Korean Driving

Back at home in the States, people often complain about how people drive... it is almost a bodily function at this point -- if you ask someone how their day went you here, "well I went to work, and did this and that, and oh by the way I got stuck behind the worst driver ever". The other common thing is to blame an entire state for how they drive. Such things as, "New Yorkers can't drive" "people from Los Angeles are always in traffic" and then you get the "Massholes". I have not seen anything quite as unique as when I got to Korea.

In Korea, people will park ANYWHERE!!! If you're walking down the street, its not uncommon to see people just pull up on the sidewalk and park their car there. I saw a guy back all the way down a major street, in the "bike lane" and then pull onto a curb just to park there. People will park in the middle of an intersection or at the very least just stop randomly in the middle and choose not to move. Last night, on our way back from Pizza School, we saw this guy who was parked more than halfway in front of a side street, and he seemed to have no intention of moving. I have also seen people just back out into the major streets of traffic without looking.

The one other thing that is different, and the only place I have seen it done is in Atlantic City, is the streets are set up to only go in one direction. There are certain, designated places to make left turns on, and there are areas where you can make u-turns in order to go in the opposite direction.

My last little piece to my driving talk was actually a funny story. Amber and I were going to immigration for fingerprints, and we got into the cab to head to the office. When we got into the car, I noticed that the cab's gas light was on, and assumed that we would run out of gas before making it to immigration. Turns out we didn't run out of gas because the car was actually outfitted with natural gas or some other type of fuel and so the gaslight meant nothing... I didn't find that part out until days later, and spent the whole cab ride thinking... "if we run out of gas, do we have to pay for this ride"?

Korean Pop

I was recently introduced to Korean Pop the other day by Amber... and I have never seen anything like that in my life. I recognize that American music, bands, groups, and singers, all use sex to sell things... I also recognize that our everyday culture uses sex all the time to sell things (just look at Victoria Secret). But I have never quite seen anything until I came to Korea. In Korea, you will see scantily clad 20-somethings, dancing and singing to sell just about any product. I was watching tv one day and you had all these girls singing and dancing (all in Korean by the way) and I would have assumed it was for a club or a movie or something... no it was for a computer. You walk around the city and you see posters of a girl wearing low-rise jeans and a top (no bigger than a bra) and she is trying to see you a bottle of alcohol. The best, which I have not seen with my own eyes yet, is that the electronic stores hear use girls in mini-skirts, boots (like uggs), and leg warms to prance around outside during the winter to sell electronics and get people inside.

You might be wondering what this has to do with Korean Pop, or Kpop for short. I mention the above story, because these music videos are like watching Korean porn... if its a girl group, its a bunch (I am talking more than 7 in most cases) of girls (all dressed seductively) dancing around to music. In some cases, its like having 8 Britney Spears bouncing around the room. This is not exactly different than at home, but one thing that is different is that there really are no lead singers -- all the girls or guys take turns singing, and the video does not show one girl more than that others. The only way to describe it, beyond seeing it, is to picture the Spice Girls or Backstreet Boys, double their group sizes, and have them all sing.

(This is a picture of 2ne1, which is relatively small for a Kpop band)



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISEoXdHb4W4&feature=fvst - Video of 2ne1

The Korean Sunset

The one interesting thing about Korea, so far, is that you do not often see the sun. When I say that you don't "see" it, I mean that you know the sun is up and shining, but that it is blocked by the heavy cloud cover or by the giant fog clouds that hang over the city and the hills that surround the school. I only mention this because I thought it was amazing to actually see the sun one day, and to see the sun set.

I mentioned that it was amazing to see the sun, and there's actually a story behind that. We were hear almost a week and it was either raining or cloudy or the sky was full of fog, so much so that you could only sense that the sun was there. We had recently eaten dinner at the Muffin Tree, the little coffee shop behind the school, and it had just poured a few minutes earlier. It was at that point when we were headed back to the dorms and I looked up and was like "holy crap, its the sun... its been a whole week since I have seen it". I have never quite had that feeling before, but it seemed so foreign to actually see the little yellow object floating in the sky.

That is why I started snapping photos of the sunset the other night. Amber and I were sitting in bed and I happened to look at our window shades and all you could see was the bright orange glow coming from behind them. I decided to open the windows and lean out of the balcony to snap some pictures of the sun and the surrounding areas. I must have stood out there for 15 minutes looking at how truly beautiful the sky was. I decided I would share those pictures with all of you... they claim that a picture is worth a thousand words, but I don't think any picture can adequately explain or show the true emotions of actually seeing it yourself... but enjoy.

