Cooking in Korea: How to Prepare Before You Arrive

When you first arrive in Korea, it can be difficult to know what to eat. You return to your collegiate behaviors and eat ramen and fried eggs for every meal. It's just so tempting because it's so hard to find familiar foods at your local stores. For example, my coworker, the Loud American, eats at least one instant ramen a day (he swears by the sesame one), and has gotten increasingly fancier with it since his arrival in MARCH, adding egg, cheese, and other chopped veggies.

But considering that instant ramen is filled with few nutritional elements and the saner amongst us will tire of freeze-dried noodles eventually, I want to help provide some insight on cooking at home with readily available ingredients. There's another wonderful and hilarious blog that provides some recipes for those of us in Korea(afatgirlsfoodguide.com), but require some online ordering from places like iherb.com or trips to out-of-the-way places like the foreign food market in Itaewon or the Costco near Seoul. Don't get me wrong, iherb is an EXCELLENT resource for those of us cooking at home in Korea and I highly suggest it. But sometimes you just want to cook something delicious as soon as you get off from work. So there.

If you, like me, frame your entire life through the lens of the food you eat, then I highly suggest preparing yourself before you come here. For example, I will be leaving Korea in November and returning in February. You can bet your butt that I'll be packing my suitcase with some key things to help make my second year of eating in Korea better than the first.

For example--instant ranch packets. I'm partial to the Hidden Valley ones, but I'm sure any will do. My mom sent a few of these in a care package and now I'm sold. Make with buttermilk instead of regular milk/cream and you've got yourself one delicious batch of buttermilk ranch. Oh? But Korea doesn't sell buttermilk? BAM! Make it yourself. One cup milk (or cream for thicker dressing) and a squirt of vinegar, a five minute wait and a stir and voila! Buttermilk. I'll save the rant of the awesomeness of vinegar for another post.

So you better believe I'll be bringing about a million ranch packets and eating half myself and blackmailing coworkers and friends with the other half.

Another thing--instant salsa. My mom sent a packet and it took me forever to use it because it didn't really look all that delicious. And then I made it and about ten minutes later it was all gone.

Canned green chiles. I made green chile pork awhile back because when my mom and brother visited, they brought a pallet of green chiles. These things add the right kind of spice to chili and pretty much anything else and are impossible to find here.

Also--spices. Every blog ever says that, but most weren't specific. For next time, I'll definitely be bringing dried herbs like oregano/Italian seasoning, cilantro (impossible to get here outside of iherb.com), thyme and rosemary. You can find bay leaves here in bulk. I'll also be bringing garlic/onion salt and powders, aromat, boullion cubes (possible to find but difficult), cumin and chili powder.

Finally, I suggest gathering up all your favorite recipes before you leave. Then, become a master at substitution. Most stores won't have what you're used to. No celery/familiar-looking spinach/? No problem.

Being bitten by the snake

Summer is still very much underway here in the big K. The humidity just broke for the first time in months, although anything I leave out for even the shortest amounts of time stills molds, including laundry, fruit, or bread.

And then there's the work stuff. So on Monday night, I had a difficult time sleeping and I realized that I hadn't gotten my contract for my extension worked out yet and it's kind of coming down to the wire. Several months ago (methinks April?) I approached my boss about extending for a couple months. I really wanted to because it would work out in a carefully-timed scheme so that I could potentially work at a public school in February without resubmitting my very expensive, very time consuming documents. That was problem numero uno--framing this extension as a need of mine, when really, I should have framed it as a need of hers, the dragon lady aka my boss.

Well after a sleepless night on Monday, I came in on Tuesday and asked my boss if I could talk to her about contracting the extension. At which point she says, "Ummmm....yeah... I've been meaning to talk to you about that for awhile but I just really didn't want to. Yeah...well, see. The thing is...we have had 30 kids drop out this month....and you know...we have nine teachers here...that is like less than 20 kids per teacher...and so yeah... we won't be able to have you extend."

