We have moved!

Come join us at our new blog:
http://wheninuiwang.blogspot.com

Learn about our NEW jobs, NEW apartments (plural!), and all of our other NEW adventures When in Uiwang!

See you soon!

Tracy and Sandy

Wrapping up at our Hogwan

Well, it was a wonderful year teaching kindergarten and elementary kids, but it was time to move on. (Plus, our kindergarten kids were going to go to different schools starting March 1, so we couldn’t have taught them anyways.)

So, we have moved on to bigger and better things. Public schools, that is. Literally bigger (approx. 800 kids per school I think vs. 30 for kinder!) and literally better (benefits, working hours, teaching hours, vacation etc.). But we are going to miss our Hogwan students so much!!

I remember when the kids first climbed into our laps. You do NOT do that in Canada. But in Korea, it’s encouraged.

There was a BIG graduation performance for the kinder students. They even got to wear little grad caps and gowns!

 Graduation, even from kindergarten, is very important in Korea. The kids who graduated out of kinder and started elementary school on March 1 were taken for photos for the occasion (mutiple shots, different outfits, group and individual portraits!) and all the kids at our place sat for a group shot with all the teachers as well.

The performance was on a big stage with a sound system, inflatable castle/fairy tale themed background set and multiple costume changes!! Multiple!! The set and costumes were rented from one company and I heard through the grape vine (does anyone even use that phrase anymore? Me, apparently) that there was over $1000 spent on those two things alone.

Children’s events like these really are JUST for the parents, aren’t they? It wasn’t spectacularily fun to do these constume changes and for them to learn many different songs, dances, speeches and miniature scripts. It was stressful even to watch! But, some kids were so incredibly proud of themselves and that was good to see. They sure deserve the credit for what they pulled together.

These kids were our life for a year. (Literally, a year as we only had 9 days off in total.) They will never know how much they affected us. They made all the hard times in Korea worth it. Some days it is hard to get out of bed and go into a workplace you are unhappy with. But we always did it for them. We wanted to be the best teachers we could be, for them. At the beginning (and for months) they drove me (Tracy) to tears – kindergarten teacher is the hardest job I have ever had (which is not surprising,  is it?) – but they also gave us our most treasured memories of Korea. I can say honestly that there is not one kid-lit of this group that we disliked. They were all wonderful little people! We are so thankful to have had them in our lives.

UPDATE:

This past Sunday we were able to get together with half of the students we taught in Osan. We hadn’t seen them since the end of February, and it was so wonderful. We went to a great café that has all these areas for the kids to play in. Parents pay $5 and must buy a beverage and/or food and their kids get to play in the space: there were areas to play ‘house’, a ball pit, jungle-gym-thingy (like the big ones at McDonalds) and even a bouncy castle! They had so much fun (and us too!).

Busy, busy

Well, we have been super busy over the last month to say the least.

We wrapped up our contracts with our hogwan (private after school education centre) and have moved on. To Uiwang, to be exact!

But before we get to that! I have a few quick food related things to post!

1. Maaaamoth Mandarins

Related to my last post about sweeties, here is a new treat we were able to try. I can’t find any information online as to their origns but, as you will see, they are quite impressive:

On the left is a ‘regular’ orange of average size. And on the right, a mandarin orange of mammoth proportions.

It peeled and tasted like a particularily delicious mandarin orange. Wonderful!

2. Cute Crabs!

Check out these crab flavoured chips. I love all things in fun shapes.

Once you get over the fact that they do indeed taste like crab, they are pretty good.

Oh, and my nails were painted like penguins. Why? Why not!

3. Chicken noodle soup – Korean style

The last time I had a cold I was directed to check out a ‘rice soup’ or ‘rice porridge’ restaurant. I was happy to try it! It is supposed to be very good for your health. It is about the consistency of water-y oatmeal (D you would hate it!) with a mild flavour of chicken and ginseng. It is served hot with all the traditional Korean side dishes. It was perfect to have when I was feeling sick.

We will update you soon about what is going on in 2013 for us!

Around Osan: Sweeties

A nice grocery store find:

Fruit is so expensive here and these were 2 for 1 so I was able to get $8 of these bad boys for $8. I figured, they look like green grapefruit…I like grapefruit….what do I have to lose?

