Miss Cha-sah-min!!

If you are reading this, go ahead and give me an imaginary pat on the back because I finally bought a camera!! After being here for six months and still not having a camera, I finally caved in and bought one! It is a Samsung- made here in Korea. I did a pretty good job bargaining with the man at the store, too. Now all I have to do is read the manual and figure out how to start taking some good shots with my camera (let's hope that doesn't take me another six months!) I am realizing now how much harder it is to take nice looking shots than I thought.

Anyway, I brought my camera to school today and I thought I would share with everyone some pictures of my kids and my classroom. Also, take note of the title of my blog. Some of my kids, because of their accents, pronounce my name Miss Cha-sa-min. It is really cute. Actually, some adults call me this as well. I will introduce myself as Jasmine and then get a semi-confused and blank look saying, "How the heck do you say that?" So I repeat myself and say, "My name is Cha-sah-min, like the tea and the flower..." and then I get, "Oh! Cha-sah-min! What a beautiful name!" It is quite amusing and endearing at the same time!

Welcome to Koala Class! This is where I spend most of my time in Korea! These are a few of my elementary kids that come after kindergarten is over.
Here is Jaden working hard and the others fighting over a pink crayon in the background! For some reason the pink crayons are the most popular. Some of my kids even cry if they don't get a pink crayon!
Stella, Sunwoo, and Jay...
We just got a class fish tank!
Here are some caterpillars made by the Koalas. Notice the one without the body...and the one without the head!
This was our first attempt at painting. Mixing paints and dipping your brush in water between colors were hard concepts, but we did ok.
So that is a little bit of a look into my kindergarten class. My kids are rambunctious, energetic, and adorable! I love watching them grow and learn. It is amazing to see their progress over the last six months. I am officially halfway through my first year of teaching! Here's to another six months!

Mudfest!

Last weekend, Adam, Morgan, and I got to experience one of the most interesting festivals yet, the Boryeong Mud Festival! It takes place at Daechon Beach, which is about a 3 hour train ride Southwest from Seoul. Every year thousands of people come to have fun in the mud, which is exactly what we did! The mud here is famous, it is said to be great for your skin. The mud from Boryeong is sold in all types of products- soaps, shampoos, and lotions. This is one of the biggest festivals in Korea and also the one attended by the most foreigners. At times it was easy to forget we were in Korea, but I am happy to say that I saw plenty of Korean people attending the festival as well. It was a great time!Here is a picture of Adam and I, pre-mud. The weather was absolutely gorgeous! A slight breeze, high 80's, and an ocean to jump into whenever you need to cool off!
The whole beach looked like this. There were people milling around everywhere. The umbrellas are where the mud was kept. The beach was full of muddy people, sunbathers, swimmers, and all sorts of interesting characters. Along with wearing the mud, there were also mud slides, mud pools, mud wrestling, a mud prison, and mud obstacle courses.
Let the muddiness begin! I am giving Morgan a mighty nice mud paint job!
Here he is returning the favor...
The finished product. Once the mud dries it is hard to smile or move because your skin feels so tight! We spent the whole day getting muddy, then going for a swim in the ocean, and then getting muddy again.
Once nightfall came we all cleaned up and the fun continued. The festival brings in some good bands to perform at night and they also put on an amazing fireworks show, choreagraphed to music. At night the tide goes out really far and people are wandering all over the beach. Later the tide came up really far again, but everyone was too busy having fun to care. The beach is illuminated in these huge eerie blue colored spotlights which casts an interesting ambiance over the beach. We spent the evening wandering around the beach and talking to people, playing in the ocean, visiting random campfires on the beach, and spinning in circles and falling over in the sand...
And you can't forget the sparklers!
The next day we took advantage of all the fresh seafood restaurants right along the beach. This restaurant specialized in shellfish. We had a lunch of grilled oysters, snails, clams, and mussels. They are thrown from the fresh seawater right onto the grill. The pop open slightly when they are cooked. When they open you grab them off the grill, wearing a glove on one hand so you don't get burned, and you pop the top shell off and grab the meat out with your chopsticks. I wasn't sure how this was all going to taste but I actually really enjoyed it! It was definitely the freshest meal I've had in a while! It was also nice to eat while overlooking the ocean. After lunch we all piled back onto the bus to head back to Seoul. This has been one of my favorite weekend experiences in Korea so far! Today (Tuesday) is a holiday for me, so I am spending the day relaxing. One and a half more weeks of school then it's off to Hawaii! I can't believe my first semester of teaching is almost over! Hope everyone is doing well and enjoying the summer!