Our Sunday Walk

It was the final Sunday before the start of school, and Amber and I decided to take a walk around the area. We went with a fellow teacher, Liane, and walked the area close to the school. The plan was to go up to this monastery that is close by, but it turns out the the path we took didn't lead to the building... even though we could see it from where we were standing. In the process of looking for it, I did take some pictures that stood out to me. A couple pictures were of these cave like areas that looked like old ruins... too dark to traverse inside, we decided to just take pictures of them, and then move on. I also took some pictures of the little park area right near the school. The park has a couple of benches, some stone objects (as seen in the picture), and a little trickling brook that runs down the middle of it. When we were struggling to find the monastery, we stumbled upon a tiny farm that had rows and rows of red chilies, some of which were 5 or 6 inches long. I took a picture of them mostly because I was amazed by the size and the sheer amount of them being grown. I now know why most food here is so spicy, because they throw a ton of peppers into them.

The other photo I took was of the new apartment complex being built right near the school. The project started in May and they are nearly complete with the buildings... or so it seems. One thing to understand, is that Korean buildings go up really fast because they work 7 days a week and they work in teams... so you will see people working at all hours of the night. The picture is a testament to how fast they can constructed buildings here. The complex... coming from the architectural designs, looks like it is going to be a massive area of buildings, green trees, and water areas. I hope that construction is completed before I leave so that I can take pictures of the final situation.

First Days of School

So far, school has gone very well. I am getting re-acclimated to teaching and am getting use to teaching English (for the first time). I have really enjoyed my classes so far, and I am starting to enjoy teaching 6th and 7th grade students... something I have never done before-- the closest I have gotten is coaching kids in those grades. I do have to say that it has been a series of long days so far. Amber and I get up at 6am and usually do not get back to our room to 5:30 or 6pm because of working on school stuff and then eating dinner. I am definitely looking forward to the weekend. The one tough night is on Wednesday, because we have to do study hall duty and be up until 11pm. Normally that wouldn't be late, except, the other night I was asleep by 8pm... so 11pm is a stretch right now.

Teaching has really been no different than my experiences at Portland High. On Monday I begin teaching my after school class on American Popular Culture, so I am looking forward to that. I am very fortunate to be enjoying the teaching aspect, to really like my students, and to have found so many fellow teachers that I have become close to. I know that this should be an excellent year, and I look forward to all the long days in the classroom.

The Korean Market

My new adventure came on Saturday when Amber, Ryann, and myself went to one of the Korean outdoor markets. In order to get there from the school, we had to take a bus ride to the subway, and then take the subway to the market. The three of us walked from the school around the corner (pretty much) to the bus stop... the only problem was that the local Korean school behind our school just got out from weekend classes. The bus stop was packed with kids, and as a general rule, you just push your way onto the buses here in Korea. Our bus made a crowded NYC bus look empty. So many people were standing up and were on the bus, that the driver would stop at places to let people off, and scream "no room" to people waiting to board the bus.

Following our "sardine" bus trip, we departed to the subway. In Korea, the bus passes also work the subway, so we just scanned our cards and then got on the subway... the station is super clean and makes the NYC system look terrible. We rode the first train, I believe, about 7 or 8 stops, and then had to get off and transfer to another train... the system here is in the shape of a giant X, with the transfer stop in the middle.

We finally got off the subway, approached daylight again, and walked the streets to the market. It is very common here to see older ladies or men selling fruit, veggies, or other items right on the sidewalks. They had everything from nuts, to fruit, to veggies, to very fresh fish. At one point we passed a butcher shop that I could see the guys cutting the meat and you could see into their freezer and see the hanging hunks of cow, also known as a frozen meatsicle.

When we got to the market, we walked around, and went through the center "covered, inside market" to get to the center of the market, which is open air (it is hard to explain how its set up). We walked around the market in search of dried fruits and nuts for Amber's trail mix. On our way, we had a Korean "pancake" that was made of dough, cinnamon, and nuts. The thing was piping hot, and so tasty that i could have eaten 10 of them. The market was full of little shops, stands, and food that it was overwhelming at points. One of the more upsetting parts was when we saw the dogs and cats in cages... presumably for meat because some people eat it here and because they were housed next to the chickens. These were (see the picture) not ugly, ragged dogs but little puppies that looked like they should be in a pet shop. That really upset me, being a dog lover, and so we quickly went in a different direction.

