Christmas in February

To my surprise, a package came through the mail on Thursday. This battered-and-bruised box has, from the looks of it, been on quite the adventure 'round the world, over the past two and a half months. Maybe it decided to go backpack through Europe before getting over here... I'd actually pay to see a written account of where-the-heck it's been - but I guess that'll remain a mystery.

The box contained a really, really awesome Christmas present from some of my favorite Ottawa people: The brand new 'Black Magic' Senators Third Jersey (at least, that's what it was dubbed when the Sens got their first two-win 'streak' of the year going - haha). I hadn't actually brought my Sens jersey over, which might explain the season-long funk they've been in, since they obviously can't win without me having proper cheering-apparel.

Big thank you to Sarah for organizing the whole thing (and trying to deal with Canada Post for the past while!)! Thanks to everyone else who contributed: Kayleigh, Rachel, Lisa, Dan, Chantal, Brigitte, Jace, and Véronique!

February 26th never felt so much like Christmas.
Cheers!

Showered

Sunday evening, my former co-teacher, Shine, had a baby shower in the dorm. Baby showers are actually fairly unheard of in Korea, but since she's been living with Foreigners for a few years, she thought it would be a good idea. It was a chance to have a potluck, play some games, and decide what her baby's English name would be.

There were three choices: Brad, Daniel, and Alex. Since i'm such a Brad Pitt fan, it was a pretty hard choice, but after pondering intensely, I settled on Alex (shocking, I know!). The total votes were:
-Brad: 1
-Daniel: 6
-Alex: 7

Woooooheee.

The games that were played were fun for some, and embarassing for others. I was volunteered for the first game, without knowing what it was. It turned out to be a Team vs Team competition, where the volunteered person had to be rolled a 'diaper' by the team, with toilet paper. Where's the picture? There ain't no picture here, fellas... though, to my chagrin, one'll probably pop up on Facebook sometime. haha.

The second was a pin-the-pacifier game, onto the baby's mouth, and the final one was to 'feed the baby' while blindfolded. Sometimes, I really love that video option on the camera...


The week ahead is the final one of my second full-semester. I'll be changing rooms and co-teachers once again (argh), but I at least get to keep my Adult-classes. As long as I can teach 'em, i'll stay satisfied.

Have a good one.

Gyeongbokgung Palace

I spent the better part of Saturday in downtown Seoul, at one of its most important historical sights, Gyeongbokgung Palace (I know, it's a mouthful). Gyeongbokgung was an ancient Palace, built during a Korean Dynasty that began in 1395. Between that time, it was razed by the Japanese when they invaded Korea (between 1592-1598), was and left in ruins for the next 250 years. In 1868, the Korean government of the time finally decided to begin rebuilding it, but 85% of the original buildings were torn down - so the majority of the buildings are actually replicates of what they once were.
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Still, it was a pretty interesting walk. While Gyeongbokgung is actually in the middle of Seoul, you can hardly tell, without stepping outside its walls. I don't know if the Korean government purposely disallowed the building of any Skyscrapers around it, or if the surrounding land just doesn't allow for them, but it has a strange escapist feel to it.

I had the chance to witness the 'changing of the guard', just outside the palace. It's a pretty cool reenactment - and not quite we're used to, on Parliament Hill. I took a video, as they were approaching, so take a look if you're interested - it's not really riveting stuff, but I found it interesting.

So Long

It's been a pretty productive week. I've done a hundred different speaking tests, graded every one of my kids, and still managed to watch the entire second season of 24 - that show's addictive!

For the past three days, though, lunch time has been used up for three seperate Goodbye meals. Next week, we're losing two Korean teachers, and one Foreign teacher (who are all done with their contracts, and are moving on to other places). While it's the first time I see another foreign teacher leave, it seems that the turnover rate for the Korean teachers is pretty high; including the two that left this week, i've seen 5 leave (in 6 months), as well as three members of the management staff. I'm not sure what to make of that.

We've been informed that next semester (in March), because of dropping enrollment, we'll only have a complement of 13 Foreign and 13 Korean teachers (as opposed to the 15/15 ratio that we had in the past two semesters). What that means for me (hopefully) is more classes, and a little overtime income. after this semester, i've found free period to be completely dull. What it also means for me is a week-full of celebrating, singing and drinking.

No complaints here.

This weekend, i'll be visiting a few sights in Seoul with a friend, so it should be interesting.
Happy Friday & Weekend!

As Exciting As Hockey

On Saturday, I went out to Yongsan (a district of Seoul) to go see a live game of 'professional-level' Starcraft. Starcraft is an incredibly popular game (easily the most popular) in Korea, and has been for almost 10 years. To this day, you can still watch 'pro' games being televised 24/7. Those 'Pro' players make great money, have many sponsorships, and evidently have pretty large fanbases.

