Springtime in Korea... a montage

A random selection of photos that i feel best represent the past month in Korea... enjoy!!!

The official wedding photo...
DJ and I are bound by both love and a COSTCO spousal membership.

Blossoms

Bicycle and Blossoms
(me and my primary mode of local transportation)

Up on the Roof
(from the Haeinsa Temple weekend)

Lindsay and I
(in my favourite Insadong tea house)

Parade

Soju and I

THE END

A Pinnical of Cultural Acceptance
What is THIS about??? Here's an article, copy and pasted, from the Korean Herald.

Canadians banned from group for cultural understanding

An organization that promotes cultural understanding and brings together people from different nations is open for anyone in Seoul to join. Anyone that is, except Canadians.

In a classified ad in KScene, a free biweekly magazine, World Class describes itself as a group that "brings together all nationalities to discuss world issues and break down cultural barriers and prejudices."

Breaking down the prejudices, however, doesn't extend to all countries. "No Canadians please," the ad continues.

When contacted by a Korea Herald reporter by e-mail, the organizer of the group, Bernard Carleton, elaborated further, "The thing is, CANADIANS ARE SCUM! They are self-loving, welfare supporting, over taxing, work ethic hating scum!!! They are not welcome in our group."

Anyone who would like to join the meetings with Carleton in order to break down prejudices, dissolve stereotypes and have an enhanced understanding of people from other countries can contact him at cbicsmd@yahoo.com.

Pictures from Haeinsa Temple Stay

Me in front on Haeinsa Temple entrance Me trying to throw coins into a turtle for luck. Considering my athletic ability I won't be getting lucky any time soon... Our sleeping Quarters DJ and I riding a Dragon Dragons Temple Love Monks on drums The Tripitaka Koreana Group shot of newly enlightened English Teachers

Hey Buddha
This weekend, several teachers and i travelled far and great distances to experience a buddist temple stay at the Haeinsa Temple near Daegu. This is one of those things that foreigners do in Korea, much like visiting the DMZ, that contributes to the greater cultural experience and understanding, dispite it not being fun (fun being defined as 'behaviour or activity that is intended purely for amusement and should not be interpreted as having serious purposes'... quite similar to this blog).

Here's a sample of our temple stay schedule:
(Saturday evening - Sunday afternoon)
Saturday
pm. 5:30 - Dinner
Dinner consisted of plain white rice, kim chi (spicy fermented cabbage as referred to in previous bloggings), and some tofu and veg in a colourless broth. As we found out a bit to too late, there is not supposed to be any talking during the meal, and when we were finished eating, we had to rinse out our bowls with cold water, and then drink it to avoid any wast. Just joking... but only about the drinking our dish water.
6:30 - Evening Ritual Ceremony
This was basically 3 hours of chanting and bowing. I stayed for about 45 minutes... and didn't partake in the chanting or bowing. The thing that was interesting about this was that, I hadn't realized how ritualistic and worship based a religion Buddhism was. Unfortunately, even though we were there to learn and expereince a bit about Buddhism, no one actually explained to us what all the fuss was about.
9:00 - Bed time and lights out
Here's a picture of my bed.
Basically, surpassing the lap of luxury. If luxury is a bare concrete floor.
We also shared this room with approximately 25 lola's (grandmother's). They were all very kind to us though and helped us settle in... and they gave us candy.

Sunday
am. 3:00 - rising
3:00 - morning ritual ceremony (another 2.5 hours of chanting and bowing)
I opted out of both of these activities... resonably guilt free.
6:10 - Breakfast
White rice and seeweed... quite nice actually.
After Breakfast we did a short hike to another temple. Incline walking before 7am is something i've decided i can live quite happily without.
9:00 - 11:00 - morning nap (this was my own addition to the schedule)
10:00 - Ritual ceremony
Unfortunately I missed this due to the aforementioned alteration to the original schedule.
11:20 - Lunch (you should know what to expect by now)

After lunch we took a gander around the temple grounds. Haeinsa is actually one of the more famouse temples in Korea. It is an official UNESCO site and home to the Tripitaka Koreana. All in all it was not a bad weekend. I was a failure on several fronts, as far as ritual ceremony attendence was concerned, but it was definately worth seeing and doing in the end. Plus, some of those Buddist Monks were surprisingly handsome.

