Follow Me to Korea

Home on the Range

2008-08-05T17:16:00.002-04:00

Home on the Range

So, my 3 months on the other side of the world are over and I'm back in Canada. I've left behind alot of great things in Korea, including my copy of the movie Twister (damnit!), but I've found new meaning to the phrase "there's no place like home."

The journey was interesting. I flew from Seoul to Denver on the same style of plane I went over on, which meant I could watch movies on the little screen attached to the seat in front of me. I didn't sleep the entire 11 hour flight, and wound up watching "21," "10,000 BC," "Spiderwick Chronicles," and "Horton Hears a Who." I also watched the episode of "Just for Laughs Gags," and the episodes of "Funny Home Videos" that were available.

By the time we got off the plane at L.A. it was noon local time, but 3am Seoul time. I hardly knew who I was anymore and I had to get my luggage through US customs. It actually wasn't that bad though. The hardest part was dragging my carry-on over a 10 minute obstacle course of people who like to stand in places that prevent you from getting through. A lot of the airport was under construction and the domestic flights area had a Wolfgang Puck pizzeria. Finally, I found out when I got home that I missed an earthquake that hit LA about 20 minutes before my plane landed and that I never new a thing about while I was there.

The Denver airport was nice and easy. I got out one gate and ran to the gate to Toronto that was only 5 minutes away. With departure delays, I should have only had a 10 minute leeway to change planes, but as it turned out the plane was 20 minutes late and then the pilots were another 20 after that. With the flight check we were about an hour and a half late, and with the delay in baggage at the Toronto airport, I walked out of the last doors at about 2am, over 2 hours later than I was supposed to...

Bless my parents for being there and in good spirits when I finally came out of "the Twilight Zone" as my mother calls it.

Anyways now that I'm back there are a few big differences between here and there that I never really thought of until now. The biggest thing is the lack of mirrors. People in Korea tend to really care about their appearance, so there seem to be mirrors everywhere in public places, and there's usually at least one person (man or woman, the guys are as bad as the ladys) looking at themselves.

The next thing is that, in order to save energy and water (and I'm sure to prevent pluggage), Korean woman don't flush their toilet paper when they pee. Instead they throw it in a garbage can located in the stall. On top of that, to prevent people from using too much toilet paper, it's not in the stall but beside the sinks instead. The only paper you can use is what you take in with you. I know it's conservation and all, and it is a good idea, but it sure was nice to go to the washroom in Wal-mart and not only have paper in the stall, but no garbage can full of used toilet paper to boot.

The third thing I'm going to talk about, and just briefly here, is the food. No I'm not going to go off on how much better our food is. Though it is familiar, and therefore comforting to me, I never realized just how heavy it all is. There's no dinky little cans of pop, or small portion meals. Everything is big and it all fills you up so fast.

That's all I have time for right now, but there's many things I haven't talked about yet, so stay tuned. I might be back, my this blog's not done yet!

One Last Morning

2008-07-28T18:12:00.004-04:00

One Last Morning

It's morning now, my last one in the Land of the Morning calm. It's just after 7 am and I wanted to sleep in, but this land is living up to its name too well. It was too quiet to try and keep sleeping. Honestly, over the last three months I've adapted the ability to sleep through the loud reveling of people leaving the restaurant that's right below my window.

There's a little more noise now, like the sound of a very quiet dump truck (I know, I was surprised too), and the grumble of some early cars, but when I first opened my eyes, all I could hear was the chirping of a few birds come down from the mountain I can see from my window.

Yesterday I had no work and no commitments, so I had a sort of personal day with Korea. It was special, I think. The weather was sunny and hot, the most beautiful it's been in weeks.

In the morning I packed and I'm very proud of the fact I managed to get everything in my suitcases. At noon I had done as much as I could so I went out to my favorite area of the city, Insadong (for those who don't remember, it's the Traditional Street).

Insadong was in top form. It always has the natural shade of it's many trees, so it wasn't too hot. It was also a Monday afternoon, so it was relatively quiet and uncrowded. I walked up and down more than once, browsing the antiques in particular. Some of the things I saw included Korean style, pug nose faced horse bells, multilayerd hand carved jade balls, old coins and bills, statues, pagodas, wooden carvings, and old household items.

These days it's the beginning of the rainy season, and there's rain almost every day, so the sun was a welcome change and all of the thousands of umbrella stands stood empty. Yet the umbrellas were out full force, this time providing protection from the sun.

When I was done shopping, I wandered towards the nearby Tapgol, or Pagoda park, which I found out from reading the signs was the site of the first reading of the Korean Declaration of Independence. It was a beautiful park and everywhere I turned there were cultural relics.

The trees were a little distracting though. They were full of the humming of a thousand Cicada bug mating calls.

After I was done there I headed to Korea House, the Traditional Village, bought some fish feed, and fed the koi in the pond. I also wandered around to see the houses and gardens, and an exhibition showing old folk paintings. I was even witness to the photo shoot of a little two year old girl wearing a red polka dot dress, pineapple squeaky shoes, and bunny knee guards.

Later on I hooked up with K and one of our Korean friends and we went for supper. We had a dumpling stew that came uncooked and was set on a gas element set into our table. On top of the Mandu dumplings, this thing had mushrooms and vegetables, beef and Duk (Korean soft rice cake).

Then I came home, finished packing, threw out all the garbage and uneaten food in the apartment, and called it a night.

As I lay in bed at 1 in the morning last night, I realized that at that time tonight, I will be halfway around the world in a hotel room in Toronto. I didn't know whether to be happy or sad about that, and I suppose the feelings will work themselves better when I get there.

