First Snow in Andong

There is a backed up list of events I want to address, such as my birthday and Thanksgiving but I just wanted to quickly post my pictures from the first snow here in my city. These were taken in and around my neighborhood.

Ground Control to Major Sean

So, it's been a long while since my last update. Heck, last I posted, I was wearing a t-shirt and today we had our first solid precipitation (hail, unfortunately).
Anyway, I live in Andong (안동) now, a mid-sized city about the size of Saint Cloud, MN. I started my third year with the English program in Korea (EPIK), teaching at a middle school. This is my first time teaching middle school at it is seriously a different ball game. I thought I would be able to re-use a lot of my lesson plans from my four years of teaching high school. Wrong! I have had to make new lesson plans on a weekly basis for three different grade levels. They have a lot of energy, maybe too much.
Disclaimer: I am not meaning to diss my school, which I very much like, or put down my students, whom, for the most part, are great kids on an individual basis.
Let's start with the school itself. My school is about a ten minutes' walk from my apartment which might be the only flat stretch in the whole country. Granted it's not the three minute commute I had in Yecheon but it's not bad at all and it gives me space and time to clear my head both to and from work. The school is bigger (six stories) and has more students than my last school, which means more classes. I have five co-teachers, four of whom have been to the United States at one point or other for varying periods of time for English-study.

I have approximately 800 kids and it sounds like it. Standing outside, my school sounds like it is filled with howler monkeys. Honestly, in my four, going on five years of experience, I have never faced such a challenge with discipline. Disobedient students are often met with either what is referred to as the "love stick" (think historical usage of the "rule of thumb") or chuckles. After a few months of losing my voice every Friday and breaking up fist fights (which the students assure me are not real but sound real), I have resorted to a working combination that is serving me well. I call my two methods of discipline "patience" and "understanding". Patience is my referee-grade football whistle that is always around my neck and understanding is a spray bottle, a method I learned from my mom while she trained her cat not to climb on counters. Unfortunately that is what it takes to get through a lesson. Fortunately, all I have to do now is raise the whistle to my lips t get quiet. They are just now starting to catch on to understanding as it's getting pretty chilly these days and they don't want a fine mist sprayed toward them.
This week, I am administering speaking tests and working with the students on an individual basis. I am loving this experience; the kids are bright, have LOTS of energy and are genuinely fun to work with. Some students still cannot respond to the question "how are you?" but that is beyond both my control and responsibilities. These students have been learning English since the second grade and I should expect that all of them can respond to that most basic of questions. It is a failing of someone but it's not up to me to place blame. Needless to say, it's difficult to work with students who can talk about racism in America and students whom cannot respond to basic questions in the same class. It's unfair to play to the lowest or highest denominators. Which brings me to why I have had to redo all my lesson plans. Not that I didn't face the same situations at my last school. Heck, every English teacher in Korea faces this juxtaposition. But as with middle schoolers all over the world, they have lots of energy and I try to make games which focus on memory and recall and reinforcement games. If all students focus on nearly universally new material and must play a cooperative and/or competitive game, it sorta, kinda, almost levels the playing field.

I'm enjoying living in Andong. I live very close to the Korean equivalent of Walmart, which means cheese, clothing that actually fits me and God willing, a pet gerbil, possibly in February. Andong has a lot to offer. It has a couple different movie theaters and there is always some English language movie playing at some time or other. There is a bowling alley, a downtown with bars and restaurants, boutique shops and cafes and an uptown (where I live) populated with bars, Korean and Western-style restaurants and cafes, such as the one I am sitting in now. It's been an adjustment, living in the city. I have lived in rural Asia for nearly four years and now I am confronted with what seems like a Blade Runner street scene: flashing neon signs, city smells, loud sounds and middle-aged men constantly hacking up their lungs. We're three hours from Seoul, three and half hours form Busan and pretty well situated about an hour from Daegu. Andong is the birthplace of the father of Korean-style Confucianism and so is correspondingly conservative, though less so now than it used to be. For example, I can actually walk down the street holding my girlfriend's hand without getting grimaced at like I did in Yecheon. There are plenty of young people here (though now I, at 27, may not exactly be one of them) and they bring a life and a vibrancy to the city that I haven't experienced in years.

