Ahh the ascetic lifestyle

My slight illness couldn't keep me from hiking. I went out for a super long hike yesterday, soI got some Kyochon and muffins and headed up the hill. I got pretty tired by the time I got to the top of our local hill, so I read some of "The Interpreter" which
is getting to the intense part now. I moved on and took a nap in some long grass some place further on. It was really nice in the warm sun just lying there with no Koreans rambling by or at me. Continued on, and unfortunately had too much Kyochon, so I had to use the woods for some business. The first time that's been necessary in Korea. Kept going, pretty far down the hill's spine and I saw a lot of those sort of pheasant/quayle birds they have. I eventually turned back, and wound going home through that dog eating village. It hasn't changed at all (not since the stupendous day they introduced neon signs I imagine). The chicken farm still plays techno for them for whatever reason. By the time I got home I was tired and lay down for another rest.

돌고래

The kids have, pretty much since the first day, called me dolphin, because they can't manage Th, r, or f. so hence DoLPHin. Anway, my Monday evening class has now decided to give me a real Korean name, not like gimchi-hi, or anything like that, but a name than fits with my real name, which is the Korean for dolphin, or dolgorae, 돌고래. I kind of like it!

That class is awesome, at least when Ricky isn't there. He would be awesome as a tutoring student, but he's so disruptive in a classroom setting. That class cracks me up because the girls are so collosally smarter than the boys. They aren't idiots, but they just postively, absolutely do not give a flying crap about learning English. Anyway, Maisy and Sally are excellent students, so much potential it brings a tear to my eye.

Driving

Everyone says Korean drivers are crazy, but I don't find the hype is vastly overblown. Not that they aren't aggressive in their own way, but, as usual, the rumours are greatly exaggerated. They are about as aggressive as drivers in many large cities. The main difference is that they follow several different standards.

*First, honking is far more pre-emptive than reacitve. This has its merits, as it keeps people from having to slow down in order not to kill each other.
*Second, they do actually drive on the sidewalks. Not at full speed, but they do drive up there sometimes as a short cut, or to get to better parking.
*Third, parking is much more ad-hoc. People specifically leave their numbers on their dash, so drivers they are blocking can call their mobile phones to get them to move. That's why double parking actually works. As does parking on the sidewalk.
*Fourthly, U-turns which are a great innovation. Any road has a designated U-turn area, to avoid the long drive around to switch direction. Excellent traffic planning. This needs to come to Canada.

My old blog was too crusty

My old blog didn't allow for paragraph creation so I decided it was time to upgrade.

Today I'm mostly annoyed by my boss. Not that he's done anything really bad to me, but he's really just a pain in a paternalistic, authoritarian, insensitive, myopic, middle aged Korean businessman kind of way.

* He told one of our teachers that she should look for a good husband because she wasn't the working type!
* He also told her she shouldn't have got divorced, and that she was a silly woman. Despite the fact that he is divorced and has two kids himself!! Just lucky he has his mother to look after them. What a prick.
* He demanded that all the Korean teachers cook food for the BBQ last Saturday, telling them on Friday evening. Then, when they decided there was no time between getting off at 9:00 in the evening, and Saturday morning, so they would pitch in some of THEIR OWN MONEY and buy some stuff at Dong-A, he got really pissed and let them have it. Despite the fact that he lives with his mother and gets her to do that stuff for him.
* He is utterly and completely disorganized and never tells anybody about anything until the last minute, and then gets pO'd about it not working out. Or he is simply negligent, shows up late for pay day, and then calls people back to work, late in the evening because its not convenient for him to pay us the next day.
* He puts on this "kindly uncle" act with the kids which is really lame and phony. He wouldn't know how to play with a kid if he spent a year in a daycare.
* He constantly gives us inane and contradictory directions based on his careful research of looking into the classes for twenty random seconds every couple of days. "I want the kids to have more fun, and be engaged by the work. Oh, by the way I won't allow any more games, and you have to assign more homework." The man's obviously never taught for two seconds in his life. Oh, and he won't actually tell you himself, because then you might be able to defend yourself, but rather get his minions to come and tell you.
* One time he kicked a kid out of school, and was acting all tough, but then refused to do the hard part and actually phone the parents to tell them. The Korean teacher got that fun assignment.


Now he does have redeeming virtues, but they really should barely count as virtues except that so many other owners are ever bigger jackasses.

* He does actually pay us.
* He takes us out to dinner periodically.
* He usually doesn't insult us to our faces.