Happy White Day!
These Koreans LOVE their comercial holidays! Today, March 14th is celebrated as ‘White Day’ Nation wide. To get to the bottom of this we need to start in 1960’s Japan, where a supposed marshmellow company decided that chocolate was dominating the valentines sweets market, in turn creating ‘White Day’. However, the mass marshmellow consumption that the day was originally created to promote doesn’t seem to have carried over as well as the day itself.

In order for these ‘love’ holidays to not appear too redundant to the masses (since they do follow each other in consecutive months), in this part of the world Valentine’s day is a time for men to be showered with tokens of love by their ladies. oh la la. Seeing as men carry the monopoly on February 14th, women are alloted ‘White Day’ for their own. Intrigued, i dug a little deeper. Here’s a quote from an internet site i found discussing the topic.

“There is another special day like Valentine's Day in Korea. We call that day 'White Day." White Day is on March 14. It is just the contrary of Valentine's Day. Many boys and young men give chocolates to their girl friends. Some confess their love to their girlfriends on that day, so many young women look forward to it.”
Excuse me, i just vomited in my mouth.

So what about us singles? As if having one day dedicated to candlelight (vomit), and roses (vomit), and cheesy stuffed animals spouting off love ballads in battery operated voices, wasn’t enough to make us want to gag. Well come one come all to Korea. You’ll all be gald to know that on April 14th, one month from today is a day dedicated to singles and singles alone! how exciting. The name of this day is... dun dun dun... BLACK DAY. On this day singles gather together, eat noodles in black sauce, and contimplate their lonely black hole existance. Thanks for the recognition!

Easy like Sunday Morning...
This weekend we finally cashed in on our grand prize for our musical fireworks as the YES Youngdo Christmas Staff Party back in January. Here are some pictures from our brunch at the Hyatt... REAL coffee, crepes, salmon, steak, lamb, CHEESE ... it may not seem too impressive to most of you, but in a country where spicy fermented cabage is the staple dish, a little champaign and orange juice on a Sunday morning can just about save your life (and by life i mean sanity)...

Typical
I died when i saw this. This video clip basically epitomizes exactly what i've been talking about... and by that i mean KOREA...

http://www.cnn.com/video/player/player.html?url=/video/offbeat/2006/02/19/vo.pajama.day.reut

annnnnnd... drumroll

i put in a new nose ring (Sorry mom and dad... i know that you'll both hate it).

That's the Way I Rike It...
My obsession with breakdancers continues. This weekend, some friends and i went to watch 'B-Boy Unit Volume 8", an international bboy competition being held in Seoul. It was HOT. The dancing was amazing. I can barely wrap my mind around it. It was SICK... seriously. The thing is, i love everything about it! I love the dancing, the music, the bboys ;)... but i think that if i were any where apart from korea, i never would have taken to it as much as i have.

Really, the most appealing thing about the hip hop/bboy culture here is that it's just that... a total sub culture in, what can sometimes seem to be, a nation of robots. It can be so frustrating some times talking to my kids... the little ones are great because they're still young enough to have free minds, but once they get into middle school it often just seems like they are being molded to live in a very black and white, yes and no society.

So, yeah, i love watching break dancing... but i love seeing people in korea that are moving against the grain... people with piercings, and tatoos (which is illegal here), and crazy hair, that don't comply with this Korean ideal that every man must be and think this way, while every female must act and make herself that way. The forum for individual expression in this country is meager at best. And, although it is not publically frowned upon, it seems to me... and all i really am, is an outsider looking in... that society doesn't allow much leeway for anyone to stray very far from its own precieved notion of sucess...
rambling... sorry, this wasn't even what i was going to talk about... hence the title of this blog not corresponding with anything i've just written. This is all generally speaking ofcourse. And, like it said, all my own opinion. And really, what do i know.

Basically, i was going to say that, apart from the dancing there were two highlights to the night:
1.) getting amazing seats simply for being foreigners!

and

2.) a guest preformance by this amazing korean beat boxer who sang... 'B-BOYS! That's the way, uh-huh uh-huh, i RIKE it!!!'
that's the way i rike it too!!!

My Little Monsters
Note my favourite child EVER... wearing the tiger head hat. She also wrote the story about the fat dog blowing up. BOOM!

This is Enda and Andy. Andy (right) is one of the cutest kids ever. He has a little mullet, but it's okay.
These girls are great. They're not in my class anymore. I miss them...
These are some of my kids from before Christmas.

Why does no one ever post comments for me??? hello???

Tales of a Fat Dog... and more
Nothing much happening on this end of the world. I realize that everyone at home is up in arms over the new conservative minority government... but, atleast our north isn't communist!
So, for the sake of blog up keep, here's what's new with me. And, don't get your hopes up, because it's not exciting.

