Brief but Good

Well, I leave to go back to Korea in a few hours.  I will be there for 8 more months.  I'm not excited to go back, but I am thankful for the brief time I had with family and friends.  Thank you to those I saw and sorry to those I didn't.

I was reminded this Christmas of how little I really know about my future.  Many people asked me what I'll do in 8 months and to be honest I don't know.  Only God does and I think that's ok.  I wish I knew but no matter what I'll be fine.

Keep me in your prayers as I go back to work.  I'm still tired and not really to excited about the prospect of working 12 hours after touching down on Korean soil.  I need strength, wisdom, endurance, and grace to go on.

Fireworks, TV stations, weird plays, and decision time

About a month ago I went with some fellow teachers to Seoul for the day. I ate a lot of food, went to some high fashion stores. No really, I did. I couldn't afford to buy anything but it was fun to look. Well the real highlight of the day was going to see the fireworks. Apparently all of Seoul wanted to watch the fireworks as well. I kid not, when I say there were a million people there. It took us nearly half an hour to get out of our subway car up to street level. See video below. I've always read articles about people being trampled to death and wondered how stuff like that happens, but as I was pushed along by the sea of Korean people I began to see how it's possible.

Although I couldn't really afford to buy any of the high fashion articles of clothing I'd seen throughout my day in Seoul, I did get the opportunity to snatch up this delightful t-shirt. One of the individuals I was with noted it was something I easily could have gotten at a truck stop, but I feel it is an authentic Korean shirt.


A few weeks ago my preschool class (that I teach) went to Seoul for a field trip. We watched a play in an underground theatre. It was silly and I think the kids liked it. It was a version of the tortoise and the hare with a more Korean flare to it. It's hard to explain so here's a little video of it.

I may or may not have mentioned this but my school is surrounded by rice fields. Over the duration of my stay here I've watched the fields go from barren in winter, to planted in spring, to lush in late summer, and now I've seen the rice harvested. Here are some recent pictures of the fields.

Now I come to the final part of my post. I have less than a week to decide if I will renew my contract and work another year here in Korea. At this point in time I honestly don't know what I'm going to do and I need wisdom. Please keep me in your prayers this week. My desire is that God's will be done and not my own.

DMZ Day

This last Saturday I had the opportunity to travel with some of my fellow teachers to the DMZ. Which is the border between North and South Korea. It was actually pretty fun. Lots of food, buses, trains, and subway.

To see the border we actually had to take part in a tour. Our first bus stop was at a kind of museum. The museum highlighted all of the North Korean conflicts and invasions that have occurred over the last 50 years. The museum was ripe with symbolism and hopeful of the two countries reunifying in the future. We watched a short video that basically proclaimed the two countries were on track to reunify. I found this contradictory to a lot of the information in the museum. It was interesting to see the spin they put on things.

The highlight of this stop though was taking a tram down into a North Korean dug tunnel. The tunnel located 54km from Seoul, is one of four that has been found. They guess there are probably 10 more undiscovered that are located on the border.

We then went to a look out that let us peer into the North. It was a foggy day and there was not much to see. Apparently on clear days there is a town visible in the distance. I was told that the town functions with piped in noise and is not really inhabited by people. It is maintained for appearances by the North. From the vantage point we could see the national highway that runs between Seoul and Pyongyang. The highway was completely empty and I believe is only used by diplomats.

Our last stop of the tour was to a newly built railway station near the border. The South built it in hopes of running rail lines in the North when the 2 countries reunify. So this brand new train stations was built symbolically but has yet to run any trains through it. They speak as if there is little standing in the way of reunification. It's quite interesting.

Here are some pictures from the day.

This picture is from the museum. It's hard to see but two sides are pushing the globe back together. On one side is South Korea and on the other is the North.

The bottom picture is me and some of my fellow teachers.

The Kids I work With

I occasionally am asked to make videos for the preschool, and here is one of them.

I've Been Unfaithful

With this blog that is. On my recent visit home I had a handful of people tell me that they still read this blog, and to you I apologize, I will try to put more pictures and stuff on here.