pictures from Ulsan

As promised, here are some pictures from my weekend in Ulsan... Jinny and Jo swimming.
This is the outside of the Minbok we stayed in. The older couple that owned it had their house right next to our place. The big pile in the middle is either garlic gloves drying or maybe pea pods, I can't remember.
Straight and to the point... smoking kills!
volleyball, anyone?
The beach was really rocky, which made it hard to walk on, but it was very beautiful!



These are the platforms that people did everything on, eat, sleep, cook, and hangout.

sunburn, anyone?

I am sitting here, listening to the rain and distant thunder, feeling refreshed! Rain always brings a refreshing feeling for me, a cool breeze is here with the rain today and all the dirt of the city is being washed away!

Speaking of refreshing, I also had a very refreshing and rain free weekend. I was fortunate to spend a much needed relaxing weekend away from Seoul at the beach! My friend Jinny, who is a scuba instructor, invited Adam and me to accompany her to Ulsan, a city on the southeast tip of Korea. Lack of funds prevented Adam and I from obtaining a scuba certification that weekend, but we did get a chance to lay on the beach, jet ski, banana boat, read and relax, and spend some time experiencing a different side of Korean life- life outside of the city, all while getting a horrible sunburn!!

Life in the city of Seoul is very fast paced. People are always in a hurry to get where they are going. Living here and working in an English school make it very easy to put studying Korean on the back burner. I always have good intentions to study, but never enough time. However, here in Ulsan we were the only two foreigners. Despite the stares, partly from being foreign and partly from our severely red skin, it was nice to be truly immersed amongst Koreans. Jinny and one of her friends that joined us both speak English fluently so it was nice to have a translator. I found that I learned a lot of Korean words and phrases just from being surrounded by the language all weekend. I wonder how much I would know by now if I didn't live in Seoul, or if I actually studied. We stayed at a little beach resort that the Hyundai Corporation puts up for its workers. Jinny's scuba boss works for Hyundai and spends his summer at this beach making sure it is run smoothly and that the lifeguards and rescue workers are doing their jobs. The resort was not a typical resort you would find in the States. There were no pools, or even a hotel for that matter. This was the closest thing to camping I have seen yet. Basically, there is a huge area set up with a big canvas-ish covering over some poles. Underneath this area are lockers and a bunch of platforms about 2 feet off the ground set up. People basically do everything on these little platforms. Everyone puts their stuff in a locker. At nighttime you grab your blankets and sleep on the platform. During the day you cook and congregate on your platform. There are bathrooms and showers on either side of the area, along with a communal kitchen with burners and sinks for people to do their cooking. This area is set up right along the beach. On the beach is a volleyball court and areas to rent tubes, banana boats, or jet skis. There is a little store and a little restaurant nearby as well. I have never seen anything like this before, it was definitely interesting. We all stayed in a minbok nearby. A minbok, as I said in an earlier blog, is basically an open room with blankets and pillows in the corner. When you are ready to sleep you grab your blankets and lay on the floor to sleep. It is a very cheap way to travel. This minbok was a house with a bathroom and 2 rooms, and a kitchen/living area. We didn't use the kitchen at all, we just slept. Definitely a weekend well spent!

Summer break is almost here! I can't believe how fast the time has gone by! This upcoming weekend I am heading to Daechon, along with about 30,000 other people, to go to the Mud Festival. After this weekend we have Tuesday the 17th off of school, then a staff bonding trip the next weekend. The weekend after is summer break!! I had been planning on going to Japan for break. However, since all of Korea has off of school for this week as well, it makes for a very busy travel season. We were planning to go by ferry and found out they were all booked. Plane tickets ended up being too expensive by this point. Now I am heading to Hawaii to see Jason! I am definitely looking forward to a week in Oahu! I love Hawaii!!!

I hope you all are feeling refreshed and having a great summer! I will post some pics as soon as I get some from Adam, since I still don't have a camera!

guess what?? chicken butt!!

