Saturday, December 26, 2015

Christmas! :D

The most lights in one spot in Ulsan
This is all of them.
Merry Christmas everyone!  I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas day whether you celebrate or not.  Trevor and I had a different sort of Christmas considering Christianity (or even the secular tradition of Santa and all that) isn't quite as popular here as it is back home.  Those who do celebrate Christmas here don't do it to the extent that is traditional in the states.  Thankfully, the gospel is the same wherever you go so we had a whole church family to celebrate with us.  In fact, our ward Christmas party was on Christmas day, but more on that later.

As you may have seen on our last post, Trevor and I made our own Christmas tree because we didn't want to buy one since we will only be here one year and they are just too expensive here.  I also made a red and green chain to string along our patio window and drew a manger scene on our sliding glass door.  Even with all our efforts, it still seemed much less like Christmas than we are used to.  There aren't usually Christmas lights on trees and houses everywhere you look and snow on the sidewalks and perfect gift ideas in every store.  I'll admit I was kind of sad to not get the type of Christmas I'm used to.  Don't worry though, Trevor and I tried our best to make it as good as we could and we did have a really good Christmas day.

Christmas morning we woke up and opened presents.  We had presents from each other and then both of our families sent a package (mine was mostly from my sister Ashley who had me this year on our family rotation).  We really enjoyed getting some American goodies.  As usual, my sweetheart spoiled me more than he should have.  After presents, we spent some time skyping our families.

We had invited the 3 sister missionaries over for breakfast and offered them to use our computers to skype their families. We had pancakes and bacon and eggs and the sisters really seemed to enjoy being able to see their families for a while which made me happy.  After they left, I had to quickly get ready for the day because I had to go to the church early to help the Relief Society (women's organization at our church) get ready for our performance.

Performance? you ask? What performance?  Well for part of the Christmas party, our ward was having a sort of talent show and the Relief Society wanted to do a group dance which they asked me to choreograph.  Koreans love to be perfect at everything they do so even though the party didn't start till 5pm they all wanted to meet at 3 to practice the dance (keep in mind we have been practicing this once a week all of December).  Since I was the one who choreographed it, I got to teach it to everyone which can, in truth, be frustrating because of the language barrier.  With the help of one sister who speaks English really well and the helpful actions of Trevor queuing everybody on what came next, we got the dance down pat.  I will post a video of it below.  I also put together the music for the dance so hopefully you can hear that.  It was supposed to be a bit comedic so it's ok to laugh I will not be offended ;).



The rest of the talent show comprised of other little dances and musical numbers and such and everybody did such a good job.  Trevor and I did some swing dancing and everybody went completely nuts over it.  They even made us do some more at the end of the program.  I will also post a video of that for your enjoyment.



After the talent show, we watched a nice video of the true meaning of Christmas and although the dialogue was in Korean, I got the message.  It was a good reminder to celebrate the miraculous story of Christ's birth and I was very thankful for the sweet message it brought.  While the video was going, one of the men in the ward told Trevor that he was going to be Santa for the party (the real Santa had of course already come and brought presents to all good boys and girls who believe) so he sneaked away to change.  Turns out they only had a red coat, red pants which were too short and a hat so we had a very young, skinny, sexy Santa with only a small goatee.  The kids didn't seem to mind though since he called each one by name to give them a present and take a picture with them.  They even handed out some presents to the adults.  I did not get to sit on Santa's lap :( but I snuck a picture just in time before he had to get out of his Santa outfit before dinner.

Last but not least, we had a lovely dinner.  It wasn't a ham or turkey or anything like that but a bunch of Korean dishes.  Everything was very tasty (except maybe the acorn jelly...ya don't ask) and it was so refreshing since I hadn't eaten anything since 10am and it was now around 7:30 or so.  Everyone did so much to put on such a fun party and worked so hard.  It was really nice to take part in the festivities and watch the performances and eat good food.

We hope you all had a great Christmas and pray for your safety and well-being in the new year.  If you have any fun stories about your Christmas day, feel free to share in the comments!  We love you all!











