Welcome to the World

My two-year stint in South Korea is coming to a close. I had no idea that the decision I made to move to Asia would change my life so completely. But now this particular experience is nearing the end. I have no idea what the future will bring, but I'm so completely content with the choices I've made to get to this point.
It's not always been easy, at times it's been beyond difficult and I didn't think I was going to make it through. In the end, I did, in fact, make it through and I couldn't be happier with what I've seen, what I've learned, the people I've met, the roads I've traveled and the journeys I've been on.
I leave this weekend for a three-week trip to visit my friends in Australia and to visit my best friend in New Zealand. I'm so incredibly excited for so many reasons. I get to return to my beloved Australia and see people I haven't seen since I lived there 8 years ago (Crap!) and be around the Western culture again after 2 years. I'm beyond words excited about seeing my best friend in New Zealand. We call each other HLPs, Heterosexual Life Partners. She's truly one of the most amazing people I've ever met and it's been over 4 years since we've seen each other. It's remarkable though, no matter how much time has passed since we've seen each other or how long we go between chats, we always pick right up where we left off. I can completely be myself with her and I'm safe. She and I have been through so many things individually and together. I trust her with my life and I'm beyond thrilled to finally get to see and talk with her again. It's going to be amazing.
I can't believe it's taken me this long to finally make an international trip while living in Korea. I know that sounds incredibly spoiled, I live in a foreign country for god's sake, but so many of my travel plans that I made for this incredible journey have not come to fruition. I know that's life, but it's hard to work toward a goal and see everyone around you get to zip off to foreign destinations while you sit at home. I know I'm being unreasonable and quite selfish. My plans and dreams are just too big for my wallet, but I've made my choices which I must live with.
Given how horrible the economy is and how many people are struggling (and the fact that I'll be unemployed in a matter of weeks), I'm so thankful for the experiences I've had.
All that being said, this experience has been all-enveloping and I'm looking forward to looking outward for the first time in quite some time. It's time to re-introduce myself to the outside world; the world outside the Korean peninsula. It will be a beautiful, humbling and reflective time.

Break Me Offa Piece a That!

A recent comment made by one of my Jinju friends got me thinking about how much foreigners spend and are willing to spend on little bits of home.
My friend spent the equivalent of $8 on a small jar of peanut butter. I haven't bought peanut butter in awhile, but I used to quite frequently last year. Nutella is a super-splurge at about $13 a jar. I do, however, buy parmasan cheese, which is over $5 for the smallest bottle available, 85 grams. Some things we're just willing to pay ridiculous amounts of money for.
Don't get me started on cheese. I miss cheese so incredibly much, it's actually quite ridiculous. I had the opportunity once to go to Costco in Busan (yes, Korea has Costco, which is a journey in itself) and I bought pretty much nothing but cheese and then promptly ate it all within about a two-week time period. If one can find cheese in a store in Korea, it's very small and VERY expensive, but sooooo worth it.
Us foreigners definitely miss home and most things within it and we're willing to do many a thing, including spending our hard-earned Won, to get a little piece of home.

Happy Chuseok (추석)!!!

It's already that time of year again for Chuseok. Crazy. Time has flown by this year.

