Proops

This is part two of my Thailand vacation blog. Please read "Having Fun in Ko Pha-Ngan" first. This still takes place in Ko Pha-Ngan for the first part... Before going to the party at 11 we returned our bikes. I got into a big argument with the owner when he said he was going to charge me $400 to replace the entire left side of the machine because it was all scratched. There were maybe a couple scratches but nothing a little sanding and paint couldn't deal with. He took me to a junkyard where he showed me all the nearly-new pieces he'd ripped off of other bikes. It seemed he'd been doing a lot of ripping off. I was fuming and said I couldn't deal with it tonight. I left the bike (and the passport ... read more

Note: read Seoul Calibur OCI: Drinking Edition before this entry to get the full story. Sunday began for me at about 2 p.m. I went with Choi to Insadong to buy some gifts for people. It's a big tourist street with lots of high quality shops. We started with some lunch where I ate some soup that was "made from beans" I was told. It was kind of foamy with lumps of bean flavored gunk in it and some pieces of pork. Not the best but I ate it because of how hungry I was. I found what I was looking for but it was quite heavy and I didn't enjoy carrying the stuff around the rest of the day considering how much walking I did. After shopping Choi and I went to Joseon palace. It's ... read more

This past week was the end of Andrew's contract. He will be living and working in Jeonju next year to be closer to the gf and also study at a university there. He was here to pick me up from the bus terminal in November and he's been there for me ever since. I'll miss you buddy! It won't be the same having the apartment next door empty, who am I going to stroll over and shoot the shit with? Well, I will see him again before I leave, Jeonju is only about 35 minutes north of here. I keep getting into issues at work. I wish it weren't the case but work can't always just be simple and straightforward. I've had to deal with quite a few road bumps this year and I'd like to ... read more

Hello Blog, It's been a couple of weeks, sorry for my infidelity. I've been getting steadily more lazy in all ways, the heat and humidity only seem to let up when it's pouring down rain...which is more often than I remember happening in Minnesota. I feel compelled to exercise but the gyms here are missing one key element- air conditioning. Speaking of which, my electric bill is going to be over $100 this month; awesome! I've had a love affair with fried rice recently. I keep trying slightly different variations though none of them are terribly healthy. I can't imagine rice, eggs, soy sauce and mushrooms to be light no matter how many carrots and beansprouts I put in there. It's at least more healthy than ramen (I think)? Two weekends ago I went to the ... read more

I haven't written in a while because my life's been relatively low-key since the mud festival. Normal social outings with fellow teachers and Koreans, nothing really to brag about. I have gone over to my friend James' house a couple times and we've cooked up some stellar dishes in the past week. I miss having American ingredients at the ready. I had a Korean co-worker go to live and study at Mizzou University for a month, she came back saying that most American food tastes really salty. I wonder if I will experience the same effect upon my return... I have had an incredibly un-American ingredient twice now in Korea. It is called boshintang, or dog stew. I'm not sure what kind of dog we're dealing with here but I never got to meet him/her, I ... read more

This week's entry comes a little late. I was hoping some friends who had cameras with them would snap some pics and put them on Facebook but none have surfaced yet. Sorry guys for another text-rich, picture poor entry. I'll try to remember to snap some photos more often...I've never been much of a shutterbug though. All week I revisited cooking with my 6pm adults class. It was something we covered way back in December but the students cycle through consistently enough that it was new for almost all of them and Kyong Yun forgot it so it was like the material was all fresh! We traded recipe advice and went over the steps of prep and cooking. We made a visit to a grocery store near the school to review ingredients and on Friday we ... read more