I was absolutely floored. FLOORED. First of all, out of the nine teachers, four are foreign staff and five are Koreans, three of which with limited English proficiency. AT AN ENGLISH ACADEMY. Second of all, she has personally told half of those parents to take a hike because she just isn't willing to compromise with parents concerned about their child's education. And to top it all off, she's known for WEEKS and hasn't bothered to say anything?!?!

So I was beyond upset and asked when my final day would be. I went from a "definite" November 1, with a potential few extra weeks tossed in to a final October 4. From 10 weeks left here to less than six in a swift moment. Although this realization was shocking, it was not as shocking as my boss' utter neglect of any consideration for me, whatsoever. If I hadn't approached her on Tuesday, when would she have talked to me? When would she have done her due diligence by me and INFORMED me of what was going on???

When we talked about it again today, I stood up for myself. I ensured that I would be paid entirely at a certain date, that I could stay in my apartment a few extra days to move and was assured of the work that would be required of me before I left. Of course, I will not rest assured until there has been a contract signed to the effect of all of this because she's a lying, conniving snake and a whole bunch of other words I can't write on a forum that my mother reads.

But still I couldn't resist getting my digs in. So I asked about the American, who is leaving for a week after my new end date. "So you're just going to have three English teachers at an English academy?" She assured me that I was correct. So I just whistled (which she hates) and said "Wow then I am glad I won't be working here by then."

Nothing Gold Can Stay

I've already passed the 11-month mark here in Korea. It is so surreal to go from being that wide-eyed new kid on the block meeting all these savvy foreigners who can spit out what sounds like gobbledegook and help you navigate your way around Korean streets, food, and culture to being the person who seemed to know so much--without really knowing anything at all!

Yes, a lot has changed.

I think about leaving my students and I get horribly sad. I don't want to think about it for a second. I have to start training the Loud American to be me. And it's so hard. I don't want to think about my kindy's loving on another teacher, holding their hand and trying to monopolize their attention. That's MY job. I'm already mourning the loss of them and I'm not even leaving for another three and a half months.

I'm sure you think I'm exaggerating, but even on their worst days, I just love hanging out with these silly five year olds.

Even when they spit on me because they were holding water in their mouths and then they started laughing.
Or cough in my face.
Or break my shoe.
Or steal my food.
Or seven of them are calling "teacherrrrr!" at the exact same time.
Or they bawl their eyes out.
Or they cling to me and try to rip off my arms.
Or play with glitter all over the table and make a huge mess.

There are just as many times they come to sit on my lap for no reason at all.
And come to the teacher's room to tell me a story about something that happened during lunch.
Or shout "See you tomorrow!"/"Goodnight!"/"See you in 300 million years!"
Or make jokes about the air conditioning sounding like a coffee maker. "Teacher wants coffee?"
Or draw cute pictures of us together.
Or clean up my classroom for me.
Or tell people how much they love me.

I'm really savoring these moments now because I know I'm going to blink, and then they'll be gone. :(

The Process of Turning 24: Part 4

On the actual day of my birthday, I could not have asked for it to go better. For the first time ever, I was at school on my birthday! Call me weird, but I always wanted that growing up. Everybody would get to feel special with the maximum number of people around and even their enemies had to be relatively kind. Because of my excitement, I talked about my birthday for weeks before it was really my birthday. When I gave my students a test, I gave them extra credit questions related directly to my birthday, when it was and how old I would be. I really milked the thing this year.

Anyway, I could not have been more surprised by the outpouring of generosity on behalf of my students. The day before my birthday, one student in my PK1 class, Tom, brought me a giant chocolate cake. We wasted probably 20 minutes of class laughing and eating together. It was so much fun and so incredibly sweet.

When I told my IE2C class, the girls took the last five minutes of class to make me a card from one of the pages in their textbooks and another one gave me a back rub. She said "This is good because I am strong." It was SO cute.

On the day of my birthday, my kindergarten students brought not one, but TWO cakes. In fact, I had to trash some of the second cake because I was SO SICK OF CAKE by then. They also wrote these stinkin' adorable cards that you would just not believe the cuteness of.

Finally, in my PK4b, one of my students gave me a whole box of chocolate cookies.

I am still blown away by their kindness.

And then, of course, none of my Korean superiors even bothered to notice. Ha! I just have to laugh because it's so typical. Whatever.

