1) You, automatically, answer the question, "How are you?" with "I'm-fine-thank-you-and-you." Then proceed to ask the rest of the three questions ("How's the weather?" and "What day is it today?") as if you were the fucking old man at the Bridge of Death.
2) You meet someone new and ask them, "Do you teach public or private?"
3) You are on Facebook half the day, at work, and have downloaded AIM, Yahoo Messenger, and Skype on your work computer.
4) New arrivals to Korea, or friends back home, ask you how work is going. And you laugh kind of hysterically.
5) You are starting to believe that knowing "hello" in a foreign language really does mean you speak that language.
6) You have gotten used to wearing high heels walking to work-- and then changing into bedroom slippers when you arrive.
7) You think eating kimchi will absolutely prevent swine flu and may actually cure death.
8) You get excited at the prospect of actually teaching.
9) You are only mildly annoyed at the students' obvious panick when you call on them to answer a question.
10) You want to adopt the kids in your class that pay attention.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Halloween Weekend Part II OR My First Trip to the DMZ
After a nice evening of ridiculous costumes and Indian food and political thought, I awoke early to meet up with the group for the DMZ tour. My friend wasn't going along, it was just me, so he left to go back to the base. I was dressed in my very colorful winter coat, all tie dye colors and embroidered, advertised by the woman selling it as a Prada knockoff. So, as I reflected with another girl waiting for the tour bus, there really weren't many of these out there and the ones that WERE were real and not like MY cheap copy (well, not THAT cheap...)
I was definitely excited about this one. The first time I tried to get an idea of the relationship between North and South Korea....here....was with the son of one of the teachers, about 19 years old, and I asked him if Koreans, meaning South Koreans, ever visited North Korea. He said they did, rather doubtfully, but that there were a lot of restrictions, could only visit certain places and couldnt take anything back, even rocks and stuff, as if it were a national park.
So that was my first glimpse.
My second was visiting the DMZ.
Let me say here, the DMZ is one of the few things in Korea I would have been sad to miss. I mean, I simply HAD to do it. And we all felt a bit nervous with anticipation. After all, we'd none of us been this close to North Korea and all we knew, the majority being Americans, was how evil it was and Kim Il Jong and nukes. It kind of only existed on television and so far away it wasn't even as real as Iraq....
Our first encounter was with a soldier who came on to the bus to check our passports. The tour guide told us to "please not be afraid" which made half the bus laugh, but then we shut up when the soldier boarded... Although one guy snapped a photo of his back.
Our first stop was the Bridge of Freedom, which was next to a small amusement park. I forget the name of the park. But we all had fun running around, happily snapping pictures of the Korean army statues and this sign that said to not take a picture of, and these people on the bridge seemed to be yelling at us, and us standing next to the leaflets and ribbons hanging off the barrier blocking us from crossing further onto the bridge. A Korean guy asked us to take a picture of me and a few other Americans....and so we did and then I asked him to stand so I could take a picture of him.
I bought some fluffy pink and yellow DMZ towels at the next stop, which was a restaurant, typical Korean style of a bowl of boiling tofu soup and a small metal bowl filled with rice and various side dishes, including my favorite kim chee (radishes). I also snapped a picture of a guard who unfortunately turned his head at the moment I took it. Ah, well.
Next, we were shown a movie about the DMZ. Then the screen lifted, magically, and we passed through into the museum. It actually took quite a while to herd us all through and the Koreans being shuffled into the room behind us seemed to get irritated at being delayed in watching the film. The coolest part was the DMZ diorama below the glass floor.
Then we got to pass through the 3rd Tunnel, at least walk down a bit of it to where the first blockade was put up to stop the invasion of North Koreans. The 3rd Tunnel, for those of you, like myself, who were previously ignorant of what the 3rd Tunnel is, is one of four tunnels the North Koreans built under the DMZ towards Seoul. The 3rd Tunnel entrance happens to be closest to Seoul, so that is the one the tour visits. Apparently you could actually feel the rumbling of the ground as it was being built, which was what tipped the South Koreans off in the first place. They discovered it after investigating the disturbance.
