Hey guys!
so it hasnt been a particularly eventful week but figured i should stay in touch anyway.
on tuesday in taekwondo class we played this game where you hop around on one leg, using a hand to hold up your other leg and try to knock down the team members. if you let go of the leg you are holding up you also lose. last team standing wins. we played against one of the teams and won! you wont believe it but they gave us 20,000 won (a little under $20) for winning! It was awesome. My team went out to eat afterwards. I thought it was some crazy Korean game but when i went to tell my CIEE friends about it they had all played it before. i still think its a crazy game though, despite not being korean.
yesterday instead of having korean class all of the morning students had a festival. We all got matching t shirts and paraded to an auditorium across campus to watch dance, music, and theatrical performances. it was a nice break. 20 hours of Korean a week can make your head hurt after a while. also later that day i scored while playing water polo in swimming class. so all around a good day.
swimming class can be pretty funny because the guys dont really want to initiate pool side conversation. last week was the first time i was the only girl in the pool. i thought oh well this will just be like any other week but i could really feel the difference being the only female in the room. normally i dont feel too much like a foreigner in that class because i have my friend Yeji. Without her there though I felt like a super outsider. It is also a unique position because the male/female power balance is thrown off. I know how to swim but the people next to me are struggling. It would be intimidating to talk to a girl who has the upper hand. Since Yeji and I are both girls and we both know how to swim it is easy for us to talk but some of these guys dont look me in the eye (which is an indication of respect in the hierarchical sense). Not to say they are rude or standoff-ish by any means. Playing waterpolo was great because we worked together to make plays and score. One of my favorite images from Korea came from this class actually. One kid was clutching not one, not two, not three, but FOUR kick boards while playing waterpolo. It was hilarious. he was just bobbing up and down, going after the ball, but sometimes just falling over because he was so buoyant. Another kid was using his kickboards to block shots and beat the ball out of people's hands. we had a good time : )
i actually have quite an exciting few weekends coming up. Lukas is coming on sunday. He will be here until next sunday. Then the weekend after that i am going to a waterpark on saturday. If you are familiar with groupon, they have a groupon korea too! it was originally around 50 dollars to go but we are getting in for $14. Not bad. And then the next day we are going bungee jumping. We realized we had procrastinated all of these crazy plans that we have to squeeze it into the time we have. I also am planning to do one trip to daejeon before i leave to say a goodbye to the lab boys. It was awesome to see Jungwoo and Inho the other day (even if Inho kept saying I needed to study Korean 5 hours everyday instead of 4....grrrr inho!!!) and I want a chance to say goodbye to everyone else. I expect I will be busy with Lukas the next week. I will probably be doing my homework whenever I have spare time but try to write soon!
see ya!
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
TIna's Awesome Video
My friend tina made this video that captures my time here thus far.she did such a great job that i thought i should share it!
Akaraka!!!
hello!!
It continues to be a whirlwind of activity here in seoul. Last week was Akaraka! Akaraka is a Yonsei school pride festival. It starts off with Daedong Festival, which is when student clubs set up tents along the main road on campus. Its a long road....there are tons of tents! Each tent is set up as a 술집 (sul jiip), which literally means alcohol house. This is the word for bar in Korean. However it is very different from an American bar because you always order food, there is no actual bar, and everyone is at booths/tables. The atmosphere feels different. Anyway these 술집 along the main road are serving lots of alcohol and food. Street vendors also pull up their carts and people line up. Additionally they had set up four stages for student bands to play on! it was pretty crazy. We don't have a festival like this at Colby (especially since hard alcohol is now banned on campus)! I even think there were people designated to remove drunken passed out guys from the road. While waiting for my friend Emily, Tina and I had the privilege of seeing one guy "sleeping" on the pavement alone and then four guys with special badges around their neck came, each grabbed a limb, and brought him into the student center. lovely.
