Dropping in on North Korea

I finally had my trip to North Korea this past weekend! It was a fun adventure and a good experience. I went with a group of about 90 foreigners. We left late Friday night, attempted to sleep on the bus, and got off and checked through in both the South (drove through the DMZ) and then the North Immigration office. You couldn't bring your cell phone, camcorders, cameras with too much zoom, etc...into North Korea. You were very limited on what you could take pictures of. There were soldiers spread out throughout the area we drove through either standing in fields or in little huts in their full uniform with red flags. If they saw anyone take pictures of soldiers or landscape from the bus they would throw up their flag and all the buses would have to stop (there were around 12 buses). They would go through all the cameras and delete all your pics if you were the one who took the pic. I believe you would also get a hefty fine. Anyways, there were some amazing shots that I really wish I could have taken but yeah...

We did a lot of hiking and went to hot springs on the first day in Geumgangsan area. The weather was rather chilly but it was a good time overall. There are a lot of people standing on guard throughout the trail so they could fine you if you did anything wrong...It was beautiful though and typical Korean hiking (waiting in line to get up the mountain). I believe this weekend there were about 1,000 of us Tourists in the area; last weekend 2,000.

When we were on the bus we were able to see some North Koreans but I definitely wonder how much of it was propaganda. Everyone bikes or walks everywhere it seems, including the soldiers, but the area is so empty. There were random clumps of shacks but they seemed miles apart from one another. Anyways, when you walked anywhere it seemed that there were soldiers watching your every move. One of my friends and I walked to the pic of Kim Jong-il -North Korean Pres.(a little ways from the hotel) and there was one path for the foreigners and a guarded off area a couple feet away for the North Koreans with guards everywhere. There were tanks sitting on some mountains too. crazy...

The trip overall has definitely raised a lot of questions for me about North Korea though. I obviously would have loved to see more of the villages and people, and see what true North Korea was like but you take what you can get I suppose. Anyways, I can't really describe the whole experience in a blog but the trip overall was good and I wish I could have stayed longer.

I'll put my pics on my flick account so if you're interested you can take a look.

On a random note though, I have been sick for about a month and I have no idea how to get over it. I've gone to the doctor but it hasn't really helped...hmmm hopefully I'll get better soon.

Teaching with Avalon-well, I'll write about that more next time. The new students are good right now but give them a couple weeks and I could be singing a different song. :) We are getting some new teachers pretty soon so hopefully that will be good. Okay I think I'm going to go to the doctor again so I'll write more later. I hope you all are well much love from Korea----

Happy Chinese New Year!

Well last weekend I finally was able to get out of Korea and check out Beijing. It was amazing...I was only there for 4 days but we fit a lot in. I went on a guided tour group with a size of about 10. We were able to see the Temple of Heaven, Forbidden City, Ming Tombs, Tianamin Square, Great Wall, and much more. I can't explain it all in a blog but I'll give a short summary at least:)

The 2008 Summer Olympics are going to be held there so there was a ton of construction going on. We were able to see the Bird's Nest (one of the stadiums for the Olympics that's being built) and a lot of buildings being torn down. It was great to hear another language and get a different feel of Asia. There are a lot more bikes, older cars, bargaining, and greasy food in China :) Beijing currently has 2 subway lines I believe, and they want to have 15 lines by next year for the Olympics...crazy!

The Great Wall was definitely one of the highlights of the trip. It was rather steep I have to say! whew! I believe we got to the highest part of the Great Wall out of the 4,000 Miles that it is...anyways it was beautiful and surreal. The weather was great, there were a ton of people, and yeah...it was wonderful. I didn't realize that it was so mountainous..I loved it.

One of the other man highlights was the White Cloud Temple. The people celebrate the New Year for 15 days (Spring Festival), so a group of us had the last day free and hoped to find some festivities in the city, and we did :)We saw a huge line of people and wanted to check it out. We figured it must be something good if all the locals are there.