Happy 추석, everyone!!!!!
Chuseok is basically the American equivalent of Thanksgiving and Memorial Day all wrapped into one 2 to 3-day holiday. Families get together and the women make a huge feast and the men sit around and watch television. The similarities between East and West are so obvious sometimes. On one of the days, families visit their ancestor’s burial sites and bow to the mounds of earth where their loved ones are buried.
Last year for Chuseok my friend, Lucy, and I decided to go on a hiking trip. We wanted to hike Seoraksan (Snow Peak Mountain), which is a famous and very big mountain in South Korea. We did little planning and decided to leave our city quite early to try to combat the heavy Chuseok traffic. We left Dangjin at about 7 a.m. and had to take a bus to Seoul and then another bus to Sokcho, which is on the northeast coast of South Korea and then once we got to Sokcho we had to take another bus to the base of Seoraksan. By the time we got there it was about 2 p.m.
On the bus ride from Seoul to Sokcho, we had been having very colorful conversations about many not-so-polite subjects. I had been telling Lucy about this TV show I had watched which had to do with strange ways to die. In one of the episodes one of the people who died was a woman who used a carrot for something quite graphic and consequently died due to a sharp edge of the carrot. We were talking about various subjects on this very long bus ride and, assuming like dumbasses, that we were the only ones within earshot who could speak English, we didn’t think anything of it. Then the person in front of me on the bus put his seatback in the reclining position and his head was practically in my lap. I very audibly told my friend how annoyed I get when people in front of me on planes or busses put their seats all the way back to which they’re practically laying on top of me. I’m tall as it is and traveling is always uncomfortable, but then when you get a jackass who has no regard for anyone else puts his or her seat back it makes everything that much more uncomfortable. My friend and I discussed this topic at length while Seemingly Native Korean Guy in front of me had his head in my crotch.
We stopped at a rest area at one point and when Lucy and I got back on the bus we could hear two men speaking English in the back of the bus. Ever since coming to Korea, I’ve noticed I have bat-like hearing ability for anyone speaking English. It was like a heat-sensing device and I immediately homed in on the guys speaking English and when one of them came to sit down in his designated seat (there is assigned seating in Korean busses) he sat directly in front of me and turned out to be the head-in-my-crotch guy. Shit.
Turns out head-in-my-crotch guy was an Asian American who, obviously, spoke perfect English. My friend and I snapped our heads to look at each other, both registered what had happened and then died in fits of laughter. Oops. Note to self, don’t assume just because someone is Asian it means they don’t speak English. But the guy did continue to leave his seat all the way back so I don’t feel that bad about bad-mouthing him.
When we finally arrived in Sokcho, Lucy and I desperately had to pee. Bus station bathrooms are pretty sketchy no matter where you are, but when you’re in a small South Korean town, bus station bathrooms are one of the foulest places you will encounter. I’m so thankful I got a rabies booster before arriving in Korea. Most of the toilets were squatters (where the toilet is in the floor and one must “squat” over the toilet in order to use it). I hate squatters and I was waiting ever so patiently for the one toilet that wasn’t a squatter. When that toilet became available I rushed in not paying attention to any of my surroundings. Colossal mistake.
When I sat down I got a very rude awakening. The toilet had, apparently, become clogged and filled with water and in my rush to pee I didn’t notice any of this and I sat on a toilet that was full of water up to the toilet seat. I certainly wasn’t expecting this and I let out a little yelp and then wracked my brain for the last time I had a tetanus shot. So epic fail on the bathroom excursion. I was so disgusted and my friend couldn’t stop giggling about it for the rest of the day. I wanted to disinfect my entire body, but there was no time for such frivolous pursuits.
Lucy had forgotten a sweatshirt and it was becoming quite chilly so we set off to find a department store that was open so she could buy one. During Chuseok everything shuts down for 2 or 3 days. We walked by a few clothing shops, but absolutely NOTHING was open. We tried to find a Lottemart, Home Plus or EMart, but alas our search was fruitless. She was just going to have to make due.
When we finally caught the bus to the trailhead of Seoroksan it was getting quite late and we vastly underestimated the time it would take us to hike the mountain. We stopped at the small grocery store area and bought a couple bottles of water, a can of nuts and a few other small things. We then purchased ajumma hats, which look absolutely ridiculous – they shield your entire face – we thought it would be funny. Then we set out on our journey. We really only thought it would take a few hours to get up the mountain and back down.


At the beginning of our hike with the ridiculous ajumma hats.



Seoroksan is in the extreme northeast corner of the South Korean peninsula. It is in Gangwon-do province and the countries 3rd-highest peak Daecheong-bong (Great Green Peak) is located within the Seoraksan National Park. Daecheong-bong is 1,708 meters (about 5,600 feet) high and it was our goal for the weekend. Seoraksan National Park is the second-largest land-based national park in South Korea and is 373 square kilometers (about 144 square miles).