Anyway this went on for two nights. I personally was a fan of the tent that was selling drinks in a bag. They were all wearing doctors outfits and even had a "tequila syringe"! But the big show was Akaraka, on friday. There is an amphitheater on campus that started filling up at noon. Akaraka is first and foremost a Kpop concert. It is a surprise who comes but it is always very famous Korean groups. Secondly, Akaraka is a cheering fest. I have never seen anything like this before. 10,000+ people all saying the same thing doing the same dance, it was like a music video. I guess it doesn't sound as ridiculous as it looked but it was pretty hilarious. There are some parts where you put you hands over the shoulders of the person next to you and sway back and forth and then make big circle huddles or push and pull the person infront of you in a chain or gather in a circle and kick someone in the middle and there is a lot of thrusting involved...it was interesting to say the least. What really puts it over the top is the leaders on stage. They are so dramatic and have this flare with their arm movements. And on top of that...their outfits! First they are all wearing white gloves (mickey mouse-esque) and have shiny, bubbly almost cowboy outfits with lots of tassles hanging off. It is quite the sight. Every single Yonsei student knows these cheers (and there are a lot of cheers) so it is a good time.
However the main part was the singing (well at least I think and hope it was). It started off with student groups since people get into the amphitheater early because even if you have a ticket it can be really hard to get a seat. It is very competitive to get a ticket; under half of the students get one! Although i know several people who got in without one, i think it becomes a free for all at some point in the night. Anyway I had no idea so many famous singers were going to be there! I actually didn't know who they were (i haven't gotten THAT korean yet!) but once i heard the songs i was like oooooohh this song!!! Here is some of the songs i heard!
First on the stage was Dal Shabet:
Then G.NA (pronounced Gina):
then DJ DOC, actually a friend who spent a year in Korea a long time ago said this band was around then too!
Then came Supreme Team:
AND THEN THE HEADLINERS! 2NE1! (pronounced twenty-one)
and heres another 2NE1 track
so yea that was Akaraka. Pictures are on facebook if you haven't checked them out yet. It was a super fun night.
Im looking forward to the next two weekends. This weekend Jungwoo and Inho from Hubolab are coming up from Daejeon to hang out in Seoul! That will be awesome since Homecoming Day in Daejeon fell through. Additionally, Reed's brother and dad are coming to visit for a week starting this friday! We already have plans to take Reed's younger brother out in Seoul on saturday night to show him whats up : ) and then next weekend LUKAS IS COMING!! i cant believe its almost here! His cousin is coming with him too except just for the first three days of his week long visit. we are going to have such a good time, i cant wait!
I cant believe what little time I have left here. It has absolutely flown by. I am going to be really sad to leave Korea. I have made some awesome new friends that I have no idea how I am going to live without but I am also really excited to get back to all the people in the US that i cant live without! I got a job at Farrington (the farm i have worked at in the past) as assistant to the director and one of my best friends Daisy got a job there too! Mark and Matthew are going to be around, so will Natalie and Aaron and Lukas and other Cambridge people : ) I hope to get down to the cape a lot too!
I think I am thinking of home a lot recently because Jay died. I don't know why but I am taking it harder than i thought I would. I have known this was going to come for a while, and even knew that it was imminent. My heart just feels really heavy and I'm doing my best to hold back waves of tears in Korean class. He was such an awesome guy. He loved his kids and made them some of the happiest and greatest ones on the planet. I know I am going to do everything I can to make sure Eleanor and David know that for the rest of their life. My sports classes have been really nice to have though. When I read the email I had taekwondo later that day and we started kicking targets, which was a great distraction. It was my favorite taekwondo class, I had so much fun, even though I felt bad because I was hitting my Captain's hand instead of the target most of the time. and I also have amazing friends here who can make me laugh no matter what. they are unbelievably helpful. They make me realize how healing a smile can be. Im really looking forward to getting back so I can hang out with the Hardys. I have and will continue to think of them and miss them everyday. Until then, despite being thousands of miles away, I am lucky to have the support I do.
until next time, have a good week everyone!
