I've done so many things lately, and I just haven't had any time--or any energy--to write about anything. The fact that this blog entry tool doesn't like to keep up with my typing and I frequently have to go back to add letters it couldn't keep up with doesn't help...

 

Anyway, a few weekends ago, May 17th to be exact, myself and a couple friends from Jinju went to a baseball game in Busan. The Lotte Giants vs. the Woori somethingorothers. The game started at 2, and the seats were all "festival seating." I hadn't heard of this before, but apparently it means first come first serve. So we aimed to show up at 12pm, which we almost did. On the way out of the train station, there were people selling roast chicken everywhere. I bought a box, but then realized something very important. I didn't see a chicken roaster anywhere... Often people sell them off trucks with an oven in the back running off a generator, but not this time. I was hungry enough at that point though, a little salmonella only meant flavour. Us coming from Jinju had to meet up with 2 of my friends from Suncheon--a town in the southwest province--so when we arrived I called them up. We eventually found where they were supposed to be, and my friend asked "don't you see us?" Now, my friend is short for Korean standards, has olive skin and black, shoulder length hair. Her friend has similar features, but is shorter. And I, of course, am a six-foot-tall, white blonde man. The only one around, oddly enough. Thus I felt it made more sense for her to look for me. Which we did, and in we went.

 

Now when my friend who bought the tickets said we had to arrive so early, I just assumed there'd be plenty of seats. It made sense.. 2 hours before the game, who would be there, right?? Yeah, it was half full already. We got decent seats in the front row in the left field and settled in for roast salmo... err.. chicken and waited for the game. People wandered by selling the traditional beer and other drinks, but also more roast chicken, cardboard hats--which we bought for 50 cents each--and of course dried squid. Before the game started, the cheerleaders--yes, they had cheerleaders--came out and got the crowd going. They were led by a guy jumping around like a maniac, and there were also some guys playing drums. And naturally the mascot running around and doing tricks.

 

Once the cheering started, it didn't stop. The first batter came up, and the crowd started to sing a song with the batter's name in it. Then they started to sing songs that translated simply to "get a hit" or "home run!" and things like that. They obliged often. The score in the end was something like 9 to 2. Woori went through 3 pitchers. The number of cheers and songs that everyone seemed to know was really amazing. And the fact that they sang a song for every player as they got up to bat was really cool. My frieds and I decided on songs for ourselves were we sports players in Korea. One chose something by Wagner, another chose Beethoven's 9th, and I just chose Beethoven's 5th.

 

After the game, we headed to the Haundae beach area for some tacos, which were amazing as always. After a beach dinner, we split up with some of us going off to other places in Busan, myself and one friend heading back home to Jinju, and two other friends heading back to Suncheon. Got back in time to meet up with friends for a usual night out on the town.

 

Last weekend, the Canadian Embassy gave an information session in Gwangju, the capital of Jeollanam-do, west of Gyeongsangnam-do where Jinju is. We asked a bunch of people if they wanted to go, and lots were willing, until they found out we'd have to get a busat 7am to make it there on time. So only Carolina and I ended up going. It actually wasn't so fantastic. The consular information was stuff I already knew, at least, and the Korean government informtion offered was delivered in some pretty poor English which made the topics, difficult to understand already, even more difficult. Some people came clearly just to complain about some things that the Canadian and Korean governments do. Like, the whole residency thing for taxes which is ridiculously confusing, and labour laws in Korea (which are actually quite good but few people bother to stand up for their rights, and Korean employers do tend to try and steal money from foreign employees trying to say some laws don't apply to us).

 

After the information session, a local brought us to a place for lunch and showed us how to get to some points of interest in town. Gwangju was the site of pro-democracy demonstrations in... the 60s I believe, and one day--May 18th--the military government sent troops to quash their protests and fired on the protestors, killing hundreds (I think..). Thus, there are parks and memorials everywhere, and Gwangju is often called the seat of Korean democracy. We only got to see one memorial park among many, then headed downtown for some good, western style food for dinner and a bit of a night out. Hotels were really hard to find, but we eventually found one good enough that didn't gouge us. The next day, a light breakfast and heavy, steak-filled lunch. Hard to turn down really.

 

I swear I did something cool on the intervening weekend between these two events, but it mustn't have been too amazing because I really can't remember what I did. If I remember I'll write something. Tomorrow I plan to go to Seoul with a friend to listen to some jazz, without interruption, and do some palace tours. I'm probably going to have to stay in jimjilbangs though. These are places like spas, with public saunas and baths, as well as different rooms to make you sweat in different ways, apparently, and places to sleep at. I always have a picture of people sleeping with wooden blocks as pillows, which is a definite possibility if you get there late and all the pillows are gone... hope that's not me!

For a long time, I'd heard of this temple called Bul-guk-sa. Since I started here, really. All my students would talk about it and say how amazing the place is. I was told that the picture of the really giant Buddha from the cover of my Lonely Planet came from there. So I was psyched when I got a long weekend off with nothing else on the go. Everyone had Monday off for some, at the time, unknown holiday, so I got a couple of friends to come down with me.

 

So saturday afternoon, myself and a friend head to the bus station for Gyeongju, the town with this giant temple complex. It's particularly famous for being the capital of the Silla empire. Quick Korean history lesson: back in the day (I think something like 400BC), the Korean peninsula was neatly divided into 3 seperate kingdoms: Silla in the south east, Baekje in the south west, and Goguryeo in the north. Well, the Sillan king Munmu was the one that finally conquered the other two and brought about the first united Korean peninsular nation. As you can then imagine, there's lots of cool stuff around Gyeongju to see!

 

We arrived late in the afternoon--evening really, around 5:45pm--and our first order of business was food. This is when we discovered the disturbing lack of restaurants. That's not to say there weren't any, but they were quite sparse, to say the least. We eventually found a doaeji-galbi (marinated pork barbecue) resturant and ate there. Next order of business, hotel. There seemed to be plenty of new ones about, so we didn't think we'd have trouble finding one. Well, all the new ones were either booked up, or much too expensive (like W130,000 for one room for one night!). After going to somewhere between 12 to 15 hotels, motels and yeogwon's (like a Korean-style hostel, but usually with single rooms and no dorm option), we found a small yeogwon with a room for the night that wasn't going to cost us an arm and a leg. Unfortunately, it didn't have a business card, but there was a nice, big, new hotel across the streert, with a tall sign, called Hotel Business. We figured this was a good a landmark as any and headed off for some sightseeing.

