Mission: Where is Fun? We had a day to explore, and accomplishing our goal of the whole weekend on Saturday left us in search a destination. Gangneung, pronounced Kong-noon-g (sort of), wasn’t our destination, but it was a larger city on the east coast that was bound to offer something we’ve never done. Walking out of the bus terminal, we wandered the streets for five minutes in one direction, and armed with a tourist map, our friend, Jon G., said, ‘Maybe we should just ask someone, where is fun?’ That search led us to the back of a taxi. We [View Full Entry]

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2008 Gold medal in the Beijing Olympics… 2nd place in the 2009 World Baseball Championships. OK, so the Koreans can play, and enthusiasms is high for the sport of baseball in one of the most prideful places known to man, but our preconceived notions of ‘what a day at the park’ truly is, were flipped upside-down on Saturday, as soon as we emerged from the subway outside Olympic Park Stadium to see the Twins play the Tigers. Yes, the Twins were playing the Tigers, but this wasn’t a matchup of AL Central (quasi) powers in the Motor City or the [View Full Entry]

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Before leaving on this adventure, the largest problems Cassie and I had were tying up all the loose ends of our lives that would allow us to take advantage of this opportunity. The house, Denali, finances, and seeing everyone before we left were all necessary and/or important to us. Recently, the obligatory question arises in almost all of our conversations is that of our plans for next year. We will be returning home, Korea was never more than a one year commitment in our eyes. It was never difficult to miss home despite all of the wonderful things we are doing [View Full Entry]

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Our final day in Beijing and Cass suggested we rent some bikes from the hostel to cover some ground and see as much of the city as we can. My first thoughts were of images of honking speed demons and the previous day’s traffic encounter on the way to the Great Wall. “No thanks, I rather enjoy being alive…” but the more I thought about it, it was a brilliant idea. The early morning sunshine cast long shadows on the locals navigating rusty, dirty bikes along the grey brick streets of the hutong. The ‘prrings’ of bike bells in the distance [View Full Entry]

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Spoiler alert! Our China trip is now over, and we’re back- swine flu free and clear- to the grind of Korea. OK- undue the spoiler alert! I thought I’d wait a bit between entries so not to blog-overload everyone with our experiences in Beijing. Both Cass and I were looking forward to this day of our trip as soon as we made our reservations. Through our hostel tour company (that’s basically how trip arrangements are done here) we signed up to hike 10 km. of the Great Wall of China. The designated ‘Wonder of the World’ did not let us down. [View Full Entry]

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We’ve been looking for a little break from the routine and frustrations of teaching in Korea for some time, especially when once we had this little trip planned about three months ago. We have a four day weekend, courtesy of Buddha’s birthday and Children’s day, so we thought we’d take advantage of it… that we did. As soon as we touched down, and passed the pig flu infrared heat sensors in the Beijing airport, we hit the ground running. Our airport pickup arrived almost on time and before we knew it, we got to practice our awful attempts at ‘Nihao&rsquo [View Full Entry]

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I’m afraid Cass and I have officially been KPop’d… right upside the head, without us even knowing it. …and danngit, it feels good. Korea is a place steeped with a rich culture, a place evolving at a pace rarely seen in the world, with a strong desire to be hip. In every sense of the word. Enter…the world of KPop. The pop culture has grown incredibly in the past decade or so, so much so that it has been dubbed as the Korean Wave. Movies, television shows, music, fashion… you name it, it’s kpoped to the nine’s. Can two kids from [View Full Entry]

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From the first day we knew we were coming to South Korea, there’s always been that lingering voice in our ears whispering, ‘North Korea.’ From this computer in Yeoju, to the most dangerous and heavily guarded border on the planet, is a distance of approximately 70 miles. Yes, there is technically a war still being fought one hour’s drive north of Seoul. At times, that thought can be a bit eerie, yet most of the time, it’s just business as usual around here. Despite all of the news lately that has been full of reports pertaining to, missile or satellite… [View Full Entry]

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Setting foot in any national park there is usually an ‘aha’ moment when you realize why this particular parcel of earth is designated so valuable we need to hoist it to a higher pedestal than that of, let’s say, a pig lot. The national park system, setting aside your philosophy on how they are or should be managed, is one on the great inventions the United States has shared with the world. With that in mind, and with countless recommendations by the locals, Cass and I and a couple of other friends (the irony is they’re Canadian), Jason and Rachel, went [View Full Entry]

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“Good morning class.” “Good moning teecha.” “How are you doing today?” “Fine. Tank you. How about you? “I’m excellent, thank you. How’s the weather today?” “It’s…” a collective contemplation falls over the class. One boy in the back of the room says, “yellow?” “Let’s try this again. How’s the weather today, class?” “ It’s… yellow dust today.” “I don’t know what that means. Um, foggy? Is it foggy today?” Half the class [View Full Entry]

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