Summer vacation time!!

I am always sick here.  It sucks.  I always get sick when I'm stressed or don't get enough sleep for a fair period of time.  Also, having snotty little kids coughing on me and picking there noses grabbing my hands and hanging all over me probably doesn't help either.  So by the weekend, almost without fail, I always feel like I'm coming down with something.

I had a really high fever Thursday night for five hours or so and since then my stomach has been a wreck.  I hate being sick! I guess it's okay right now though because I don't have any money to spend on doing things right now cause I'm saving it for my vacation in two days.

Speaking of which, I'M LEAVING FOR JAPAN TOMORROW NIGHT!!!  I am muy excited.  I get to see my Chiaki bear!!!  I don't really have things to do planned out but I'm planning to do some research today.  Plus, I will be with a native Japanese person, so I'm expecting she will know some fun things to do.

I half want to start studying some Japanese just so that I can be a little prepared for my trip but every time I try to start I start feeling like my time would be better spent studying Korean instead because it is still driving me mad that I don't really understand that much.  I need to just sit down and start drilling vocabulary.  Maybe that would be a good plane activity.

Korean character of the day: ㅑ - ya sound
Korean word/phrase of the day: 병원 (byeong-when) - hospital

I do not understand Korean parents

The beginning of this week was the beginning of summer vacation for normal schools in Korea.  Unfortunately, it is not the vacation for the kind of private language institute at which I work.  Instead, the kids are coming to take intensive English courses at my school in the morning when they would normally be in regular school.  I'm sure this is not by their own choice.  Sure, it will be really good for their English, but they're overworked kids who need a break.  I would have probably had a melt down if I was in school as much as they are.

Somehow, despite the fact that there are so many more classes everyday now and we had to hire two extra teachers, I ended up with less classes.  Now I don't completely mind this, except that it means my pay check will be smaller because I have been working overtime the past two months.  All of the students who are taking summer intensive courses aren't going to their normal classes that I would teach, so one of my tutoring students is only doing that, and another one of them quit for unknown reasons.  So basically half of my afternoon classes don't exist anymore.  I do not know how I feel about this.

One of my more advanced students is going to Italy for a week over his summer vacation.  I'm really excited for him, partially because they speak a language that I know a fair amount of there and partially because I know they have delicious gelato.  He doesn't know any Italian, so I'm having a great time writing up a list of useful phrases and words for him while he's there.

My Korean is apparently better than I thought.  I'm doing a language exchange with one of the Korean teachers twice a week and she was thoroughly impressed with what little I feel that I do know.  Super happy time for me.  I'm still making slow progress, I'll let you know when I can hold real conversations.

In completely separate news, some of my pants are not fitting quite as well as they used to.  I think it's all of the rice.  Yikes.  I really need to get on that.

Korean character of the day:  ㅠ - sounds like "yoo"
Korean phrase/word of the day: 이것 (ee-guht) - this, 그것 (geu-guht) - that, 저것 (juh-guht) - that way over there

The Dark Lord is dead!!!

Sorry if I just ruined the series for anyone, but I imagine you would assume that he would die in the end.  I saw Harry Potter the day that it came out over here.  It was awesome.  Except for the fact that I was with hardcore Harry Potter people so I couldn't really make any kind of commentary during the movie or I would get shushed. The fact that they serve caramel corn in all movie theaters made the experience even better.  Why don't they do this more in the US?  I know there is one that does kind of near my house in Indiana but other theaters need to get on this.  They would make so much money because I know I would always buy pop corn if there was caramel corn, and I am sure that there are other people of similar persuasion.

I do not understand how Koreans are so skinny to the point where many look unhealthy.  I have yet to happen across their version of healthy food, and from what I can tell from the ones that I know they love to eat junk food all the time.  For example, they have these street food carts everywhere, especially at night (I think it's partially for the drunkies and their midnight cravings), that serve all sorts of fried, carby foods from ddokbokki (떡볶이), which are basically glutinous rice cakes in spicy saucy, to tempura blood sausage and yams.  None of these are very good for you despite being very delicious.  They are also very big on rice and noodles, and it's almost impossible to find whole grain versions of these.  There are so many pastry shops and coffee shops that also serve waffles and ice cream that I'm not really sure how they manage to stay borderline anorexic.  Even the very slim amount of vegetables that get served at lunch tend to be either deep fried or some sort of kimchi.  I guess it could be because of the kimchi, because it is a very healthy food, but I fail to see that as a key factor in counteracting all of the other high calorie junk foods they consume.  They also drink a fairly large amount as a cultural and business tradition which adds even more to their calorie intake.  The only real answers that I can find is that they are genetically gifted with a high metabolism or they just pretend to eat.

