Adventures of ShadKat!

Wow! It’s been months since I’ve had the motivation to blog. Why have I been away for so long? Well, first, I accidentally deleted the database that held all my posts from the Soju Sonsangnim days. Second, I’ve been fixated on the idea that my posts have to focus on life here in South Korea. Really, I’ve said all that can possibly be said about life here in Sparkling Korea. Finally, I’ve been too busy reading to even think about blogging.

Seriously, I’ve had my nose buried in books for the past two months.  Here is a list of the books I’ve read in the past three or four weeks:

• Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
• Blink, Malcolm Gladwell*
• Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell
• Yiddish Policemen’s Union, Michael Chabon*
• The Reader, Bernhard Schlink*
• To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee*
• Exiles, Ron Hansen*
• Child of God, Cormac McCarthy*
• Fahrenheit  451, Ray Bradbury*
• The Giver, Lois Lowry*
• Brida, Paulo Coehlo
• Revolutionary Road, Richard Yates*
• Atonement, Ian McEwan*
• Saturday, Ian McEwan
• Child 44, Tom Rob Smith

The sad thing is, I probably forgot some books. Half our books are buried in a suitcase in one of two spare rooms, so I can only go off of the ones currently residing on our new bookshelf. Clearly, I have the reading bug. I should probably start a blog for book reviews because that would give me a decent excuse to start blogging again.

If you’re looking for a decent read, check out any of the starred books on that list.

So here is the long awaited video of Shadi eating skate! It smelled repulsive and it lingered on our clothes for like a week. I never want to smell that again.

Here is my birthday dinner:

The move went well. We are all moved in and got some new furniture. It’s awesome. I’ll take a video tomorrow when the light is better because the sun is setting.

Enjoy these for now.

K
Edit: Here is a quick video of our old apartment. Sorry for going so quickly, but we were in a hurry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vykNqOESHE

Here is a video of our new apartment. We got the fridge, gas range, TV, and washing machine delivered just after the video was made. After we move everything in and I do some decorating, I’ll take another video. I found an area rug that we are going to put in the living room, and hopefully that’ll brighten the place up a bit. I hope you enjoy the video!!

K

Here is a video of Korea’s solution to snow removal.

We are in the process of moving. Almost everything is packed up and ready to go, so when I clean the apartment, I will take a video of it so you can see the old one, and also a video of the new one.

Nothing is really new. English camp has been weird this winter because of all the snow. I missed it two days this week, so we will be making up a day next week…on Tuesday!! My birthday!! I’m excited to spend the time with my students since last year it was traveling to Seoul and shopping before our trip to Taiwan. It wasn’t a very good day (I tripped and fell and it was freezing cold…just miserable all around), so I’m hoping to enjoy cake with my students and going to a nice dinner with my lovely husband.

Until next time!!

K

Here are a couple of videos. I think they are fun. Enjoy!!

Today we went to Daegu with Dave and Zak. We went to a place called Gorilla Burger:

Then we went to Kyobo books and spent a long time finding books, drinking coffee, and reading a little. We had a lot of time to waste before our 2:20 showing of Sherlock Holmes. Shadi, Zak and I all thought it was “meh” but Dave really liked it.

Apparently there have been some problems with posting comments and such. I’ll get Shadi on it in the morning. He’s currently reading The Giver, which is a book I’m shocked he hasn’t read before. I purchased that again because one of my best students, who got into one of the best high schools in the country, is currently reading that and To Kill a Mockingbird. I told her I would discuss the books with her, and since I said I’d do that, I think it’s a good idea to read them at the same time.

So, tomorrow we plan on cleaning the crap out of the house, so that means we’ll take a video blog of the apartment! Which isn’t so great because we’re moving on January 7th to a new apartment. It’s a long story, quite boring, but it’s not important. What is important is that my friend Denise is coming to visit us on Monday and I hope to have a lot of videos of her visit.

Love,
K

P.S. Please bare with me with the videos. This is my first attempt at trying to put different videos together and editing it with captions and such. Be prepared for a lot of practice things until I get the formula down perfectly.

Shadi and I are going to try a new way of blogging: videos. This is the first post with videos. Stay tuned for more videos!!

Dinner with the foreign teachers for Giftstravaganza (AKA Christmas).

After running my own blog for over a year, I decided that it was time to finally form a joint venture with Kathleen – especially since I could never remember to cross-posts the entries from the other blog over here. So, you can look forward to the same posts I was doing on my old blog in a new location. Cheers!

