It's Snowing Here!!!

Wahoo! It's the first time I've ever actually seen it snow! Too much fun. And, I'm having one of two festive Thanksgiving celebrations tonight. What a great day!

It's Too Cold Here!!!

The past two days it's been in the 20s!!!! Today I wore leggings and a pair of jeans underneath my work pants, and I was still cold walking to and from work! And, it gets really cold in the building at school. I need to get much much warmer clothes immediately, or I will have to go into hibernation. At least my floor heater and hot water work now. Otherwise, I wouldn't survive. I don't like the cold one bit.

Billy Joel Concert

I don't have any pics, but it was so much fun! I went this past Saturday and it was perfect timing. This week had quite a negative vibe at school, so it was great to let everything go and relax  and have a good time. It brought my spirits back up where they needed to be.

Sadly to say, they informed us that we are having "intensives" next session. Before coming, I was promised that my school wasn't having anymore, which was the main reason I chose to come to this particular school. Intensive is a 5 week period where we teach from 8 am to 7 pm with very very little increase in pay (my normal schedule runs from 2:30 - 9:20 pm). I am not happy about it. We are supposed to have a new teacher coming next week, but we told him about intensives and now he is reconsidering. Our bosses were not happy about that. Friday they yelled at us all for giving him "unnecessary" information, and threatened to give us bad references. There was a lot of tension at school, and I am not looking forward to this week. I am actually planning on checking into working at a public school, where the schedule is consistent year round.

The concert was the perfect way to clear my mind and forget about all that stuff. I had no idea I would enjoy it so much, but he is a great performer! And it was fun to see so many foreigners in one place. We met people from all over the world who spoke English.

New Plan

I just applied for my TESOL certificate, so that I can teach in other countries after South Korea. This is one of the few, if not the only country where you can teach without a certificate. I guess they have a difficult time finding teachers that want to come over here.

I am really glad that this has been my first experience, because they are so welcoming to foreigners. We are novelty items, and are treated as such. They bend over backwards constantly to keep us happy, because it costs so much to get us here, and we are few and far between. Also, this country is very Americanized. There is English everywhere, and I might have to pay extra, but I can find almost anything I want. They even have queso at the grocery store (obviously cannot compare with amazing Texas queso, but at least there's the attempt).

Right now, I am thinking I would like to teach in Greece next. I am looking at the schedules and trying to determine what would work best for me. I want to have at least a month in the states to relax and visit with friends and family before heading out again. It seems like it might be more like 4 months though, with their school schedule. I will figure it out.

They have programs in so many places! I am looking for a location with a new language, and one where I can travel to other countries with ease. The way it is looking from my quick research, is that most places are in need. And with my year of experience, I will be high on the list.

In Greece, it looks like they pay for your housing as well, so that is a bonus. I would be making a little more than I do here, since they pay in Euros. The Korean Won is doing terribly right now! It feels like everyday I am making less in less. At least I can keep my money here until the exchange rate increases.

Travel Updates!

We have our first break from November 28 - December 2, and I am going to Beijing! I am so excited. We have booked the flight, hotel and two day tours. We will have the opportunity to see two different parts of the Great Wall of China. I cannot believe it! Also on the tours we will visit the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square (the largest city square in the world), the 2008 Olympic Complex, and on the last evening we will see a Chinese Acrobatic Show. 

!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah!

And, our hotel has 24/7 hot water, free internet, and is an actual room with two double beds! So amazing, and all for $40 a night. The tours will pick us up at our hotel in the morning and drop us back in the evening, and every one on them, including the tour guide will speak English!

My only concern is the weather. It will be sooooo cold! But, we'll survive :)

Mountain Climbing

Morning Calm

This place was so beautiful. I have never seen that many colors so bright all at once; it was truly breathtaking. And no small feat to get there, I might add. This weekend was our second attempt. Last time we failed miserably, missing the key point that "train" actually means train, not subway like I assumed. I think it's a fair assumption, but it got us nowhere. This week we knew before going that we were actually going to have to remove ourselves from the subway system and find the train station. We didn't realize that our journey would continue for almost two hours after that.

Man, what a long day. Thirty-two subway stops to an hour train ride and then a thirty minute mini-bus ride through some serious slums in South Korea had us a little concerned about our destination. It turned out to be beautiful, and I certainly wasn't expecting it when we got there. They even had really nice, normal American style bathrooms! That was probably the most amazing part. Not only did they have actual toilets, there was room for me to change from shorts into jeans in the bathroom without touching anything. Oh, you have no idea how excited I was about that. 

We intended to leave at 10:45 in the morning, actually left around 11:45 (all my fault), and made it to our destination around 4:30. South Korea is not big enough for things to take that long! We were able to stay about an hour and a half, which was plenty of time to see what we needed to see. Everything was so beautiful, and there were mountains surrounding the entire garden so we climbed a little bit.

It was the perfect time of year to go; in a few weeks all the leaves will be off the trees. It was also really interesting because getting there required that I do several new things. This was my first time to ride a train. Ever. I never realized that I haven't been on one until we were sitting down, and then it was such a new experience. I prefer it over the subway, because you can see the land while you travel.

Once we got off, we were in the most slummy place I have seen thus far in South Korea. Pretty slummy for anywhere actually. It was very strange; so far everything has been really nice (relatively speaking, of course). There was nothing nice about this town. When we went to find the bus (which we found out was free after we paid someone. Those jerks taking advantage of the weguken!), there were the mobile office type things set up and a man in one on the far end walked out without a shirt on. I'm not sure if this translates as well as it should, but it is really cold here. Really cold. And, this man had a belly on him. People Do Not have bellies in South Korea. Being overweight is very taboo, so it was really shocking to see that. 

Driving up the mountain through the country side it was extremely desolate. There were many tents on the hillside with campfires set up, and greenhouses everywhere. We even saw cows! Everything was really dirty and poor. It was such a contrast to what I am used to seeing. Especially since at the end of our journey we were in such a beautiful place.

The trip back seemed much quicker than the ride up. We took a cab and cut the subway in half by stopping for food. But, it was definitely a very long day. And then I woke up at 9 am to watch the UT Tech game, only for them to lose. Those boys better get it together. Just because I left the country does not mean they are aloud to lose football games. Absolutely not acceptable.