Korean Fun Facts pt. 1

OK, so for those of you who haven't heard, I'm writing a novel this month. The website nanowrimo.org basically sets forth a challenge to anyone to write 50,000 words in a month. I'm currently at 28,000 words (about 86 pages). So my desire to blog is a little low right now, so I apologize to anyone who's reading this (if anyone is still bothering to read this) but that's why I haven't done anything in a while, and probably won't do anything big until at least the first part of December. To hold you over until then, I thought I'd offer a few quick fun facts I've learned about Korean culture.

1. 11/11 is Pepero day. I'm not exactly sure why, but on November 11th, Koreans go around giving each other boxes of Peperos. Peperos are basically cracker sticks, covered in chocolate. Some of the students basically told us that Pepero day is a big scheme by a candy company to get people to buy more candy. They come in all different sizes, and despite the fact that I'm sick of them, I still have four boxes in my desk at work.

2.They put weird things on pizza here. I've seen corn, pototoes, sweet potatoes, carrots and God knows what else. There are a few places that have good pizza, but you have to be careful.

3. Some Koreans walk deathly slow. I realize that sometimes I walk fast, but these people get as close to standing still as you can possibly get. I asked one of my Korean friends why this was. Her first suggestion was that Koreans have shorter legs, and thus walk slower. Her second suggestion was that, at least a long time ago, only poor people walked quickly, because they had to work. Rich people walked more slowly because they didn't have to work. So maybe it's polite or better for other people's opinion if you walk slowly here, I don't know. I just know it's really annoying when you're trying to get somewhere on a narrow sidewalk and there's a young Korean couple who is basically just blocking the sidewalk.

4. If you want real frosted flakes here, don't trust Tony. Tony the Tiger's face gets plastered on corn flakes, and slightly sweetened corn flakes masquerading as frosted flakes. If you want real frosted flakes, look for Flion the Lion. Not even joking.

5. You'd be amazed how many B movies have been made in the last twenty years, and how many bad movies well known actors have made. I have one channel that shows english speaking movies and tv shows, and the movies are almost always just above unwatchable. They usually have some big name american star doing... not their best work. Oh, and I've seen multiple films containing either Nicholas Cage or Keanu Reeves, if this gives you any idea of the quality of the movies. Even a couple with Hillary Duff, the Olson twins and Katie Holmes. But, beggars can't be choosers I guess.

Hope that holds you all over until I get the time and the energy to write more. Hope you're all doing well, and I hope to hear from you all soon.

Traditional Korean Drumming (with commentary)

TreX-Games, or My Three Minutes of Korean Fame

Busan has been working very hard over the last decade to become a player in international events. Every year they host the Pusan International Film Festival (PIFF), which displays new films from all over the world, especially Asia. The helped host the 2002 World Cup held in Korea, they hosted the fourteenth Asian Games in 2002 and the APEC summit held in 2005, and they have officially made a bid for the Olympic Games in 2020. The latest in this line of international events was the World Sport for All Games, or TreX-Games held here last weekend (the last weekend in September. Sorry I’m a little behind on the updating).

The TreX-Games is a combination of an X-Games-type sporting event and a huge international cultural festival. It’s sponsored by the International Olympic Committee as well as a ton of other organizations, and it’s only taken place three times before: twice in germany and once in Thailand. My friends and I had nothing better to do on Saturday, so we decided to make our way down to BEXCO (the convention center) and check it out.

They had a really nice exhibition room, where you could try out all kinds of fun things. They let me ride a Segway, which was a really good time, although the Korean guy demonstrating them didn’t really trust me. They had a couple of weird, fun roller vehicles. One of these vehicles was called “Xliders,” and I took it as my personal mission to succeed in at least being able to move without falling over. While it may not have been pretty, I did succeed in moving across the area they had set up. I must have looked like I was trying really hard, or the guys running it just felt sorry for me, because after I’d been at it for a while they gave me a free Korean soft drink. The other highlights in this room included weight machines that only went up to like thirty pounds (the women running the booth were a little embarrassed that I could lift it on the heaviest setting without exerting any effort), tons of hiking equipment, and a bunch of sweaty, greasy teenagers playing computer games (which was part of the Games).