Banana milk is delicious.  As is strawberry milk.  Do these exist in the States and I have just been completely unaware?  All of the little convenience stores sell individual cartons of milk in different flavors.  The ones that I have seen have been coffee, banana, strawberry and chocolate, although there maybe more of which I am unaware.  I love chocolate milk, but the chocolate here tastes weird, kind of chalky maybe, but nothing like the chocolate milk at home.  All of the others are excellent.  They put the milks right next to individual sized cartons of drinkable yogurt in other flavors.  I feel like this is almost like milk so if you want to think about it this way they also have mixed berry and kiwi flavor too.  It's quite a nice snack.

Korean character of the day: ㅍ - p sound, aspirated
Korean phrase/word of the day: 의사 (eui-sa) - doctor

snip snip snip

So I had minor surgery this week.  I had a cyst on the inside of my lip from "trauma" ie biting the inside of my mouth and it was getting really awkward to talk and eat and things and I kept biting it more.  So they went "snip snip snip" and took it out.  And now I have some lovely stitches and trouble eating because my mouth awkward.  It should be good in like a week but right now it's rather uncomfortable.  Every time I make the "F" sound my teeth hit the stitches.  Yikes.

One of my kindergartners got stitches this week too.  Apparently he stuck his hand in a fan.  Because he is super smart.  He's actually quite a little punk (although ridiculously charming at the same time) so it doesn't surprise me.

When they spelled my name in Korean on the hospital forms, I gained a syllable in my last name.  I find English words in Korean fairly entertaining.  The get weird sounds and extra syllable.  Like sandwich becomes  sain-duh-wee-chi, I just didn't expect it with my name, especially considering that my first name can actually be a Korean name as well.

There is a plethora of 7Elevens and similar convenience store like places in Seoul, but not a single one of them has slurpees.  I thought that was the whole point of 7Eleven, their delicious, delicious, slurpees.  It makes me very sad.  But having one of those kinds of stores and a coffee shop on every corner is quite convenient when you want a snack or a pick me up.

Korean character of the day: ㅊ - ch sound, aspirated
Korean phrase/word of the day: 진짜 (jincha) - really?

Everywhere else I'm 24, but in Korea, I'm 25

BIRTHDAY!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
I love birthdays.  I don't really care if I get presents, I just really like being able to say, "Hey, guess what.  IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!!"  Although I do like phone calls, texts, cards and surprises and having people celebrate with me.  I had a lovely day full of small children making at attempt at singing, cake, random surprise little presents from my coworkers and ice cream, followed by sushi dinner and KARAOKE!!!  It was quite a lovely birthday overall.  One upside of karaoke rooms is that you get to pick all of the songs for the hour or two that you have them where in a bar you have to sit through some awful renditions of things.  I am so grateful to everyone who came and celebrated my birthday with me.  I had a great time.

My parents sent me a big box which is apparently like Christmas but it hasn't gotten here yet.  I hope it gets here Monday because I am super excited.  I know there is peanut butter in the box but it is pretty much a mystery box.  I love mystery boxes.  WANT NOW.

Went shopping yesterday and finally got some rain boots.  They are black with rainbow spots.  I am very excited to no longer have wet feet when I walk to work and then for hours afterwards.  Is it kind of weird that I hope it rains tomorrow so that I can wear them?

After my shopping extravaganza yesterday and my birthday the day before I am very much in need of a 'nothing' day so that is exactly what I'm doing.  It is glorious.

Korean character of the day: ㅇ- is either used as a place holder for consonants at the beginning of syllables that start with vowel sounds or makes and -ng sound at the end of a syllable; examples: 일- eel, 송 - song
Korean phrase/word of the day: 생일축하합니다! (saeng-eel-chook-ha-ham-ni-da) - Happy birthday!

Asian vegetables are HUGE!!