We started up the mountain all sorts of excited and there were tons of people there, which we didn’t really expect because most Koreans stay home for the Chuseok holiday. The weather was a bit overcast and, in some areas, it rained a little bit, but that felt lovely. We made our way up the mountain and met many people along the way. We were taking pictures and I noticed a family speaking a language other than Korean or English. It was Spanish! I was so excited! I yelled, “That’s a language I understand!” and they all looked at me with frozen half-smiles and laughing lightly and a bit awkwardly. It’s been awhile since I’ve heard Spanish and I get really excited when I understand what someone is saying these days.
We met an older man who was hiking with his wife, son and his son’s family. The man spoke very good English and him and his family kept us company for awhile on the hike up the mountain. He and his entire family were very friendly. We eventually parted ways and made our way up the beautiful peak.
It was nearly fall and a few of the trees were beginning to show the rusty red, muted yellow and amber of autumn. There were grey jagged rocks poking out from the evergreen and leafy trees and it was truly a beautiful hike. When you live in and travel among the very industrialized areas of Korea you forget that Korea truly is a beautiful country and can be breathtaking at times.
Sometimes it can be very odd hiking in Korea, though. There is many a paved pathway and there were many staircases throughout the hike. I’m not used to such amenities back in the States. But we passed many a stream, waterfalls and water pools. I’ve heard rumors about the government building a gondola to the highest peak at Seoraksan too, which is something I sincerely hope they don’t do. You really lose so much of the experience by ruining it with a 20-minute gondola to the top of a mountain.
As we made our way up the trail the faces we saw on their way down became less and less foreign and more and more Korean. Turns out most of the foreigners we saw at the trailhead weren’t planning on making the climb. When we did run into people on the trail their faces went from shocked surprise at seeing our white faces, then huge smiles spread across their faces and then we got a fist-pump in the air with a scream of “fighting!” “Fighting!” is the quintessential Korean battle cry. We say “fighting” for so many things here. Koreans say “fighting” against their enemies to the death: Japan, they say “fighting” when they’re playing at the World Cup, we say “fighting” when hiking up mountains, we say “fighting” when having pictures taken and I even hear “fighting” in commercials here. “Fighting” is a term used so frequently in Korea. The appearance of being strong must always be exuded no matter the circumstance. I can’t even begin to count how many times I heard or said “fighting!” on that hike up and down Seoraksan.
The hike was difficult and we had no idea how far the hike actually was. Evening was fast approaching and we really hadn’t planned to be on the mountain at night. We had no overnight gear and Lucy didn’t have anything warm to wear. Such an epic fail in the planning department. We knew there were a couple shelters on the mountain and we had already passed the first one so we were trying to make it to the second one for the night. We stopped on the side of the trail to eat a small bit of the food we had left and we ran into a few men who were on their way down. They weren’t Korean and ended up being from the Philippines. They had been on their way to the second shelter as well and informed us that it was full. They were headed back down to the first shelter. They suggested we join them and we had no better option; we took them up on it.
So we all hiked back down to the first shelter and thankfully there was room for all of us. Lucy and I were freezing at this point and huddled under the blankets issued to us when we checked into the shelter. We took stock of what sustenance we had left. We had about a half bottle of water, half a can of peanuts, a small bag of chips and some cookies. We decided to ration them until tomorrow afternoon when we could get to the second shelter where we heard there was food for sale. Did I mention epic fail in the planning department? It’s a wonder I’ve survived as long as I have with the stupid shit I do sometimes.
We ran into the Philippino boys and they invited us to eat with them. I’m convinced these boys literally saved our lives. They were nothing but awesome from the time we met them until today. While we were waiting for dinner another foreigner arrived at the shelter. She was a fellow American English teacher in Korea. She shared what food she had with us and then disappeared and came back with more food. We asked her where her magic re-supply of food came from. She looked at us like the morons that we were and said there was a small shop at the main office of the shelter.
“What?!?! We can BUY food here?!” we exclaimed. Complete idiots.

The Philippino boys who saved our lives!!!!!!