Today I am flying from Seoul at 4:30 pm and I'm arriving in L.A. at noon the same day. That's right, I'm 4 and a half hours back in time.

Now I have to clean the apartment and I'm ready to go catch the airport shuttle that comes to my local subway station every half hour.

Korean Fun Fact: Don't Trust the Labels

When living in a country with a very different culture than your own, you can expect that many of the food and drink is will also be beyond what you're used to. A quick look at some of the products for sale can tell you that.

In any store you can buy what looks like milk and wind up with peanut juice or soy milk. If you buy what might be a pepperette or cheese stick, you end up with a potent tasting rubbery sausage. The bag with the shrimp on the front is full of crisps I can't decide are rice or potato.

Sometimes you just have to throw caution to the winds and try things despite the packaging.

Here's one of the first cases a had where that didn't work out so well. I had seen this can in many vending machines but I couldn't read the symbols at this early point, so one day curiosity got the better of me and I dropped some money in:

Now you can't see the color well here, but the can is light pink with dark pink letters. It looks pretty harmless, like maybe strawberry milk (which you can get in a can here), or some exotic fruit. Then I found the English on the back...

Cultural Trip Part sam (Three) + Some Other Stuff

2008-07-15T00:11:00.006-04:00

Wow, it has been too long and I'm very sorry. I'm getting close to the end of my stay and things are getting... well soggy. It's not monsoon season yet, but the heat coupled with the incredible humidity makes for an environment where you just don't want to do anything. It makes sense then that I was busier the last 2 weeks with exhibition stuff than I've been yet. Plus there's no air conditioning in my apartment and my computer produces alot of heat.

Enough of excuses though, you all want to know what a Noraebang (pronounced Nor-eye-bong) is. So here it is

Cultural Trip Part Sam: Noraebang Night

So, right... Noraebang. We all know what karaoke is. Now imagine a karaoke where you go alone or with some friends, and rent your own private room with a karaoke machine (called a Music Bank) where you're free to butcher as many songs as you can in two hours without a bunch of strangers to witness your incredible lack of musical talent.

If the thought of strangers appeals to you, there's always groups of young Koreans looking to hook up with random new friends and have a good time (I know this from the stories of other interns).

After supper, to Noraebang we went , and we rocked it out for our whole two hours.

(ugh, for some reason I can't upload pictures)

Once we were done there, we headed down to the beach where people were setting of fireworks and just generally hanging out. I had a corn dog (a Pogo for all those brand oriented people) that was embedded with cubed potatoes.

Our group camped on the sand, and one of our number, a musician, started playing his guitar. It was a sign that we've been working with small children for too long that this heavy metal rocker was on a beach in the middle of the night playing a modified ABCs for all of us to sing along.

Also K gained himself a story he'll be able to tell for years to come. At about one in the morning he, an Australian intern, the curator of our exhibition, and one of the two senior interns all decided to strip to their underwear and go swimming in the Yellow Sea. Me? I was the one on the beach yelling at them to come back when they started trying to swim to a far away island.

When he got back back to shore, K found his clothes were missing, so some Koreans that ran a food stall not far away from us gave him a free pair of boxers that he still has.

The next day we hung around on the beach a bit more until we visited an old Buddhist Temple and went home.

Some Other Stuff: Namdaemun (Nom-day-moon)

I just wanted to do a quick blurb on one of the large and very famous markets. It's called Namdaemun, and it pretty much epitomizes what I thought South Korea would be like based on pictures I've seen.

There are alot of people here, but everything is so well organized that huge crowds you can barely move in are rare. Not here.

Namdaemun is advertised as a place where anyone can find anything, and having gone there I believe it. It's not just a market, It's an entire town larger than Larder Lake, where I grew up.

Picture this: There are countless street stalls selling everything from clothes and accessories, to Chinese remedies, to American imported food. On top of that every building around which these stalls are clustered has a department store inside, and all these stores go up several stories and are linked to all the other buildings by a spider's web of walkways. You could literally shop the entire market without every touching the ground. On top of that there's an underground shopping center that spreads beneath a large portion of the market proper.

Many of the streets are themed, and one of the first I went down I think should be called Old Lady Street. It was lined with clothes only old ladies would wear, and was swimming with old ladies all trying to buy as much of the clothes as fast as they could.

There was a fish street, a vegetable street, a leather street, a cheap restaurant street, a young people's street, and many many more.

And finally it seemed like half the population of Seoul was packed inside, all looking for something.

Food of the Day: Sam Gae Tang

Sam Gae Tang is Korean traditional chicken soup, and with this soup you see the whole chicken sitting in the middle of the milky broth. The chicken is stuffed full of ginseng (or insam) and rice. In the broth is dried plums, cooked chestnuts, and various herbs and spices. You want to be careful about which of these you put in your mouth, as some Korean spices come in the form of tree bark and taste rather nasty on their own.

The whole thing is cooked so perfectly that you can eat it with chopsticks and the juicy meat just melts off the bone. It might sound a little gross to some people, but I assure you it's delicious.

The meal costs only 10 000 won, or $10 and comes with a pitcher of ginseng wine and a cup of traditional royal tea.

Cultural Trip Part ee (Two)

2008-06-20T22:03:00.008-04:00

Sorry about the suspense folks. I'm sure you're all dying to know that the exploding clam thing is all about so I'll quite stalling and get right to it.

Cultural Trip Part Ee: Dinner aka. Attack of the Exploding Clams

After wandering around for an hour we all met back at the hotel (which is actually a resort) and headed out for supper er... dinner (if you say supper even the English speaking Koreans won't know what you're talking about). Did we go to a restaurant you ask? No. We went to some place that was basically some fishtanks and a dozen heavy wooden tables under one of those giant party tents you use at outdoor weddings. Each of the tables had an iron pot set into it with a grate on top that turned it into a Korean style barbecue.

