We're on the Map!

Oh hi! We're at that purple dot on the southern side of the map.

We're on this map anyway! I thought I'd give everyone back at home (and anyone else that's curious) a better idea of life around Cheongju-si, especially in relation to where we live/work. I took a few screenshots of Cheongju, zoomed in to give you a better idea with a few highlights.

Cheongju is a decently sized city. In the map above, we live in Juklim-dong which is approximately where that purple dot is on the southern side of the city. Why purple? Because I happen to like purple, its a nice color. I would consider Cheongju to be a pretty large city, though it's no Daejeon or Seoul by any means. The most recent population numbers I remember seeing on Wikipedia for Cheongju put it around 700k, so it's not what I would call small.

Some people that we've talked to have come to understand part of the difficulty of living "out in the boonies" if you will. We can hop on any number of buses at our bus stop down the road, but you also have to wait for the buses and that can be trying in the cold. We're actually one bus stop away from one of the bus end points/rest areas for the drivers. It's also quite hard to catch a taxi out here too. The bus takes approximately 15 minutes to get from our closest stop to the bus terminal and closer to 45 minutes to get from home to Shinae (Downtown) if things work in your favor.

Riding the bus is kind of an adventure though. Sometimes the bus drivers are crazy, you see interesting people filtering off and on, they drive all crazy sometimes, you just never know. There was the one time where there was a person in a car behind us with major crazy bass going on (we're talking rattling windows here) and all the ajummas (older women) freaked out and the bus driver stopped and gave everyone their money back because they thought it was a problem with the bus.

Here is my other handy dandy map, complete with numbered purple dots. After some consulting with Zach I think I got it all figured out. As I said before, we live in that area in the far south on the map in Juklim-dong (1).

The small square to the north that is not numbered is the approximate region of two small convenience stores we sometimes visit to stock up on snacks and food for the week. The prices are reasonable at these places and we've even become familiar faces to those that work there. 

North of the small square is our second dot, Homeplus (2). This is where we shop for all our needs. Homeplus has pretty much anything and we end up there somewhat frequently. It's also next to the chicken place we like to go to. There for a while we would just walk up the road toward Homeplus and walk on the sidewalk. Then we discovered that we could cut through by going between some apartments and a school and take a bridge above the road and it really saved us some time. This area has several blocks worth of restaurants, cafes, and small shops. There's also a street vendor with delicious waffles.

If you head toward dot number 3 you hit the bus terminal area (3) in Gagyeong-dong. If you take the time to walk to and from there to home down at (1) it's approximately 30 minutes. We've walked it many times and will probably walk it many more. There's a nice park that we started exploring when we first got here, but didn't get the opportunity to look much otherwise. The bus terminal area is also bustling. There's a Lotte Mart, DreamPlus, a bookstore, lots of restaurants, a local street market and many other things. We sometimes hit up this area and go to Pizza Hut for dates! Also near the bus terminal is a fantastic cultural store where I hope to buy gifts to send/bring home and a man who is almost always selling battery powered toy dogs that walk around.

Dot number 4 is up to the northeast. This is Shinae or Downtown (4), which we frequent somewhat often. The spot I marked is just the start of the downtown area as it's quite large. This is the home area of the cat cafe we visited. There are tons of restaurants ranging from KFC and McDonalds to Italian to traditional Korean and more. There are many street vendors here and it's always bustling. Teens, kids, ajummas, you name it you see it all. Near a small video game store we visit sometimes there are typically people out selling their crafts and they're very well done. We also ran into the talent contest thing the one time. And there was the time we saw a small parade of people dressed as clowns that were handing out some sort of flier that we couldn't read. 

Number 5 in the middle area on the map is BCM (5). This is where Zach teaches the adult classes and I've visited the place a few times too. Yet another area we've walked to and from several times before. Taking the bus from home is about 20 minutes and the stop is just after the stop for Chungbuk University (which is huge and we intend to explore soon) but before you hit the huge stadium off to the left. Chungbuk University is that big area just South of the dot. There is a strip near the school for blocks and blocks that is all outdoor wear and hiking gear because Koreans love hiking.

As we discover more I might make a more detailed map (or make the ones above more exciting). Since it's getting cold out I'm not anticipating a whole lot of traveling until springtime, but I'm sure we'll be doing some local exploring.

Halloween at the Hagwon

At this point Halloween has come and gone (and now we're past Thanksgiving), but there are always fun pictures floating around! Halloween isn't as big a deal here in Korea, but the schools like to highlight the holiday and apparently it's just another excuse for older Koreans to go drinking. That said, we had a good time at our hagwon's celebration.