The South Koreans think there might be as many as twenty tunnels. I was unclear whether North Korea has acknowledged these. Signs in the tunnel said that North Koreans had painted the walls with coal to claim they were a coal mine. But that they didn't admit to them being a means of invasion.
I was not allowed to take a picture inside the tunnel, but I did snap one of myself, posed Billie Jean style, in a yellow hard hat. At the bottom of the underground pathway to the actual tunnel was a fresh water spring. It reminded me of the Fountain of Youth tourist attraction, which another girl on the trip had coincidentally been to before. She thought it was pretty ridiculous, too, the Fountain of Youth, anyway. Basically, it was this huge room filled with plastic people and maybe cardboard cutouts to make up this silly recreation of an Indian gathering and Pontes discovering the fountain...and in the middle was this rather pathetic little spring. They charged twelve dollars, or maybe sixteen dollars, to go see it.
I passed the fountain, and ducked into the tunnel. I could walk straight up, but it seemed like I'd hit my head (protected with a hard hat of course) if I stood up. I tried to imagine 10,000 soldiers passing through here in one hour. That's the number of soldiers (armed and fully geared, unarmed: 30,000) that could come through in that time. Me and two other Americans characteristically mocked it by pretending to be North Koreans marching through...but it was still intimidating. The Korean War was, after all, real.... Just was a bit closer to me now than it had been before. ...sort of like how the Cold War became more real when I visited Moscow... ...travel really does make the past come alive and the future seem more exciting..
We arrived next at the DMZ itself. There was an outdoor patio with observation platforms. You had to stand in behind a yellow line marked "photo line." If you stepped beyond and tried, they would take your camera and delete the photos. Some of the foreigners in our group tried to be cute by sitting on someone's shoulders...but they deleted the pictures all the same. Or standing on the wall. This happened several times. It was pretty cool to be looking right at the DMZ, but they were nonetheless pictures of a blurry panorama with some fuzzy buildings. Not really great pictures.
Our final stop was a fake train from Seoul to Pyongyang (the North Korean capital). We'd all been promised we could get our passports stamped here, and so, in like manner to little kids getting all excited about getting their "passports" stamped at national parks, we all wanted ours stamped. I'd brought mine specifically for that.
We walked into the "station." It was set up like the Lied's Discover grocery store, or similar. Made up to look like a train station. I took pictures of the departing/arriving schedule. There was this whole map laid out, a railroad system that would transport you all across the Euro-Asian continent, and I think it was part real...but Korea-- South-- couldn't access it because they were blocked, landwise, by North Korea. And as one of the guides mentioned, North Korea was hardly going to let South Korea pass across their country to save on freight costs without severe pressures, probably most effective from China. Cheaper, the guide said, to use freight to ship than boats like they used now.
I took this opportunity to discuss relationships between the divided nation. He seemed to think South Korea was more open to the idea of reuniting (the idea of the two countries reuniting is an idea I've been thinking of ever since I read an article http://tinyurl.com/yffrjhm which talked about how China wasn't as opposed to the concept as they might have been before).
And that they wanted to, but North Korea didn't....how this train could be real, leading from Seoul to Pyongyang, but it would be stopped by North Korea. There is still definite animosity towards North Koreans (as evidenced from rhetoric in the DMZ museum, video, etc about N.K. as "invaders," sneaky, underhanded, brutal...perhaps understandably, but a lot of regular people don't seem to think that is an important as reunification. I think they would like it to happen. I mentioned how "Korea" to Americans means South Korea, whereas North Korea is always referred to with the "North" as a marker. He told me something interesting.
Korea, South Korea, does the same thing. He said Koreans have a word, "Hanguk," for Korea...and this is the word I learned. But Korea also has another word that they use, "Nam-han," "nam" being their word for "south," and "Puk-an," "puk" meaning "north." In my lonely planet Korean phrasebook, North Korea and South Korea are referred to as the latter. But I've never heard any Korean call their country using that name.