 

Our first stop was a series of parks known to have a large number of Korean traditional tombs. These things aren't really exciting to look at, aside from the fact that these particular tombs were everywhere between 5 meters to 5 storey's tall. Otherwise, they just looked like large mounds of grass. We couldn't really take pictures because of the lighting, but that didn't stop us from trying. After the first section of park, we went in to a temple area to have a look. We were greeted by an eager monk who wanted to know where we were from, a made sure we'd eaten and found a place to stay. He said it was very busy because of Buddha's birthday celebrations. It finally clicked. That explained why it was so busy, Gyeongju essentially still being the capital for Buddhism in Korea, given it's large temple complexes (more than just Bul-guk-sa). The monk let us know that there was a free "Korean traditional music concert" just down the street that was scheduled to start soon. We thanked him very much and wandered off, deciding to detour throuh the rest of the park--whose gate was half open--on the way to the concert. The park was better maintained and landscaped than the previous sections, but again too dark for photos. We found our way out of that section to a third, larger, flater section, which also went past which I believe they said was Korea's first observatory. It was made of stone, with 12 layers, each layer with 30 stones or some such thing, with 366 stones in total. One layer a year, one stone per day for the whole year. Sort of strange actually, given that those numbers are for a solar calendar and the Koreans used the lunar calendar at the time (as far as I know).

 

Eventually, we made it to the park with the concert. It wasn't actually free in the end, we had to pay a whole dollar. The park was actually an old sight of a palace that, naturally, had been completely destroyed by the Japanese in the invasion from 1592-5. They had restored some of the pagodas and the pond it was on. It was interesting, as were the relics on display in the pagodas that were dredged up from pond when they restored it. The music was... well, Korean folk music played by a concert band.

 

After the concert, we started the walk back in to the town center--at least, we hoped. We actually got back in to the town reasonably easily, but we didn't recognize where exactly we were or where to go next. We walked around for quite a while, then decided to stop at a police box to ask directions. I asked, in Korean, where the Hotel Business was, and the police officer said he had no idea. He didn't think it was in Gyeongju at all. I assured him it was. He called many places, and as he was talking, my friend and I found a map, found out where we were, and found a good idea about where to go. I tried to tell the officer that I had an idea where to go, and he told us to sit down. Eventually, he called a consulate of some sort to translate. I told them we had an idea where to go, but the officer was really intent on helping us. Well, that didn't work, we still had to wait. Eventually he said, in Korean, "Oh, I know the hotel! It's that way!" And he pointed vaguely off in the direction we thought we had to go. So we said thanks, and went on our way. We got back to the area we knew the place to be, but still couldn't find it exactly. After another hour or two, we finally found the place and discovered we'd been close to it for the past two hours, we just had to walk a few feet further down a road. Our room found, we decided to get a drink at a bar called "Perhaps." A small, nicely interiored place with cheap drinks and a nice owner who spoke some English.

 

The next day we eventually got up around 9:30am to go out and meet another friend at the bus station. After breakfast we hoped a cab for the famous Bul-guk-sa temple. We knew it'd be about W20,000, but figured it reasonable between the 3 of us, especially given it'd save us the hassle of getting lost taking a wrong bus, or getting off at the wrong place. We got there easy enough, the driver trying to convince us that the hiking trail between the temple and a famous grotto was closed. We thanked him and got off. The temple complex was pretty amazing. I got some great photos of the grounds, and a lot of Buddhas. I've never seen so many Buddha statues in one spot! So much gold! We were allowed in to almost everywhere to pray if we wanted, but none of us were Buddhists, and felt uncomfortable going in just for a photo op. Actually, many places, though not all, prohibited photos from the inside. I dealt with this by taking photos zoomed in from the outside. ;-)

 

After seeing wandering around the really crowded temple complex for an hour or so, we started the hike towards the grotto. Much harder than I anticipated. Though it was paved, it was entirely up, usually steeply. That took us about an hour or so, whereupon we had to wait for almost another hour in line to see this thing. I had thought this was going to be where my big giant Buddha was, but I was sadly mistaken. Almost wasn't worth it, though it was free, so hard to turn away. We also saw another temple on the other side of the grotto, so it was like a bonus feature. We hung out for a bit there, then decided to head to this place called Girimsa, which the guide book told us was nearly as big, and so just as impressive, as Bulguksa, but much less visited owing to it's difficulty to get to. We looked around to see if there was a bus or taxi we could get, but couldn't seem to find much. Eventually, one of my friends managed to chase down a cab, and we got in and headed towards Girimsa, for another W20,000. The ride was much longer than I had anticipated--it looked like it'd be a 10 minute drive on the map, but it turned out to be almost 30. As we were talking about stuff, the cabbie saw the cover of my guide and figured we were talking about it, and mentioned that statue I`d wanted to see was actually in Daegu. Oh well, next time. As we were getting closer, the cab driver said that getting a cab from there would be hard, and offered to take us there, to another place called Golgulsa, and back to Gyeongju for anothrt W40,000. At this point, we figured we could either do that, or risk getting stuck, so we agreed.

 

Girimsa was similar to Bulguksa, though the area it sat in was flatter, and the temples weren`t as tall. We went through a bunch of the different temples, and as we were walking through we heard some Buddhist chants off in a side temple. We wandered around to have a look to find a monk praying. Kind of cool to hear that sort of thing for real. We left him to his own peace, and carried on towards a bit of a museum in the middle. Everything was marked in Korean, though, so we weren`t entirely sure of all the significance of everything. Though the one Buddha in the center we surmizedto be the one mentioned in the guide book, made of saw dust and paper, and lacquered over, about 500 years ago or so. Though it really just looked like any other statue.

