The Wonderful World of Not Hollywood

Korean media provides a much different experience than you get from American TV.  That isn't always a good thing, but it certainly isn't always a bad thing either.  I've watched two Korean Dramas (K-Dramas) so far, 아이리스 (Iris) and 시크릿가든 (Secret Garden).  I haven't watched many movies yet, but my good friends Elspeth, James, and Gregg are working on changing that.  Let's talk about the Dramas.

Dramas

Trailer (with English subtitles)

아이리스 (Iris)

This drama is excellent, though it does start off a little slow.  I think of it as Korea's answer to James Bond.  I love James Bond and I love 아이리스.  The show is about a couple military guys that are selected for training with a CIA-type black forces agency.  There is action, drama, romance, and conspiracy.  If you have a way to check it out I highly recommend you do.

Teaser Trailer

시크릿가든 (Secret Garden)

This is the second drama I watched, but I think it beats Iris by a little bit.  This drama is a romance comedy with a special twist.  I'll keep this part spoiler free for now since I know some of my readers are still early on in the series, but I will say it is an emotional roller coaster and a show you must watch if you are at all interested in Korea.  It will give you an interesting look at the culture here.


Movies

Trailer - Korean

달콤한 인생 (Bittersweet Life)

This is an older movie (2005), but you could say the same thing about The Godfather.  It will give you a great introduction to Korean cinema.  The story is about an enforcer for the mob who faces a life changing assignment.  It has lots of action and some drama, and the title is quite appropriate.

Trailer - English/Korean

만추 (Late Autumn)

This is a really interesting movie because you have to work with three languages.  When I saw it the subtitles were in Korean, but there is spoken English for a lot of it, and there is spoken Chinese.  That doesn't stop you from mostly understanding the story, and actually makes you use your imagination to fill in the blanks.  It is a romance, no action in this one.

Wait List

These are the movies I've been told to see.  I'm not going to put up pics for all of them:

시 (Poetry)
살인의 추억 (Memories of Murder)
공동경비구역 JSA (Joint Security Area)
악마를 보았다 (I Saw the Devil)
추격시 (Chaser)
오드보이 (Oldboy)
조폭 마누라 (My Wife is a Gangster)

There are also some dramas on the agenda:

싸인 (Sign)
마이더스 (Midas)
드림하이 (Dream High)
아테나 (Athena)

So there you have it, my current status as far as Korean dramas and movies.  I'll have to do a post on K-Pop soon.  Videos will be included!

Oh Blog, How Long it's Been

I keep meaning to post on here, but each time I think about it, I realize how much I haven't posted and it seems an insurmountable amount of work to chronicle my experiences from the last 7.5 months.  So I've made a decision.  Here is my summary:

It is awesome.  I love Korea.

So here we are in April.  We're coming out of a long cold winter and I'm excited to get out and explore more of Korea.  I went up to Seoul last weekend and met up with Gregg, which was fun, and saw The Vagina Monologues, which was really interesting since there were both English and Korean presenters.  It was a much less cheerful show then the version I went to in University.

Alright, some things you should know about my current relationship with Korea:

I'm studying Korean.  Not as much as I should, but I just signed up for another class (20 1.5 hour classes for 5k won, yes please) in an effort to make myself make time to study.  This comes as a large disappointment to my friends that I usually meet on Tues. night, as the class is Tues/Thurs.  Sorry guys, I promise to skip once in a while!

I'm in a Yoga class where I am not only the only guy, but the only white foreigner.  There are some Chinese girls in the class though, but their Korean is much better than mine.  That said, the class is awesomely fun because of the language barriers.  The teacher and some classmates are helping me pick up yoga terms and I am teaching them the English versions.  It works out well.

I haven't been climbing since Oct. or Nov., but the weather is getting nice so hopefully I'll get to start again soon.

Korean dramas have grabbed me like a rottweiler going for the kill.  There will shortly be a post about that.  No really, I'm going to do a whole media post as soon as I finish this one.

I miss having a dog.

The food here is mostly amazing.  Too much fish, but as a trade off most of the rest is fantastic.  You can find dog here, but I have yet to see somewhere you could get it in Daejeon if you wanted to, so it isn't nearly as common as the stereotype would have you believe.

I went to Thailand over winter break, there are already pictures up and linked in a post below.