After work, the boyf came over and took me to dinner. Sushi! It was real sushi too! Actually edible. And he revealed his surprise present to me--a massage! My first ever!

Wow, I was really spoiled this year. I couldn't have asked for more, except maybe to share it with my family and friends back home!

The Process of Turning 24: Part 3

Sunday morning we awoke bright and early to see my coworkers looking preeeeetty tore up. The Canadian 2.0 started the morning off by shaking out her purse that had been temporarily adopted by the ocean in a shower of seashells and sand. The Hunters people put on an awesome breakfast (with onions in the scrambled eggs! Why did I never think of this before???)

Then we gathered up all of our stuff and headed back out to the ocean. We swam, we played in the mud, and then the boyf and I went on a super ridiculous journey to find kimbap. Now back in Seoul, you can get kimbap anywhere. But noooooo. Boryeong, apparently is The Land Without Kimbap. So that was an hour wasted. We returned to the beach to see the waves licking our bags! That tide really does come in fast...

Finally, we all met up as a group to get on the bus to go back home. The boyf arranged it for us to get on the "quiet bus" and we ditched my coworkers. They were late for everything all weekend and almost missed the bus home! If I sound frustrated, it's because it's still frustrating to think about it... Anyway, it was a good thing especially because the Loud American ended up letting his shorts mold over the weekend, but with all his clothes making a seaward voyage, he had to wear them as is. And they were SO smelly. Couldn't hardly stand to be near him on the subway ride home. Although it was hilarious to see people's faces when he would come near them and they'd catch a whiff.

Because we were getting dropped off in Gangnam, we just haaaaaaad to go to Tomatillo Grill, one of the better Mexican joints (get the California Burrito, I promise you'll die and go to heaven). And who would show up while we are enjoying our meal, but the trip leaders! And they brought us free Hunters. What a plus. What a guy!

All in all, what a fabulous weekend to celebrate my birthday. I'll write about the final installment of my birthday celebrations next!

The Process of Turning 24: Part Two

After meeting up with the Hunters group, we boarded our bus to pick up another group in Suwon, a city about an hour away from Seoul. The group consisted mainly of fuelers in the U.S. Air Force. Let's just say they had definitely been breathing in fuel fumes. They boarded the bus shotgunning beers and the insanity continued the entire way there, including dancing in the aisles, karaoke, and Harlem Shaking dangling from the storage racks above our seats. The boyf was beside himself--being from South Africa, he was not accustomed to American displays of stupidity.

After the absolutely insanity of the bus ride, we arrived in Boryeong to find our pension (think hotel, no beds) and that because the boyf is South African and we went with a South African group, the trip leader basically hooked us up with a small room NOT crowded with 45 people like some unlucky folks. After a quick change into our swim suits, it was time to get muddy!

And then the Canadian 2.0 and I promptly lost everyone else.

Like, immediately. We lost them en route to the beach! And with the crazy huge crowds, we basically decided we would just never see anyone ever again so we would celebrate by going into Mudfest. Except they said it was closed because it was too full. Major sad face.

So we went and jumped in the ocean, instead. The water was awesomely warm, except everywhere you looked, there were people. It was like taking a bath with 30,000 of you best friends who were all wearing regular clothes because they have a weird aversion to swimsuits.

We caught a beachside concert, later, and messaged the lads to find where they were and later connected. Once reunited, we decided to try going into Mudfest again. Literally, two minutes later, the Canadian 2.0 and I lost everyone again. However, we did meet some really nice people. We actually got to go into the fest at this point, where we promptly cut every line to do anything.

Mud prison? Cut the line and ate a lot of mud by accident.
Mud obstacle course? Cut the line and lost to the Canadian 2.0 because some girl in a saggy swimsuit was stuck in front of me.
Mud slide? Cut the line and then accidentally slid our way out of Mudfest.

Back into the ocean we went. Eventually and completely randomly, we met up with the Loud American, who was off by himself all day and completely lost. When he saw us, he dropped everything and looked like he was going to cry. He said "I lost everyone. I don't know where I live!"
 
