skip to main |
skip to sidebar
yes it's official!!!! jens and i are going home at the end of this contract! unfortunately that does not mean his book was picked up to be published yet. we just thought it all through and decided that no matter what we'll go home april 2010! i'm so excited!!!
it all started when i emailed jens and told him i was done with korea. that i couldn't take it anymore! lol korea has been a wonderful experience and i definitely don't regret doing it but there just comes a point when it's time to leave, ya know? (i emailed him because we always do that when we're both at work).
he wrote back giving me all the numbers- like how much we've saved, how much we could save this year, how much we would save if we stayed a 4th year, how long it'd take him to write a 3rd novel and go through the firefighter emt training he's going to do, etc. then he sent a second email saying he had just found out some more info about the training- turns out he has to do a boot camp (in person in texas of course) before he can finished the last 9 months of the training. originally he was thinking he could get ALL the training out of the way before going home so he could immediately start looking for a job when we got back. but since he can't finish the training in korea that changes things a bit.
but he was still sounding pretty pessimistic and wanted to know more from me- about why i wanted to leave now, what we would do in texas, etc.
long story short- i convinced him that this should be our last year! woohoo!!!!! i can't believe it!
it's such a relief! it's amazing how much it's changed my perspective already. i feel so much more optimistic. i feel like i can really appreciate korea more now that there's an end in sight, ya know? i find myself wanting to take pictures again like i did when i first came here! pics of random things like mailboxes and carts filled with cardboard boxes and little dogs with dyed hair!
aaaaaahhhhh it's so refreshing!
now we're thinking about all the places we wanna see and things we wanna do in korea before we leave. we're still planning to go to se asia in winter. i think we're gonna try to go for the full two months- jan. and feb. depending on how much we wanna spend. se asia is super cheap though so it should be doable. i mean some places cost like $5 a night lol
then when we go home in april we'll live in my grandma's old apt. that my dad built onto their garage. we call it the bungalow. it's really nice and we'll share my parents one acre yard with them. that'll be REALLY nice seeing as how we've had NO yard for 3 years lol it'll be great to be able to let the dogs out the front door to use the bathroom and run around. no more pee pads! (hopefully they'll catch on pretty quickly lol)
career plans:
jens will write his 3rd novel in sept./nov. then do part of the emt/firefighter training online in nov./dec. we'll go on vacation then he'll do another part of the training in march/april. once we get back to texas he'll do that boot camp and then he'll have 9 months left of training.
as for me i'm seriously thinking about getting into event planning/wedding planning. i want to try to be an assistant to someone who's already doing it so i can get hands-on experience right away. then if i really like it i can become a certified event/wedding planner and do it on my own. another option for me is culinary school. in high school i wanted to be a chef but gave up on it when i became vegetarian because i didn't want to deal with meat- plus i was young and wasn't sure what i wanted to do. but now that i'm not vegetarian anymore and i've really gotten into cooking the past couple years i think it's a possibility for me again. i'd love to work in the cooking school at central market. so those are two things i'm going to pursue when we get back. a 3rd thing i'm interested in is the eco-friendly field in general which opens up a lot of options. hopefully i can find a job in one of those fields right off the bat but if not i'll just take anything until i can find what i want and we can get on our feet.
so our to-do list so far is:
see and do things in korea
go to japan
have ben and viv visit
go to se asia
jens- write novel
jens- train to be a firefighter-emt
randi- look into job opportunities
sell stuff off
ship stuff home
prepare ourselves for culture shock! lol
go home!
yaaaaaaaaaay! goodbye korea! hello texas!
hey! i'm gonna make this short. just want to give a little update.
we only have about 4 weeks left of this semester which is nice :o)
classes have been going pretty well. i've been teaching a music lesson where i show lots of american music videos and a lesson comparing high schools around the world which have both been pretty fun for the students and i.
i'm realizing my co-teacher does have some very human parts to her so we're getting along better lol
i'm getting to know the japanese teacher, akiko, better and i think we'll start hanging out outside of school soon.
jens is still liking his job and he just started to edit his second novel.
