Morning routine

I wake up.  Attempt to keep in touch and make contact with home.  Usually don't (turns out I'm a terrible Skype'r).  Drink my green tea and eat breakfast.  Breakfast is usually fruit.

Here's what about that:

My kitchen sink doesn't have a disposal, so old fruit leftovers and other stuff can't just get washed away.  It has to go in the trash can.  But that stinks.  Smells real bad.  And it took me a while to realize this.  My apartment gets reeeeeeal hot when I'm gone.  It's for-real-like-very-badly-stuffy every night when I get home.  And smelly.  And I totally did not make the 'food in the trash can/smells like ass' connection for like, three weeks.  So my solution for the past two weeks since the 'food in the trash can/smells like ass' enlightenment has been to...throw it out the window.

Is that wrong?

Ulsan smells bad enough in most places, so I just feel like my apartment should be spared.  I mean.  There's a perfectly good pile of trash outside my window.  It's across the street, really, so it's more that I'm lobbing food out the window across the street.

There's also a not so itsy-bitsy spider friend who lives in between the window and the screen that I lob my fruit from.  He looks ferocious and I strongly dislike him.  But I'm keeping him because I hear he'll eat the mutant roaches that are rumored to appear after rainy season.

He moves fast and I'm terrified to take my eyes off of him when I'm at the window.  You can imagine how this affects my fruit lobbing skills.  I heard a big thunk the other day after I chunked my apple core; I'm not sure what I hit, but I didn't lose sight of the spider, and this is the second main goal each morning, aside from preventing 'food in the trash can/smells like ass'.

It should also be noted that when I dodge spiders with the impressive agility that I have recently developed, an uncontrollable sound comes out of my mouth.  Something resembling terror and triumph combined.  Like Sloth from the Goonies yelling about his Baby Ruth.

And since it's morning and I'm getting ready for the day, I'm usually only half dressed.

So.  Every morning when I wake up in Korea, I find myself  half dressed at the window, balancing a cup of hot green tea, lobbing fruit across the street while dodging a spider and sounding like a person with a speech impediment on drugs.

Here's what else.  Korea has a surveillance system all over everywhere called CCTV.  The camera on the building next to mine is aimed directly at my window.

This routine is caught on tape every morning.

A cold, cats, and the incredible panda hat

Last Thursday, I walked into my upper level 6th grader's class and they had the lights off.  As soon as I entered, I heard them whispering "ca-ca-ca-ca-ca," "ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch." with a slow fade ala 70's horror films.  Followed by a deep, raspy "Good evening, Clarice."

And this is why I love teaching the older kids.

The little ones are great, too, I supposey.  I just personally have a hard time teaching and only getting clueless little bobble-headed blank stares in return.  They give instant love, though.  My upper level 1st graders drew me a trophy on the board the other day titled "Kate's the Best Teacher Award!"  That won points, obviously.  I like being liked, and I have one little Suzy Q who just sits and gazes at me with her head in her hands and stars in her eyes.  I remember loving my teachers at that age, too.  It's nice and all.  But if I had to choose, I'd definitely pick with the 4th-6th graders over the littles. They are so clever and witty.  I mean.  "ca-ca-ca-ca-ca."  Come on.  That's hilarious.

In other news: I'm sick.  I totally blame the littles.  My 4th-6th graders are faaaaaar too awesome to ever be such germ culprits.   This cold wins a giant poop sandwich because I've totally mastered the art of fighting off colds over the years.  My efforts were futile this time.  Pounding green tea, vitamin C, and OJ < Korean germs.  I've given into the Dayquil/Nyquil routine.   I'm usually very anti-medicine, so I have no tolerance to the side effects of such remedies.  Therefore,  I'm. totally. high.

Last weekend, before I got sick, I went zip-lining in Daegu.  Two things about Daegu:  1)  It's hotter than Hell.  It's hotter than Hades and 2)  It's seriously hotter than Hell.  It's hotter than Hades.  Zip lining was sweaty, fun and slightly absurd.   In addition to regular zip lines, the ropes course had weird obstacles like riding a bike on lines across a suspended bridge, and snow boarding across suspended lines...Apparently, I have a lot to learn about momentum, as I stalled in the middle of both:

stuck

Is that picture actually legitimately funny or am I being influenced by the Dayquil?  The bike was exactly as awkward as it looks.  Durpity durr.  Which was kind of a general theme throughout the park.  This place was called Herb Hillz (for real with the 'z') and was completely Willy Wonka-esque.  Sadly, I'm a terrible photographer and didn't capture all that that entails. It's easy to picture a horror movie being filmed there with all of the creepy life-sized, gnome-y wooden characters coming to life, their eyes lighting up and glowing evil-red singing "It's a Small World" ominously out of tune...