Later that evening, we returned to our pension and played yahtzee while the Quiet American passed out on the floor all over some stranger's stuff. Then there was a braai! A real South African braai! And it was awesome! The braai gave way to a dance party and the dance party gave way to all of my coworkers (not me, Mom) going skinny-dipping in the ocean. And almost getting arrested. And all of their clothes and belongings washing out to sea in the fast-approaching tide. Seriously. None of them have phones anymore.

The night ended with fabulous fireworks and a nighttime stroll on the beach. What a perfect night!

The Process of Turning 24: Part One

Although this is somewhat belated, it is in no way a reflection of my enthusiasm for my birthday. Simply put, it was awesome! For my birthday, my friends, boyfriend and I went to Mudfest! If you don't already know, Mudfest is a giant festival held in Boryeong, a small city on the western coast of Korea, about 2.5 hours from Seoul. This festival draws in tons of people from all over the country and is a magnet for foreigners.

Although there were two weekends of the festival and one was being held the actual weekend of my birthday, my coworkers were going to Thailand that weekend, so we did it the weekend before. We went with Hunters, a social group that promotes Hunters, a South African cider. They are a new group, but I can't recommend them enough.

Our journey started on Friday night, trying to stay at a jimjilbang close to the pick-up point for the group we went with, but it turns out the one near Express Bus Terminal that Google Maps pointed me toward closed multiple years ago. Luckily, a kindly Marriott employee directed toward a different one nearby. This is where my coworkers and I went our separate ways because they wanted to go to a casino. So I went inside, changed into my jimjilbang uniform (must all jimjilbangs use the exact same pepto-pink uniforms for girls?) and met the boyf in the common room. We stayed up talking and eventually crawled into our own caves (cut outs in the walls) and attempted sleep.

But here's the thing--sure there are thin mats (and I stole two *gasp* going against the grain), but it's an entire room filled with people, some of whom are talking, some are snoring, and several lights on. So it's not for light sleepers. On top of that, time in the caves slows down and we had a 5:30 a.m. wake-up call, with no real alarm. So needless to say, it wasn't the best sleep of my life. And with my contacts out, I was left in the hilarious position of having to get within inches of the wall clock by carefully stepping over strangers asleep on the floor to decipher the time in the wee hours of the morn.

Luckily, we got up at the right time and awoke to messages from my coworkers, who apparently slept outside the jimjilbang on the rocks. So at least I had a better night than they did? The Loud American was still incredibly inebriated and ecstatic about the $70 he won at the casino, so he smelled like a liquor store and insisted on counting out his cash on the sidewalk. Everyone else looked exhausted, but no worse for wear, so we trekked over to the pick-up point at Express Bus Terminal in Gangnam.

And then the real fun began!

Bad Days Are Bad

Today was one of those rough days at work.

For the last couple months, ever since she bought two new hagwons and merged them with hers, she's been out of our hair. This has been positive for everyone involved. Her being happy = us being happy = the students being happy. It's a win-win-win.

But inevitably, the students from the acquired hagwons start dropping out and my boss starts losing money and she starts getting pissy. Nope, not at her own poor business and interpersonal skills. But she assumes it must be the teachers. It must be us driving these students away, not the vastly different curriculum, testing, and homework at our hagwon compared to their old schools or her own inability to adapt to the parents' expectations. So it is easy to tell when my boss is losing money because of how involved in our daily classes she becomes. And from how "involved" my boss has become as of late, she must be bleeding cash like a stuck pig.

This wouldn't be a problem if she offered helpful teaching tools or extra training. Her brand of involvement largely relies upon shouting interchangeably in Korean and English, publicly embarrassing students, and criticizing our teaching skills in front of our classes. Needless to say, it's not exactly a positive work environment.

Today was presentation day. This means that the paragraph my students have been memorizing all month is performed in front of a camera to be uploaded to the website for their parents to see later. Normally, they do this performance in front of me and another, gentler Korean teacher. Today, they performed for me, the gentle Korean teacher, my boss and her mini-me. Luckily, I've been drilling my students all month on their presentation so they were near perfect, even despite their nerves. Regardless, they still made two of them re-do their performances.

