Having "a life" outside of school seems almost unheard of when you are a public school teacher - but alas, it does exist! When I am not in school Monday-Friday from 7:30 a.m. until 6:00 or sometimes later in the afternoon, I have picked up some extracurriculars to establish a social life and have some fun outside of class (although being at school with my students and co-workers is really fun too). This past Friday I started going to a Korean class with other foreigners in my area. The class will be every Friday night from 7:30-9:30 - sounds somewhat like a bummer when I've been in school all week and I start my weekend with my own class, but it is actually super fun and I have met some awesome friends. Plus, we all go out afterwards together for food, drinks, and karaoke, which is always a good time.
Korean class crew!
Korean class seems like it is going to be a great opportunity to progress - the class is limited to ten people, so we get plenty of face time with our teachers. I was put into the intermediate class with two other ladies, so there is just three of us getting some quality learning from our two teachers! The class is sponsored by the Gwangyang English Club - which a huge bonus is that this class is FREE - and we get snacks each week - can't go wrong with that at all. It is really nice to meet other foreigners, as well as some new Korean friends who can practice with us and hang out with us! The class will go until the middle of December, so I am hoping by the end of the year I will actually be at an 'intermediate' level of Korean.
Aside from being a part of Korean class, this past weekend my host dad took my host brothers and I to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity Korea, where we helped build an apartment complex for low-income families. Specifically, our crew of almost 30 people worked on installing the ceiling panels in the apartment, which means I got to do a lot of drilling - fun times. We worked a full day - 9 a.m. until 5 p.m., but we accomplished a lot. It is a really special feeling being able to help out in my new community, especially with a familiar organization. We didn't let the language barrier stop us from achieving our goal! I had a lot of fun meeting other people in my community, and I look forward to volunteering more in the future. Here are some snapshots from our day!
Putting in the ceiling; a view of the apartment complex; my name tag; my host family and I
Part of our work crew!
Keeping up with something I cannot live without, I decided to sign up for my first running race in Korea! I will be running a 10K with a friend from Korean class on November 9 - I am so excited! I am sure this will not be the only race that I participate in while living in Korea. I am actually looking forward to doing some networking at this race, potentially finding some local running buddies or some sort of running club I can join to make friends and stay active around the community. So, I am back to some somewhat strenuous training to be in tip-top race-pace form! Haha - we will see about that one, though. Here are a few pictures of some scenery I caught while on a run the other day - enjoy!
Beautiful flowers alongside the running trail
A beautiful sunset in Gwangyang
Some other random things from this past weekend: I tried "Prime Rib Pizza" for the first time - literally a piece of prime rib on cheese pizza. I didn't know it would be such a delicious combination, but it truly is. I love pizza. Here's a picture of the infamous prime rib pizza from "Mr. Pizza" restaurant.
My Korean diary
I have also been trying to keep up with my Korean writing skills while also documenting my journey in Korea by keeping a Korean-language diary! It is a little sloppy so far but it keeps my brain thinking in Korean. Hopefully I will have some solid paragraphs by the end of this year!
Prime Rib Pizza
Volleyball practice every day after school for 2-3 hours has taken a toll on my arms, as evidenced by this photo:
Volleyball, I have a newfound respect for you.
As you can see, it IS possible to have a social life outside of teaching, and I think I am doing a pretty good job at it so far. Hopefully I can continue to balance all of these activities and find some time to relax too - the jimjilbang will be calling my name (haha). October is quickly approaching, and it is going to be a busy month - just the way I like it. We will have our Fulbright Fall Conference, midterm exams for the students, and of course celebrating one of my favorite holidays, Halloween! Plenty of opportunities to meet up with fellow Fulbright friends are to occur, and having quality time here in Gwangyang with my family, friends, and co-workers is sure to happen as well - you will just have to stay tuned. Just a quick update after a busy weekend - talk to you soon!
Hi everyone! I hope you all are settling into the autumn season that is quickly approaching (from what I hear!). Here in Gwangyang, the weather has been a bit sporadic - sunny and warm one day, rainy and windy the next. Thankfully, the past couple of weeks have settled down and it is finally starting to feel like autumn. The seasons in Gwangyang are pretty comparable to the Midwest, albeit a bit warmer even. But as far as having all four seasons and experiencing weather changes, it is definitely there.
I have officially been living in Gwangyang for one month! During this time, we recently celebrated a Korean holiday called Chuseok (추석). Chuseok is one of the biggest and most important holidays in Korea. Family members from near and far come together to share food and stories and to give thanks to their ancestors for an abundant harvest. In 2014, Chuseok Day falls on September 8, but the holiday is observed for a total of three days (September 7–9).
