Laos and the majestic beauty that lies within

Bus crash, moto bike crash, jumping off a moving tuk-tuk to save a friend, getting jumped by some bartenders, some of the most beautiful scenery in the world, some of the coolest people I've ever met, walking through opium fields and villages that had never seen foreigners, reading books to children who can't understand a word I say, some of the most hospitable locals you'll ever find drinking you and eating you under the table (not really, they just insist you do!).  These are my highlights of my time in Laos, and if you simply want a summary you need read no further!

One month in Laos.  That's what a VOA (visa on arrival) allows, so that's exactly what I did.  I arrived on January 12, healthy and strong, and I left February 10, after several incidents I returned to Thailand, still in one piece.

The scenery was this nice the entire 2 day trip!  And better!

My first week in Laos consisted of a slow, 2 day boat ride across the Mekong towards Luang Prabang.  And let me tell you, I have seen the Mekong, hell I've seen MOST of the Mekong (only slight exaggeration) that lies in Vietnam and Cambodia, having taken several trips up the river in those areas, and Laos, by far, has the most beautiful section of the Mekong that I have yet encountered!  The river seems to be cleaner there (still wouldn't drink from it XD) and the surrounding landscape is awe-inspiring!  If my slow boat hadn't been such a social gathering of backpackers I would have spent most of my 2 days on it just watching the land pass by, and taking pictures.

I was still ( / again) traveling with my buddy Gavin, though his girlfriend Karenth had split ways with us in Chiang Mai, making her way back to Alaska to work in below 0 degree weather (both Celsius and Fahrenheit!) while Gavin and I headed North to a country that we had extremely limited knowledge about, and no real expectations beyond 'tubing in Vang Vieng' which seems to be a SE Asian backpackers rite of passage!

When we arrived to this brand new city that we had never been to, we did what we always do... went walking around Luang Prabang in search of a cheap hotel.  We found one relatively quickly and we also stumbled across one of the best night markets I have encountered in Asia!  If you don't count the fact that you have to slump over like Quasimodo to get through the excessive number of stout tents set up throughout the entire market.  The only things I purchased from the night market were a cloth water bottle holder with a strap (one of the most useful items I have) and a 10,000 Kip (~$1.25) vegetarian buffet on the street, which was delicious and nutritious, or so we thought... We spent a few days checking out the city (you could also call it a town, it's pretty small).  As it was the last stretch of Gavin's adventure in Asia he had a time-line, and we needed to get a move on to Vang Vieng so he could get a few days of tubing in!  Unfortunately, and possibly due to our veggie buffet, Gavin was hit with a heavy bought of stomach flu in the morning, and I (quite abruptly) started feeling ill in the evening, and then no one was happy on either ends, if you catch my drift...  So we extended our stay in Luang Prabang an extra 2 days to let our orifices recover before heading on to SE Asian drunken backpacker central, aka Vang Vieng, Laos.

Giant series of waterfalls on 4000 Islands, Southern Laos

We arrived in Vang Vieng in the wee hours of the morning, after most places had closed, and well before any would open.  Once again we had not planned ahead and failed to book a place to stay before ariving, which usually isn't a problem... but when you arrive at 2 AM, in a town that closes down around mid night (except a handful of bars and sandwich / pancake stalls) it can be.  Luckily two Danish girls were getting off the bus with us, so we (only somewhat) awkwardly followed them to their guest house, where we hoped there might be another available room (or maybe the Danish girls would share a room? =) which it turned out there was.  So Gavin and I shared a large, rather uncomfortable bed on the bottom floor, which OF COURSE had some damn dumb rooster RIGHT outside, who either A. always thought it was dawn, B. liked keeping people awake, or C. was too competetive with the other cocks in the vicinity and always needed to get the last crow.  Either way, it was a PITA (first word is *pain* figure out the rest =) for the remainder of my stay in VV. 

Gavin and I experienced tubing, which coincidentally the tubing aspect of tubing in Vang Vieng is actually quite terrible...  The real attraction there is getting drunk at the bars that line the river and acting like a jackass... which isn't quite my scene (ever / at the time / anymore?) but I managed to keep up with the crowd pretty decently.  VV is like an international spring break, all year round, which is almost unfortunate because there's such a beautiful area surrounding the town!  There were plenty of dangerous activities lining the river to give entertainment for all who dared try them, or those who just enjoyed watching others try them =). Gavin only got one or two days in before parting ways for home, which left me in a drunken city with drunken people and no plan on what to do next... so I drank.

I'll learn one of these days! :p

I stayed in VV for a total of two weeks, and let me tell you, this place is like the twilight zone!!  Nowhere else in the world can there POSSIBLY be as much craziness going on, all around!  So I enjoyed the craziness, and then I lazed around, trying the various 'exotic' foods and shakes that Vang Vieng had to offer along with watching too many episodes of friends, as the restaurant / bars there all either play episodes of friends or family guy all day long.  And then I drank some more.  I made friends with the owner and family that ran my guest house, and would have dinner with them most nights, as they made delicious authentic Laos meals, and the owner practically forced me to eat and drink with him!  (I think he might have been attracted to me... I seem to get that a lot).  I was really enjoying the friends I made there, both the backpackers that were usually there for 3 days before they had to get away from the craziness, and the locals who were very friendly and warm.  I would even take a shower in the managers room occassionally, as my water heater was broken!  I was looking into getting some work as a ar promoter there, also looking into seeing if a rock climbing company needed help (they said I needed qualifications =\ ) but an incident at a bar with 4 or 5 (hard to count when you're concussed) proper British 'gentlemen' left me bloodied and bruised, and more than ready for a new scene.  So I packed my bags and headed to the capital! Vientianne!

