Jen in South Korea

Hello Kitty Cafe

2012-10-28T22:32:00.001-05:00

This weekend near Busan I happened to come across a Hello Kitty Cafe. I knew Hello Kitty is very popular in Asia -- especially in its origin of Japan -- but I had no idea they had cafes!

Dragon Temple in Busan

2012-10-04T01:29:00.001-05:00

Gwangju Folk Museum

2012-09-07T11:11:00.001-05:00

This museum in gwangju showed several different scenes to help you get a feel as to how life used to be in Korea.

Photos from Japan

2012-08-23T01:23:00.001-05:00

Here is a series of pictures of things I took on my phone while in Japan:

Love island

2012-08-06T06:03:00.001-05:00

This weekend I took a short ferry ride to one of the islands near mokpo called love island. It was pretty hot, but I must say I was pretty impressed with the beach compared to Busan and others near the mainland.

Coming soon...

2012-08-02T22:09:00.001-05:00

Korea's Ginseng Chicken Soup

2012-07-31T03:43:00.001-05:00

So during about mid-June or so I had a cold. Sore throat and my nose kept running -- all I wanted was some chicken broth. Like, I wasn't even concerned about actually getting noodles or vegetables in it at that point -- I just wanted chicken broth. So I asked my co-teacher if I could find that anywhere, which, naturally, didn't quite have the answer to my question. She knew was I was referring to after I explained how I made it but there was no way that I could buy it here. They don't have canned goods (maybe a few but it's rare) so there is definitely no Campbell's soups for an option for dinner. However, when I mentioned this to my co-teacher she said how once mid-July hits all the Koreans start to eat Samgyetang, which is Ginseng Korean Soup. The theory behind eating this in mid-July is that they believe it has many nutritional benefits, so you can be replenished during the dreadfully hot days.

Of course to anyone from a Western culture, we'd feel this is a little "backwards", as we usually eat chicken soup a lot in the winter time to stay healthy and eat lots of fruit in the summer. In general I've noticed though that, in general, Korean's health remedies are not really surrounded by fruit. In fact, they usually will say how fruit and cold things "cool" the inner body and stomach so it isn't as good for digestion. And I've not only heard of this through co-teachers but also my acupuncturist and I've read it as being some Indian health philosophy as well, so it must be an Asian thing.

So, as of the end of July the restaurants that serve Samgyetang are quite crazy and all the 7-11's, GS 25s, Family Marts, and any other convenient store in existence in this country are even serving bags of this soup for sale during these humid months.

Yeonghwa Middle School Pictures: Part 2

2012-07-16T02:43:00.001-05:00

Yeonghwa Middle School Part 1: Outside

2012-07-09T01:22:00.001-05:00

Ginkgo Tree!

Along the walk way up to the High School

What we walk through every day to get to the cafeteria building.

The yard for PE, soccer, badminton, and other sports games.

Entrance to the High School

Zinnias and Snap Dragons!

On the corner of the middle school building

Entrance to the cafeteria

In front of the middle school building -- what I see every morning

In front of the middle school

Rosemary!

The stairs that you walk up to get back to the main school building from the play yard and parking lot.

Better view of the cafeteria entrance

The city view from the outside the cafeteria. The new gym/auditorium building is right below.

Middle school entrance

Other high school entrance

Musk Thistle! (yes they have it here too -- not just the midwest!)

4th of July in Korea

2012-07-01T23:26:00.000-05:00

Since I'm American and this week is the week of the 4th of July, I decided to take the opportunity to do a lesson with each one of my classes to do some basic US history of why the 4th of July is celebrated in the US.

The lesson, found from the convenient website of waygook.org, starts with the simple story of Christopher Columbus and then talks about how people migrated from England years later. The powerpoint portion ends with a discussion of what the US flag symbolizes and traditional activities for the 4th of July. I then do a Simpsons review game with them over the material discussed.

Naturally, one would suppose that this would be an only natural thing for an American to do when teaching in an ESL classroom in order to promote greater awareness in cultural differences. These are things that I've done more in my morning classes so far, but not necessarily in my regular classes until now... so that means that I've only done these lessons with only myself and the students in the room and no other co-teachers.