Also, I found a cat cafe in Ulsan last week.  Cats!  Galore!  Like, just laying around everywhere.  And, just my luck, even a DOG!  We paid $6 to get a delicious bevvy of choice (I cannot stop with the green tea lattes), a giant pancake, and as much fur and purr as our hearts desired.  You know I'm seriously craving some animal companionship when I am all about cats.  The dog was my bestie, of course, and I just loved the concept of this place.  Rescued cats lounging, playing, and generally being awesome.

That panda hat I'm wearing?  It's even more incredible in person.  My sugar-mama-coworker fronted me the $12 in order to be the proud owner of such amazing-ness.  Up until last week, I hadn't yet received my alien card in order to set up a Korean bank account.  And for whatever reason, the ATM's kept eating my foreign credit and debit cards. So I had no access to my money and was cashless for a few days, fully relying on my sugar mama for cab/bus fares and other general daily living necessities.  The incredible panda hat obviously falls into this category. A new friend said it best the other night, and I couldn't agree more: "Going into debt for a panda hat is awesome."

panda debt

Aaaaand, I almost forgot about the 4th.  That was the day the Korean germs began invading my body.  It's been a long week since then.  We ate pizza and did sparklers on our roof.  Very low key.  Very American.  We did lots of these writey-outey things (stolen from The Sparkler Photog's Facebook album <sidenote:  The Sparkler Photog is from Dallas, too.  How have I met three people from Dallas in Korea in one month?>):

I had a good one spelling out 'K8' and 'dogs,' but some wise guy kept drawing supersized male genitalia next to me.  I don't understand why The Sparkler Photog didn't post those to his Facebook album.

Discovery Sunday: Greenie-green in my Backyard

After my first week in Concrete-Land, aka Korea, I mentioned that I needed some nature, stat.  Come to find out?  Easy to do in Ulsan.

I am able to walk to Mt. Munsu from my front door, which is pretty dagnab nice.  It's a definite hike once you get all up in its face - steep at a lot of points.  I also probably should have made it more clear to my group that I enjoy mini-explorations during hikes.  I kept sneaking off down hidden trails to take a look at things and then would have to run up the steep-as-hell hill to catch the marathon hikers.  My lungs hated me and I missed out on a lot of views and secret spots that I would have explored otherwise.  But here's the beauty:  it's so accessible that I can go back and explore at an explorer's pace any time I want.  And I will.

I also made a discovery today just outside my window.  First, allow me to introduce my window:

It is super bright in my apartment at all times.  Unbearably bright.  I'm a big fan of natural light and will soak it up until I'm essentially sitting in a cave before I'll turn on a light, so it's hard for me to admit that I can't handle this.  But.  My eyes scream at me every morning at 5am.  I think the fogged window screen adds an absurd amount of super glow.  Or something.  My solution to dim the super glow resulted in the above picture.  It's still bright at 5am, but the happy paper helps.

Outside the now happy paper'ed window are these:

Where do they go???

The mystery has nagged me since Day 1.  Today I found out:

At the top is what is now known as Kate's Zen Pad.  I can see myself using this a lot: for lunch, with my laptop, with a book, with my ipod.  This = incredible discovery.

And there's my apartment building from the tippy top.  I thought that this was it, a perfectly placed Zen Pad behind my apartment for my convenience.  Until I noticed more steps going down the other side.  Whaaaat??  Don't mind if I do:

What could be at the bottom?

A rock'ish garden with strategically placed work out equipment, of course! 

Even more steps led me to...

...An adorable bench-laden trail!

Then I took a wrong turn and landed here and got mad at myself.

But I promptly righted that wrong and found this garden and loved myself again.

Then, I thought I was home and taking a picture of my cute street.

But, turns out hills go both ways, I was on the wrong side, and this is my cute street.

In any case, Discovery Sunday = success.

Also, HAPPY HAPPY Father's Day to the one and only Old Man Pops.  Me and M'bro are basically spectacular because of you.  Miss you so, so muchly on this side of the pond, OMP.