Gosh. I always feel horrible for not posting, but I never feel like I have enough to talk about to fill a whole post. However, a lot has happened since we’ve been home.

First of all, since coming home, we’ve been hanging out a lot with Dave and Thwani, two South African’s in town. It’s interesting to live in Yecheon now. There are about 18 foreigners in town now. Isn’t that crazy? There were three of us this time last year, and now we have almost 20! Well, now that there are so many of us, we’ve kind of broken off into groups. We do all get together once in a while, but lately it’s just been the four of us, and I’m happy with that.

The beginning of October was the Korean holiday, Chuseok. My co-teacher invited us to his house to celebrate with his family. We’ve seen the ceremony before, it’s the same one they do for the new year, and on the anniversary of the death of each ancestor (going back to great grandparents), but this time, we took Shadi’s video camera and video taped it for you all to see what happens! You can check out the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuFZDEkrTTI

Korean’s bow twice for the dead. They also offer them rice, soup, fruit, protein, and rice wine. It’s really an interesting ceremony, and we are so happy to be included. After the ceremony, we all eat the food that the spirits of the ancestors ate. Cool huh?

Shadi and I have been going to the gym in the mornings. I’m hoping to lose another 20lbs by next year, and I think I can accomplish that. I’ve been eating less at work, and trying to eat better foods when I’m not at school.

This month is obviously the month of Halloween, so this week I’m doing something fun with my students. We’re making masks and watching an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Last Friday I had three of these classes because next Friday, I wont be at school. The students did a great job with their masks, and they got the crap scared out of them by the episode of Buffy, and I couldn’t stop laughing. So, I took some pictures and I hope you enjoy them as much as I do:

So as I said, I wont be at school next Friday. Shadi and I were picked to go on a tour of the DMZ and other locations around Seoul for two days. We are so excited, especially since my co-teacher was selected to go too!

We’ve been trying to make some plans for the next few years. We’re already talking about staying for a third year. We want to make sure we have all of my student loan debt paid off, and a lot of money saved before we come home for good. We are really happy in Korea, but we do miss aspects of our life in America. We really miss holidays with our families. We really miss Bailey. We really miss the simple things of going out with friends whenever we want, going out to dinner with our parents randomly during the week. Just simple little things like that. Sometimes it’s really frustrating when we can’t eat the things we want to do, and do the things we want to do, but our lives, I think, will be the better for everything that we’ve had to go through in Korea. We’re becoming stronger as a couple, we’re learning more about each other and what we want out of life, and how we want to raise our children. Sometimes I see what others have: a house, kids on the way, and a career, and sometimes I’m a little jealous. I’d love to own my own house and be in a job which would be rewarding and require me to work hard. I’d love to have children, but I know what we are doing now will benefit us all in the future. Just a little patience, and everything will work out better than we could ever imagine.

So we’re coming home in February for a week. Our great friends Randy and Sarah are finally getting married. It’s going to be a quick trip, but it’ll be fun. I don’t think we’ll be coming home next summer because of the trip in February. We’ve been kicking around the idea of maybe going to France for a week (and traveling around a bit in Europe), and spending some time in Lebanon with Shadi’s grandmother. We’ve also talking about maybe going to Australia for three weeks instead of the France/Lebanon trip. We’ll need to figure it out soon, especially since we’re going to have to budget for it. There are pros and cons for each trip, but we need to seriously sit down and figure it out. We’re thinking of going to Southeast Asia in the winter of 2011, and then doing a full on backpacking trip through Europe the summer of 2011 before we come home for good. Because we’re planning on that, I think Australia would be the better choice for summer 2010, but we need to talk about it.

I’ve been knitting like a fiend! I made a shawl for my grandma, and I can’t wait to send it to her. I also made my first pair of socks, and I am so excited. The socks were fun and easy, and I can’t wait to become a sock knitter. I’m also waiting on a package of yarn for winter knitting. It’s getting really cold here, and I’m making hats, gloves, cowls, and I’m going to attempt to make my first sweater. This should be exciting.

Alright that’s it for now.

All my love. K.

Note: We’re having a problem uploading the pictures. We can’t get it to work, so I’ll upload them when we fix the problem.

I know. I’m the worst blogger ever. I can’t get Shadi to post either. He’s got his own blog now and so he has abandoned this one. His blog can be found here: http://www.shadimirza.net/

Anyway, back onto the blog!