It continues to be a whirlwind of activity here in seoul. Last week was Akaraka! Akaraka is a Yonsei school pride festival. It starts off with Daedong Festival, which is when student clubs set up tents along the main road on campus. Its a long road....there are tons of tents! Each tent is set up as a 술집 (sul jiip), which literally means alcohol house. This is the word for bar in Korean. However it is very different from an American bar because you always order food, there is no actual bar, and everyone is at booths/tables. The atmosphere feels different. Anyway these 술집 along the main road are serving lots of alcohol and food. Street vendors also pull up their carts and people line up. Additionally they had set up four stages for student bands to play on! it was pretty crazy. We don't have a festival like this at Colby (especially since hard alcohol is now banned on campus)! I even think there were people designated to remove drunken passed out guys from the road. While waiting for my friend Emily, Tina and I had the privilege of seeing one guy "sleeping" on the pavement alone and then four guys with special badges around their neck came, each grabbed a limb, and brought him into the student center. lovely.
Anyway this went on for two nights. I personally was a fan of the tent that was selling drinks in a bag. They were all wearing doctors outfits and even had a "tequila syringe"! But the big show was Akaraka, on friday. There is an amphitheater on campus that started filling up at noon. Akaraka is first and foremost a Kpop concert. It is a surprise who comes but it is always very famous Korean groups. Secondly, Akaraka is a cheering fest. I have never seen anything like this before. 10,000+ people all saying the same thing doing the same dance, it was like a music video. I guess it doesn't sound as ridiculous as it looked but it was pretty hilarious. There are some parts where you put you hands over the shoulders of the person next to you and sway back and forth and then make big circle huddles or push and pull the person infront of you in a chain or gather in a circle and kick someone in the middle and there is a lot of thrusting involved...it was interesting to say the least. What really puts it over the top is the leaders on stage. They are so dramatic and have this flare with their arm movements. And on top of that...their outfits! First they are all wearing white gloves (mickey mouse-esque) and have shiny, bubbly almost cowboy outfits with lots of tassles hanging off. It is quite the sight. Every single Yonsei student knows these cheers (and there are a lot of cheers) so it is a good time.
However the main part was the singing (well at least I think and hope it was). It started off with student groups since people get into the amphitheater early because even if you have a ticket it can be really hard to get a seat. It is very competitive to get a ticket; under half of the students get one! Although i know several people who got in without one, i think it becomes a free for all at some point in the night. Anyway I had no idea so many famous singers were going to be there! I actually didn't know who they were (i haven't gotten THAT korean yet!) but once i heard the songs i was like oooooohh this song!!! Here is some of the songs i heard!
First on the stage was Dal Shabet:
Then G.NA (pronounced Gina):
then DJ DOC, actually a friend who spent a year in Korea a long time ago said this band was around then too!
Then came Supreme Team:
AND THEN THE HEADLINERS! 2NE1! (pronounced twenty-one)
and heres another 2NE1 track
so yea that was Akaraka. Pictures are on facebook if you haven't checked them out yet. It was a super fun night.
Im looking forward to the next two weekends. This weekend Jungwoo and Inho from Hubolab are coming up from Daejeon to hang out in Seoul! That will be awesome since Homecoming Day in Daejeon fell through. Additionally, Reed's brother and dad are coming to visit for a week starting this friday! We already have plans to take Reed's younger brother out in Seoul on saturday night to show him whats up : ) and then next weekend LUKAS IS COMING!! i cant believe its almost here! His cousin is coming with him too except just for the first three days of his week long visit. we are going to have such a good time, i cant wait!
I cant believe what little time I have left here. It has absolutely flown by. I am going to be really sad to leave Korea. I have made some awesome new friends that I have no idea how I am going to live without but I am also really excited to get back to all the people in the US that i cant live without! I got a job at Farrington (the farm i have worked at in the past) as assistant to the director and one of my best friends Daisy got a job there too! Mark and Matthew are going to be around, so will Natalie and Aaron and Lukas and other Cambridge people : ) I hope to get down to the cape a lot too!
