Just call me Billy Mayes (no, it's not too soon) ... because in this blog not only do you get all the exciting information about my Halloween weekend, but I'm also throwing in everything that happened this past weekend too! It's an extreme blowout sale where everything must go (or be documented in my blog, you know, for posterity and stuff).
Well actually I've found myself somehow behind a weekend in blogging ... so this latest installment features two weekends for the price of one.
Just think of it like you ordered a vat of OxiClean, and received some Orange Glo as my free gift to you.
This was the first Halloween I have celebrated in Korea, and it was, pretty memorable. The evening was filled with costumes, candy, coffee shops, and various other things that start with the letter "c". Myself and about 20 other Fulbright ETAs gathered in Gwangju to affirm our status as foreigners in Korea, and celebrate a holiday that is unheard of over here in Asia. However, this small fact did not tone down our celebration, as we all dressed in costumes (many, quite elaborate) and paraded around the streets of Gwangju ... which made us the recipients of countless stares, awkward glances, and overall pure amazement from many Koreans.
I believe at many points in the night I received a couple "Wows".
I dressed up as an ajumma ... a title given to the oldest of Korean ladies ... something into which all Korean women will eventually evolve. I believe once they hit 65, all Korean women begin to turn into what can only be described as Yoda-like. The costume consisted of gloriously mis-matched articles of clothing (which are an absolute standard in ajumma fashion), a wide brimmed hat (to preserve their wrinkly skin while sitting on the sidewalk all day selling an assortment of vegetables), and an E-Mart (similar to Wal-Mart) bag in which to carry all their priceless possessions (mainly vegetables). I must admit that I think I had a pretty stellar costume, and it was by far the most comfortable Halloween costume I have ever worn.
(Check out my picture website to confirm.)
So in our costumes all us ETAs invaded a coffee shop - one which another ETA's principal's son owns (hope that is clear enough for you) and had a lovely celebration drinking various beverages and listening to the "Once" soundtrack - ballad after ballad of sappy love songs blared amongst the Halloween festivities. Seriously. Koreans love anything to do with that movie.
As that weekend was spent celebrating one of the greatest pagan holidays, this past weekend was atoning for those sins at my host-family's church, being treated to a lovely vegetarian buffet lunch by some of my new church friends, and visiting the Hampyeong flower festival in Hampyeong (duh).
The festival was full of flowers, flower sculptures, your routine swine-flu emergency center, and the saddest carnival in the history of humankind. I took the bus to Hampyeong (it was much to far to walk) and met up with one of my ETA friends to enjoy a day of looking at flowers and nearly getting killed by the most terrifying carnival ride ever.
The bus ride was surprisingly pleasant, a nice change in that most bus rides passengers don't ever / aren't really supposed to speak (especially in English). But the bus was packed and I found myself sitting by the only other English speaker on the bus ... a Korean guy who lives in Dubai, is a flight attendant and world traveler, and speaks fluent Korean, English, Portuguese, and Japanese. We decided to hold our convo in English (my Japanese skills are a little rusty / nonexistent). He told me all about his world travels and how his favorite two cities in that he has visited thus far have been Paris and Dallas (probably because of his love for berets, guns, and cowboy boots), and I shared my experiences as an American English teacher in Korea. It was really great to have a legitimate conversation with another individual ... they are definitely few and far between. And he did inform me that the overwhelming opinion of Koreans is that American English teachers are by far the best foreign teachers in Korea (because of our small, beautiful faces) and that next come the Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, and then lastly those who come from the Philippines. Apparently they have the largest faces ... and the worst accents.
The flower festival was something ... it smelled really good (like flowers), boasted some of the most interesting flower arrangements I've ever seen, and also was home to the most depressing carnival this side of the Mississippi. Well, I guess both sides of the Mississippi.
The day was spent walking around the grounds and observing the different flower sculptures. But we first had to pass through swine-flu central, which basically meant we had to douse our hands with sanitizer (the current swine-flu vaccine over here in Korea), walk through what to appeared to be a car wash of more sanitizer ... we were literally had to be sprayed down with the stuff in order to enter the festival).
Throughout the day I was able to see flower sculptures of all kinds: the Eiffel Tower greeted us as we walked in (for a moment I was confused as to exactly what continent I was living), penguins, bulls, Indian temples, penises, and giraffes.
All there. All made out of flowers.
After observing the lovely flowers we headed over to an adjacent impromptu carnival. I guess you could call it a carnival ... it had a ferris wheel, which is my definition of carnival. But this was, as I stated before, the most depressing little carnival ever. We were 2 of probably 5 people there total ... not counting the 3 guys it took to man the rides, concession stands, ticket booths, and souvenir shop. Actually, I don't even think there was a souvenir shop ... seeing that the only thing they would probably sell would be shirts boasting:
"I went to the Hampyeong carnival and all I got was depressed."
So after taking our chances and being the only people to ride the ferris wheel ... which was pretty risky in that its max speed was .25 miles per hour and made solely out of rust, we were invited to ride another ride for free ... one that I now know to be called "Taga Disco".
I figured that we should do it, and make sure we got our monies worth (we paid about 3 dollars to ride the ferris wheel ... which I would estimate to be about 25 cents worth of fun). So we hopped on this "Taga Disco" ... basically a padded, round ride with no seat belts and barely any places to hold onto. I thought we and the three other Korean girls who were at the festival would spin around a couple times and call it a day. But silly me, I didn't know this was the ride from hell.