Which is not that exciting.  Vientianne is actually pretty dull..  So with no real plan or intention of doing anything in Vientianne I managed to make friends with two Aussies who were headed to Kong Lor Cave, some hours South of Vientianne by bus.  So I figured 'what the hell' and went with em.

The exit of Kong Lor

Kong Lor cave was amazing!  Though it was the only place in Laos that I had a hassle with people trying to rip me off repeatedly, it was well worth getting there!  I was told it was the 3rd biggest cave in the world, though was unable to find info on it online after a (not at all) extensive search.  But it was large, and beautiful!  We had to keep hopping in and out of the boats so the guides could drag the boats up the miniscule, low flow falls, as well as to take hiking breaks through the cooler parts of the cave.  After we left the town with the cave was when we experienced a hell of a night involving a bus crash, a night I'm certain I shall remember vividly for the rest of my life,  and has made a difference in how I define myself, forever. For now I will just say two out of ~16 people died, and I was semi-severely injured.  Story to come...

Scar from crash ~3 months later.. My body is all healed up now. My mind... well that might have been fletched from the beginning eh?

on the boat ride to see the dolphins

After that we got to a town with a hospital to get stitched up, relaxed for a bit, then headed down to 4000 Islands.  The South was my favorite part of Laos that I had seen thus far!  Beautiful, giant waterfalls, dramatic landscape, freshwater dolphins, and an ocean-like beach chill-out spot in the middle of the Mekong River!  It was a cool experience, and I met some great people there.  I really wanted to spend some more time there, but unfortunately my visa was expiring... So back down to Bangkok I went to waste a good 10 days of my life, as Bangkok is another infamous city for drunken backpackers to get into trouble. More on that and my second trip to Laos later.  -The Chaz

Pretty scenery found all over the island of Don Det, 4000 Islands

Biker bangers

So in Hue we had good weather even though it was rainy season (only in the middle of Vietnam, not the North or South...) so we took advantage of this during our three days there by getting a motorbike tour all over the city one day.  For ~10 US$ you can hire one moto-bike driver to drive you all over the city, show you the good sites etc.  Good way to see the city, and a good way to spread the money you spend around the community instead of just going to travel agencies..  Gavin's moto-bike driver was really cool and knew English well.  Apparently he is a rice farmer on a Vietnamese coop farm, and a tourist moto-bike driver / tour guide in the off season.

We heard that sometimes the street side moto bike tour guides have been known to take tourists to their friends house and rob them, and there was one point when we had been driving through rice fields for about 20 minutes, with nothing apparent ahead where we started getting a little nervous that we might become victims of such a happenstance, but we dismissed those thoughts and made it through the day no problem.

The trouble with motorbikers came later that night.  Gavin and I went out to a local bar that had about 6 girls patrolling the streets, practically demanding that you take their fliers even if you alraedy have one!  We get there during the early part of happy hour (which is ~5 hours long) and take advantage of the cheap drinks.  We met the DJ, a Vietnamese guy named 'Lucky' who was really cool and charismatic, and after a few drinks we go and get dinner with Lucky, compliments of Gav, then head back to the bar to get some more drinks.  Lucky has to work and Gavin and I have to dance and play pool, so we divide in order to conquer.  Gavin gets caught up dancing with a whole assortment of internationals while I (why?) am still playing pool.  We keep the drinks flowing, and Lucky helps us in our pursuit of intoxication by giving us free drinks every hour (very strong free drinks as well).  Gavin and I spend the rest of the night gigging (a.k.a. dancing hard), until some English girl gets her purse stolen and it kinda kills the buzz, so after a drunk mission to find her purse (Gavin was searching the whole bar and didn't even know what he was looking for!!!) fails, Gavin and I head home on foot.

It's about a 5 minute walk to our hotel from the bar, but of course in Vietnam everyone seems to think walking is a tragedy, and you must motor bike everywhere!  So as soon as we leave the bar we have three motor-bike drivers following us trying to get us to get on their bike, and at the same time trying to sell us various drugs.   Gav and I have both consumed a lot of alcohol (partly thanks to Lucky feeding us free drinks every hour) but Gav seems to be on a different level from me.  While the moto bike drivers are offering drugs Gav is heckling them!  (at the top of his voice) "Oh you have cocaine!!", and  "No, we don't need marijuana, your weed is SHIT!"  This pisses off one of the moto-bike drivers who starts talking mad shit to Gavin, I am trying to get Gav on one of the other moto bikes to get out of there and get home asap because it's not looking very good, but Gav absolutely refuses to pay a motor bike driver a dollar for such a short ride, and "has perfectly good legs".   We continue walking with these guys following us and get back to the alleyway where our hotel is located, and of course where there is yet another motor bike driver waiting...