Ever grabbed a chicken butt with a set of chopsticks?? Well, there is a first time for everything! Try eating it! Kate, Adam and I went out with our friend Morgan and a girl Mia (who was visiting Korea and decided to have her first meal with us) and we didn't know a single thing on the menu . The server manages to say chicken in English so we give an emphatic, "Yes! We will have the chicken!" Well, he forgot to say butt after the chicken part. We were all starving so imagine our surprise when we popped the first sphincter filled chewy piece in our mouth... yuck!! However, I guess it is considered a delicacy here.I also got a chance to go to and be in The Donkey Show. It is a musical performance- think Midsummer Night Dream meets Studio 54 on acid. This production was going on in the States but got pulled because of its "raw" content. It was especially interesting for it to be in Korea because this culture is so conservative. However, it was an awesome performance (all in Korean). The story was all told in song and the audience was all standing around the stage, like you would at a concert. Random people were pulled on stage- I must be random because along with "random" security checks at that airport, I got pulled onstage at the Donkey Show!
Robyn, Trena, me, Jinny, and Janice on the way to the beach near Incheon.
Adam at his birthday party. He wasn't thrilled about the hat!
My first beach experience in Korea! This was in the beginning of June when the beaches aren't crowded yet. People here don't go to the beach until it is officially summer on the calendar. It could be 90 degrees outside and you will still find the beaches fairly empty in comparison to the summer season. Also, when summer officially ends on the calendar, so does going to the beach for most Koreans. Summer clothes get put away and summer activities come to an end, even if it is still hot out!

Alas, another 22 days has gone by since my last post! I honestly don't know where the time goes, it has been passing by so quickly! Yesterday marked my 4th month living in Korea! Sometimes it seems as if I've been here much longer than 4 months, other times I feel like I just got here! Summer is officially here which means I am trying to stay out of Seoul as much as possible on the weekends! We are about to enter monsoon season for the remainder of June and all of July. It has been getting hot- in the 80's every day- and is supposed to get hotter yet. Right now the summer feels like a typical Wisconsin summer, hot and humid!

I have been to two beaches in Korea so far. I went to a beach near Incheon and also just recently I visited Daechon beach. I spent the weekend laying on the beach in the hot sun. I got to go kayaking in the ocean and at night I sat on a beach with my friends while we talked, played guitar, and just goofed off! There were little mini four wheelers you could rent so we got one and cruised around the beach and made little jumps out of sand for people to try and jump over. The tide went out really really far and I found 15 starfish, a shrimp, and a crab! About 9 of us crammed into a Minbok to sleep. Basically, we each paid about 9 dollars to sleep in a room with nothing in it. You grab a blanket and a little floor pad and sleep on the wood floor. The next morning I felt so sore like I had been lifting weights. Korea is a beautiful country, almost 70 percent mountains, which is easy to forget when you are surrounded by buildings in the huge city of Seoul. Everytime I have taken a trip out of Seoul I always fall asleep on the bus or the train. I really wish I could stay awake to look at the beautiful scenery, but so far I haven't had much luck!

Last week Adam's sister Kate came to visit. She is teaching in Japan for the summer and decided to spend 11 days visiting Adam. It was nice to have a face from home around, even though I don't know Kate that well. I enjoyed getting to know her this past week. It was also fun seeing her initial reactions to things here in Korea, it reminded me of how Adam and I saw things when we first got here. Now these things seem so normal.

I just finished my first set of parent teacher conferences! I officially feel like a teacher! I was very nervous for them. They are set up a bit differently here. All the parents came into my classroom to observe a 30 minute lesson. After the lesson I met with each parent individually to discuss their child. I was so nervous that having the parents in the classroom would drive my already rambunctious kids wild, but the lesson went just fine. I definitely have to say that the part of teaching I have learned the most about has been classroom management. It is so easy to let little things go, but as time goes by you realize how much of a mistake that was because kids will remember the last time you didn't correct them for something and then all of a sudden your management strategies are not as effective. That is a lesson I have definitely been learning.

I am busy trying to plan things for the rest of the summer. Adam, Morgan, and I are planning on going to Japan over our summer break. We will visit Kate in Tokyo and then explore Osaka and Hiroshima as well. I am also going to the Boryeong Mud Festival. It is basically a time on the beach that everyone gets covered in mud, which is supposed to be great for you skin, and plays. I should have some interesting pictures after that weekend. I am also hoping to get a rafting trip in this summer. It is so hard to fit everything in!