Thursday, December 10, 2015

Trevor's Turn

Hey everyone. Change of pace this week as I (Trevor) am going to write the blog. I guess its been longer than a week. We've been busy, and I keep forgetting to write. So here we go.

November has been a somewhat busy month, and its been a nice change. First week nothing special happened. We were going to go to an amusement park with the youth of our church but decided to chicken out since it was raining so hard. They still went and said it was okay, but not as fun as it could have been. We were glad we didn't go. The second week was about the same, lots of rain and getting colder. I got some good news that I got an interview with a graduate school in Winnipeg. It went well we think and are hoping to hear back from them soon. Also at the end of the third week in November the relief society president asked Kelsey to make a dance for the sisters in the ward to perform at the ward Christmas party.

That brings us to Thanksgiving week. I had graciously invited the missionaries to Thanksgiving dinner, because I know what it can be like in Korea. More times than not the missionaries don't get much of a Thanksgiving here. However, I did this on Sunday, without discussing it with Kelsey. So any plans that she may have had went out the door when I invited 4 extra bodies (2 of them being hungry Elders) to our Thanksgiving dinner. I also soon invited 2 coworkers but they had other plans. My wife being the amazing person that she is, took this all in stride. I soon realized why though. She was fine with all these extra guests because it gave us a good excuse to go shopping at Costco. Always one of Kelsey's favorites. There we purchased several things, including our turkey (about $50 for 13 pounds) some hot chocolate, and veggies. We also then got to go on several “shopping adventures” for pie tins and other baking goods for the desserts and rolls.

Thanksgiving dinner was great. We had the 2 elders, the 2 sisters, and Chloe, an investigator that the sisters brought. We ate, we laughed, we had a good time. Unfortunately it was cut a little short due to the fact the missionaries had English class, and I had been recruited to be a judge in a debate at school that evening. My wife being the trooper that she is was promptly abandoned with all the dirty dishes from the dinner. Luckily we have a dishwasher in our apartment now, so its not as bad as when we were first married.

Now that thanksgiving is over we are promptly moving on to Christmas and couldn't be more excited. Kelsey has had several ideas to decorate our apartment, which have resulted in several more shopping trips (noticing a pattern here?). I'm sure some of you have already seen our Santa door. We are currently finishing up our Christmas tree. We decided not to buy one since they are very expensive here, and we would then have to turn around and sell it when we leave. Anyone tried to sell a Christmas tree in July? I'm sure that's rough. Now do that in Asia. Yeah… we didn't like our odds. So we made our tree this year. That's about it as far as what we've been up to. Lots of shopping and getting things ready for Christmas. We have started going to a language exchange on Wednesday nights, in order to improve both of our Korean, and to make some more friends. These next couple weeks will be nice, since we are winding down here at school for the winter vacation, and we'll probably just end up having a nice small Christmas with just the two of us. We may have the missionaries over so they can Skype their families later that day. Don't know yet. So that's all I wanna say as far as catching us up. By the time I post this I'm sure Kelsey will have another blog post ready since its taking me so long to type this.

Now for all of you that are curious. I'll talk a little about my job. I teach at a private high school in Ulsan, South Korea. Its one of the most prestigious high schools, simply because there are always students from here that end up going to the top national university in Korea, Seoul National University. That being said, most of my students are very smart, and academically driven. For those of you that don't know the Korean school system basically revolves around the college entrance exams or suneong. You take this your senior year of high school, and if you do well enough on it and get into your school, great, if not, you may retake it NEXT YEAR. That's right. Think like SAT or ACT, but you only get to try it once a year. Combine that with vast amounts of social, family, and peer pressures, and you see why suicides always go up in Asian countries around the time of this test. If you don't get into one of the best universities you get kinda a low end of the stick, since many companies here operate on the good ol' boy system, where they will take people from their own Alma mater, rather than look at credentials all the time. This is changing but slowly. Anyway, so my students have lots of  incentive to learn, and grow. Sometimes I do get a few students that don't want to participate in class, simply because they don't like English, but really I can't complain at all about my job.

