Snow, National Museum, Silent Disco, Snowboarding, and More Randomness

Alright! It's time again for a bunch of photos and videos, with some poorly written descriptions! I

hope everyone is having a good holiday season. Rest and party and spend time with family and friends! I have been continuing to have a good time here. I was very excited Friday to receive a box of gifts from home, and I'm enjoying the fact that the school term is winding down. We've got some fun staff events coming this week, and then it will be Christmas, new student orientation, and winter camp / AP Psychology time! It will be a calm January and start of February, and then I'll be off to China. I got my visa for China with no issues, and I've booked my flights and hotels. I just need to book my Great Wall tour and get a basic plan sketched in for the rest of my time there.  Now on to the photos. 

So, I got to go to a cool National Geographic photo exhibit with a friend. It was really cool to see all the photos. They were all really cool and beautiful. There were some I'd seen before, but it was still great to see them all blown up huge. We had a good time there. I was surprised that we were there for about two and a half hours looking at the photos. Naturally we weren't supposed to take photos in the exhibit (not that that stopped everyone), but we did get a few photos outside the exhibit proper.

It's been snowing more often. There have been a few large dumps of snow, though they've always gone and melted over the few days following. This shot behind the school shows some decent snow cover one  morning.



Also snow related, here's a video of some students playing football while it was snowing. The snow was coming down in pretty big flakes, but it didn't stick around for long. I took the video from one of the walkways between two of the buildings, and I also walk into the school and go to the window in my office to give you all a bit of a view into the school. Someday I should do a video tour of the school.



And while I'm showing videos, here's one of my washing machine. I've been meaning to catch it during it's massively joy-filled "I'm done washing your clothes, Dan!" song. I thought it was funny that after I had posted it, YouTube showed me all the other happy washing machine songs people had posted. Apparently this is a common thing to post on the internets.

There was a German Christmas market at Seongbukcheon Square. Since it was so close to home I went a couple of times. It was really small, as expected, but still alright. The sausages were crap, but the mulled wine and waffles were good. Also there's a giant Christmas tree there, which is sweet. The market's gone, but the tree stays.

After one of the German market visits we went to Hyehwa and checked out another of the Pal bars. These places are really dimly lit, and might seem kinda sketchy, but they're not that bad. I'm sure you'll appreciate the red neon and candlelight!

One afternoon I visited the National Museum with a friend. I hadn't been back since I returned to Korea. This is the view north from the Museum building.

A simple view of part of the Museum. It's a huge place. It's tough to walk through more than about half the permanent collection in one visit. This photo is taken from the mid-point of the museum, with the permanent exhibitions on the left, and the special exhibitions are held in the other half, off-shot to the right.



One night a few of us ended up at a Silent Disco in Hongdae. We were all given wireless headphones, and jammed to the same music. There were a few DJs playing music. The music was pretty hit and miss, but it was still a good time.

There were a lot of santas in Hongdae that night. One was dressed up as this hilarious bear. Anyone recognize this bear? lol.

Here's me at the silent disco. Note the awesome scarf. Tis my favorite scarf of all time.

One of my friends is a design student. She made this awesome hamburger! It's made of various material that aren't food, but looks good enough to eat! The whole thing can be taken apart and put back together. I was very impressed.

We've been hitting up Korean bbq lately. It's awesome as always. This was at the High Fire Mountain place in Hyehwa. I like it better than the other place next door.

So I went snowboarding with a few coworkers on Wednesday. We went after school, and first went to a really good dakgalbi place. The chicken was grilled on stone slabs built into a table, with fire underneath them. See the video of the grilling below. It was really good, and got us well ready for our skiing and snowboarding.



Grilling dakgalbi.

And here is a shot of some of the other tables at the dakgalbi barn.