My new students are overall pretty good.  Some of my 3rd grade boys classes are a pain in the ass, but they are balanced out by the girls and the entire 1st grade.  The 1st graders show me why people would like teaching Elementary school.


That's all I can think of at the moment, quite possibly because I can't think about much besides the drama I just finished, so I'm going to go work on that media post.

Pictures

This post is a bit out of order, but I've put up a number of pictures.  Here are the links, and blog posts will go up soon (I hope).

Mt. Hood:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2309694&id=19704854&l=533cf71ee8

4-T Trail

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2309691&id=19704854&l=c447dc207e

Random Daejeon

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306340&id=19704854&l=c778923ca4

Global Gathering

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2309686&id=19704854&l=f50643fa4c

Chuseok in Seoul

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306380&id=19704854&l=483da03100

Chuseok in Seoul part 2

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2309660&id=19704854&l=ae27289c1d

We Are All Purple!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306374&id=19704854&l=bec11746af

Regular life in Daejeon

Now that I've updated to school I'm going to switch focus on my posts from a day-to-day log to general topics and cool things that happen.  To start this trend I'm going to provide an overview of how life in Daejeon goes on a daily basis during the week.

I have a 20 min bus ride so I usually get to the bus stop at about 8am.  Assuming the bus isn't too full with students getting off at the next stop (which is not always the case, I've had to wait for the next bus multiple times) I get to school at about 8:25, just in time to start at 8:30.  I don't usually teach until 9:30 though, the only exception is Friday.

I teach 22 classes right now, five on Mon and Wed, 4 each other day.  My classes are evenly split between 1st and 3rd graders.  Their English level varies from nearly fluent (not too many of these) to almost none (way too many of these).  This makes it very difficult to have effective lessons for everyone in class.  I end up doing a lot of group activities and games to try to get everyone involved.

I get off at 4:30 and head home, usually getting there about 5.  Then my plans depend on what day it is:

Monday - nothing routine!
Tuesday - climbing or Korean Class
Wednesday - Go up to Sintanjin for dinner with friends
Thursday - climbing, Korean Class, and/or hanging out with friends over by Chungnam University
Friday - nothing routine, but I'm never just sitting around

That takes care of the regular week, next up, my wonderful weekends.

Daejeon!

We arrived in Daejeon on Aug. 27th.  The buses dropped us off at the Metropolitan Office of Education (MOE), which is the agency responsible for education in Daejeon.  We were quickly sorted and shown into an auditorium and met our head co-teachers.  My head co-teacher is named 박혜경, or Hyekyeong Park.  She is about 40 and has a 15 year old son.  After a few speeches from the head of the MOE we were dismissed to collect our luggage, which was on a truck just outside.  I grabbed my stuff and we left for my school.  It was a very quick departure with very little time to say goodbye to everyone.  This is where the orientation bubble really burst.

Hyekyeong took me to my school, Maebong Middle School, where I met the principal and vice-principal.  There were no students in the school because it was still closed.  This actually worked out well for me because I was starting on the same day the students came back.  I was shown a desk and got a few introductions, then we went over to the office.  I was given some bedding (a little girly, but at least it isn't flowers) and the 300,000 won settlement bonus.  I wasn't expecting that money until around the first payday so it was pretty nice.

Next was the really big step, seeing the apartment.  I found out it is about a 20 minute bus ride, so it was a little bit of a drive.  By the way, drivers here are crazy and very fast to use their horns.  We arrived at my building and it was not what I was expecting.  As we drove up I had a strong feeling of "ghetto," but it turns out my building is brand new and fairly nice.  It isn't a high rise, which I had been expecting, but thats ok.  My apartment is on the first floor and (a complete guess) about 200 sq. feet.  I have a washer, one stovetop, a microwave, fridge, tv, desk, and of course a bed.  Hyekyeong did some quick translations so I could use the washer and turn on my hot water and AC, then we went to Home Plus to start stalking up on supplies.

After this quick trip and unloading everything at my apartment Hyekyeong showed me to the subway, which is about a 20 minute walk or 3 minute bus ride away.  I got my T Card, which is used to pay the fare, and Hyekyeong left.  I headed downtown to meet up with other English teachers in Daejeon.  Some people from the Feb. intake had set up a meet and greet.  It was pretty cool to meet people with specific knowledge about Daejeon.  I hung out at the Yellow Taxi for a while.  Yellow Taxi is a pretty sweet foreigner bar, complete with pool table, dart boards, and Guinness (though that is 10k/bottle)!  At about 1:30 I decided to head home.