We eventually bought tickets to go watch the X-Games portion of the festival. We got to see the tail end of the rollerblade park qualifiers and the entire BMX park qualifiers. It was very entertaining. You don’t realize how high those guys on their bikes are getting until you’re sitting three rows away. My friends and I have noticed that the larger the event, the higher our celebrity status at said event (for being white, obviously). The TreX-Games were no exception. They did the “fan cam” on the big screen twice while we were there, both times it was us: the only group of more than three non-Asians anywhere in the stands.

Outside the Convention Center, there were booths with traditional arts and cultural materials from every continent, especially Asia. There were traditional Taiwanese rug weavers, all kind of Korean crafts, and other cultural items from all over the world. ‘What did they have from the United States?’ you ask: Mickey and Minney Mouse plates, and cowboy boots. It made me sad.

They also had cultural demonstrations going on outside the convention center. There were a group of Bolivians who were experts at horse-whipping. They had long whips that were solid most of the way up with just a little tail on them. And they could get them to crack really loudly. They were letting other people try them too. It was pretty hilarious to watch a bunch of fifty year old Korean men trying to make these whips crack. So, being in a foreign country, surrounded by people I didn't know, I decided to make a fool of myself too. I stepped up and took the whip, and flung it around wildly for a while (I managed to only leave one mark on my neck). But eventually I was able to get it to crack. I was the only non-Bolivian (while we were there) who got it to crack, eliciting a round of applause from the surrounding Koreans. That's right. Round of applause.

The most exciting point of the day was when my friend David and I decided to try the neoltwiggi boards they had set up. Neoltwiggi is a Korean traditional seesaw which is only about a foot and a half off the ground. One person starts on the end of the board and the other person jumps on to their end. As that person hits the board, the person on the other side jumps. If you do it right, it will launch that person into the air. You then continue back and forth until someone loses their balance or someone gets launched off the seesaw and onto the pavement. As far as I can tell, it’s usually played by children, so as you can imagine it’s a little more dramatic when played by two 6’, 170 lb men. We were done making idiots of ourselves and were about to leave when a news team from KNN (Korean News Network) asked us if we would do it a little longer so that they could film us. So there is a fairly good chance that we were on Korean National Television, and may even be filed away under their stock “foreigner” clips.

It was, overall, one of the best days I’ve had in Korea so far, and definitely a day I will remember for a long time.

Squid, Scooters, and Suicidal Cabbies

Having been in Korea for almost a month, one thing I can definitely say is that—at least at this point—nothing is boring. Even tasks and events that would be mundane in the States can become full-blown adventures in the “Land of the Morning Calm”

Grocery shopping here is way more fun than back home. It’s kind of like a treasure hunt where the map is in a different language. I’ve been to two different grocery stores since I’ve been here, and what we take for granted in the US is that groceries are kind of the same anywhere. It’s a little bit of a shock to walk into the grocery store and find octopi, vegetables you’ve never heard of, and a million packages you can’t even read. The first couple of times I went in I had to walk through the entire store to find what I was looking for (since all the signs are in Korean) and just praying that it was actually here. There are some signs in English, but they’re not always right. Guess what I found under the sign labeled “Sports.”

That’s right, you guessed it, dog food. Of course. If you do manage to find what you’re looking for, who knows whether it’s really what you think it is. I got a bag of Cheetos in a convenience store the first day I was here, and was rather surprised when I opened it up. They were the shape of Cheetos, but instead of being cheese-flavored, they were part barbeque, part kimchi-flavored and not at all appetizing. Though when I did first manage to find what I was looking for, the sense of accomplishment was greater than I could possibly have imagined after grocery shopping in the States.

Though grocery shopping is exciting and fun, it’s not as necessary as in the US. Most of the time here it’s cheaper to eat out than to make your own food, especially if you’re trying to eat healthily. Meat and vegetables are not cheap raw. However, I’ve been to at least ten different restaurants since I’ve been here, and have seen at least forty more, all within three blocks of my apartment. There are places called Kimbop Shops where you can get a very substantial Korean meal for 3-4 dollars. Although eating out is not without its excitement either. Some places have picture menus, and a few even have English menus, but most have only Korean menus, if they have menus at all. And ordering unknown items here is not quite as safe as in the US. When Derek and Claire were here last week we went to a Shabu Shabu restaurant (Shabu Shabu involves putting meat, lettuce and other vegetables into a pot of boiling water or broth that is cooking on your table, and pulling them back out with your chopsticks and eating them). I was looking at the menu (because I had been there before) and had narrowed down what we wanted to one of two options. Having no idea which one was what we wanted, I decided to choose the one that had a green ribbon printed next to the name. When the woman brought us our food, we were slightly surprised to see a plate of raw seafood. And this was not your average seafood: there were octopi, squid, shrimp (completely unpeeled, including heads), crabs that had been cut in half that were about the size of a sand dollar, about 4 different types of mussels, and two or three things we couldn’t identify and didn’t resemble anything I’d ever seen before. So we managed to convince the waitress to bring us an order of beef to go with our seafood. We ate all the seafood (which we were pretty proud of) as well as the beef. The whole thing only cost us $21.