It was amazing. Everyone was carrying incense and praying, monks were throwing the incense in the fire, there was security all over the place and hardly any tourists! yay! It was one of the most surreal and beautiful experiences I've had so far.

We also went to an outdoor market during one of the evenings. It was pretty sweet I have to say. I had silkworm on a stick and I don't' really recommend it...yeah...
The food overall though was delicious. I felt that the daily routine became :
eat, walk for a little bit, eat, walk a little more, eat, chill, eat, sit on a bus, etc...
but the food was good and very greasy/oily. I think I gained like 5lbs in 4 days...oi. :) It was nice not to have spicy food for a change. Okay well that is a very quick summary on my stay in China. Maybe I'll get back there before I leave Asia, but we'll see. :)
My only disappointment about the trip was that I didn't get to see any parades with dragons or any lantern festivals...sad...but I shouldn't complain.

anyways I'll post my pics on my flickr account so check em out if ya want.

I guess the only other news is that I am finally done with Pre-School! yay! I have my mornings back!They had their graduation on Friday and it was pretty darn cute. Even though they can be a pain sometimes, I'll definitely miss them, some more than others :)

Our Avalon program also starts in a week so all of us foreign teachers have some seminars we need to attend next week..fun fun fun...a good break from teaching though. Okay I believe this entry is getting a little long so I will depart. Hope all is well and I'll write more soon!

The Power of Avalon

So I realize it's been a little while since I last wrote in here, the reason being, a combination of both lack of time and lack of anything extremely exciting. I figure I would spare you all from reading a complete bland entry and wait until something at least a little entertaining happened. :)
Our school is switiching over from E.C.C to Avalon on March 5. The slogan is "The Power of Avalon" and yet I continue to associate it with Avon and Powerade...anyways everything here is blue and white and says Abolon in Korean (the Korean alphabet doesn't have a "v" sound). Our curriculum as well as length and size of classes are changing which hopefully will be good...hopefully :) We are moving into 80 minute classes and I don't know if I can hold students' attention for that long. We'll see.

The weather has been pretty warm. No major ice storms, snow storms, or any storms really, so I'm not missing the mid-west in regards to weather :) I'm still doing pre-school in the a.m. and el.ed in the evening. The kids have way more energy than me! oi.

Well I am feeling like I'm at my low with my stay here so far. The first couple months were great; full of new adventures, hikes, etc... but I think teaching these long days make me too tired on the weekends to do anything too adventurous. I have been visiting different churches in Seoul which has been great. There is a large English Ministry in Seoul called Onnuri so I've been checking out their 2 campuses. Hopefully I'll get more connected in the near future.

I still haven't had time to go to Holt yet but I have been involved with G.O.A.L which is an organization in Korea that helps connect Korean adoptees with fellow adoptees and also supplies a wide range of resources for adoptees (helping find families, jobs, community,..) So I've been getting a little more involved in that circle.

This upcoming weekend though is the main highlight of my week. I will finally be out of this country for a couple days and will be able to spend the weekend in Bejing with my girl Kychele over the Lunar New Years!! Great wall here I come! I'm super excited and hopefully I'll feel a little more refreshed when I return on Monday. I'm going on a guided tour so that should hopefully be good (less stressful....I get stressed out way to easily as most of you know! ) Anyways I should get rollin. I have taekwondo practice....I love it but man it's rough :)

Good Times...

This past weekend was culture packed, love it :) I was invited to my first Korean wedding which took place on Saturday. One of the Canadian teachers at E.C.C. married a former Korean teacher. The ceremony was pretty much as opposite from the traditional dutch weddings as you can get. I really can't explain it in a blog, but just so you can get an idea, it involved fog, confetti, and lasted about 15 minutes. Anyways, there was a nice buffet to follow which I took full advantage of :)

On Saturday one of my friends that I worked with in Montana arrived in Korea with her mother. They are here to pick up a new member of their family which is always exciting. Anyways, I was able to meet up with them on Sunday and spend the day together. It was a fun filled day in Seoul. We went to a Korean Theatre in the afternoon. It was great to hear some traditional Korean music and see some Korean dancing. There is so much to learn! The instruments they use and history of each form of music is very interesting. After the show we all headed outdoors and the performers formed a line and started dancing/skipping/and playing music. They invited some of us to join in so Jen (my friend) and I jumped it. Good times.