Eventually it was time for dinner and our new bunk buddy and supplier of all things nutritious (tunafish and chocolate pies) joined us with the Philippino boys for a meal of vegetables, fruit and ramen. It was the best meal ever, especially when the prospect of rationing a half bottle of water, half a can of peanuts, a small bag of chips and some cookies between two people was our food option for the next 12 hours. The Philipino boys were amazing, welcoming and so generous. Apparently they had been planning this trip for several months. Oops. We are ridiculous morons.
We were sharing cooking space on a little porch with several Koreans who were very loudly enjoying themselves with every bottle of soju they consumed. At one point, a Korean man came over to our group and began drunkenly practicing his English and asking us many questions. He wanted to know who we were, what we were doing in Korea and what we were doing hiking Seoraksan. He was quite a chatty little man and very, very drunk. He talked to us for what seemed like hours. The whole time he was talking to us, he had an entire dinner roll in his cheek and kept spitting little bits of roll out of his mouth. He used to live in California, he told us, and during one of his stories about his job Lucy said, "Oh, California, that sounds nice," and then just out of nowhere he screamed, “FUUUUUCK YOOOUUUU!” All of us were completely caught off guard and the surprise made us all burst into fits of laughter. Apparently he didn't like California.
When we finally calmed down the Philippino boys began to apologize to us on behalf of the crazy Tourette’s-suffering Korean drunkard. The boys were rather religious and thought the outburst would have offended our delicate sensibilities.
The crazy drunk Korean eventually left us and we all decided it was time for bed. We said our goodnights to the Philippino boys and thanked them effusely for the meal and headed to our little wooden cubbyhole in the shelter. It was quite cold and both Lucy and I were wearing all the clothes we had with us and we had the fleece blankets issued to us when we arrived at the shelter. It was a cold night with little sleep, especially with the drunkard Koreans yelling and singing all night long.
We got up early and wanted to get an early start. When we were leaving the Philippino boys were out on the deck getting their things together and making breakfast. They offered us breakfast, but we decided to make our way up the mountain instead. We said our goodbyes and expressed our undying gratitude to the boys for saving our lives and made our way up the rest of the mountain. Our bunkmate, Kelsey, the American English teacher we met the previous night, joined us for part of the hike, but eventually we parted ways.
We didn’t see any more foreigners for quite awhile. We made our way up the mountain and ran into Koreans making their way down and we came upon the same reactions each time. Surprise, happiness and “fighting!” Many of the Koreans offered us snacks along the way. We got crackers, chocolate, nuts, so many things. Koreans can be so welcoming and generous. At one point, Lucy and I ran into two Korean women making their way down. One of the women spoke very good English and she gave us chocolate and then she asked, “Do you ever wonder who makes these beautiful places like Seoroksan?”
Are you freaking kidding me?! I even run into the Bible beaters on the side of a bloody mountain. Lucy and I gave each other quick glances and then I said, “Uhh, sure,” to the woman and then she pulled out pamphlets on the belief of God and she went on a shpeal about the Lord and how we should be thankful for having nature. I can’t seem to escape the religious fanatics. Thanks for the chocolate and have a lovely hike down, but we should be moving on. It was nice to meet you. Blah, blah, blah. Eventually she let us go and Lucy and I continued on.
We were almost to the second shelter and we passed a line of several older Koreans and they all did the rubbing their arms and pretending they were cold action at Lucy because she was wearing a T-shirt. She turned to me and said, “I think I’m getting hypothermia and all the Koreans thing I’m a frozen moron.”
We took a break and happened to see a foreigner in the midst. We began chatting with him and it turned out he was from Russia and working for a company in Korea. He loaned Lucy a sweatshirt he had and continued hiking with us. So many people saved us from dying of our own stupidity on this trip.
Eventually he went ahead of us because we were moving at a snail’s pace. Lucy and I made it to the second shelter, which was ridiculously close to the summit of the peak. We stopped at the shelter and had a bowl of rice and some water and then continued to the peak.
The Russian dude, Ivan, was relaxing on some rocks as we made our way up the last bit to the summit. He had already made it to the summit, but walked the rest of the way with us. We made it to the top and we were so excited!!! We actually made it despite our ridiculousness, stupidity and atrocious lack of planning! There were hordes of Koreans lounging around eating and drinking beer and soju. The three of us waited our turn to have our picture taken at the peak and the Koreans were so excited to see us and many a “fighting!” was heard. We didn’t spend too much time at the peak. We looked around at the valley below us and relaxed a little bit, but eventually made our way down the opposite side we came up.

