The Buddhist Temple Stay.

This past weekend Lesley, Brian and I went and stayed at a Buddhist Temple in Seoul.  It was an over night stay, so that we got to experience every aspect of the Buddhist life, including waking up at 4:30 in the morning to do the morning prayer and meditation.  The night started out great, they gave us these rocking orange outfits to wear with blue rubber pointy shoes.  We looked like a bunch of prison inmates that were going to go garden.  For all of the prayers and the explanations we gathered in a prayer room, where we sat on the heated floor on top of little square pillows.  The heated floors were so relaxing, they made me want to curl up right there on the floor and take a nap, which made it really difficult to keep my eyes open when our little nun lady was explaining the details of the weekend and giving us the background of Buddhism and Buddha.  So after our little explanation of the religion we got to go participate in the ringing of the bell, which sounded the start of prayer time.  After the evening prayer we went back to our heated prayer room to complete the 108 Prostrations.  The Prostration is a prayer/meditation bowing gesture that involves standing, kneeling, bowing your head to the floor, lifting your hands, then standing back up. It all sounds simple enough, but one of these gestures is basically a squat, so to complete 108 in a row posed quite a challenge. While completing each prostration you put a bead on a string to make the wood bead necklaces that they wear.  Putting the necklace together while doing the prostrations just made it that much harder, in the middle of struggling I would look down to see the pile of beads not make a dent at all.  This process, also, is supposed to be a meditation, so your mind is supposed to be pretty blank.  I don’t think I really know how to have a blank mind; so forcing it to be blank just made it that much worse.  It went something like this “1, 2, 3,…15 wouldn’t it be cool to be a fashion icon?, 16, 17,… 20 omg this is hard, 21 I want a sandwich, 22…. 34, 35 o shoot I need to have my kids practice for the talent show, 36….41, 42 should I get a hair cut, 43…. 67, 68 I need to get more yogurt and cereal, 69… 79, 80 I want to put up Christmas lights, 81 it would be exhausting to be an octopus…98 this is hard, 99 this is hard, 100 my knees kill, 101 this is hard, 102 this is hard 103 im hungry, 104 this is hard, 105 I want to go home, 106 this is hard, 107 this is hard, 108.”  It was rough.

In the morning we woke up at 4:30 to take part in the morning meditation.  This was tough as well.  We had to sit for 2, 20 minute periods with our legs crossed, our hands by our stomach making a circle with our fingers and thumbs, and our eyes focused on the floor about a foot or two in front of us.  Again, we were supposed to clear our minds, and not cling to any thought, but try to overcome the urge to move or shift or concentrate on a specific thought.  I was so tired, that the whole time I was thinking, “don’t fall asleep, don’t fall asleep, don’t fall asleep.”  It was not as bad as I thought it was going to be though, but I don’t think Buddhists meditate just to see if they can stay awake. 

The whole point was to free your mind and go with the flow.  I cant say that I necessarily accomplished the whole point of the weekend, but I got a lot of great thinking done and was able to complete my grocery list for the week.  I can say, for one thing, that I really did find their train of thought interesting.  The main thing that I took away from it was that they want to focus on being happy, and the only person that can make you happy, is you.  They mentioned that people are unhappy when they disagree, or when they have different views about something.  The way to solve that unhappiness is to find a way to find the similarity in the difference instead of just focusing on the difference.  The only reason that you are unhappy is because someone chooses to think or make decisions different from how you do, but it doesn’t mean that it is the wrong way.  A wise man, Mike Smith, once said a very similar statement to me when a person was really getting under my skin, and I found that he was so right.  The only person who was making me mad, really, was me, because I was letting that person’s different way of thinking/acting get to me.  The reminder this weekend was extremely refreshing, especially to see how happy these people are in their every day lives.   It also helped me to think about how I live my life, especially how I am teaching.  When I become frustrated I need to step back and remind myself that maybe it is me who is approaching this whole teaching thing the wrong way.  I am just going to have to see how that goes.  

tanksgibing.

Continuing with the theme of introducing Western holidays, I took a stab at explaining Thanksgiving and the whole turkey concept.  I started out with the standard "trace your hand turkey".  At first the kids were so pumped by the mere fact that tracing your hand results in a pretty good drawing of a hand.  I had to steer them away from putting nails and rings everywhere.  I stressed that we were making a bird, and then the whole bird idea took on a mind of its own.  

Here is Sally and Jake in the process...

This was the end result of Cherry Class' Turkeys... they look more like medical testing turkeys.

And this is what Jake perceived as a Thanksgiving Turkey...

he was so proud of his artwork that he wouldn't let me hang it up, he wanted to take it home.  (my favorite part are the sun's facial features).

why does the sun go down?

Last summer, my curious, 4-year-old cousin Sloan asked mom why the sun goes down? Mom, thinking it best to always tell the truth to a 4 year old, decided to try to explain the solar system and the orbit of the earth around the sun and how the earth spins on an axis thus exposing the sun to one side of the earth and then to the other.  when all she really needed to say was that the sun goes down each night so it can come up the next morning....