You could find a whole variety of seafood in those tanks, but the menu for us that evening was - you guessed it - clams.

The first order of business after we sat down was lighting the barbecue. There was a pyro guy out on the side street whose only job it seems was to turn these big solid cylinders of charcoal into flaming balls of heat. Then he would load them into a heat proof mortar, bring them to your table, and drop them in the pot. These things were so big that you only needed one per table.

Then the clams would arrive. There was one huge one full of some sort of pepper sauce and cabbage, one medium sized one per person that was prepared the same way, and then a huge basket of unopened fresh ones per table.

(Yummy)

(would you eat that?)

Now when I say fresh I mean it like this. We had three, very horrified vegetarians with us who were having a meat free Korean pancake, but when our food arrived one of the morsels we were about to mow down on promptly squirted at them. That marked the official start of dinner.

Now in Canada I've had steamed and boiled clams and mussels before, and in those cases they were probably cooked alive as well, so I didn't feel that bad about it.

Anyways, the clams didn't stand a chance against us hungry interns, but that doesn't mean they didn't put up a fight...

I think the science behind it goes something like this: sometimes clam shells are not perfectly formed. Sometimes they have tiny pockets of water within their layers and when something, say a dozen hungry humans, starts heating them up the water turns into steam and expands at a rapid rate.

What this translates into is that the shells of the clams would randomly explode. Combined with the startled screams of slightly drunk young women (and one not so young Korean man) the effect was downright exciting. To my credit I did have some explode on me and I didn't scream. Of course I also didn't have as much to drink.

To handle the clams everyone got a white glove to wear on their left hand and a pair of tongs. When the clams were cooked they would open almost all the way and you just have to remove the top shell. Then you grab the meat with the tongs and cut it up with a pair of scissors provided until it is in chopstick friendly bits.

I have to admit it was one of the more fun meals I've had in my lifetime, and I'm a sucker for fresh seafood.

After that I went to a corner store and bought a watermelon pop for desert.

Don't go thinking that's the end of my night though. There's more...

Next Time: Noraebang NOREEBONG!!!

Cultural Trip Part il (one)

2008-06-16T08:01:00.004-04:00

Ok, so we just went on our first cultural trip this weekend and it was everything I was expecting of a trip for experiencing culture. It went over the whole weekend though, and I don't have love for the computer enough to sit down and relay everything in one long post sans when I first got here, so this will appear in installments.

Cultural Trip Part il: A False Start

On Friday I got an email from the senior intern telling me to meet the group at 1 o'clock sharp at the Sinchon station on line 1, so I immediately pull out my huge subway map and trace line one to find this station. Finally I locate Sincheon station, only one stop from Jamsil where I got off to go to Lotte World, and the next day, at 11:30am, K and I head out, confident in our ability to arrive early.

When we get there, we're told to head out a certain exit and find a Hyundai Department Store, only when we exit all we can see is a Lotte Department Store... whatever, we head for it. Only the others can't find us, and we can't find them. It's only when I tell them I'm close to the theme park that they realize I'm at the wrong end of the city.

That's right, on line 2 there is a Sinchon station and a Sincheon station and K and I went to the wrong one.

It was ok though. The gang wasn't mad at us and we only lost an hour. So we packed a white 14 seater van with all our interns, our boss, our boss' 14 year old daughter, the curator for our exhibition (yes, we're having an art exhibition. More on that later), the head of the Nipissing International department, my soon to be Printmaking Professor, and our driver... a Korean man everyone calls Beer. Then we gunned it for the west coast.

4 hours and a few batting cages later (the highway stops here usually have them), we arrived at the Yellow Sea. More specifically we arrived at a small city no one told me the name of that kinda felt like a old midway.

Maybe it was all the old midway rides:

When we got there the first thing that really stood out was the hotel room. There were 2 rooms, one for the girls and one for the guys, and there were 7 girls and 5 guys between them. The thing that really stuck out was that fitting this many people into single hotel rooms is actually fairly normal. You see, each room had a bathroom, a common room, and 2 bedrooms, and there were no beds. Instead we had mats, and we would sleep on the heated floors.

Then we got to explore what was essentially a combination of Cony Island and an Asian Jamaica.

We only got an hour, so I really didn't see much. There were tents on the beach selling live seafood (including the freshest raw octopus you can imagine), but we were going to go for supper soon so I didn't try anything. Also I can officially say I put my feet in the Yellow Sea. It was cold and that was as far as I'm taking it... I'm not a water person.

After that, we met for supper.

Sorry, it's late and K's overnight guest wants to know where the corner store is, so that's all for now.

Next Time: Attack of the Exploding Clams

Brand Power

2008-06-07T21:41:00.008-04:00

What is Lotte World?

Well, to answer that, first I have to define what is Lotte. The simplest answer is that it's a company. It makes stuff, and it sells stuff.

Back home that's all a company does, that's all it has to do. Here, Lotte takes it so much further. It makes drinks and food (including snackfoods and candies), has its own Department Store of which there are 13 in the Seoul Metropolitan area alone, has countless smaller Lotte Marts, has its own type of cash card (I don't mean like a President's Choice Master Card, I mean like if President's choice started its own credit card company). Lotte is involved in everything from tourism, to construction, to welfare.

Apparently there are bigger, more important companies in South Korea, but you don't actually see any as much as you do Lotte.