On the morning of Chuseok Day, foods prepared with the year’s fresh harvest are set out to give thanks to ancestors through Charye (ancestor memorial service). After Charye, families visit their ancestors’ graves and engage in Beolcho, a ritual of clearing the weeds that may have grown up over the burial mound. After dusk, families and friends take walks and gaze at the beauty of the full harvest moon or play folk games such as Ganggangsullae (Korean circle dance).
My host family and I celebrated the holiday by going to my host dad's family's house, where we met with other parts of the family. We went to the cemetery together and cleared the weeds, and shared a family meal. On the morning of Chuseok, my family and I bowed to the ancestors, and then we proceeded to have a large meal filled with fish, bulgogi, rice, vegetables, and more. It was so delicious! Here are some pictures.
Our family's lineage
One of our delicious meals
After clearing the weeds around the graves
Setting out the food and bowing to our ancestors
I feel like I am adjusting to my daily routine and gaining some knowledge about my city and its whereabouts. I have even took some gambles traveling outside of the city... on my own! It has been quite an adventure, but I am easing my way into the navigation of Korea. A week ago, I went to visit some fellow Fulbright friends in Busan, which is about a two hour bus ride northeast of my city. We had a great time together - we shared our highs and lows with teaching so far, went to the spa, took a long nap, and enjoyed some American food together. I ate a huge steak burrito - it was glorious!
One thing that I really love about Korea is their spas, known as 찜질방 (pronounced like gym-jill-bahng). These spas are different than most American spas because you arrive, receive a change of clothes, and then each sex goes their separate ways. You go to a huge locker room and strip down - butt naked. It can be awkward at first, but once you get past the self-conscious phase and realize that no one is really staring at your body 24/7, then it's all good. So, you get naked, then you go to an area that typically has various baths and saunas you can choose from. Hot baths, cold baths, steam baths, ginseng, you name it, there are all kinds! You choose a bath, get in, and relax. The rest is history. At these spas you can also get massages, manicures/pedicures, scrubs, etc. When I was in Seoul, I did both a massage and a full body exfoliation scrub. In Busan, I just enjoyed my time in the baths and saunas. However, I did enjoy the snack bar and had some beer, Korean noodles, and ice cream. These spas have everything! Travelers can also stay overnight and sleep - which is where my friends and I took naps. You can wear clothes for this part... haha! We changed into the outfits they provided for us and went to sleep on a huge heated floor with a wooden block as my pillow - no blanket necessary. It is a lot more comfortable than it sounds, I promise! I didn't take any pictures at the 찜질방 because we were naked most of the time, but I will post some pictures of what the spa we went to looks like from their website.
Courtesy of: http://www.hotelnongshim.com
Courtesy of: http://www.hotelnongshim.com
Aside from having fun in Gwangyang and visiting other cities, life in school has been enjoyable as well. The past couple of weeks I have spent getting to know my students and coworkers after school. My co-teachers recently told me that every year, all of the schools in the Gwangyang area have a faculty volleyball tournament. The top three teams will win a monetary prize! They immediately recruited me to join our women's faculty team and call me the "best hitter" (granted I've barely even played volleyball in my life). I think my experience as the 8th grade volleyball manager may come in handy! Anyway, we have been practicing after school every day for the past two weeks until we have our tournament next weekend. I will be sure to let you all know how we do.
I've also been playing soccer, soccer-volleyball, and basketball with my students during my free periods. This has caused me to be extremely exhausted by 9:00 p.m. every night! But it is totally worth it - spending time with the students in a less formal environment is a great way for me to get to know them more personally. What is soccer-volleyball, Jokgu (족구), you may ask? It is a sport that combines the rules of both soccer and volleyball (go figure!). You play with a soccer ball and a low net. You are on teams (however many people per team), and you can only use your head or feet (no hands, rules of soccer) to hit the ball up to three teams before it must cross over the net to the other team's side (like volleyball). The goal of the game is to earn the most points and beat the other team. It is a really fun game, and although I am not the greatest at it yet, I will practice and get better!
Although I would love to continue writing about my experiences in Korea forever, this post has become quite lengthy. These are just a few highlights of what I have been up to during the past couple of weeks. I am beginning a Korean class starting tonight (Friday), and I am looking forward to being able to communicate better with my coworkers and build stronger relationships with them. It should be a fun class, and a great way to meet some new people in my city. Stay tuned for more updates within the next couple of weeks - have a great weekend!