Here is me and a student of mine named Kevin. Kevin is by far the smallest kid in our class despite being far from the youngest. This coupled with his affinity to smile no matter the circumstances, makes him a kid that gets picked up a lot. I toss, carry, twirl, throw, and catch Kevin on a daily basis.


These pictures aren't from Korea, but I finally saw my niece last week and boy has she changed.

Whenever I'm out wandering...........

Here is a brief video I made of a walk I take. I've found myself taking these walks a few times a week. It's peaceful to me. I sometimes forget what is in fact unique to Korea, so hopefully this video gives you a visual of some of the differences between the States and here.

Where's the Beef?

As some of you may or may not know there has been some political unrest here in Korea lately, and what would be the cause of this unrest........................................... US beef. Yes, US beef. Korea has agreed to start importing US beef again after a 5 year hiatus. The US beef promises to be half the price of what is currently offered in the grocery stores (food is expensive here.)

Yet there is tremendous public outcry concerning mad cow. There are constant protests, people setting themselves on fire, and a whole lot of misinformation out there. Basically, with the exception of a few people I've met, all of Korea thinks that American cows have mad cow disease. The interesting thing is that no one really knows what happens if you eat meat from an infected cow. A lot of the government cabinet has resigned and some are calling for the resignation of the President of Korea. This is insane.

The most ironic thing about this to me is that avian bird flu is already in Korea. We couldn't go to the zoo because of it. They do know what happens to people who get infected with this yet vendors sell eggs on the side of the road, and chicken restaurants are everywhere.

What it really comes down to for me is that I want to be able to buy some beef. I'm hungry and I like beef, I just don't like paying through the nose for it.

This has been me ranting. If you want to look at photos and videos of the protests go to bbc.com.

I'm out

Things have happened

Well since the last time I chronicled about my stay in Korea much has happened. I've visited the Pacific Ocean and seen the barbed wire fence that runs along the coast and is supposed to ward off North Koreans.

I've gone shopping at a night market in Seoul at three in the morning. It was full of shoes, shorts, shirts, and sunglasses. Due to my large in Korean foot size (11 US) and my general uneasiness about Korean fashion (lots of bright colors, and tight pants) I didn't really buy anything.

I've finally played basketball, but I'm not sure it can really be called basketball. The quality and general rule following that accompany a normal game weren't really evident.

I've grown to love Korean food more and more. Especially dumplings, noodles, and dare I say some vegetables.

I've tried and failed to get my driver's license. Thanks to my current Oregon driver's license having a provisional title on it (despite the fact I've had it for 6 years and it will not expire until I'm 26.)

I've also visited Costco 3 times, and Korean Costco is in fact like American Costco. There's the huge pizza slices and hot dogs. As well as Kirkland signature everything, apple pies, tillamook cheese, and yes mom the huge trail mix bags.

I'm no longer uncomfortable taking the subway. Mind you I was never uncomfortable with the cleanliness or people on board, just the general lack of knowledge of how things worked. I now feel somewhat confident I can navigate the cities system with no stress.

And most recently I had parent visiting day in the preschool. Picture this if you will a room full of mothers, cameras (video and flash), siblings, preschool students and me sweating and dancing and singing like I always do in the preschool. Only most of the kids are distracted by the aforementioned moms, siblings, and cameras and I'm pretty much doing all the silly stuff by myself.

Needless to say I'm not the crazy about doing parent visit days. The kids acted nothing like normal and it was weird. But it's over I survived and hopefully won't have to do another one for a long time.

Here is a picture of me and I fellow teacher at the night market. I nearly bought these but knew I probably would never wear them.



This last picture is kind of indicative of how a lot of my pictures turn out. I generally don't smile in pictures and haven't really since about my 2nd grade school pictures. I usually decide to go with more goofy/intense route. What happens is that the kids in my pictures kind of sheepishly smile while I make a face that is a little over the top and slightly disturbing.



At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I do intend to update this a little more frequently.