But for the other class that is a level below mine that followed us--urgh. They were shamed for not being smart enough, for not being as good as my class. And then after lunch, both classes were made to practice over and over and over. She pulled individuals up to the front and embarrassed them. Poor Raye didn't know if she should laugh or cry and I kept having to wordlessly coach her from the back of the room. When she was told she could sit down, she came and hugged my leg.

It was heartbreaking to see these kids who were so proud of themselves a few hours earlier torn to shreds and looking so unsure. Aren't we supposed to be building these kids up, telling them they can do these things, maybe so they will WANT to do them? Shouldn't we be making it impossible for them to fail so they have the confidence to succeed? I suppose I understand the need for "perfection" later on, but they are five. Like, can't we try not to damage them so young, creating a nearly irreversible aversion to learning English?

Raye

I feel like I could write an entire blog post about this girl...so I will. Yes, she's the dong/waste girl. Yes, she's the cutest little future car model you've ever seen. She's Raye.

Story Number 1:
All of our kindy kids have memo books that we (their teachers) write in every day. It's usually something small, like "Please help so-and-so practice their presentation tonight" or "So-and-so did really well in math today." So every day after I finish my memo books, I put them in my kids' backpack. But one day, Raye ran off and wasn't with the rest of the students. I found her in the bathroom, talking through the stall to one of the other teachers. I dragged her out of the bathroom to give the other teacher some privacy. She wanted to talk to me, so she was facing me, forcing me to lean over her to put her memo book in her backpack. She chooses this moment to reach up and put her hands on my chest, tapping out a little rhythm. "It's like a drum!" she squealed.

Story Number 2: Raye and another (adorable) boy at the school have a semi-romance going on. They're always sitting together, holding hands, just generally being adorable. So one week, Raye leaves to go to the Phillipines. Wouldn't you know it, but the same week, Jin Seo (her lovah) left for the Phillipines, too. It was the running joke at school that they left for a romantic getaway, just the two of them.

Story Number 3: Raye was acting really goofy in class one day. She was making weird noises, jumping all over the place. It was to the point that one of my other students turned to me and (quite seriously) said, "Samantha teacher, what was in Raye's food??"

Story Number 4: Raye and her mother got me a very, very nice gift for teacher's day, and actually hand-delivered it to me several days early because Raye was so excited about it. However, on the actual teacher's day, I think Raye was a little jealous seeing all the students give their gifts and not having anything to give. So she came up and semi-creepily whispered in my ear, "Samantha teacher, if you come to my house, I have a gift for you."

Raye seems to have a penchant for the creepy whisper, as this has happened on several other occasions, as well. When a few other students were whispering "secrets" to each other (they're obsessed with this), Raye came up to me and whispered in my ear while panting breathily, "If you come to my house, I have candy. Don't tell anyone else."

Although all of my kids are stinkin' adorable, I love this one the most. So sue me.

How to Get Your Taxes Back in Korea

If, like me, you happen to be working at a school that has a somewhat lax regard for (following) rules and laws, then you might be put in the situation where it's May and you haven't received your Korean tax return. Which was supposed to come back to you in March.

Now I generally like to avoid doing anything remotely responsible or adult ever, so I realize this is highly out of character for me. But it just so happened that my school flat-out refused to pay one of my foreign coworkers and "forgot" to pay the rest of us on time this week, so I was in a real mood. A real responsible (read: vengeful) mood this Thursday, which we happened to have off (yay!) because my school doesn't want to give us the full week off in July we were promised (boo!).

So, I'm in a mood because of all this crap going on at work and I decide I'm going to stop complaining and start doing something about it. Thanks Mom. "Doing something about it," near as I could figure, meant going down to the tax office and filing paperwork and just generally having a miserable existence. But my desire to stick it to my boss hard outweighed my desire to not have a miserable existence, so there you go. Hence how all atrocities (i.e. child-rearing, exercise) are endured.

First, I found my district tax office online. Then after an almost ridiculous amount of googling, I found out it was pretty close. So I hopped on my bicycle to work off some of the highly glutinous rice taking up residence in my thighs and made my way to the tax office.