 

Off to our awaiting cabbie, and the ride to Golgulsa. This was a series of `caves,` though they were mostly erroded, in a cliff face. There were monuments and carvings in each of the twelve caves, and a large carving of Buddha in the stone at the top--I believe it`s the largest such carving in Korea, though I could be mistaken. Climbing around the mountain was pretty cool. I was disappointed that my camera battery had died before going to the grotto, and I was stuck with only a quicksnap I`d bought, with no more photos left at this point. The view from the top was pretty amazing.

 

Back to town--not sure how long the drive was to be honest, but I wouldn`t be surprised to find it was an hour. One of my friends had a craving for chicken from a place called Kyochon, so we had the driver find us one and drop us off. We offered for him to come with us, but he wasn`t interested. This time, when we went to find a motel, we just got the closest one we could, that didn`t seem to dodgey. The one we settled for just had a couple of Korean traditional sleeping mats for the floor, but we were just happy to find a place to sleep that wasn`t too expensive or crowded.

 

Monday, our final day there, and the day Buddha`s birthday is actually celebrated. We decided to hop a bus this time to the sea tomb of King Munmu, credited with uniting the Korean peninsula under the Silla banner. It`s also credited with being the `worlds only sea tomb,` officially I guess. We got there easy enough, and say the tomb: a series of rocks about 200m off the shore. Ultimately, not too exciting. We couldn`t get any closer at all, even if we had a boat, because the sea was quite rough. After hanging out on the beach a bit, we decided to seek out a pagoda built on the spot where, according to legend, King Munmu transformed into a dragon and went in to the sea to defend his kingdom from foreign invaders (ie, the Japanese). We weren`t sure how to get there, so we asked a passing monk, who was very happy to give us directions. Though he told us to go along the street and cross a bridge, we decided to walk along the beach, and if we couldn`t cross the river from there, we`d just walk up to the bridge.

 

Well, the river was extremely narrow when we came up to it, but still a hair deep, and the rocks weren`t great for crossing on. However, as a wave swept back, one friend hopped across, getting only slightly soaked on one foot. Having little choice at this point, I waited for the right moment and hopped across myself, though I missed the second rock and went in to the drink. Not too bad though, only up to my knees and I was out quickly. Next came my other friend, but before he went over, the first friend to go over suggested he take his backpack off so he`d get better balance. Before I could point out that holding your heavy backpack in one hand would hardly give you better balance, he was hopping across. He almost made it perfectly, though in the last skip he missed and also ended up soaked a bit.

 

We wandered up the other side of the beach, and eventually found the pagoda, where we took our shoes off to dry, and changed in to dry socks. We hung out there a bit--not an amazing spectacle, but a decent view of the ocean, and it was empty so it was quite relaxing. After a while, we caught a bus back to town, and then, after some lunch, headed back to the bus station. Buses to Jinju ran every 2 hours, but we were fortunate enough to be there about 40 minutes before the next bus. Got our tickets and waited. The bus comes in, and it`s already packed from the previous towns, with only one or two seats left--and of course there was 3 of us. So we decided to head to Busan first and get a bus from there. We swapped our tickets and got on the next bus to Busan, which had only 5 seats left.

 

A quick trip, but it didn`t take us in to the main Busan station, but instead to one in the east. Still, we were able to get another bus to Jinju easily enough, though we were told it`d come at 4:05, and it came at 4:40. And, it wandered through Busan for at least an hour before heading on the expressway, not stopping for any more passengers at all, despite the fact there was a gate to the expressway 5 minutes from the station.

 

Anyway, made it back just fine! And that was my latest adventure. Pictures to come soon. I have yet to develop my quicksnap--hopefully I can get the photos on a CD as well as prints. Photos from my digital camera that I did manage to get will be coming soon.

 

Tomorrow (Saturday) I`ll be heading to Busan for a Korean professional league baseball game. Should be exciting!

 

EDIT: Photos are up, and yes, I know my captions are lame. A tumuli, by the way, is the name of the giant tombs that Koreans use for burial. These ones are for kings and stuff, so they`re huge of course. Common people also use them, though they`re much, much smaller.

Well, it's a long story really. It boils down to work craziness--and not in a good way--and me becoming single after a year long relationship that had been really quite good (if anyone's concerned, there's actually no hard feelings there in the end, and we're still good friends!). These things combined really didn't help me see the funny side of things, or anything at all that was really entertaining. As such, I felt that the wider internet society, who might just wander in to this site for entertainment or informative purposes, would not enjoy another person complaining about how horrible life treats them, and only them, and why does fate have such a vendetta against them anyway? But now, things are better. I feel better, my job has achieved a state of tolerableness, and I've been doing fun things!

 

Ironically, my computer troubles, which had been fixed, are returning. Turns out my system just loves overheating itself. I've ordered a new one, but it could be some time before I see it (a week or two). Until then, I have to deal with a computer that my overheat and turn itself off at any moment (and I even have it set up so that air can move freely beneath it so it can cool down better...). But, once I DO get my new system, I'll likely be doing more things like gaming... we'll see how it goes.

 

Anyway, last weekend (12th to 13th) I went to Seoul with some friends, because one of them was going to pick up his buddy visiting from Canada. Did that, went to a bunch of clubs and stuff. Went to the jazz bar I'd gone to before. It was awesome, so naturally my friend leading the expedition said we had to leave after only an hour. Then, a $40 cab ride later, we went to another bar, that had a decent atmosphere, pool tables, and $2 drinks. We had to leave there after 30 minutes. And only 2 other people paid their bar bill (of 8) so I was stuck with the rest. Yay for cheap beer! After that, we went to a club with a $10 cover. Went in, full of a couple of hip hop Koreans, and some gaggles of girls that wouldn't give anyone the time of day--even when I just asked if they knew any other good bars around. We stayed here for a couple of hours, because apparently it was fun. Next, we had to go to Itaewon. Regulars to my site might remember how much I dislike Itaewon, because it's the foreigner district. Full of pretensious people, much too good for Korea, and American servicemen who have a reputation for fighting and being general, well-rounded jerks. It cost us another $10 cab ride to get there, too (cheap, actually). Went to a club where we were promised beautiful women, and we got a large number of gay men and some average women who looked like they may have preferred the hooker trade, except they were much too good for men.