I'm getting more into photography and have recently bought a new lens for my camera, a Canon 40mm f/2.8. Hayoung (Haley as some of you may know her) took me to Gu-in-sa (구인사) for my birthday. It's a giant compound of Buddhist temples nestled away in the mountains and the perfect place to catch the height of the changing of the leaves. I'll post pictures in my photographs section some time soon after I can sort through and edit them.

Some of you may remember that I wrote a novel last November. Well, I don't have the gumption this year but have gone through and edited the sucker twice. As a matter of fact, my brother Colin is doing the final edit while my good friend Kyle Raum is creating a book cover. Indeed, I plan on publishing the thing to the Amazon Kindle store first for two or three dollars and, if can sell more than a handful of copies, I'll put it on on the B&N Nook store and iTunes iBook store. As I promised last year, the novel will be available for free download on my website in PDF format.

Winter vacation is fast-approaching and I have decided to take Hayoung to Minnesota to meet friends and family. We'll be staying in St. Cloud with my mom but hopefully spending time in Minneapolis so she can see where I went to college and the meaningful places I miss so very much now. This will be my first time back in an officially English-speaking country in two and a half years and her first time to an English-speaking country. We're both ecstatic that we'll get to spend one week, over the New Years holiday, in the States.

Enough for now. Of course there is more much, much more but that will leave me plenty to blog about in the very near future. I'm BACK, baby!

Megan and Ben visit Yecheon

This summer vacation has been a whirlwind of excitement, welcoming friends and family to Yecheon and then saying my farewells. I cannot believe how quickly vacation came and went. Last Tuesday, I parted ways with my brother at Incheon Airport. Later that day, I took the bus back to Yecheon, took a shower at home, grabbed a coffee at Yoger Presso and then went to the Yecheon bus terminal at 5:30 to pick up my Peace Corps friend Megan and her boyfriend Ben.
Megan was a close friend of mine in the Peace Corps whom I haven't seen since serving in the Philippines three or four years ago. She and her boyfriend took two weeks to vacation in Korea and visit friends of theirs now serving in Korea with the U.S. armed forces or as English teachers like myself.
Beyond the company, I really enjoyed their visit as it gave me a chance, arguably my last before moving to Andong later this month, to see Yecheon with new eyes. Most of their time here was spent in Seoul and Busan (and therefor on the subway). They enjoyed the rural pace of things here in Yecheon, the "home-cooked" style of the food here and the fact that we could walk anywhere in town within a matter of minutes. They got to see quite a few things here they weren't able to see in the cities like traditional homes (some predating the Korean War), the Yecheon Insect Bio Expo running all month and rice fields. Well, the rice fields were exciting for Ben. I think Megan, like myself, had her fill while living in the rural Philippines during her Peace Corps service.

The best thing for me about their visit was the opportunity to actually talk about my Peace Corps service. Since I had come home back in 2010, I haven't had the opportunity to meet up with anyone from my batch (267 <3) and really talk about service in a way that would make sense to anyone else. My friends Melinda and Jason have been a wonderful source of comfort and understanding as they served in the Peace Corps in Mongolia, but they were in a different place with different people. I never really realized that I'd never had the opportunity to decompress with one of my own until Megan came. It all felt healthy, the good and the bad, just talking about it with someone familiar with the people, the places.
I had met Ben over Skype once but this was the first time I ever really got to talk to him. One of the prevailing emotions throughout Peace Corps service was loneliness; I was so glad to see Megan happy. Ben is an absolute sweetheart and seemingly an open-minded travel partner. They seem so happy together and, knowing Megan back in the "dark ages", it makes me glad she has found someone who makes her happy and can indulge her wanderlust with equaled enthusiasm.
I just took them to the Yecheon bus terminal; they fly out of Incheon on Sunday. I wish them a safe flight and all the best in their life together in Tampa.
My home has been blessed with friends and family but it'll be nice to relax this weekend and take in a movie or seven.

Saying Goodbye to Colin...again...