I nearly missed my opportunity to check out the waiting platform, so I flew through the gate (the guy who took my 50 won/50 cent USD "ticket" wasn;t even there to tear it), and took a few snapshots of me waiting for a train. I guess, while I was discussing politics with the tour guide, a girl had actually gotten ON a train. And it left with her. She called a friend, frantically, a few minutes later. She had, naturally, no idea what to do. The train was run automatically. One tour guide seemed to think she'd get off okay and be able to take a bus back..or maybe even a subway station close by.
We pulled out of the station in our red tour bus, letting the day sink in. Our tour guide announced that "We only lost one person today." I ate some waffle cookies and slept until we arrived in Seoul. Then I relaxed for an hour, ate dinner with a guy I met on the bus, got a delicious pastry topped with cream and kiwi and mandarin oranges and some apricot tea, and caught the train at the last minute. Where I met two quite interesting deaf Koreans. But that is another story.
I was definitely excited about this one. The first time I tried to get an idea of the relationship between North and South Korea....here....was with the son of one of the teachers, about 19 years old, and I asked him if Koreans, meaning South Koreans, ever visited North Korea. He said they did, rather doubtfully, but that there were a lot of restrictions, could only visit certain places and couldnt take anything back, even rocks and stuff, as if it were a national park.
So that was my first glimpse.
My second was visiting the DMZ.
Let me say here, the DMZ is one of the few things in Korea I would have been sad to miss. I mean, I simply HAD to do it. And we all felt a bit nervous with anticipation. After all, we'd none of us been this close to North Korea and all we knew, the majority being Americans, was how evil it was and Kim Il Jong and nukes. It kind of only existed on television and so far away it wasn't even as real as Iraq....
Our first encounter was with a soldier who came on to the bus to check our passports. The tour guide told us to "please not be afraid" which made half the bus laugh, but then we shut up when the soldier boarded... Although one guy snapped a photo of his back.
Our first stop was the Bridge of Freedom, which was next to a small amusement park. I forget the name of the park. But we all had fun running around, happily snapping pictures of the Korean army statues and this sign that said to not take a picture of, and these people on the bridge seemed to be yelling at us, and us standing next to the leaflets and ribbons hanging off the barrier blocking us from crossing further onto the bridge. A Korean guy asked us to take a picture of me and a few other Americans....and so we did and then I asked him to stand so I could take a picture of him.
I bought some fluffy pink and yellow DMZ towels at the next stop, which was a restaurant, typical Korean style of a bowl of boiling tofu soup and a small metal bowl filled with rice and various side dishes, including my favorite kim chee (radishes). I also snapped a picture of a guard who unfortunately turned his head at the moment I took it. Ah, well.
Next, we were shown a movie about the DMZ. Then the screen lifted, magically, and we passed through into the museum. It actually took quite a while to herd us all through and the Koreans being shuffled into the room behind us seemed to get irritated at being delayed in watching the film. The coolest part was the DMZ diorama below the glass floor.
Then we got to pass through the 3rd Tunnel, at least walk down a bit of it to where the first blockade was put up to stop the invasion of North Koreans. The 3rd Tunnel, for those of you, like myself, who were previously ignorant of what the 3rd Tunnel is, is one of four tunnels the North Koreans built under the DMZ towards Seoul. The 3rd Tunnel entrance happens to be closest to Seoul, so that is the one the tour visits. Apparently you could actually feel the rumbling of the ground as it was being built, which was what tipped the South Koreans off in the first place. They discovered it after investigating the disturbance.
The South Koreans think there might be as many as twenty tunnels. I was unclear whether North Korea has acknowledged these. Signs in the tunnel said that North Koreans had painted the walls with coal to claim they were a coal mine. But that they didn't admit to them being a means of invasion.