Gavin is a little bit ahead of me as I am trying to get rid of the moto bikers behind us, Gavin tries to walk by the new moto-bike driver, and of course this one is also trying to sell us drugs, and when Gavin tries to walk by the new moto driver gets in his way, so now we have 1 moto bike driver in front of us, and 3 behind at the entrance of an alleyway.  The new moto bike driver is very pushy, literally and figuratively.  He really wants gavin to buy some pot, and is not letting Gavin pass by.  He has his hands all over Gavin, and there's nothing I can do except step to the side and watch, and make sure his hands don't go IN Gavin's pockets, because they seem to be everywhere else!

We are in a really bad situation being surrounded in an alleyway, so i'm trying to keep the spacing good, I immediately relocate near the entance so i can't be surrounded by these drug selling bikers, who also happen to be pissed off at us... I yell to Gavin to be wary of his pockets, which he acknowledges and finally manages to push past the pushy moto bike driver.  I wait until Gavin is near the door of our hotel before i fully enter the alley, and as i walk through with the bikers all talking shit, the one in front snatches my hat off my head and throws it to one of the others.  I'm getting really tired of this shit at this point!

So after the biker pushes Gav around a bit, don't leave us alone, practically try to fight us, and then steal my favorite hat off my head.  I brisquely march up to the one with my hat, snatch it back and march to the door of our hotel without saying another word to them, and when i get in the door i am quite thankful that Gavin and I both made it home safely and with all our belongings.

After one month of travels

I wrote this after 1 month of travel, though it has been longer now, i'm just getting around to posting it...  I finished my contract teaching in Korea, and it was a lot of fun, I learned a LOT about teaching

I, learned a LOT about teaching, about Korean culture, I learned the language relatively proficiently, and I got involved with a lot of different organizations.  I did some volunteer work at an orphanage on the weekends, I acted in a play (SO MUCH WORK!), I took some Korean classes, I met a lot of good people, Korean and Foreign, took piano lessons, and did language exchanges on top of going out and socializing... In short, I learned a lot, made some great friends, and earned some money while doing it! 

I'm now in Southern Vietnam, I have spent over 3 weeks in VN thus far, and have about 5 days left on my visa.  So Gavin and I are trying to see all of Saigon and the Mekong Delta, and possibly a VN island to the South before heading on to Cambodia to see Angkor Wat and to meet up with Gavin's girlfriend!

We are thinking about buying some mountain bikes, but also looking into renting some for a week or two, so we can bike all the way through Cambodia.  We heard the roads there are pretty bad, but flat, so biking probably wouldn't take much longer than buses, and it would be a great way to see the countryside, and we could just camp if we didn't find a town with a hostel to suit us for the night.  After ~2 weeks in Cambodia we are going to meet up with some friends in Bangkok, Thailand, and travel to Southern Thailand to do some rock climbing around Krabi during our friends' grad school winter vacation for a few weeks.  Gavin, Gavin's girlfriend, Karenth, and I also plan to get our open water scuba certifications in that area during that time.

The trip is going great so far!  I've met some really cool people, including a really cool Israeli guy named Penis whom taught me a little Hebrew, a cool Vietnam war vet who told me some cool stories about his return to Vietnam, Bamboo the tour guide, and many others!

Gavin and I did some DWS (deep water solo) rock climbing (rock climbing over water with no safety equipment, when you fall or if you get too high for your comfort, you just fall into the water)  in Halong Bay, which is an amazingly beautiful place, and a great way to spend a day there!  My highest ascent was ~55', and I had a few that were ~35'.  Not too shabby for how little climbing I've done in the past 2 years!  We also did some kayaking in the bay, which was also really nice.  I have rented motor bikes 3 times now, in smaller cities, to drive around the surrounding mountains / bay / jungles, which is a great way to see the area, and a lot of fun just in the driving itself!  I was considering buying a motorbike to do the rest of my travels on, but it is quite dangerous, my insurance wouldn't cover me since I don't have a motorcycle license back home (or here!), and I couldn't find a bike for sale in the right price range with the right specs for me.  Anyway, taking the bus and trains around seems like a safer option for now, and I still have plenty to do and see!

Gavin and I got some custom clothes made for us in Hoi An, a city rather famous for its tailoring.  Gavin got a whole suit, a couple shirts, dress shoes, and a dress for his girlfriend!  (She sent him her sizes)  As for me I just got some custom made leather flip flops (which I just lost the other day zip lining...), and a custom made shirt.  I wanted to get a suit as well, as it only costs 80 - 150 US$ depending on the material, but then I would either have to mail it home which is relatively costly, or lug it around with me, which is not preferable.  And I had just bought a new camera since mine was stolen (I've lost many things already this trip!) and I splurged a little bit on the camera, going for the tough kind that can go 10 meters underwater and be dropped from 2M, also takes pretty decent pics, so i didn't want to shell out more dough on commodities I didn't really need.

We just left Dalat the other day, where we did a 2-day adventure tour hiking a mountain and through the jungle, where we stayed the night in a bungalow in a tiny village, and had an amazing dinner there!  The hiking was nice, the sights were beautiful, we saw some cool wildlife, most notably a spider the size of my face!!! And what MIGHT have been a flying squirrel (it was too fast to know for sure what it was, could have been a monkey?).  But the main attraction was day 2 when we went canyoning and repelled down 15 - 25 meter waterfalls and cliffs!  We went sliding down some smaller waterfalls head first (with helmets and lifejackets on of course =) and just had a blast!  We also made really good friends with our tour guide (named Bamboo), and he took us out for dinner to get some dog meat after our day of abseiling, BUT, apparently it's bad luck to eat dog meat during the first two weeks of the all lunar months (or something along those lines) so no restaurants were serving dog meat, so we got some VN BBQ instead, and a few beers.  The next day we went on a nice bike ride around town, with Bamboo again, and saw lots of cool stuff.  And THAT night he took us to his friend's house to have a dinner party with all his Vietnamese tour guide friends (good that they were all tour guides because they knew English!) and we had a BLAST!  Most of them had fun nicknames they went by, that all had sexual connotations! One of the guys was named Hib, which means strong man in Vietnamese, but if you say *Hip* it means rape, which (of course) provided lots of material for jokes after we all downed our first 3 beers in the first 30 minutes and kept that pace the rest of the night!
 