Turns out these are called “sweeties” or “oroblancos” and they are a cross between grapefruits and pomelos.

They are the size of a large grapefruit but have very thick porous skin so that the size of the fruit inside is much smaller.

The flesh is a yellow-y colour. The way Sandy and I would describe it is a mild taste of orange with the sour/bitter (me: delicious, Sandy: horrific) taste of a grapefruit.

Food adventure #6282 deemed: Me — Successful!! Sandy — Unfortunate.

We are having technical difficulties!

Sorry for any confusion regarding the order of recent posts. 5 of some of my most recent posts are sitting at the very bottom of all of the posts I have done. I am having trouble fixing it and haven’t been able to get any help from wordpress :s

We thank you for your patience… and have a great day!

Things the Same: The Movie Theatre Edition

There is a surprisingly large amount of movies from the US that come to our area, but sometimes it feels like disappointingly few. (First world problem)

We were so excited to see the new Bond movie and after a few weeks of it out, we went into Suwon to see it. But guess what was playing… not Bond, no, no. It was Twilight! Noooooooo! Common! Twilight!? Bond was taken out early for that?

*sigh*

Anyways, we were not going to let that happen again, so we were set on seeing The Hobbit as soon as it came out. Plus, we were pretty excited  to see it (okay, very, very excited).

Fun facts about movie theatres in Korea:

1. They serve beer. They do look at you strange when you buy one in the afternoon though. What? If you can buy beer, you have to buy it at least once! No? Just me?

Can you see? That’s 2 beer and 2 hot dogs for your movie going pleasure. $9 well spent

2. No lines! Okay, well, there are a lot of people but everyone takes a number and kind of mills around until their number comes up. It’s nicer than being confined to a line, though.

You can wait about 5 min to buy tickets from a person. Or you can use the machine that has an English option

3. When you buy your ticket you will notice that there is a seat number! All tickets are reserve seating which I think is pretty awesome. But, it has its down side, too. If you want to go to a popular movie spur of the moment, there may not be any good seats left. I think the reserve seating is related to the next fun fact:

4. You are not allowed to go into the theatre until 10 minutes before show time. Rather, you wait outside in the lobby area where they have seating and a big screen with trailers/ads. When it’s time to go in, it will show up on the sign (yellow and green in the picture) in Korean and English. Reserve seating helps prevent a mad rush for good seats.

5. They have ‘Sweet Heart’ seats which are essentially love seats with cup holders. They cost about $34 in total, but you get a wickedly comfortable movie spot that has great views and no arm rests digging into you when you try to hold hands.

6. There are Korean subtitles! Not surprising of course. All the big Hollywood movies are subtitled but have original audio. I have heard that you may come across dubbed Korean movies but we haven’t stumbled onto any except for childrens movies which we can only find dubbed (we wanted to see Wreck-it Ralph!) but that seems pretty reasonable.

7. Tickets are cheaper than in Canada! A typical movie will cost around $8 and only slightly higher for 3D or Imax. If you want to go Sweet Heart seats though, those tickets bump up to $17.

I hope you enjoyed learning about movies in Korea!

Anyang Halla Hockey!

Just in time for the end of the lock out, Sandy and I went to a hockey game in Anyang! Team Halla (halla!) vs. a Japanese teams whose name I can’t remember. Whoops.It was great fun!!

Korea is part of the Asian Hockey League with teams from Japan and China. But, hockey is not very big here. Case and point: look at the size of this professional hockey league areana:

You could actually count, by hand, the number of people there. You could introduce yourself to all of them if you wanted to, too!

It was great fun, though! Get your long johns (no indoor heating), pay $8 for a ticket, bring in a beer from the convience store and watch three periods of hockey. The crowd was pretty good especially in our section because there were many foreigners who were quite excited to see hockey! But not as excited as the official cheer section you see at all pro sport games:

New Years!

We hope you all had a fantastic New Years!

Spent ours in Icheon, a small city with hotsprings. While our vacation (2 nights) was a little bumpy (forgot our swimsuits! no restaurants were open!) we did find a cool place to have dinner one night. Reminded me a little of the cheesiness of a Red Lobster! It was called Rum Boat.

