Dave-Teacher goes on a Field Trip- Soraksan/Sokcho

I recently went on a field trip with my school. It was over a month ago but I never got around to blogging about it. I had some pretty great pictures and even some great places for "treasures in Korea". But I needed a vacation from my vacation when I got back and put off making this post. As the school year moved on I became busier with my social life and I even bought a motorcycle which I also need to post up a quick entry about. Since then a lot has happened but nothing worth noting in this blog yet. Summer vacation is closing so I will need to make all of these posts about what HAS happened since my last entry, before I can move on to the very exciting next couple-of-months!

Below is a picture of a gate to a courtyard with a very tall standing Buddha. If I was better at being a tourist I would have grabbed a leaflet to remember what this was. But instead I took this picture and a few more of the kid standing in lines around the Buddha for a head count.

As our group traveled back down the hill the temple grounds were all lined with lanterns for Buddha's birthday. This was the best photo I took of all of them. The entire area was a well kept and quaint temple. If I were not in a school group I would have spent much more time in this spot. The temple was gorgeous as well.

My lovely students asked if they could take my picture. This was the best one..... really. I had no idea he was there and the camera man gave no indication of foul play.

These ended up being mint-oreos. "Have a nice rock." No teeth were harmed in the demolition of these amazing little morsels. I very much look forward to stumbling upon these again.

This what would have been a nice day's hike. I would have loved to spend all day here but our group was on a mission. If I stopped to look around and take pictures I was met with a quick "Hurdy...we-uh need to be finishy before duh lunch tie-eem."

This was a North Korean Submarine. I went in it.... and again was rushed not to take pictures. 

A giant ship....with guns.

The same ship.... with a giant antenna. I did not go in this one.

I may come back to this entry to update with new information when I find out where these "Korean treasures" are.

Until then stay tuned for my adventures on my "otto-bi-ee-kuh". As well as my favorite places in Chungju.

The Jecheon/Chungju/Seoul Marathon

So today is Wednesday, May 1st. It is my first scheduled day off so last night I celebrated by drinking iced coffee and painting toy models until 3AM, then sleeping in until 9AM. Yes, that's right, I said 9AM. That's sleeping in now. But I did mosey around the house and thought about going out to do "something." Then I realized I haven't posted about the past weekend on my blog like I had promised. The photos were disappointing but they did happen. I know our friends took some and as they appear on Facebook and through email I will share them.

Friday Night. 

Megan and I went out to Mega-box to see Iron Man 3 in 3D. We ate at one of our favorite Korean Chicken chains, then got some Hoddeok. Imagine a pancake with the filling from a cinnamon sugar pop-tart, then deep-fry it. Hoddeok is really good.



A good explanation of the lovely little morsels. Photo and link credit to the site linked below.
http://zenkimchi.com/FoodJournal/featured/street-food-famous-insadong-hoddeok/

My most important lesson Friday evening, movies are BYOB. I believe my response was "I can bring a 40 into the movies?"  when the group of young men were sitting in front of me with straws.

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When we got home we told our matriarch, Debbie, that she should go see the new Iron Man. As she is surfing movie times she informs us that Iron Man 3 is not in theaters in the USA yet.

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So we hop in the taxi and go home to bed. The next morning we have a wedding outside of Jecheon to go to.

Saturday

It's everything I wish weddings were in the USA. Short, requiring only business casual attire, and the food is more delicious than it is pretty requiring no vest-wearing-servers to bring it to you. The wedding started at 1PM.  I was back home in Chungju and then on a bus to Wonju by 5PM. Lovely, memorable, and painless.

Megan's cousin and her new husband.

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Our reason for heading to Wonju was "Megan's cousin" (you will see a trend in future posts, I will make an acronym for this phrase when I see it fit) Ton Gue was invited to come to Seoul with us on Sunday. He is a bit younger than us, but his English is pretty good making him a welcome addition to our travels while navigating Seoul. By the end of the day on Sunday he will have saved our dumb-waygook-bums multiple times in the maelstrom of Seoul's public transport system. Our contribution to him: a burrito, some french fries, and some impromptu English lessons while riding the bus. I felt quite inadequate in our gratitude for his help. Nevertheless, we stayed with Megan's uncle and associated family in Wonju before leaving for Seoul in the morning. We ate takgalbi and drank beer for dinner. It was delicious.

Ton Gue, Ryeong Hae, Me, Megan

Sunday

We rise from our food-baby-induced-slumbers and slowly make our way to the bus station. From 11AM until approximately 1PM we ping-pong from bus to subway to train to taxi before finally arriving at the iParkMall. It is jawdroppingly intense. Coming from Scranton, PA, USA anything with more than two flights of stairs is a large building. The iPark Mall is an 8FL city block of toys, electronics, designer boutiques, restaurants  and even a an open air courtyard centered on the 4FL. There are marble and slate steps that go on like a hiking trail. (Insert Rocky theme music.) After running up and down stairs like an old Italian boxer, we settle on the fact we need food. After a 15 minute stroll around the 3FL food court we decide on burritos. Yes, they have burritos in Korea, along with milkshakes, Coke, and french fries and they are all delicious. But the stairs have become the most noticeable daily difference for Megan and I to handle. Stairs in Korea do not follow rules. They are slippery, covered in jagged metal boot catchers, and have no problem  having unequal sizes mid-stairwell. That disgusting feeling when you over shoot the top of the stairs....every goddam day in Korea. I swear that the escalators may even be out to kill us. And the stairs never stop in the iPark Mall.

