Garosugil/Sinsa/Apgujeong

This morning I skyped with Grandpa for a bit and then my Mom. It was good to finally chat with them after a few weeks.

I decided I would go somewhere new! I wanted to study my Korean in a cafe somewhere and picked the neighborhood Sinsa, with a famous street, Garosugil. I walked around there and found a cafe and bought a piece of carrot cake to go. I continued looking for a place that looked cozy to study. The weather was a bit warm and the sunshine felt so nice I enjoyed walking around stopping in different shops and cafes looking for the perfect spot. I finally picked one that had a kind of covered patio and got a tea and sat "outside" in the sun. I stayed and studied for a little over an hour. Then I looked up a place to have dinner. I found a pizza place called Ace and thought I'd give it a go.

I went in search of the restaurant and finally found it. Right below it was a burger place, so I had a few moments of indecision to pick what I wanted for dinner. The pizza won and I'm glad I chose it. There were several good sounding pizzas on the menu, but there was a build your own option for only 15,000W, with as many toppings as you wanted! I did that and put lots of veggies on my pizza. They baked the pizza in a brick oven and served it on a wooden paddle. It was really good! I didn't finish the whole thing and they gave me a container to take the rest home.

Mexican Night!

Work was pretty easy-I had two classes and the other two my one COT told me I didn't need to come because she was just doing an introduction/orientation class. It was nice to have that time off.

In the evening I came home and had a little bit of down time before heading to Mangwon. I decided I would walk there since I didn't do any running during the week and it wasn't too far. The only problem was I got lost and went way too far down the street and had to backtrack a bit. I wasn't exactly late to the cooking class, but I wasn't there as early as I had wanted. Chef D asked for burners and I volunteered mine, but he didn't want to use it because it wasn't gas. Anyway, the cooking studio space was quite small and there were around 30 people.

First things first we made corn tortilla dough. He had already measured everything out, we just added water and kneaded it. Then we made jalapeno poppers, stuffing the jalapenos with cream cheese and wrapping with bacon. While those cooked, he showed us how he made his jalapeno jelly, guacamole and salsa. The poppers were finished cooking and we sampled them-spicy but so delicious! Next we took or tortilla dough and pressed them using a tortilla press. We also fried/cooked the tortillas. Then it was time to clean up and Chef D cooked the meat he had marinated. There was chicken and pork to fill our tortillas with and we had tiny tacos with salsa and his guacamole and special chili sauce. Yum! Then we also had nachos with a cheese sauce he made. He topped the nachos with a pork and kimchi mix, cheese, salsa and sauce. They were delicious. Finally, we had habenero brownies with avocado ice cream. The brownies were spicy but the ice cream helped cool it off. All in all, it was a delicious night!

Cuties

Today was the first day teaching! I met the 4th graders and they were cute. I saw some of my students from summer and winter camp. They were excited to see me.

After work I came home to take it easy and keep working on feeling better. It was nice to just stay in and take a rest. (Does "take a rest" sound strange? Koreans use this expression a lot, but I had another native English speaker say it sounds a bit unusual)

Korean Class

I still felt a little sick, but not as bad as the day before. Today was the last day to prepare before we had our first class! I did more planning and then met with my 4/5 COT to discuss our classes for the Thursday and Friday.

As usual for Wednesdays, I headed downtown before my Korean class. I was deciding what to have for dinner and figured some comfort food would be good. I went to Subway and got a BMT. After eating, I headed to class. It was okay.

When I got home, I made a donation for an animal group in Korea. I also signed up for a weekend trip to Jindo for a Sea Parting Festival in a few weekends. I'm looking forward to seeing a new city in Korea.

Sick

I woke in the middle of the night a few times with a lot of stomach pain. I couldn't sleep well even though I was exhausted. When it was time to wake up and come to school, it was so hard to get out of bed and go. I had considered calling my COTs and saying I couldn't come to work, but figured it would be okay since it was another planning day.

I got to school and just stared into my computer screen for about an hour before asking one COT if I could go to the nurses office to lay down. She took me down and explained how I was feeling to the nurse. My COT turned on the heated blanket for me and I slept for 2 hours. She woke me at lunch time and asked if I would eat. I was tempted to because she told me the menu was jap chae! But I didn't feel like eating though I knew I was hungry. I passed and just sat at my desk doing small prep work until the end of the day.

After work, I went to Hongdae to meet a new acquaintance. My friend Mike had a friend from Ann Arbor who was moving temporarily to Seoul to be with her parents. Her name is Michelle. She and I had made plans the day before to meet and I didn't want to cancel at the last minute and for the first meeting. So, we met at the station and I suggested a few places to try. We agreed Shabu Shabu (a kind of soup) sounded the best as it was cool and rainy. It was nice to meet someone new and we had fun chatting. We went to get bingsu for dessert. We shared a strawberry one and it was delicious!

Beginning of the (Last) School Year!

Back to work...it was a relatively easy day at work. We didn't have to do too much today except prepare for classes. At noon all the subject teachers went out to lunch. We were going to go to the restaurant we've been to the last two times, but there was no room for all of us. Instead we went to a place to have a rice dish with bossam (steamed pork) and other sides. One of the subject teachers paid for everyone's meal. I met the new 3rd grade English teacher; her English name is Jaymie and she's a year older than me. She was at our school when I first started here, but last year she went to teach in Taiwan. I also was able to get to know my 4th grade COT a little better; she was a 6th grade homeroom teacher last year. I knew her by sight but didn't know her well.

We returned to school after our lunch and had a staff meeting in the afternoon. After work I came home, organized my photos from my trip, and had dinner. I was still not feeling well so I took a hot shower since it had helped immensely the night before.

Return to Seoul

Our flight landed at 6am. I dozed off and on until we landed and was jolted awake by the plane touching down. We were waiting to get off the plane and the woman next to me was talking about how they had a 10 hour layover and wasn't sure what to do. I told her that my friend had worked in the airport giving tours to people with long layovers so she should look into that if she wanted to see Seoul. We finally got off the plane and after a 1 hour commute, I found myself back at home, quite exhausted. I took a nap until a little after noon. When I woke, I was feeling a bit groggy and not so good.

I unpacked and cleaned. Then I looked for something to eat for lunch. I also felt really sore from horseback riding. I started feeling worse, but had said I was going to soccer already so I figured I'd just give it a go and see how it went. I walked to soccer as normal, but it almost took me a full hour as I was not feeling well and was so stiff and sore.

As it turned out, soccer went pretty well though. There were a few oldies that returned and Johan brought a few new guys. The high school boys were there as well, so we had 3 teams of 5 or 6. My team did quite well and we were winning almost every game. I also scored 3 goals! It felt great to be playing again though I was worried that I would be off after missing a few weeks.

I returned home and took a hot shower and felt much better after that. I was exhausted and got ready for bed early.