Lately me and my co teacher Joe, have been trying some new ideas. I had them research animals one semester and give presentations on animals of their choice, and we also had debates. This semester (which is just ending) we've been doing K-pop, or Korean Pop. More specifically how we can help spread it. So what we did was have the students pick a popular Korean pop song they liked, and make their own lyrics in English to it. They had to include certain literary elements, as well as make a music video. Its been a fun unique experience for them I think, since most other places don't do things like this. But I sure am glad its over. Imagine having to listen to over 60 different k-pop songs that don't have the best lyrics, and are done in almost karaoke fashion. Haha yeahhh…. But thanks to the Internet you don't have to imagine! I'll provide a link to our facebook site where a lot of these music videos are. So head over there and listen to a few maybe! It's kinda fun! Anyway, thats about it, just a normal high school teacher. I guess I may write more but since it took me so long to get this one out, maybe Kelsey will ban me from the blog all together! Thanks for all the support and prayers. We've appreciated it. Love you all! Cya!



*turn down your sound, the videos are a bit louder than normal

Also, check out this video of one of the students at a little talent show at school.


Sunday, November 1, 2015

Happy Halloween!

Halloween? In Korea? Well, no not usually but anywhere there are Americans, there will be Halloween.  And why not? It's such a great holiday why would anyone want to do without?

Halloween's lack of popularity here makes it somewhat difficult to find traditional Halloween necessities so Trevor and I did the best we could with what we already had.  We dressed up as Anna and Kristoff from Frozen.  Not only do we both already resemble these two characters, but Frozen is extremely popular in Korea so I was so excited to make our costumes work.  Sadly, they did not get raving reviews.  In fact, we had to help almost everyone guess who we were supposed to be.  I thought we were a little more obvious than that but oh well, I liked our costumes!

So, what better way to spend midday Halloween dressed as Anna and Kristoff then at the ice rink???  I thought it was pretty fun and a good date idea.  I guess nobody else got it.  They were probably all wondering why I would wear a dress ice skating.  Once again, I thought it was clever so that's what counts, right?
In regards to the video, what Trevor means is that I can go a little bit faster than him.  Not that I'm great a ice skating.  Although I enjoyed the comment about the pink streak :)

The main event for our Halloween was the church party organized by the missionaries in our branch.  There was a cake walk, bean bag toss, fish pond, bobbing for apples, put your hand in the boxes of "brains", "eyeballs", "guts", etc, pumpkin pinatas, and a haunted house.  The kids went absolutely crazy! It seemed like they really enjoyed it.

Trevor and I were in charge of the cake walk and most of the kids who participated thought it best to run around in the circle as frantically as possible and then push and shove onto a number when the music stopped.  Every once in a while when there were more numbers than kids, Trevor would call out a number and nobody would be on that number so at least one kid would make a dive for the number trying to be the winner.  They were pretty nuts!

Unfortunately, I hadn't been feeling that good so we decided to go home a little bit early.  They had brought out all the food at the very end and everyone was going to have dinner once all the kids went through the haunted house.  I don't know if they thought the kids would get done sooner or what but the food was out and sitting for a while and by the time the kids got done everything was cold.  We decided to grab a handful of candy and sneak out and have pizza at home while watching Nightmare Before Christmas.

All in all, I had a pretty good time and Trevor was such a good sport to go along with all my ideas (skating isn't his favorite thing to do).  Hope all of you had a good Halloween and enjoyed your extra hour of daylight savings time (if it applies to you). There isn't daylight savings time here so we will be an additional hour ahead of most of you back home.  Feel free to tell us in the comments about what you did for Halloween and write about or attach a picture of what you and your friends/family dressed up as!
My stash :)










Monday, October 26, 2015

Busan Firework Festival

Trevor and I had a large plethora of adventures to choose from this weekend.  One in particular definitely popped out against the others: fireworks!  Busan is the 2nd largest city in South Korea and every year they put on a firework festival that attracts gigantic crowds.  And by that I mean there were more than a million people crammed onto a beach and the surrounding area to witness the firework spectacle.