I have been trying to make a point to learn bits of the languages in each country I go to, because it's fun and you get a better feel for the culture, i think...  We have also made it a focal point of our travels to try ALL the local specialty foods at least once.  But we have found just about all the local specialties to be absolutely delicious and want to eat them all the time!  A lot of times I won't go for local breakfast dishes, because I really enjoy (and haven't really experienced for the past 14 months because Korea doesn't really have) a nice Western breakfast!!!  Omelets and pancakes and all kinds of goodies!  But for lunch and dinner it's always Pho, spring rolls, rice dishes, freshly caught sea food, or whatever they say the local specialty is!  And the food (minus one TERRIBLE bus stop restaurant that may have permanently scarred the inside of my stomach) is amazing!!!

The food, and just about everything in Vietnam is very cheap, even after the foreigner tax (10 US$ for a two bedroom, decent hotel with breakfast for two people!!) 2 US$ for a bowl of pho and a beer =). 
Meeting people while travelling is awesome, because sometimes you can make really strong connections with people in a short amount of time!  But the thing that I am loving the most about my travels thus far is the freedom!!! I don't have anyone I have to answer to, anything that I HAVE to do (except leave VN by Dec. 7 because my visa expires =) no time constraints, some money in the bank, and just about limitless options!  It is an amazing feeling that I don't think many people truly feel!  And I am lucky to have the opportunity to do so!

Well this has been more or less an update on my travel through Vietnam, I will try and do a briefer update on Cambodia soon

Picasso and private schools

My focus in this blog is going to be mainly on the play I'm rehearsing for and my job, which makse sense, since the aforementioned subjects are where I spend the majority of my time these days.  So let's just jump right into it then, shall we?

Rehearsals for our play, "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" are going well.  I see a lot of improvement in myself and in all of my co-actors each week.  For those of you interested (especially if you're in Korea!!!) check out the website for our play:  http://gototheatre.weebly.com/  .  There are only two more weeks of rehearsal before opening night on June 25, and we still have some work to do, but it is looking pretty good.  I am nervous, but excited.  I haven't been in a play since Jr. High unless you count the two I made cameo appearances in for my two Kindergarten class graduation show this last Spring.  I don't feel nervous about it while I'm at home, or even while I'm at the theater, until I step back stage and am waiting for my turn to come on stage.  Even during practice this gets my stomach in knots, though I don't think it helps that I've usually drank 2 coffees not long before this point!

But nerves are good I suppose, that's part of the reason I took it upon myself to try and be a part of this play, to step out of my comfort zone a bit, cause living in another country where I don't exactly know the language isn't uncomfortable enough!!  When I auditioned for the play (in February?) I didn't think it was going to be this much work!  I also kind of expected a smaller role, but was also excited when they directors told me I got the title role.  I am glad I am doing the play, practice can be fun, though frustrating at times.  The people in the play with me are all really nice, and I enjoy spending time with them.  Though it's really starting to eat up my weekends, and I will be glad when it's over and I can go out of town on the weekends if I want to, or just stay in bed all day, or basically do whatever I want without having a weekend commitment.

Play rehearsal has cut into some of my other previous activities, like the GIC talk (an informative talk on varying subjects by speakers in the international community each Saturday), and my Spanish/Korean Saturday evening class.  I also am not currently taking a Saturday morning Korean class because I am too damn tired of waking up early.  And my weekends are busy enough as it is without class.  My time spent studying Korean these days is rather minimal, and I would like to change that.
 
My mind is getting enough exercise as it is with the play and trying to handle my younger students, I somewhat recently started working on getting my body into a respectable physical condition.  As many of you know I am saving my money to go travelling with my college buddy Gavin, who I basically lived with for 3 of my 4 years at Chico.  We are going to meet ~ Nov. 1, probably in Vietnam, though we haven't worked out the specific details yet.  We figure we can do around 4 months of travelling around South East Asia relatively cheaply and have enough money left of to WWOOF in Australia and New Zealand for some months after that.  But since I got to Korea I have been doing less physical activity than I ever have in my life.  Even a while before I left I wasn't doing anything since after I got jumped last August my body wasn't feeling so great.  Well my back is still a bit shotty, I think it's from that incident, BUT I figure now is the time to start working out and getting ready for some good hard backpacking.  As long as I stretch before doing physical activities, and I avoid putting lots of pressure on that part  of my back (squats hurt the next day =\ ), my back doesn't limit me from doing things.  So I joined a gym with my buddy Stu from work, and since then I have been going 2 - 3 times a week.  It's only week three now, but I think I will be able to keep it up since I enjoy working out (more so the feeling afterward and the next day) and the gym is so close to my apartment.

