My weekend(Insert sad face here)

This weekend was about as dull as it gets.  It rained all weekend.  I had a fever of 102.4 saturday night, that is just now back to normal on tuesday morning.  Consequently I spent all weekend in my apartment while Alison fled to the germ free confines of her own apartment.  She did manage brave the lions den and check my temperature and bring me Aleve and fruit cups.

Sorry, I know that is not as exciting as say...... 10 grand babies, but it is the best I can do for now.(sorry if you don't get this reference, its a little inside)

I promise more exciting news in the near future(no babies though)

Just a Regular Thursday Evening...

So, we have been doing review activities this week to prepare for the student's mid-term tests next Monday and Tuesday. That means we get to come up with our own review activities instead of working from the textbooks. I found a website that lets you make your own word searches, so I made some sweet worksheets using the unit vocab. It turns out the kids go crazy for word searches, just like my mother incidentally. Seriously, this is the first time my classes have been quiet... ever. I thought I'd capitalize on the moment and take some pictures. My plan was to pass it off like this is how my classes always look, but that would be a... lie.

This is my TTh 4th period RB class. We have (L-R) the twins Kevin and John, Paul and Jake, Judy and Michael, and Sarah and Alice. Jake was th big winner. He got a sheet of frog stickers and 3 pieces of candy.

On this side of the roon we have Nina and Isabelle, Annie and Kristi, Ron and Harry (all of my Harrys are holy terrors, just FYI), and Jack.

Next, because Alison Teacher is awesome, we played some unit Jeopardy, which was also a hit. However, since the classrooms are squashed together it's necessary to keep the children from screaming their heads off, which is difficult when there are thirty points on the line and your teammate seems unsure. Please notice the ridiculousness of the units I have to teach.

Sue's Red Shoes was deceptively challenging.

After the school Sam Teacher and I decided we were a little hungry, so we went for dinner at one of our favorite places by school. I have no idea what it's name is, but the couple that run it are hands down the nicest people we have met here. We had a slight mix-up in the ordering process and aren't quite sure how we ended up with so much food. However, when we got to the cash register the total was a whopping 11,000 won. That's about $11 for all of this food. It was crazy. Crazy good.

Kimchi Jjigea

(The rice comes on the side, but Sam had already put it in before I remembered that I'm supposed to be taking pictures of everything we eat. It's a spicy stew with kimchi, in this case tuna, and broth. Great for a cold, winter day.)

(sounds like: kim-chee chee-gay... sort of)

Kimchi Jun

(Mom, this is what you had at the Korean restaraunt in Denton!

It's a very thin egg-y kind of pancake with kimchi baked in.)

(sounds like kim-chee j-un)

I have absolutely no idea what this was but it is one of the best things I've eaten in my entire life. It was some sort of egg, cheese, ham, honey mustard goodness. The lady tried really hard to teach me how to say it after I pointed to the picture, but I forgot to write down the Korean to learn to pronounce it myself. Whatever, it's new name is: delicious.

Our meal also came with all of this as well. That's some sort of processed fish (really quite tasty) on the top left, dipping sauce for the jun top right, below that some radish kimchi, and some seaweed to wrap it all up on the bottom.

All in all a pretty typical weeknight for us. School, food, home. So, what do you think of the food so far? I'll probably take pictures of my MWF classes at some point in the near future. If I can stop yelling at them for long enough to get my camera out and fired up. I'll also give Sam a gentle nudge to jump on the picture band-wagon, too. His kids are funnier that mine, anyway.

Happy Easter!

Okay, so, a bit late, but I hope that you all had a great holiday. Being away from home over Easter was actually a bit difficult, but I finally broke down and purchased a phone card, so I had a nice chat with the parents which helped tremendously.

As usual, the weather on Easter took a turn for the worse and was gross and cold and rainy. This tempted Sam and I to blow off going to church and stay home in our pajamas, but it was Easter after all, so we bundled up and headed out to locate the church. We decided to go to Onnuri English Ministry, a part of Onnuri Community Church, which is apparently one of the biggest churches in Korea. It was a bit of a hike on the subway, and we weren't sure what we would find when we got there, but we're always up for an adventure.

It was an interesting experience. The only slightly strange thing was that although it was, in fact, Easter, the holy day of holy days, it was only mentioned a few times and the service was pretty much "business as usual", which was slightly disappointing. However, the band was really good, and I enjoyed the praise music a lot. The service was pretty packed and there was a big blend of Koreans and foreigners which was nice. The pastor, who spoke amazing English, was really young, energetic, and funny and Sam and I both enjoyed his sermon, an interesting take on the David and Goliath story. Some of his points were good talking points for us during the day, which I think always says something about a sermon. We ran into Lindsey and her friend Paul on our way out, so that was a nice surprise, too! I think we will definitely be back to that service, but also want to check out a few closer to our apartments.

After we got home we broke out the egg dying-kit that my mother sent in our care package and had some good old-fashioned Easter fun. Almost all of the eggs in Korea are brown, though, so only a few colors took. And, we really wanted hard-boiled egg in our tuna salad like right now so we only ended up actually decorating 4. But it brought much festivity to our drizzly Easter day, so, thanks mamma!

A Trip to the Hospital

Okay, don't let the title freak you out too much, this was a planned trip. Well, I use the word "planned" in a very loose sense, really. Sam was told that we both needed to be outside the big church by our apartment at 10:10 on Friday morning and that a car would pick us up to take us to the hospital to complete the medical part of the "getting our Alien Registration Cards so we can begin living life normally" process. So, all we knew was to be on the corner at 10:10 with 70,000 won and someone would pick us up in a car. If we hadn't already been in Korea for a month this would have seemed maybe a little bit sketch, but I think we're beyond that now.