We made it!!!

The opposite side was extremely steep and painful to walk down. Ivan ran down and then would wait for us at various resting points. There was one point in the trail where we ran into some foreigners heading up. I was so momentarily surprised to see a white face that I wasn’t paying attention to the trail and I tripped on a tree root and fell straight down. I was sandwiched between Ivan and Lucy on the trail and my fall was so slow it was literally like it was happening in slow motion and I fell flat on my face facing down the trail. I had my backpack on and it slid on top of my head due to the gravitational pull and Ivan came to my aid and I was laughing hysterically at myself and he said, “Oh my God! Are you ok?! What just happened?” I hear Lucy behind me and she is literally laughing her ass off and I look back at her and she’s pointing at me and laughing hysterically. She then was able to breathe and said, “Oh yeah, are you ok?” God, epic fail. I don’t even know what happened, but it was ridiculous.
I checked for injuries and recovered somewhat quickly hoping no others had seen the ridiculousness that was me falling face down on the trail. Korean hikers were passing us on the way up and they were giving me disgusted sneers and some were laughing at me. I could hear Lucy still unable to stifle the laughter behind me as we continued down the trail. Awesome. So glad that particular memory was not captured on film.
The hike down was obviously much quicker, but my kneecaps began to feel like they were separating from my body. It became increasingly more painful to continue the descent. My hiking became hobbling and I had to take frequent stops so my legs didn't collapse. I'm such a badass.
Lucy and I stopped at a small pool near the end of the hike and took a dip in the water to rest our sore feet. We caught up with Ivan there who was doing the same and the three of us hung out in the water for a bit.
Eventually we decided to continue on the path down and I had to keep holding on to trees on the way down because my knees were crapping out. We ran into some Korean men along the trail, who were also headed down, and they kept encouraging us. "So close! Almost there! Fighting!"
We made if off the mountain safely and in one piece, despite our complete idiocy and it was a fantastic way to experience one of Korea's more beautiful settings. We were definitely walking funny for a few days afterward, however.

Roadtrippin' With My Foodies

I recently went on a spur of the moment roadtrip to an island south of Jinju. Two of my friends (one of whom had just purchased a car) and I decided to head out of town for a little island camping and basking in the sun while the summer season was high.
When we got to Geoje-do it took us a little while to find the beach we were looking for, but with broken Korean and the help of some lovely ajosshies pointing us in the right direction, we finally found our way.


The beach where a typhoon was supposedly going to kill us. That's the fun little fishing boat we swam out to.

