Much of our trip was consumed with tours here and excursions there, but on the rare day that we had free, we were able to wander the city of the day and experience it for ourselves. This is just what we did on this day in Ha Noi. After eating our free breakfast at the hotel, the three of us decided to head to a bank and get some of the local currency. The nice lady at the North Hotel gave us a map of the area, and we set out in an attempt to get our bearings and find the [View Full Entry]

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It seemed like years ago already that Jess and I arrived in Korea together and began our year-long contract. In reality, however, we'd just finally reached out vacation month, and today was day one. I discovered (by complete accident) through a student of mine that the flight today would not be a direct one. I thought I already knew this, as our flight path included a stop (and change of planes) in Bangkok. As it turns out, there was also a stop and 30 minute wait in Hong Kong. We departed Seoul Incheon International A [View Full Entry]

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Yes, the battle has been a bloody one. Predictibly, time has passed on, and my laziness has increased to the point that this is my first update of this spot since our return from Beijing. As it happens, I'm now on the verge of the Next Great Adventure. Our flight departs Incheon Airport at 10:30am on March 5th. We're headed for a one hour layover in Bangkok before continuing to our final destination of Hanoi, Vietnam. We have two nights booked at a hostel in Hanoi, following which, we plan to visit Halong Bay. Follow [View Full Entry]

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Although I am certain that my taste of Beijing was little more than a cursory examination of a much larger beast, I am still at a near loss for words in trying to describe it further. Early in the morning of December 25th, 2005, Jess and I met our friends Angela and Giselle at their apartment up the hill from here. Together, we made the ten minute journey over the crest of the hill, and down the other side to Itaewon, where the airport busses stop across from the Hamilton Hotel every fifteen minutes. Within about five, one arrived, and we [View Full Entry]

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“이 천 원!” the older man grumbled at me, as he finished pressing my pants. “What the hell. . .” I thought, sure I had paid for these pants when I originally dropped them off for mending and dry cleaning. I’d picked them up a few days later, only to notice that the hole in the ass had gone unrepaired. I immediately returned to explain that I needed the hole mended, assuming that he understood he’d made a mistake in not fixing them the first time. Now here I was picking them up (actually mended this time, however) and being re [View Full Entry]

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Whoever told me that snow in Seoul is minimal and doesn't last more than a few hours on the ground is a goddamned liar. Saturday afternoon, one of my middle school students got a text message on her cell phone, and literally jumped up during class and ran to the window. "Teacher, SNOW!" she yelled, prompting the others to get up and move toward the window to see. I went and had a look, but saw little more than a few tiny flakes the size of grains of sand. "You call that snow?" I asked, scoffing at their enthusiasm. "If you [View Full Entry]

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It's almost as though it never happened. I look back at the previous entries on this site, and I wonder if it could really have been I who wrote them. I know the memories are there: stored alongside others entirely unlike them from the past twenty-plus years. The time, however . . . seems not to have even passed. It's the second of December as I sit and type in the warmth of my spare bedroom. The wind was cold today, but the sun was bright, and the air was crisp and fresh, and I felt a thrill as it occurred [View Full Entry]

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So obviously this is the first update in quite some time. I haven't been writing in my paper diary, either. I've recently become conscious of the simple fact that I've slipped into the doldrums of day to day life in Seoul. When we first arrived here, every day was an adventure. The simplest of tasks was made an absolute freakshow by our inability to speak Korean, our attempts at finding our way around, adjusting to the new job. . . Around the 3.5 or 4 month point, everything had more or less normalized, and we were over the awe of being [View Full Entry]

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Well, autumn is slowly beginning to settle over the Korean peninsula resulting in evening temperatures reaching as low as 10c sometimes. Those of you reading from Ontario are probably scoffing at this, as I understand the weather there has been rather on the miserable side for the last couple of weeks. Not in Seoul, however. The average daytime high temperature is still around 20 or 22 degrees celcius. For example, the Yonhap news service website tells me that today, Seoul is set to enjoy a mostly sunny day with a high of 24c and a low tonight of 13c. Tomorrow, the [View Full Entry]

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This past weekend was Chuseok, the Korean version of thanksgiving. Normally it's a few days from what I understand, but this year, only Saturday to Monday were days off. Since I don't work Fridays, however, I was able to enjoy a four day weekend, which was quite nice. On Friday, Jess worked to cover one of our co-workers who was taking a personal day of leave for a presumably personal reason. I kind of hung around the house, and cleaned up, went food shopping and waited for Jess to get home. She arrived, and after relaxing for a bit, we got [View Full Entry]

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