I went to buy some carrots earlier today to make a snack for tomorrow, and I swear, these carrots were about as big around as my wrist! Granted, I do have small wrists, but still!!  Cutting them up was pretty intense.  Same goes for their zucchini.  They are about twice the size of the normal ones that you find at home.  In an interesting twist however, their fruit seems to be smaller.  I got some plums today and they were quite small, as were the apples that I saw.

Have I mentioned that it's my birthday on Friday?  Because it is. :D  Cards, texts, phone calls, whatever are very much appreciated.  I may have a sugar overload though, because so far for every teacher's birthday there has been a copious amount of sweets brought in.

Harry Potter comes out in Korea next week!!  I think it will be even better with caramel corn.  I'm very excited. I will probably cry my eyes out.  The last one was super depressing, so I can only imagine how this one is going to be having read the book.

Korean character of the day: ㅛ - sounds like 'yo'
Korea word/phrase of the day: 몰아요 (mole-ah-yo) - I don't know/I don't understand.

The torments of written language

Sounds that they don't have in Korean: the 'o' sound in 'not', the 'a' sound in 'happy', the 'i' sound in 'stick', the 'f'sound in general as well as the 'th' sound, and the 'v' sound.  I may be missing some, but so far this is what I've gleaned.  It has also made me realize again, how effed up English writing is.  I noticed today when I heard some random drunk Korean guy trying to sing "Happy Birthday" that his 'a' sounded funny.  I thought about it for a second and realized that they don't have that sound in Korean and that their 'a' sound sounds like the 'a' in 'father.'  I then moved on to realize that the 'a' sound in 'father' also sounds like the 'o' sound in 'hop.'  So the Korean 'a' sound is also and equivalent to our short 'o' sound.  How messed up is that?  I also had an entanglement with the word 'cleanliness' in my most advanced class when they were completely baffled that it didn't sound like 'clean-ly-ness'.  I completely understand their sentiments.  But hey, at least they're not learning French, with all of it's silent consonants and vowels.

My birthday is on Friday!!!  I hear there is a lovely, random birthday box on its way through the mail system.  I am very excited.  I keep getting all of the mailing list birthday emails too, each promising a free ice cream or meal, and then I feel very sad because I can use my free birthday fun.  Although, there are definitely Baskin' Robbins and Coldstones here.  Unfortunately, I highly doubt that they will be able to understand, much less accept my English birthday coupons.  Le sigh.
birthday

I have brilliantly figured out a way to text home like normal texting.  It is brilliant!! But I said that already.  Oh the wonders of iPhones/smart phones.  So, if you feel the need or desire to text me, contact me through one of the means that you know of that is more private than my public blog and ask me for my texting number.  Or you may very well get a random text from a random number that is actually me at some point because I am quite thrilled that I can do this now.  It makes phone call organization much easier.

Korean character of the day: ㅐ- kind of like the 'e' sound of the first 'e' in 'elephant', only slightly more of an 'ey' sound
Korean word/phrase of the day: 사랑해요. (sa-rang-hae-yo) - I love you. :D

I have been to the gym four times this week.  Hallelujah.  Although, it makes me really tired.  My body is trying to adjust to the amount of energy that I takes to teach children nine hours a day and also do a significant amount of cardio and weight lifting.  This explains why I slept for 12 hours last night.  I also am a wee bit sick too and can't hear or breathe properly half of the time because I'm stuffed up so that might be part of it as well.

We had a pajama party at school on Friday with the kindergartners.  I was told that we could teach them a song, a game or read them a book.  I was so stoked because I was going to teach them "Baby" by Justin Bieber, but apparently I misunderstood the context and there was no way to really teach them a song and a dance so I ended up reading Green Eggs and Ham which was also okay.  The littlest kids, who were sitting in the front, kept saying "No!" after every line that said how I would not eat green eggs and ham.  It was freakin adorable.

I just spent about five hours going through Korean vocabulary.  This is how I spend my freetime now.  Not that I mind it, because I really want to be fluent-ish, but it takes a lot more time than I was hoping.  At some point I need to start writing my grad school apps as well which will take up a significant amount of my time as well.

Yesterday, I went on a boat ride on the Han River, which runs through the middle of Seoul.  It was a sunset cruise but it was really muggy and hazy so it wasn't as awesome as it could be but it was still enjoyable being on a boat and watching what parts of the city that I could see go by.

Korean character of the day: ㄴ - n sound
Korean word/phrase of the day: 얼마에요? (oel-ma-ay-yo?) - How much does it cost?