This weekend I went up to Seoul to visit Everland. It is one of Korea's theme parks (a bit like Disney land)

The entrance to Everland. Behind this is what feels like a big castle.

 

Not a thing is  out of place.. The real flowers are immaculate, all over the park.

 (For those who want to visit- its really easy to take a shuttle \ 6000 a way. It leaves from Seoul city hall, just off the subway. It makes getting to Everland about an hours journey)

Everland was awesome! Although I had to que for nearly an hour and a half, the wooden rollercoster - The T express, was by far the best. It is technically the second highest wooden roller coaster in the world. Good god, did it feel high. In fact it was about the same height as the small mountain next to it. Most of all, it is the anticipation of climbing steadily to the top, before plummeting, almost at a 90 degree angle, to the ground. It is not for the faint hearted. It was still an exhilarating rush and I would definitely ride it again.

The entrance to the T-Express rollercoaster

Another stand out moment was the Horror Maze. I can without a doubt say that I was scared shitless. There are no two ways about it.
 I had been through horror mazes before and expected it to be a couple of wondering zombies, or maybe a dressed up nurse operating on a fake patient. All I can say is that Asians scare on a totally different level. I said f**** a fair bit.  People physical chase and grab you along the way, there was even a point where they locked you in separate cages. I had my head buried in the person in front of me for a good 80 % of the time, but I swear I heard growling. I took photos, but had to delete them because I was shaking and they were completely blurred. Either way, when we all emerged.. half the group had to go for a nice long cigarette.

 What amazes me is that the women seem to come to Everland exquisitely dressed. Many of them walk around in 5 inch heels for kilometers. I figured there would be water rides and so I wore hoddie and jeans. At one point, Tamrin and I went to the bathroom, only see a group of women re- straightening their hair. Roller coasters can be so taxing on ones hair-do. There were also a couple of cosmetics stores inside the theme park itself just in case you run out of lip gloss?

The Halloween parade!

The girls taking a rest between rides.

For the evening we went to a Mexican restaurant, called "On the Boarder" - It was pretty great to just sit down and have a mojito after a long day of walking. The rest of the evening was spent clubbing in Hongdae- a foreigner friendly area.Tamrin and I met a New Zealander that we dragged around with us for most of the evening.

School is pretty relaxed this week, I get to go home at 12 o'clock because the students are writing exams. Last weeks' theme was all about advertising. I taught them a bunch of key words before getting them to create their own logos and products. Some of them were interesting and inventive like a face-moulder and a water bottle that refilled itself. However, the picture below was just plain concerning. A boy decided to advertise the devil (??). The picture was of the devil posing with a peace sign on the beach. Oh well. All I keep thinking is, glad its not my child.

The devil ?

The second graders planning their products.

The past two weekends I have gone up to Seoul. Being a newbie, I was incredibly proud of myself for making it to the correct terminal in Seoul all by myself. Although I must admit that my ever faithful co-teacher gave me pages of translations so that I wouldn't get lost, as well as calling me a taxi directly from school so that I would arrive at the bus stop in time. Admittedly, I got a bit lost at the terminal, trying to figure out which was the correct platform. Finally a young Korean guy came up to me and said in a pitying voice, " You look lost, I speak English". I could have hugged him!

On the subway with Tamrin!

Who did I meet up with when I finally arrived at Dong Seoul terminal? Tamrin!! Who I haven't seen since graduation. It was like meeting up with a long lost family member. And of course, we did not stop speaking until I got on the bus on Sunday afternoon. It was so great to see her. She took me for my first subway ride back to Munsan (just outside of Seoul) where she lives and teaches at a little elementary school. Her flat is pretty similar to mine, except that it has the weirdest wall paper I have ever come across. Basically the wall is covered with these scenic little country houses accompanied with inspiring quotes about living to your potential. Its bizarre, but hey, its Korea. I laugh every time I see it.

The next morning we met up with another foreigner who has being living in Tamrin's area for sometime. She showed us around everywhere, it was like employing a free built in tour guide. Thanx Cindy! She took us to Gyeongbokgang palace. Palaces here are quite different from the European version and was first constructed in 1395. There are no high towers or ball rooms. But there is definitely a sense of intricacy and wealth. One of the most interesting things that I found was the three separate leveled paths that run along the palace. The highest being for the King, the second being for his clergy/nobles and the third almost dirty path being for the servants.Tamrin, being a fantastic friend, insisted I walk along the lowest path.

The changing of the guard

Very pretty!

I spent the rest of the day in Hongdae and Insadong, which are both pretty foreigner friendly areas. For once, possible since I have arrived, I didn't stick out like a sore thumb. I was just one of the many westerners wondering the streets. What is alarming is that  I seem to have become one with the Koreans. Every time I see someone who isn't from the country, I instantly stare in surprise... "What are they doing here?"  As if I'm not odd at all.
 

Lunch in Hongdae. Sashimi and noodles, dumplings (called Mandu in Korea). As well as kimchi and pickled radish. The Sashimi was kind of underwhelming, like chewing raw chicken.

