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jimjilbang
yay for pink outfits and not orange! ha haAfter 2 weeks of very sporadic weather (sweating in the heat walking to work one day and then freezing with a winter coat on the next) I think Cheongju has decided to let Summer begin. The last three days have been very warm and I know it's only going to get hotter. I won't complain yet because I know there will be plenty of that to come...ha ha.
Last weekend, as soon as we were out of work on Friday, we decided to check out one of the local jimlilbangs. Before we checked in for the night we decided to grab some dinner at a place very close to where we all live that has been completely packed every time we walk by it. It's a rather small restaurant and the biggest table seats 4 so our group has always had some trouble. We walked in once and everyone just kind of looked at us like we were crazy. There was no room for us. Friday we went with only 5 of us so we squeezed in at a table. This place was SO good. We were so excited when we saw the menu because there were so many familiar
things...quesadillas, fried chicken, calamari, pork cutlet, cheesy fries, and plenty of korean food. We each ordered something yummy and waited with anticipation. I think a few of the things we ordered were "sets," or commonly shared between groups of people. But of course, we each ate almost our entire plates. I think the owner was happy with our spending so 3 large, glass bottles of coke were placed on our table and the waitress said, "service," which apparently means free. So that was nice! And nice is a lovely surprise when dining at a place where everyone speaks Korean. That was my first experience with extreme kindness here so far. Since all we'd heard was that there was a jimjilbang in bunpyeongdong, we decided to ask our waitress if she knew where it was so we had something to tell the taxi driver. Within a few seconds, there were 3 waiters trying to help us and write directions down for us. Then one guy (possibly the owner?) says "want me call taxi...come here." Yes we do, please! So this guy calls a taxi driver on his phone and then goes outside and WAITS with us until he shows up. He
then gives the taxi driver directions. So friendly! I was very impressed with his kindness and we plan on returning to the restaurant, for sure! It's always nice to not feel like a huge inconvenience. This guy was so happy to help us.
My other kind story for the week: (Yes, I have 2!!) Jake, Nick, and I decided to head downtown for dinner and a movie and we wanted to try to take the city bus, which we had done once before...kind of on accident. So we see this kid standing near a bus sign and we ask him, can we wait here for a bus to downtown? He thinks about it and says no...we need to go up the street and to the left and wait at that bus stop. Okay...we start walking. After we are quite a ways away, the kid appears behind us, this time with two sacks in his hands that are full of green vegetables. He's like "i'm sorry, you need to go right, not left...and wait at that bus stop." We were like ooooh my goodness, thank you. Wow, that was nice of him. Then he turns around and BOLTS off running
Bunnies
They have these on the streets at night and you play a game and if you win you take the bunny. at a sprint, with the bags, across 5 lanes of traffic and doesn't even look. We watch him in amazement as he runs, ridiculously fast back to where he came from. So either he likes to run, or he was supposed to be somewhere and kindly ran to us to let us know the correct directions. I definitely thought that was extremely nice and worth mentioning.
No for a not-so-nice story. In the last 2 weeks, 4 people have opened my apartment door without even the slightest knock. The first time...let's just say it was unfortunate for her. Jake was out on a bike ride and I decided to do a little bit of yoga to stretch and help my back. I have a disc on my computer and a yoga mat so there I went, doing yoga. I get to a lovely position...(i don't know the names) where my two feet are spread apart, farther than the shoulders, and my hands are supposed to be touching the floor, in between my legs. So, I am in this position when a Korean women opens my door with absolutely NO notice. This would be fine, if I wasn't in my
Picture time
1 of 3 pictures that I took. All unsuccessful ha ha underwear! Yes, I was wearing shorts/underwear/pajamas and a shirt. And yes, I was facing towards the door that she opened. So lucky for her she got a nice shot of my yoga pose...and my butt cheeks. Thank you for knocking. She preceded to speak in Korean and kind of wave her hands (maybe meaning sorry?) and then she closed the door and left. Since then, THREE men have opened the door and looked inside. The last time a guy did it, Jake was standing right by the door...and the guy opened it, looked at us, and then left. Jake opens the door and goes outside. In a pretty stern voice he goes "next time...knock" and starts demonstrating how to knock on the door. The guy said sorry a few times in English and then left. I have NO idea who these people are or what they want!
Back to the jimjilbang. This time we all decided to get hour long massages. Jack has been really sore from his intense bike workouts, and I'm always sore from doing nothing so I was really looking forward to it. Five of us signed up for massages, the first one starting at 2am.