We got to the dried fruit stand, and Amber bought some pineapple and nuts; Ryann also bought some fruit and nuts... I only say that because I did not buy anything, but asked instead if I could take a picture of this little stand area. The woman agreed, and then gave me a free, "gift" bag of peanuts -- this was no cheap, airline bag of nuts, but it was a good size. We could not decide if it was because she liked I took a picture or if she liked me and my appearance. In Korea, white men who are relatively thin are considered "very handsome" (I am not kidding) and its not uncommon for me to see people stare and smile at me or have people call me handsome. But either way, I got a free bag of peanuts out of it and enjoyed my time in the market, aside from the dogs.

I did chuckle when I noticed that they were selling a large dufflebag that had the NYPD logo and name on it.

Donghwasa Temple and Daegu Stadium

This post is a little late, but last Friday we went on a "new-teacher-field-trip" to the Donghwasa Temple and to the Daegu Stadium, which will be hosting the IAAF track championship. We hoped into the van with four other teachers, our headmaster, and Jack one of the office staff, who did all the driving. Our first stop was to the Temple which is located within a national park. We arrived at the Temple, parked the car, and then climbed the flights of granite stairs up to a flat area where the temple was located. The Temple was a large building (see attached photos) that had a symbol on it that resembled a swastika, but not tilted on its side. Our were allowed to go inside of the Temple, but not allowed to take any pictures... which made me sad because it was so beautiful inside. I called it the Korean version of the Sistine Chapel because the ceiling was all painted. They also had little statues, that looked like buddhas, with peoples names on it and a prayer... apparently you pay for that (just like how you could pay to have a roof tile placed with your name on it on top of the Temple). They also had a giant stone statue of a praying man along with some statues of a lion and a flower. We left there and went to a lower section which had more little prayer buildings along with a stone fountain that I took a drink from (with the help of Jack's instructions on how to do it).

Following the Temple, we drove down to the Daegu Stadium, which was used as the World Cup Soccer Stadium for the 2002 World Cup. It is now being used to host the IAAF Track Championships, so members of the world's Olympic teams will be coming to Daegu to compete. The stadium, I found, was very cool and amazing to look at and take pictures of. The building had all country flags around it and the inside reminded me a little bit of a baseball stadium. I made the comment that I could not imagine entering the stadium to the cheer of a crowd that big.

When we were finished walking around and inside the stadium we went to lunch at Outback. but since there was a 20 minute wait, we ventured into the Underground Mall, which I at first thought was a subway tunnel (because you only saw an escalator going down). The mail had plenty of shops and was really cool to walk around in... it was there where I took a picture of a poster with the backsides of two naked models... "only in Korea" could you see something like that. Outback in Korea has all the same foods, but they are just much more expensive... so a steak there was $33, compared to the $19.99 or less you would pay back in the States. The trip allowed us to explore the city, get to know some of our equally new faculty members, and have some good quality fun time.

Korean Physical part 2... the results

Like promised, we returned to Fatima Hospital on Friday to get our results. We wandered into the International Wing, and were told to wait until the doctor could see us. Amber went in and was done in two seconds... I was in there for closer to 5 minutes. When it was my turn, I sat down and the doctor asked how I was doing... he then pulled up my EKG document and proceeded to ask if I had any chest pain, any chest issues, or if I wore a pace-maker (interesting enough, I noticed that on the EKG results it said "possible pace-maker or reflection") I responded with, "no pain, and no I don't have a pace-maker. Why? Do I have some heart problems?". He looked again at the scan, then at me, then at my chest x-ray, and proceeded to tell me he thought it was a machine mistake and I was fine. We then had our documents prepared, stamped, and sent in for our alien card.

The most interesting part of the whole trip was how you pretty much heard everyone say, "looks fine, all set" at the end of every little doctor meetings. I assume I am healthy... at the very least, I am Korean healthy according to their doctors.

Korean Physical

As part of our employment here at DIS and to live in Korea, we needed to have a physical done in order to get our alien cards (or nice little ids that allow us to go to the doctors here). So we took a taxi to Fatima hospital, here in Daegu Korea, and headed for the International Wing (which is more like an office than a wing, but I digress). We waited in the office for roughly 30 minutes after having our height, weight, and blood pressure taken -- then, one by one, we went to see the international doctor, who was a very nice Korean doctor who spoke English. This meeting consisted of him asking if I had any pain, any physical issues, and then laying down so that he could listen to my heart, lungs, and check my internal organs.