I have not made it to the girls orphanage in the past month (quite unfortunately, I miss my little friend Da Song).  Varying reasons have kept me from being there including some irregular transportation issues as well as my mom and sister coming to visit me and going out of town with them.  I went to Seoul with them their first weekend here (the first of May) and Jeju with them their second weekend and last days here.  I had a lot of fun, and it was really nice getting out of Gwangju and seeing new places.  A bit surprisingly I had not visited Seoul before they came here, and when they were here with me it was the first time I have been living in Korea where I felt like a tourist.  But it was a nice change of pace, and it was great getting to see some family, it has been a long time.  There is a lot I could say on that visit, but that's not what I came to talk about today, check out the pictures of that ( i don't think i put them up yet, but soon!!)

My classes are pretty good.  There is one that I really wish I could get rid of, and I dread it every Tuesday Thursday, but at least it's only 80 minutes a week with those kids.  There are 6 boys in that class, and 4 of em are brats, 1 in particular.  It just doesn't work with that kid, I have tried punishing him, I have tried rewarding him, I have tried witholding rewards from him.  Sometimes he's okay, but usually he's a shithead.  At times the Korean co-teacher for that class will see him causing trouble and take him out of the class for a while, which usually makes the class MUCH better overall, though the other boys may still occasionally act out, it's much easier to handle.  There's only so much I can do, the kids are only 5 western age, there English is obviously limited, though there are a few kids in that class that are quite smart.  They don't completely understand me and if they don't want to listen or if they want to yell while I'm talking I can't do much about it.  I don't have that problem with my other classes, though I experienced that overwhelming feeling of uncontrollable kids a little bit last semester with my Daisy Duck class.  I'm about ready to give up with those boys and just send them out to their Korean teacher every time they act up, which would have Rickey out of the class for most of the class every time.  Daniel would probably be gone quite a bit too.  I'm just too damn tired of trying to control them and getting nowhere. 

I really like my elementary classes.  It's like they're real people or something!!  I think most of the kindergarten kids I teach are too young for the serious book work classroom learning they are forced to do.  I have deadlines on when I am supposed to finish my books with my classes, which is fair enough.  And in the plan it seems like there is enough time to do the book work and actually teach them the subjects reasonably well in that timeline (this is for my main class 80 minutes a day).  But then we have gym every Wedensday (40 minute class), Leadership every Tuesday (40 min class), Science on Thursdays (usually takes all 80 minutes, and the kids will cry if they don't finish it) and role play on Fridays (we are supposed to do 40 - 80 minutes, with my low level Korean 6 year olds I generally need all 80 to feel like I taught them the subject well).  Which leaves me with 80 min on Monday, 40 Tues, 40 Wed, to do three books.  One of those three we are supposed to finish each month and send home, so i have to make sure and keep on track.

The teachers at my school have recently been doing a teacher's seminar at the end of every month to help us teach our books / subjects better.  We are given a section of a book and asked to make a lesson plan for it, and we do that for an hour or two and talk about things we could do with our classes.  That's all well and dandy, but I don't have TIME to play all these games and do cool shit with my classes because we have to be doing book work all the damn time otherwise we will fall behind and won't send our books home in time and the parents will bitch and I will get bitched at!  And not just that, but it's really frustrating for me because I often feel like I don't have enough time with my class to really drive the material home, or to review the material.  We always have to be going on to the next pages or we will fall behind.  It's not condusive to learning, especially at that young of an age level.  And it's also not condusive to keeping me sane.  It makes me testy when the kids goof off and sometimes I start to snap beause I know we don't have time to goof off or either we won't finish the pages we need to, or they will just scribble on the pages and not learn anything.  But I know I need to relax, they are kids and they do need time to just play, but it's not a great system.  It seems to be more about selling the books than teaching the kids, and it's not the most effective way of doing things.  Don't get me wrong, my school isn't bad.  As far as I can tell I'm quite lucky where I was placed as it is my first time teachind and my school is pretty good to it's teachers compared to other hagwons (private schools) in Korea.  Well there are more thoughts I would like to share, but it's getting late and I have work in the morning.  An nyeong!

1 / 2 way there

Well, it crept  up on me, but apparently I have been in Korea almost 6 months!  It certainly doesn't seem like it's been that long, but time flies when you're having fun I suppose. 

So, what's new?  I stopped going to the rock climbing gym I was relatively consistently going to, my friends Shawn and Cheline stopped going.  Duyeong still goes, but I wasn't going enough to justify getting another month membership.  This cuts my physical activity from a little to almost none, bah...  But it's starting to look like spring, it's getting pretty warm out, so I'll probably start doing more hiking soon, and maybe hit up the basketball courts not too far from my house at night after work.  I definitely need a little more physical activity in my life...  I'm doing a decent amount of studying, my last two weeks not quite as much as I had been for the last 2 months or so, but my Korean is definitely improving, and I can have short conversations with people.  Though trying to talk to random Koreans (on the bus or store clerks, etc) can prove very frustrating.  If I say something in Korean I guess they think that I know Korean well and start talking faster than the speed of sound, which makes it very difficult for a begginer to translate and understand.  But my girlfriend or Korean friends that I chat with in Korean here and there usually talk at a reasonable pace, and pause after each sentence, to give me time to comprehend one thing before they say the next, which is exactly what I need.  I also try and text a few friends in Korean for more practice, and it's easier.  I can think about what I want to say, take my time to make sure and use correct grammar, and use my electronic dictionary to translate a word into Korean if I don't already know what it is. 