Gym and eyeballs.

My apartment is right next to a gym.  This is obviously a great thing, minus the crazy monthly fee.  I figure it's really the only thing I'm paying for in Korea besides traveling, so I'm sucking it up for the sake of fitness.

Things I have learned about the gym:

1) There is a personal trainer who wears the tightest biker shorts I've ever seen.
1A)  This personal trainer has a reputation for loving foreign women.
1AA)  This personal trainer stares at me.

2)  This gym provides neon pink gym shirts and shorts for female customers to wear.
2A)  I opt to wear my own non-neon pink gym garb.
2AA)  Everyone stares because of this.

So, already I'm in an awkward position here.  No matter what, someone's eyeballs on me, usually in the least discreet manner possible.

First thing every day, I head straight for the treadmill.  I have yet to actually see any Ulsan'ian running on the treadmill on their own accord; they are always walking.  Until I arrive.  I hop on, warm up, and start my run.  Within 3 minutes, the whole row next to me begins to run as well.  Just a daily dose of 'Follow the Blondie,' I guess.  I always wonder, Should I applaud?  But then they quickly slow down and return to their walking.  And stare at me.  I hear that running isn't this culture's 'thing' so it is apparently sort of mind blowing and necessary to watch.  When this happens, I just turn up my music and look at the river outside the window and ignore everyone.

Doing exactly this made for an awkward moment yesterday.

I was jamming so hard at the end of mile 1 and I stupidly closed my eyes to feel the music when I was suddenly jolted off the treadmill.  There was total chaos and confusion in my head as I came out of my music coma.  I yelled.  Loudly...a big fat HO SHIA (LeBeouf?  I don't know).  Complete with the 'I don't want to die' arm flail and teeter-totter wobble.  I'd skipped my foot on the side of the belt, throwing myself off balance.  BUT I DID NOT FALL OFF.

Victoriously and a little panicked, I went back to my running, fairly aware of how absurd I just looked.  That kind of 'almost fall' dance usually gets a laugh, so I looked around for that knowing smile, or the wink and nod.  Some kind of acknowledgement.  Everyone just stared at me, as usual, with no additional reaction.  I almost just died and nothing.  Total zombies.  So I got all twerpy, doing the nervous did you all just see that? so hilarious, right? laugh that happens to me when I don't know what else to do.

Take 2:  Today when I walked in, there was a big yellow sign in Korean.  I can't read Korean yet.  So, like a typical foreigner, I ignored it, hopped over it, and be-bopped upstairs to jump on a treadmill.  Not a soul in sight, I could work out eyeball free.  What a day this would be!

Five minutes into my run it occurred to me that the lights were off.  I pulled off my headphones and realized there was also no rockin' K-Pop music blaring.  Whatup, gym.

I turned around and nearly fell off the treadmill again.  Standing RIGHT behind me, seriously 1 foot away, staring, was a cleaning lady.  I don't know how long she was standing there or why was she just watching me run.  Something tells me I probably could have gotten my whole run in had I not turned around, while she watched the entire time.  She just wagged her finger at me and said "closed."

That's what the yellow sign was.

Apparently they close on the third Wednesday of every month to clean everything out.  Totally weird to close for a whole day just to clean, right?  I thought so too, until I learned that the whole appeal and point of this particular gym is their Spa and Sauna.  It is supposedly super fancy and luxurious and everyone is naked and leaves their nakedness all over everything.  Which is why they say the third Thursday of each month is the best day to go, after ol' Squeaky Clean Wednesday.

I have to admit, I am intrigued.  It sounds nice and when in Rome and all....maybe I'll try it out in a few weeks after I brace myself for more staring:  not only would I be a naked foreigner, which is clearly enough of a reason to stare, but I also have a tattoo, and I hear those garner even more attention.  I also currently look like I'm wearing a perma-bikini thanks to the remnants from my recent Mexican sunburn.  I would probably stare at me for that, too.

Gym stares and eyeballs, check.  Naked Sauna and Spa stares and eyeballs...maybe. Stay tuned.