Colin, Hayoung and I sat in a tea house in Seoul the evening before Colin was to depart from Korea. The tea house was a great find, somewhere in Insadong. There was writing on the walls, proclamations of love, friendship, napkins drawn on and hung around the walls, sometimes covering the pen on plaster. Throughout the tea house were relics of the past. Old metal fans, kitchen knickknacks, and other jetsam of days-gone-by. As sad as I was that Colin would be leaving the next morning, I was lost in thought, thinking about the antiques. They belonged to people at one point, people whom had gone, people whom had stayed and people whom have passed on. This is the natural process, the motion of us all. We're particles bouncing around this earth and all we leave behind are belongings and the memories, some passed into secret, some still held dear by those who knew the owners.
I started thinking about Colin leaving and having to say goodbye at Incheon Airport all over again. It's hard to put into words but I couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't him leaving as much as it was me who was leaving.
Colin went home this morning. In the grand scheme of things, what's the difference of me taking him to the airport and saying my goodbye as if he was staying in America and him taking me to the airport at MSP and saying goodbye to me as if I departed for Korea? I guess it's relative to the actually location of the parting, but it felt different this time. I felt guilty. Once again, the only Stanhill in Asia; once again, the only Stanhill away from Home, from culture and the family network that spans the U.S. I feel lonely. I feel like I'm the one who left, saying my goodbye all over again. I miss my brother dearly.
Last night, we stayed at the sauna at the airport (Incheon Airport is sort of awesome that way) and sat in the hot pool, the same way we did the night before he left for China August of 2011. It was all so familiar yet all so different, but why? Colin came to Korea last August a young adult, a college graduate and unsure what the future, a year abroad, would bring. Today, when we hugged before he entered the security area, he left a man, a sure-footed traveler and a master of the path which brought him back to me.
Today, I said goodbye to a brother, a friend and, for the first time, a man. That's enough.
Later today, I'll be picking up my friend Megan and her boyfriend Ben. They'll be staying with me for the remainder of the week as they round Korea visiting their friends who are now teachers like myself. I know Megan from Peace Corps; we were batch 267, Philippines and fellow members of the self-styled "Loser Crew".

Colin in Yecheon...AGAIN!

As I sit here typing this at Yoger Presso, my brother is sitting across from me, reading. This feels like the old days at Hard Times on Riverside, though arguably the cafe is better lit and is playing K-Pop (neither of which are good things). I have seen him three times  this year, a record, damn near. 

I met up with him in 청주 (Cheongju) where he was staying with a Korean friend he met in China. We met up near the bus terminal and we spotted each other from across a busy street. We both went to the nearest crosswalk and as we waited for the lights to change, he was gearing up to dart out into the street as soon as the traffic cleared. I LOVE the way he hugs; it doesn't matter if it's been five days, five months or five days. Before he darted at me like a magnet, his yellow, longish hair waived in the breeze, his torso rocked with energy. The the light turned green. I love the hugs I get every time. 

We spent an evening in Cheongju with his friend, Sunny and then came back to Yecheon together. We have spent time with friend whom he has met before and friends I have made since his last visit last August. Last night, I took him to 안동 (Andong) to see the city to which I will move next month. There, he, Zach and I went to HomePlus (like WalkMart) and then went my Ryan's (the dude in my band) house for some beers and dry, broken up ramen chunks. Once Hayoung got off work, we all went out to 샤브샤브 (shabu shabu), a kind of make-your-own-soup at your table restaurant. Afterwards, my other bandmate Jonno showed up and we all went out to a local park and played guitar for about an hour and a half. I really wanted Colin to hear us play and I think he had a good time (he danced a wild dance to a couple songs). I love playing in public in Korea. Koreans are typically too shy to do it but they always appreciate it if other people are doing it. We drew a bit of a crowd but the best part of all was singing the last song of the night, "The Weight" by The Band, a Korean kid came up to us as sang along with the last chorus. He had no idea what the words were but he was really into the music!

Today, Colin showed me some of his artwork and we're going to go back through and look at the pictures I took in China, I think.

Right now I am happy. That's enough.

Colin in Yecheon...AGAIN!