They're essentially the same as any hockey player playing at the NHL level in Canada.

The television-spectacle happens on the top floor of 'i-Park Mall', a gigantic electronics mall. The bottom 8 floors house seas and seas of every electronic gadget that you could think of - cameras, computers, video games, and so on. The top floor is the 'Electronic-Sports Stadium', where a huge room accomodates those who come to cheer for their favorite Starcraft players.

Those players sit in sound-proof glass bubbles, and look pretty damn serious during the game. Announcers also sit in the middle, in between them. It's really entertaining - the crowd really does gasp and cheer, after every major battle in the game - and the announcers look for anything to happen, to start yelling excitedly.

I took a video of the last few-seconds of the game we saw, to get a feel of the crowd reaction. Enjoy!

Valentine's Day in Korea: The Untold Secret

I discovered something funny this week. Valentine's Day is celebrated (and is about as much of a big-deal) in Korea - but in an awesomely different way. It turns out that women are the ones who are expected to give chocolate to men (and not vice-versa), on February 14th. Women get nothing, until a holiday celebrated exactly a month later, on March 14th, called 'White Day', when men are expected to give women 'non-chocolate' candies (i'm told that if someone gets you something on Valentine's Day, then you're expected to get something for them on White Day).

I'm not going to dwell on the political-incorectness of calling a holiday 'White Day', but I think it's pretty funny - have no fear though, there's also a Black Day.

Black Day happens a month after White day (April 14th), when, according to Wikipedia:

On April 14 (Black Day), those who did not receive anything on the 14th of Feb or March go to a Chinese restaurant to eat black noodles and "mourn" their single life.

haha.. you can't make that kind of stuff up.

Luckily for me, one of my adult-students gave me a very generous box of assorted chocolates (pictured above), so you won't be finding me at a Chinese Restaurant on April 14th. With the risk of Black Day out of the way, i'll be spending my Valentine's Day on yet another nerdly quest - going to watch a Live game of Pro-Level Starcraft players. I think I mentioned, awhile ago, that there are two TV stations here that only show Video Games being played (at a professional level!). Those games are filmed in front of an audience (for the gasps and cheers, no doubt!) - and y'know what? It'd be a shame if I spent a year here and never attended one.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Beer Hunting

Even after the first week of February, it seems some Christmas Trees are still up. Kind of makes me wonder if this one in particular, at 'Beer Hunters', is ever taken down - I wouldn't be too surprised if its seasonal-aspect kind of passes over the head of a few business-owners. If you don't really celebrate Christmas, I s'pose it's a nice decoration to light up your bar.

Beer Hunters is the place where I usually go with my night-time adult class, at the end of the month - I was also there on Saturday with a friend. It's about as close as one can get to a Sports bar over here (Local Hero's-style) - although the only sport i've ever seen played was Baseball. Since Korean Baseball season has been over, though, it's become an absolute hot-spot for Korean melodramas (and alcohol).

As you can tell by the empty seats, it's insanely popular.

Anyway. One of my old adult-students came back this week, from a three-month stint in the Philippines - one of Korea's favourite destinations for learning English at a much-cheaper cost than Canada/Australia/etc. We caught-up by going to an Internet Café, and taking turns at beating each other at games the other's horrible at (I lost horribly at Starcraft, while kicking a lot of ass at Warcraft 3. Them late-night WC3 ATs really paid off, gents).

From what he told me, the Philippines is a very cheap, but generally unsafe place to be. Therefore, it's not going to be on the top of my list of destinations to visit, for when I want to enhance my spoken-english.

Maybe i'll head to this Canada place, in about 6 months.

I'll keep you updated on that.

Like Old Times

Coming home from the trip was strange. It's bizzare to think of Incheon as the place where I come home to, after a trip - but after nearly 6 months, it's starting to feel like it.

As much as I used to dread going back to work after any kind of vacation, it's also strange to admit that I was really looking forward to getting back in the classroom. This school semester is quickly winding down, so I think i've just hit that groove where i'm comfortable with all of the kids - it makes the job fun.

It's been a good, uneventful week - exactly what I was looking forward to.
We'll see what the weekend holds, soon enough.

Cheers

Hong Kong (Part 3) - This Ain't Korea

Our fourth (and final full) day in Hong Kong, we started off with the objective of visiting a museum or two. There were two nearby museums: The Hong Kong Museum of Art, and the Hong Kong Museum of Space. I'll let you guess which one I wanted to go see.