The timing was quite interesting though as we were told that some of the parents would be coming in to observe class before our "party". So we each had a couple of parents who had come in to see how class works and we, of course, had to be on our best behavior and show off.

Zach had planned ahead (I'm not sure if this was intentional or not, or at least not how intentional) and had brought his horse head mask, as you can see above. This was a hit with the kids and our director. I, however, did not plan ahead, but before we left the States I did manage to snag a few silly things from Party City. Thus, I donned a silly moustache which everyone seemed to love. I also managed to remember the pirate hat that had been left by one of the teachers before us. A pirate with a moustache, it worked!

The kids dressed up and we were instructed twice during the day to hand out candy. The parents helped earlier in the day for the first round, the kids would knock on the door and come to all of us for treats. They knew to say trick or treat, but I used the time to advise them to also say thank you! The later round of trick or treating with the older kids was just 3 teachers each in a classroom and that was different in its own way.

Happy Thanksgiving from South Korea!

Happy Thanksgiving in the States to those of you who have been up for a while preparing for the big day or possibly just got up too. We hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving and have a good time with your loved ones, be they family or friends or both. We are celebrating here with delicious chicken from a local place that we visit about once a week. It's close to turkey, right?

Today was pretty much a normal day for us, however, since Koreans celebrate Chuseok (which was in September this year) which is the closest holiday they have to our Thanksgiving. We worked in the morning and had lunch (today was rice, tofu, soup, radish kimchi, and a few other small things) and then Zach stayed here for the older kids while I went on a field trip with the boss lady to a milk factory in Cheonan. I will definitely be posting about that little adventure sometime soon. Tomorrow is also our monthly birthday party, so it's been an eventful end of the week!

We also found out some interesting news about Saturday, December 1st when there will be some sort of open house at our school and Zach and I will be having a faux class for potential kids and their parents. Should be an interesting day.

That said, I leave you with a final picture of our delicious meal. Have a wonderful day and have a little turkey and fixings for us over here. ;)  And if you also happen to go out on Black Friday, be safe and have a good time. Don't take it too seriously! I've already made my (probably one and only) online purchase for Black Friday which will be waiting at home for me in 9 months!

So, so delicious. A bit of crunchy, a bit of sweet, and a touch of spicy. 

The continuing path of becoming a teacher

From left to right Kate, Lily, Aiden, Carley, Susan

One of my lessons

So now that I have been in Korea close to 3 months it is time to talk about(after a long hiatus of not posting sorry about that) what my feeling are as a teacher and what turning into a teacher is like for me.  For a long time I actually dreamed about being a teacher and helping shape children into successful adults.  I was hoping there would be children who looked back upon my classes fondly, but due to being a terrible student (or at least having a bad first few semesters in college) my dreams of being a teacher were put aside.

So my topic today is how I feel about being a teacher and my continuing path to actually feel like I am a teacher.  When I first arrived in Korea I was overwhelmed at the idea that I would be in charge or (close to) 10 children all of whom I would have to take care of, teach, and furthermore discipline if they got out of hand.  The first two weeks didn't really help matters.  The former teachers Rob and Rachael warned us that the kids were going to be worse due to our presence, but it just heightened the overwhelming feeling.

Now that I have been teaching for three months I am finally starting to get my wings with the whole teaching thing.  While Monday and Tuesday are usually lost causes due to the kids being so riled up from the weekend.  Wednesday and Thursday I get some real teaching done, and then Friday both I and the kids are so exhausted from the week once again nothing gets done but that is OK because its FRIDAY!  While the kids still run wild due to being children I think I am getting better at discipline aspect of the job.  I have experimented with a few different formats of discipline, of which writing the offending child's name on the board seems most effective.  Of course this only really working for the Kindergarten class, since they are actually feel shame at being bad.  Contrast this with me Elementary class where the bad kids are the heroes of the class almost no discipline system actually works, other than literally forcing the kids to do what they need to do.

I think I can see my house from here!

Days like today are great, everyone gets along I am in a good mood and things actually get done.  Whats even better is that these sorts of days are increasing, and with it my comfort in teaching in general.  I'm three months through our ESL Honeymoon Adventures and I am looking forward to the next 9 months and of course to coming home to start a brand new domestic adventure afterward.

Culture or something else...

The girls with their beloved Doraemon --with special Halloween moustache.

If ever there was a face of enthusiasm, it was this. You can't tell from the oozing excitement in this picture just how happy these girls are to be at a hagwon after school. Alright, enough beating around the bush, they're a real challenge, at least when their friend is there. These two together are actually a lot of fun. This small class, however, is one of my biggest challenges.