So snowboarding went well. We were at a ski resort called Elysian near Gangchon. I tried to teach a couple of my coworkers some basic snowboarding, but that didn't go really well. I might try again because one of my friends wants to try to learn. I had a great time, and even though I hadn't boarded for about 5 years it came back to me really quickly. Oh, and the picture shows the spot on my face where I assume I landed. I fell on our last run, and knocked myself out again. This is starting to be a trend, and so I'm going to wear a helmet from now on whenever I board. I'm hoping to go at least a couple more times this season. There are a number of parks nearby, and it's a lot cheaper than in Canada.

And for the last photo, here's my stocking, stuffed with stuff (...), and hung from my air conditioner with glee. I look forward to Christmas when I can open it!

Among other recent events, I went to quiz night at Dillinger's a couple weeks back, and my team didn't do all that well. A friend was hosting the quiz, and it was fun, but I would have liked our team to place higher than 5th out of 7 teams. It was still good times though. I also got to go to a coworker's housewarming party, which was really fun. We ate and drank and talked from about 4 to 8. It was really fun. I was honoured to be invited and go share the company of some great people.  And most recently, I got to see a friend and meet her husband. I saw them the night before they flew back to the States. It was good to meet her husband.

Yup, alright, I think that's most of what's been going on. I am still having a great time, and I hope all my readers are as well. Oh, and here's a special shout-out to my readers in Russia. I'm not quite sure why, but readers from Russia have taken the second place in my reader stats, pushing Canada down to third. I enjoy checking out the stats and charts built on them!

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all, and I hope you have a good transition into 2011!

So, it's been a while....

Yup, it's been quite a while since I've put a blog post together. Life's been busier than usual, with the end of the school term fast approaching. This week is the last full week of classes for the first and second graders, who will start writing exams next week. A lot has happened since I posted last, and I hope to share some of that with you here. I've got three videos to share this time, so hopefully that will make it an interesting post! Again this will be very much photo-driven rather than story driven.

Starting with the most boring, there's a coffee shop opening up right near my place. It will be the closest place for me to get half-decent coffee, and will have sitting space. I'm keen to visit once it opens this month.

This is a random and quite tight alley in the area across the main street from my apartment. I was wandering over there at some point.

Delicious fried Mung-bean cake things (녹두전). They were awesomely tasty, and I ate them with great company. I went to Gwangjang Market with some friends, and we ate these and drank makgoli.

The makgoli we drank along with the jeon pictured above. Twas a very good time. I hope to see these friends again soon!

Many people had written on the walls of the little dive place we ate in. I decided to also write. I followed the trend on the wall, and wrote a message of love for my little nephew Lealand! His name will forever adorn the walls of this little shop!

This is a photo of the market itself. I didn't have a lot of time to wander, but it was very cool. Lots of different things were available for sale. I will have to return and wander about sometime.

Many of our students were lined up to cheer on our third graders. This was the day before the third graders wrote the extremely important Korean SAT. Many students cheered their older peers as they came out of the gym. It was quite a sight to see, and really emphasized the importance of the test. I'm not sure it reduced the stress level for the writers, but it was a nice gesture.

Some friends and I went out in Hyehwa to celebrate our friend's birthday. One of the things we did was grabbed cocktails from this very convenient cocktail-in-a-bag stand. The long island iced teas were very good (worlds better than the super-crappy ones my friends got at the Comfort Zone a week or so later).



Another thing we did was spend some time in a place called The Flair. They had some very cool bartender tricks going on, and I took a video of some. Sorry about the horrible shooting. :( Hopefully you can enjoy the show as much as we did though!

We quite naturally ended up at a karaoke place (karaoke here is called noraebang) as the night was getting on. You can see that noraebang and neon go quite well together.

Singing and light show in the singing room. Was good times.

In other news, our school competed against the nearby science high school in a football game. You can see the science high school just on the other side of that green fence. The plan is to have this game every year, and a nice championship trophy goes to the winner. This is the first year, but it's intended to be a tradition. Of course, our school won! Also, I hope you like our tiny football pitch. :)

The same day, a few of us walked to the nearby Palace. On the way back we spotted this sign at a hair salon. I'm not 100% sure what the message is here, but it makes me want to get my hair cut here (I actually understand now, but at the time it was a confusing sign).