We just got back from our three week trip to America. I have to say, I’m happy to be back. Yea we had a good time with friends and family, but to be honest, I didn’t miss America as much as I thought I would. The food was okay, some of it was excellent, but some wasn’t very good, and most of the time we were bored. I think a lot of it was because we weren’t working and we just felt lazy. I think if we stay another year, we might plan some more trips. Maybe we’ll go to DC or New York or some other place instead of just going from house to house. We need to keep busy!!

Now that we are back in Korea, I’m so happy! I’m happy to be home in my own space. I don’t have to worry about being in anyone’s way, I don’t have to worry about being too loud, and I don’t have to be on anyone’s schedule. I do, however, miss family already. I also miss my puppy! Bailey melted my heart when she saw us. She was like whimpering and going like nuts. I miss her already!!!

So this week we are under quarantine from the H1N1 virus. We’re supposed to be staying in our house, but we’ve left it a few times. We got paid yesterday and sent money back home. Also, last night we went out to dinner with my co-teacher and his wife. I bought some grapes for them (they’re back in season and they are the greatest grapes in the world!!), and we also got them key chains. They were so happy. Also, dinner was amazing, and the walk around the river after was lovely. I really like my co-teacher and his family. They have some of the nicest hearts of anyone I’ve ever met.

I got some back news at dinner though: the principal at my school is leaving on Monday. Friday we are having a teacher dinner, and I’m really sad. The principal is so loved at our school. He is kind to the teachers and students, and he seems like he really cares everything going on at his school. I’m worried about what the new principal will think of me, and of our school. The reason I’m worried is because if he/she doesn’t like me, I could lose my job. It’s up to the principal of each school if they want a foreign teacher or not. If something were to happen, we’d be okay and I’d be able to find another job, but I love the teachers I work with, and I love my students, so here’s hoping for the best!

Back in March, the head of our program in our province, asked Shadi and I to come to Seoul to welcome the new teachers coming to teach in our province. We went to Seoul, had lunch, and then got back on a bus and talked to the new teachers about the province, being in the classroom, and about any other questions that they might had that weren’t answered at the orientation. Well Angela, the boss, as asked us once again to come and welcome the new teachers into our province. So tomorrow Shadi and I are going to meet Angela in Daegu, and go to the University (this time it’s not in Seoul, it’s in the Southwest part of Korea…somewhere we haven’t been yet) to meet with the new teachers and assign them to their schools. Also, we’ll be answering any questions about their towns. On Friday, we’ll be doing the same Q&A session on the bus back to our province. I’m excited to go and do this again. This is the third time Angela has personally picked us to help with something important. I’m glad that she feels like we are responsible, friendly, and professional enough to be chosen to help her out. Shadi and I have talked about the possibility of staying a third year. Most of it is based on how much money we have saved and if things are better in America. We’ve talked about maybe if we stay a third year, perhaps we can work for the program in an administrative position instead of in the classroom. It would be good to be able to call and interview people before bringing them over (try to weed out those that might leave in the middle of the night), and helping with proofreading documents, and coordinating events. I think it would look really good on a resume, and it would help our chances of getting a job when we are ready to come home. We love our jobs, but we have to think realistically and for our future. I really think doing stuff in the background will look better on our resumes than the teaching English…because really that usually equals a black space in your resume.

So I’m looking forward to our next year here. I think it’ll be go even faster than this last year because I’ll be going home in February for Randy and Sarah’s wedding!! I’m in the wedding party, and I’m so excited to stand up there and watch them get married. So for this year, I’ve got some goals for myself:

-I would like to lose at least 30lbs (I have already lost 20lbs since last year, and I’d like to lost at least 30-40 more)

-I would like to take more advantage of the fresh food that the farmers are selling on the streets. I’d like to eat more fresh veggies and fruits each day. I’d also like to try to attempt to cook more Korean foods, or at least to cook things from our grocery store. We’ve been going to Costco, and I’d like to not have that expense, and the hassle of going there and hauling our things back.

-I’d like to take my knitting skills to the next level. I’ve set the goal of making my first sweater and socks this year. Also I’d like to make some gloves.

-I’d also like read at least one book a week. I’ve been thinking of maybe starting some sort of book club with other foreigners. Maybe meet once a month after reading a few books and discussing them. I’ve tried a knitting thing, but no one in my area knits so that’s out. However, I can knit at our monthly book meetings!

Alright…Shadi has I have written a novel, and has called me Dickens a few times too…so I suppose I’ll be off. I need to pack for tomorrow anyway.

Kat