Had a small boat right in the middle of the restaurant and everything.

Happy New Year!

Gwangju: The Long Version and the Too Long Didn’t Read (TLDR)

In the fall, Sandy and I visited the city of Gwangju. Originally, we had been offered a job to work there but it fell through as some things do. But, I had done a lot of research about the city when we first intended to live there and so had to see it anyways!Gwangju has a powerful history. It is seen by some as the centre of the democratic movement in Korea because of its history but also its continued focus on the rights associated with this form of government.

Thanks to this website, here is the rundown that stays quite true to the history materials that were available in the city. (Scroll down for the TLDR):

Tens of thousands of students and other protestors poured into the streets of Gwangju (Kwangju), a city in southwestern South Korea in the spring of 1980.  They were protesting the state of martial law that had been in force since a coup that previous year, which had brought down the dictator Park Chung-hee and replaced him with military strongman General Chun Doo-hwan.

…

Outraged by the crackdown [on the rights and movement of students and other activists], about 200 students went to the front gate of Chonnam University in Gyungju [sic] early on the morning of May 18.  There they met thirty paratroopers, who had been sent to keep them off the campus.  The paratroopers charged the students with clubs, and the students responded by throwing rocks.

The students then marched downtown, attracting more supporters as they went.  By early afternoon, local police were overwhelmed by 2,000 protestors.

…

By the morning of May 20, there were more than 10,000 people protesting downtown.

That day, the army sent in an additional 3,000 paratroopers.  The special forces beat people with clubs, stabbed and mutilated them with bayonets, and threw at least twenty to their deaths from high buildings.  The soldiers used tear gas and live ammunition indiscriminately, shooting in to the crowds.

On May 21, the violence in Gwangju escalated to its height.  As the soldiers fired round after round into the crowds, protestors broke in to police stations and armories, taking rifles, carbines and even two machine guns.  Students mounted one of the machine guns on the roof of the university’s medical school.

…

By the morning of May 22, the army had pulled out entirely from Gwangju, establishing a cordon around the city.

…

Meanwhile, inside Gwangju, teams of professionals and students formed committees to provide medical care for the wounded, funerals for the dead, and compensation for the families of victims.  Influenced by Marxist ideals, some of the students arranged to cook communal meals for the people of the city.  For five days, the people ruled Gwangju.

…

On May 27, at 4:00 in the morning, five divisions of paratroopers moved in to Gwangju’s downtown.  Students and citizens tried to block their way by lying in the streets, while the armed citizen militias prepared for a renewed firefight.  After an hour and a half of desperate fighting, the army seized control of the city once more.

…

In the aftermath of the horrific Gwangju Massacre, the administration of General Chun lost most of its legitimacy in the eyes of the Korean people.  Pro-democracy demonstrations throughout the 1980s cited the Gwangju Massacre, and demanded that the perpetrators face punishment.

General Chun held on as president until 1988, when under intense pressure, he allowed democratic elections.

TLDR: When the government was seizing too much control and taking away the rights of citizens a pro-democracy uprising occurred in Gwangju. When the protest turned violent the protestors forced the military out and held the city. In the end, the army took back Gwangju. Thousands were either dead, missing, or injured. This incident has been remembered as the turning point in the democratic movement in Korea.

We went to see the memorial and found a somber and beautiful site with the requisite student protester statue and wall of names for the dead.

It was a nice memorial but nothing spectacular.

Going to the archive of the events leading up to May 18, 1980 and spanning until the adoption of democracy in Korea proved to be much more interesting. There, we were given thorough information for further reading which I devoured in some unknown lust for dull university-esque material.

Gwangju was a really pretty city and all the leaves were changing there and along the way by train which was so nice.

A random note on Gwangju: I felt more aware of my ‘foreign-ness’ in Gwangju. Perhaps living close to Seoul means that people in this area of the country are used to seeing many foreigners and generally you only get the blatant stare of disbelief from babies (so funny! they look at you like you have 6 arms!) or small kids. But, in Gwangju I felt more stares and comments. It didn’t feel all together unfriendly but was something I noticed nonetheless.

Happy December 25th!

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it. To everyone else, we hope you are happy and healthy this entire holiday season and in the New Year too!