 

At this point, myself and two of my friends who were tired of this sort of thing went to a lounge next door, then outside for some schwarmas (mmmm schwarmas! I didn't realize how much I miss those!) and to another bar to relax with people who didn't feel they were too good for us. The whole while I had maintained that because I had to go to Busan for a friends birthday the next weekend, I wanted to stay on a $100 budget. So, I had always planned on leaving on the first bus around 6:00am or so to avoid an expensive hotel. And so I did, with one other friend from Jinju. A friend from Seoul that had come to join us started his hour long subway ride home at the same time. Well, despite how this might sound, I did enjoy myself. It felt good to finally get out of Jinju for a bit, see other things.

 

This, as you might have guessed, brings us to the Busan birthday party. Now, a bunch of us went out on Friday night to begin birthday festivities--it was a 30th birthday after all! We finished work at 11:00pm, so we didn't get to the bar until quite late. But, after a few hours and a few long island ice teas (I know it sounds like a pansy drink, but YOU have 4 of them and see how you feel!), we went off to norae bang (karaoke/singing room). Were there until 5:00am or so. The guy just kept giving us more and more free time. We kind of go to that one a lot, and we're always really nice to the owner, so he's really nice to us!

 

The original plan was to meet at the bus station for noon. Got a call at around 11:00am saying that, given 3 of the 6 people were really quite hung over and tired, including the birthday girl, we'd push it back to 1:00pm. No problem. Set an alarm for 12:15 and went back to sleep. Of course, my alarm is set for Monday to Friday, and it was Saturday. I woke up at 12:50 with a text message asking if I had coffee. I cursed, answered back that I slept in, and got a move on. Fortunately, because so few of us were coming from Jinju, a friend offered to drive us in her giant, US-style van/suv. So, that gave me time. We left around 1:30, and after a bit of a detour for various reasons we got to Busan at Haeundae Beach around 4:00. Met up with friends from Daejon, and we went for the ever famous Mexican taco restaurant. It's pretty much the only place in Korea that has any mexican food at all--I heard that day there's another in Daegu or some such place, but not nearly as good. Carolina said they were as good as any mexican food she's ever had. And, from someone from a mexican family, that's a good rating. But, of course, they were closed for an hour. And we were hungry! So we went for Thai food instead. Met up with another friend down from Seoul (not the same as the one I'd met, who couldn't make it), and back to the hotel so that the girls (most of the group ;-) could "prepare." They were damn good looking too. Why I forgot my camera this weekend, when I KNEW there was going to be so many more good looking women, and I brought it to Seoul, I'll never know.

 

Anyway, all ready, we went to a club with a live band that was average for Korea--read, amateurish but they could play guitars alright and sing as well as anybody. Hung out there for a bit, then actually out to norae bang quite soon! But it was really nice. While we were waiting for our room to be cleaned, a drunk Korean in a suit wanting to practice english wandered out of a room (likely a hagwon director) and asked where we were from. I said Thailand. He seemed to believe me... Once we got in to the room, it was awesome. Had a giant window out over towards what would have been the beach, had the sun been out. And it was quite large. Though I found the song selection a little skimpy, others found it better. I guess it's just a little different (this is rare in Korea--most places I've been have the same song choices...).

 

The next day (Sunday), we finally got a chance to get our tacos, after about a 30-45 minute wait--it's only one guy in the shop, and he's REALLY popular. Some people took off towards their homes in various parts of the country, while those of us from Jinju went for some ice cream to take to the beach. We didn't actually get a chance to sit on the beach too long, but it was worth it. At this point, we had to leave to avoid big traffic. We got back around 6:00pm. And that's that!

 

 

In other news, people may find it interesting that I now have a beard. I'm not sure how long I'll keep it, but most people like it so far so I'll keep it for now. Also, I'm looking to come back to Canada to work. I'd really prefer Ottawa or Vancouver, but I'm not overly picky. I'm toying with the idea of seeing if some big corporation, that hires people from overseas often like in the tech sector, might need/want an ESL instructor for some employees to help with every-day sort of things. I mean, I'm sure all these people can communicate well enough for their jobs, but a little help here and there could boost productivity, yes? Even if it's just water-cooler chat in some cases. Anyway, other than that, I'm not interested in a job teaching ESL any more. I need a career change! Any suggestions with what someone can do with a BA in poli sci and 4 years teaching experience (with no TESOL) can do in Canada, I'll be happy to entertain. Outside of business-to-person sales (I could do business to business, in the right context) and call centers of course.

 

So, I'm back! I'll put up random photos I've taken recently soon.

Well, it's about the end of 2007. Some people might've noticed my lack of blog entries for the past month or so. I've just been busy with random things, and plenty to do with Christmas. Everything was great until, on Christmas Day, I discovered my harddrive had crashed. I managed to get it to a technician and found that it was actually a virus. Most of my stuff will be saved, but I won't get it back until later on this week. If all my photos are still there I'll try to put some up and actually tell you all what's been going on. Needless to say, lots of fun stuff! I hope I remember it all. For the moment, I'm forced to use Carolina's computer or the one at work, so I don't want to spend too much time writing here when it's not my computer to use... Soon though!

Yes, I've actually posted some photos! Amazing isn't it? I have some from the lantern festival this year. As last time, I only posted a fraction of what I took. I wanted to get some pictures in the daytime this year, but it never happened. Things kept coming up. Anyway, I also have photos from the Pusan International Film Festival. Film festivals, by nature, don't tend to be very photo-y events, so not many there. And of course, I also have plenty of photos of my new kitty, now named Jigae (pronounced Jee-gay, and it's the name for a spicey soup most often made with kimchi :-) She went to the vet for the first time today and had some tests done. She's all good and healthy, but not heavy enough to get her vaccines yet.

 

I'll try to get some apartment photos up. This place really is 100 times better than my last one, you'll see (eventually...)!

 

Enjoy the new pics.