Even crossing the street here can be a bit of an adventure. One of the first things you learn when crossing the street is that red lights are more of a suggestion than a rule. Anyone here that’s been in a cab after midnight has noticed that the only reason the cab drivers slow down is if there is a 75% chance of death or better. Anything less isn’t worth their time. The cab drivers here are kind of crazy. I’m actually really surprised that I haven’t seen or been in any accidents since I’ve been here. I’m pretty sure no one here has heard of “blindspots” or “rear view mirrors.” Hell, some of the people here don’t even turn their lights on at night.

The other roadway hazard is motorized scooters. They’re everywhere, and I don’t know that I’ve ever seen one stop at a stoplight. They weave in and out of traffic and rarely travel below 50 miles an hour. The most exciting part about the scooters is that they drive on the sidewalk (at about the same speed as when they’re on the road). I’ve only been actually bumped once, but they’ve definitely gotten my adrenaline going more than a couple of times.

You can’t even go into a bar here without the possibility for adventure arising. I went out with my friend Dave and some of his friends for his birthday last week. We went to Sumyeon, which is kind of a big downtown area. We went to a couple of different bars and eventually ended up at this bar called the Fuzzy Navel. Now when we got there, a couple of Korean women started pulling Dave and me towards the dance floor. We politely declined if for no other reason than we hadn’t even gotten drinks yet. Then two Korean men started being really friendly with us and inquiring about our female friends. We politely tried to skirt any questions about our current relationships with said girls (since if we said they weren’t our girlfriends there was a good chance they would hit on them, and if we said they were, they would want us to kiss them). So later, when we ran into these fellows again, it came out that these guys had been married to the women who had tried to get us to dance earlier. For EIGHT years. It sounded like a very healthy relationship on both sides. Well, it either didn’t bother them that their wives seemed interested in us, or they didn’t notice, because they kept pouring us drinks for most of the night.

So while a lot of things here are still pretty foreign to me, there are a lot of things that are just a lot more fun, if for no other reason than that it takes considerably more brainpower to complete most tasks here. I’m sure some of the shine will wear off in a month or two, but for now, I’m just going to keep enjoying my exciting life.

Contact Information

For anyone who feels like sending me cookies or other food products:

Kevin Meyer
Golden Plaza 6F
2271-4, Hwamyoung-Dong
Buk-Gu, Busan, South Korea
616-847

If you send me something (a letter, a postcard, brownies, anything) I promise I'll write back. Do it. You know you want to. Here's the rest of my contact info.

Korean Cell phone: 010-4631-1737

kevinleemeyer@gmail.com

Skype: kevinleemeyer

Hope to hear from you all soon.

I will have an actual blog post soon.

Week One

Well it’s been a week. As strange as it feels, I think I’m starting to get used to this alternate universe known as Korea. So, on the tail end of my first unaccompanied day of teaching, I thought I would put forth some of what I’ve learned so far.

The area I live in is called Hwamyeong. It’s kind of a suburb of Busan (the second largest city in Korea (4 million people). It’s on the south coast, and is kind of a vacation spot for Koreans) though it’s still within the city. If you doubt the size of Hwamyeong, put your fears to rest. The entire area is covered in apartment buildings at least 20 stories high, and every building around my apartment is at least 15 stories high with different signs covering the entire building. Because it’s kind of a suburb, there are a lot of young families in the area, hence a lot of demand for English schools, hence a lot of foreigners in the area, and hence a lot of businesses that cater to foreigners. Looking out my window on the seventh floor, I can see a Baskin Robbins, a Dunkin’ Donuts, and Pizza Hut, all within three blocks. There is also a wealth of Korean restaurants crammed into every nook and cranny of the towering landscape. The one stop shop in the area is the Lotte Mart, which is a three story, Grocery store/Department store/Walmart all rolled into one. I have found very few things (other than some western foods) that I couldn’t find there.