What greeted me when I arrived was perhaps the most depressing place of business I've ever encountered in Korea. Granted, I haven't had much cause to frequent many such places here, but I can most closely liken it with the DMV. Luckily, I'm a foreigner, so I didn't have to wait very long. Occasionally, this racism thing works in my favor.

After explaining my situation to the first person ("I need to check if I am owed or was paid taxes for 2012."), I was met with a chorus of blank stares. Then came the translation services--I bow at your almighty hand! I explained my situation--ish--to the person on the phone who then translated it to the person I was attempting to communicate with. Finally, I was taken to a filing room where I filled out a lot of paperwork with confusing math--"Cross your salary with this number--60.17--and then subtract it from your salary and then completely disregard that number and subtract 130,000 from 130,000." Yeah. Okay.

Eventually, I got the point that I'll receive 130,000 KRW in the mail...eventually. But I'm not sure what this money is from. It could be my tax return from 2012 or I could've accessed my pension fund early. Or it could be magic money, origins of which I am wholly unaware. All I know is--WOOO! FREE MONEY!

Organ Soup

...what I accidentally ordered for lunch.

See, in Korea, they have this thing called 해장국 (haejangguk). It means "hangover soup" because a) why not? and b) the massive drinking culture means this is a regular occurrence in the lives of Korean GROWN-ASS MEN people. It's this delectably spicy soup chock-full of wilted greens, green onions, ox ribs, and occasionally, potato (my favorite)!

But apparently, this term can be applied to any number of foods eaten to cure hangovers. Cue the horror music. Also, reading that Wiki is like horror music all of its own. I didn't realize I'd been eating congealed ox blood all this time. Ew. Anyway, I decide its high time to try that poppin' restaurant down the street from work and order the haejangguk. I hear something in Korean that I don't understand. I nod my head and what arrives is...terrifying. A greyish-purple liver is floating in my broth, pocked with holes as if it needs air. A string of *gulp* tripe twists in a malignant spiral through the dish. Other unidentifiable pieces drift by.

And that's how I first tried tripe. And liver. And other things.

When in Rome, eat organs!

Cinco de Mayo

How did I celebrate my Cinco de Mayo, a holiday as close to my heart as Mexican food is to my food cravings? By making my first truly-from-scratch Mexican meal. Can you believe it?

Green Chile Pork
Homemade Tortillas
Halfway Homemade Salsa

You would think that finding these things in Korea would be relatively difficult, but thanks to my family back home for their meal-saving shipment of green chile and jalapenos, it was almost a breeze!

To make Green Chile Pork:

• Eight cans of roasted green chiles
  
• One can of jalapenos
  
• Four red/orange bell peppers (because Lotte Mart didn't have green peppers)
  
• Two small onions
  
• A guesstimated teaspoon of garlic
  
• Two cups of water
  
• Flour/milk mixture for thickening later
  

Of course, grocery shopping always requires a little finesse, as you have to buy the meat and such and just guess at what is probably the meat cut of choice. Lucky for me, I guessed correct--ding ding ding!--and got two pork roasts for a cool $15 (which is crazy cheap out here, mmkay). Once I browned the meat, I threw everything in the largest pot I had and let it go for about three hours. At the very end, I threw in the flour/milk mixture and it thickened right up. I couldn't believe how easy it was to make and how delicious it was in the end! I put half of it in a freezer bag for defrosting later (erm, next week). I really impressed myself with this one, you guys. For the tortillas, I literally just put flour and water and a little butter together a few seconds in a pan and bada-bing, bada-boom--tortillas!

Favorite Students

Imagine the pride I felt on our field trip last week when I heard one of my kindergartners actually applying something she learned in conversational English. Can I just pause to gasp right now? *GASP*

So, here's what happened. Background: a couple weeks ago, I taught my kids about the human body--nervous system, arteries, veins--everything. We even went over the digestive system and the process of food being broken down by acid and being turned into waste. If that seems pretty heavy for a seven-ish-year-old to handle, imagine breaking that down for seven-ish-year-old to understand. It ended up being one of those things I had to shrug my shoulders and just hope they gleaned some useful information. It's not like they're taking the MCATs tomorrow or anything.