As I sit here typing this at Yoger Presso, my brother is sitting across from me, reading. This feels like the old days at Hard Times on Riverside, though arguably the cafe is better lit and is playing K-Pop (neither of which are good things). I have seen him three times this year, a record, damn near.
I met up with him in ?? (Cheongju) where he was staying with a Korean friend he met in China. We met up near the bus terminal and we spotted each other from across a busy street. We both went to the nearest crosswalk and as we waited for the lights to change, he was gearing up to dart out into the street as soon as the traffic cleared. I LOVE the way he hugs; it doesn't matter if it's been five days, five months or five days. Before he darted at me like a magnet, his yellow, longish hair waived in the breeze, his torso rocked with energy. The the light turned green. I love the hugs I get every time.
We spent an evening in Cheongju with his friend, Sunny and then came back to Yecheon together. We have spent time with friend whom he has met before and friends I have made since his last visit last August. Last night, I took him to ?? (Andong) to see the city to which I will move next month. There, he, Zach and I went to HomePlus (like WalkMart) and then went my Ryan's (the dude in my band) house for some beers and dry, broken up ramen chunks. Once Hayoung got off work, we all went out to ???? (shabu shabu), a kind of make-your-own-soup at your table restaurant. Afterwards, my other bandmate Jonno showed up and we all went out to a local park and played guitar for about an hour and a half. I really wanted Colin to hear us play and I think he had a good time (he danced a wild dance to a couple songs). I love playing in public in Korea. Koreans are typically too shy to do it but they always appreciate it if other people are doing it. We drew a bit of a crowd but the best part of all was singing the last song of the night, "The Weight" by The Band, a Korean kid came up to us as sang along with the last chorus. He had no idea what the words were but he was really into the music!
Today, Colin showed me some of his artwork and we're going to go back through and look at the pictures I took in China, I think.
Right now I am happy. That's enough.

Summer Vacation - Ready, Set, Sweat!

Summer vacation officially started today for me and my friend Zach, who teaches at the middle school on the same campus as the high school at which I teach. We met up around 11:30 and went to the gym. Now, some of my readers may find this surprising. In fact, I have been going to the gym with some regularity for the last few months (excluding June). I figured that if I spent a modicum of time maintaining my body as much as I spent maintaining my laptop, tablet and phone, I may just live a longer, more comfortable life in the future. There is a community (read free) gym that is very adequate that Zach showed me months back. We spent about 50 minutes sweating our asses off and headed off to one of the local saunas.

I have not spent much time on the blog dwelling about saunas, one of my favorite places to go. Korea has a long and extensive public bathhouse culture. The process is quite relaxing and very rewarding after a long day standing and teaching a bunch of apathetic teenagers (hyperbole). Every sauna has a little different setup but the following is more or less the process: upon entering the men's sauna (남탕), you enter the first of two rooms. This first room is the locker room. You put your shoes in a locker and find a locker for your clothes (sometimes it's assigned). Once as naked as the day you were born, you enter the actual sauna room. There are a series of pools, each one a different temperature, from searing hot to nearly ice cold with assorted personal pools with jets. The pools are not for swimming but for soaking. Some pools are unique in offering different bathing experiences. Some pools are made into a giant brew of rooibos tea while others are artificially mixed with the same minerals and elements as found in the Dead Sea. There is an endless variety of preparing the pools. There are also dry and steam sauna rooms around the perimeter of the pool area. These also vary, with, for example, miserably humid Philippines-style 70 degree C room to dry rooms where the walls and the floor is made of sodium rock and you cook at an even 50 degrees C. After showering with an exfoliating rag at a row of showers, the series of dips begin! Zach and I tend to the following routine: shower, warm pool, cold pool, hot pool, cold pool, steam room, cold pool, shower. And how much is this luxurious experience? About $4.50 each. So far, this morning of health and fitness has cost us just under $5 each.

We then hit up our favorite Korean-style Chinese restaurant for some fried rice and egg drop soup. We're now at $9 each for the day's activities, and we head to our favorite cafe, Yoger Presso, which is where I find myself now.

I'm not sure how this summer vacation will go but I like where it's been so far. My brother will be here in less than a week and Megan (whom I know from Peace Corps) and her boyfriend will be arriving the evening of the 31st and staying until the 3rd or 4th. I go back to school on the 2nd but I'll be able to spend some quality time with them before my apartment ceases to be a transient motel and life in Yecheon goes back to its quiet ebb and flow...until I move to Andong later in August!