First, let me apologize for the lack of blog posts. As you may remember, my original laptop died during orientation due to the humidity in the dorm building. The good news is that I now have a functioning laptop that will last me through my grant year (fingers crossed!). The bad news is that it took nearly six weeks to replace, so I haven't been able to update my blog. Therefore, this post will be a brief recap of important highlights that occurred during the remainder of orientation, and I will also talk about my transition into my home stay placement and the start of my classes as a high school English teacher! I may also copy and paste excerpts of events from my friends' blogs, and I will include links to their pages if you would like to check them out too!
So, right around the time that my laptop died, the nearly 80 of us ETAs were finding out what city we would be moving to for the remainder of our grant year (week 3 of orientation). It was a very exciting yet nerve-wrenching time for us, as we had filled out preference forms beforehand and want to be close to all of our friends. I was very happy with my placement - the only thing I requested was to be in a rural area and near to transportation to larger cities. In general, it is pretty rare for an ETA to request a rural placement, so the committee had little difficulty in placing me. I found out that I would be living in Jeollanam-do (province name, like "Illinois" would be in the USA), and my city name is Gwangyang-eup. Here is a map for you to see, and a picture with my fellow Jeollanam-do crew!
After finding out our placements, we only had a few weeks left of orientation, which the main highlights consisted of a trip to Seoul (my first time!) and our Fulbright Talent Show.
To put it simply, Seoul was amazing!!! I don't think I could live there because I would be so overwhelmed by the endless amount of things you can do there, but it is great for weekend trips and meeting up with friends. While we were in Seoul, we visited the Fulbright Office, graduated from our Korean Language Course at Korea University, and we also took a trip to the border of North and South Korea (the Demilitarized Zone). Here are a few snapshots from the weekend!
I want to express my gratitude toward my Korean professors throughout the six weeks of orientation. They have been so helpful not only in the classroom, but outside of class as well. They were so patient and willing to communicate with us about anything during our training. I would not feel as prepared to live in Korea as I do now if I did not have such wonderful teachers - so thank you, 이승훈 and 김민혜 for all that you do - thank you for your inspiration and motivating me to be the best that I can be!
My Korean class with our professors... I will miss them dearly!
Seoul! Ferry ride
I did it! I graduated from Korean class.
Hanging out in what is almost North Korea
Want to know how I know my Korean class is the most awesome class ever? For graduation, each class had to come up with a skit and/or activity to present to everyone (and Mrs. Shim, the director of Fulbright Korea!). So, our class decided to create a music video and rewrite the lyrics to the song "Talk Dirty to Me" by Jason DeRulo. My friend Leanndra and I were put in charge of lyric-writing, which I was thrilled about! We named our song "Teach Hangul to Me" (Hangul is the name of the Korean alphabet). Here is the video!!! It is all in Korean of course, but you can still laugh at our funny gestures if you don't understand the lyrics. Enjoy!!
After Seoul weekend, we were scrambling to prepare the Talent Show - we decided to go with an SNL theme. The Talent Show highlighted inside jokes between the staff, ETAs, and our Jungwon University lifestyle. It was a great way to end our orientation together - but also bittersweet. I sang a song to the tune of "I'll Make a Man Out of You" from the movie Mulan, and changed the lyrics to relate to our experiences at Jungwon. I will try and upload a video when I get access! Other performers included musical acts (a'capella, piano solos, duets, the whole range), K-pop dancing, choreographed dancing, and more. It was a blast!
Fast forward to moving out of Jungwon and moving to Gwangyang:
Almost three weeks ago, I met my Fulbright Co-teacher for the first time when she came to pick me up at Jungwon. I was immediately overcome with joy as I saw her bright smile walk up to me with a big bouquet of roses to give me. We took a five hour car ride home together, and I met my home stay family! They are the cutest family ever. I have two host brothers, one in high school and the other in middle school, and my host mom and host dad. My host dad is a government worker, and my host mom owns a gas station. I am so happy to be with them, and they have helped me transition into my placement at Gwangyang very easily. Here are some pictures of my family and the view I wake up to every day!
For the job side, I am teaching at an all boys high school! Upon hearing this news, I was actually very excited. I am super active and full of energy, so I think this matchup is a good one. Two weeks into teaching and I can say that it is a good fit. Those boys are a riot (in a good way)! It will definitely be a challenging yet fun and interesting year for me. I feel well-prepared after having some teaching experience before arriving in Korea! I teach between 500-600 students each week, so it is a struggle learning names, but I am determined to know their names by the end of the year. They have a wide range of interests, personalities, strengths, weaknesses, and other qualities about them that I look forward to learning more about. I will be sure to keep you all updated on any funny stories that happen during my year, as I am sure there will be plenty.
I don't want to make this post too long, so I will stop for now and update again later with some more finite details now that I can update more frequently. Please check out all of my friends' blogs by clicking the link below if you want to hear more about any experiences that I had amidst my laptop breakdown.