I think I am thinking of home a lot recently because Jay died. I don't know why but I am taking it harder than i thought I would. I have known this was going to come for a while, and even knew that it was imminent. My heart just feels really heavy and I'm doing my best to hold back waves of tears in Korean class. He was such an awesome guy. He loved his kids and made them some of the happiest and greatest ones on the planet. I know I am going to do everything I can to make sure Eleanor and David know that for the rest of their life. My sports classes have been really nice to have though. When I read the email I had taekwondo later that day and we started kicking targets, which was a great distraction. It was my favorite taekwondo class, I had so much fun, even though I felt bad because I was hitting my Captain's hand instead of the target most of the time. and I also have amazing friends here who can make me laugh no matter what. they are unbelievably helpful. They make me realize how healing a smile can be. Im really looking forward to getting back so I can hang out with the Hardys. I have and will continue to think of them and miss them everyday. Until then, despite being thousands of miles away, I am lucky to have the support I do.
until next time, have a good week everyone!
Sunday, May 8, 2011
walking in the rain
Hey everyone!
its been a while!
Last weekend my program went on an excursion to Taiwan. It was soooo much fun. We had three awesome tour guides, went on the worlds fastest elevator, biked around, and saw tons of cool sights. But before any of that happened we got into a car accident! What would a study abroad experience be without a little metal crunching? Our enormous bus didn't sustain any damage, no one was hurt, and heard a taiwanese lady yelling like crazy until the driver threatened to call the police (since it was her fault) and then she suddenly had an urgent appointment she had to get to...
We went to an AMAZING dumpling restaurant. best dumplings i have evvvveer had. When we first walked in the lady asked us if we knew how to eat dumplings. we were just like...uh yea? turns out we didnt. first you have to make the sauce with proper ratio of soy sauce to vinegar (1:3) over ginger. you then dip the dumpling in the sauce with chop sticks then transfer the dumpling to this spoon and poke a hole in the dumpling so the broth on the inside streams out. put some ginger on top and ta da! thats how you eat a dumpling. we got a lot of different kinds and they were all so delicious (except for the veggie ones...).
Even though I should have been focusing on Korean because I had midterms the day after we got back i learned some Chinese! It was exciting because there are five people from China in my Korean class so i impressed them with what i learned. I have the character for person, big, item, and Daoist temple down. I can say "I am" (washer sort of, hard to romanize chinese!), and "thank you" (shye shye), and that "joo" means wish if you say it with one tone but pig if you say it with a different tone...yikes. Each word has 5 tones that change the meaning. It was Yuri's birthday on the trip and our tourguides were joking around saying that some people sing happy birthday to you with the pig joo instead of the wish joo to be funny : )
I had such a great time! you should check the pictures on facebook out if you want to see more : )
I am almost finallly done with midterms. All I have left is swimming which i am not too worried about. I had reading and speaking Korean on wednesday, thursday was Children's Day so we didnt have classes, and then friday I had written and listening Korean. I think I did well. The other people in my class are doing a bit better than me but all they have to do is this class and then they spend all afternoon studying Korean while i have five other classes I am running around doing but I think I am still getting the hang of it to some extent. I am the only person on my program in level one doing the morning class (9-1) while everyone else is doing the afternoon class (4-6) and even though we stared 6 weeks later than them we are waaaaaay ahead so whenever I am feeling less than confident in my Korean I know i understand more than them : P
My taekwondo midterm was...interesting. We all struggled a bit but I had fun. After the exam the professor calls me over and he is standing next to this kid who looks super young. He tells him to introduce himself to me and I can tell the kid is kind of struggling, trying to come up with the english words but ends up just thrusting his hand out and saying his name. I shake his hand and introduce myself in Korean and the professor then says so do you know him? I am thinking he wants me to speak English with him or something because at the beginning of the semester he made everyone standup and introduce themselves in english. I just say uh no, kind of like uh obviously i dont know him...how would i? hes not in this class...hes just some random guy who happpened to be walking by...
well turns out he wasnt just some random guy. The professor says something about silver medal and speed skating or inline skating. i didnt really catch everything so I walk over to the TA afterwards and say uh why did i just meet him? and she says that he is very famous, everyone in korea knows him because he got the silver medal. i continued with but why did just i meet him? apparently everyone else knew who he was already...and hes not even 21 yet! I have tried since to find out who this was online but i completely forgot his name...maybe there was a g in it? i asked my roommate if she knew any famous skater and she said she had no idea, so im still investigating but anyway still cool!