Fast-forward to our field trip. We were told we were going to see a "musical performance." It ended up being really fun for the kids (and really boring for the teachers, as everything was in Korean). They even passed out dough for the kids to roll and play with. The "cooks" had them roll it out into a long string, and then coil it in their hands until it looked like....a pile of crap. No joke, all the kids are shouting "dong! dong!" (the Korean word for poo).

So then one of the foreign teachers asked my student Raye, "Is that poop?" But Raye responded with "No! It's waste!"

Immediately upgraded to favorite student status.

Lately

Oof, I've been a bad girl. Always neglecting the ol' blog. When it rains, it pours, so lucky you. Time to catch you all up on my life.

--I have officially decided to pursue my masters degree, starting June 3, 2013. I know I vacillated significantly regarding all my options, so thank you for hanging in there with me. I decided to completely disregard my prior musings of concentrating on a Masters in Development. Although that is still something I am interested in, I couldn't fathom getting into that kind of debt without any guarantees for employment.

All things considered, I decided that I will be pursuing my Masters of Education in Curriculum and Instruction with a specialization in ESL online. This option will allow me to continue teaching abroad and will make finding gainful (oh, let's be real: lucrative) employment wherever I choose to go in the next few years. In addition, since my future career goals definitely include youth services, this further education will still improve my chances towards that end. Finally, I've been feeling the need to seek more professional development in my current position. As such, I think this option is best for me financially and professionally. 

--I've officially been in Korea for eight months. As always, it feels like the time has absolutely flown by. I can't believe there is only one season left to go before my contract is up! As a small side-note, real-world-spring (as opposed to Arizona-spring), is the worst. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. What a tease. Bring on summer.

--I've been making a conscious effort to keep in contact with people back home in more ways than one. I have been enjoying sending snail mail to friends and family back home. I'm having so much fun picking out all kinds of cute stationery.

--I'm really loving teaching my kindergarten class. They are such hard workers and every one of them are adorable and brilliant in their own way. It's a surprise to me, too, that they have ended up being my favorite class, and I will definitely be sad when the time comes to leave them.

--I've got so many exciting opportunities coming up. In two weeks, we have a four-day weekend. I'm hoping to go out of town, maybe see Busan, or some other new city. Next month, we have another four-day weekend, which I'm hoping to use to go to Japan. At the end of July, we have a five-day weekend (that is partially causing me inward groans because two day week? Seriously???) that has yet to be determined. Be excited, folks. The possibilities are endless!

That's all for now!

Jimjilbanging

Last weekend, I got to check an item off my Korea bucket list: going to a jimjilbang!

Okay, so in case you don't know, a jimjilbang is kind of like a Korean spa. Except that it's not just for hoity-toity white people.

Going to a jimjilbang, unlike a spa back home, is completely financially accessible. It's all of $8 to get in. This gives you access to the communal baths, the saunas, cold rooms, everything. Jimjilbangs are open 24 hours a day, which is why lots of drunk people choose to sleep here overnight.

So...walking into the ladies portion of the joint was...quite the experience. As someone who never had to shower with other girls and had minimal exposure to locker rooms growing up (due to my aversion to working out), the amount of nakedness I encountered was overwhelming. There was just so much ... vagina ... everywhere! I wouldn't exactly consider myself a prude, but really? Is it really necessary to lay out on the communal benches, put on your make-up, do your hair, calm your screaming babies--in the nude? Needless to say, I didn't partake in the communal bathing. I was just too chicken, I'll admit it.

However, onto the part of the jimjilbang that wasn't overwhelmingly nightmarish--the saunas! I've never been the type to partake in sauna-ing before, so this was quite the departure from the norm for me. It was just so utterly relaxing. I could have spent all day there!

About a million other people who have taught in Korea wrote on their blogs about jimjilbangs and no one was nearly as terrified of all the nakedness, so that's probably just a "me" thing.

Living a life you love

Waking up to the news of the bombs going off during the Boston Marathon this morning has left me thinking about life, particularly living one you love.

