Home Improvements

As you all may know, a couple months after arriving in Korea, I was taking a shower and I locked my door, just because I wanted to see how the lock worked.  I ended up locking myself in the bathroom for 40 minutes and had to rip the door handle off.  You can read about it in my previous post in December.

So I was at Home Plus with my boss and a new teacher so we could buy some things for the new teacher.  By chance we were walking in the aisle where the door handles were and I saw one that looked exactly like mine. So I picked it up and put it in the cart.  My boss looked at my funny and asked why I needed one.  I told her I got locked in the bathroom and I ripped it off.  I don't know if she understood, but I felt really embarrassed.  She must have known because the landlords were in my apartment a couple of times doing who-knows-what, and I'm sure they communicate.  So my boss was nice enough to buy me a new door handle.

This is what my door looked like for most of the year: it had no door handle and there was a gaping hole you could see out from (or see in from).  So that was embarrassing because everyone who ever came over always asked what happened.  I felt really stupid.

But the striker and plate were really easy to install.  I couldn't figure out how to put the lock in though.  It's this pin that pushed in to lock and pulls out to unlock.  I don't know about you, but I think I'm doing the next person a favor so they don't get locked in.  Hahah.

English Contest in Daejeon

Our students (and teachers) have been working hard and many many overtime hours with two students who will say a speech and two groups preforming a skit.  They will perform in Daejeon, where it was the finals, so-to-say.  They competed in Seoul during our summer vacation and now last weekend was when they performed in front of all the finalists.

One group did a play called 'King Solomon.'  It was a group of four boys and they did pretty well, but their pronunciation wasn't the best.  I could understand them because I knew the lines of the play for the most part.  During the finals days before we left for Daejeon, they added a whole bunch of props and costumes and it seemed like too much for them.  They were bring overloaded and they got jumbled with all the extra things they had to worry about.  That was true for all the groups and speech givers.

The other group was 'The Sound of Music.'  I wrote this script.  It was awesome.  Maybe in June sometime, our boss gave us an assignment for the day and she said that each teacher had to write a script for four characters in 'The Sound of Music.'  We all looked at each other and thought that was the stupidest assignment in the history of stupid assignments.  We also had to include three songs.  Now I can't just sit down for a day and write a script, mostly because I have never done that before.  But also, even in college it would take me a couple different days to write a paper.  C'mon.

Needless to say, we three teachers all turned in a script.  Mine was chosen.  Alright!  I worked really hard on it and I really liked the flow and how everything turned out.  So the kids were rehearsing and memorized their lines within the first couple days.  They are ALL amazing.



Then just like the other skit group, our boss started adding and deleting a whole bunch of things, confusing the kids, making them scream and fight with each other and it got out of control.  She bought a whole bunch of matching costumes and everything.  I must admit, when Daejeon finally came around, they looked pretty cute.

I wrote one speech about the Pyeongchang winter Olympics in 2018 and helped edit a speech about sign language.  Both of those speeches I was really close with too, so I'm glad they were chosen to go to Daejeon.  So the two skits and the two speeches won at Seoul Summer Camp and now they were going to the finals in Daejeon.

Finally, the weekend of Daejeon comes and Arazue and I were chosen to chaperone the trip.  We both felt really bad because we didn't rehearse much with the kids, the other two teachers did.  But I really wanted to go and offered my place to one of the other teachers to go, but they both didn't really seem to care, so I just left it.

So Friday morning we load the bus to make the 5-hour journey to Daejeon.  It was fun to hang out with the kids and see them in their true element.  And these kids probably have the best English in the whole school, so we communicate easily with them.

Arazue and I were so nervous the whole day the were performing.  We couldn't control our bladders and had to pee about every 20 minutes.  Now I think I know what it feels like to be an anxious parent...haha.

We kind of had some idea of how the results would turn out: We thought 'The Sound of Music" would place pretty high, but this other play was super good, so we thought the other team would win.  We also thought the Pyeongchang winter Olympics speech would win, because she had good pronunciation, content and actions within her speech.  But we didn't really know what to expect.