Unfortunately all public transportation shuts down between 11:30 and midnight, so I had to take a cab.  Usually that wouldn't be a problem, but it didn't go as planned.  I got in a cab and showed him a card my co-teacher had given me that lists my address.  Unfortunately addresses here are not like back in the states, where they make sense.  Buildings here are numbered as they're built, so you will find number 10 next to 25, next to 4.  It makes it really difficult to find your place, or for others to.  This is what happened in the taxi.  I have no idea where he took me.  We get to some random location, try to talk for a few minutes, then end up calling some of the guys I'd just met.  They talk in Korean a bit, then the taxi driver takes off again.  I eventually end up at Fashion Island.  I have no idea where that is, but I got out here because the driver was making me mad.  It ended up costing 20,000 won, which is crazy expensive for a taxi here, even when you take into account the extra 20% they charge after midnight.  Eventually, after spending 15 minutes looking at a map trying to figure out where I am, I get in another taxi to try it again.  This one has a GPS and the driver puts in my address from the card.  He takes off and 15 minutes later I'm at my door, for 8k.  Much better experience.

The moral of that story, take the taxis that have the city banners on them and say "It's Daejeon!"  The taxis that only have the box on top of the car are private and I no longer trust them to get me where I'm going unless I can speak Korean.  Still though, it was an adventure.

Orientation Days 5 - 8

Even though this post covers four days, it will be pretty short.

Days 5 and 6 were both lecture days with Korean classes after dinner.  Bam, two days down.

Day 7 was interesting, we did lesson demonstrations.  Basically earlier in the week we split into small groups to plan a lesson.  We had 15 minutes to teach our fellow teachers, or students, a lesson on fast forward.  My group's topic was "I'd like a cheeseburger."  We set the lesson in a restaurant and did some role-playing and games.  Overall it went pretty well but we did struggle a bit to fill the time.  The problem is the games and such go extremely fast with native speakers, but they will take a lot more time with Korean students.  But we got through and no one got deported.

After demonstrations we had lunch, then spent some time going over everyone's lessons with the evaluator.  Then we finally found out where we were teaching.  I am at Maebong Middle School in Daeduckgu.   I teach 22 classes a week, 11 1st graders and 11 2nd graders.  In Korea you start over when you go to a new school.  So in western thinking I teach 11 classes each of 7th and 9th graders.

We ended day 7 with a farewell feast, which was great.  There was a talent show that was pretty entertaining, and a Lion Dance, which was really cool.  Then it was back to the dorms to pack, followed by a quick drink down at the bar to say goodbye to everyone.  It's cool how we all became such good friends in such a short time.

The morning of day 8 saw us taking our luggage to the buses and taking off for our respective cities.  Nothing too exciting happened until we got to the MOE (Metropolitan Office of Education), but that deserves its own post.

Orientation Days 3 - 4

Day 3!  This actually wasn't that exciting a day since it was our first lecture day.  I won't bother putting up details of the lectures, but some of them are quite good.  I also had a Korean lesson to work on learning the letters.  The day ended down at the bar we all started going to.  Huge pitchers for 12,000, not too bad, and they have pizza!

Day 4 was much more interesting.  This was our field trip day.  We started at a Buddhist temple that was outside of town a bit.  It was really peaceful and beautiful.  I'll link the photos as soon as I get them uploaded.

After the temple we went and cooled down a bit at the river that runs by the temple.  It was interesting to watch the kids play and meet some more new people.  Luckily almost everyone is wearing their nametags.  After the river we went back to the busses and moved on to Hannok village.  We had Bibimbap for lunch, which was really good.  Then we went to our first activity; fan-making, a very popular choice just for something more substantial than our name tags to cool us off with!  We got a brief education about Korean paper, then the arts and crafts began.

Once we were finished a group of us went through a wine museum, did some tasting, then went to a tea shop.  That was pretty nice actually, it was AC'd and right across from the last event.  I had iced pine needle tea, which was actually pretty good, if a little sweet.  One guy got arrowroot, which was not.  His was probably healthier though.

After a while a dance started across the street.   It was some kind of traditional dance but I don't know the name.  It ended up being very interactive though, and after a while there were Epik teachers beating on drums and a huge conga line stretching through the square.  It was really fun and almost everyone got into it.  We finished up with some group photos with the dancers and headed back to the busses.