Well, a couple weekends ago, as I mentioned, we went the Pusan International Film Festival (yes, I know it's spelled Busan now, but they didn't change it for the festival name). We could only order tickets in advance for one movie we wanted to see, called "Le Ring"--a movie from Quebec (oddly enough), and yes, in French with both Korean and English subtitles. We (being myself, Carolina, and four other friends: Jenni and her boyfriend Philip, and Archer and his coworker Chris) figured we'd head there early to go get tickets for some of the other movies we wanted, if we could. I also had the idea that I might want to buy a cat there.

 

We got to Busan and headed straight to the Haeundae beach, where a bunch of the theaters were. When we finally found the theater we were looking for, and the area where the PIFF stuff was, we found most movies sold out. We had just decided on one that was not sold out, and as Philip ran to get tickets, someone came over and crossed it out (thus indicating it's sold out). So, we only got the see the one movie, which was stereotypically Canadian: ie, it sucked. It was depressing, and there were no real endings in the whole movie, with all these other plot lines open. It was supposed to be about a kid who finds some sort of meaning in a church wrestling group (odd I know, but that was it), and the wrestling was only a very small part of it. It's worth noting on that day that after we finished realizing we couldn't get more tickets, we found a great Mexican restaurant, that was big enough for only about 4 stools and a counter, but it was hugely popular. We got some great stuff from there for lunch. After the movie for dinner we went to a Thai restaurant that, I thought, didn't really meet expectations.

 

Anyway, everyone else went home and Carolina and I stayed the weekend in Busan. So we got more photos, some more freebies and stuff. Also, I bought a kitty! Now it's been just over a week with her, I'm actually starting to regret it. It wasn't so expensive to buy her and all the stuff required (cage, litter box, etc), but I didn't check before I bought her to see how much other things would cost, like food and litter. Litter costs $15/8kg, food I have no idea yet because she has barely begun the bag I bought for her to begin with, and shots, I'm about to find out today. Hopefully not too bad. The biggest problem is that she likes to climb my legs, thus shredding either my pants slightly (she even managed to start causing damage to my jeans), or my legs a lot. Pictures will be forthcoming, I promise.

 

Last weekend, a bunch of us went to the Lantern Festival to see it out. Had some great roasted pork, and saw a bit of the circus. While we were at the pork tent awaiting our bounty, we noticed a guy trying to get a balloon down from the top of the tent that his daughter had let go of, but he just wasn't tall enough. I figured I was tall enough, so I hopped up on a stool and tried to reach it. But I was just a few inches short. So I grabbed a pair of chopsticks (it was in a restaurant after all) and made a few dabs at it. Eventually I got it down, to some applause. Apparently everyone was watching me. And naturally I was wearing my black shirt that says in English and Korean "Foreigner." Carolina got some pictures of that and if she gets them up on her site I'll link them here.

 

Started Korean lessons last Monday, and again yesterday, and I gotta say, it's damn hard. I'm not so sure I'm cut out for it. I never have been able to really learn any other language... Still, I'll give it a try for a bit.

 

I swear there was a ton more that I wanted to write, but I can't recall any of it now! If I remember, I'll write. Please hold your breath until then ;-)

The last few weeks have been interesting to say the least. It all started 3 weeks ago, when we were mostly expected to "supervise" the students' studying. At other hagwons, this means sitting there reading a book and answering any odd questions that pop up. At this hagwon, we not only were expected to not read, we were also expected to stand, and, if you can believe it, not answer any questions! That's right, we were instructed to tell students to ask the Korean teachers and keep everyone quiet. Strange, but if that's what they want, I have no trouble with it.

 

The beginning of that week, our director took us (myself, my girlfriend with whom I work, and the other foreign teacher) with his wife and son to a place called a "jim-jil-bang." These generally have a sauna (which we skipped, being a place where clothes are frowned upon), as well as various theme rooms. The one we went to had a gold room, jewel room and a salt room, among others. The first two were just panelled with a bit of gold, or gems like jade, quartz, and amethyst (very common in Korea they tell me). The salt room had giant salt stones that you were expected to not just lay down in, but cover yourself with. Apparently it's very good for your health. The killer though, was this room that looked like an oven from the outside, and was probably as hot. This was painfully hot, and my director and his wife loved it. It was interesting. It seemed nicer to me once I got out and went to the cold room. Anyway, also in the jim-jil-bang was a restaurant, and if you really wanted, sleeping rooms. But there were no blankets, and only a hard floor and a small pillow. And if was busy one night, you might not get a pillow and have to get a hunk of wood for your head.

 

After that week was Korean Thanksgiving, Chuseok. For this we got Monday through Wednesday off (Tuesday being the actual Thanksgiving day). Didn't do too much but do a bit of shopping for things we still needed, and played some ultimate frisbee on Wednesday. There was also a friend's party the Tuesday night which was pretty fun because there were a lot of people there that were new to Jinju. Thursday and Friday that week was more studying by the students. Then another 5 day weekend. This one because we don't work Monday anyway, Wednesday was a national holiday, and most students would be studying on Tuesday anyway so we weren't needed. Fine with me!

 

Sunday I got a little bored and went for quite a walk. Walked clear across town, from where I live in Pyeong-geo-dong (west end of town) to a village out the east end of town called Geumsan. Three hours, but fun. Monday we went to the Lantern Festival (hopefully I'll get photos up, but you know me...). It was great so far this year. It's way bigger than last year. Lots of really cool stuff to see. While we were looking around, I got asked by a videographer from KBS news to interview me for "my feelings about the lantern festival." Yet again I demonstrated my horrible interviewee skills. Of course if I was prepared for it... Anyway, we met up later with some other friends who we sort of lost track of earlier in the evening and found that one of them got interviewed as well. Pretty cool stuff. Though I never saw if my interview made it to air.

 

Tuesday night Carolina and I went again, and met up with some friends again, to see a Korean show called "Nanta." It's a kind of music/percussion show with kitchen stuff. So all four actors where chefs clothes and do cool things with knives, pots, pans, and even food. It was just as much a comedy as a musical idea. Probably more comedy, I think. I thought it was hilarious myself. Most of the comedy was in the actions rather than words so it was easily understood, and the bit where they did speak we could get most of it.