Last night I went out with my class to celebrate we were done with midterms. We had a fun night learning some dangerous Chinese drinking games that I have to bring back to the US. Later in the night we went to a club in Hongdae, an area known for clubbing. When we got out of the club we discovered it was pouring rain. A friend of mine from class luckily had an umbrella and we walked around and got some food, hoping it would stop. It tapered off and he took a cab back to his house and I figured I was kinda already wet so I would just walk home anyway (its about a 25 minute walk). I put in my ipod and pounded the pavement. Not one song into my playlist I reach a crosswalk where there is a guy standing under an umbrella listening to his ipod too. As soon as he sees me he comes on over and shares his umbrella with me as we wait for the light to turn. He ended up walking me all the way back to my dorm! He didn't speak any english so we spoke korean together the whole entire way : ) I know a whole lot about his family (he lives with his brother, and dad but hasnt seen his mom in 5 years because she owns a korean restaurant in japan but hes planning to visit her in a year) and what food he likes (bulgogi, like me!) seeing as that is the vocab i just learned. He walked me because the busses weren't running yet so he didnt have anything better to do anyway. i figured the least i could do was chill with him until the busses started running again so when we got back to my dorm we just chilled outside talking together. it was fun! definitely got a lot of korean practice in. And then we went our separate ways. yet another reason to love korea, a random person on the street, walked with me for half an hour because i was walking in the rain without an umbrella at 4 in the morning. Sounds kind of sketchy. If a man were to walk up to me with an umbrella in jordan (nevermind the serious lack of rain) i would a. ignore him b. run in the other direction or c. lead him to a fake house, never under any circumstances show a man where i really live. but in korea its ok. I wonder if my parents prefer this or walking around the slums of giza with two random guys we met on a bus?
tonight is a lantern festival/parade in preparation for Buddha's birthday on May 10th. We have no school that day so I am sure there will be lots of things going on but tonight is supposed to be epic as well. so keep an eye out for the pictures!
until next time!
its been a while!
Last weekend my program went on an excursion to Taiwan. It was soooo much fun. We had three awesome tour guides, went on the worlds fastest elevator, biked around, and saw tons of cool sights. But before any of that happened we got into a car accident! What would a study abroad experience be without a little metal crunching? Our enormous bus didn't sustain any damage, no one was hurt, and heard a taiwanese lady yelling like crazy until the driver threatened to call the police (since it was her fault) and then she suddenly had an urgent appointment she had to get to...
We went to an AMAZING dumpling restaurant. best dumplings i have evvvveer had. When we first walked in the lady asked us if we knew how to eat dumplings. we were just like...uh yea? turns out we didnt. first you have to make the sauce with proper ratio of soy sauce to vinegar (1:3) over ginger. you then dip the dumpling in the sauce with chop sticks then transfer the dumpling to this spoon and poke a hole in the dumpling so the broth on the inside streams out. put some ginger on top and ta da! thats how you eat a dumpling. we got a lot of different kinds and they were all so delicious (except for the veggie ones...).