I was not allowed to take a picture inside the tunnel, but I did snap one of myself, posed Billie Jean style, in a yellow hard hat. At the bottom of the underground pathway to the actual tunnel was a fresh water spring. It reminded me of the Fountain of Youth tourist attraction, which another girl on the trip had coincidentally been to before. She thought it was pretty ridiculous, too, the Fountain of Youth, anyway. Basically, it was this huge room filled with plastic people and maybe cardboard cutouts to make up this silly recreation of an Indian gathering and Pontes discovering the fountain...and in the middle was this rather pathetic little spring. They charged twelve dollars, or maybe sixteen dollars, to go see it.
I passed the fountain, and ducked into the tunnel. I could walk straight up, but it seemed like I'd hit my head (protected with a hard hat of course) if I stood up. I tried to imagine 10,000 soldiers passing through here in one hour. That's the number of soldiers (armed and fully geared, unarmed: 30,000) that could come through in that time. Me and two other Americans characteristically mocked it by pretending to be North Koreans marching through...but it was still intimidating. The Korean War was, after all, real.... Just was a bit closer to me now than it had been before. ...sort of like how the Cold War became more real when I visited Moscow... ...travel really does make the past come alive and the future seem more exciting..
We arrived next at the DMZ itself. There was an outdoor patio with observation platforms. You had to stand in behind a yellow line marked "photo line." If you stepped beyond and tried, they would take your camera and delete the photos. Some of the foreigners in our group tried to be cute by sitting on someone's shoulders...but they deleted the pictures all the same. Or standing on the wall. This happened several times. It was pretty cool to be looking right at the DMZ, but they were nonetheless pictures of a blurry panorama with some fuzzy buildings. Not really great pictures.
Our final stop was a fake train from Seoul to Pyongyang (the North Korean capital). We'd all been promised we could get our passports stamped here, and so, in like manner to little kids getting all excited about getting their "passports" stamped at national parks, we all wanted ours stamped. I'd brought mine specifically for that.
We walked into the "station." It was set up like the Lied's Discover grocery store, or similar. Made up to look like a train station. I took pictures of the departing/arriving schedule. There was this whole map laid out, a railroad system that would transport you all across the Euro-Asian continent, and I think it was part real...but Korea-- South-- couldn't access it because they were blocked, landwise, by North Korea. And as one of the guides mentioned, North Korea was hardly going to let South Korea pass across their country to save on freight costs without severe pressures, probably most effective from China. Cheaper, the guide said, to use freight to ship than boats like they used now.
I took this opportunity to discuss relationships between the divided nation. He seemed to think South Korea was more open to the idea of reuniting (the idea of the two countries reuniting is an idea I've been thinking of ever since I read an article http://tinyurl.com/yffrjhm which talked about how China wasn't as opposed to the concept as they might have been before).
And that they wanted to, but North Korea didn't....how this train could be real, leading from Seoul to Pyongyang, but it would be stopped by North Korea. There is still definite animosity towards North Koreans (as evidenced from rhetoric in the DMZ museum, video, etc about N.K. as "invaders," sneaky, underhanded, brutal...perhaps understandably, but a lot of regular people don't seem to think that is an important as reunification. I think they would like it to happen. I mentioned how "Korea" to Americans means South Korea, whereas North Korea is always referred to with the "North" as a marker. He told me something interesting.
Korea, South Korea, does the same thing. He said Koreans have a word, "Hanguk," for Korea...and this is the word I learned. But Korea also has another word that they use, "Nam-han," "nam" being their word for "south," and "Puk-an," "puk" meaning "north." In my lonely planet Korean phrasebook, North Korea and South Korea are referred to as the latter. But I've never heard any Korean call their country using that name.
I nearly missed my opportunity to check out the waiting platform, so I flew through the gate (the guy who took my 50 won/50 cent USD "ticket" wasn;t even there to tear it), and took a few snapshots of me waiting for a train. I guess, while I was discussing politics with the tour guide, a girl had actually gotten ON a train. And it left with her. She called a friend, frantically, a few minutes later. She had, naturally, no idea what to do. The train was run automatically. One tour guide seemed to think she'd get off okay and be able to take a bus back..or maybe even a subway station close by.