I have two informal Korean classes on Saturdays, one at 11 am, the other at 5 pm.  One hour and two hours long respectively, though the 5pm class is beginner Spanish the first hour, Korean the second hour.  The Spanish class is a little lower level than I need, but as it has been a couple years since my last spanish class I'm a little rusty, and it's good to practice.  I'm studying Spanish because I want to travel around South America sometime in the next few years, I'm thinking maybe 2013... but it's a long ways off right now.  Right now I am thinking a lot about what I will do within the next year.  It seems pretty certain that at the end of my contract I am going to meet up with my college buddy Gavin and travel around South East Asia for probably around 4 months.  My contract ends at the end of Sept. beginning of Oct. and his work ends mid to late October.  I'm considering taking a month long CELTA course which would be full time classes training me to be a more competent ESL teacher specifically for teaching adults.  I think I would like to work at a university, all universities prefer a teacher with a masters degree, but I made aqcuaintance with a director of foreign teachers at a university in Seoul and he said that the CELTA certificate was the next best thing.  So I am looking at places to take my CELTA class, I was considering Hong Kong, but was told living there is relatively expensive compared to my other options.  So now I'm leaning towards Seoul, Thailand, or Vietnam.  I would like to line up a job at a university for February or March 2012, that's the time new semesters start, and that would give me enough time to get a lot of travelling in.  If I don't get a position lined up in Korea for that time I am thinking I will look for a job in Australia.  Possibly teaching ESL, though I am also looking into WWOOFing and other possibilities.  So the next year is still a little hazy for what will come, and I am keeping my options open, but I think good things will come.

My school started a new semester of classes recently.  My two special 7 year old classes (8 years old by the end of the semester) graduated kindergarten and some went to elementary at different schools.  I was very sad to see them go, they were good kids.  BUT, I am teaching 3 elementary classes this semester, as opposed to my one elementary class last semester, and two of my favorite students from one of my kinder classes are in one of my classes!  I was very excited to see them when I walked in the class for the first time.  I taught mostly 7 year olds last semester, with a few 6 year olds and one elementary class in my schedule.  7 year olds (I will repeat myself: Korean age is differently calculated, 7 ~ 5 or 6) are a pretty good middle ground as far as teaching kindergarten goes.  They are still really young, but they have all had a year of English class by that point, and they aren't so young that they need babying attention.  For example, I have had to zip up the pants of some of my 6 year olds after they use the bathroom...  This semester I have more kids on both sides of the 7 year old middle ground.  I have more elementary classes, which are nice and I genearlly like, and I have more 6 year old classes.  I will also be reading to Korean 4 or 5 year olds soon, I haven't started that class yet, nor have I been told whether I have the 4 year old class or the 5 year old class.  If my boss knows me she will give me the 5 year old class, as I am not exactly a baby person.  Though I must admit my skills with little kids have definitely grown a lot after 6 months of teaching them.  However, I am still not one to coddle a child.  Two of my kids in my 1st period class (mostly 1st year English student 6 year olds) cried the entire class for the first three days of the semester.  I try to comfort them some, patting them on the back and telling them they will see their mom after school (in both Korean and in English).  But I do not baby them, I teach class as though there weren't two kids crying, and I tell them to do their work just like the rest of the kids.  It is my belief that babying them will not help them at all in the long run.  They need to realize that they are okay on their own and cope with their fear.  Apparently my Korean co-teacher doesn't agree, because one of the students has been moved to a different class.  The other student had a completely dry day Thursday, with just a few sniffles on Friday, so I'd say my strategy is going quite well!

In general I like my classes this semester.  My younger classes, mainly my first class of the day which I just described in part, I feel as though I am doing as much in teaching them behavior as I am in teaching them English at the moment.  They need to learn how students should behave in class before we can get a good learning groove down.  I think it's going quite well though, and already their behavior seems better than the class I had last semester that was the same level.  I think having the kids from the beginning of the semester makes a big difference, though the kids not being quite as rowdy doesn't hurt.  I have two classes continued from last semester, an after school class (6 year olds when I got them, 7 now) and an elementary class.  I am quite pleased about this, especially the after school class.  When I got them their English seemed a little behind par, but with only 4 kids in my class there was lots of time for individual work with them, and I could easily see each students' strengths and weaknesses and work on those accordingly.  Also, the book I was required to use for that class was given to me for 4 months of class, and we could have easily finished it in two, which gave me a lot of free time to supplement the lessons from the book or make focus on other subjects entirely.  By the end of the semester the four students' English had improved greatly, two of the students in particular, both of whom are very bright, and I felt like I contributed to their great improvement quite a bit.  Anyway, I have that class again this semester and I'm excited to see them continue to grow at that pace.

For the past month, maybe month and a half, I have been volunteering at a girls orphanage downtown for an hour every Saturday.  A bunch of waygooks and Korean highschool girls go there every Saturday, we teach a little English, but mostly just hang out with the girls and play games.  My buddy Dan and I planned the lesson for last weekends visit, and it was actually a lot more work than we thought it was going to be.  There is an age difference in the girls, though most are probably 9-12, and there is a difference in their levels of English skill.  So it is difficult to plan a lesson and games / activities to supplement the lesson that are both entertaining for the girls and appropriate for all skill levels.  But we put a lot of thought and a decent amount of effort in and the lesson was a success!  The girls learned about clothing, a few phrases, and most importantly, had fun. 