So all in all, despite the fact that I'm being culturally insensitive, I think I can safely say he is a capital porker.

A New Chapter

Well, Corie left. We went up to Seoul this weekend to drop her off at Incheon for the horrendously long trip back to Halifax, via Tokyo and Newark.

We had a good day visiting Mark and Jen at their awesome new digs in Seoul. Although their apartment is a bit smaller than their last, it is nice and has an vastly more excellent view. Their jobs sound enviable. Normal hours, and basically only a couple of classes a day. Mark apparently plays badminton all afternoon.



Obviously it was difficult to say goodbye at the airport. Its really wrenching, even for an insensitive and emotionally stunted clod such as myself. Especially after this year of living together and going through so much in such a strange environment together. I don't know what to expect living alone here. Its going to be a bit lonely... I'll be banging around in that apartment all on my own. Not that it won't have fringe benefits like having a whole single bed to myself. Too bad this couldn't have been in the summer ;-)



Anyway, Candace and Tammy were also up in Seoul for the weekend, so we all kind of travelled around together. We went up the tallest building in Korea (the 63 building) and drank vastly over priced cocktails at the top overlooking the conglomeration of Seoul at night. We even managed to get lost in the subway again, even with local guides, maintaining my perfect record.

We also fooolishly didn't reserve tickets on the KTX on Sunday night, meaning we had to wait for ages for a train. Makes me thank our lucky stars when Corie and I lucked out on Canada Day, squeaking in on the two last tickets.

Skip the Karaoke

Just head straight to the room salon.

Jeju-rama

Probably my last big trip has been to Jeju. The weather was kind of crummy, but apparently there was "heavy rain" in the Sea of Japan, so I guess we're lucky to have escaped with glumness rather than a rainy beach vacation. Jeju is pretty much the same as the rest of Korea, but with a slightly different landscape and slower pace. The trees were actually more similar to Canada even though its supposedly sub-tropical. There were palm trees, but I they were the minority among the other pine trees. Anyway, the beach was awesome. Excellent waves that beat us up. I have honest to goodness scrapes to prove it. Lots of weyguks around, and not all english teachers. The lack of traffic and people was great. I think this weekend has been almost the only time in Korea that the atmophere could honestly be described as "sleepy", but that might be Cheusok, and not Jeju. I'll have to ask Jeff.

It was so quiet that we were often the only ones in restaurants. Our first night there, Corie and I had a Korean ajuma spend her whole evening hovering over our table cooking our Galbi. In Daegu ours have begun to leave us alone, realizing that we at least know what to do. Its pretty uncomfortable after a while, but I'm defintely much more non-chalant about being waited on and laughed at than I used to be. She gave us hell about grilling kimchi, so i guess they're a bit more trad in Jeju.



We also visited Udo, which was just like a mini-Ireland but with Korean style roofs. I haven't seen so much rock, since, well, Ireland. We ate far too much galbi this weekend. And steak. And spicy chicken. Too much meat really, until the last two days when we ate too much Family Mart food, and realized far too late that we hadn't had a real meal or vegetables in the better part of three days. Anyway, on Udo we managed to catch the Ujuma olympics, as they all came tearing out of their tour bus, straight into the water for foot races, stockings and all.... Now that's entertainment.






We travelled with Chelsea and Ian, which is good, they always come up with good stuff to do... plus its easier to do more stuff in a group of four, rather than as a couple.

More entertaining too. Mr. Kim was good to us, gave us one extra day at the end of Cheusok. I'm sorry about the paragraphs, but this stupid site won't allow them for some reason. At least, it won't allow me to do them, which is my pet peeve if you really want to know.



They provided a good ego boost, and plenty of derisive laughter. Apparently their rip off travel agency booked them into our "memories of shag" (in more ways than one) hotel for two nights, at a cost only 5000 won cheaper than our three night stay. AND they got the room with the post in front of the window. Chalk one up for my excellent contacts at Happy Tours. Unfortunately this kind of contributed to their already low estimation of Korean culture, which was at the 8 month low ebb.



We hussled our way briefly into the giant 5 star hotels on the southside of the island, and even bit the bullet and ate in one, which was a refreshing change from the ajuma husslers of the previous nights. Its funny when they think you're staying there and they really try to suck up to you and display their excellent English skills. We really should have taken more advantage of this misunderstanding, ordering drinks, massages, and so one, but we're just too bashful to get away with it before we've stammered away the advantage.