So, sure enough at 10:10ish an actual official school van pulled up to wisk us and three other new teachers from our school away to the hospital. We get to the hospital and have a bit of paperwork to fill out. I think I have gotten the wrong forms so I mention to the guide that mine don't look like everyone elses. He very politely turned them right side up for me. Awesome, this is going well already. While we waited we did a bit of teacher bonding sharing ridiculous stories about going through the new visa process and random things that have happened so far, and we all received eggs from the Easter ladies (that is not their official title, I'm sure, but they were giving out eggs wrapped in tissue paper and a sticker of Jesus coming out of a tulip, so I'm pretty sure that's the gist of it).

After that we were taken upstairs where we had our height/weight/bp/hearing/eye sight tested. And our chest measured. Just the chest. Not entirely sure what that has to do with, well, anything, but nevertheless, Korea now knows how big my bosom is exactly. After that we're told to head down to the chest x-ray area. Sure, why not. After that we are to follow the red line on the floor to the "blood department". There we get lots of blood drawn to test for hepatitis, drugs, AIDS, etc. Then we're handed a cup and told to run off and do our urinalysis. So, Lindsey and I head to the public toilet to do our business. I open the stall and encounter this:

The dreaded squat toilet. I have managed to avoid these thus far, but this time I had no other option. Let me just say that if you are a lady, the best first time to attempt the squat toilet is not, in fact, the drug test scenario requiring both balance and precision. Awkward. Lindsey and I were cracking up by the time we were done, though, which I'm just hoping the medical professionals did not take as a sign that we were actually doing drugs at the moment.

So, that is what roughly 64,000 won will get you in a South Korean hospital (that's the not-with-insurance rate). If we pass we get half refunded. Yeah, if we'd had to have all of that done in the states it would have cost probably twice as much with insurance. Seriously, get it together US! Anyway, we'll find out next week if we passed everything... fingers crossed!

Thanks for all the birthday wishes!!

Just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone who wrote on my facebook wall or sent me an e-mail for my birthday a couple weeks ago. It was much appreciated. Special thanks to Grandpa Forbes. I got your card today when I got to work. I am glad that you are able to keep up with us through the blog and the pictures. I miss you all and thanks again!!

Food

I really did try to think of a snappier title, but I promised myself I wouldn't blog until all of my essays were graded and it hasn't left me much time!

So, we've been trying to remember to take pictures of the things we eat. However, we haven't been paid yet, so a lot of what we've been eating has been Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwiches, and we figure that y'all know what those look like (they are the same in Korea, we promise).

I feel that I should preface this post with the fact that a)I don't actually speak/write/read Korean, so if some of this is wrong I blame... someone else. Also, as with any place, every Korean restaurant makes things a little bit differently, so things will will not look the same from place to place, even within a franchise. One of our favorites, Gimbap Sarang, has very different takes on some of the same dishes, and we are learning what we prefer at each.

Tteokbokki 떡볶이

(sounds like: dock bo key)

Sam wouldn't stop eating long enough for me to take the picture. He loves this stuff! It's pretty tasty. You have your ricecake tube-thingy, some ramen like noodles, and a delicious spicy red sauce. All of the other stuff comes with your meal. On the far left we have some kimchi, some pickled radish (not my favorite), some lightly flavored broth, and in the silver cups is our mul (water). All of this food costs about 2,500 won (about $2.45). You can also buy this dish on the street as a snack at almost all of the markets.

Gimbap 김밥
(sounds like kim bap with a soft k)

It doesn't normally come with the random noodle. This was part of the same meal as the tteokbokki and I'm a little messy with the noodles/chopstick combo. So, gimbap is the pickled radish (I usually take that part out), ham, carrots, some cooked seaweed, egg, and some other random stuff all wrapped up in rice and seaweed. There are several varieties, chamchi (tuna), nude (no seaweed), kimchi (pictured above), triangle (because that makes it taste different?), and some others that I haven't had, but I'm sure are delicious. One roll (again, I wasn't fast enough with the camera, so we had already eaten about half) costs about 2,000-2,500 won.

Galbitang 갈비탕
(sounds like kal bee tahng)

Delicious soup that has some galbi (beef), rice noodles, onions, and spices in a delicious broth. It's served with bap (rice). This bowl cost around 4,000 won, but I couldn't even finish it! It's not nearly as spicy as most Korean dishes, so it made for a nice change.

Banchan 반잔

This is the name for all of the side dishes that come with just about every meal. In the white dish you have some kimchi(9 o'clock on the plate), seaweed(12 o'clock), bean sprouts(3 o'clock), and lotus root(6 o'clock). You also have the pickled radish again, and the broth again. Notice that Sam is eating the tteokbokki yet again :)

Okay, so there's a start for what we're eating. It's all been pretty tasty so far, and we'll try to keep you updated!

In other news, congratulations to Erin and Jason on the birth of their first baby! I'm so so happy for them, but it is definitely events like this that make me miss you all so much. We're having a great time, but sorry to miss the important events of loved ones lives!

Our Address

We have had a lot of people ask for our address.

We are more than happy to provide it to you. The price to ship a flat rate box is around $40, so don't feel like you have to send us stuff. We appreciate the simple fact that you are thinking about us.

Here is the address:

Our names

Seoul-Si Songpa-Gu

Bangi-dong 182-8

Avalon Building 2nd Floor

138-050

South Korea