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THE TAMIYA STORE

But my main mission in going to Seoul was going to the Tamiya PLAMODEL store. In the USA I enjoyed playing with "real" cars. In Korea, the necessity to own a car is non-existent. I can go wherever I want and never touch a set of keys or a gas pump. But.... I do miss my tools, and I do miss "my car".

Me and my car :(

Yey! New Toys! 

 So currently I am playing with 1/24th scale plastic models. The Tamiya Company make some amazing products and the chance to see an original manufacturer dealing in Seoul was enough to justify the day trip.  I bought 3 models and some paint and as I was leaving the man at the counter hands me a NERF gun and says in very mono-tonous English... "Follow me please." He points me at a spinning wheel and gestures for me to shoot at it. I'm an American and you have just given me a handgun in a shopping mall? I'm 26 years old buying toy cars, and to show me your appreciation for my business you give me a handgun that shoots Styrofoam projectiles so I can get something more for free! Hell yeah! Sign me up. I nailed the shot and got a free RC car. (Nailing the shot is creative license. I actually unloaded on the wheel until the man's straight face turned to a slight bit of worry as I'm smiling looking at the gun making sure it's empty.) As we go to the lower floor Megan finds a stationary super store. FACEPALM. So her cousin and I mosey around the mall like we're interested in the giant rack of markers while Megan buys "ALL THE THINGS!!!"

IDK WTF THIS IS, BUT THEY SELL THEM NEAR MARKERS

After leaving the iPark Mall Megan decides that she thinks we should try to see "THE Bronze Mirror" in Korea while we are here.(I will allow Megan to insert an edit later on to state her case.) I acquiesce and we all jump back on the train to another part of Seoul. We arrive at a Christian university to find it unsurprisingly closed on a Sunday. While we are there we bop around the campus taking pictures with the sculpture and taking Lindor truffles from the evangelists. That's right they give out chocolate with their pamphlets here. "Hey talk about Jesus as long as you want...just give me another hazelnut truffle!"

Me and a horse sculpture at the university.

What you don't see is the park benches she climbed to get here and evangelist's
yelling at Megan for climbing a wall to sit on the art. Such a vandal!

Megan's disappointment wearing off after missing out on "THE Bronze Mirror."

Finally we head to the bus station to go home. (Cue the disaster music) There are no tickets out of Seoul to Chungju until 11PM. This means we wait to get home until 1AM. Megan's cousin, through whatever Korean magic, gets us on a bus at 8PM and we are safe and sound at home by 10PM.

Weekend Marathon Tally
Wedding, bus-rides to two new cities, seeing the biggest shopping mall of my life, and I got to get some toys. Mission success.

Preface to Seoul Trip 2

So I have just typed all of this on my phone. Bare with me as its late but I feel compelled to post this before I sleep.

Today we went to Megan's cousin's wedding.  It was both of our first opportunity to see a Korean wedding in person. It was beautiful yet surprisingly quick. The ceremony was gorgeous. The bride and groom were fully decked in gown and tux. But the reception was a quick lunch and we were back home to Chungju.

We decided to make a day trip to Seoul tommorow so I can see the Tamiya model store and maybe Megan can buy some clothes. 

Right now we are in Wonju.  Tommorow we ride a bus to Seoul and then the train back to Chungju. Late night lesson planning for the upcoming week of classes and the back to work. If all goes well I will barrage you with photos of it all tomorrow.

Until then I will leave yo with this little gem. A small korean man on an even smaller Korean chopper. I didnt know if it was cute or imposing. If this motorcycle was people sized I would have been more impressed. Nevertheless it was the coolest thing on wheels I seen since arriving.

The Honeymoon's Over...

Like most GET's (Guest English Teacher's in Korea) I feel the need to start a blog. As handy as Facebook is for keeping up with family and letting them in on all the wonders of Korea, I can't help feel like like I am short-changing so many present and future GET's of all the useful information I have learned. So this blog will hopefully serve to do both things.

My wife and I were working through the recruitment/application process to get a teaching position in Korea for some time. For whatever reason my wife's first attempt proved fruitless, along with her second attempt (our first as a joint couple.) After the fairly difficult process of apostiling documents, tax preparation, and finally application interviews, Megan and I were accepted into the EPIK program's March placement group. It only took three attempts and many months of paperwork but we did it!

We packed up and here we are in beautiful Chungju, Chungbuk, South Korea. Megan-Teacher is the GET at Daerim Elementary, and I, the GET at Chungil Middle School. We both enjoy our jobs immensely now that we have settled into life in South Korea.

The schools have set us up in a very nice (and on Korean standards very large) apartment.  We recently got smartphone plans (a first for both of us), as well as high-speed internet. The internet here is something worth mentioning coming from the US. South Korea has the fastest internet service on the planet. (No really...look it up.) Its pretty great streaming movies in HD while downloading giant files at the same time.

Our life here is pretty great! We can walk less than 10 minutes and get any Korea food we like! You can't say that in Scranton, PA. We have already traveled to a few destinations on the weekend for sightseeing and we look forward to sharing those photos and videos with you as well!

Next post should be chock-full-o photos and video. Until next time...