I hope everyone is enjoying their summers thus far. Keep me posted on your lives and adventures!

a birthday eulogy

Ok, ok, I know I have failed my 14 day blogging challenge miserably! This whole blogging thing is a lot harder than I thought! However, on this lovely day of June 5, I would like to take some "oh so precious" time to dedicate a blog- or a birthday eulogy, as I am choosing to call it- to my good friend and traveling partner, Adam Van Straten.

Most people when they hear the word eulogy think of a dead person. This is not always the case, a eulogy is also considered "high praise or commendation" according to dictionary.com. Being the cheesy person that I am, I was looking up some quotes on friendship, thinking they might be good to put in a card or in this blog and I came across one that inspired the title to this blog: " Do not save your loving speeches for your friends till they are dead; do not write them on their tombstone, speak them now instead." We can all thank Ann Cummings for that lovely quote. I decided to take her advice and celebrate the day of Adam's birth with a loving speech, haha. So Adam, this one is for you!

Adam and I have technically known each other since the 5th grade. However, all throughout gradeschool, middle school, and high school neither of us had ever spoken a word to each other. We have discussed it recently and realized we really don't even have any memories of each other during any of those times at all. It wasn't until one happenstance day in the summer of 2005 that we actually met. The story is actually very random in itself- I got to know one of Adam's best friends, Ryan, and one day I went to hang out and met Adam. We got along instantly- which also brings me to another quote I found- " Two may walk together under the same roof for many years, yet never really meet; and two others at first speech are old friends." -Mary Catherwood. At that point we never would have expected to be living together in Korea. We chatted randomly for the next year. One day, knowing he was a fellow wanderlust at heart, I asked him randomly, "Hey, do you wanna move to Korea with me?" He looked at me and said, "yeah, ok." Thus started our adventures! We made plans and here we are!

Sometimes I wonder if my experience in Korea would be the same without Adam. I have heard it said that it is not where you are but who you are with that makes the difference. I think this is definitely true in my case. I have honestly found a friend that I get along great with and one who challenges me to think differently and has a genuine love for life! I don't think I could ask for more! In honor of Adam's 25th birthday today, I am going to attempt to write 25 things I appreciate about Adam (after all, this is a eulogy)
1. His love for life
2. He introduced me to Northern Exposure
3. The way he can pull a random quote off the top of his head that fits any situation
4. When he says, "that's so strange"
5. He can cook
6. He is genuine
7. He is creative
8. He is a true wanderlust
9. He loves his family
10. He loves his friends
11. He is an amazing writer
12. I don't know anyone else that can talk to a dog for an hour
13. He is always ready to have a good time
14. He is free
15. We usually know what the other person is thinking
16. He laughs at my jokes (and is usually the only one laughing)
17. I laugh at his jokes
18. We can tell each other basically anything, no matter how random or weird
19. He makes me eat fruit
20. His intellect
21. He stops to examine every random plant he sees
22. His ugly blue wrist supporter he wears at the gym
23. He introduced me to Jonathan Safron Foer's books
24. He has a didgeridoo
25. He is unique

I will conclude by saying, Thank you Adam! You have been a great friend to me and I am looking forward to many more years of friendship and adventures. You are a beautiful individual and I am thankful that I have a friend like you in my life! Happy 25th birthday!!

I'm not in Kansas anymore!!

I know, I know.... I already failed the challenge! ha! Oh well, you have to give me something for consistency at least- in my lack of blogging, that is! It was a busy weekend as usual. Friday night was Trena's birthday. We went out and had a great time celebrating, which resulted in a late night. Saturday night I went with some friends to see my friend's boyfriend perform in his band. It was a great performance!

Today was a beautiful and relaxing day! I went out for lunch with a friend and he took me to a Caribou Coffee! For those of you that don't know, Caribou Coffee is my all time favorite coffee. It is a company from Minnesota and it basically fueled all my studying, or lack thereof, throughout college. One can only handle so much Starbucks here, so I was extremely ecstatic to taste the wonderful goodness of Caribou again. It made me feel a little more at home!