Now knowing this, it wont come as much of a surprise to know that Lotte has its own theme park, Lotte World. It has an outdoor section called Magic Island, and an indoor section that happens to be the largest indoor amusement park in the world (debatable as the West Edmonton Mall also lays claim to that title), and yes, I went there.

It was kind of like what Disney World if it ever got hit with a shrinking ray. Remember, there's not alot of room in South Korea, and this place is in the middle of Seoul so they had to make it as compact as possible. It was kind of sad though, I think it really wanted to be Disney World, I mean just look at that castle, and the mascots are Lotte and Lorre, little raccoon versions of Mickey and Minny.

It was a fun day. I went with K (no surprise there) which sucked a little as he was too tall to go on a bunch of rides, but we did a Drop Zone type thing that provided an amazing view of the city, and there was a roller coaster inside he could ride. There were also a bunch of theme rides that put the cheese factor through the roof (think a Sindbad version of the old Pirates of the Caribbean ride). All in all the rides were very tame. You didn't even get wet on the flume rides. Oh and by the way, if you ever wonder what happened to the actor Christopher Lloyd, he's over here doing Korean language kids movies for the 4D theater. He was definitely dubbed, but his lips matched the words. I guess he did the video in Korean, but butchered the language so badly they had to get a Korean voice actor to fix it. It was funny though, and we got spit on alot (for those of you who don't know what a 4D theater is, it's like a 3D theatre, but if the characters spit on you, you get wet).

It was a fun day, it wasn't crowded so we never waited more than 20 minutes for a ride, and we got to see what a Korean Theme park is like.

My only complaint is that it was a beautiful, sunny, burn your butt day outside, but the light just didn't seem able to penetrate the thick glass roof. Between that and the massive dull blue walls, the whole place had this eerie, sombre atmosphere. At the same time, there were constant shows going on and this hyper-a-go-go energy was everywhere. It was surreal really, you didn't know if you should feel depressed or giddy, or both.

Food of The Day: The Gross Stuff

First off, bean sprouts don't taste the same here as they do back home, they have this sort of strong, musky flavor that I don't really like that much.

I eat lunch at my schools, and so I get to try alot of normal, home cooked Korean food. This is great except that every now and then I get served quail's eggs (which taste like chicken's eggs only ten times more repugnant), or tiny dried anchovies in sesame seeds. The little fish aren't that bad, but they're salty, they're crunchy but not quite, and they stare at you...

I regularly eat roasted butter squid, which you can find everywhere. I know some people would be disgusted by it, but I really like it. It's like fishy tasting beef jerky.

I had a soup at a place that serves lamb the other night, and I thought that the chunks of meat in the picture would be lamb meat. That's a reasonable assumption, right? Instead, it was big chunks of jellied lamb. That's right, they somehow got lamb into jelly form and threw it in a spicy Korean style soup. I've read of Jellied lamb before (I think it's Turkish), but until I came face to face with it , it just never quite registered as possible. It wasn't that bad though. It tasted like meat, but had the texture of tofu. Once you get past that, it's fine really.

Finally, here's the mother load. The most infamous of the gross Korean Dishes...

What is it you ask? Why it's silk worm larvae, stewed in their own juices for your enjoyment.
These little guys on sale everywhere. Outside palaces, in marketplaces, even at the entrances to theme parks. If you don't see them, you smell them. It's a difficult scent to describe. It's rich, salty, savory, and very very bug-like. I don't find it that bad, but some people I know near throw up every time they catch a whiff.

If you're adventurous, you can pick up a cup full for a mere 1000 won. I went for it, and I only managed to eat 3 of them. That's right, even I was grossed out. It wasn't really the taste that did it. It was the fact that they pop in your mouth with juicy gushyness, and then you're left chewing the meaty insides.

Sorry, I don't mean to turn any stomachs. I'm just trying to share the experience. It wasn't bad, it was neat and different, and - for the equivalent of about $1 Canadian - totally worth it. This country is full of amazing things to eat, so there is bound to be a dud or two, right?

Korean Fun Fact: Leading the Blind

I'm apologizing right now because I don't have a picture to back this one up, but this entire City is webbed by paths created by bright orange or yellow floor tiles that have 4 raised bumps each. The go 2 by 2, and are most common in the subway, but you can see them out on the streets and generally anywhere people tend to go.

They might not sound that interesting, but their purpose blows my mind. I always thought of Canada as being very handicapped friendly, but I've never seen anywhere go so far as creating what are essentially braille pathways for the blind!

Scaling Mountains

2008-05-30T21:14:00.009-04:00

Sorry about the long delay, that might happen from time to time. Remember I'm not here on vacation, and sometimes my work schedule gets a little crazy.

Scaling Mountains

Since my last update I have been to see an amazing classical string quartet at the Korean Parliament. We got the tickets for free from the lead violinist, whom we befriended on the flight over here. We also got to talk to a world famous celloist from Poland who was in the concert. I can tell you that was one amazing experience.

I also went to Yongsan, which happens to have a massive electronics market (think 5 Wal-Mart sized floors of nothing but computers, and video games). It made me think of some of my friends back home. I had just walked into their wet dreams, or nightmares if you consider everything was in Korean so even if they bought video games, they wouldn't b able to understand them.

What I wanted to talk about, though, is the day K and I, and a Korean friend of ours climbed the mountain I posted a picture of my first day here. You know... the one I can see out my window and is only 1 station away.

I can say right now, that hiking in South Korea (or at least in Seoul) is alot different than hiking in Canada. First of all there's just getting to the mountain. You have to walk through what I like to call Camp Town. It's this entire mini city of tents and stalls that sell everything from food and hiking gear, to bootleg DVDs. You spend a good half an hour trekking through this vast labyrinthine marketplace, following the crowds and just hoping they're all actually going to the mountain.