Once we had all been "felt up", we went with our Korean-Student-Translators, who were students in the area that spoke both Korean and English, which was very very helpful. We attempted to go to the dentist office, but were told there would be a 20 minute wait, so we instead went to get blood draw and give a urine sample. Anyone who knows me knows I hate needles, so I had to look away and think happy thoughts while they took my blood. I then had the nice Korean nurse tell me (through a translator) that I had to pee in the "Hello Kitty" cup, up to the "Kitty's eyes". That is where I met the Korean squat pot, or modern hole in the ground that I had to pee over. Once I met the "kitty requirement", we were off to the EKG test, which was pretty normal, and then to the eye and ear doctors.

The ear doctor looked in both ears, asked if I had any pain, discharge, or ringing, and then told me I was all set. The eye doctor was a little more rigorous, which consisted of reading off numbers from the eye chart, getting air blown into my eyes from the machine, and then reading numbers out of a book to check for color-blindness.

We then returned to the dentist, which took me 30 seconds and consisted of listening too "you have a little plaque, brush harder, all set". Our final trip was to the chest x-ray area, where I stood against a machine with my shirt lifted,and waited the 2 seconds it took to take a picture. We then were told to come back in three days to get our results.

Koreans and Major League Baseball

This is going to be a short post, but there is an funny thing that many Koreans will do in regards to American baseball. In the U.S. many people are obsessed with sports and religiously follow their sports teams. You have your Yankees fans and your Sox fans and every other MLB team has its followers. In Korea, they are also obsessed with baseball... in the few bars that I have gone to, the TVs all had Korean baseball on them. The Koreans also have a number of Major League Baseball stores where you can buy shirts, shoes, and hats with the team logos on them (for a nice $33 I can get a new Yankees hat). I do have to say that they have different, and more unique hats than we do have in Maine, so it was cool to see some of the different hats that I had never seen before.

My point of this whole thing, is that many Koreans will wear baseball hats and shirts not because they like the teams or the sport, but because they like the look of the items. I saw a girl yesterday wearing a Montreal Expos hat and thought to myself, I wonder if she knows they aren't a team anymore. I also saw the ultimate contradiction, which if I knew how to say "can I take your picture" I would do so, but I have seen two guys now (in separate locations) to be wearing a Red Sox hat, and a Yankees shirt... every time I see that I start to laugh and wonder if they know how that would not be tolerated in the United States.

The last thing in regards to the MLB is that the Koreans like to "support" teams that have Korean players on them. So when Chan Ho Park played for the Dodgers, everyone had Dodger clothing, and now you see a lot of Cleveland Indian stuff because Shin-Soo Choo plays for them and he's Korean.

Its just one of those different, cultural things than we see in America and its also funny to witness it and point it out.

My trip to Costco

Yesterday Amber and I went to Costco, which if you were wondering, yes we do have those in the U.S. and its pretty much just a giant wholesale club like BJ's or Sam's Club. Like many stores in Korea, they are on multiple levels connected by flat-ramp escalators that bring you and your cart to the next level... the neat thing is that your cart has magnets on it, which connect to the ramp so that it doesn't move and then when you reach the end, the lip of the escalator separates the magnets from the ramp. That was a really neat thing when I first saw it.

The items that Costco sells are pretty much the same as in the States except for one interesting thing that I saw. They had small, kid-like cookbooks that were geared for certain types of "name-brand" ingredients. So one of the books was all kinds of recipes for Land-o-Lakes butter; another was for Dole Pineapple; and a third one was Quaker Oatmeal. This was pretty neat, but was not as interesting as the food court area.

So to order food in the food court, you went to one window and ordered and paid for your food; the lady then gave you a receipt that you took to the next window where you got your food... in our case we ordered a pizza, brought the receipt over, and in less than 60 seconds got our pizza. This was the relatively normal part of the food court... the more interesting thing was that the area uses "real" silverware instead of plastic, and that they had large bins filled with onions. The bins had hand cranks and you would watch almost every Korean customer fill a plate full of onions and then cover it with ketchup, mustard, or both, and then sit there and eat it... so people would eat a full plate of only onions, mustard, and ketchup... I have never seen anything like that and it wasn't just a few people, it was most of them.

It was just something that was so odd, yet fascinating to watch. I wish that I had taken my camera.

Camping in Acadia

New York City part 2

Part of Daegu and Korean Barbecue.

Last night we decided to walk around the section of Daegu near the school as we headed to eat dinner at a Korean barbecue place. The city area is very clean with plenty of neat little shops and restaurants (granted most of them are in Korean). One interesting thing about restaurants in Daegu is that they will have the store name and then a picture of an animal, which is meant to show what type of meat that is being served... in other words a sign with a pig means that pork is being served here.



