Things I have learned so far....

dinner last night. beef in a broth with some noodles. it came with rice too. best meal i have eaten so far.

sides that came with dinner last night. two kinds of kimchi, peppers and cucumbers to dip in that red pepper paste.

the buttons on my washer. do you know how to work it?

Delivery anyone??


mom was right, eating breakfast keeps your health.


street near my school


looking confused in my school.


more shops near my school.

*Buses rule the road. They run red lights and weave in and out of traffic enough to make you feel sick to your stomach. I’m surprised I haven’t seen any wrecks here yet.

* A lot of women either carry an umbrella (when there is no rain) or wear visors that cover their face completely. This dates back to the old days when the lower class worked in the fields and thus had darker skin. They want to shield the sun to prevent getting a tan. It’s a status thing. I am told sometimes women wear really light colored makeup on their arms and faces to make their skin look lighter. Dang, I worked on my tan all summer and now I need it fade quickly!

* Women should not wear low cut tops. You can wear as short of shorts as you can fit in (and I have seen many girls that made me think, how on earth on wearing those!?!?), but do not show the first sign of having cleavage or you will be looked at as though you are a hooker. I am told that I especially shouldn’t because, as a foreigner with blonde hair, they will think I’m looking for extra work. My Maple Bear contract says no work on the side, so I guess that is out!

* The bus is so cheap to ride. If you buy the bus card, it cost 900 Won, which is about 70 cents. If you pay by cash it is 1000 Won, which is still only about 79 cents.

* You can have anything delivered! Pizza, McDonald’s, you can even order your groceries online at Costco and have them delivered. Now remember, there is no minimum wage in Korea, so they probably are being overworked and underpaid. And tipping is not practiced in Korea. They probably won’t turn the extra money away, but it can be considered insulting.

*The average work week is about 60 hours here, and many work 72 hours.

*I am told many very young students stay up until very late at night waiting on daddy to return from work to eat dinner.

* Korea is very competitive. Students must be child geniuses and are therefore put into private schools, have private tutors, take violin, piano, play sports, anything you can imagine. They may work more hours at their extra curricular activities than I work at my job.

*Rock, paper, scissors will solve any dispute, and the loser takes it graciously.

*Any convenience store sells beer and Soju (a Korean drink that is equivalent to vodka but comes in bottles like beer), and most have tabled out front for you to sit and enjoy your drink.

* Koreans don’t flush toilet paper in most places. I have to throw it away instead.

*Korea takes trash and recycling very seriously. Any food scraps are separated and kept to ship to feed the pigs. Anything that can be recycled is separated into the many recycling categories. And then anything that is absolutely waste, such as toilet paper, is separated. Each of these things needs to be in a color-coded bag on trash day. You can be fined for throwing something away that was recyclable.

* GSU would be very proud of Maple Bear. At orientation today, I had my 4 years of school crammed into 6 hours. Everything from Vygotsky to Bloom’s taxonomy to child-centered learning to teaching phonics and on and on.

*There are more smells in Korea than I have ever experienced before. Every turn is a new smell. Some good, some bad, some sweet, some like horse manure, it’s interesting.

Things are still going well. I found out today that I was given a new class to teach.

I have a morning KG5 (kindergarten 5 year olds, but they are really 4 year olds), which is M-F for 4 hours. I also have afternoon KG5 for 3 hours two days a week. Now, I have been given ESL 4 (English as a second language, level 4, which is 10 and 11 year olds, but since it’s Korean age, they are actually 9 and 10 I guess…..)two days a week for two hours. Now that’s complicated!!

Starting Thursday, I will be teaching three different groups of kids, which are either 5 (but really 4) or 10 and 11 (which is really 9 or 10)

The food is difficult. Meals are usually rice, kimchi, and some kind of meat with some kind of sauce. Sometimes it is served with noodles. Tonight, a group of us went out to a soup sort of place. My meal was a big bowl with a piece of beef still attached to bone in a broth. It had clear noodles in it and came with rice. Sounds odd, but so far this is the best thing I have had. The kimchi really is served with every meal, including breakfast.

The humidity here is not a joke. I have never felt humidity like this before. It’s hot and sticky. After walking around for the day, I feel like I am actually peeling my clothes off at night. Also, you are supposed to turn everything off when you leave the apt, including the A/C, so it’s nice and warm in my house when I get home…..

I’ll try to get a video to show my apt instead of the pictures. The pictures don’t do it justice. It’s bigger in person I think, not by much, but still.