 

I should also mention at this point that Monday I started going back to the gym. So, after that huge walk on Sunday and the gym Monday and Tuesday, by the time Wednesday rolled around, I didn't want to do too much.  Just tried to allow my muscles to recouperate. Today, the gym again to start off with. We expected that we'd be teaching again today, with all the exams over with. We really need to get to it because we're told we need to finish the textbooks by the end of February and Carolina figures we need to do 3 to 5 pages a class in order to get done in time. On average, getting a page and a half done has been considered good for me. But, we get there, and the teachers said that we didn't expect the classes to be very full so we should just have discussions with the students.

 

Well, my first class was changed for today so instead of a low level class of 10 students, I got a single student whose English was quite good. Nice start. My next couple of classes were cancelled because nobody showed. I taught one more normally scheduled class, then the little kids like normal, then my last class was cancelled! So I got home early, which is always nice. Tomorrow, they say, we start the textbook again like normal. Hopefully we do, because man do we have a lot of work to get done!

 

This weekend, we're planning on going to the Busan International Film Festival. We're having a bit of trouble getting tickets for the shows we want to see, but I'm sure it'll all be good once we get there. It's possible, as well, that I may get myself a cat while I'm there (I can't find any in Jinju :-S ) I'm not positive I'll get one, but I might. I'll definitely let the world know if I do. What else is a blog for other than informing the world of my trite little life changes? ;-)

Well, I've finished my first week back here in Jinju. What a different experience this time. First off, I only have a 4 day week. So far, it hasn't meant that things are particularly easy. The work day is still significant: 3:00 I teach a couple of the Korean teachers for a bit, then break until 5:00 or so when I start teaching the middle school kids. This continues, with short breaks here and there of anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes, until 10:45. I teach all the same classes twice a week (thus making a 4 day week rather sensible, actually), and I teach a class of elementary kids every day. That's quite the challenge because the age range is 5 to 10, and there's six kids. They're all super smart, but even so the material they're covering is pretty advanced for children, particularly the littlest kid (who, incidentally, has some of the best pronunciation I've ever heard).

 

The kids, more or less, are awesome. Some annoying ones here and there, but way fewer than in other schools so far. Some particularly great students too. The whole school uses one series of books, which are quite decent, and they're all making fairly consistent progress. That's one day a week per class. The other days they study a newspaper published for ESL students. I think this is a great idea. It helps them study English in a more practical sense. The only problem is that it's clearly written and edited by Koreans, or people who don't speak English as a first language, because there are often problems in the text. But that's just another teaching tool to me. I get more annoyed with the journalistic mistakes that are rampant, but it's only for students...

 

The other teachers and the director so far have been absolutely great. Really friendly and helpful the first week. Carolina and I spent most of both of our weekends here getting our apartments to our liking, adding dishes and stuff that we felt were lacking, cleaning and stuff. The apartments are bachelor, but they're really nice, fully furnished with quality furniture--not the used stuff I had last time. I even got left another musical instrument: this time a classical guitar. The biggest problem I have is that I have a little much stuff, including a spare TV (I had bought a nice large new one before, that I kept, and now there's a nice TV here, so I'm probably going to end up selling the one I bought, even though it's bigger).

 

Got a bit of planning to do for the classes this week but I think I'll make it without too many troubles. The biggest is just remembering student's names. This time around there hasn't been a single thing that has annoyed me at all really, aside from not yet getting my hands on a scooter. I'm somewhat nervous that things are so good for me now, because usually things never stay good for too long before blowing up in my face... here's hoping!

 

Sorry I took so long to post anything. Hopefully I'll get things a little more consistent now. I think I'm going to try and get myself a go-rang-ee (cat!) so if I do I'll probably put some photos up. But, as we've all discovered, I'm really bad at putting photos up... We'll see. Also, the lantern festival is soon so I'll hopefully get some good photos there, too.

Just thought I'd drop a note to let people know I'mm still around. I'm in Vancouver now heading back to Jinu. We'll start our new jobs at the beginning of September. I've been pretty busy the last month and probably will be until a few weeks after getting back to Korea.  Given we'll be back in Jinju, it's not like I'll need a ton of time to adjust to the place. Just the new job and apartment, which both promise to be pretty cool. I'll start writing more soon!

I admit, I'm more of a hockey fan than a soccer fan. Football, voetbal, futbol, whatever you want to call it. But, that doesn't mean I don't like the game. You hear everywhere that soccer is growing huge in Canada, and I don't doubt that there are more kids enrolled in soccer programs in the summer than there are in hockey programs in the winter. Think about it: hockey goalie equipment: Helmet, pads, gloves, stick, skates, plus the normal protective gear. How much, $800? $1000? Soccer goalie equipment: shin pads, shoes (like everyone else) and gloves. $100 maybe? Cheaper, easier to play and understand for kids.

 

That's one thing. But when it comes to watching soccer, I still don't get why people think it's not going to be big in Canada. The Toronto FC in the MLS (Major League Soccer) I've heard time and again on the news is sold out for their season (yeah, mostly because people want to see them play LA so they can see Beckham I'm sure). But did you know there's the USL--United Soccer League--in North America  (Canada, the US and the Caribbean), where Montreal has made the finals in previous years, Vancouver is presently on top in the first division, and Toronto has another team in the second division? And there's also the Western Ontario Soccer League where all sorts of towns have teams around here, including London (called, uniquely, London City). My biggest problem with this latter league is the names of the teams. Like Bosnia, Hungarians, and America. Really? Where do these teams play? Does team Bosnia, for example, allow non-Bosnians to play? Why the hell is there a team called America that plays in Ontario? Or do they? The website they have has precious little info on the league or the teams. That stuff sort of annoys me, but it's good to see what seems to be a reasonably successful league in my own back yard. Now only if London would get it's act together and give us a good field for these guys to play on, and help them out with a little promotion, you'd totally see people going to watch. I think there'd be more interest in them than in the London Majors, our local inter-county baseball team (sorry guys, but we know how baseball goes in this town).