Finally you reach the mountain, called Dobongsan, itself and you notice that there are still people selling things along the main trails. There's buskers, Buddhist temples, icecream stalls, guys with megaphones, etc... plus there's an endless influx and outflux of people, proving just how popular hiking is to Koreans.

Our merry little group decided that instead of just following the main, paved path, we'd veer off on the first side trail we came to. This was a benefit and a curse as, on one hand the trail was gorgeous, uncrowded, and challenging, and on the other hand it was one of the most difficult trails on the whole mountain and we weren't wearing the right shoes for such rugged terrain. Despite that, we made it almost to the top before finally having to turn around.

The sad thing was that we kept getting passed by, and told by elderly people that it was too dangerous and we should turn back. I swear, the seniors in this country are invincible. Just picture 60 year old grandmas powering their way up a mountain like there's no tomorrow! It was either that, or guys in formal dress shirts and pants. Every time I saw one of these guys go by I kept thinking that maybe there's an office building on the peak.

Here's some pictures I took of the amazing view near the top.

Going back down we walked along a dried river bed that had cut a valley into the rock. We drank fresh spring water, and got yelled at by a monk who didn't want us near her temple. I say everything is an amazing experience, and I don't want to sound redundant, but this was an amazing experience.

Food of the Day: Funny Mushroom Cookies

(sorry for the fuzzy picture)

I don't know what the actual name for these is. I think it's like 'Waokoaongi' but my Hangul reading skills aren't up to par so don't quote me on it.

Just as the box promises, it's filled with little mushrooms.

Don't worry though, they're not real mushrooms. The stems are cookie, and the heads are chocolate. Mmmmm chocolate...

Korean Fun Fact: The Time Warp

Check this out, the Koreans figure age differently than Canadians do. I don't know exactly how it works, but it seems that whatever your age is, in Korea you're 2 years older. I just turned 21, but over here I'm actually 23. That means by these reckonings, I was legal to gamble in the US 2 years ago!!!

This also means that most of the 5 year olds I'm teaching are actually 3. That's right, three years old and already learning a second language.

Note: Someone asked how much a 2 000 000 won sweater would be in Canadian $s. Well the exchange rate changes every day, but usually I just go by the standard 1000 won to $1. That means the sweater cost around $2000 Canadian... or WAY TOO MUCH!!!

Foreign Invasion...

2008-05-18T08:07:00.005-04:00

A while ago K and I were invited to go see some palaces and temples with a couple of our coworkers. Simple to say we accepted, and it was an amazing day. Unfortunately I'm tired and I want to go to bed, so I don't have time to tell you about it.

Instead I'm going to talk about what happened afterwards when we went out for supper. It's a little story I like to call:

May 12, 2008: The Foreigners Invade the Salad Bar

See, we wound up agreeing that we were all hungry and wanted pizza, so we wandered around the area, called Anguk, for about 45 minutes not finding anyplace with our desired dish. This was odd as we were basically in a restaurant district and pizza is actually very popular in South Korea. By the time we finally found a place called Mr. Pizza we were starving, or at least they were. I wasn't that bad.

As it turns out most places that serve pizza or steak have salad bars (and sweet pickles for some strange reason), and this one was no exception. The salad bar was expensive and I new if I got it I wouldn't eat any pizza, so I decided to stay at the table with my empty plate and the random bowl they had given us.

The others though, they all grabbed their plates, marched down there, and helped themselves. It was quite a good salad bar too. It had fresh fruit, and nachos and cheese on top of the usual fare.

As I watched my three friends attacking the food (that's an exaggeration by the way, they were actually quite civil about it) this little Korean waitress stood there watching them, and you could just tell by her nervous posture and troubled expression that something was wrong. She stood there rocking on her feet, wanting to say something to my friends for a good minute or two, but she probably couldn't speak English and never gathered the nerve. Instead she burst out with silent giggles and went to tell her coworkers, who then started ogling the hungry foreigners in disbelief and amusement. My friends never noticed any of this as they were too fixated on the food.

We found out afterwards that in Korea, whenever there's a salad bar or something similar, each person gets a plate, and then the whole table gets one bowl. The point is that you only go up one at a time with the bowl, fill it with what you want, come back, dump it on your plate, hand the bowl to the next person, and so on... It's actually quite a good idea, especially since these restaurants are very cramped for space and the salad bars are tiny. It saves the places from being swamped with people all clawing over eachother to get at the food. So picturing three starving white people, two of them very tall men, going at a tiny little salad bar at once while this poor waitress looks on, not knowing how to tell them they're doing it wrong... I can see why the girl laughed.

Even despite this little mishap, the staff were very nice to us. We had a great pizza and went home contented.

I don't know why I wanted to tell you about this. It's not even that interesting, but it's just one of those things most people never think about or talk about when they share their experiences of a new culture.

So the lesson here is, when in Korea don't all go up to the salad bar at once or the waitress will laugh at you.

Little Note: Don't worry, I'll probably put a better update about the palace or something tomorrow.

Food of the day: Bulgogi Burger

Burger? That one's easy, but what's bulgogi? Why it's some sort of brown, syrupy sauce that Koreans like to put on various foods, including McDonald's hamburgers. It was good. A new taste. Still the same crappy burger patties and the same soggy fries that you get at McDonald's back home though. Actually the Bulgogi Burger was the only thing on the menu that's not the same as back home. That and the Green Tea McFlurrie (which I also tried). I didn't really want McDonald's, heck I don't even like the place. I guess it was just the novelty of eating McDonald's in Korea that drew us there.

At least now that I can say I've tried it, I can stay away from that damn place for the rest of my trip.