All Sorts

My band had another performance yesterday. The Andong Volunteer Association (AVA) held another event of carnival games, a bake sale and live music (my band, The Band From Out Of Town) to raise money and awareness for a local orphanage. The AVA is a great organization and one in which I plan to participate when I move to Andong next month. The organization is composed of foreign English teachers and Koreans who meet and act in their free time to do charitable volunteer work, such as organizing activities and game days at the orphanage, picking up trash along the river and the like. SO that was really fun last night. Jonno, Ryan and I played guitar for a solid four hours. The music drew many people to the event and we helped entertain the volunteers as well. I love playing at their events because of the energy. Most of the volunteers have heard us play quite a few times and now sing along with some of the songs. It's a great time.
Foreigners get a bad wrap in the media most of the time.

We are depicted as unreliable alcoholics who prey on innocent Korean women on MBC (Korea's equivalent of FOX News). To a small degree, this image has merit and is shared by foreign English teachers and US soldiers stationed in Korea alike, mostly in cities like Seoul, Daegu or Busan. However, participating in the AVA improves our image.

About two weeks ago, some of the foreigners in Yecheon were given the opportunity to shoot some arrows at a nearby archery field. Yecheon has actually produced an Olympic medalist and she was shooting right next to us for a while.

Yecheon is famous for archery, hence why our bridge is shaped like two lit bows and arrows, as you an see. I suppose these are the kinds of events I never really think to put up on my blog but would be the kinds of stories people would find interesting.

In another thrilling episode in my pursuit to gross out my family with exotic foods, I ate 되지 막창, pig intestines, with Zach and my coteacher, Mr. Do. I emailed the picture to my dad to which he replied, "what's it stuffed with?". To his dismay, they were au naturale. They were quite good. As we sat there eating, I tout about the meta nature of ingesting an animal's intestines with my own. How much further up the food chain can a species get?

This last week, students prepared for final exams, scheduled for next week, which means I have been deskwarming, sitting in the office eight hours a day doing nothing. One might think that this sounds like a dream job but it gets really monotonous. But it beats the hell out of a cubicle job wherein I wouldn't be able to get up and walk around at least. While I have be deskwarming, I have watched a few movies, started editing my novel I write last November and read the first book of Game of Thrones. When my novel is finished, I plan on self-publishing it to the Amazon Kindle store, Barnes & Noble Nook store and the Apple iBooks store for about $3. However, I will offer a PDF format of the novel on my blog for free. Boom.

In other news, my plans to go to Jeju island for summer vacation were cancelled due to extenuating circumstances and I will remain in Yecheon for the duration of my vacation. I'm okay with this for a few reasons. First, I will be able to save money. Secondly, I have had plenty of opportunity to travel with my last three vacations (Philippines, winter 2010, Jeju, summer 2011, China, winter 2012). Thirdly, my brother and a Peace Corps friend are coming in late July and will be able to spend part of my vacation with them!

New Song From Vicious Delicious & DJ Grandalf (me and Zach)

Note: This music is intended as satire. Bad language.

Another year, another dollar

Well, it looks like I haven't blogged in quite some time. Most recently, I have signed a new contract and will be staying in Korea another year though this time around I'll be in the nearby city of 안동 (Andong). This new city is only about 35 minutes away from where I currently live. But it seems so much further when I have to go to justify her and cheese. Indeed, I'll be living about a 10 minute walk from what is equivalent to a Walmart. This and the fact that there is a bowling alley and two movie theaters make this city a very different experience of what I have here in Yecheon or what I had in the Peace Corps, in the Philippines. My new contract will start August 26 so wish me luck with the move!
In other news, I'm still playing music pretty regularly with my band. We have a performance at a bar this coming Saturday in the city I'm moving to. I have also been working with my friend Zach creating some music with the aliases of MC Vicious Delicious and DJ Grandalf. As much as I've been practicing guitar and fingerpicking in particular, I've been working DJ skills in a range of genres. We're now working on a song called "The Coffee Song" and the music uses only percussion and mouth noises.
Here is our most recent finished track, called "Pork Attack (Samgyeupsal Song)". I made all the music with original samples and Zach wrote all the lyrics. I actually made the beat. By recording cooking pork at my house :-)
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7xAYxhyJzo?rel=0&w=560&h=315]
Working on music has kept me very busy. It's something I've never really had in my life and something I am immensely enjoying. I have never had a band that has stuck around this long and I'm getting a lot out of it.
I have also been very involved in photography. The DSLR that I bought after Colin visited me last August is probably one of the best purchases I've ever made. The camera has given me plenty of excuses to go on walks I never would've gone before and see my town here in ways that I never looked at it before. Above are some pictures that I took while on a mountain hike to catch the sunset here in my town about a week ago.

