“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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Being relatively ‘old hats’ at this Korean gig, we still find ourselves in positions that truly boggle our minds. These last two weekends we went back on the prowl, the first weekend to Seoul and this past weekend we began our assault on the southern half of this country. Before our routine begins again with the start of the school year March 2nd, we caught some good music, were given an interesting gift courtesy of our accommodations, and saw some of the oldest and most incredible sights of Korean’s Buddhism history. Seoul, as often as we visit there, still has surprises [View Full Entry]

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Taking a vacation from what seems to be a vacation was a new concept for Cass and I, but after our jaunt to the Philippines, we found out that we come back to Korea with fresh eyes. Still, seeing signs we don’t understand, and being surrounded by people that can only half communicate with us, has become the familiarity of home. It was over a week since we had to… “Gangnam Apat-a ka Juseyo (go to Gangnam Apartment please),” but pulling into the Family Mart (‘Fam-ee-lee Mawt ka juseyo’) and tossing our backpacks on the cement from the backseat of the [View Full Entry]

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What can I possibly say about this place? There is definitely a heaven on earth and it is found here, without a doubt. The sirens song and clarity of water is truly irresistible, the sand tugs childhood fantasies of sandcastle building and burying a loved one instantly to the surface so much that you need to recognize and act on them. The breezes dance through the palm trees and drift over your skin to butterfly kiss your sun drenched cheeks. Here, your mind has the room it has yearned for, leaving the complexities of life somewhere in the banana tree groves [View Full Entry]

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I have finally figured out Hollywood. I’ve got all those television commercials pegged. I know the secrets of those tourist ad campaigns where a sweeping shot of the most beautiful beach imaginable is shown, where it quickly becomes the backdrop for some catch line as, ‘Visit the most beautiful white sand beaches in the world during your visit to (fill in the blank).’ Yup, I’m on to all of them. Here’s the secret… Boracay, Philippines is all of those pictures. No matter the country, the continent, or hemisphere, it’s Boracay. Boracay is the silhouette [View Full Entry]

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*Sorry about the pictures, doubles, etc., the internet has been hit or miss for about a week now, and i'm not exactly sure what's gonna make the blog or not* Our second day in the Philippines was going to consist of a day trip outside of the mayhem that is Manila, about thirty miles to the south. As trip planning usually goes, our original ideas of getting to the northern part of the country ended up being a bit grandiose for the time we had on the ‘mainland.’ We thought we’d get our nature fix in the way of the active [View Full Entry]

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…that’s the only accurate way to describe our 48 hours and change in the hub of this chaotic, charming, threatening, beautiful island-style of city. We had a long day of travel, as all really are, but after planes, trains, and automobiles, we touched down on Filipino soil. Almost in coordination with each other, we realized that we were going to be in for an adventure that would easily top our first week in Korea, a feat for the ages. Once through immigration and customs, again just a formality in this part of the world, not the rigorous and violating Guantanamo Bay-like [View Full Entry]

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Over the course of my life I’ve developed this theory that things, whatever they may be, life, health, sports, work, are always striving for homeostasis. This concept was introduced to me, and don’t all laugh at once, through the Pauly Shore movie, Biodome. Yes, Pauly Shore… and yes, I’ve seen it more than once. It’s not my favorite movie by any means, but you know those Sunday afternoons on TBS when the station runs those movies no one really cares about, that’s a golden time to catch a movie like Biodome. A quick synopsis of the movie, to fill in the [View Full Entry]

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I’m afraid this blog is going to have nothing to do with Korea, what kind of unfamiliar situations, or observations that we are succumbing to over here. My apologies for this. Although, in a round about way, the topic of this blog is about something that is happening to me while I’m in Korea; so if you can stretch your mind, it fits. This writing is more about something that has been affecting me, weighing on me, this week, while in Korea. Now, I don’t consider myself a writer any more than I think of myself as a politician or an [View Full Entry]

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We find ourselves sitting in a precarious position stuck between seeing the holidays come and go, an interesting feeling half a world away from anything or anyone, having the weather representative of everything people hate about winter with its bitter cold temperatures with very little snow to enjoy, and staring at the calendar counting down the days until we depart for the Philippines. After finagling all of the plans, payment methods, email conversations with far too many people, we have most of our trip taken care of and paid for. With our bankbooks getting thinner, and for a good reason w [View Full Entry]

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