The performers wore Hanbok which is traditional Korean clothing; bright and beautiful! After the show we met up with a Korean family that they {Jen and her mom} knew from home. They were absolutely lovely. They took us to Korean House which is a very traditional Korean restaurant. It involved about 8 courses it seemed and a ton of side dishes. I ate eel for the first time, and I'm sure some other things I wasn't aware of.

Anyways I officially like Korean pumpkin soup and seaweed.

Great stuff. Korean food seems to be very healthy for you (for the most part), but extremely spicy. They also have different kinds of kimchi depending on the season. Winter kimchi is pretty good for the most part but I have yet to figure out what the differences are between the seasonal kimchi.

After we were stuffed we went to another Korean theatre show at the restaurant. There were some new acts that I hadn't seen in the previous show, but a lot of it was similar to what we had seen before. There were drummers, dancers, dancing drummers, singers, and many other musicians. It was great.

Work has been going well. I'm still doing pre-school which is going better. It's still pretty draining to do morning and afternoon/evening classes, but it's going alright. The children are starting to grow on me more and I think I'm getting a little more patient! (yay! ;)The weather has been alright. I'm a little disappointed I haven't seen much snow this winter but what do ya do. I guess that's about it for now. There's alot I still want to see and get involved in in the area but all in due time I suppose.

Oh, I also added a link to my photos on flickr, so if you're interested take a peak :)

Ho hum hum...

Well nothing major has happened this past week. Let's see, I'm still doing pre-school and middle school. Supposedly I'm done with Pre-school at the beginning of February but I'll believe it once it happens. This past weekend a new teacher/roommate from Canada arrived, so I'm currently living with an Irish and Canadian. I believe we are getting about 3 more teachers over the course of the next month or so which will be nice (more Canadian and Irish).

This past weekend I was able to check out a new church. It was a larger English service which was great and I enjoyed it for the most part. One of the downfalls though is it is about and hour and a half away by subway. I think I might check out a couple other ones closer to me. Hopefully I'll find one soon.

It's been a good experience to be the foreigner. I feel like I'm getting a taste of what my international friends in the states go through. And to think that I'm only doing it for a year and they do it years at a time. crazy.

I feel like it's finally hitting me that I'm here for 9 more months. I'm looking forward to it though. There's a lot of travelling I need to do (nationally and internationally), adoption info I need to figure out, songs that need to be sung etc...should be a good year.
One of my girlfriends that I worked with in Montana is coming this weekend (with her mother) to pick up her new baby brother. Asian babies are just too cute to resist ;)
Adoption is an amazing experience for both the adopters as well as the adoptees. I love it! Anyways, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing a familiar face!

Other than that I guess nothing new is happening. The weeks go by so fast and the weekends even faster. Crazy. I'll write more soon if something exciting is happening ;) Sorry that this entry is so random. I'm feelin kind of off right now... or maybe that's just an excuse. :)

New Experiences...

This past week was a relaxing teaching week. I only had 2-6 classes a day rather than the 9-12 (no pre-school for a week), but I got in the routine of going to bed late which made going back to my busy schedule this morning rather difficult. The students had a lot of energy today...or I should say more so than normal. It was good to see them again though. I am finally starting to feel like this is my home which is nice. (Don't worry, I'll still come back to America sometime :)