Silk worm Larvae anyone? At the Insadong street market. Gave it a skip though.

One of the highlights of Hongdae was the Trick Eye museum. In a nutshell, the museum takes a number of well know paintings and distorts them so that it appears you are a part of it. Here are two good ones.

A newer part of the museum is the ice section. I wasnt sure what was on the other side of the doors and was a bit concerned when someone handed me a fleece blanket. To my surprise, a room with igloos, frozen polar bears and snowmen opened  up as well as an apartment reconstructed purely from ice. Apparently the apartment was incomplete without a frozen dump in the ice toilet.

Sliding down the big ice slide

One the second weekend I had dinner at Braai republic which is a South African restaurant in Itaewon. I figured that seeing as I will be missing Braai day at home I might as well enjoy it here. Hey, I may have spent R60 on a Hunters Dry... but it was totally worth it!

My cheap-o Hunters Dry. Savored every sip lol

Last but not least I ended my weekend having lunch with Tamrin. It was our first Solo Korean eating trip and we were mighty proud of ourselves. We had Samgyeopsal. This is basically a type of cured pork rasher that you fry and cook for yourself. Often you wrap it up in sesame lettuce leaf along with a couple of sauce options and eat it. Pretty delicious. The lady who owned the restaurant was out in the back when we arrived. She nearly fell over backwards when two little South African girls were sitting waiting for her in the corner of her empty restaurant.

This weekend I will be off to Everland- a Korean theme park. Cannot wait!

I have been battling to get the boys to focus on the work in front of them instead of falling asleep on their tables. I can understand it to a certain degree, the average high schooler arrives at school at about 7 in the morning and only leaves at about 11pm at night. As a student, I would probably also have taken the opportunity to sleep in the one class I didn't get graded on.

As soon as I turn the lights out to better see the projector - its time for students to sleep.

Yesterday, I was teaching a particularly unruly class, when one of the male teachers snuck in quietly and flicked two of the sleeping boys in the face. The teacher, smiled at me before grinning down at the groggy  students in sort of an evil Disney character way and pointed to a set of chairs in the corner. I momentarily stopped instructing being far too interested in what was happening. I felt like nudging one of the students and saying "Hey.. look at that ". Without a word, the boys got up, put the chairs on their shoulders and began doing 100 lifts. The teacher satisfied with his punishment, gave me a quick thumbs up and left.  No one in the class seemed to be remotely phased.

The chairs the boys lifted.

On a lighter note, I was asked to judge an English debate on plastic surgery last week, It was very entertaining. One of my co teachers asked me to be a part of the debate that he was filming. What I found hilarious, was the way in which the entire lesson was engineered to seem perfect. The often lazy and asleep second graders, were all of a sudden well groomed and enthusiastic. It was like stepping into the Korean high school version of the Stepford wives.
"Good morning Class, How are you today?"
Every student shot back in an almost sarcastic unison, "We are great teacher"
"Do you love English class?"
"Yes we do!!!!"

If only it was like this is real life. The naughty buggers would laugh and roll their eyes if I dared to ask how much they loved English class. As the hours went on, the debate seemed to become more and more ridiculous. It was like watching a comedy show unfold. Everyone would converse in formal English and sit perfectly upright saying things like, " Yes and one of the determining factors of the this study suggests..."
This was all until the boy behind the camera, said "cut".  A sense of immediate relief would sweep across the room and the boys and teacher would start nattering frantically in Korean and laugh. My teacher finally told me, just to make it look like I was writing something important down about their work. There was one section, where the boy behind the camera was told to zoom in on me while I pretended to look deep in thought.

Filming the debate.

One of the things I really like about the culture in Korea is the way the students clean up after themselves. I come from a country where it is perfectly normal to have a set of cleaning staff to pick up the kids rubbish. In Korea, janitors and domestic workers don't exist. And I suppose I can understand the reasoning - why should an adult have to pick up after a lazy littering child? At my school, the boys actively volunteer to be assigned to a room to clean. And they are happy to do it. Originally I thought that they were being punished. I asked my co-teacher Erica, "So what did they do wrong?"
"Nothing. They are just cleaning our office for us"

The cleaning crew in our office.

I am slowly figuring things in Yeongju out.. here is a few pictures of how my apartment block looks.

Last week I went to K-pop dance class. It was potentially the single strangest thing I have done in a while. In fact it was damn bizarre. But I loved it. I sat at the back giggling through every hip thrust and face pose. I feel like I couldn't possibly describe this to anyone at home.

When I arrived at the studio with two girls who live around my block, I expected a normal aerobics class. I walked to the back office where a middle aged lady asked for my name and school. She was dressed quite conservatively in a calf length summer dress and cardigan. I just assumed she dealt with the admin for the studio. Wow, was I surprised, when the class began, and the same lady reappeared in sparkly gold hot pants with a matching crop top!! The top was lined with shiny fake rhinestones, all while her legs were ironically covered in beige stockings as if trying to be modest. Another two ladies came up to the front to lead the class, one of them wearing a hot pink leopard print tutu.

