Shopping In Seoul

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Dear Blog Readers,

I realised last week’s lacklustre attempt at a blog went relatively unnoticed so I’ll make this one a bit better. I also completely forgot to add any photos so I’ve put some on there now so maybe it will become more ‘readable’ in a round-a-bout sort of way. I’ve been in a horrific mood this weekend for no apparent reason but I hope that by writing down everything that has happened during the week that it may cause it to transpire as a culmination of events.

Mum sent me a few photos of a snow-covered home, including a picture of the chickens, who are now fast becoming celebrities in the lessons. The students think ‘Marjorie, Rita and Babs’ are the funniest names ever; but then again, I find some of their names hilarious so it’s only fair. They’re also wondering how we will eat the chickens, and they have suggested having fried chicken because it’s surprisingly good here! I also had a good chat with Dad about the Test Match. Korean’s don’t really understand cricket so I don’t have anybody else to chat about it to. Luckily, we’re only about an hour time difference from Australia so I can keep relatively up to date via the internet. Dad, on the other hand, is listening to the Test Match nocturnally since it starts at about midnight at home and finishes about 8am. I can just imagine Mum jumping out of her skin during Dad’s celebration of Ricky Ponting being out for a duck in the second innings at 2:30am in the morning.

After school on Monday I went to the dentist with Laura. I say ‘dentist’ in the loosest sense of the word. The four dentist chairs are in a row in a room with no barrier between them so you can see the horrific procedures occurring about two foot away from you. The scratches on the partial barriers between the chairs can only be the remains of flying teeth and plague coming from the victim. Laura sat back as I went into the waiting room and pretending to watch another Korean soap opera waiting for the outcome. I was initially hygienically nervous due to the transfer of the same tools from the previous patient and the fact that the dentist wasn’t wearing any gloves. This nervousness soon turned to almost laughable surprise after the three seconds it took for him to look into Laura’s mouth. He sat back, looked to the ceiling, thought for a minute, then put his head in his hands before getting his cell phone. What could possibly have gone wrong!? After a ten minute discussion, the person on the other end of the phone translated what had been said in little over 10 seconds. Laura needed a crown and it would cost 300,000Won! 300,000Won! Does she think we’re English teachers on a very good wage considering the cost of living!? Since it wasn’t hurting, she decided to skip the procedure. And anyway, “you can buy at least 10 pairs of skinny jeans for that price in Fashion News in Cheongju!”

At school we have a messaging system, it’s a bit like MSN Messenger but between the teachers. It’s been great for sorting things out quickly between Eun-bi and I. Other than these messages, the rest are all in Korean. Sometimes I translate the short ones to try and understand what is going on by putting them into an online translator. I thought it would be good to put one of the longer messages in on Tuesday morning because the message on my screen was in larger-than-usual letters and some of them were even in red! Anyway, the translation was truly exceptional:

“There are many, and you come here today nothing more than an
injection River your message. Working with supplementary budget and
will be conducted, and each business in charge of the expansion of
business, or reduced the people you if you have any vent their
frustration informed until the 9th, please. The Samneric each of which
is in charge of, and budget funding is not written out achieving when
we get to the supplementary budget if elsewhere in the next year, or
written over Israel because in the four, and do what you need to do,
dignity; and to the budget to be executed care about me to write
Royal. Israel's into once said. Definite purpose to worry about.”

I was therefore a little apprehensive starting my Grade 3 classes on Tuesday. Should I be concerned about the “Injection River your message”, or should I send my lesson plan to “Royal” or “written over Israel”? Furthermore, I had a definite purpose to teach adjectives and idioms that morning which I probably should now start worrying about.

Luckily Grade 3 had their creative juices flowing. I stole an idea from my friend to use Garfield comic strips to fill in the speech bubbles. This time they had to fill it in with an adjective or idiom that I had taught during the lesson. One of the difficult adjectives was telling the difference between ‘falling’ and ‘fallen’ – which one student exclaimed, “Ah! The Fallen! Your brother’s band!”. Some of the students failed at the task in hand but redeemed themselves with comical effect. I’ve put some of their comics onto this blog for you to have a look at.

It was freezing cold on Wednesday morning, so much so that most of my walk to school was walking over black ice. I’d managed to get all the way to the front of the school gates before, what I can only assume to be ‘invisible’ ice planted by some of the students waiting for my inevitable outcome. Thankfully, I masterfully balanced my way out of the slip and casually walked into school assuming none of the 25 students who surrounded me had noticed.

Mr Shin phoned me the previous evening to let me know he’d had to work at the dormitory the night before. This isn’t an enjoyable job – he basically has to stay up all night making sure that the Grade 3 boys at his high school don’t leave the dormitory. Unfortunately, this was combined with the cold he was now suffering from, meant that he was extremely tired for the day’s lessons. Grades 1 and 2 have just finished their exams so thankfully, we were able to get through the lesson with ‘The Magic Schoolbus’. I chose the comically titled episode, ‘Going Batty’, but after seeing the same episode 8 times, the main sequence title lost its comic effect.