Also for birthday celebration, I went with a couple of friends to a waffle place near work. We ate food, then this waffle-iced cream combination. It was killer. Delicious vanilla cookie iced cream and waffle and fruit and stuff. You can see for yourself how epic it is.

With the same people as just above, but a different day and place. We visited Beer O'Clock in Hyehwa. This is the view from the window in our little booth. It was early Friday night. You can see a lot of people eating across the street.


Beer O'Clock advertises "Touch and Self,"curiosity about which was part of the reason we first checked it out. I'll let you figure out what they mean from the video here and from the photo below. We had a good time messing with the ordering system seen in the video.

Beer, fried potatoes, and friends at Beer O'Clock.

I ended up walking along the Cheongyecheon again that weekend too. I was moving from place to place buying Christmas gifts to send home. The stream was nice, with green plants still sticking around despite the cold.

Some of the shopping I did was in Insadong, and so I stopped into Tapgol Park. I hadn't been here since my first trip to Korea, so it was good to get back. I sat for a while and watched the people coming and going. The pagoda was still there, and just as tall as I remembered.

Another weekend night in Hyehwa. A couple friends and I visited the Comfort Zone. I had only been once before. It was alright. I'm not sure why, but I feel this place has potential. It was much calmer and less annoying this time than last. My friends ordered some long island iced teas, and they were pretty awful. I'm thinking I might return here sometime in the near future.

It also snowed recently. I got this photo from just outside my office. There was a decent amount of snow cover, but it's all gone now. You can see a bit of the mountain behind the school, and the cool windows.

I've been meaning to get a photo of these leaves for a while. They're giant metal leaves hung at different heights from the ceiling just outside my office. They very much remind me of fall. In short, I'm a big fan of these fake leaves.

Yesterday was my last day of After-school Book Club. I've really enjoyed the club, and I'm sad that we won't be meeting anymore. I hope to do some kind of after-school class next term too. We had a little party because it was our last day. We ordered pizza, and here you can see the students nom-ing. Nom nom nom.

I was involved in the assessment of our students' Subject Research reports, and was rewarded with a free dinner as a result (It always pays to help out and do stuff for the school, in dinners, snacks, or immaterial things like increased respect in the school, better relationships with coworkers). Four of us went to a nice Japanese place quite near work (across the street from the waffle place mentioned above, actually). It was really good, and there were a couple things that were picture worthy. One was this boat of sushi. It had a big ol' fish head on it, which was awesome. There was sushi and wasabi about the boat, and in the front there was sannakji (freshly sliced octopus, that still wiggles about). It was not very alive, but moved a little bit. It was interesting to eat, since the little suckers suck onto your tongue and teeth and stuff. I'm now even more excited to go out and try really fresh stuff that is actually moving about with gusto.

So there's a few things that have been going on. I've got a busy weekend ahead of me, as I'll be proctoring SATs again Saturday morning, attending friends' going away party, and hopefully visiting this National Geographic Photo exhibit. I am also working on getting my vacation plans all set. I got the signatures of my head-teacher and vice principal on my proposed vacation days today, and I should be getting my visa to visit China tomorrow after work. I am planning to fly to Beijing and spend a few days there, then train down to Shanghai, and after a bit there, fly back to Seoul. I may also hit Japan for 2 or 3 days if I'm feeling like a rich man after the China stuff.

Yup, I think that's all I've got for now. I hope you're all doing really well, and that the cold hasn't set in too deeply wherever you are.

Love from Korea!

P.S. I realize I said I'd post 3 videos with this. I decided that since I hate the shooting in the third one more than I hate most things, I would not embed it here. If you're desperate to see snow falling outside my apartment window, you can click the blue letters and watch. Feel free not to if you don't want to; I promise I won't be offended.