Random Happenings

Today is children's day, which means a day off for all teachers. This last week our kids went to a festival for all the preschools in our town. Here are some pictures from the day. There were clowns, tanks, fire trucks, and mandatory tricycle races for the kids. I say mandatory because when watching the races it was evident that the parents were way more into it than the three year olds. Which made me think the parents should race instead. And lo and behold there were parents footraces for the mothers and the fathers as well as a teachers footrace. Now these races were very competitive, I saw at least 3 moms fall flat on their faces while running.

I bowed out of the teachers race because I was the only dude preschool teacher there . It was really a no win for me to race anyway. If I won it was because I was supposed to and if I lost.............................( I wouldn't have) it would have been embarrassing. Here are the pictures.




A few weeks before, we joined the two Korean preschool that operate on the bottom floor of our building on a field trip to a children's museum. Although I didn't take many pictures, I did manage to capture something uniquely Korean. Karaoke on the bus. Complete with scream singing and children's songs. It was an experience that was once in a lifetime (hopefully.) Here are some of the pictures.



These next pictures are from Seoul. On a day off I went into the city with some fellow teachers. We ended up at the movie theater. The theater was on the 11th floor of a place called Techno Mart (which is kind of like best buy on steroids.) There was a pretty awesome view from the roof.



Here is a quick video from one of the little boys I work with in the preschool. Every time we start playing music he does this dance. As you can see the dance is becoming contagious among the kids. It's kind of bizarre looking but it makes me laugh. This little guy is pretty hilarious but he is also probably the most challenging of the kids to work with. He keeps me on my toes. I'm sorry the video is sideways.




Finally here's kind of a picture of me and one of the kids. I don't actually have many pictures of myself, which I'm sure you are all disappointed by, so here's some of my face. This is me and one of the preschoolers, Chloe, after spending most of the day at the children's festival. In all fairness it's not a very good picture of Chloe, so I put another picture of her where she looks more like herself.



I'm well thanks for your continued prayers.

Nearly two months in here are some picture

This isn't from Korea but it's currently my favorite picture. That is my brother looking freakishly huge and my niece looking cute.


These are some of my kids from the preschool. Two new kids were added this week. That puts the preschool total up to 14 kids.




This is the preschoolers during PE. They have PE once a week and a man shows up to lead them. It's pretty entertaining to watch.



And here are some of the kids I teach in the afternoon. Everyday I teach language arts for about 2 hrs. I get two classes a day and teach four classes total. Which means I see these classes below twice a week.

Quick Video

We had an open house for all of the church families who helped us move. I found these two little guys running around my apartment. I should have seen this coming.

The pictureless post

Places and cultures are all different. I'm taking this chance to highlight some unique things I've experienced here in Korea.

The school where I work is located somewhat near a military base. Not close enough for me to see it but close enough that for one day a week the doors in our school rattle as mortar rounds are being fired across the nearby mountains. On the way to school this week I saw 2 tanks driving in the road coming from the opposite direction. I've never seen that in the states.

Our school is surrounded by rice patties. They are all dried from the long cold winter. As I speak I can look outside my classroom window as the patties are being burned. These burning fields are not 40 yards from the school where children are playing outside. That's something new for me.

Couches. Its not uncommon for a family in Korea to have one. It is uncommon though for them to sit on it. Generally when going to someone's house I end up sitting indian style on the floor rather than on the plush couch near me. This leads to legs falling asleep and me shifting around a lot. It's not a big deal it's just different.

Another difference is in the heating of homes and buildings. Many Korean building heat their floors. Never once have my feet touched a cold floor. Even in the morning when I first crawl out of bed. My toes are warmed.

Groceries store bags. Free, you would think. Not so in Korea. One must tell the clerk how many bags one wants and then must bag ones own groceries. I'm not so good at guesstemating how many bags I'll need so this can be somewhat problematic.

They are many more differences I'm sure. But I have time for only a few. This is what I love about traveling. I get to experience new sights, sounds, smell, and tastes.

New Place

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Here are the pictures for the new apartment that I live in. It's a nice place. Much nicer than any that I've paid to live in in the states.

Everyday I stay busy. Between my preschool duties and my afternoon classes I stay busy from 8 to 6. It's good for me.