Japan has bikes, I teach funny kids, Seoul saves dogs, new friends, and an upcoming vacation

First week in Korea = torpedo Kate.  I've been debating on whether to write one giant and chaotic post or to split my weeks adventures into several specific posts.  Laziness wins, so here goes one beast of an update:

I went to Fukuoka, Japan last week to get my visa on what's called a visa run.  It literally started out with a run.  My boss got the times for my ferry mixed up and we ran our faces off through the terminals.  What did I learn from this?  1) I hate running with a backpack and 2) my boss is incredibly fast and agile.  He didn't drop a ounce of his coffee during his sprints.

Fukuoka is super nice and I actually questioned whether I picked the wrong country.  So clean and friendly.  And they love bikes.  I've been talking about getting a bike while I'm here, but I keep hearing that Ulsan is not so bike friendly.  Fukouoka made me jealous and I'm pretty sure my current stance is: to hell with the nay-sayers! I'm bikin' it.

Fukuokan bike envy

After Japan, I came back to Ulsan and taught for three days.  I like it a lot here at Omni Learning Center.  I have really hit the jackpot with a rockin' boss.  The kids are also dang great and I'm particularly drawn to the older classes.  They have such advanced English language skills and it's fun to joke around with them.  I have a favorite class:

This past weekend I went to Seoul.  It was Memorial Day weekend here, so I took advantage to go and meet with some people at CARE (Coexistence of Animal Rights on Earth).  I'd link their site, but it's in Korean.  Have I mentioned that while I'm here I'll be working as the South Korea National Liaison for the great Animal Rescue Corps?   Well, while I'm here I'll be working as the South Korea National Liaison for the great Animal Rescue Corps.  So, I've been emailing and talking on the phone with the people at CARE from the moment I arrived in Korea and needed to meet with them immediately.  They run an incredible organization here and I'm hoping ARC can partner up and do some good things with dog farming and puppy mills.  I think that with these two powers combined a real change can be made.

One of the members, Kenneth Lee, arranges protests in Insadong every Sunday to raise awareness and petition dog farming.  He has an incredible site, www.stopeatingdogs.com.  It should be enlightening for anyone who is unaware of the hell on earth that is the life for dogs here.  I dare anyone to watch the videos and sit back and just accept it.  I had lunch with the CARE members on Sunday and then headed over to the protest.  I was lucky enough to be able to help out for a few hours:

Believe it or not, people actually stop and argue, like this woman in the blue hat:

Stay tuned for many, many updates in this department.

While in Seoul, I was pretty insanely lucky to connect and crash with new friends.  The incredible Jason Mehl and Craig MackIntosh played super hosts and gave me the best introduction to Korea in the history of introductions to Korea.  A weekend with these two involves a lot of art all up in your face/climbing and bouldering chatter that sounds confusing yet awesome/foam dust/Korean lingo/giant City Hall enemas/fat kids with mullets/futile alphabet lessons/delicious vegetarian quests/accidental palace circling/canals and face plants/i be die/radiation allergies and so much more.  Click on their names, check out their sites, buy their stuff.  They melted my brain with their creativity.  This picture explains everything and nothing about them:

We also saw these things in Seoul together:

sandriches

 faceplant on video =  sweet victory for Jason

a random and fantastic soundtrack

My boss and his wife went to Seoul this weekend as well, so we explored Itaewon and Myung Dong before heading back to Ulsan together last night:

I will survive very happily if I never have to visit either of these two places again.  I am loving Korea, but the cities and 'hot spots' like Itaewon and Myung Dong are all the same:  crowded, pushy, concrete, and smelly.  I seriously need some nature, ASAP, so I'm hiking Mt. Munsu this weekend.

What else is glorious?  We get a summer vacation off the first week in August.  Whatatata! Time to plan my first trip.  I'm thinking Jeju Island.  I need to find some people to join me in order to cut costs on accommodations, etc.  Or maybe it will turn out that I know someone with a tent and that's all we'd need...

Is anyone still reading? The end.

Kate Teacher - the adventure begins

I made it.  What up, Korea?  I'm surprised that I'm not really having any culture shock yet.  I feel totally comfortable and ready to start remembering the things I need to know (jet lag has done a number on my brain).  It's been a whirlwind.

So far I've had a couple of hours of training at work and I even taught a few classes, covering for a teacher who went home sick. "Taught" is a term used loosely since I was covering without a lesson plan.  Really, we just chatted and played.  The kids were cute and when I asked what they knew about me, they said "You're Kate from Texas, you like dogs and don't eat meat."  Spot on, kiddos, spot on.  They asked a lot of questions, like why my hair is yellow and if I'm married or have a boyfriend.  And when I responded "no" to that, they told me they felt sorry for me.  Evidently we are not through with those questions/reactions.