There's a reason why I mention culture, aside from the obvious being that culture impacts everything, and I'm trying to figure out how much that cultural piece influences the attitudes of these girls. When I say that almost every day with these girls is a challenge, I really mean it. I know from personal experience that I do much better with younger children, which is why the kindy kids are the class I work best with. But why culture? Because the way Koreans are raised and the way by which they think plays a big role in my abilities and options with the class.

Culture this, culture that, yes. So what's the hitch? Well, it really seems as though using their imaginations is a bit of a challenge. From my experiences it seems like Koreans are more of a literal people as opposed to the more abstract. It's a good thing I don't have to explain analogies to anyone!

The specific issue I ran into today was with their everyday writing that I give them. The girls love music, K-pop of course, but they also like some international music too since I've been trying to expose them to language by way of a big interest of theirs (including, but not limited to Adele, Justin Beiber, Taylor Swift, Ellie Goulding, Santana (with Rob Thomas, Michelle Branch, etc), One Direction, Carly Mae Jepson, etc.). I will play music videos in class and today they showed interest, but when it's the three of them they're always more interested in their stickers or chatting.

I figured I'd give them something fun, but I ran into the usual roadblock of culture, or is it laziness? It's kind of hard to distinguish the two. Despite explaining what I wanted them to write, they always take it in the most literal sense, instead of pretending and thinking outside the box. Today I wanted them to write about what they would have a music video be about, what and who would be in it, what special props would they use? The first response I received? "I don't want to make a music video" which goes hand in hand with a previous writing task I gave them where I got an initial response of "Halloween costume is expensive. I don't wear Halloween costume". I can sing their praises about telling me straight up what's going on, but it's really hard to develop writing skills and understand common mistakes when getting them to write is like twisting their arms.

I mention the laziness in an offhand manner, knowing that Korean kids have a lot of pressure to achieve exceptional academic success even from a young age. So while they don't want to work at their hagwon learning English after they get done with school, before they go home to their families, it's a necessary evil. If nothing else, they certainly make me value my time with my kindergartners. My kindy kids will finish their worksheets and draw on the back, or they'll fold them into boats or cups or hats, they will pretend they're characters from their favorite shows, and it's really nice to see. I know it will not continue as such as they get older due to the system, but it's nice to see them being kids while they can.

Home for Confused Photos

Not all pictures are lost, some are just confused or otherwise don't really know where to go. So in this case we'll call it a home for confused photos, but it's all the usual here. Looking above though, this was on a timer for our food when we went to eat at Lotteria one of the first times we got here. The picture and the text says it all. This is the Lady Burger we're talking about here. "Sorry, Boys! Only for Ladies!" Clearly it's a "MUST-EAT" Hahaha. We got a giggle out of that one.

Speaking of food, what is this even? This is a bacon cheese donut from Dunkin Donuts that's down the road from us. They have some delicious things, but this is not one of them. I do like the fact that pretty much every place you go (that is fast food or something like DD) tells you the basic nutritional value and the kcal count.

Speaking of food, and things that are not food, another perk of living here is that they love to give you free things. This cereal has free small cereal packs attached and you see this pretty frequently. HomePlus likes to give you free things by way of their 1+1 sales too. You see the free attached things everywhere though, whether it's feminine products, frozen foods, or other miscellaneous products.

We first saw this amazing car when we started traveling down near the hub of the bus station. I love the pumpkin and I wish I could be cool and have a pumpkin like this one. It's worth noting that the road that the car is on in the direction it is facing is the local market.

Speaking of transportation, advertising comes in many shapes and forms and this is just one ad for an English school that was on the side of a bus. I like how the school can make kids into English speaking superheroes.

It's not uncommon to see ads inside the local buses advertising for various drawing and animation schools. This is similar. They're ads that are posted downtown (Shinae) near this little craft/youth hub that is next to a Dunkin Donuts. Sometimes there is singing or dancing and quite a few people gather in the general area. These are the ads for the school you want if you're looking to specialize in anime girls apparently.

Speaking of Shinae, the other day we were downtown just roaming around as usual and we ran into this event happening. There was singing, dancing, cameras, you name it. It kind of seemed like a Cheongju's Got Talent sort of thing. Yes, those are backup singers.

We were advised to also check out this underground mall downtown because it has this cool fish tank and is generally kind of interesting. There are so many tiny businesses, a lot of which sell clothing or shoes. Speaking of clothing, the Engrish (or Konglish for here specifically) can make for some very interesting apparel and signs. They're sometimes very logical mistakes considering the fact that there are some sounds that Koreans don't distinguish between. Others are just grammatical mistakes.