 When we got to the beach there was a full-blown company party occurring and all sorts of tents were set up on wooden platforms. The camping tents were set up under overhead tents. Koreans have a very skewed idea of camping.
We set up our tent on the actual ground and headed to the water. There were a few adolescent boys that were basically beach patrol and they were quite concerned for our safety. We were 3 women and clearly not able to take care of ourselves, according to them. In broken English and with the aid of a Smartphone dictionary they informed us that a typhoon was coming and we were going to die (as they made a slitting motion across their necks) if we stayed at the beach. We assured them we were going to be fine, but they were adament we were going to die. We told them if the weather got too bad we would run to the safety of the car. They came back to us three different times to warn us of the danger.
We were sharing the beach with a group of men working for some nondescript Korean company and all their families; lots of noise and children and alcohol was a-flowin'. Oddly EVERYONE exited the water at about the same time, approximately 7 p.m. Koreans are deathly afraid of the ocean so you frequently see them with full life-preserving gear on and they hug the shore like it's their only chance of living a long, happy life. Quite a sight.
My ladies and I jumped into the water at about 7:30 or 8 p.m. and we were swimming around and splashing, having a grand time. Then one of the super-excitable beach patrol boys came full-on running out of his little shack by the beach and screamed at us to get out of the water like Jaws was behind us. He said the beach was closed from 7 p.m. to 9 a.m. and we could come back in the morning.
Are you frickin' serious?
My friend piped up, "Do you own this beach?"
He, of course, said no, but said it was very dangerous to swim after 7 p.m.
Bloody hell.
I swear Korea is afraid of absolutely everything. I certainly wouldn't trust the little she-boy lifeguards to save my life if I was in trouble anyway. They weigh about as much as my left pinky toe.
After a bit more frolicking in the water we begrudgingly got out of the water so as not to give the she-boy a heart attack.
Who closes a damn beach just because a clock hits 7 p.m.? Weird.
After some time had passed and the little adolescent water-nazis had retired to their shack by the sea, the three of us crept out to the water, stopping statue-like when we heard anything from the shack and then swam out to sea. It was lovely and the perfect temperature.
There was a little fishing boat hanging out in the water with nothing to do, so I took it upon myself to swim out to see it and say hi.
After a less than graceful entry into the boat I got pretty cut up from the fiberglass contraption, which was rather painful, but funny. The girls followed me into the boat and we had an enjoyable time chillin' in the fishing boat. One of my friends was convinced we were drifting out to sea, despite the fact that the boat was anchored and we weren't going anywhere. Of course, she was also convinced their were sharks in the water, so her judgement can't really be trusted.
We made the decision to head back to the beach and myself and shark girl were still in the boat. She looked at me and asked which one of us was jumping off the boat next. She asked our other friend, who was already in the water, if there were any sharks in the water and of course there were none. She looked at me wondering who was going next and I asked her, "Do you really want to be the last one off the boat?" She got this look of terror in her eyes and exclaimed, "Fuck no!" and promptly belly-flopped into the shark-free sea.
There was no typhoon that made us "die!" At one point, there was a bit of wind, but then it went away and a tiny bit of sprinkling, but that left after about 10 minutes. It's funny, nobody else got the "Die!" message and the beach patrol only seemed to warn us about the non-existant typhoon. Curious.
On our drive home the next day, the three of us talked about all the food we missed from home for 45 straight minutes, almost the entire duration of the trip. We discussed restaurants, meals we used to make and all the ingredients we miss. We talked about food for so long and then we got depressed and we couldn't even eat to drown our food-missing depression.
I'm going to gain so much weight when I get home.

The Real World? Not so much

I was told people my age had something significant and traumatizing happen to them in their life to get them to Korea. People our age are running from something.
I've worked with people in their late 50s and 60s in this country and met a handful in that age range. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this, but I just wonder what got these people to the point where they left their entire families behind: children, grandchildren, friends, etc. to come to South Korea to work with children. It just blows my mind and many of them have no intention of returning to the U.S. or wherever they came from. Granted, given the current state of the United States and the ridiculous government, I can't really blame them for not wanting to return.
When talking to many people around my age who do come abroad to teach and live, I do sense a certain undercurrent of a troubled past or something significant happening to them that forced them to run away. The majority of teachers here, and the new teachers arriving daily, are fresh out of university and are just here for an adventure. Many of them are trustfund babies and just thought it would be fun to party it up in a different country and travel. However, the ones my age are looking to forget something or a few are looking to pay down monstrous amounts of debt accumulated through years of higher education, but most are looking for a little of both. There are a token few who are just wanderers and nothing more (and obviously also end up being trustfund babies).
The beauty and abominable nature of Korea is that it's not reality for foreigners. We're here, for the most part, for a short amount of time. It's like a year-long holiday. Nobody knows us here, nobody knows anything about our past or where we came from. Essentially we can get lost in this place and it's ok. We can party like rockstars when we're not at school and we can drown all that we feel or don't want to feel with endless socializing and cheap alcohol.
Relationships and dating are not normal in Korea. It's the absolute twilight zone when it comes to dating and relating to people. You have foreign men who know full well that they wouldn't be given a second glance in their home countries, but in Korea subservient Korean girls fall at their feet hoping for the distinction of dating a foreign man. You have Korean men who have completely different cultural ideas about the responsibilities and role of girlfriends and spouses. Or you have the lovely last group of men, the members of the military. Dating someone in the military is just a whole different can of worms that I just don't want to get into. And these are our options in Korea as foreign women. Dating is not dating in Korea. It's not normal and it's unlike anything I've ever experienced in my life. I'm definitely looking forward to leave that aspect of Korea behind.
I do often wonder if those people who have trouble in their souls and pasts ever do figure out what it is they're looking for here. I can't help but think there is probably no real resolution due to the endless numbing in the waegook way of life of drinking excessively. Bars don't close in Korea and drinking EVERYWHERE is completely acceptable. Open container laws don't exist here. I could drink on the steps of a police station at 8 a.m. if I wanted to and nothing would happen to me.
That being said, I have met some really great people here and I've had some amazing experiences here that I will never forget, but I'm definitely looking forward to a little taste of real life. Granted, as soon as I get back to that real life I might be ready to leave again. Such is the nature of a restless and mercurial soul.