I'm still enjoying the hell out my iPad. As a matter of fact, I wrote this whole post using voice dictation :-)

Open Mic in Andong

As part of a running series of performances to benefit the Andong Volunteer Association (AVA) and those the organization serves, an open mic night was set up at the Life Cafe in the old downtown of Andong. Along with some poetry readings and a song and dance performance, my band played a few songs. Below are some videos taken of our performance. The video was shot using the new iPad (iPad 3rd gen).
The first couple songs we played were "The Weight" by The Band and "End of the Line" by The Traveling Wilburys. We decided to open with "The Weight" and dedicate it to the late Levon Helm, lead singer and drummer for The Band who had passed the evening before the performance.
"The Weight" - The Band & "End of the Line" - The Traveling Wilburys
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOvtO73DTKU&w=560&h=315]
"Hotel Yorba" - The White Stripes
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5DBWcrf1MQ&w=560&h=315]
"Rattlin' Bones" - Kasey Chambers
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDjLLdNn49c&w=560&h=315]
"The Cat Came Back (Medley)"
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNEjofKmznI&w=560&h=315]
"Wagon Wheel" - Old Crow Medicine Show
note: the first 30 seconds or so are pretty quiet for some reason; feel free to fast forward.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2Cxqy1k6vM&w=560&h=315]

Upgrading My Life: iPad and SSD

There have been a couple major upgrades to my tech life lately. As it is, I'm sitting in my favorite cafe typing this on the newest generation of iPad (essentially the iPad 3). I don't have much to say about the product as much as I can speak on the way the product has affected my life even in the past few days. I like to sit on my deck every morning drink coffee, drink coffee and read the news in aggregate on my iPhone. There are some spectacular apps for news aggregation that work so well with a larger screen, such as News 360, Flipboard and Zite. These apps exist on the iPhone but their layouts for the iPad's larger screen is commendable. I have also downloaded Photoshop Touch and have rendered some shots of the river in downtown Yecheon into a neato kinda dealy (attached above). I finally decided to get an iPad because it seems as though it is coming into its own as a device for production, which is opposed to consumption. I wanted an iPad to be productive and not just read and watch movies and tv shows. There is a way to manipulate the USB camera connector into letting me use my MIDI Akai MPK mini keyboard with music production software. I can also use the iPad as a touch-based MIDI control panel for Ableton. There are so many possibilities.
I have also purchased an Intel 320 series SSD for my two year old white unibody MacBook. I now get a 24 second boot time. I can probably get another 2 years out of this thing. It is so snappy; applications launch in just two bounces versus the three minutes it took to launch iPhoto or iTunes. I even found a way to enable TRIM support for it via http://digitaldj.net/2011/07/21/trim-enabler-for-lion/
The beauty of having SSD's in everything now is twofold: the speed and durability. My old platter hard drive was starting to make some disconcerting sounds. Jostling HDD's too much is quite bad for them. One of the funny things to get used to is the fact that my laptop is completely quiet now aside from when the fans spins up every once in a while. It's like driving a hybrid car in low-gear...is this thing on?
Just had to kvell.

The Food I Couldn't Eat

I finally have been confronted with a food I could not eat. Faithful readers, meet 빙어 (bingeo).

The small minnow-like fish are eaten live, dipped in chili sauce and wrapped in a leaf.

It all started one afternoon my co-teacher took me and my friend Zach on a drive through the country and had asked if we wanted to eat some, what Zach and I heard as, "raw fish". We thought this wouldn't be a problem as we had eaten sushi with him in the past.