Changing gears this time, this is the rice field that we walk by when we come and go from the school. It's all been gathered up and placed very nicely, it's so pretty. By now it's been taken elsewhere and the field is just empty, but it still looks neatly trimmed.

And last, but certainly not least, this time around is this adorable chocolate whale cake that I saw today at Tous les Jours which is a local bakery. They have the prettiest cakes for sale and this one just looks so cute and pleased. Maybe I'll get a cute cake for myself as a treat, hopefully it'll be as cute as this one!

That's all for now though, I'll post another round of pictures in the near future. You never know what you'll find here and I like to appreciate the little things and I hope you do too. ^.^

Pepero Day is 11/11! (Also, 1,000 Pageviews!)

Happy Pepero Day! Here in Korea 11/11 is Pepero Day each year. If you're familiar with Pocky at all, Pepero is Lotte's version of the same snack. It comes in multiple variants, but is the most well known for being a long biscuit covered almost completely in chocolate. Pepero is a fun snack for all ages and they really go crazy with it over here. Going to the store (we went to both HomePlus and Lotte Mart and saw a variety of others too) you'd think it was Valentine's Day with all the Pepero and chocolate everywhere. All with decorative packaging and even things like large plushies and gift baskets. 

Pepero Day is definitely a consumer holiday and we were able to see it pretty clearly. On our visit to HomePlus earlier in the week we grabbed a few boxes for ourselves-- the strawberry kind for Zach and the chocolate filled kind (called Nude) for me. We also stocked up again later, one cannot have too much Pepero! That and they were only 790 won each.

It was interesting to look at all the marketing and also to watch the people who were doing all their Pepero gift shopping at the time too. I saw three girls with a shopping cart and they had a list of who they needed to buy for and then had their stacks of Pepero lined up on different sides of the cart so they knew whose was whose. Then we ended up in the checkout line behind a family with all this Pepero (below).

Not only do the larger grocery and general shopping hubs have displays, but so do smaller stores such as 7/11, and this little place we passed yesterday. Even places that don't sell food had some sort of product deal where you (I believe) get free Pepero along with your purchase. 

I kind of wish I had seen the Doreamon thing, whatever it was Pepero related because my older elementary girls would have flipped out and loved me forever if I had given it to them. Oh well. Speaking of which, two of them gave us large Pepero on Friday.

We also ran into a multicultural version of Pepero (like everywhere else, they even had Pepero-type things at Tous les Jours which is a bakery) at Dunkin Donuts too. Yes, those are Pepero churros. I was kind of tempted, but I think I have more than enough Pepero type things for the time being.

Last, but not least, I want to thank those of you who are reading our blog and I hope you're all doing well. With this we've reached 1,000 page views and I hope you are all enjoying following along with us. Please feel free to leave comments or questions, we like hearing from everyone. So with that, I give you a photo tribute (in Pepero), for our little achievement. 

Still to come? Halloween post and photos, more "lost photos", and maybe a rant or two. :) Thank you!

Korean Thermostats-- or how does that thing work?

I would like to take a moment to introduce our thermostat as I don't believe you had the opportunity to meet before. Now, it seems pretty simple, and it really is not as complicated as it looks. That said, it's in Korean so it is a little bit of a challenge. 

When we first arrived here in late August 2012 we had no real need for it because it was still sort of hot out and we were still using the air conditioners off and on at that time. Our director instructed us how to turn the hot water on for when we shower by hitting the red button to turn the boiler on and then hitting the green button just above it for the hot water. Then when we finished we were told to turn it off by hitting the red button again. 

Since it's been getting cold we've bought ourselves hats and gloves, and I even got myself a snazzy purple scarf, but when you're inside that just doesn't cut it. So that means operating the thermostat (especially when the director is away on the weekends). She didn't really give me instructions aside from turning on the boiler (since they do floor heating here and warm water is pumped up through the building), so I was a little dumbfounded in trying to figure out how things work. 

I had the good fortune of stumbling upon a blog with a post titled My battles with the Thermostat which, while it wasn't the exact same image as our thermostat, it was similar enough once I figured out what I was looking for. If you need further assistance with similar thermostats, that's the place to go. I am so glad to have found it!

That said, the dials on the left side are easy to figure out. You have the current temperature reading on top, 16 degrees C is pretty cold for inside! The dial below that indicates the desired temperature, the one below that is the timer (so in this case the boiler will turn off after 3 hours), and finally, below that is the minimum and max temperatures for the water.