I've taught more in the last few weeks than perhaps my whole life. In the afternoons I teach kids ranging from 8 to 12 years old. I teach for two hours with them. I've found that when working with grade school and elementary kids I can tend to be a little bit of a tough teacher. I have fun but I don't put up with much junk from the kids. It's funny because I find myself doing very teacherly thing. For example today I made one of the older boys stay a few minutes after class so we could discuss his behavior. It has started to feel natural for me to teach. I'm far from accomplished but I enjoy it and learn a little bit more everyday.

On the preschool side of my job everyday is fun for me. I'm working with 12 kids and 7 of them are new to the preschool this week. Everyday get to play with and engage them in new ways. Its fun work.

Today it snowed a bit and I got the chance to have a snowball fight with the kids during lunch break, which I probably won't ever do again. The odds get a little sketchy when its twenty kids to one. Not to mention there was about half an inch of snow on the ground. After about ten minutes of intense snow ball warfare there was basically only mud and mush to throw, which didn't stop the snow balls from being launched at me.

This last picture is a funny one. This little boy attends the Korean speaking kindergarten that is downstairs from the one I work in. This week was his first and he spent two days running throughout the building to avoid his class. The teacher seemed to allow him to get away with it. Yesterday, his second day of running, he wandered up to my classroom late in the day. There was no one else there and I was just hanging out. He grabbed a puzzle starting working on it, and after about 5 minutes ended up like this. It was picture worthy.



Thanks to all for your continued prayers and support. All of your comments and e-mails are greatly appreciated.

Emotions

I thought I was a pretty emotionally stable guy. Not too many highs and not too many lows. Someone you could call steady. That's until I started taking pictures of myself throughout my daily life. Here's a snapshot of a day.


This first picture is of me in the morning. As can be seen I'm eager and ready to tackle the day. I would call this an emotional high.

If the last picture was an emotional high I would call this an obscene emotional high. The day has just begun I'm stoked and ready to mold the minds of the little ones.

This is me realizing that my computer is acting up. I'm thinking though that I can figure it out. No big deal. It's just a little internet problem. It'll hook up pretty soon. I'm emotionally level. Neither high nor low but focused on the task at hand.

Here is where it starts to get ugly. I don't know what's wrong with my internet connection. I start blaming Circuit City, and Microsoft, and the chord to my computer. I am in an emotional depression.


This is an emotional rock bottom. I am disgusted. How am I supposed to make it an evening without internet! I mean I have e-mails and sports and videos that can't be ignored. At this point I began muttering unintelligible words. My own language of curse words never before spoken by humans. Gibberish to you, but to me the venom spewed as I sit in my pit of despair.

These pictures are me calling on a greater source of power to help me. I am in an emotionally humbled state.

This is me when my internet works. I have now reached emotional euphoria. This is such an extreme high that I'm pretty sure there is adrenaline involved. This stage is also generally marked by a vocal exclamation of some sort. Perhaps a loud "Yes" or "Awesome" or even "Woo Hoo." In this stage one may find oneself making these exclamation no matter their surroundings.

This is just me taking a meal break. I love to cook. I'm emotionally content and about ready to go back to my computer for some more internet access.

This is me after coming back from the meal. The internet isn't working again. I am in the most severe emotional zone. This zone is called emotional explosion. At this stage I consider throwing my computer out the window or drop-kicking it across the room. It's best that I'm by myself during this stage otherwise someone could get hurt.


This is me after I jiggle the chord and the internet begins to work again. I am emotionally euphoric. This is the stage where one wavers between laughing and crying.

This is a slight exaggeration of how much my emotions differ through the day, but in some ways its not to far from the truth. Isn't it amazing how such simple things can cause such great raw emotion. A car cutting us off, slow service at a restaurant, a snubb by an acquaintance, poor internet connections. Small things that we perceive to be huge slights and inconveniences. Things that in reality are just not that big a deal.

It's humbling to thing that an internet problem can be the reason for such great mood swings. It's embarrassing when I think about it but also challenging.

By the way I'm great here in Korea. Thanks for your prayers.