I’m living in a single apartment that came furnished with just about anything you need. I live about a block and a half away from the school I’m working at. It’s almost twice the size of many of the other apartments, and it’s in the building right next to the building where my other four coworkers live. There are three restaurants on the ground floor of my building, and a movie theater (which I have yet to explore) right across the street.

There are four, soon to be five, other foreign teachers at the school that I work at, and about eight to ten Korean teachers. I am teaching one class of Kindergarten science, and the rest are 8-14 year olds. The school is what is known as a Hagwon, which is the Korean equivalent of an after-school program; the kids got to public school during the day, and then go to different Academies (Math, Piano, English) in the afternoon and evening. The school seems really nice. They take care of a lot things (like the medical exam) that some other schools force the teachers to do on their own. It seems like a very good working environment, and I’m excited to be working there this year.

I’ve done some exploring since I’ve been here, although not a ton. We went down to one of the beaches one night, and me and two of my other new coworkers went to Nampo-Dong, which is a big market district. We went to the live fish market; that was a sight to behold. Crabs, eels, giant worms, octopi, squid, and fish of all kinds, all being kept in tanks. Though we didn’t try it, I have been assured that you can pick out an fish you want and bring it a few flights of stairs and have it prepared in front of you. We also went up Busan Tower, which gives an amazing view of most of the city of Busan.

So, that’s about all I have right now. I will share more adventures as they happen, and I’ll upload pictures at some point in time. I hope to hear from all of you soon on how your lives are going.

My Trans-Pacific Adventure

Good news: I am currently safe in Busan, South Korea. Unfortunately it took me a lot longer than I thought to get here. (Sorry if this story is poorly written, but my brain is still somewhere over the Pacific ocean)

The flight from Minneapolis to Tokyo was overbooked, so they didn't have a seat for me when I checked in at the counter. So when I got to the gate I went up to ask for a seat assignment, and it turns out I had been bumped up to Business Class. Business Class, for those of you who have never been lucky enough to fly in it, is about like being in the movie Wall-E. You sit in these comfortable chairs that can lay completely flat if you want them to, and people keep bringing you food and drinks. And apparently ( I didn't find this out until later) they are the only seats on Northwest flights in the Pacific that have the individual screens. Unfortunately, with this amazing development came the news that we were going to be delayed on the runway for an indefinite amount of time. After two hours sitting on the runway, they finally fixed the problem and we were allowed to take off. So, add two hours to the already twelve hour flight. Although I can't really complain (for reasons see above discussion on Business Class).

When we finally landed in tokyo after a fourteen hour afternoon, my flight from Tokyo to Busan had already taken off. So I, along with other members of the flight to Busan as well as another flight to Hong Kong, were told we would be spending the night in Tokyo. We all gathered near the Northwest desk, and were told that we would be staying at the Radisson, and the bus would leave at 8:10. It was around 7:15 so when we found this out, so we all filed out the door to go wait for the bus. After what seemed like an eternity, the shuttle from the Radisson finally arrived. All thirty of us were slightly dismayed that this shuttle turned out to be an 8 person van. On top of that, the Radisson didn't actually have enough rooms for us to stay in. So we all trecked back to the Northwest counter, where a Japanese man in a suit proceeded to talk on a cellphone for a very long time. They finally found us another hotel, and we all filed out to meet our fullsized bus. They provided us dinner and breakfast and sent us on our way the next day. Through that entire ordeal I did manage to meet some very interesting people. One man who plays bass in the Hong Kong Symphony, Three other english teachers going to mainland China, and two other English teachers who were going to work in Busan, and had been in Korea for three or four years apiece. It was really nice to get to pick their brains a little bit and get to sleep before I finally showed up at my school.

I finally got in to Busan yesterday afternoon and was taken directly to the school where I started shadowing the person I will be replacing. Since then, my time has been occupied by wandering and waking up at 5:30 am. My appartment currently does not have internet so I am writing this from a "PC Bang" down the street. I will describe my first week in Korea soon, but for now I need to go get some lunch before I start training for real.

You found it!

That's right. This is where you'll be able to find (hopefully) frequent updates about my entire experience in the great nation of South Korea. Since I'm currently sitting in Mounds View, I don't really have any more to tell you right now. Check back soon!