Even though I should have been focusing on Korean because I had midterms the day after we got back i learned some Chinese! It was exciting because there are five people from China in my Korean class so i impressed them with what i learned. I have the character for person, big, item, and Daoist temple down. I can say "I am" (washer sort of, hard to romanize chinese!), and "thank you" (shye shye), and that "joo" means wish if you say it with one tone but pig if you say it with a different tone...yikes. Each word has 5 tones that change the meaning. It was Yuri's birthday on the trip and our tourguides were joking around saying that some people sing happy birthday to you with the pig joo instead of the wish joo to be funny : )
I had such a great time! you should check the pictures on facebook out if you want to see more : )
I am almost finallly done with midterms. All I have left is swimming which i am not too worried about. I had reading and speaking Korean on wednesday, thursday was Children's Day so we didnt have classes, and then friday I had written and listening Korean. I think I did well. The other people in my class are doing a bit better than me but all they have to do is this class and then they spend all afternoon studying Korean while i have five other classes I am running around doing but I think I am still getting the hang of it to some extent. I am the only person on my program in level one doing the morning class (9-1) while everyone else is doing the afternoon class (4-6) and even though we stared 6 weeks later than them we are waaaaaay ahead so whenever I am feeling less than confident in my Korean I know i understand more than them : P
My taekwondo midterm was...interesting. We all struggled a bit but I had fun. After the exam the professor calls me over and he is standing next to this kid who looks super young. He tells him to introduce himself to me and I can tell the kid is kind of struggling, trying to come up with the english words but ends up just thrusting his hand out and saying his name. I shake his hand and introduce myself in Korean and the professor then says so do you know him? I am thinking he wants me to speak English with him or something because at the beginning of the semester he made everyone standup and introduce themselves in english. I just say uh no, kind of like uh obviously i dont know him...how would i? hes not in this class...hes just some random guy who happpened to be walking by...
well turns out he wasnt just some random guy. The professor says something about silver medal and speed skating or inline skating. i didnt really catch everything so I walk over to the TA afterwards and say uh why did i just meet him? and she says that he is very famous, everyone in korea knows him because he got the silver medal. i continued with but why did just i meet him? apparently everyone else knew who he was already...and hes not even 21 yet! I have tried since to find out who this was online but i completely forgot his name...maybe there was a g in it? i asked my roommate if she knew any famous skater and she said she had no idea, so im still investigating but anyway still cool!
Last night I went out with my class to celebrate we were done with midterms. We had a fun night learning some dangerous Chinese drinking games that I have to bring back to the US. Later in the night we went to a club in Hongdae, an area known for clubbing. When we got out of the club we discovered it was pouring rain. A friend of mine from class luckily had an umbrella and we walked around and got some food, hoping it would stop. It tapered off and he took a cab back to his house and I figured I was kinda already wet so I would just walk home anyway (its about a 25 minute walk). I put in my ipod and pounded the pavement. Not one song into my playlist I reach a crosswalk where there is a guy standing under an umbrella listening to his ipod too. As soon as he sees me he comes on over and shares his umbrella with me as we wait for the light to turn. He ended up walking me all the way back to my dorm! He didn't speak any english so we spoke korean together the whole entire way : ) I know a whole lot about his family (he lives with his brother, and dad but hasnt seen his mom in 5 years because she owns a korean restaurant in japan but hes planning to visit her in a year) and what food he likes (bulgogi, like me!) seeing as that is the vocab i just learned. He walked me because the busses weren't running yet so he didnt have anything better to do anyway. i figured the least i could do was chill with him until the busses started running again so when we got back to my dorm we just chilled outside talking together. it was fun! definitely got a lot of korean practice in. And then we went our separate ways. yet another reason to love korea, a random person on the street, walked with me for half an hour because i was walking in the rain without an umbrella at 4 in the morning. Sounds kind of sketchy. If a man were to walk up to me with an umbrella in jordan (nevermind the serious lack of rain) i would a. ignore him b. run in the other direction or c. lead him to a fake house, never under any circumstances show a man where i really live. but in korea its ok. I wonder if my parents prefer this or walking around the slums of giza with two random guys we met on a bus?
tonight is a lantern festival/parade in preparation for Buddha's birthday on May 10th. We have no school that day so I am sure there will be lots of things going on but tonight is supposed to be epic as well. so keep an eye out for the pictures!
until next time!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