It was a sunny fall day in Seoul, after an afternoon of touring around the palaces that are placed in various areas smack dab in the middle of Seoul.  It is such a beautiful thing because there is the hustle and bustle of the city happening all around, and then you enter into these gardens where the palaces are and you are transported into another quiet world.  well we were taking a cab back to another part of seoul called Itewan, where we were going to have dinner.  our cab was in the left hand turn lane, a couple cars back, and we were on a fairly big street so there were 3 lanes of traffic on either side.  the traffic and pedestrians are nuts here, people always darting to make the light to cross the street, and cars always running red lights or speeding and swerving in and out of traffic.  well the light turned green for our lanes of traffic to go, right as a little girl, holding ice cream, and wearing a pink little sweat suit, was finishing running across the road.  we saw her scurry in front of the line of busses, and all held our breaths.  all of a sudden one of the busses stopped, and we could see everyone on the bus standing up, and some covering their faces or their mouths.  we looked down and saw the little girl laying in the street next to or under the bus, and her pink little body was not moving.  my heart sank so low in my chest, it has never reached that point in my body.  i felt so sick and so sad.  all of a sudden it was our turn to go, and the cab proceeded forward, turned left, and we were onto another street and on our way with our journey.  just like that, our world kept moving, the earth kept spinning, the sun kept moving in the sky and soon went down.  The little girls fate I will never know.  but the sun went down and came back up the next morning just like it was supposed to.  

I was so saddened by that sight, and I will never forget what happened that saturday in Seoul.  It mainly made me realize that the world does keep going.  all day i have been thinking about her family, and her, and all of the possibilities of what could have been the outcome of that accident.  Did they spend the whole night in the hospital? Was she dead right there in the street? Did she stand right up and brush off her pink sweat suit?  I will never know.  All I know is that the sun is going to go down every night, and come up again in the morning, and i just have to be thankful every day that I am here and healthy and happy and just keep going. 

koreas finest.

One of Korea’s favorite past time, other than soccer and baseball, is hiking.   Hiking is not only a great exercise, but it is a social event, as well as a fashion statement.  Koreans LOVE hiking gear.  They dress alike, and love every little accessory that goes with it! My first experiencing hiking here was on Dobongsong (I could be way off), a mountain right outside of Seoul.  You have to take the subway to the base of the mountain, and right when you get off the subway it is a fury of people everywhere.  There are little paths of shops and restaurants all over the place.  It reminded me of a ski resort.  The shops sold every things imaginable that had anything to do with hiking, and every Korean on the mountain had purchased these accessories and was wearing every bit of them.  They all had bright colored jackets, and snazzy pants, and intense boots, and backpacks filled with more accessories and their picnic supplies, and of course, can’t forget their walking sticks. In America the women participate in book club, or garden club (you know who you are), but in Korea, they have hiking club.  You would see these packs of women, or really old couples, or a whole family with their little, little kids.   Out of the 9 million people that live in Korea, I would say about a million of them were on that mountain on Sunday.  You had to wait in line to hike…

It was the most rewarding and oddest thing I have ever seen.  There were so many ways in which it reminded me of the sport of skiing.  There is the obvious, the fact that you simply go up and down a mountain.  But also people’s obsession with having the latest and greatest gear, how the more popular days you would find yourself waiting in a line, and how at any break or at the end of the day you would find yourself eating and drinking.  Of course, the main attraction to the hike is the picnic...

The top of the mountain was beautiful (despite the crowd), you could see all of Seoul sprawled out below...

and the leaves are turning, making it officially my first fall...

halloween.

Last Thursday was the Halloween party at school.  Everyone dressed up and there were games and candy, the whole jig.  Korea doesn't normally recognize Halloween as a holiday, so it is our job to introduce the holiday to the students, so the concept of Trick-or-Treat had to be practiced.  Along with Trick-or-Treating being foreign to Korea, so was the concept of adult costumes, at least where I was looking.  Wednesday night I had to find a way to make my own costume with the limited resources at my disposal.  It worked though, and come Thursday morning I was a fat pumpkin.  

Lesley was a Suji Kids College Kid, as you can see by the hair and the Gym uniform.  

And then there was Daniel...

...and Donny...

...and Jake...

...and the preschoolers... 

and of course Iris.

There comes a time in every Halloween when the kids figure out the stuffing of the pumpkin costume is in fact newspaper, and that was the end of my fat friend...

tasty.