we take things pretty easy during the week but we have stuff going on almost every weekend. last weekend jens and i went to a bachelor party and bachelorette party respectively which was fun. a couple americans here are getting married in korea next month. this weekend there's a b-day party and i need to get a lot of things done for a baby shower i'm helping to host next weekend. the baby shower is for my best friend here in korea and i'm having a lot of fun planning it! :o) i love planning parties! weekend after next jens and i are hosting our annual 4th of july tex-mex fiesta which i'm really looking forward to! should be fun! then we just have that wedding to go to and we'll be on vacation!
we're planning on going to japan for 10 days and then meeting up with ben and vivienne in seoul when we get back. they'll be visiting us for two weeks. i just hope all goes to plan despite all this swine flu nonsense! i'm hoping none of us have to be quarantined in japan or korea lol
in entertainment news - jens and i are watching the series madmen which is really good! it's about men in advertising and life in general in the 1960s. it's very well-done.
two movies i watched recently that i liked - revolutionary road and the reader. i like revolutionary road more. both are sad but good.
and the book i'm reading now is called - the girls. it's fiction but it's written like an autobiography of conjoined twin sisters. very interesting and good!
in other news- our basil plant is getting really big! i should take a picture! lol also, jens finished stringing and tuning our chromaharp today! i think it took him 4 hours total lol i made the mistake of telling my co-t we have a chromaharp and that i'm gonna try to learn it and she's told me like 3 times she can't wait for me to come up to school and play the chromaharp for them...oh boy lol
anyway, that's all for now i suppose. hope you're all having a great summer so far!
you may not believe this but i ACTUALLY had a good night with my co-t!
she finally took me to buy that hairpin she's been wanting to buy me for weeks!
we left school at 5pm and went to a shop in shinae first (old downtown)- apparently it's one of her favorite shops and she's familiar with the owner now.
as we were driving there she put on some music and surprisingly i liked it! it was like yoga-style, indian, buddhist music of some sort and i felt a little weird actually having something in common with her lol
anyway we arrived at the shop and it was a really cute place- half coffee shop, half clothing shop. very small and a somewhat expensive. it's one of those places that only has one of each piece of clothing and i think some of the items have been creatively altered by the owner- the hairpieces especially look handmade. pretty cool.
anyway i thought we were just there to look around for fun- you know, eye-shopping as they say in korea. so i looked around and found some REALLY cute dresses. they were so cute i wanted to know how much they were so i asked- one was like 40,000won or so so i didn't bother trying any on. that's a little out of my price range. so i finished looking around and then my co-t asked- are you finished? i said yes and she asked- are you not satisfied with these clothes. and i was like oh yeah i am. i like those dresses but i can't buy them. and she was like oh oh! try one on! go go! and i'm like ok whatever. i would like to see how they look (still thinking it's just for fun).
so i tried on a long dress on and it fit perfectly. i showed my co-t and she said- oh so however i would like to buy this dress for you! and i was like oh nono, you don't have to do that!! but she argued with me and convinced me that she should buy it for me. but she told me to try a few other things on and decide what i want. so i tried on two other dresses and decided on a short dress (similar to the first one, just short and a different pattern). i told her i liked it and she said something like oh you like this one? not the long one? and i was like yeah, i like this pattern more. she hesitated for some reason and i worried that the one i picked was more expensive than the other but figured if she really didn't wanna buy it she'd say so. but she bought it and then she bought us some drinks at the coffee shop and we sat down and hung out.
she started talking about the dress again and said she thought i would have picked the other one and i was like no i like this pattern more (the other one was way too bright and loud for me and i probably wouldn't have worn it much so i wanted to get the more subdued pattern so i'd actually wear it and get her money's worth out of it lol) but then she started talking about how the one i picked "showed the breast" (meaning it was low-cut) which i know koreans are squeamish about but the weird thing is the other dress was the exact same style so i couldn't figure out why she was surprised i picked the one i did. it wasn't even super short either. it comes down to the knee. i kept thinking it was more expensive than the other but i finally looked at the price tag and it was actually cheaper! so i dunno what her deal was lol she did say- oh you can't wear this kind of dress to my school because it shows the breast so maybe she forgot the other dress was low-cut too and was thinking i'd be able to wear it to school and she could show off that she bought it for me. anyway, i told her the other dress was also low-cut and that either way i could still wear the dress she bought to school if i wore a sweater over it. she didn't seem to really listen to me and proceeded to ask me what else she could say for "shows the breast" and i taught her the word cleavage lol as in this dress shows cleavage.