My Saturday's are usually pretty busy, with my two Korean classes, 1 Spanish, Sung-Bin orphanage visit, and the GIC talk that I almost always go to, after dinner I am usually just tired and go home, though sometimes I will meet up with friends before calling it a night.  The GIC talk is a nice, semi-educational talk where every week a speaker presents on a topic of their choosing for around an hour, including a question and answer portion.  Some of the topics include introduction to journalism, an Irishman that grew up during the 80's and 90's talked about 'the troubles in Northern Ireland' during that time period, New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina were one of the subjects, etc.  I am considering doing a presentation on Evolutionary Psychology in the summer, though I have not yet committed to doing one.  The GIC (Gwangju International Center) is a great place to meet people and find things to do.  There was an advertisement for auditions to a play last Saturday.  I thought it would be fun to be in a play, so I auditioned.  I don't know what part I got, though the directors seem certain I will be in the play, which will be in mid-May.  I don't remember the name of the play, but it was written by Steve Martin, and seems pretty funny. 

I'm making a lot of friends outside of my school, which is good because it gets me out and about downtown on the weekends.  I have a friend who has a membership at a Jujiutsu gym, and another one who has a membership at a sword fighting gym, both of which sound like they would be a lot of fun to check out, and I'm not sure which one I will go to, but I will definitely do one once I get my body in a little more respectable shape (more so I don't hurt myself than anything).

Well I guess it's a good time to end this post, though I haven't talked about my trip to Shanghai and Suzhou China at all, I think I'll leave that for my next post.  I hope you enjoyed reading this, it seems like a relatively thorough summary of my life recently, busy with work, studying / extracurricular activities, and friends!  And reading, I have been doing a decent amount of reading novels (mostly nonfiction) recently.  Oh, and the big earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan recently didn't affect me at all, I didn't feel any tremors or anything, just in case that crossed your mind.  Until next time!

Long time

So it's been a long time since I posted a blog, I know both of you have been waiting on the edge of your seats!   lol...  It's Friday evening here, and boy am I glad it's the weekend.  Teaching has gotten easier for me, less wearing is probably a better way of putting it.  But this was a long week.  With a dumb disagreement with a co teacher, to a kid stealing my candy, and a few other petty things and some not petty things wearing on my patience, I am ready for the weekend. 
I had to test my older kindergarten kids (Korean 8 year olds now that it's a new year and they all turn 8) to see what level elementary school English class they should be placed into.  This was tough on both my kids and me.  A lot of them didn't do as well as I expected them too, though some did better than I thought they would.  I guess we are all biased...  Plus some kids do better on tests or under pressure than others.  They had about 50 minutes of written test, and 5 - 10 minutes for each individual student to take an oral test.  Their reading comprehension seemed very weak overall.  Though Koreans tend to teach children to memorize more so than understand, which would make reading comprehension difficult...  One of my brightest students and best behaved students aced most of the oral test until it came time for the reading comprehension.  She got the first 3 questions right without much of a problem, but couldn't for the life of her come up with an answer to the last two questions and nearly broke down crying.  I felt so bad.  The next day I made sure she won a game and gave her a piece of chocolate for winning the game.

But it's time to forget about that because it's the weekend, and it's payday!!  I'm going out to dinner with a Korean buddy and his wife tonight.  Might get a few beers with him after, but not staying out late.  I have Korean class in the morning and want to spend a good amount of time studying after class with my buddy from class.  Studying before as well would be good, but I rarely get up in time to do that.  I have been relatively adament with my studies.  At first when I was trying to think of something in Korean I would often get Spanish going through my head, now at the end of studying Korean for a few hours I can hardly remember Spanish at all. 

We found out today that our usual 5 days off in the summer (9 days total with the weekend before and weekend after) has been cut to 2 work days off.  This sort of blows for me as it's my first year, and I probably won't get the "approximately 10 vacation days" my contract states.  But one of my co-workers is contacting the foreigner labor department through the Korean government and asking about it, so maybe it will change.  We are also putting a letter together to our boss basically saying that we know we have pretty good working conditions, but that all teachers get a week off somewhere.  Some public school teachers get months off, we don't even have a full week off scheduled for the entire year.  3 work days in a row is the most.  A little frustrating when you want to travel, not to mention you see all the other teachers taking a month off during Christmas and a week off here and there.  But, I figure if I save up some money I can see a lot more if I do my travelling all at once after my contract(s?) are done.  As airfare is generally the most expensive part of travelling (depending on where you go and what you spend your money on obviously) a one way ticket and travelling from place to place thereafter would be much cheaper and give more time to explore.
Well, I have dinner plans soons, so I will get going.  peace!

culture in korea

After two months in South Korea I am by no means an expert on Korean language or culture.  However, I definitely have learned a lot about Korea and Koreans.  These are some of the culture differences I have noticed between Koreans and Americans:

Men and Women
When you have dinner with Korean families, the men sit on one side, the women and children sit on the other.  They will talk amongst each other, but conversation is more kept within the groups than I am used to.
Most Koreans live with their parents until they are married.  Usually the women live by pretty strict rules, whereas the men are pretty free to do what they want.  The only example of this that I can think of is that women living with their parents usually have a curfew, whereas the men usually do not.  Even 30 year old wome still living with their parents have a curfew. 
Men are the breadwinners in Korean families.  Women do often work, but usually get paid much less, as I have come to understand it.  This isn't completely different from America as men do get paid more than women, but there are definitely a fair few families where the wife makes more than the husband.