I asked for some feedback from my 4 Grade 3 students who have attended my English Extra Class. I say 4, I’ve actually had a 50% increase in the intake from two students who have optionally wanted to come to it. Unbelievable! I loved one of my student’s feedbacks, “Sometimes so boring (very very sometimes).”

G-market is phenomenal. It is the Korean version of E-bay. If you manage to navigate your way around the website and not suffer from an epileptic fit due to the constantly flashing images, then you are rewarded with extraordinary cheap goods. I got all of my snowboarding gear for about £150 (goggles, jacket, trousers, socks) and they threw in an extra pair of trousers and loads more accessories for free! G-market is great until they get something wrong. Laura’s jacket was ordered two weeks ago and they sent her the correct pattern but the trousers. So we repackaged the trousers and sent them back only for them to send us the exact same pair of trousers in a different bag a couple of days later! Absolute madness. We’re assured the jacket is on its way…or maybe it will be another pair of trousers.

This weekend we went into Seoul. I like Seoul because it’s so different from Boeun. I hate Seoul because it’s so different from Boeun. Laura knows how much I love shopping so the thought of spending a whole weekend doing one of the things I loathe the most filled me with excitement. She sugar-coated the ensuing spending by buying me my birthday present which was a great little mp4 player. We went to the electronics market in Seoul which is phenomenally big and full of everything you could possibly want. Unfortunately, this means there are about 250 people selling exactly the same thing. My mistakes came two-fold, firstly, I had no idea what I wanted, which meant I was simply lead down the inevitable hard sales push from every single person trying to sell. Did you know that a product made in Korea is at least ten times better than one made in China? Also, the battery life for a Korean mp4 player is 25 hours compared to a measly 12 hours for one made in China (note: I did do the maths, and that is actually only 2.083 times better but I wasn’t prepared to argue in Korean…or Chinese.).

We circled the shops and realised how absolutely freezing cold it was. Laura had only come out in shorts and tights so she was feeling it much worse than me, but the excitement of shopping numbed the pain. Shopping really isn’t created for men. Even in the clothes shops where the women’s clothes occupy at least 97% of the shop so no wonder men get bored after individually going through every single item of clothing available in their 3% section. Of course, my favourite shop is the girly accessory and jewellery shop where I suddenly become fascinated in the ‘Hello Kitty’ earrings which are suspiciously perched just above the industrial sized heater beneath them. Reluctantly, we ventured back out into the cold where the ‘God Squad’ of Korea were performing their rendition of Christmas carols next to some palm readers. I’ve considered going to get my palm read but I fear that they might panic if they don’t know any English and they would have to constantly be using the future tense which must be difficult for them. Instead I went and had a kebab on the main street. Yes, a kebab.

I did buy a couple of shirts in one shop which is quite adventurous for me. I came down the stairs to show Laura only to be confronted with what appeared to be a bright purple yeti. Then I realised this was Laura’s new purchase. She insists, “It’s so warm…and it’s reversible!” We then went into a department store to buy a Christmas Tree and some decorations. It is quite possibly the smallest Christmas Tree ever but I’m pleased that at least we’re making the effort when our families at home still haven’t put theirs up. They don’t really celebrate Christmas much here so we’re not really feeling the Christmassy vibe yet.

We stayed at our ‘usual’ motel in Seoul and found a really cool café next to it which neighbours the Yamaha Music Academy. Fortunately, this means that they have a Yamaha Grand Piano in the café which I had a quick play on and even got a round of applause from some nearby Koreans. The woman who owns the café even gave us a 100 Won discount so I think it was worthwhile. Anyway, enjoy the photos and we’ll be back same time next week!

Tink and Laura

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Photos

Shopping In Seoul
Laura looking suitably cold.

Kebab
Not as good as the ones in Nottingham but not a bad try!

Korean
I think this coffee chain is unique to Korea, it's called "스타벅스"

Beer Restaurant
Not only is the title oxymoronic. I was also intrigued what "world beer" and "drink" consisted of. Oh and of course "wisky."

Comic 1
He seems like a kind robber. At least he says thanks!

Comic 2
This student was playing with a paper airplane until I scrunched it up. If only he'd wrote, "Teacher is the Destroyer"...

Comic 3
Well I wasn't expecting that ending!

Comic 4
I'm failing to see the sense of urgency here!

Caffe Themselves
Sometimes you can see what they are trying to say but failing. But this one was just plain ridiculous.

Piano
My playing was worth just under 5p.

Seoul
Nice temple.

Comments

[Eric song]

nice!!
I have to say!! there are some hilarious names of shops and places and etc!! makes me smile when im walking down the streets then people just look at me with giving me expressions of "what are you smiling at you perv!?, or freak!? " etc etc. Matey!! you need to do plenty of shopping before it gets literally "antarctically" freezing!! lol one question though! what are the kebabs like in Seoul? anything even close to the ones in England?? x

[Tink And Laura]

Kebab
Haha! Yeh some of the signs are really funny. The kebabs in Seoul are not a touch on the ones in England, but I commend them for having a good try! They put the meat with salad and chilli sauce in a tortilla wrap rather than garlic sauce in a naan bread!