Hey! Haven't You Heard?? Korea has FOUR Distinct Seasons!

Koreans are freakishly proud of the fact that they have "four distinct seasons."
They are absolutely convinced that they are the onnnnnnnnllllllllllly country in the whole, wide world that has four seasons and it's near impossible to convince them otherwise. It's super awesome.
For those who don't know me well, that's sarcasm.


This super-green number was taken near the base. Those are greenhouses next to the rice fields and due to the highly uncomfortable monsoon season, crops grow quite well and are so green and beautiful.



There is a fellow English teacher from the States who taught in the same city as me last year and he sums Korea up in 5 seasons. There is the Yellow Dust Season (thanks China), the Monsoon Season (perpetual pruney skin and moldy walls), Typhoon Season (super windy good times), Too Bloody Hot to Do Anything Season (my personal favorite, natch) and Too F*&%ing Cold to Leave Your Apartment Season (reeeaaallly good times when listening to whiney Southerners who've never seen snow).

I get that Koreans are extremely proud of their country, culture and pretty much anything to do with themselves, but really? Do they really need to be excessively proud of their "four seasons" and adamantly convinced they are the only country in all the land that has four supposed seasons? Seems like an odd thing to be so intransigently proud of.



The Final Stretch

I have less than four months to go before I'll be back home in America.
I'm not sure how to feel about that. On one hand, I'm RIDICULOUSLY excited to go home. By the time I land on American soil I will have been gone for more than two years. I'm so excited to see my friends and family; I can't even explain how much I'm looking forward to going home. And I'm so, so, SO excited to see my dog! Two years is a very long time to be away from your dog. That's about 14 people years! I doubt he'll even remember me. Gah! I can't wait to see my puppy!
Although I'm very much looking forward to going home, I still feel like I need to really enjoy and digest my last few months here. I feel like I might be rushing through to get everything organized for re-entering the U.S. that I won't be able to look around and enjoy this place. I feel like, these days, I'm moving too fast and rushing toward the finish. I know I'm going to really regret that when I get home. I just want to stop and take a look around and really be here; taste, touch, feel, smell all that I can.
The truth is, it's so easy to get upset about so many things in this country and to get frustrated when things don't go the way I think they should, but I'm going to miss so many things about this country and this culture. I've learned so much here and I just hope I can remember all the wonderful experiences I had here. It's definitely not been all great, the She Devil experience was particularly grand, but I can definitely say without a doubt that I'm so glad I made the choice to do this.
I'm already getting nervous about the question I know I will get from everyone when I get home, "So, how was Korea?" How can I possibly answer that question after having spent two years of my life in a completely foreign country? There's so much to tell and I won't even know where to start. I feel like this experience won't fully sink in for me until years down the road. This experience has been so massive and literally other-worldly that I can't possibly encapsulate it in one conversation or even a string of conversations. I'm honestly having mini-panic attacks just thinking about going home and trying to explain this. What am I going to say?  "Ummm, great. Crazy. Wonderful. Beautiful. Insane." I don't know how to explain it fairly and thoroughly.