anyway, we moved on after while and went to another one of her favorite stores in hadang. this one was bigger and had many more pieces of jewelry, hair clips and clothes. the main purpose of this expedition was to buy me a hair clip so i looked at those first. i had already had in mind what kind of hair clip i wanted - a long, rectangular one to clip all my hair back behind me- since it's going to get hot soon and that hairstyle looks a little more professional than a ponytail. i found one i liked immediately- it was long oval clip made of black plastic with tese small, white rhinestones all over it. simple but shiny. at the same time my co-t and this other woman were showing me smaller clips i could use to pull my bangs to the side but i really wanted on to pull all my hair back and when i told my co-t that and showed her the bigger pin she hesitated again and acted weird...but i figured it was just her being weird for no reason again lol so i put the clip in my hair and went and looked at it and said oh i like this one. but then she took me back to the counter and showed me some other clips and said see you can see the prices here. each pin had a tiny little dot on it with the price and the long clip i had been looking at was....you'll never believe this....48,000won!!! (back when the exchange rate was even that would have been $48!!!) i immediately said oh! surprisingly and put the clip back lol i could not believe that cheap looking thing was almost 50 bucks! that's insane! so i proceeded to find the smallest clip they had and we got that lol it's a tiny version of the big one with multi-colored rhinestones on it an i can use it to pin my bangs to the side. don't know how much it ended up being because it was so small a tag couldn't fit on it lol
then she told me to look around some more. i looked at some of the clothes and noticed the prices were all 100,000won and up so i knew i probably wasn't getting any more clothes that night. she said i could try some stuff on though so i found one top i liked and tried it on. it was really cute and i thought for a moment she might buy it for me but she asked if it was on sale and it wasn't so she asked me- do you like this more or the dress we bought earlier more? i definitely liked the dress more so i told her that and i put the shirt back.
we lingered a little while longer and then left so she could take me to her favorite flower shop to meet the owner. random i know, but that's my co-t!
we drove a while and i decided that since she had bought so many things for me i would treat her to dinner. earlier that day she had said- oh and so however i am taking you shopping so maybe you will treat me?? (meaning for dinner) and i thought this was a bit rude to say that outright so i just said oh i dunno, maybe. but that was when i thought she'd be spending like 5,000won on me lol after she spent 35,000won for a dress and however much for that pin i decided it would only be right for me to treat her to dinner. but then she said oh maybe the flower shop owner will come with us and i got a bit worried about how much that would cost lol
on the way to the shop we were stopped at an intersection near this bedding store i always admire when jens and i drive by it so i told my co-t - oh i really like that bedding store! they have really beautiful bedspreads there. and she was like oh! shall we drop by there? and i was like sure! i hadn't been there in like a year and they had some new stuff so i figured what the hay. i like eye-shopping lol so we went in and looked at everything. at one point i was looking at one bedspread and i said - oh this is really nice. and she said oh i think we have the same taste. we both like beautiful things. and i thought- god, i guess we do have some things in common! aaahh!!!! lol after looking at all the bedspreads we found a section of houseshoes and started looking at those. she asked how much they were and i thought maybe she was wanting to buy some for herself. but no- she wanted to buy some for me! i said no- you already bought too much for me. but she wouldn't have it. she said no i want to honor our visit to this bedding store. and i'm like ok whatever! so i picked out some slippers and she bought them!
after that we went to the flower shop and the owner ended up not being there. two other ladies were there and we hung out for a while. at one point one lady said something to my co-t and kind of pointed at her stomach and mine. and my co-t laughed and said something i can't remember now but she must have gestured to my stomach cuz i looked down and realized the way i was standing my stomach was kind of pooching out and i was like oh ok and then the lady said in korean (is there a baby in there??) to my co-t and i said no! no baby! and they all laughed because they were surprised i understood her and then i think the woman was embarrassed that she had asked lol i wasn't really offended. it was probably partly because i'm of child-bearing age and she was curious if a foreigner was having a baby here. anyway we laughed it off and left shortly thereafter.