It was a long and tiring day, but left enough time to go down to the bar for just a bit.

The next few days were filled with lectures, nothing too exciting.  Besides lectures we went out to the bar or found other ways to hang out with all our new friends.

New Design

I like this a lot better.  Do you?

Orientation Day 2

Orientation was really busy.  I think they were giving us a taste of what our students have to go through, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Day 2 was pretty laid back.  We just got separated into our groups, took a campus tour, and had an opening ceremony and feast.  Only complaint is how hot and humid it was.  That sucks a lot =\

The opening ceremony was pretty sweet.  They had some cultural demonstrations for us that were really cool.  The first one was a drum dance that was really cool.  Then there was a taekwondo demonstration that was just incredible.  They ended things with a traditional fan dance.  Then we had a huge feast with more food then we could eat.  That was all of orientation for day 2.

Welcome to Korea

I'm here!  I am currently sitting in a dorm room in Jeonju University waiting for my medical check.  This is day two of orientation, but I'm getting ahead of myself.  Let's start with packing and the trip over.

Packing actually went pretty well.  I had a baggage allowance of two 50 pound bags to check, one carry-on, and one personal item.  I rolled all my shirts and folded my pants together, put my PS3 in my carry-on, my laptop in my laptop shoulder bag, and all my climbing gear in my backpacking pack.  Once I got everything in my luggage, I ended up with a carry-on that weighs 27 pounds, two bags that are 48 and 45 pounds, and my laptop bag.  The great news is they never looked at my carry-on, so I got all my luggage for free.  Excellent!  The one issue at check-in was some bad news.  My flight was delayed up to an hour due to weather in San Francisco.  My layover was two hours though, so that should be fine.

So after saying goodbye to everyone at the airport I went through security.  That was painless, but I did have to take my PS3 out of my carry-on as if it was a laptop.  I hadn't thought of that, but it makes sense.  I went down to my gate.  There, I checked in and found out it was possibly a longer delay but they weren't sure.  So I waited around.  They finally boarded us and we were on track to land with about an hour between flights.  Shouldn't be a huge problem, just have to hurry.  Then, once we're all on the plane, they tell us it will be another hour.  Uh-oh.

We finally take off and have an uneventful flight.  We get into San Francisco at 2:10, five minutes after the Singapore Airlines flight was scheduled to depart.  At this point I'm resigned to the fact I will be staying the night in Cali, and I'm not the only one.  There were several other people scheduled for the same flight.  We figured we'd go down to the gate anyway on the off chance the plane was delayed and we could still make it. Naturally the departure gate wasn't on the boards or on our tickets.  So we made our way to the International Terminal.  On the way, I hear an amazing thing: they call me on the intercom and tell me to get to a gate.  Does this mean the plane is still here??  I start jogging.

I get to the gate and it's great.  There are a ton of people in line to get on a plane, and there's a jet sitting outside.  I check in and get a boarding pass.  We barely made the flight, but we did all get on.  That's the good news.  The bad news is our luggage did not have time to make the transfer.

The flight to Korea took roughly 11 hours.  It was actually very nice.  I had a window seat and was next to a kid about 7 years old.  He was very quiet the whole trip and just watched tv or played games.  His mom was in the isle seat and she didn't speak English.  I spent the trip watching movies from the on-demand system.  It had quite an extensive collection, including Iron Man 2.  I had also called ahead and ordered the vegetarian menu, which turned out to be the same as the Indian menu.  They brought out my food (along with the other veggies) before everyone else.  All in all it was a good flight.

Once we landed there was no trouble getting through customs or anything.  As expected my bags didn't arrive.  I met up with a few other EPIK teachers and we filled out paperwork to get our bags delivered once they arrived on the next flight from San Francisco.  I changed money at the airport, with the standard rate at about 1180 and the booth buying dollars at 1131.  Then I went out of the secure area and met up with Gregg!  We found the EPIK booth and I got a number for check-in, then Gregg and I walked around.

I ended up finally getting on a bus at about 9pm.  The bus ride was pretty laid back.  It was dark so really hard to see anything that was outside, so most of us slept.  I met some cool people though.  We finally got to the dorm at about 1230 am.  I met my roommate and after figuring out how to get the AC working went right to sleep.

That was the end of day one.