(Food Sign)


I decided to take my camera with me and just take pictures of things here that I would find interesting, such as:



(Korean Gas Station)


(Korean Street Sign)


(very fresh garlic)




(Korean fire station and Korean post office)








(Korean Barbecue)



(A good old fashioned Coke bottle in both English and Korean)

The School In Pictures

Here are some of the pictures from the school and around the area.



Amber's Classroom




The Student lockers with electronic key-pads




The mountains around the school and "Korean Hollywood".

Its a very nice compound and scenic area around the school.

Interesting Differences Between the U.S. and Korea

Traveling to another state to work is one thing, but traveling to another country puts things into perspective and really shows how different cultures are.

The most startling difference, coming from Maine, is the temperature. It is regularly in the 100s or near that with heavy humidity. It also, lately, has rained at least once a day for roughly 20 minutes.

One of the first things that you notice here is that Koreans do not heat or cool their hallways... so with the temperatures approaching and passing 100 degrees, you sweat doing anything... especially walking down the halls. Every room and classroom is air conditioned, but other than that you are "exposed to the elements". Another unique thing about Korean is that their doors open in both directions, so instead of the door saying pull, you could decide to pull it open or push it open... it all depends on what you want to do.

It is also interesting to walk around Daegu because there is not too much diversity here... with most of the people being Korean. So being a white American, people tend to stop and look at you or watch you as you walk around the city... in some cases, people look shocked to see a white person walking around. Having said that, there is no problem with that and people are all very kind and often say hello, nod, or smile at you as you walk around.

Korean also has really cheap cigarettes, to the tune of 2500 won, or roughly $2.50usd... and lots of people smoke here. Gasoline is sold in liters and not gallons (making it very expensive compared to the U.S.) and they have very interesting water fountains... you do not drink the tap water here, so the fountains have a regular mouth piece, but also include a hot and cold "tap" (like a sink) which you can fill things like water bottles up with.



Other things that are different is that construction here goes really quickly, mostly because they work 7 days a week, and its not uncommon to see people working on buildings at 4am or at 10pm.

Also, unlike most of the U.S., Korea relies a lot on mass transit. So its easy to take buses or cabs anywhere. We took a 30min cab ride downtown and it cost only $10.

I could go on and on about the differences, but I think everyone gets the point. The one obvious thing is that we are no longer in the States, so its important for us to respect the Korean culture and way of life -- if you do that, then people will respect you for it here.

Traveling to Korea

So the adventure for Amber and I began on July 31st, 2011. Our family dropped us off at the Portland Airport and after some interesting events with airport security (they stopped one of our bags for "excessive liquids", because of nail polish, and then let it go)we waited for the plane. I had never flown, as an adult (only as a 2 year old kid) I was quite nervous about it all... in the end, I luckily did not throw up, but I sure felt like I would... The flight to Washington Dulles was not the greatest, but after that things went smooth.

We arrived at Dulles, and began to search for Korean Air (quite possibly the best airline in the world) only to get to the counter and be informed that we could not sit together because we did not arrive the necessary three hours early... mind you our plane from Maine only landed 20 minutes before this. In the end, the lady at Korean Air was very nice, and after some minor seat adjustments allowed us to sit together.



(Here is Amber sitting in Dulles)

and then there was the Fox News Store... which I could not help but take a picture of.



We had a rather short stop in Washington D.C. and then we boarded the plane for Seoul, South Korea. The flight attendants on Korean Air were excellent, we had a decent amount of space (nothing like first-class and their chairs that turn into beds) but it was nice. Every seat had its own TV which you could use to watch movies, shoes, play games, check flight information (like where the hell the plane was) and even listen to cds or the radio -- this helped make the 13.5 hour ride semi-enjoyable. I managed to watch "Unknown", "The Lincoln Lawyer", "Sucker Punch", and "Red Riding Hood" and still have 5 plus hours to go.

The food was very good, I even tried to traditional Korean lunch on the plane. They served us snacks, lunch, dinner, and some other foods. You could also buy things from the duty-free store, such as $2200 dollar bottles of boozes, jewelry, and perfumes.

We finally landed in Seoul and had to make it through customs and immigration in order to find our bags. We rather easily found the luggage, and made it to the new Korean Air Counter were we had to re-check our bags. That was easy except for security stopping both of Amber's bags because she had too many hair-sprays and we had to more them to other cases and then into her carry-on bag.

We had yet another lay-over, and then boarded the plane to Daegu. The flight only lasted roughly an hour and we got to our rooms at 9:30pm, the following day (in comparison to when we left.