Unfortunately, it seems the museums didn't open on weekdays until 1PM. Luckily, though, the museums were situated right next to the port, where Hong Kong's 'Star Ferry' ships run. The Star Ferry is a very cheap alternative to the Subway lines, to reach Hong Kong island (we were lucky enough to cross Victoria Harbour twice on it, once during the day, and once at night).

We ventured around the Island for awhile, with the objective of finding the 'Low to Mid-Level Escalator' - a gigantic Escalator system that's used by morning pedestrians who need a 'lil extra help making it up and down the mountain. We eventually found it, and wow - it's a very cool idea that helps keep the pedestrians-going-somewhere and the pedestrians-looking-to-shop apart.

After finding a place to eat, we decided to check out one of the local Beaches - the closest one indicated within our Travel Guide was named Repulse Bay, about a 20-minute bus ride away. The bus actually had to go swirling up the mountain, then swirling down the other side to reach it, which gave us yet another high-altitude view of the area. I don't think we ever got tired of those.

Finally, in the evening, we made our way back to SoHo, to have one last go at drinking in Hong Kong, before heading home the next day. The only thing that's actually noteworthy about that, is the fact that Heineken here is the cheapest beer available. I never figured if that spoke to how expensive the others are, or if, for whatever reason, it was cheaper there. Ah well.

Overall, it was a good trip. Hong Kong has a ton of things to see, many of which we missed out on (including a few temples and historical sites), due to a lack of time. It was definitely interesting, though, to have another Asian culture to contrast with Korea - and the difference is quite noticeable. I think the Korean maneurisms are much more respectful and friendly, as opposed to what I saw from local Chinese in Hong Kong. The politeness level declined to about the same thing I was used to anywhere in Canada (so it's not to say that they're impolite, just less so than Koreans).

Looking forward to the next trip!
Have a good week.

Hong Kong (Part 2) - Copy Watch?

Our second day in Hong Kong, we made plans to go to Ocean Park with two nice Indonesian girls we met during the fireworks display. Ocean Park is Hong Kong's top-rated amusement park, more-so even than Disneyland - (which is the reason we missed out on Disney). As you can probably guess, it's a very aqua-centric place.

There were a lot of very good animal shows and exhibitions, including Jellyfish, Seals, Doplhins, and Pandas - and of course, a few rollercoasters. I hadn't ridden on one since going to Wonderland a couple of years ago, so I decided it was time to verify my theory of 'maybe this time it won't make my head spin'. It wasn't too bad. One of the teachers, Brandon, went on his first ride - ever - and was captured by the end-of-the-ride-cam looking like a man who was about to die. haha.. those pictures are usually overpriced, but I considered this one to be pretty priceless, so I bought myself a copy.

The park was a fun way to spend the day - even with the Asian-sized lineups, we all had a good time.

After we made it back into the heart of the City, we went looking for a place to eat/drink. We eventually ended up at a district named SoHo (for South Hollywood), which is hugely popular with foreigners. Let me just say first, though, that the ratio of foreigners in Hong Kong is already very, very high (with only 65-70% of the population actually being Chinese, by my entirely unscientific-estimate). When you head into a district that's popular with foreigners, those Chinese become a visible minority. It's strange.

When we headed back to our hostel, we heard someone say a word that we ended up hearing way, way too much on our trip: 'Hash?'. By that point, we were starting to get used to the people standing on each street corner saying 'Copy Watch? You want a copy watch? Rolex?' and 'Tailored suit? You need a tailored suit? Take my card'. The 'Hash' guys seem to operate with the same business plan, and after being offered Copy Watches/Suits/Hash for the umpteenth time, it was hard to resist not making fun of them by offering each-other (loudly), as we were walking by, 'Copy Watch?!'.

I even saw an elderly English gentleman say, after being offered a tailored suit, 'No, I just bought a big bag of Hash, but thank you', with all the loudness and sarcasm he could muster. haha.

The main excursion during our third day was to reach the top of 'The Peak', one of the highest points on Hong Kong Island. The easiest way to get there is to take the 'Peak Tram', which reaches the top in about 8 minutes (as opposed to the hour and a half walk). We were treated to one of the greatest views available in the region, upon reaching the top. There were a few restaurants, and some attractions that we skipped (not wanting to waste time on a Wax museum), but we did take some time to walk down a trail that led downhill quite a way. We didn't go too far.










After finding a place to have supper, we went to a notable market located on Temple Street. It's a very large market with tents pitched up, and people selling things from utter-crap to pretty cool souvenirs. Everything is negotiable, and haggling is expected. That aspect isn't all too different from Korea, but at least here, I can haggle in a language I understand, which was a lot of fun.

I'll wrap up my Hong Kong trip with another post in a little while - I missed Korean food while I was gone, and it's a-callin'.

Cheers.