The ride was operated by some douche-tastic man who controlled both the speed and actions of the padded doughnut thing we were sitting in. He would spin us around and then make the ride pop up and down until we were literally nauseous. This acted like some type of torture device ... he genuinely took pleasure out of our "I think I'm going to throw up all over your stupid ride" faces.
I later learned that this type of ride is one that the operator basically tries to make you sick. They ask you various questions and you are thrown about depending on if they like your answers. As all the questions were in Korean, (still in Korea) I understood only two: "Do you have a boyfriend?" and "How old are you?". When I answered (or really, motioned with one hand ... as the other was desperately clinging to a handrail so as not to die ... that I am 23, he laughed, popped me up and down a few hundred times, then told me "You have old face."
Nice.
This is one of the worst things that can be said about any Korean's appearance ... the ultimate Korean burn. However, I didn't really take much offense to it, only because all Koreans look like they are about 12 (except for the ajummas who, again, look like Yoda). But he thought this was hilarious and continue to try to make me vomit all over his stupid, Korean ride.
All in all, the flower festival was enjoyable, save the 15 or so minutes of torture I received thanks to "Taga Disco" ... or more like "Taga Lame-o.
This past Sunday I once again attended my host family's church in Gwangju, and helped to lead a childrens' English worship service ... another hour informing Korean children how stellar my singing voice is, and having them recite new English words such as "javelin" and "spear" ... two words I'm hoping they at least try to bust out on the playground this week.
After the church service I went out to eat with some of the other church members who help to put on the childrens' service ... and was treated to a delicious vegetarian buffet. Lunch was great in that the majority of everyone I dined with spoke a good amount of English and we were able to have some legit conversations about Korea, the United States, international politics, and religion. They were very eager to hear how I feel about Korea after living here for over 4 months. I was able to share many of my experiences, thoughts, and opinions ... and was also able to hear how they felt about said topics.
However, I get the sneaky feeling that they are still desperately trying to convert me to a holy roller ... only because throughout lunch I was constantly reminded that God had big plans for me in Korea, and that I will absolutely find God before I leave next July.
Definitely the longest game of hide-and-seek I have ever played.
In unrelated news, last week at school I was sitting at my desk ... diligently making lesson plans (aka watching the Daily Show and creeping around on Facebook) ... and I was approached by Moon, a fellow teacher at Hwasun High School. He began to explain that in his quest to learn more English (his is probably the cutest quest ever) he has started to use this "cool, new Internet website". So he came to show me this "cool, new Internet website" ... but first told me he wanted to know what a "dickory" is.
Dumbfounded, I asked him to show me the website ... secretly hoping that it wouldn't entail anything that would bring horrible, awful viruses in and around my computer.
So he eventually found his way into this "cool, new Internet website" and proudly presented to me a childrens' nursery rhyme website that boasts an awkward lady reading the most popular American nursery rhymes ... the hottest one at the moment: "Hickory Dickory Dock". Completely proud of himself, Moon then logs into the site with the screen-name "lover". No joke.
I'm just surprised he didn't choose the name "littlekidlover" ... just so people will know exactly where his priorities are.
Clarification: Office reference - he is not a creeper.
It's that time of year. That Korean time of year ... when 3rd grade middle school students are preparing to enter high school and either commit to an intense three years of academic study, or three years of rigorous training at a trade school. In Korea the students are placed in either category based upon their middle school test scores - they don't really have a say in the matter. However, from what I can understand most students are placed on the academic track, though it is up to them to chose which high school to attend. Not every high school is a viable option. The ridiculously good ones (the ones with fancy computers and stuff) are much more difficult to get into ... just think of it as if they were applying to college (but that's a whole different ball of worms).
Anyways, Hwasun High School is in recruiting mode. There are technically two schools in Hwasun (although the one where I teach is legit in Hwasun ... the other one is a 20 minute car ride outside of town - how it is still defined as "in Hwasun" I have no idea) and each are in fear that the other will get all the smart students, while they will be left with all the boring, not-so-smart ones. So a couple teachers at Hwasun High School are currently making a promotional video of the school - getting some pretty sweet panoramic shots of the lunchroom - in hopes to recruit all the good students. I have actually had a couple of my classes videotaped by said teachers, if only to emphasize, "Hey! Look! We have a foreign teacher! She has brown hair! Come check it out!"
In addition to recording me teaching some classes, I was recently asked to do some voice-over work (that makes it sound so professional ... definitely going on my resume) for the video. My co-teacher asked me to write a couple sentences in English (I don't know what else she should expect - Latin?) that talk up Hwasun High School and "sound really fancy in English". And I do believe that was a direct quote.
So I wrote up some fancy sentences, making sure to include words like "diversity" and "endeavors", so as to make it sound important. However my co-teacher then decided that they were too fancy and the middle school students wold have absolutely no idea what I was talking about, which, I assume would be completely true. She then asked me just to read two sentences in English as they were directly translated from from the promotional video.
I obliged and then spent about 30 solid minutes perfecting my pitch, speed, and overall ability to speak, at the request of the video's directors.
The two sentences (phrases, really) that ended up in the video:
"The everlasting beautiful challenge" - which I'm told is in reference to the three years spent at Hwasun High School - it's a challenge, but a beautiful one.
and
"No extra students at Hwasun, everyone works!" - also appropriate for Russia, circa early 20th century.
If this doesn't attract the middle school students, I don't know what will.
It worked on me.
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