as we were walking out though my co-t looked back and that same woman was walking directly behind us and they laughed and my co-t said oh she is imitating my walk. many people say when i walk (and she demonstrating swinging her hips) and i was like oh you swing your hips? (which i had noticed before but didn't say anything cuz that's rude) and she was like yes! and we all laughed and left. i was really surprised that woman did that though. i dunno if she didn't mean to get caught and my co-t just noticed her. or if she did mean to get caught and that's a normal thing to do in korea. very weird lol
so then! it was finally time to go to dinner (at 9pm! lol) i asked her where she wanted to go and she couldn't decide. only thing she could think of was galbi- but i know she doesn't like to eat galbi because she has high cholesterol or blood pressure (don't remember which) so i tried to think of something else. then i thought of shabushabu. by some miracle we happened to be right by my favorite shabushabu place so that worked out nicely! we ate there and it was really very pleasant! she really liked it and praised my choice over and over and we talked about various things including the difference between my old school and my new one. she wanted to know all about that.
after dinner she drove me home and went the wrong way a few times so it took a while and the whole way there she gave me advice about marriage and friendships lol after a while she put in a different cd of korean buddhist music and it was really pretty but at one point she had me sing along a phrase with her lol from the outside looking in it would have been a really funny sight lol
i think i got home about 10pm and that was that.
overall it was a good night! she never really irritated me and i made out like a bandit! lol
now some of you may be thinking- ok she's obviously bribing you! trying to put you under her thumb little by little. trying to show you that she's better than all the other teachers because she buys you things. but i bought her dinner so it was more of a back and forth thing. granted she spent more on me but she certainly didn't seem to mind and in fact she seemed thrilled by just getting to hang out with me. you may also think she's just doing nice things for me so i'll do nice things for her but what's so bad about that? don't we all do that on a regular basis? i think it's more fun to do nice things for each other rather than not doing anything at all for each other and just have a robotic, work-only relationship. hey i don't mind paying for dinner if i get a dress out of it! lol
and it's situations like last night that i can actually see a positive side to my co-t. not just because she's buying me things but because we're outside of work, we're doing something fun that we both enjoy (shopping around) and there isn't really any chance for conflict, ya know? i think doing stuff like that with her will help balance the frustrating times at work.
yes, she's crazy but i think somewhere in there she has a good heart. she does say lots of nice things to me. she compliments me almost everyday (my hair, my skin, my clothes, my decorating skills, my teaching skills, etc.) she's always telling me that she wants to help me in any way she can. she's been much more open-minded about my foreigness than any other co-t i've ever had. it's weird but it seems that since she's so crazy and out there she can kind of relate to being foreign, ya know? and any time i do get upset with her she does what she can to mend the situation. not just having me say sorry to her but she'll say sorry to me if she makes a mistake too. and sometimes she'll make coffee for me or take me out to lunch or invite me places (like shopping last night). i really do think her intentions are good. they are misguided at times but overall i think she means well.
i know a day or two or a week from now i'll probably be ranting and raving about something she did that frustrated me but maybe i can come back to this and remember she does have a good side too lol. i think that's the only thing that's gonna keep me sane this year lol
anyway, the end!
so the owners of our apt. bldg. and a repairman came to our apt. monday night and finally fixed our gas range problem. they put the cabinet back together and screwed on a metal serving tray to the side of it to protect it from the gas range fire. good enough i guess lol we didn't have to replace the gas hose because it's only slightly burned and now it can rest down low, far away from the range.
their visit was fairly uneventful. the only amusing thing was that they just bought a random metal tray to screw on there. instead of some kind of special metal sheet or heat-resistant tiles.
all in all we could have fixed the problem ourselves had we known the repairman wasn't going to have any more skills or ingenuity than we have lol we even have our own power drill!
that'll teach us! lol
facebook note jens wrote about our gas range ordeal:
I'm not the sort of guy who likes to make broad generalizations about any culture without first saying how I don't like to do it - so now that's out of the way, here we go!
