindsey and we headed to Busan Tower where I was determined to take a replica photo of the one I posted before coming to Korea (and that serves as the background to this blog). I succeeded... almost. Since that picture was taken, a massive Lotte Mall has been built in front of the beautiful orange bridge that you can see in the original. Ah, well. Close enough – I’m here and now I have proof of it!

Let's see how my replica holds up against the blog background...

·         Afterwards we went to Gwangalli Beach to a foreigners’ market where I bought banana bread and chicken curry to last me a week! The most interesting part of the day, however, were the wonderful Korean people we met. There are many bad stories online about Koreans’ hostility towards foreigners but (at least in my area) I have never experienced this. Some of them will refuse to sit near me on the subway or bus or whatever but hey, more space for me! Other than that, everyone has been so, so, so friendly and helpful – more than people in South Africa even and I consider us to be pretty nice people in general! Firstly, we were helped with directions by a couple of university students. They didn’t just tell us where to go but actually took us all the way there, which was about a 20-25 minute walk! Along the way they spoke to us in English and told us about themselves. They were lovely. Later on in the day we bumped into them again and offered to buy them a beer to thank them for their help. So we sat and enjoyed a drink with them which was great. Then in the evening, Lindsey and I decided to check out this foreigners meeting in the area. Turned out it was a little more formal than we’d thought – we had to pay a fee to get in and then we were given name tags and assigned seating. Luckily for me, I ended up near this really lovely girl who had lived in South Africa for a year. She’s Korean but lived in China for many years and also spent some time in the USA too. Not only could she speak Korean, Chinese, English and Spanish but she’s also a talented artist and quite possibly the single nicest human being I have ever met. Like unbelievably nice. I’m pretty sure she’s an angel.

That chicken curry with some instant rice, beer, bread and sweets

·         Last weekend we hiked up Jangsan mountain which was incredibly tough (people say we took the easy route; I call bullshit) but ultimately very rewarding. The view from the top was spectacular, even better than the view from Busan Tower if I’m honest. Everyone agreed that it would be awesome to see it at night so a potentially dangerous night hike could happen at some stage – I’d better get a bright lumo outfit before that happens!

Amazing view from the top of Jangsan Mountain (which, I might
add, is in my area of Busan; 10 minutes away minus the climb)

·         My teacher’s dinners took place last week too. All I’ll say is that Koreans really know how to drink... and eat! Alcohol is apparently never consumed without food (short anecdote: when I was buying a pack of beers from the supermarket my co-teacher disbelievingly asked me: “But how will you drink it without peanuts!?!”) but the saying of “eating is cheating” clearly doesn’t apply here. In fact, there are some special foods Koreans eat during a night out to actually help them drink even more alcohol. So, in short, the teacher’s dinners (one official and one unofficial one with just the subject teachers) were very new experiences for me. They have these insane drinking customs:

o   Rule #1: you never, ever pour your own drink. Never never never. Soju and beer is placed in the middle of the table and it’s your job to take care of the people around you. I got gently scolded once or twice for not keeping my co-workers’ glasses full.

o   Rule #2: it’s incredibly rude, disrespectful even, to refuse alcohol from an elder. Which is basically a short way of saying that at every teacher’s dinner, I have no choice but to get monumentally wasted.

o   Rule #3: always hold your glass (or the bottle if you’re pouring) with two hands. This is a general rule in Korea that also applies to handshakes and passing objects to an older person or person of higher authority.

o   Rule #4: look away when taking a shot. This is the craziest one for me. You have to turn your entire body away from the elders when taking a shot so that they cannot see you downing it. The look my co-teacher gave me when I forgot to do it the first time is a look I won’t forget, which is why I haven’t forgotten since!

·         In short, I find drinking to be a rather stressful experience here but it’s pretty great once you get used to it. It’s customary for the oldest or person of highest authority to pay for meals and drinks so I got all of this completely free of charge. My co-workers couldn’t believe it when I told them that in South Africa we pay for our own drinks and meals and pour our own drinks! They were shocked.

The first stop on the teacher's dinner part 2 was this wonderful
Chinese restaurant - the food was great!

That’s it for now. Bullet point format was necessary for this behemoth. More news on the way soon enough...