The show was scheduled to start at 8pm but Trevor and I decided to spend the earlier part of the day exploring Busan.  Somehow, each attempt at adventure was smoldered by some cause or another.  For example, we decided to go to the largest mall in Korea for some possible shopping only to find that just about everything was way overpriced.  I even felt guilty window shopping there.  Like I wasn't even rich enough to look at what they had to offer.  Just for kicks and giggles, we even checked the price tag on a winter coat with a fur-trimmed hood.  More than $2,000 for a coat!  I'm sure some of you are like ya, ya I've seen more expensive things but seriously I thought a high-end expensive coat would be like a couple hundred not a couple thousand!

Anyways, another failed adventure occurred at the aquarium.  We had seen a poster advertising 50% off the entrance fee between such and such dates so we thought what a great way to spend our time and do it for half the cost right? Wrong! We got the aquarium and saw a sign showing all the prices.  For a regular customer, it was about $25 per person.  We weren't sure if this was already the 50% off, or if that was the normal price so we decided to ask one of the workers.  She said it is the normal price so we thought we could both get in for the price of $25 all together.  Wrong again.  In order to get the 50% off, you had to prove you are a citizen of Busan.  Foiled again!  We weren't really prepared to be spending $50 for an aquarium so we moved on to plan C.


Plan C was to go downtown and explore street vendors selling novelty items.  We got there and explored around for a little bit and stopped at a cart selling some jewelry and headbands and other such accessories.  We got talking to the vendor and told her we were going to attend the firework festival that night.  She said if we were planning on doing that, we ought to have been there by now.  At this time it was 4pm and the show wasn't supposed to start for 4 more hours!  We had heard there are a lot of people that go to the festival but according to this kind lady, the beach was bound to be packed already and she told us good luck as we scurried toward the nearest subway entrance. Plan C thwarted.

Speaking of the subway, we got a taste of how many people were going to the festival when we were cram-packed in like a can of sardines.  People push and shove in order to get where they need to go as fast as possible.  There were even guards at each of the doors at major stops to stop people from getting on once the car got too crowded.  People would even try to push and shove past the guards so they didn't have to wait an additional 3 minutes for the next train to arrive.  Not being a big city girl myself, I was baffled by the amount of people and their desperation to get to their destination.


After getting off the subway, the sardine-like crowdedness did not cease.  That lady downtown was right!  The whole beach was already jam-packed!  Unfortunately the best place we could find was somewhat blocked by a couple of trees.  I was disheartened thinking the fireworks would be a bust as well because we wouldn't really be able to see them.  Thankfully, the show was so great I was wrong.

Past the beach, out over the open water is a giant bridge that goes from one sort of peninsula to another.  The bridge was all lit up and even had special lights that scrolled words across the bottom of the bridge.  Out in the water there were several boats which I assume were also used to launch fireworks.  8:00 couldn't come fast enough.  We had already spent most of the day standing or walking so I was anxious to finally take a nice break and watch the fireworks.

To my great delight, the firework show was spectacular. Seriously it was beyond amazing.  I was extremely impressed with the magnitude of everything it took to put on such a show.  There were countless numbers of fireworks set off timed to music that was playing.  It must have taken great ingenuity and calculations and countless hours planning to make the show work like it did.  The fireworks were splendidly symmetrical and came in an array of shapes, sizes, colors, and effects.  The show went for a duration of about 50 minutes which was much longer than I had expected.  It was such a fantastic thing to behold, the few trees ended up only slightly blocking the splendor.  It was definitely worth the wait and I'm so glad that we decided to go.  I would go again in a heartbeat if given the chance.  I would even spend all day at the beach to get an even better view of the show.  I wish I could share with everybody what it was really like but Trevor and I were too busy enjoying ourselves to try and film the whole thing or take too many pictures.  Trevor did get a couple of small clips and I'll share one of them below.  The crowded subway ride back to the bus station didn't even bother me because I was so satisfied with the firework show, there was almost nothing that could annoy me at that point.  I guess there are some advantages to big cities!


Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Time for the truth

It has almost been 6 months living here in Korea.  Can you believe it?  I know I can't.  And we still have about 9 months left!  I figured I've been living here long enough and have had enough experiences that I can offer a few opinions on Korea and Korean culture.  Just as a reminder, this is an opinion piece.  Take it with a grain of salt and know that I'm simply expressing my thoughts based on observations and experiences.  Feel free to comment on your own opinions or questions you have about the culture.

The first thing I want to mention is the fast-paced lifestyle especially found in big cities.  "Time is money" is certainly a phrase that describes Korean everyday life.  This concept is especially noticeable in public transportation.  Trevor and I ride the bus often.  It is our main source of transportation since we don't have a car.  Every time we ride, I hope and pray there is an open seat because otherwise, we are bound to get thrashed around like Willow Smith's hair.  The bus drivers speed off as fast as they can and slam on the brakes at the last minute before each stop.  I've learned to take a surfer's stance in order to keep my balance especially if I can't cling to one of the poles.  There is a lot of pressure to get on and off as quickly as possible and not to waste any time.  Heaven forbid if you need to ask the bus driver if he goes to a particular stop because that of course wastes time.  We've even been told no they don't go somewhere even though they actually did because the driver just wanted to leave.

You also have to be quick at the grocery store.  I feel like we are always in the way because we are trying to compare prices or figure out how much something costs or deciding which brand of something to buy.  Get what you want and move on seems to be a more popular approach to shopping.  The worst part is getting in line to check out.  They are so busy, they don't even bag stuff for you.  If you want something bagged, they will hand you however many bags you ask for (so hope you calculate correctly or you're in trouble) and you can either shove everything back in your cart and find a place to the side to bag everything, or frenziedly bag everything at the same rate it is being scanned so you don't hold up the line.  Either way, you have to be lightning fast or people start to get annoyed pretty quickly.

I also don't feel comfortable in any sort of shopping scenario.  There is a word here called 부담 (boodam) which is basically like social pressure.  At a department store, there is a person in every section of the store.  And by that I mean someone at the purses, someone at the ties, someone at the socks, someone at the scarves, someone at the perfume, someone at the umbrellas, etc.  Their job is to pressure you into making a purchase. If you even glance at one of their items, they will hop over and tell you all about all their other products and give you some prices.  I personally do more window shopping especially as a tourist as opposed to going somewhere with the intention of buying.  I just want to look!  The same goes for farmers markets.  Everyone is selling the same basic stuff but everyone of course wants you to buy theirs.  Old Korean grandmas will sit on the corner and shout out the prices of their food.  One time I was even grabbed by the arm by an old lady trying to get me to buy some fruit.  It was a very uncomfortable experience and it certainly makes me NOT want to buy stuff from the 부담 people.  Instead of looking around, I walk away because I don't like the workers to approach me.  I feel rude just walking away not buying something after they spend so much attention on me.

This next topic I know I should be grateful for but I can't help but be annoyed by it.  Korean people are extremely hospitable, almost to the point of being overwhelming.  This is especially true when it comes to food.  They LOVE giving foreigner's a taste of their beloved Korean food.  Don't get me wrong, I am willing to try more Korean food but just like any normal person, I'm not going to love or even like everything I taste especially since most food here isn't like what most people are used to in America.  When invited to a meal, you are expected to eat A LOT.  If you finish your plate, they will inevitably tell you to eat more and/or put more food on your plate.  I just want one plate of one dish and that's it.  I know I should be happy that they are being so nice but I start to get overwhelmed with the amount of food and how strange it is to me.