What's up with Korean workmanship? It's baffling. These people make very fine supertankers and mp3 players and economy cars, but in construction, quality is all over the place. Often one encounters maddening and bizarre cases where a minimum concession is made to necessity, and a maximum to laziness and getting the job done in as quick a way as possible, never mind how it looks (or functions).
In our first Korean apartment, back in Daegu, they installed the air conditioner exhaust hose, from which condensation drips, by breaking the window. They just smashed out a corner of the pane, snaked the hose through, and taped up the rest in a half-assed way. Mosquitoes leaked in through the gap, and cold air leaked out. In our last place, here in Mokpo, the bathtub was sealed improperly, and it leaked every time we showered. The balcony doors didn't seal - no problem with the doors, though, it was the very foundation of the building that was crooked. At my insistence, the handyman drilled the sliding screen doors into place, blocking out mosquitoes, but preventing us from ever opening the screen. Our hot water heater constantly conked out; after many complaints, the maintenance guys finally condescended to come and give the filaments a good scraping with a pair of needlenose pliars, fixing the problem for at least a week and a half.
Now, certainly Korea has a valid excuse for this sort of thing. The aforementioned trauma of the 20th century aside, they've only been industrialized for fifty or sixty years, or about two generations. In 1950, most of them lived in shacks, huts, or wooden houses, where such, shall we say, temporary repairs might have been acceptable. But this "good enough" spirit just doesn't cut it an age when everyone lives in fifteen-story apartment buildings.
When we moved into our current place, we noted some problems with our gas range and kitchen cabinets. The cabinet was too close to the range, so the side of it was blackened and peeling. It was also too close to the wall, so it pinched the hose for the gas range against the wall, holding the hose at such an angle that the hose sometimes dipped perilously close to the open flame. I believe life should be lived at the edge, and this existential hazard gave me a little thrill every time I fried eggs, but Randi is of a steadier temperament, and did not appreciate living under the looming spectre of devastating explosions. For some reason.
A few weeks of complaining got an apartment guy to come see it, who told us that he could do nothing with the hose, as it was the gas company's business; a gas man came, and told us he could do nothing because of the cabinet blocking it; the cabinet belongs to the apartment. Today we had a visit from the people empowered to move the cabinet. It only needed to go a few inches away from the wall to allow access to the hose.
The ajumma (middle-aged woman who wears a visor) pondered the problem, in pondering pose, hands on hips. Then, when my back was turned, she grabbed a peanut butter-smeared knife from the sink and hacked away the glue holding the cabinet to the sill behind the range. I offered a saw so she might not ruin the kitchen knife, but she merrily declined. Then she had me empty the contents of the cabinet, covering the dining table and ruining that room of the house unusable for the nonce. The repairman arrived, power drill in hand, and the real work began.
At first, the ajumma walked around the house, looking for another suitable place to site the cabinet; I stopped her when she suggested we put it on the balcony, on the other end of the house, where my exercise bike is. (Where would the bike go? Behind the refrigerator?) I didn't relish the idea of walking through the dining room and living room, and opening the patio doors (which stick) every time I want a spoonful of mustard (which is often). In the pantry, then, where the oven is, and put the oven in the bathroom. No, thank you. Please just move it a few inches out from the wall to unpinch the hose, and an inch or two to the left to remove it from the heat of the stove. Simple.
So they did! Problem solved. Thank you for your help.
And then they disassembled the cabinet, removing the two top cabinets from the bottom one, giving us two cabinets - one three feet tall, with no top surface, the contents exposed from above - and then another section about five feet tall that would go where the oven is. The oven would go on top of that one. And what about that expensive and totally functional oven shelf? Who cares? Why was this arrangement better than leaving the cabinet in one piece? They mused for a while, hands on hips, then realized that now we had access to the gas shut-off knob, which we didn't before. Much better.
So much better.