We pulled out of the station in our red tour bus, letting the day sink in. Our tour guide announced that "We only lost one person today." I ate some waffle cookies and slept until we arrived in Seoul. Then I relaxed for an hour, ate dinner with a guy I met on the bus, got a delicious pastry topped with cream and kiwi and mandarin oranges and some apricot tea, and caught the train at the last minute. Where I met two quite interesting deaf Koreans. But that is another story.
Halloween Weekend Part I
Sometimes I feel a rather desperate urge to get out of Busan...and this weekend, further impounded by the presence of Halloween-- a holiday my poor Korean students sadly know little about other than that their hagwon is putting on a party-- was one of those times.
I hopped on a train Saturday morning to meet a friend, also from Busan, in Seoul. Since she was going to be off on some hike during the day, I met up with another friend who helped me find a hotel in Itaewon, a.k.a. Seoul's foreigner hangout. Notorious for being filled with Westerners and a lot of soldiers, since there is a post right there. Anyway, it began raining as soon as my train pulled in, so we booked it to a hotel first, then off to find food. I'd been craving Indian since the only place I know in Busan has been closed for repairs (or something, I couldn't really read the piece of paper they taped to their sign).
I dressed up as a Catholic school girl. I felt, being a teacher, this was necessary, and my friend was supposed to dress up the same...but we didn't end up meeting here...but that's later in the story. First, must address the important issue of food. We went to this Indian restaurant (so many!) called Agra.
Let me preface this next part by describing the room in which we were seated. It was set aside from the rest of the restaurant (the larger part of the restraurant made to look bigger with mirrors lining one wall). There were only two tables. As we were being seated, I noticed this guy sitting down at the other...and what with the cramped space and knowing how lonely I felt most of the time...I invited him to sit with us. He was American, military..we talked about our experiences in Korea and he seemed to be okay with his time here.
Afterwards, he took off and my friend and I wandered Itaewon enjoying the sights and people. My other friend ended up calling around eleven wanting us to go to the university area to bar hop. But since it was so late and I had to get up early for a last minute DMZ signup, and my friend wasn't allowed in that area (due to military restrictions) after 9pm...we apologized, said we couldn't make it...and I made him discuss Machievelli with me around midnight.
Anyway, that is MY idea of celebrating Halloween.
I hopped on a train Saturday morning to meet a friend, also from Busan, in Seoul. Since she was going to be off on some hike during the day, I met up with another friend who helped me find a hotel in Itaewon, a.k.a. Seoul's foreigner hangout. Notorious for being filled with Westerners and a lot of soldiers, since there is a post right there. Anyway, it began raining as soon as my train pulled in, so we booked it to a hotel first, then off to find food. I'd been craving Indian since the only place I know in Busan has been closed for repairs (or something, I couldn't really read the piece of paper they taped to their sign).
I dressed up as a Catholic school girl. I felt, being a teacher, this was necessary, and my friend was supposed to dress up the same...but we didn't end up meeting here...but that's later in the story. First, must address the important issue of food. We went to this Indian restaurant (so many!) called Agra.
Let me preface this next part by describing the room in which we were seated. It was set aside from the rest of the restaurant (the larger part of the restraurant made to look bigger with mirrors lining one wall). There were only two tables. As we were being seated, I noticed this guy sitting down at the other...and what with the cramped space and knowing how lonely I felt most of the time...I invited him to sit with us. He was American, military..we talked about our experiences in Korea and he seemed to be okay with his time here.
Afterwards, he took off and my friend and I wandered Itaewon enjoying the sights and people. My other friend ended up calling around eleven wanting us to go to the university area to bar hop. But since it was so late and I had to get up early for a last minute DMZ signup, and my friend wasn't allowed in that area (due to military restrictions) after 9pm...we apologized, said we couldn't make it...and I made him discuss Machievelli with me around midnight.
Anyway, that is MY idea of celebrating Halloween.
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