Korean Culture

These are just a few things that made me go "hm...that's interesting" here in Korea.

1. I can't seem to find buns (burger or hotdog) in a Korean super market, specifically HomePlus, which is like a Walmart but with a Safeway-type grocery store attached.
2. Their eggs don't come in a dozen. They come in a ten.
3. The young women here wear heels ALL THE TIME. Whether it's date night or headed to the grocery store or even, yes, hiking, they have their cute heels on.
4. They have a ton of coffee shops here. I like to order mochas or lattes, which tend to be even sweeter here than in America. I call them candy coffees.
5. They show the most disturbing things on their cable television but they will censor it via pixelation. Extra bloody scenes will be played but the bloody body part will be pixelated. Porn will be shown but the crotch will be pixelated.
6. Motorcycles and bicycles ride on sidewalks and roads. They switch depending on the amount of traffic. I've had to quickly get out of the way of a speeding motorcyclist while on my leisurely stroll to work. On the sidewalk.
7. They don't believe in clothes dryers or ovens. Or separate shower areas (as Ships has shown a few posts back).
8. No one wears sunglasses, despite the enormous amount of sunshine they get here. The few who do wear sunglasses have usually spent some time in America or are very hip and fashionable and young.
9. They use umbrellas all the time: as a shield from the rain and as a shield from the sun's rays.
10. You can't shop anywhere and be left alone. There is always someone selling to you. I hate this.
11. Couples here like to wear matching clothes. This includes matching underwear. More pictures to follow on this.
12. Homosexuality is not as widely accepted here as it is in America. HOWEVER. Men here can do the following things and their sexuality will not be held into question: hold hands with each other, perm their hair, wear tight jeans or bold colors or stuff with lots of beading/bling.
13. Pedestrians do not have the right of way. If you are at a crosswalk and a car is coming, let the car go if you want to live.
14. ATMS close after 11pm at night.
15. Bars, conversely, never close.
16. Korean Pop music. That is all they ever listen to. I asked my kids what other kinds of music do they listen to here and they were all like "...other kinds?"
17. They don't do art. I asked one of the other instructors where can I buy good Korean art. Her response? "Yeah...they don't do a whole lot of art here so maybe you'll find stuff in a tourist shop by a Buddhist temple but there isn't a young artist scene here."
18. If you are at a restaurant, you have to say "yogi-yo!" (this means "here") in order to get someone to take your order or to get any kind of service. Otherwise, no one will help you. Ever.
19. We live in the suburbs. The burbs here consist of numerous high-rise apartments (teensy studios where a small family will live). This is insane to me considering the burbs in America means huge 2 story homes with SUVs and huge backyards.
20. Mi-Guk means American. Yong-Guk means British. Wei-Guk (like "WAY Guk")means non-Korean. This is funny to me because in America, I've heard Guk as a derogatory term for Asians.

- Chips

Learning Korean

Yes, we are trying. We could live our entire year in Korea not having to speak much Korean. You can do ok with a few words and hand gestures. But we are going to try to learn. I have a feeling that our experience will be a bit richer being able to talk to the natives. Chips is taking a class every week and I'm looking off her notes. We can now read a bit of Hangul and say please and thank you and butterfly and yes and no and few other words and phrases.

Not much more to write home about yet. Trying to get back into the routine of blogging though. Anyong...

Wow We're Slackers

It's been a little over a month here in a different freaking country and we've barely blogged about our experiences here. To be fair, the first month has been an insane ride of trying to get used to things and we're extremely busy. And unmotivated.

So. Yeah. One month. And we're still trying to figure out two major things:
- a regular schedule
- food

I work technically fewer hours here in Korea than I did when I worked a full time job in Seattle. But it doesn't feel like it. So Seattle, I worked full time (at least 40 hours a week but usually 45-50 hours a week) plus theater on the side. Weekends did not matter to me because I was performing or rehearsing or teching anyway. That was my life in Seattle. Here in Korea, I teach about 25 hours per week plus preparation time. I haven't done theater or explored a whole heck of a lot. WHY AM I SO TIRED ALL THE TIME?! I think it's a combination of several reasons:

1. I'm getting old. Ships and I are one of the oldest (if not THE oldest) teachers in our hagwon. This means we tire more easily and require at least 8 hours of sleep now.
2. We work odd hours. 4pm-10pm (but we usually show up an hour or two earlier). After work, there's dinner, followed by unwinding. We get to bed by 2am usually. Wake up at 9:30am or 10am. Prep some more for work. Get ready for work. Eat. Then head to work. It's lame. And it's never ending.
3. It's too damn hot to do anything. Like leave the apartment. Or get up.
4. It's takes a lot of effort to explore and do cool things. We had epic plans of checking out the Daegu International Musical Festival but the websites were all in Korean. The online translations were crap. So we called this hotline where they try to translate things for you in English. There was a lot of calling back and forth, trying to figure out times and locations for this musical. Then we had to call to figure out how to get there via bus and subway. Then we had to look up and learn a few phrases in Korean for the actual journey there. In the end, we just decided to go some other time.

Regarding food. I don't need to explain this too much. We're trying to be brave. It's a slow process. I'll post up picture soon.