Yesterday we  took a field trip to the amusement part in Gyeongu.  THAT was nuts.  At first I didn't recognize whether the kids I was watching were ours or not since I had yet to meet most of them.  I just kind of took charge of anyone who was shorter than me.  I got a few crazy looks from some as they ran back to their parents yelling about the crazy yellow haired lady who was trying to kidnap them.  But, by the end of the day I had a good grasp on who was who and their silly little personalities.

They are hams, all of 'em.  Ulsan is actually the wealthiest city in Korea and many of these kiddos have lived abroad in America with their parents, so we are pretty lucky with their advanced language skills.  This guy (I won't be posting any kids names) picked up a lot of tidbits from living in America and his sense of humor about is hilarious.  Here he is "being emo" aka cutting his wrists furiously and emotionally in a corner:

I mean.  So weirdly witty.

This little guy jumped to the top of my favorite list.  He was so intrigued with the clown:

Here's the whole crew:

Kids who look tired but are actually freakishly energetic at the end of a long day.

I'm not totally sure how much I can post of the kids on a public blog...I know at home it might not fly, so if this post comes down, just know that they are all pretty awesome.

Korea is a dirty little tease

I'm pretty sure my boss thinks I'm some kind of mirage in a desert.  He keeps trying to get me to Korea, but I'm always juuuuust out of reach.  And then he's having nightmares like I don't really exist, I'm just some kind of rapture-esque otherwordly, fooling him into thinking I'm going to be teaching for his students this next year, only for him to wake up on my first day of work to hear a big 'psych!  got your nose' and never hear of me again, thereby leaving him stranded without a teacher so his business goes crashing into the ground. And when he asks what happens, no one knows who or what he is talking about, it was all in his head.

I tried tonight to convince him that I am really not a difficult person.  Things are usually pretty seamless for me, I am well prepared and organized.  Not that he would know any of this based on all of the visa issues up to this point.  Believe it or not, there were more at the end of last week where it looked like everything would be delayed 2 weeks, and I am happy to announce that I remained Griswold-free and handled it like a pro and it all worked out after a mere 48 hours.

I was packed and ready to go tonight with my 70lb suitcase because I refuse to be the girl with more than one bag.  I haven't checked a bag in 10 years - having to check 1 bag, let alone multiple bags...it's a pride thing, let it be heavy, I'll pay the fee.  My friend Zha picked me up to zip me out to the airport because Old Man Pops didn't want to drive.  I really thought he'd be more upset about my leaving, but he just hugged me like it was nothing and walked back up the steps into the house, despite all of my best efforts for a sentimental goodbye.  Old Man Pops is such a cold hearted snake.

Long story short (don't people always say that after talking too much in the first place?), my flight was canceled, but I didn't sweat a beat.  Surely there are 9879687589 flights from Dallas to LA tonight, right?  I'll totally make it to connect to my flight to Seoul at midnight.  Zha was kind enough to park his car and come in with me to help figure it out.  As soon as we walked in (well, I walked in, Zha was crawling about 10 miles behind me with the bag full of sand), we saw lines.  Around the building.  Everyone on cell phones, on  hold.  Turns out every flight in America is delayed or canceled; those tornados in Missouri yesterday clearly didn't cause enough grief.  It was going to take 4 hours to even reach the ticket booth to discuss re-routing options, and the hold times by phone at all the airlines were hovering around 45 minutes to an hour.  WELP!  Home then.  I overheard enough people talking about their delays and realized that I was not making it to LA to catch my flight to Korea tonight.

So, I'm re-booked for tomorrow, driving my poor boss insane.  I feel so bad about how much money he has spent on me and how much grief all of this is causing him.  BUT, I get one more night with this guy, and I can't complain one single bit:

There's only one thing about leaving Dallas behind that gives me the sads and it's saying goodbye to my love.  My life anywhere in the world would be better with him by my side, but his happiness is my top priority and I know that there is no comparison between 10 hours locked alone in a tiny Korean apartment versus a big spacious home with multiple doggie companions, big yard and pool, and OMP at his beck and call all day long.

So, one more night of Mikey kisses and then I'm really outta here (right?).