There's so much I want to do while I'm here. I'm rather worried I won't be able to get it all done within the year but I'll try. It's dangerous though because I rationalize my spendings here (and everywhere I suppose) by continually telling myself it may be a once in a life time experience...it's okay for small things but when it becomes a matter of plane tickets and such, well, that can be dangerous :) All my money should be going towards paying for my B.A. degree..but ya only live once right? ;) I'm still hoping my music/german degree will make me money someday...hmmm...:)

Well this weekend was pretty eventful. So the "once in a lifetime" mindset carried over into this past weekend. I pretty much will try anything once when it comes to food and so on Friday night a group of us went out and........ I had my first experience eating dog. it's true...and i love dogs too! here it is...yup. (sorry for those that have a weak stomach). We had dog soup and dog with veggies. There was a lot of fat, it was expensive, and it really didn't taste good at all. So basically I'll never eat it again but it was an experience (not necessarily a good one though :).

I also got a new hairstyle this weekend. I usually get my haircut once or twice a year while everyone here seems to get a new hairdo or cut like once a month. anyways, I 'm use to people taking like 30-40 minutes to cut my hair just for trim. Well I go into this little haircutting area on the 2nd floor of my school building and this lady sits me down and starts hackin away! crazy! No washing, no small comb to makes sure all the cuts are even, no careful eyeing of the hair, nope, none of that...just her fingers, scissors, a large comb, and a barrette to hold back some of the hair. The haircut took about 8-10 minutes. amazing. 10 inches off in under 10 minutes. crazy. anyways, it's decent for the most part..:)

On saturday night a group of us went to Hongdae in Seoul which has a great night scene. We went to an amazing which was....get this...all you can eat and drink for about $22 USD. I love Korea! :) As most of you know I looooove food so, yeah it was pretty great :) They had a ton of meat, seafood, kimchi (of course), soups, octopus..yup it was nice. Full of foreigners :) I'll be heading back there for sure :) I would still take grilled steak and potatos with special K cookies over the buffet though...ahh...nothing can beat that.

So those were some of the events that have been taking place this past week. We are having new teachers come this weekend and one current teacher is leaving this week. Crazy. I'm starting to study Korean (finally!) so hopefully I'll be studious and start crackin down on the language.

Alright, I'm calllin it a night. :)

Cheers to 2007!

Well 2007 is here! It's always interesting to reflect on 2006 and see the journey I've been on. 2006 has especially been an exciting year---finishing undergrad at Calvin, having great friends get married, working at FMG, working in the mountains in Montana, being blessed with another niece, and wrapping the year up in South Korea. Love it! I'm looking forward to see how I grow throughout this next year and hopefully get some more travelling under my belt. There's a lot of opportunities to be taken advantage of out here, so bring it on :)

I received the new year in Gyeong-ju, which is near Busan (South-East part of the country). This was the capital city during the Silla Kingdom I travelled with Kathy Teacher and checked out the country down there. It was great to see farming land again and get away from the city.

I was able to visit the famous Buddhist temple, Bulguksa. This temple contains 7 of Korea's National treasures and is on the World Heritage List. It is gorgeous. The roofing is beautiful along with the stone pagodas. yup. I'll hopefully post more images later on a website. The Seokguram Grotto is also nearby (large Buddha in the mountains) but I didn't have time to hike to it. I believe most of it was destroyed during the Japanese occupation though. The mountain ranges are a beautiful sight though. oi.

We also checked out the tombs where Silla Kings were buried. (It was a tomb park actually). I really liked this pic of the tree on the tomb... reminded me of the tree from Der Kleine Prinz.

anyways.

There is always so much to see and of course not enough time. I'll hopefully go back to this area during the spring so I can see the cherry blossoms! :) I'm already excited!

Kathy and I then headed back home. I had my first chance to drive in Korea...crazy. I realize I'm not an aggressive enough driver; my chevy use to be intimidating enough. Driving was fun but it was a long haul; I think it was about a 6 hour drive.

Well, this week I don't have any pre-school classes which is nice :) I can sleep in and relax. I guess there's not much more to write so I'll be signing off for now.

I hope you are all having a great start to the New year ;)