I feel like recently all I have been doing is hanging out with little kids and eating! But the food is just too good here to resist!! It is just about exactly what you would expect, rice, noodles, and meat all in variations.  Every mean is accompanied by a side of kimchi, a red, fermented cabbage.  It is pretty good, but varies at every restaurant.  It is comparable to the chips and salsa of Mexico, it comes out in a little dish while you are waiting for your main meal to come.  My favorite meal is for sure the Galbi! As seen in appendix 1.1 and 1.2, this is where you grill a variation of meats on a personal little grill in the middle of the table... and you get to sit on the floor! They bring out the raw meat with sides of lettuce leaves to put it in and fill with a variation of vegetables and sauces.  As seen below in appendix 1.1 and 1.2, there are restaurants that are "all you can eat" for 14,000 Won, which is a little less than 14 dollars.  Cheap, cheap for all you can eat meat!  

Appendix

1.1

1.2

This week has been my transition week to becoming the full time teacher for Cherry class Kindergarten 1.  These are the 10 little 5 and 6-year olds whom I spend 5 hours of the day with.  Monday, Wednesday and Friday I work with Elementary classes from 2:30 til 6:30.  Tuesdays and Thursdays I am with preschool classes from 2:30 until 5.  This fluctuation schedule continues to confuse me, I find myself always with a schedule and lesson plan in hand.  The afternoon elementary classes have been a big help though, they are a bit older so they have the routine down, and I find that we tend the fill most of the class time playing Uno.  I have lost every game so far.  I have so much fun every day though.  I would admit that one or the other is my favorite class if I honestly had one.  I don’t know if I like dancing with the preschoolers, or enjoy the witty banter of my new elementary Korean friends.  It is a tough call.

 Every day is a new adventure.  Last night Lesley and her boyfriend Brian took me to what is called the Café District.  It is a neighborhood area that is about a 20-minute walk from my apartment.  This neighbor hold area is 3 brick blocks of café’s, shopping and restaurants.  It is a quite, beautiful shopping area that reminds me of the outside Biltmore shopping area.  We went to this restaurant that serves gourmet burgers, best burger I have ever had (sorry dad). 

Here are pictures from my first P.E. experience.  My cameras memory card only holds 10 pictures, something I have to fix. 

a view of my world.

This is my first morning in Korea, Lesley made me pancakes which I had to eat with chop sticks.

As I mentioned before, this is Lotte Mart.  What I first thought was the Korean baseball stadium...

And my first day teaching of course included a photo shoot of Joseph (who cried today and I came really really close to crying as well)...

The Adventure Begins.

My adventure began 6 days ago when I left for the Sky Harbor airport at about 6:45 monday morning.  I had been waiting for the nerves and the scared "oh shit" feeling to hit me, but up til that point I was more excited than anything.  I flew to LAX where I then needed to make my connection in the International section of the airport.  This is where I found myself surrounded by mainly Japanese and Indians.  Still, no "oh shit" feeling.  I was nervous that I either had not properly informed myself that I was moving to a different country, for a year, where I didn't know the language, never tasted the food, and was only accompanied by 1 pal and 2 bags.  But still I was never more ready for an adventure.  My 12 hour flight was smooth sailing, and finally I arrived at the Seoul Incheon Airport.  

The school arranged for a driver to pick me up and take me to Lesley's apartment.  (For those of you who don't know, Lesley is my friend from Semester at Sea).  I arrived at her apartment at about 8:45 and right away the first thing we did was eat! She and her boyfriend, Brian, took me to their favorite place.  The type of place where you take off your shoes, sit on the floor, and cook the meat on a little grill of burning coals in the middle of your table.  Best meal I have had so far, by far!

So Wednesday I was already off to my first day of school.  I am currently employed at Suji Kids College.  My class is the combination of 2 kindergarden classes, for a total of 9 6-year-olds.  Starting Wednesday I was only observing half of the class, so this is when I met Daniel, Sally, Jake, Donny and Joseph.  (When the kids apply to the school they are given an English name.)  Right off the bat my favorite is the little underdog Joseph.  He is pretty smart but could care less about doing his school work, all he wants to do is draw/talk about/ or act out Power Rangers.  I think his ultimate goal in life is to be able to create an electric field between his two hands.  But for sure my favorite!!

After my half week of observation, and 1 jet-lag hangover I was ready to finally move into my studio apartment and sleep.  (I had been on Lesley's couch for a couple nights).  This past weekend was spent making my apartment live-able and familiarizing myself with this little suburb known as Suji.  This little city is so cool.  Every building is about 5 stories or taller.  Nothing opens before 9:30, and nothing closes before 10.  The store fronts and restaurants are spilling out onto the sidewalk.  Everything is cheap cheap cheap, except coffee.  I can usually get dinner for about 5 dollars, and a cup of coffee for the same.  The people are some of the nicest people I have ever met.  Funny with their little ways of life, they love to work out in pairs that are dressed alike, they love putting the word happy in front of everything ("happy restaurant", "happy shirt", "happy towel").  There is a little creek that runs through Suji all the way to Seoul.  Right next to the creek there is a little walking/bike path that follows it all the way to Seoul.  This has been my running path, lined with trees and flowers and grass. I would describe Suji as a small San Francisco with a Colorado feel.