Suddenly I felt under dressed... for aerobics class.

Here is one of the bands that we dance to - Girls Generation. I am assuming that our instructors outfits are based on what Kpop bands wear? :P

Say what you like about the outfits and the pelvic thrusts... these women can dance. Some of them were arguably twice my age.. yet seemed to shimmy and pose better than Psy himself. Some of the songs are even pretty catchy... I'm just not sure what they are on about. All I can say is, yes it is weird, but I will definitely be back!

The rest of my weekend was pretty relaxed. I had my first taste of pizza since leaving South Africa on Friday, followed by more makkoli and beer. Makkoli is a type of rice wine served in Korea that is pretty good (especially the kiwi flavour).  They serve it in a tin kettle and you pour the liquid into little soup bowls. Apparently the tin kettle starts off perfectly rounded but slowly gets all of its dents because drinkers are meant to punch it. I tried once... the tin didn't move at all. Maybe it only applies to people on their 4th or 5th pot. In all honesty I'm not too sure if its really what you do to kettles or if I am just easily talked into things.

Makkoli

On Saturday night I went bowling with Lindsay, Melissa and Robyn (Melissa and Robyn are also South African). Poor Lindsay was completely confused when we used the word 'robots" instead of traffic lights. Neither of us were particularly good at bowling but it was still a lot of fun. The teenage boy bowling one lane over by himself seemed to wrack up more points than all of us combined.  So we called it quits after one game and went in search of a place to drink instead.

Bowling!

Afterwards we met up with a whole lot of foreigners for dinner- jjimdak (Andong is famous for it) It is basically spicy chicken with glass noodles.

jjimdak

After a rough start to the week, I have begun to settle into things. Here is a quick few pictures of the classrooms I teach in.

This is just in the 'reading corner"  and is never really used. Every classroom comes equipped with one. Super cool!

classroom 1

the smaller classroom

My school boarders on a forest. When the building ends, the forest starts. Its interesting coming from South Africa - the school doesn't ever seem to be locked and isn't fenced in. I come from a high school with security guards and electric fencing.

My teachers are constantly worried that I haven't eaten. When I arrive at school in the mornings, my co-teacher hands me a cup of coffee and asks if I have had breakfast. On the off chance that I haven't, she leaps up from her desk and tries to find me something to eat.  She is such an angel and I feel like i am always inconveniencing her. Her and all the other female teachers are concerned that I do not eat enough at lunch. Its a difficult catch 22.  I am starting to get used to the raging fire of spice that is Korean food and actually finding a way to enjoy most of it. However, I just cannot eat as much as Korean women do. I had always had a very naive view on Asian women's appetites, assuming that because they are so thin, they must eat nothing but half a bowl of rice each day. Boy, was I wrong. In reality, they eat way way more than most women I know yet, outrageously, stay pin thin. A perfect example was when I told my co-teacher that I would probably have pasta later. She smiled and said, "Yes pasta is a very nice snack. But what will you have for dinner?"

 A typical lunch at school. School lunches will always come with rice and kimchi and a type of soup.

My teacher gave me a walnut pie because she was worried that I was hungry. It was so nice of her! They are actually really good. They are sort of like little doughnuts with soft walnut in the middle.

Yesterday the cafeteria served purple rice - was surprisingly good.

Its difficult because the teachers seem to be a little offended if don't finish my lunch as if it is somehow indicative of not liking Korean food. Ultimately, I have been stuffing my face with piles of rice and soup and kimchi. I literally sit there, feeling like a beached whale in my next few classes after lunch and really do not feel hungry again until the next morning. One of the foreigners, Karina, was telling me that you really have no choice but to stuff your face in the beginning and ease off after a week or two. I suppose if nothing, it's a cost effective solution. What's even funnier is that they find it absolutely astounding that I do not have rice and kimchi for breakfast. One of the older English teachers threw his head back and laughed for a solid minute at the notion that I have 'cereal' for breakfast "oh noooo wahhaha"

In my town of Yeongju there is a ladies Facebook group that organizes events occasionally. On Tuesday we all met at a coffee shop. It was great, I had this giant mocha choc ice shake thing, it was like drinking ice cream. It was really nice to meet up with the girls and just chat. Its helpful because all of them are teachers with more experience than me. They gave me quite a bit of advice on how to deal with unruly high school children.

Yum.

I loved hearing from another really cool teacher who has what she calls the "fuck up book".  If I had one, I would have most of the school in it. In fact the way these boys act would probably result in them having competitions to see who could appear in the book the most. My co teacher, who is as docile as a baby deer, feels nothing to whip out her stick before each lesson. She picks up her lesson plan, smiles at me sweetly, grabs her broken chair leg and trots merrily off to class. Its just the done thing here in Korea although I still will never touch them.

The sticks in different colours ha ha

So as it stands, I will be off to Seoul and Paju next weekend to see Tamrin!