Life is too short to commit yourself to responsibilities that are only paying off in money. While I could be at home, paying my dues at a company and starting a 401k, what kind of life experience would I be getting out of that? Today, as I snuggled with one of my five year olds, I was reflecting on how much I truly love every single one of them (even the boy that touches himself constantly under the table). Not only am I being fulfilled by my work, but I'm loving it, also. I'm in a foreign country with the unique opportunity to learn and understand new people.

Sure, I'm missing out on being with my family and friends. But I'm expanding my family and friend circle here as well. I'm meeting valuable and worthy people that I'm hoping I will connect with for the rest of my life. So when I have to ask myself if I'm interested in doing another year here, the answer in invariably, undeniably: yes.

Lately: March in Review

 My ma and brother came to visit! Although my boss wouldn't give me any time off, it was awesome to be able to hang with them by night and to receive a 50-pound suitcase full of goodies!

Lena and Stella

Annie and Sarah

Tommy and Branden

From the looks they are giving here, you would think that eating these cookies was like, the biggest punishment ever. But really, they were just lulled into being silent for ten minutes. It. Was. AWESOME.

Stumbled into this design store when my friend from Camp Wildcat came to visit for eight hours! So many pretty, wonderful artistic things to enjoy and drool over. Loved.

 

Sigh.

So that was March!

The North Korea Situation

Okay. It's been so ridiculously long since I updated and the longer it's been, the harder it is to start again. But a rainy day seems to be just the excuse to do some updating. And boy is there a lot to update on! I'm going to break it up into a few posts so that you really get some tender lovin' over the next few days to make up for my atrociousness.

The North Korea Situation

I know that many of my family and friends are concerned about this issue. In fact, you're much more concerned than the average Korean citizen if you've worried even a little about it.  Not trying to be flippant, but it's true!

Honestly, the situation has not affected my daily life at all. Well, that's not entirely true. There have been some changes. Like the price of food sky-rocketing ($7 for 5 apples or six potatoes--highway robbery, I'm tellin' ya!) and the devaluing of the Korean won. It's good news for visitors who will get a radical exchange rate, but bad news for those of us planning to exchange our money later on. Hopefully, by the time I'm leaving, this madness will have all blown over and I'll be back to making beaucoup bucks.

Every day, the news reports seem to get worse and worse. It's difficult to tell how much of it is sensationalist media and how much is informative and reliable. I've been taking it all serious-as-a-heart-attack and am in the process of preparing a 72-hour kit complete with emergency supplies and whatnot if the situation arises and I need to get out quick. A Canadian coworker checked in with their embassy and was told to proceed to the American checkpoints and was assured that all Canadians would be evacuated after the Americans. So I'm safer than the Canadians, at least.

Well, that's the most up-to-date news from my war-torn country *lament* and I'll make sure I check in here more often so you can all stay apprised.

Lately.

1) Eating kamjatang in my onesie. 2) Cool new train set-up. Maybe I'm the only weirdo who finds this newsworthy. 3) Finally getting exactly what I want for dinner at Korean barbecue! Imagine the fiasco of describing a variety of meats with your hands. 4) An entire aisle of tuna. For reals. 5) The price for grapes. I'm offended and constipated. 6) Some old friend-shaped pasta! In Korea! My world, I tell ya. 7) This beaut changed my life. I've been stuck in a ranch-gasm for weeks. 8) I'm writing for a website! Check it out:
http://www.gloobbi.com/travel/city-spotlight-hongdae-seoul/ 9) Missing this gal like whoa.

Check in on me next week. My ma is visiting! Squee!!!

Lately

I actually paid someone to clean my apartment. It was either that or throw away all my dishes and begin anew.

The weather has been bordering on ungodly. And in other new, my bathroom is colder than my freezer.

Can you believe that these are normal colors to find in large(r) paint quantities, but you can't find black ANYWHERE?

Oh hey, prosthetic limb store.

Snakes on a train.

Mac n' cheese, courtesy of an express shipment from America. (THANKS MOM!!!!)

 

Hello adorable onesie!

Excluding that time I lost my phone on the street for three hours and used Find My iPhone to get it back and had a really confusing conversation with the Korean that picked it up, eventually requiring my coworker to step in and run interference last night, that's my life lately!