 

All this comes up because of the U20 tournament happening right now. Canadian soccer should be not so bad. Fifa thought so, obviously. They never award tournaments to countries they don't think have a reasonable chance of doing well in them. But we haven't scored a single goal. Our team has been playing like dirt. Sorry guys, but really. You have the skill, you have a decent coach, you've even played well before. What the hell happened?! I'm also disappointed with South Korea's performance. I do sort of have an affinity for them, and they did play well. They just drew a hellish group. Guess for me it's Japan all the way! Anyway, I think Fifa in Canada, and whatever ministry is responsible for sport, should do a bit to help out the leagues and teams we got so we can get to training out players here in Canada so when it comes to playing at the national level, our good players actually come and play for us (as it is now, a lot of players don't or can't because they play in Europe or South America, and it's too hard to travel to Canada for team practices and stuff).

 

Anyway, that's my soccer rant. Bet you didn't know I cared about soccer, did you? ;-)

Ran across this story today, about Naver, a Korean search engine: http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/07/04/business/naver.php . The way that works in really typically Korean. I love the quote from the guy who says he spends an average 3 hours a day helping people online, which he takes from his sleeping time. Of course, you couldn't take any of the time you're at work, sitting waiting for customers doing otherwise nothing, to do anything else other than sit there and wait. Great stuff!

Okay, with all the hubub about Canadians not answering questions about Canada correctly, I decided to take a practice citizenship test from http://www.yourlibrary.ca/citizenship/index.cfm . They offer to give you anywhere between 5 to 100 questions at a time, presumably randomly chosen from a totally collection of 100 (I took 20 at a time because they said that was the length of the actually test). Some of the questions actually had the wrong answers, officially! This is mainly because there was a huge discontinuity between the de facto answer and the technically correct answer. For example: Who's the head of state for Canada? Technically, Queen Elizabeth II, in proper political practice the Governor General, but really neither of them wields any power in Canada so you could almost easily say it's the Prime Minister.

 

Another one that was confusing: it gave a question which of the following two things were the responsibility of the municipal government; the answer was policing and snow removal. But, just because there's municipal police doesn't mean it's their responsibility. Isn't that federal? The RCMP was all there was for ages. Many small towns rely on provincial police where they exist, or the RCMP.

 

Yet more greatness: "Give an example of where English and French have equal status in Canada: a. in schools, b. in the workplace, c. in the parliament of Canada, d. at city hall" hmmm.. let's see: the constitution says we're a bilingual country, thus shouldn't the answer be e. everywhere? I guess this one is a little nit-picky, but I'm sure you see my point.

 

Last one, I promise: How is the Prime Minister chosen? Technically, by the queen. Practically, by the Governor-General. Remember, political parties didn't exist oficially back in the day, they were just sort of alliances of people that shared the same ideas and were slightly more fluid. The Governor-General, as the Queen's representative, would choose the person who they felt would best hold the confidence of the House of Commons. It just so happens that the leader of the party with the most seats, most often, fits that description. But, what about minority governments? If the Liberals and NDP teamed up right now in a coalition government, then someone from those parties should be chosen as PM because they'd have the confidence of more of the House than the Conservatives alone. But, if the GG really feels like it, she could appoint someone else anyway. That's what she does, and is about the only power left that she's supposed to have and use, especially in these days of minority governments. It's possible that if the governing party loses a confidence vote in a minority government, the GG can ask the Opposition to form a government, which would usually, I'd assume, be a coalition government. This happened when Arthur Meighen became PM after WL Mackenzie King in what's known as the "King-Byng Affair." (Meighen had more seats, but King, as previous PM, didn't resign and instead formed a minority coalition government. He lost confidence, asked for  an election, but was denied, and GG Byng asked Meighen to form a government). Granted, Meighen didn't last long, and people were non too pleased about it, but it happened. Oh, the answer on that site, by the way, is the leader of political party with the most seats. Heh.. okay, long rant for a simple thing.

 

Anyway, lots more examples I could give, and things I could say. Have a look at that site I referenced above anyway. Some questions are ridiculous (like who's the leader of the Opposition in BC? Why would I, from Ontario, care?!) and as I said, some are slightly wrong or confusing whether they mean de facto or technically, but most of them are good. Have fun!

I just wanted to say my own congratulations to Jonathan Kealey and Caroline Spittle on their wedding today! It's really unfortunate we weren't able to get in to contact earlier and I had to miss the whole weekend of festivities. I'll try to make it up to Ottawa before I leave to congratulate you properly!

 

You know, I can't figure out this whole wedding "season" thing. Among my friends, this year at least, there was one wedding April, another today and of course one in mid-July, and another in November. For me, the "season" seems to be the entirety of 2007.. If anyone else I know is getting married between now and August, I'll be happy to come, just give me a couple days notice if I gotta travel ;-)

For someone who is currently on "vacation," or at least between contracts, for whatever reason I feel unbelievably busy right now. I've got Craig's bachelor party on Saturday--which will be, in part, flagswipe with giant, arse-whoopin', military-training laser guns instead of the traditional paintball gun. A few days after, on the 5th, I get the wonderful experience of all my wisdom teeth being forcably removed from my face. That should be great fun I'm sure.

 

On the 18th--and to be perfectly honest this is what I'm most excited about right now--my girlfriend is actually coming to Ontario! Yay! Who knew?! The original plan was that she'd be visiting family in Regina for a good part of July and we'd meet up in Vancouver in August, but because our jobs start now in September, she figured she'd have the time to come by. After what will be about 3 months apart, this is going to be the most awesome thing ever. My poor friends here will now have to suffer through me talking non-stop about how happy I am she's going to be here in 3 weeks. Well, 20 days, really. ;-)

 

And then of course, the most awesome thing ever in the life of Craig to this point I'm sure: his wedding! That happens on the 21st. My first time as a best man. Should be awesome. I feel like my job should be something like a linebacker--or whoever the hell it is that protects the quarterback in football--for the day. Any time someone tries to approach either him or Amanda with anything other than a congratulations and shot of sambuca, I intercept them and get to take care of it myself. Then there's the requisite embarrassing speech. Thing is, through 22 years of knowing Craig, it's really been me doing the stupid, embarrassing thing most of the time with Craig rolling his eyes in the background. And given the likelihood of Craig being my own best man, some day, and the fact that he has WAY more ammunition on me than I have on him, I think I'm going to tone it down and give the nice, heartwarming speech instead.