Anyway, after a series of hilarious and awkward circumstances detailed in Zach's excellently written blog, neither Zach nor I could eat the food. I have eaten some weird things in the past but I have finally met a food I could not eat. I've had hard-boiled duck fetus, pig brains out-of-the-skull, raw cow intestine, horse pot roast and a myriad of other exotic foods, I simply couldn't eat these little bastards. While squeamishness had the better of Zach, I couldn't fathom taking something's life inside my own mouth. Congrats, 빙어, you got the better of me.

As Zach so elequently wrote in his blog,

Since then I've sometimes regretted not eating it when I had the chance. Granted I could go back there sometime and try again, but if I went specifically to order it I know that I'd have to keep going until the bowl was pretty much empty this time, so I really don't think I will. It was that one time situation that passed me by and I wonder what I missed. I can't say I've actually eaten every unusual new food that's been offered to me now, and for that I am regretful. I hit my culinary wall, and just hope I'll get my second wind someday.

Another Semester, Another Day, Another Americano

I am two weeks into the new semester and it has come with some unique challenges as well as some really fun opportunities. I am teaching four D level classes, the lowest level of learners. Some of the students have a loose grasp on Korean, let alone any kind of command of English. This makes my job a little difficult, teaching English as a foreign language to low level learners. However, after spending two weeks with them, they have quickly become some of my favorite classes to teach. Let me explain.

The first week was a challenge. I knew that conventional teaching methods and lesson planning would not work for this class (Mr. Bean to the rescue!) and I had to come up with a way to teach varying degrees of low levels in the same class without isolating some kids or boring others. The first week I was terrified, especially since I taught the first class completely alone! Despite the low level of English, the students have a natural curiosity about me and a genuine sweetness that makes teaching them a pleasure. They do not talk and they try their damndest, which I absolutely cannot say about many of my higher level classes.

I have come to realize that these students are not trying because they want or even need to speak English but because they want a chance to succeed. It would be presumptuous of me to assume that they seek my approval. Instead, it seems to me they are seeking the feeling of success, of being told that they did a good job, that they completed a language task, no matter how basic it may seem to a higher level learner, with confidence and pride.

My second week in the classroom, I wrote at the top of my daily calendar "today is a day I can actually make a difference by teaching English". I cannot tell you the confidence boost that gave me which was obviously reflected by the students. I now look forward to those classes; not only do the students want to be there, but I do too. That makes a huge difference.

I am also leading an English club of extremely bright students, nine all said and done. They are very enthusiastic about learning English and picking my brain for any snippet of culture they can. They're a blast. Today, I showed them a Korean subtitled version of Abbot and Costello's "Who's On First" routine, which they loved.

One of my students brushed off the clip before I had a chance to play it, saying, "it looks so old." I told him to wait and give it a chance. The clip was eliciting belly-laughs from otherwise jaded high school boys.

We meet every other Friday for about two hours in the afternoon.

Otherwise, my B and C classes are causing me a lot of stress. How Dae Chang got its reputation for being a respectable school in general is beyond me. I find new students this year to be aggrivating and disrespectful, far beyond even the worst headaches my students gave me last year. Every incoming year gets worse and worse. There is a lot of politics behind it and my blog is an inappropriate place to speculate on them.

In other news, I pre-ordered an iPad 3 which should be arriving at my Dad's work in less that 24 hour, according to FedEx. Pretty excited about that.

Teaching English as a Foreign Language Certificate

So I suppose I should get this beast up to date. I just returned from my China trip, but I'll get to that later. Before I went to China, I spent three weeks of Winter Vacation completing a teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) certificate. My buddy Zach recommended that I go through International TEFL and TESOL Training. I opted for the 120 hour tutored course. The course cost USD$290 but I'll make that back almost monthly with the pay raise for which it qualifies me. It also makes me quite competitive, along with my almost three and one half years of teaching experience, for future re-employment.

Anyway, I finally received my TEFL certificate, a considerable accomplishment in what I am realizing could be a long-term career path.

Moon Over Yecheon

The moon over Yecheon this evening. Took my camera and tripod out and after about 30 trial and error shots, this one finally came out.