Korean Fun Fact: The Green Grass Grows

You know, for being such a huge and populated city, Seoul is actually very green. That surprised me, as there is gardens, trees, ivy vines, etc... everywhere, when I was expecting nothing but concrete. Want to know why?

I can't remember if it was the Korean government or just the government of Seoul, but someone passed a law that every business has to dedicate a certain percentage of it's property to plant life (which often ends up on the roof due to space constraints). That's why if you keep going up in a shopping center, you'll often find a random balcony garden.

There's not much wildlife here, but there's no shortage of greenery even in the deepest heart of the city, and it's so much more beautiful for that.

Where Have I Been?

2008-05-10T21:43:00.014-04:00

Wow, it's been almost a week since I last updated. Why is that? Well, I've been busy of course. I have an hour and a half subway ride to the schools I work at every morning, and on top of that, we've been having meetings/not getting home till 9 or 10pm every night, and on top of that I have the mother of all colds!

Besides, in what little spare time I have I don't want to be sitting at a computer. I want to explore. And that's just what I've been doing.

So, where have I been?

For starters, K and I have been back to the Korean War Mamorial, and this time we actually went into the museum... on Children's Day (one of Korea's national holidays).
I can tell you, the impact of such a serious subject as war is lost when the museum dedicated to it is overrun with adorable little kids. One even tried to pay us when we gave him a Canada flag pin.
I took lots of pictures though.

Too bad most of them turned out fuzzy because we were in a dark museum.

We also went back to Iteawon twice that day, and we truly appreciate how Americanized it is now.

We've been to the Coex Mall. Think 7 story department store, endless maze of shops and Korean teens, a cineplex, an aquarium, a Toys R Us that I never found, 2 000 000 won sweaters... and there you have it. The Coex Mall.
I couldn't even take any pictures because either no one would let me, or if I stopped to try I'd be trampled.

I went alone to Korea House, which is right next to my boss' office, one day when I got to a meeting an hour early. If you're wondering what Korea House is, think the Korean equivalent of a pioneer village and you'll be right on the mark. It was in the evening so there wasn't much going on, and I didn't have my camera with me so no pictures. It was amazing though, and this nice woman who could speak English fairly well showed me how to make white bean paste.

While looking for the Korean National Folk Museum, K and I accidentally wandered into the entrance for Gyeongbokgung, one of Seoul's largest palaces.

Because the area is so huge, we're going to go back some other day.

After that we reached the Korean Folk Museum which had an outdoor folk village, a Children's Museum, and the main area. I'll go into more detail some other day, but for now here's some pictures:

Finally, I went to Insadong Market which turned out to be one of my favorite places so far. It was pretty much the opposite of Itaewon in that it sold clothing, objects, and food aimed to the tastes of Koreans and not American tourists. This is where I found calligraphy supplies, pottery and artwork. It's where I tried Mandu (Korean dumplings) for the first time, and it's even where I found a tin, windup R2D2.

I can see doing most of my souvenir shopping here.

Food of the Day: Deepfried Wiener, Crab, and Dough on a Stick

That's right. For a mere 2000 won, you can get a wiener, a strip of crab meat, and a tube of dough all rolled together in seaweed and fried up for your enjoyment. Choice of toppings include ketchup, mustard, or some white stuff I think was mayo... yum.

Korean Fun Fact: Early Birds Beware

If you like to get up early, go out, do your shopping and sightseeing, and be back before dinnertime, well you are out of luck if you live in Seoul. Nothing here opens till around 10am and most places don't open till 11am. On the other hand, everything's open late. Like till midnight late. So night owls rejoice and early birds beware when living in Seoul South Korea.

The Memorial

2008-05-03T16:40:00.016-04:00

Update: The last post took me hours to do. Really... it took me like 4 hours. For this reason, I'm going to limit myself to 1 event per post, as well as a 'Food of the Day' (Where I describe something I new I ate that day) and a 'Korean Fun Fact' (Where I talk about something neat I found out about Korean Culture)

The Memorial

K and I went to Itaewon yesterday. It's the district where the US Army base is located, as well as loads of Western aimed shopping and, most importantly, the Korean War Memorial. Obviously we didn't see the base because, well... most army bases can't just be seen, and the shopping wasn't that great (although I did buy a bag that says "I'm not a plastic bag"). It was very touristy, expensive, and repetitive.

No, the highlight was running into a South African fellow who showed us where the Korean War Memorial was, and I can tell you it is an impressive, and moving sight to behold. To begin with, the area leading up to it is beautiful. It's lush and green, like walking down a park street only with lots of traffic. As for the place itself... take a look:

This first bit is just the statue at the entrance.

Here's the building itself.

And here's the international flags.

There were also a lot of the planes and boats they used during the war on display.

We didn't go in because it was too late and the place was closed. We're going to go again another day to actually visit the museum.

Food of the Day: Sweet Grillwich

In Itaewon we had lunch in a not Korean restaurant (I think it was German), but all the food had a Korean twist. K had a Petit Grillwich, which had ham and jalapino peppers, I on the other hand had the Sweet Grillwich. I think it was supposed to be a grilled cheese only it had this sweet paste spread on each piece of bread that made it... you guessed it... sweet. I didn't enjoy it that much, and I would have preferred to have something actually Korean.

Korean Fun Fact: Everything Sings...

I mean it. Everything here sings. The lock for K's apartment sings. The fax machine in the first school we went to sings. Doors sing. Subway trains sing. etc... And what do they sing? Why nursery rhymes and lullabys of course. It's actually quite nice. You get this sort of warm fuzzy feeling every time you hear it.

There's probably a good reason for it as well, but I have yet to find it out.