Ganghwa-do and a Few Other Little Things

Hello everyone. I have a few pictures to share! I went out to Ganghwa-do, since it will soon be cold and less fun. I visited the island last time I was in Korea, and I was very glad to be able to get back. I went out with a friend, and it was a good time. We had some issues finding the right place to catch the bus out, and spent too much time waiting for busses in various places. Even though there were some annoying issues, it was a really good day.  As I'm feeling pretty lazy, I'm going to let the photos guide me through this. Hope you enjoy them!

Fall's here, and the leaves are all changing and falling. This is a spot between the school and the Museum of Art that you can see below.

I walk along this road on my way to work. The ginkgo trees are really dropping their leaves.

I was given tickets to a special exhibit at this art gallery by one of my coworkers. I went one Sunday. It was really cool. The art was all very abstract, which is usually not my favorite thing, but it was really good. There was an art student from Incheon who works at the gallery, and she showed me around. We talked about the pieces, and she told me about the artists and what they were trying to convey. It was a good experience. The gallery is really close to my place, so it was very convenient.

This is another picture at the school. I took it as I was coming in in the morning. You can see the A and B wings of the school, and the Dorms are just out of shot to the left.

I finally stopped by Hyehwamun to get a few pictures. This is a few blocks from my place, on the way to Hyehwa. It was a smaller gate, but it looked really cool lit up at night.


So on to Ganghwa. I made this little Tripline trip to illustrate the trip!

We bussed out when we finally found the right place to catch the bus, and then we bussed to the port of Oepori. We jumped on a ferry to take us across to Seokpori.

Inside the ferry. We didn't sit inside during the trip there; there were too many interesting bird antics to watch.

The birds followed to catch snacks thrown from the boat.

The birds would even swoop in really close to the boat to grab snacks directly from people's hands.



I took a video of the birds and their crazy snack-catching antics. Disappointed that I talked during the video, but it still turned out pretty well.

Also on the ferry was this sign, which reads: "Jump and clear all the steps for a bonus prize!"

I got a few pictures of myself at the temple. One of the bonuses of touring with other people! This is near the entrance to the temple. To the right is the second or third largest ginkgo tree I've ever seen!

Here you can see the entrance to the cave room, a juniper tree that looks like a dragon breathing fire (which was news to me, but I was able to see it very clearly once learned this). You can also see the platform up on the cliff where a buddha's been carved into the wall.

Here you can see me with a carved buddha and a large number of monk statues. The monks were stored in a huge class case last time I was here, because this part was still being built. It was really cool to see it finished, and I was happy that I could get a few pictures of myself here. You can see that it was a popular place for people to get photos, and also the family on the right were trying to throw coins up onto a pagoda.

I was also able to get a photo of myself alone here. Thanks to C. for being a willing photographer!

The pagoda mentioned above, with coins visible. Both my friend and I were able to toss coins up and have them stay. I hadn't seen this kind of thing before, but I bet it's lucky! There is very little area on the structure that isn't sloped, so it was a bit of a challenge for us.

I suppose this sort of ruins the attempted anonymity I've been shooting for, but oh well, it's worth it. Here you can see a roof tile that we paid to write on. We decided to share one since it was 10,000 for each tile. We wrote simple messages. The tile will be used at some point when they retile the roof of one of the buildings. As my sister sais, it's got to be good Karma. It was a fun thing to do, and was another first for me!

After the temple, we took the ferry back to Ganghwa island. We wandered close to the ferry landing point, as we had heard that we could have good crab stew here. We found a place that looked good, and got some good food! You can see the stew cooking in this picture.

And here you can see the food after it had cooked. This is after we had eaten some of the crab already. It was quite good, and nice and spicy. It was kind of difficult to get at the meat, but all the work was worth it!

After this, we spent some more time waiting for a bus, and we ended up grabbing a taxi to get back to the Ganghwa Bus Terminal. We then caught an intercity bus back to Seoul.

As I mentioned it was a good trip, and I am glad I got out before winter. I am sure I'll return again in the spring or summer, since I still need to see fortresses, and I'm sure there are other things I haven't yet seen.

I hope you are all doing really well, and that the weather is staying relatively warm so far! Let's all get ready for the cold of winter!