SO, the results were:

The Sound of Music - 2nd place and ₩700,000

Pyeongchang winter Olympics - 2nd place ₩700,000

Sign Language - 1st place ₩1,000,000

Charlie with his parents

King Solomon - not top three

That is pretty exciting.  You should have seen Charlie's face (Sign Language) when he heard that Anna (Pyeongchang Olympics) got second.  Then he thought he didn't place because Anna's speech was so good.  But when they were announcing the winner, they started off by saying the province, then the name.  When Charlie heard the province, he jumped up, but sat down right away because he didn't hear his name.  Then he heard his name and ran up on stage.  It was a very exciting moment!

I Had a Great Bidet

Yes.  A bidet.  When I was in Daejeon, we stayed in these crappy dorms.  But I was alone and it had this special toilet seat on it.  I initially thought it was a seat warmer and thought that that is a great invention.  So when I sat down I noticed a whole bunch of other buttons.  I can read Korean, but I don't know the meanings of the words, if that makes sense.  But pictures are amazing.

So I saw a picture of a woman and a picture of a butt.  So after doing my duty, I pushed the power button.  I was confused because there was a red light, a green light and no light.  So it took me forever to finally turn it on.  I was very nervous.  I wanted to do a test run and stare at the toilet to see what it actually does, but I remember seeing some movie where someone does that and gets sprayed in the face, so I thought I would go balls to the wall and just sit there.

So I pushed the butt button and heard a buzzing noise and I knew it was the sprayer being extended from the under portion of the rim.  Now I know why many people use bidets.  They are life-changing.  It actually worked.  I won't get into more detail than that, but I thought this story must be told.  감사합니다.

Halloween in Sokcho

Well, Halloween was crazy as usual.  And not to sound lame, but I went as a scarecrow.  Not to sound even lamer, but I went as that last year in the States.  Ha, dumb.  But it's an easy costume.  My new friend Arazue had an awesome costume: Waldo from 'Where's Waldo?'  She was randomly in the background of other peoples' pictures.  It was hilarious.

Haha, Arazue in the background!

I really just look like a farmer

The Inje crew

Connor, one of the new guys in town, actually dressed as a Korean school girl.  He was so dedicated, he even died his hair black.  He also borrowed a bra from one girl in town (I won't say her name, but YOU know who you are).  That's hardcore.  He stayed in character all night too.  It was hilarious to watch him.

Connor attempting to seduce the bartender

Smokin'

This is during the K-Pop song 'Put your Hands Up.'
That is Zaaid's hand.

Ashley also had a cool costume.  A chili pepper come to mind.  And he has the best poses.

I'm not going to lie, it was a little boring at first.  But after a few rum and cokes (mmMMMMmmm) it became more fun.  Then they were also having some good deal on Tsingtao, the Chinese beer, which is delicious even though I am not much of a beer fan (especially Korean beer).  So that was a good change.



They had Korean DJs at the bar, which usually at this bar, there is just a computer and you can pick your own music.  I like it better that way because these Koreans were playing some weird music that didn't have a good, steady dance beat.  That's no good in my book.  But after a while I started shouting Korean K-Pop artist and they played some of those songs.  But after a while, it seemed like the DJs had only three songs on the playlist and it was on repeat.  Honestly, we hear four songs about three times a piece.  LAME!

DJs

I sat in beer.

Beer-soaked butt

I also met some Russians.  I think they were Korean.  But the guy stole my hat.  They were awesome dancers.  I asked the guy what his first language and he said 'Russian' in English.  Craziness.

This was the scariest costume I have ever seen.  Seriously, he popped out of nowhere from the crowd and scared the crap out of me.  So I took this picture.  Admit it, you would be scared too.

So 4am rolls around and we decide to head back to the motel.  Arazue and I already had it all figured out, but there were three other guys from our town that had nowhere to go.  We told them to come with us and see if there was a room in our motel.  When we got there, there were no vacancies, so we crammed five people in this tiny motel room.  Three in the bed and two on the floor.  Just the usual, I guess.

That's all.  

Korean Fashion

Koreans have a great sense of fashion.  I am being honest.  They are pretty trendy and in the bigger cities, you rarely see a sloppily dressed Korean.  BUT, even their socks are fashionable!  In Korean culture, usually you remove your shoes before entering a room, whether that be a: restaurant, your apartment or in the school.  So your socks are always exposed.