It did prove a little problem the other day though, because even the wall phone in my apartment sings, and I didn't know this so when K started calling me because he was locked out of the apartment. I thought it was my roommates alarm clock, and not wanting to invade her room, I ignored it... for 2 hours. When I finally figured it out and let K in I felt terrible, but he was understanding. He told me if he had been in my shoes, he probably would have made the same assumption.

The Journey and The First Day

2008-05-03T08:21:00.001-04:00

I can tell you this'll be a long one as it's actually 2 posts.

The Journey:

I don't have many pictures in this one because it was mostly just airports and my camera stayed in my bag almost the whole trip out of fear of loosing it.

The airports were actually very easy. That's what happens when EVERYTHING is labeled. The first one was Pearson in Toronto. I got there about noon on April 30th and got a really wierd look from the check in lady when she found out my flight wasn't till 7pm... that's what happens when you're alone in Toronto and you don't feel like/ have time to explore.

Pearson is actually a very nice airport. Not much in shopping as all the stores are the same and are very expensive, but the food prices weren't ridiculous, it was very clean, everyone who worked there was friendly and helpful, so yeah, good atmosphere, not stressful. I had a roast beef sandwich for lunch, found out I had to pay $10 for wireless internet, wandered around, sat at my gate for about an hour playing video games without even knowing it was my gate, and finally went looking for my gate and found out I'd been sitting at it. My fellow intern, who shall be henceforth be called K showed up around 4 and I showed him some art instillations I found that are part of a series called Transience (appropriate for the Airport, isn't it?):

When we got on the plane to Chicago, my family's natural Karma kicked in. You see, K and I were next to each other in Economy class, but when we got on we found out there was no more room for our carry-ons in that class so we had to stow them in Economy-plus over-heads. When I got to my seat it was wet and smelled suspiciously of vomit, so I told the flight attendant and she apologized. She told me to wait there and next thing I knew, K and I were moved up to Economy-plus in the seats right in front of where our bags were.

I didn't like the Chicago International Airport. It was big, and the tram that we took to our terminal was alot of fun, but it was very cold (emotionally), not as user friendly as Pearson, and every 5 minutes this ominous male voice would come on the PA and announce that the Department of Homeland Security was coming to get us... actually it just said that security was raised to level orange so you couldn't leave your bags unattended and you were only allowed a carry-on and one small bag or computer on the plane... every... five... minutes... I mean the same thing happened in Toronto, but just often enough to make sure everyone entering the airport heard it right away, and the voice was cheerful. This voice was aggresive and persistant. It put both K and I on edge right away. Other than that things were fine. We went through all the security quickly and the workers were once again friendly.

The actual international section was much nicer than the rest of the Airport, what with it's creepy baby benches that I don't have any pics of and it's FisherPrice play gyms for the kids (which there were alot of). Everything was closed though, which sucked because we wanted to have a drink. We managed to find coffee at least, and I bought K a brownie because he didn't have any American money.

This is our plane to Seoul...

It was incredible, one of those doubledeckers that had little video screens on the back of every seat that you could watch movies, documentaries, travel shows, TV, and play videogames to your heart's content. They even had a flight channel that showed where our plane was on the map, as well as our departure and destination points, our altitude and speed, our distance to Seoul, the time back home and in Seoul, and even the temperature outside (which reached -70F at one point).

K and I were originally seated in the same row, but at opposite ends. That's when Karma kicked in once again, because the elderly woman to my left (the window seat) had no baggage and was alone, so she offered to switch with K. On top of that, the woman to my right was a Korean who was returning for the first time in 20 years. She was a concert violinist who was invited to play in a concert at the Korean Parliament at the end of May, and she offered to try and get us tickets.

The meals on the plane were actuelly very good... for airline food. For supper I had a choice of steak or Bi Bim Bap (Bee Beam Bop). I had the Bi Bim Bop, which was rice, vegetables, and lots of other stuff that I had to mix together. There was also Kimchi, fish soup (which was more like dried husk soup), cold udon noodles, and fresh fruit involved. It was my first taste of Korean food, and it wasn't half bad.

The entire 14 hour flight from Chicago to Seoul was spent in darkness because we were basically outrunning the sun, and we never flew over the Pacific ocean. Instead we went up over the Yukon and Alaska, then back down over Russia and China. The plan took off on time and arrived an hour early, so when we got our baggage and were out of the airport CT, our boss, wasn't even there yet. The didn't take long though, and thus started our first day in South Korea.

The First Day

The drive from the airport into Seoul was about and hour and a half, and as it was 6am, everything was veiled in mist. With the bridges, buildings, and mountains all creeping up on us through a thick soup of red sunrise, it was beautiful, mysterious, and enigmatic. The only problem was that CT wanted us to shower at our apartment and then go with him to learn the subway and meet the kids we'd be working with. This would be fine except that I hadn't slept since I got to the airport on April 30th and this was already May 2nd.

Driving into Seoul was like... well WOW!!! There was no end to the things to see and I can't start listing stuff because I'll never stop. The best way to say it is that every little space available is used up. I haven't seen an alleyway yet that isn't lined with shops or gardens or filled with stuff, and even though it all seems like pure and utter chaos, it all has this sort of secret order, like its organized by the world's most complicated but brilliant mathematical equation.

Here's some pictures of my apartment, which I'm sharing with four other interns including K. The first is our odd metal door with the ad stuck to it, than the kitchenette, the bathroom, and my bedroom:

Even though the apartment itself is small and old, the view is amazing! We're in the district of Dobong-gu which is famous for it's mountain of the same name, and I can see this mountain from both my bedroom window and the kitchen window. On top of that we have roof access and our building is 5 or six floors, so you can imagine the view from up there.

