~*~*~SEOUL FLY~*~*~

Hello!

I have been living in Seoul the last month or so. I'm just staying for the summer but I've liked it so far ^__^

HIGHLIGHTS:

- AJUMMAS. What is an ajumma?

Ajumma means, literally, "woman old enough to be married." It's more that that, though. Ajumma is a state of mind. When women cut their hair and curl it and start pushing and shoving a lot like a wild beast on the subway ... they are an ajumma. When a woman starts wearing a visor of a color and size that would give Darth Vader helmet envy ... they are an ajumma. When a woman gets together with her friends and talks so loud that the decibel level of their conversation rivals that of an above-ground nuclear test ... they are an ajumma.

Ajummas are fierce. I love them. I want to be one. I haven't bought the visor yet but I'm tempted on the daily.

- The people in general I went to COEX to get a cell phone- Korea is ~special~ so my tri-band phone will not work and I NEEDED a cell phone (I think it is illegal to be without one in the ROK) and the people at the LG store were so helpful. First this girl who did not even work at the store (I didn't find that out until later lol) translated for me. Then the owner who didn't speak any English gave me 3 kawaii cell phone charms and some noodles and then I left and he called me on my phone so say I had overpaid 10,000won. Aww it was sweet.

-(^_^)/ Okay about that cell phone I bought... it's great, it does the job, it wasn't new when I bought it (foreigners aren't allowed to get new ones :( mine is old and Koreans make fun of it) BUT everything is in Korean. No English option. I'm kind of a luddite when it comes to cell phones anyways but now I'm pretty helpless. I can answer and make calls and that's pretty much it.

UNFORTUNATELY Koreans are huge fans of text messages. From the article:

Want to feel old? A survey of a middle, high school, and college students in South Korea found that over two-thirds of students there rarely or never use email and supposedly young people are starting to think of email as something overly formal that you use only for business purposes or to communicate with your less tech savvy parents or grandparents who are still stuck in the Nineties (when email was king). For them it's all about text and instant messaging, and by comparison, even email seems like an incredibly slow way to communicate.

Please note that the article is from 2004. Things are much worse now. It's unfashionable for anyone under the age of 70 to use email. Anyways so my K-friends send me text messages and I have a heck of a time responding since I can't find the Roman characters abcdefg... so I am training myself in the ancient art of aZn emoticons in hopes that I will be able to convey a sentence or two in 8 characters or less. Here's a quick lesson:

^^

Simple, but poetic. An abbreviation of ^__^

/(@_@)/

WAAAH?

(-_-#)

I am bitterly disappointed in you. Have you considered seppuku?

I don't know maybe I'll just learn Korean.

-The English(ee) industry It is crazy. More on it later, but I've met kids named Robot, Ghost, and Destiny (he's 12 years old lolol)

I have been really bad about travelblogging sry :( I still have not done Romania or Belize! I will try to do another Seoul post at the end of the summer. I still get plenty of hate mail from angry Catalans and 60 year old hippies re: Vang Vieng to tide me over ^__^ but if you want to see what I'm up to I will update my flickr more often.

OK well enjoy the pics. I got a new camera- a Canon Rebel XTi (yeah yeah Nikon people) I don't really know how to use it yet but I'll figure it out over the summer. Sorry this blog is so useless it's mostly just to let y'all know 1) I'm alive and 2) not in Guatemala- I'll get there soon tho.
Kate Hildebrand

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