Summer in the City and the Foreigner District

It's starting to get much hotter and humid here in Seoul, but the humidity is not that much different than Atlanta, so I'm quite used to this weather. The hot summer is a much more welcome experience than the frigid cold of the winter.

This school year is coming to an end and I'm staying busy by having to plan a summer English camp. Most of the lesson plans I created for the last camp will have to be reworked since many of the students will be returning to the program.

While I'm continuing to enjoy my stay here in the ROK, I'm starting to miss my home a bit. Which is why I've started eating more western food again. A couple times a week I'll meet some friends up for some western style food, possibly in the foreigner district. The foreigner district has a bad reputation for being a dirty place compared to the rest of Seoul, but in the day time it's quite nice and there are extensive affordable western style restaurants to choose from. One small place, called Smokey's Saloon, is a regional favorite. The restaurant can maybe only fit about 15 customers and a long line can almost always be seen outside its doors, sometimes as many as 25 people. Koreans and foreigners alike enjoy the wide selection of interesting burgers that they have to offer, many of the burgers at Smokeys rival those of any steak house that I've ever been to in America.

Surf'n in the R.O.K. (Busan part III and Gwangan-do mountain stream)

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This past weekend I went on a surf trip to Busan, and the weekend before that I was in South Korea's north east province, Gangwon-do, hiking on a mountain stream in the middle of nowhere. The surf trip was a much needed vacation from the city of Seoul, as I always seem to forget how much I love the beach and surfing, also Gangwon-do has much beautiful nature to offer the traveler.

My friends and I stayed in a little motel right on a beach that is not frequented by as many visitors, which made it more relaxing and better for surfing. The surf shop, pictured aboved, had afforadble rentals on both boards and wet suits. And there was pleanty of good Korean and international food available in walking distance for when we took breaks for lunch and snacks. Nothing like a good kimbap after being worn out from the sun and surf.

About two weeks ago I went to a Korean baseball game with my friends, while the game was fascinating and fun to watch I was surprised by the amount of MLB hats I saw in the stadium. Koreans are big fans of MLB, and anytime when going out I often see a few Atlanta Braves caps. This is most likely because there is a Korean pop singer whom has lived in Atlanta and supports the Braves. Still interesting to see my home city's baseball team's cap being worn here. One of the biggest differences between going to a Korean game and an American game is the price. Besides the tickets being about $5 the food inside is hardly marked up from regular prices, meaning that a bottle of water costs less than a dollar and a fast food combo would cost around $5. Also, instead of individual owners the teams are owned by Korean corporations, such as LG, KIA, etc. Although it's not too much of a difference since the owners of sports teams in America are usually the CEOs or owners of corporations.

Another interesting note is that I think I'm allergic to all Korean alcohol, which is not the worst thing since Koreans seem to have an extremely low grade of alcohol here. I assume it might be the great presence of sulfates in their alcohol, but don't really know. Either way, probably a blessing in disguise. Soju is the social drink here in Korea, used in almost all formal social situations, and I found out quite quick that it was not the drink for me. I will go through the formalities of having a glass poured for me by an elder but just not drink it. It's also fascinating to note that I believe that Heineken and Budweiser, among other international drinks, are brewed here domestically in Korea, which does not help my situation.

Showing Respect

Last week, while walking around Seoul, with a friend we came across a rather large gathering of people paying their respect to the previous South Korean President whom recently passed away. The people were reading news articles about President Roh Moo-Hyun while also paying their respects by standing in a line to bow as a way to show respect.

On a side note, a friend of mine recently moved to Shaghai, China for an internship with a magazine on economics. Hopefully I'll be able to find the time to make a short visit before I leave in August.

This weekend is Memorial Day weekend, and I'll be traveling to another province to go nature trekking through a river. Should be relaxing. :)

Coffee in Corea, and Nukes in the North

I don't drink coffee, but I enjoy cafes, and Seoul has many of them. Most of the cafes are grouped together in certain districts of the city, as most things are grouped together in Korea. A couple of my friends are coffee aficionados so they enjoy tasting espressos from various cafes. This man roasts his own beans in a rather small, book cluttered, cafe.

Life in Seoul is much the same as before the North Korean nuclear testing of their bomb. South Korea is technically still at war with their neighbor, so they are quite used to the raised tension. Some of my fourth grade students painted some posters promoting peace and reconciliation between the two countries, and some were very creative. I'll try and grab a picture of a few and post them next week. Maybe there is hope that one day North Korea will rejoin the world instead of trying to provoke their neighbors.

blog.stevenswigart.com

My new blog is up: blog.stevenswigart.com

I will continue to post my experiences in Seoul on this blog. :)

Teacher's Day

Last Friday caught me off guard, because it was Teacher's Day. I was not really expecting anything from my students, but to my surprise I received flowers (real and fake), chocolate, and many letters. All of the letters were precious and fun to read. Most were in English, and a few were written in Korean where my co-teachers had to translate them for me. I was not expecting it to be such a big deal.

While waiting on some friends at a subway station a radio personality came up and interviewed me on what I was doing in Korea, the radio program being one that helps Koreans learn conversational English. Through the interview I learned that May is the month of family holidays in Korea, the main ones being: Children's Day, Parent's Day, Teachers Day, and a couple others I can't remember. The interview reminded me that I wanted to do some radio volunteer work while here in Korea, but I've managed to stay busy enough not to attempt it. But I imagine while in grad school I'll do some radio work again.

Later this week I'll have my Art, Tech, and Politics Blog up and running, and by politics, I mean general social issues and how they affect us. I uploaded it to my website earlier this week, now I just have to tweak it a bit and make my first post before I post the link here.

JIFF

Went to a film festival this past weekend, as it was also an extended weekend because of a few Korean holidays. The film festival was called JIFF, standing for Jeonju International Film Festival, and it was quite impressive. Last year I went to Pusan's film festival, but it was much more hectic, JIFF was more relaxing due to its more laid back country atmosphere. In Pusan it was nearly impossible to obtain tickets, but since JIFF is not as well known as PIFF it's much easier to get tickets. Yet JIFF still has that raised excitement and a nice crowd for the movies which is important for a film festival and probably has even more excitement and a bigger crowd than Atlanta's film festival.

One of the highlights of the film festival was being able to watch a Korean film with a talk back with the directors and the two actors after the film; the film festival would have people translate to English so that foreigners would participate in the talk back.

Jeonju is a small city with a traditional Korean flavor. It's known for it's bibimbap and small traditional Korean village.

Last Friday we had a sports day because in Korea they are about to celebrate Children's Day, a holiday where children, or teachers of those children, under 12 don't have to go to school. Which is one of the reasons why I'm only working Thursday and Friday of this week.