After the quick stop off at the apartment, CT took us to see one of the other interne's school. So we got to take the subway for the first time. It's actually one of the few things I'm very apprehensive of. Every thing's in English as well as Hangul, but it's also crazy hectic and very complex. On the way to the school we stopped off at a bakery and I got a sweet potato bun for 500 won.

The school was incredible. They had a huge play area outside, I think there was a ball pit inside, and the whole thing was made to look like a castle. As for the children... lets just say you'd never find a sweeter, more well behaved bunch in Canada. Because it's Children's day on Monday, they got to have a large party with face painting and, get this, the school actually rented a small midway ride for them...

So I spent most of the morning painting faces... aka painting Spiderman. I even wowed them all with my knowledge of the Spiderman song.

After that CT took me for lunch, which was Kimbap. Think Sushi, only with ham, egg, and cheese instead of raw fish. It came with Kimchi, pickled radish, and a warm broth

Then the two of us made our way to 'my' Kindergarten class. The school was equally as nice as the first one, but it was much farther away, I think the class was smaller, and the children were naughtier (according to CT. I didn't find them that bad.). CT proceeded to give me the run through of how a class is taught, which involves alot of hand signs, memory games, and drawing.

When we were done there we got a little lost, then managed to make our way back to the subway and reach CTs office. On the way I noticed that Korea Village (the equivalent of a pioneer village in Canada) is barely a block away, so one day I'm going to visit it.

The other interns showed up and we did some administration things as well as learning some of the songs we'll be doing. The program's actually very well structured, so we don't have to come up with entire lesson plans ourselves. There was also talk of the art exhibit we'll be doing at the end of the three months, but by that time I was so tired I was barely awake and I can't recall much.

To finish the day off the entire group went out for dinner at a traditional Korean restaurant...

This was the most amazing part of everything so far. The whole place was decked out with traditional Korean objects, such as lanterns and hats. We had some sort of alcohol that came in a pot and that was poured with a ladle, and we had a type of apple soju (liquor). The meal consisted of free cold radish Kimchi and cold seaweed soup, a "Korean Pancake" that was made of slices of crab, squid, fish, and vegetables covered in a flour sauce and fried. Next came tofu with cooked kimchi and pork, and finally, my favorite, a seafood soup filled with... seafood, vegetables (seaweed included) and toasted rice cakes. The whole thing was just... well... I can't describe it. It was good... very, very good.

After that one of my roommates took me home on the subway, which was good seeing as I was so tired I literally fell asleep on my feet. No, I mean it. I hooked my arm around a pole and nodded off. The guy I was with told me he'd never seen anyone do that before.

Finally we got back and the day ended with Earth's most precious commodity... sleep.

Goodbye from a Toronto Hotel Room

2008-04-30T09:53:00.009-04:00

Well, it's Wednesday morning and I'm just packing up to catch the shuttle to the airport and... I got a few hours so I thought I'd update.

Yesterday was my birthday you see, and with the whole 'flight pushed back a day' thing I convinced my parents to head home instead of taking an extra day off work and staying here to stress about stuff. So this guy...

...was my only company in the hotel room.

It was cool though. Yesterday morning my Dad went to get coffee at a Country Style and he brought me back a birthday doughnut. He even put a matchstick in it in place of a candle. Also A couple of my fellow Canadians showed up to wish me well...

We went shopping before they left and I got to have a Greek spinach pie for lunch... yummy!

Mom found this at an exotic food store.

It was like Corn Puffs that were salty and tasted like real corn. They were good, but all I could think was BRING ME SOME!!! (inside joke between me and all my video game loving friends)

Anyways the folks left around lunchtime and I spent the afternoon playing games, watching cartoons on TV, and talking to my friends on my computer. So all in all, my birthday was actually pretty good. Besides, if the reason I'm spending it alone in a hotel room is because I'm flying to Korea for the summer, than there's no place I'd rather be.

P.S. It was my Dad's birthday too, so "HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!"

Hello from a Toronto Hotel Room

2008-04-28T20:13:00.003-04:00

Not much to say. I'm here in Toronto, hanging with my parents for the last night before I leave. They're watching Bones... I'm not really interested.

Anyways, looks like I'm staying in Canada for an extra day because all the flights from Chicago to Seoul are booked. That's alright though. I can wait.

On a more interesting note, Toronto's proving to be an interesting taste experience. I had 'Dynamite' sushi for lunch that had salmon, smoked salmon, and tempura bits. For supper I had rare beef rice noodles that came with all fresh vegetables, some kind of mint/licorice tasting leaves, red pepper paste, and all kinds of other things. I also had a rice ball wrapped in bamboo leaves and filled with pork and black beans (really good), and some sweet rice thing that was kind of disgusting. To top it all off I have a small bottle of specialty sake and a chocolate bar that had red pepper in it.

...and I haven't even left the country yet.

Haven't Left Yet

2008-04-22T21:00:00.002-04:00

I'm on the phone to my buddy (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!!!) and he's helping me set this up. This is the first blog I've ever made and I have no idea what I'm doing. Also I'm trying to talk and type at the same time so if my spelling sucks, that's why.

Anyways, I got my wons today. It was very exciting. They look pretty with all the art on the back. I'd tell you who the guys are, but I can't read Hangul (han.gool) yet so I don't know what their names are to look them up.

Here's some pictures:

That 16,000 wons there is about $16 Canadian.

OK, now I'm going to finish talking to my friend and then study for an exam.

I'll update when something more exciting comes up... that is MORE EXCITING THAN MY FIRST BLOG POST EVER!!!