The buttons to the right are the confusing part. So with the assistance of the previously mentioned post I was able to figure out that top button is the "normal" setting, the one below it is the "sleep" setting, and the button above the red on/off/reset button is to turn on the hot water.

Field Trip to Seoul and Museums

A few weeks ago, on October 19th we went to the Children's Museum in Seoul on a field trip with our school and we also went to the Seoul National Science Museum. It was an interesting and fun trip. The bus ride is the usual hour and a half and we got to ride on this very snazzy bus. Think Gangnam Style party bus, then imagine it filled with kids.

The bus ride was filled with snack sharing and watching a show called Shin-chan, which is popular here. There's a US release of the series which I've seen, but my understanding is that the series here is a little different.

We made a quick stop at a rest area so that everyone could have a bathroom break, and everything went pretty smoothly.

We sat all the way in the back, easier to keep an eye on the kiddos and kept us out of the way.

This is on the bridge as we drove into Seoul.

The museum has a playground attached. We got yelled at for taking the kids there since they're apparently supposed to play on it after they get done inside, or something.

The children's museum is also attached to some other museums/theatres and this is the general area for all of them. The view was very pretty and you can see Seoul Tower in the background.

Now we know what children's museum is in Korean!

We had to wait for our time slot to open up, so in the meantime everyone played around on the stairs.

The museum was really neat and had very interesting things for kids to do and observe. 

Here they could look at architecture and construction and try something similar with their own pieces.

Here they are learning how to prepare grains to make food.

The lights on the ceiling were so neat. They faded in and out and were different constellations.

What's a children's museum without an informational dress up area?

I'm in charge here, clearly.

This was really interesting and a fun concept for a children's museum. There were three screens like this which were set up with XBox 360 Kinect-like technology where you utilize motion to make the character on screen move. I think they were supposed to be harvesting rice.

An interesting display of farming tools and equipment.

That's another one of those motion games where the blur of a child is.

The display of old weaponry was fascinating. They had a variety ranging from swords to arrows.

Bronze weapons are highlighted in this case.

The kids had a lot of fun playing with these large puzzles.

This castle was really neat. The kids could enter and exit and climb behind the wall and look over it.

After we finished at the Children's Museum we had lunch on the bus, which was interesting. Everyone had a packed lunch or something bought by their parents. There was a little bit of everything, including the more traditional kimbap. They were all very generous with their food and shared with their friends and us. 

As for our lunches, our director had bought sandwiches for us from KFC which were actually pretty amazing. They were chicken sandwiches but they were grilled and smoked and had a delicious flavor. Definitely something to have again.

After we finished lunch we left the children's museum and headed to the Seoul National Science Museum, which is actually right next to one of the old palaces in Seoul. We're hoping to make it to one of the palaces once it starts warming up here again. 

The science museum itself was kind of a zoo around the time that we visited since there were lots of older high school students mingling around. Some of them also had a strange interest in some of our kids which I would venture to say was pretty creepy. Once everyone was wrangled though, I have to say that we all had a good time.

McDonald's here is tasty, and popular! Those are delivery bikes parked outside.

For those of you who are Twilight fans, here's a bus advertising Breaking Dawn. I'm sad I missed getting a picture of the World of Warcraft bus though.

This is the palace that's next to the science musuem.

Welcome to the Seoul National Science Museum! I believe the entry fee is 1,000 won.

Standing inside the main lobby of the science museum.

The kids got to play with and observe the different things. The museum was hands on and a lot of fun.

Trying out some of the exhibits.

Those high school guys to the left? Yeah, they were kind of creepy.

Everyone had to ride the car, they spent most of their time waiting in line to drive.

The space portion was really neat. There was space food, including space kimchi!

This thing was a lot of fun. That's Zach on the left and me on the right.

Sometimes things just make you laugh a little.

We stayed for the final event which was this little robot dance show. It was pretty cute.

Dance little robot, dance.

On the way back to the bus we passed Changgyeonggung Palace.

Everyone in front of the palace sign.

Following the end of our trip and pictures outside of Changgyeonggung we hopped back on the bus and headed home. The kids watched Shin-chan and some of them fell asleep on the hour and a half long trip. We made a quick stop at a rest area on the way back as well so everyone could use the restroom (I got stared at in the bathroom, but that's nothing new) and have a quick snack. 

We made it back to the school with enough time to drop things off and then head to the school where Zach teaches adults. So we went to the school and I sat in on two of the classes and got to meet some of his students and then we went out for dinner. :)