I must say, that by doing a lesson such as this I have felt that it makes the underlying feeling that Koreans have for foreigners to be more obvious than it already is in your day to day life as a foreigner. The truth is: Deep down, Koreans don't like foreigners. Now, this isn't so much as a statement that would imply that all hate you and would steal from you or vandalize something (quite the contrary actually, as this is country is VERY safe in that regard -- safer than the US). However, my point is that in the mist of these lessons where I'm constantly saying words like "independence", "freedom", "declaration of independence", etc. and then looking to who I'm talking to the only vibe that comes reflected back to me is: Freedom of what? US politics preach it, history classes preach it, schools preach it, the news says it, etc. But honestly - what freedom? From an outside perspective, the US appears to be a contradiction of what they preach. "We fight for freedom". Okay -- WHO'S freedom? The US invaded South Korea post WWII while the USSR invaded the North in the midst of "fighting the cold war" because Korea was no longer occupied by Japan. Neither the USSR or the US allowed Korea it's own "freedom" to do as they wish but rather fought for them to be what THEIR country's economic philosophy was. As a result, the country is still separated, still technically at war, and the US military is still occupied here... and I can't help but constantly get the vibe that South Koreans don't even want them here.

It's certainly not just the US, but rather just an underlying unconscious, almost, fear that they have for anybody non-Korean. But, I suppose, you can't really blame them when every single group of foreigners that have come here through many years of their history was to invade. In the upcoming years with the younger Koreans this would likely change -- a mixture of their developed economy at this point along with these kids being exposed to cultural diversity at such a young age could very well impact things for the better. Yet, the underlying hurt and damage of this culture is still very much so present, unfortunately.

Insadong in Seoul

2012-07-01T02:09:00.001-05:00

This weekend I took a trip to Seoul and went to the neighborhood Insadong. It was a really neat area directed for tourists. They had several tea shops, neat jewelry stores, eastern Asia style fans, dishes, and tons of other suveniers. Here are some pictures of the area:

Bingsu: A Korean Summer Treat

2012-06-21T06:41:00.001-05:00

After discussing Bingsu with my students and one of my co teachers I've finally decided to try this stuff out. It's basically a summer dessert and it is traditionally made with frozen milk, red bean, and fruit. This one is a bit fancier than the traditional with strawberries, red bean, and a scoop of yogurt on top. I must say-- it is pretty good and a nice treat for the humid summer days.

When your in the hospital in Korea...

2012-06-09T20:54:00.001-05:00

What I've found amusing is that if you are in a hospital in Korea it is perfectly okay for patients to leave. I've seen so many Koreans walking down the street with IVs in their arms.
Definitely something you would never imagine to see in the states!

Ping pong

2012-06-08T03:03:00.001-05:00

This Friday we had a little teacher get-together after school to celebrate the opening of the schools auditorium. We had cake, cherry tomatoes, rice cakes (duk), and cookies. The teachers then had ping-pong games where they competed for money. My one co-teacher told me that it was for about 150,000 KRW. I must say -- I've never seen a ping pong game get so intense in my life! Apparently ping pong is pretty intense in this part of the world. In fact, it wasn't until I was sitting there watching these games that I remembered watching some ping pong games on the Olympics at one point way back in the day and it was primarily the Chinese and other countries of this area competing against each other. My co-teacher told me that when she was younger they used to have ping pong "clubs" that you could go to and play (like you can to play pool or bowl), but that has more recently become a thing of the past and Korea is starting to have more gyms instead.

As for me, I played a couple games with two of my co-teachers. I was a bit confused to see that the paddle was completely different from the ones I used in the US! Not only that, but the Koreans kept telling me to hold it with three fingers behind the paddle. I was so puzzled, so I actually googled this right after and apparently it is just the way they make and use the paddles in China, Korea, Japan, and maybe a few other countries in this area.

My 3 Day Weekend in Busan

2012-05-31T02:28:00.001-05:00

This past weekend was a 3 day weekend for Buddha's birthday so I took a trip to Busan. On Sunday night we ate at TGIFridays to have all the foods we have difficulty finding here: Caesar salad, good Mexican, guacamole, pasta, bruschetta, steak, wings, and more. To make the experience even better, we ate outside and this was our view:

Rice cakes

2012-05-25T00:25:00.001-05:00

I feel that Koreans are trying to make me fat today with all this food. Because it is sports day, I have been given burgers, soda watermelon, regular lunch and now these rice cakes. Eek!