Drinking
Drinking is part of their culture, and it is looked upon well if a man can drink a lot.  The earliest I've seen a bar here close is 6 am, though I'm sure there are some that close earlier (they probably close if they have no one in there).  I don't think their alcohol is taxed very much, because I can get imported beer for near the price I get it in the states, and soju (a local rice based liquor that has about half the alcohol content as vodka and tastes pretty much like half vodka) is plentiful and very cheap.

Education
Koreans are a very education oriented people, just about all families that can afford it send their children to private schools, even after their kids go to public school.  So kids may be going to two or three different schools a day.  There are children that are learning English and Chinese on top of their Korean studies, and many spend all day at school or studying all the way through Highschool.  This is a bit extreme compared to America, however I have talked to Koreans about it and they say that once they get to college school is a breeze.  Though they don't know what to do with having free time for the first time.
My take on this: it is a bit extreme, children need to have some free time to figure out what they like to do, play sports, even just relax.  Training your brain is like training your muscles, it's good to work out a lot, but you need to rest as well.  I have read that playing a sport is good for healthy brain development, which America is a lot more sport oriented that Korea, and is a good thing, but I think that too many Americans don't place enough emphasis on education for their children and their country as a whole.  What is one of the first things to get cut when funding is low? Education.  What is the number one factor to increasing future economic growth? Education.  Education should be one of our top economical concerns, and I'm not just saying that because I'm a teacher, I've always thought that!  But in conclusion I believe that in general Koreans put too much emphasis on formal education and Americans put too little emphasis on it.  If we could meet somewhere in the middle we'd be great.

Gifts
It is common to receive gifts from Koreans and Korean families, especially food.  There aren't many weeks that I don't come home from work with at least one gift from one of my students' families, or sometimes even Korean coworkers.  On thanksgiving I brought home about 4 bags of food, part of it leftovers from our festivities, but a lot of it was gifts from parents.

Service in Korea. 
In Korea you don't tip waiters, taxis, bartenders, anyone.  I have seen some foreign bars that leave tip jars out, but that is it.  In fact, not only do they not expect tips, but sometimes they give what is called 'service'.  Which is where they give you a few free beers, or some extra time at the noraebong (private karaoke rooms), free friesor something of the sort.  They usually do this when you are with a big group.  How I reasoned it is that when you bring a big group of people they make more money.  When they give you stuff, it makes your experience more enjoyable, which makes you want to come back.
That and the fact that they charge enough for their food and services (still less than America in my city, though comparable, Seoul and bigger / international cities are more expensive) to pay their employees without having tips a necessity.  Tips in America are expected, which in my mind undermines the whole idea of tipping.  You are supposed to tip when you feel service was especially good, not because it is required.  It should be the responsibility of the company that employs the workers to pay them an appropriate amount, not the customers.  If customers feel that the person serving them did an exceptional job and want to give them extra money because of it, THAT is what tipping is about.  If you need to raise your prices in order to make enough money off your product and still pay your employees an agreeable amount, so be it.  Service in Korea is usually better than what I'm used to in the states anyway, and they don't even accept tips.

Trust
Koreans are much more trusting, and.... trustworthy.  In general..  I've seen trucks filled with boxes of fruit sitting on the side of the street over night.  At least some, if not all, of the inventory would be gone in the morning in most parts of America.  I've seen mini marts with fridges of beer sitting outside them, no one looking after them.  Beer would definitely get stolen back home.  I'm not sure if it being such a small country, somewhat cut off from the world has anything to do with it. 
I only say somewhat cut off because it is surrounded by ocean, and North Korea which no visitors come from that direction.  It has a fair amount of foreigners in it, many more than I expected.  Also a much more western society feeling than I expected (except all the fried squid being sold everywhere, ha).

Language
The language is simpler than English, it is more methodical.  I read somewhere that Korean is ranked by many linguists as the most scientific or mathematical language... something to that extent.  Which I could see that.  Writing Korean only consists of straight lines and circles.  They don't seem to have as many tenses and times where you need to change a word.  You can use (phonetically spelled) 'ee eh yoh' which translates to "am" after your heritage, after your name, after your employment, after another person's heritage or name or a group of people's heritage, and many other instances without any changes.  In comparison in English we say, I am, or she is, or they are etc. 

This is all I the differences and a bit of analysis on the differences that I can think of at the moment.  I'm sure I know of more, but am not bringing any to mind.  I may come back and edit this post and add what I think of later if I come up with something good in the near future.  I expect I will do another analysis of this sort around the time I am leaving, when I know more about Korean culture, and hopefully the language also (I've been putting a decent amount of time into studying Korean recently, and am improving slowly.. the hardest part is the pronounciation).  Oh and one last little note... Koreans in general seem nicer than Americans.  At least where I live, most people are very kind.  I don't know if that is true of all Koreans (obviously not ALL Koreans or we wouldn't be having this conflict with the North having bombed one of the South's islands right now) but it does seem significant enough for me to take note of.