When the repairman got out his tape measure to prepare a new top for the first cabinet section - after first seeing if our now-displaced wooden floor grate from the pantry would fit (it didn't) - I knew I had to speak up. I explained in my pidgin Korean that we didn't use the knob before and didn't need it - what we did need was our cabinet in one piece. "Can you please reassemble it in this new location, a few inches from the old? That would solve every problem at once, easily." "Oh, sure, we can do that. On Monday, at 6:00. See you then!"
"Wait! Why can't you do it now?"
The ajumma had a good laugh, and I asked again. Finally, she gestured at the repairman, and said, in Korean, sotto voce, "He's stupid!"
Ahhhhhhhhhhhh. Of course. All becomes clear now.
And they left. Our cabinet is in two pieces, our oven is unusable, on top of the cabinet, and our foodstuffs are all over the kitchen. Until Monday. Then everything will be fixed.
well i'm getting some time to update so here goes:
school and my crazy co-t are pretty much the same. i had an argument with her this past thurs. because i told her a long time ago i was going to be a judge in the english competition (this past fri.) and she was supposed to make sure the official paperwork came and tell the principal, other teachers, etc. and she did nothing. it was thurs. and i was like so you know i won't be here tomorrow right? and she's like what? no! the paperwork never came! well i told her i was upset at her for not telling the principal about it ahead of time (whether the paperwork came or not) and then she proceeded to make me apologize "10 times" because she was offended by that!! can you believe that??? i didn't know what to do. you can't really argue with insanity! so i just laughed it off and said sorry really quickly 10 times and she was like "no however- sincerely!" well that crossed the line and i just said- no one sincere sorry is enough. although i wasn't sincerely sorry at all because she WAS at fault to a certain extent. granted i probably should have asked her about it more often before the actual day (her having "dementia" and all, as she puts it) but she too should have said something to someone- either to the principal about the possibility of me not being at school that fri. OR to me about how the paperwork had not come. since she never said anything i assumed everything was fine. i guess because that's how things always went at the elem. school. i'd tell my co-t about something, she'd get it done and it'd just work out. no problems. i keep forgetting i'm dealing with a lunatic lol
anyway, in conclusion i was able to go to the english competition fri. and i judged the 5th grader interviews. it was nice to have a day out of school and get paid extra but it was a loooong day. felt longer and more difficult than last year. i guess cuz last year i judged the middle/high school speeches and they speak english much better and therefore it's not so monotonous and tedious. some of these 5th graders were great (which were the ones that won the contest) but so many were horribly bad lol i'm sure most of them were put up to it by their parents. parents really need to find out the actual english ability of their kid and other kids before they make them enter into such a contest. several kids couldn't even read the questions we needed them to read in order to pick one for us to ask. one girl came in and just cried the whole time. it was so sad :o( the contest was just an exercise in humiliation for many of them :o( but like i said a few of them were really great and they ended up with the first prize of getting to visit new zealand! pretty awesome! i wanna go! lol
other than school jens and i have just been taking it easy. hanging out with friends here and there and just relaxing at home. last week was our 3 year anniversary so we went to gwangju the weekend after (last weekend). we went to the underground (a western food market), ate at a nepalese/indian buffet (which was ok), shopped around, ate at outback, went to a noraebang (karaoke room), hung out at ethnic bar (cool place with lots of pillows on the floor), ate at another, better nepalese/inidian place the next day (which was awesome!), shopped around some more and came home. oh and it was the first time we ever drove the scooter there and back. it was nice to not have to take the bus and get motion sick, etc. overall it was a fun weekend centered around food Po:
things are gonna get pretty busy again here shortly. this month we've got a bridal shower, bachelor/bachelorette party, birthday party and a baby shower and then next month we're having our big annual 4th of july fiesta here at our place which will be fun :o) then a wedding and then vacation starts! we're going to japan for about 10 day and then our friends ben and vivienne will be visiting us for 2 weeks :o) i'm super excited about that! i just hope this whole swine flu problem doesn't mean they have to stay in quarantine for 7 days when they get here. hopefully it'll all blow over by then.
the puppies are doing well :o) jjang's getting bigger and even cuter lol but we haven't been able to teach him not to bark so much yet. he's even got sadie barking more than usual. we've started really cracking down on them for barking recently so hopefully it'll get better soon.
anyway that's about all for now! have a great week!