All my students always make fun of me when I have holes in my socks.  They always point and laugh and say 'hole' in Korean.  I always get embarrassed, but I am too cheap to buy socks.  Apparently socks are very cheap, so that's why there is no reason to have holes in your socks.

Mine and girls' socks

Kids' socks are also very fashionable.  They never have plain, white socks.  They always have some cute little character on them or the socks will have more than five colors.  It's pretty funny.  So one day during cooking class, I brought my camera and wanted to take pictures of all my kids' socks.  The girls were willing, but the boys weren't.  I made them do it anyway or I told them we couldn't go to cooking class and eat food.  So they obliged.

Mine and boys' socks

They also have lots of other little accessories like bear ears or something on top of hoodies and bunny ear on top of their cell phone.  Winter hats for young children are also popular with raccoon, tiger and lion faces.  They are pretty awesome when young kids wear them.

Mina with her hood

Unfortunately, I never bought any Korean clothes.  I am considered fat over here.  I will admit that I have gained some (beer) weight, but I hope I'm not fat.

Summertime In Inje

I know this is old news now, but on October 3, it was a national holiday, so we didn't have school.  It was still about 75 degrees and the mountains were still green, so I thought I should take some pictures of what the summer looks like in Inje.

It's weird to think that these will be some of my last opportunities to take pictures.  It's getting really sad realizing I have such little time left.  So I wanted to remember what my town looked like on a perfect end-of-summer day.

I rode my bike around town and first stopped at the Catholic church in town.  They don't offer any masses in English, and I hate to admit it, but I never even went to church.  But I took pictures of it! (I don't think that counts).

There are a whole bunch of fields in people's yards.  Houses with yards don't have grass like a typical property in the States, but instead they plant a whole bunch of vegetables and rice.  They really like to plant cabbage, because Korea's most popular dish, kimchi, uses fermented cabbage, and cabbage can't grow in the winter, so you need to grow lots in the summer.

I also took this picture down the main street..

...you can see the huge green mountain invading the background.  Inje is surrounded by mountains, so everywhere you looked, you were always staring into a mountain.

And I took pictures of my favorite stores.  These were the ones I went to most frequently.

My favorite restaurant where I can get a substantial meal for $4

EcoMart, where you can buy anything under $3

You can get some crappy, over-priced coffee here

And the bakery and the 24-hour convenient store

And now the summer is coming to an end.  There are only so many other things I can write about, but I will sure share them.

Cold and Flu Shot

Whew boy, was I sick a couple weeks ago.  I had a sore throat that felt like my throat was shredding every time swallowed and my nose was insanely stuffy.  So it's a good thing we have this doctor friend that works in Inje.  All Koreans must do two years of service, usually serving two years in the army after they turn 18.  But some guys can chose to do their service in a different way.  So this guy chose to be a surgeon in a small town.  His English is superb.

So, I hate to bother him about medical stuff, but I really just wanted to ask him what name of drug I should buy from the pharmacy.  But he simply asked me if I was at my apartment and I said yes.  So he stopped by and dropped of some pills for me to take.  He said take them three times a day for three days.  He didn't even tell me what they were...well, he said one was for rhinitis, which I know means stuffy nose.  Instantly, I felt better and with lots of rest and fluids (not beer) I felt better in those three days.

Then I kind of got everyone sick at school, so then everyone wanted to get a flu shot.  But you can't get a flu shot when you get a cold, so the two other teachers and my boss couldn't get one because they were sick.  But I was able to.  Woo hoo!

When we arrived at the hospital, everyone was prescribed cold medicine, but I was able to get the flu shot.  The doctor spoke English and he happened to be the father of one of my very smart students.  He asked me if I was sick and I told him I was last week, but now I felt better.  He asked me if I took any medication and I said yes.  He asked me what I took and I told him I didn't know.  He laughed and didn't really say anything.  He probably thought I just swallow pills for fun.  That's not true.

He listened to my chest and heard that I was in top shape to get the flu shot.  So that was it.  All is good.  The flu shot was a little expensive because we don't have insurance here, but the school still paid for it.  It's about $30.