1. I cut all my hair off... viola!

2. As a Chinese New Years gift our school's head office gave us all a giant gift wrapped box of apples. Landom, but much appreciated.

3. I've decided that it is my new life ambition to become a hip hop dancer. Last weekend i went to go see a hip hop/break dancing show down town called 'The Ballerina that Fell in Love with a B-Boy"...
from there i've taken to watching the movie 'You Got Served' (staring B2K and IMx) every other night. I'm a loser. It my be the worst movie... that i ever loved. I can't get enough. Again, i'm a loser.

4. Today, purely for my own amusment, i showed my kids this picture (taken by jeff brez while in thailand)...
and told them to write a story about it. Here's a taste of what they were able to produce:
The dog many eat. It happen is at house. First, he likes food. Next, he is very very fat and his girlfriend is leave. He is want to die and is very sad. The End. - Andy

The dog is FAT. This happens in America. His mother was very fat, his father was very fat, too. He eats so much. He was very fat. The End. - Kevin

The dog much eat. He is eating many foods. His friends don't like him because he is very very fat. He is going home. He is sleeping. He must diet. - Alex

AND

The dog's stomache is blow up. It happened in the bathroom. First, the dog eat candy, chips, chocolate, ice cream, sandwich, fruit, juice. Next, the dog is very stomache ache, then he go to the bathroom. The dog's stomache is blow up. He is die. Die. BOOM. - Sophia

Rock and Roll Baby
Last night was a night of musical... hmmm... if not success, then at least competence. The company I work for hosted a New Years/Christmas party for all of it's staff at a posh hotel downtown Seoul. Althought the food was AMAZING... the program was boarderline making me want to end my life from boredom. However, the night did peak when our school campus won the grand prize for our poignant rendition of I will follow him, from the cinematic masterpiece, 'Sister Act I'.


Afterwards, to wake ourselves up from the dead, we headed down to Hongdae, the university bar and clubbing area, for some good times. It was only appropriate that we eventually ended up at a Norae Bong (or Karaoke Room, for you non-koreans) to finish off the night properly.

I heart Hong Kong
Well...Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Although i'm already back to the tedious grind of teaching Korean children the magic of the english language ("no, it's actually called a L-obster... not a 'Robster'"), I had an amazing holiday in Hong Kong!

1.) Korea was -10 degrees... Hong Kong 20 degrees... Hong Kong wins.
2.) Everybody (EVERYBODY) speaks english in Hong Kong!! EVERYBODY. hmm... remember what it was like when things were easy? I'd almost forgotten.
3.) Hong Kong is probably the coolest city in asia... possibly the world.
It's pretty cool... It's basically a city right out of the future. Everything is super hightech and spotlessly clean... but there's still a little bit of dirty china town in there... yeah, it's pretty cool.

We (my co-worker/ friend Denise and I) arrived on the 24th and basically didn't stop till we left on the 30th. It was a crazy time. Lot's of eating, shopping, and partying. All the things we love best!!!

Here's us with some Christmas carollers in Causway Bay (where we were staying)

Happy New Years... er... I mean... christmas??? In Hong Kong, Christmas Eve is celebrated the same way as New Years... you name it. Party masks, noise makers, champaign, count down etc.

This is 'Isola', our favourite place in Hong Kong. A great Martini Bar on top of the International Finace Centre (IFC)... expensive drinks... but killer atmosphere and view

The Kow Loon Sky line from the 'Isola' patio

Here's us...

View of the IFC

This is the INSANE line up to get to 'Lon Kwai Fong' (the most popular clubbing/ bar scene on Hong Kong Island) on Christmas Eve

This is us foregoing the crowd and making our own party at 'Lush' a hole in the wall bar off of Hollywood Ave

And, here are some whole ducks, heads included, hanging in a storefront in Causway Bay... hungry?

Denise and I with some Weirdo Clowns in this crazy 11 story mall

Me at Isola

Oh, hi drunken Santa (Lan Kwai Fong)

Random Canadian Horse... Why wouldn't there be one?

Drinking Champaign at 'Sugar'... where the floors are actually covered in Sugar

So... you like meat?

.. then you'll LOVE these cooked ducks with heads...

This is in a Russian Bar where they give you these fur coats and hats so that you can go into a ice room and drink vodka... random... or 'Landom' as my students would say

Cheers to Hong Kong! our last night...