 

After that, tour around London and area for a couple of weeks, then off to Vancouver. People in Sarnia, Guelph and Toronto, I haven't forgotten you! I will definitely get to these places before I leave. Whether it's sooner or later depends on how fast I heal from the aforementioned teeth-removal. Oh, and I figure the family is going to want to perform the standard Mak interrogation. She's be forewarned. Warm up the Army of Darkness.

 

Did I mention how excited I am to have my girlfriend here so soon?! Yay!

 

EDIT: I just got an e-mail from a good friend from university who said he's getting married tomorrow (Friday) in Ottawa! I was originally going to try to get to this, but we had some missed communication due to a bad spam filter, so I hadn't heard anything about it until now (Thursday afternoon). So who knows, I could end up having a nice, looong weekend driving across the province a couple of times.

I've been getting a lot of e-mails lately asking for help finding work in Korea. Of course everyone that knows me knows I'm always happy to help. But, to be honest, I've pretty much run out of open positions that I know of to hook people up with. I have a couple more, but if these directors ever get back to me, I have quite the list of people that want them. So, I figured it'd be useful to post something to help people choose a hagwon on their own if they choose to go through a recruiter. A lot of people say working at a hagwon is horrible, and I have to say, sometimes it can be. But, if you get a good school, it can be even more rewarding. Smaller classes means you get to know your students, teach more effectively (those students that want to learn, anyway), and get to know people in your community more than those that work at public schools. And these days, the pay can be better, too.

 

Please keep in mind before reading these tips: Nothing is universal. I usually make an effort to say that something "tends" to lead towards a better experience. For example a school that's been in business for a long time tends to be better to work at than a new school. That's not to say that all established schools are good and all new schoools are bad. I know of some great newer schools, and some horrible established ones. It's just a trend. And, in the end, common sense is always important! So, with that in mind, let us begin!

 

When deciding to go to a hagwon, it's often a good idea to go through someone who works in the country now, or an established recruiter. The reason is that if you apply to schools directly, you only get the perfect picture of the school and not a realistic interpretation of how it is. For example, a school may say you'll get paid on the 5th of each month every month. You may take this to mean that at midnight every 5th, you'll have the money deposited in to your account. What this could mean is that on the 5th, if they have time, they might decide to go to the bank and get you a wad of cash (getting paid in cash, I think, is awesome, but some people hate it), and if they don't have time, you have to wait for a day or two until they do. A good recruiter will tell you more details about the school and the director that the director may gloss over. However, a less established recruiter may tend to make even the worst school seem as easy as a cushy government job. After all it's the schools that pay the recruiter, not you, and a new recruiter may be more concerned with getting money at first than a perfect placement record. People that work in Korea, like myself, will often hear which schools are good to work for and which have issues, and what they are. So, we can help steer people towards those schools that are known to treat teachers well. This boils down to: make sure your information about the school is reliable.

 

Get assurances about the amount of work you're supposed to do for the pay. Keep in mind that most often verbal agreements in Korea are worth more than the written agreement (though please keep in mind that a written agreement is just as valuable legally as it is in Western countries, so if it comes down to nastiness, written stuff is very important). For example, a lot of contracts will say that you have to work 6 days a week. My last one did, but not once did I have to, because my director promised it would never happen. And it didn't. Also keep in mind that if it says you teach so many classes a day for however much salary, if you have to teach more regularly, you should get overtime (though you might be expected to teach one extra on a one-off, which though might not always be rewarded with overtime, will often be rewarded with a night out on the town later in the week--basically, if you do them a favour like that, they often very much appreciate it and will reward you some how to your liking). Ask a current or past foreign teacher about this and make sure the pay and work conditions are to your liking. It's important to find out from a foreign teacher that's been there a while, or a recruiter that's recruited for the school before, because you'll get a naked truth out of them.

 

Schools that have had foreign teachers for longer tend to be better. This is mainly because they know how you, as a Westerner, will expect to be treated, they'll know what will offend you, and they'll be able to accept your akwardness that is inevitable if this is your first time overseas. Also, the students will be used to a foreigner and will know what to expect, and in some cases, even help you out. The director will also have a clear idea of what he expects you to do. Whereas if you're the first one, you may find that the director changes your responsibilities as he realises what he should've been asking you to do all along, which can get in to some contract disputes. As well, if they've had a foreign teacher for a while, they know that they can afford to pay your often comparatively large salary and pay your rent. It's always nice to know that you'll get paid!

 

Schools with many subjects are gold. The ESL market in Korea is huge, and very competitive. You'll find that some students come and go often in your school. I had a student leave for another school for a month, then come back for a couple of months, then leave again. They do this for a million reasons: they want to go to the same hagwon as a friend, another school is offering a more competitive tuition fee, or even that their parents decide they don't want them going to any hagwon anymore. If you are at a school that has only English, especially if it's smaller, and in a particular month a bunch of students leave for whatever reason, this may put a strain on your school's pocketbook. Now I've never heard of someone not getting paid because their director lost so many students per month, but if they have math and Korean language students as well, the odds of them being short on any particular month are pretty low. This tip isn't so important, but it's great if you can get it.

 

A director that speaks English well is often an advantage. If they have some problem with something you're doing in class, they can tell you themselves so you can resolve it. Or if you have a problem with your apartment or a student or something, you can go to them directly. This makes things a million times easier than having to run to a translator all the time, especially if you can't find one when you really need to. Or, if you can't find anyone that can translate reliably.

 

Finally, once you get a job, keep in mind: no matter what, always be polite and professional as possible, and know your rights as an employee. Disagreements happen, but they can often be talked through so long as you keep your head, remain polite, and know what you're talking about. I had a pretty big disagreement with my last director once, but we sat down and talked it out, and then no problem. I even stayed at the school for few months after my first contract was over. Cultural misunderstandings occur as well, but if you're polite and understanding of what they might be thinking, these to can be resolved.

 

I hope this information helps when choosing a school. It's by no means a complete list of what you need to look for, just some tips, but I think they're good ones (otherwise, of course, I wouldn't bother, would I?). Of course, I'll always answer questions you might have if you e-mail me!