One thing I can't get enough of however, is everything cutesy.  Cute and quirky is all the rage.  Cute umbrellas, notebooks, socks, stickers, and any other imaginable accessory.  Here it's perfectly normal to have a pink and white polka dot umbrella with little cats on it (yes, I have one :D).  It brings out a sense of innocence and youth that is so refreshing.  One thing I've seen that does take it a little far is how much people cutesy up their pets.  Some people even dye the fur of their little dogs because they think it's cute.


The last thing I'll talk about today is nature. Ulsan is a very big city (and not even the biggest in Korea) and sometimes it is hard to get caught up in the hustle and bustle and be lost among the never ending buildings.  One thing I have noticed, is that even in big cities, there is always somewhere to go to enjoy nature.  There are several parks (usually with exercise equipment for anyone interested) and hiking trails and if nothing else, trees and vegetation along the sidewalks.  In fact, Trevor and I spent some time this weekend at a GIGANTIC park where we rented a tandem bike which was a lot of fun and good for us too!

I have more opinions which I will probably share later but I figured this was enough for now ;)





Monday, October 12, 2015

Gumi Friends (not Gummy)

When living in a foreign country, I think it is extremely beneficial to create friendships of many kinds.  This weekend Trevor and I were able to spend some time with some friends who live in a place called 구미 (Gumi pronounced goomi).  I've mentioned them in a previous post when they came to see us in Ulsan so it was our turn to give them a visit.  They were extremely hospitable and provided us with memorable experiences.  

The first day we were in Gumi, we went on a hike that led to a waterfall.  Although the waterfall was more like a small drizzle (I've seen more impressive water action coming from my kitchen faucet), the hike was very beautiful and definitely worthwhile.  There were so many picturesque spots throughout the hike so excuse us exceeding our photo quota for the week.  Just past the waterfall, there was a small "cave" (more like an indent in the hill) that was set up as a meditation/worship area for Buddhist monks.  The view from the cave showed most of the mountainside all the way down to the valley below.  I'm saddened that our cameras couldn't catch the full splendor of the beauty around us.  Just so you are aware, these pictures don't even do it justice.  



Coming back down from our hike, the Kim family showed us a booth in the park where a famous man was doing traditional calligraphy for free.  He used a brush and ink to write wise sayings on thin cloth-like paper using old Chinese characters.  He worked so decidedly with every stroke and you could tell he had been doing this for a while.  My favorite part to watch was the area where he makes a series of small characters.  You can really see the detail and focus he puts into his artwork.  The one Trevor and I got said something along the lines of if you have family, and your family unit is good, then everything else will be good too.  Here's a video of the calligrapher at work.



That night, the Kim family treated us to dinner.  We had what is called samgyeatang which is basically a soup with a whole chicken stuffed with rice.  The soup came out literally still boiling it was so hot.  This meal is tricky for me because you have to pick off the pieces of chicken and discard the bones yourself.  I still struggle a little bit with chopsticks and I'm a slow eater to begin with so let's just say I didn't come in first place as far as finishing the meal goes. 




The next morning, we all took a drive to go to a traditional Korean Buddhist temple.  It is just starting to be fall here so the leaves are beginning to change so there were so many colors and once again pretty pictures to be taken.  The temples here were similar to the ones I posted about from our 4th of July adventures but some of these ones were even perhaps a bit more vibrant, detailed, and colorful than the first.  It was such a nice day to walk around, enjoy nature, and gaze at the beauty around us.  





































After seeing the temples, the Kim family took us to dinner AGAIN (they are so nice!).  We had more traditional Korean food.  This meal mainly consisted of a huge variety of side dishes (note that each individual dish pictured contains something different) with the main attraction being pork.  My favorite was the pork that was red and spicy.  I'm pretty sure it was cooked on an open grill because it tasted kind of like that grill-charred taste that you get.  So good!

Our weekend was so much fun and it wouldn't have been as accessible and easy without the generosity of the Kim family.  











Seriously this is how my pics look when I'm putting together the blog, then they turn into scrambled eggs when the blog is actually viewed.  NO clue how to fix it.  Sorry again!