Sports Day

2012-05-24T20:11:00.001-05:00

Today my school is having sports day so the entire day is just filled with sports competitions such as soccer, arm wrestling, tug of war, races, soccer, and more.

Pumpkin and rice drink

2012-05-16T01:04:00.001-05:00

This is another one of the many random foods and drinks that my Korean co teachers give me. This one is a pumpkin and rice drink that is supposed to be good for health. It's a little sweet, but it's very subtle so its not like pumpkin pie. It is still good though-- tastes more natural.

Flower bushes.

2012-05-09T04:03:00.001-05:00

Once the cherry blossom trees are over I've notices that there are now many bushes like this with very beautiful flowers in them in a wide array of colors. These are just some of the bushes on front of my school.

Vitamin drink

2012-05-06T05:12:00.001-05:00

Korea has quite a variety of drinks at their mini marts. This is one of the vitamin drinks I decided to try... apparently it gives you vitamins AND confidence. I've had a vitamin c drink that tasted better than this one -- this is pretty flat.

Oriental Medicine: Part 4

2012-04-22T01:16:00.001-05:00

To give a little update on the oriental medicine/acupuncture, it has been working quite well. I will admit that a few days I was really wondering if it was working because I had one day where I had bad heartburn and felt really fatigued. However, I was very impressed when I went in for a treatment that day. I couldn't translate to tell him the issue since I didn't have my phone in my hand, but all he did was check my pulse and asked to look at my tongue and he said "no energy". I don't know what "mapping" he did for the needles that day but it certainly gave quick results!

The one main thing I noticed with acupuncture is that it takes away any stress. When I'm done, I often feel like I just finished a yoga session -- calm, relaxed, and tired.

I did ask him about getting treatment for seasonal allergies, but the procedures involves sticking a needle into the side of your nostril, moving it a bit, and then taking it out then do the other side. It then causes the nose to bleed, so you blow all the blood out. I would've had to do that procedure 10 times over 10 days (like this treatment). Needless to say, I turned that one down.

Corn dogs and chestnuts

2012-04-16T01:56:00.001-05:00

This weekend I went hiking and came across a little food stand. I had some roasted chestnuts (that are pretty common in the fall/winter in Korea -- so I'm surprised I found them now!) and a corn dog. The way they do corn dogs here is a bit different. They put some ketschup on it but they also sprinkle it with sugar.

Japanese Cherry Blossoms

2012-04-10T23:25:00.001-05:00

The cherry blossom trees have officially bloomed! More pictures to come once I get a sunny day.

Oriental Medicine: Part 3

2012-04-10T01:56:00.001-05:00

To give an update on my oriental medicine/acupuncture -- it has been working fairly well though, of course, I have to watch diet along with the treatments. I have felt a lot more "balanced" than I was when I first came in for treatment. At this point, the majority of the time I don't feel the needles at this point in the same way as I did at first. The first two times it felt a bit more sore and tender. However, I will admit today there was a spot or two that was uncomfortable for a little while.

Today I kept my phone in my pocket so I could take a picture to show what some of this looks like. Prior to the acupuncture treatment, they apply heat to the area. Naturally, they don't use just a simple heating pad but rather this heated-pot looking thing with some sort of incense that they light and put on my stomach with just a little cover the size of a napkin underneath. I lay there on the heated table (traditional Korean style) with this pot on my stomach with additional heat being pointed at my stomach above the pot. The smell of the smoke is actually quite relaxing, so I normally take a little nap for the 20 or so minutes that I lay there before they do the acupuncture. When they do put the needles in (which are actually quite small and thin -- certainly not the size needle for when you get a shot or blood drawn), they keep the heated lamp above the area.

Middle School ESL Activities Blog

2012-04-09T02:23:00.000-05:00

I've recently made another blog that focuses on sharing the work, ideas, and thoughts of my Korean students. My hope with this blog is to provide some ideas for other ESL teachers and to simply share the work of my students to people from all walks of life. Perhaps by sharing this will provide those who have never been to Korea a small taste of what life is like for these students.

The blog can be found at: Yeonghwa Middle School ESL Activities