There were only 2 people giving the massages so I finished around 4:30 in the morning. After that we grabbed some spicy, ramen noodles in the restaurant. All of this is located on the 3rd floor of the spa, which is for males and females, and primarily for sleeping. I saw many children this time, which I thought was odd. On the 4th floor, which is the female locker rooms, and showers, I saw a little girl showering at like 1:30 in the morning. Anyway, it was a fairly nice jimjilbang. The different sauna's were decorated pretty lavishly. The cold room was so pretty. I forgot to take pictures! It was all white like the inside of a freezer but the whole ceiling was crystals and shiny rocks that sparkled and there was a pretty chandelier hanging. It reminded me of those frozen hotels that you can stay in. Also, upstairs in the spa, there was an outdoor area that I went in in the middle of the night. It was a shallow pool made of stones and it was really hot and filled with minerals that made the water red. I was the only one out there so I
Omelet
Jake has PERFECTED the omelet and makes really good ones. Yum :) just sat there and relaxed and looked up at the sky. I could see a total of ONE star. ha ha. But it was relaxing and nice.
Saturday night we invited two of our Korean coworkers and one their husbands our with us. They took us to some Korean restaurant/bar/club places rather than the western one we usually go to. When Koreans hang out with friends for an evening it usually consists of at least 3 to 4 different places. One dinner, then another dinner, then a beer place, where you just sit at tables and talk and hang out, and then maybe a bar that actually plays music, and then a club, and maybe food after that. Pretty intense evening. First, we ate dinner and after dinner one of the Koreans asked me why we weren't drinking beer or soju at dinner. I was like...umm I don't know? I hate beer, Jake doesn't drink, maybe everyone else was trying to save money? I have no idea! She was like oh...in Korean culture, when you have dinner with friends, there is always, always been and soju so I didn't know if something was wrong. Ha ha I was like
Friendly girls
These little girls were eating at pizza hut and came out and bombarded us with Hello Where are you from? Nice to meet you. They were sweet ooh oops! Sorry...we did it wrong. She said, no it's fine, just strange. Culture lesson #1 for the evening.
I went to my first Korean club with our coworkers. That was pretty interesting and I knew it would be when I walked in and saw a pole in the middle of the room. Ha ha. It was pretty much just people standing in groups at first. As it got later, and everyone's alcohol intake increased, the Koreans became more friendly, ha ha! I was in the restroom and another girl came in. She looked at me and said "where are you from?" I was excited to see a Korean speaking to me in English! I told her where I was from and she said "my name is..." and I told her mine, which ....almost no one here can say. I think the "th" is rough. So the second time, I always say BE-TA-NEE. That usually helps. Anyway, later when the crowd and the music picked up, I saw her and her friends up towards the front half heatedly dancing. I ran up there and started dancing in the middle of all of them and they went nuts. Like screaming
and clapping and they all started dancing with me. Ha ha it was hilarious. And then Jen and Ra got up on the stage and started dancing and everyone came and watched and clapped and cheered. It was funny because up until that point I kind of felt like...awkward, we are the only foreigners here. do they hate us? After our dancing session, two Korean gangster rappers came out and put on a live show. Jen and I decided that since we were sweating and it was rather loud, we would go outside and cool off. We go out there for a couple minutes just sitting and talking and then one of our coworkers comes out and she's like "What are you guys doing? Why did you leave?" We were like oh sorry, we were just hot and tired so we came up here to get some air. She then preceded to tell us that it is very rare to get to see live performances like that and that those guys were really good. Oops! She was confused/shocked that we would leave during there performance. Korean culture lesson #2 for the night.
Sunday, Jake, Ben and I went to
Coworker
This is Brenda, she's VERY helpful everyday at work and has great English church and found out we are going to get adopted by a Korean family! Fun! I guess they will invite us to do things with them, go out to eat, etc. Sunday night, the other two american teachers that teach in Bunpyeongdong, came to our area and we ordered pizza (that was AMAZING) and we all ate on our roof as the sun set. The weather was nice so it was perfect. After that we went inside and I taught everyone how to play fishbowl. They loved it and we played 2 rounds! It was hilarious and I think everyone had fun.
I forgot to mention one funny story from Saturday night. One of the Korean teachers tells me after dinner that I look like Charlize Theron (have no fear, I did not take this compliment too seriously) and that she told her brother about me and he wants to see a picture. I kindly laughed and said, no I don't think I do, ha ha but thank you. Fast forward...we are at a drink place sitting around the table hanging out and she gets out her phone and says let's take a picture. She takes one and it
Hmmm
Saw these guys at the club is pretty dark so she doesn't like it. I tell her I have my camera and it has a flash. So I take a picture of the 2 of us. She looks at it and says "ahhh no...I don't like." I'm assuming she is talking about herself. Koreans in general, seem to be quite vain and blunt. We saw many adds in a magazine advertising for new hairlines, new breast shape, new eyelids, etc. Anyway, after the second picture I realized that she wanted a picture to show her brother...she didn't like how I looked, ha ha, not her. The story goes...that I took THREE pictures, and did my normal, smile-I'm-happy-face, and she did not like any of them. LAUGH OUT LOUD. I thought it was pretty funny. She didn't say no you look ugly. She just kept saying, "no I don't like...I want to show you are beautiful." HA HA HA So apparently I am only beautiful sometimes, and when I'm wearing make up and giving my best smile, I am not. I thought it was all rather funny.
Good times in Cheongju. I'd love to hear from everyone at home! Happy Honeymoon to Stacey!!! And a shout out to Nanny, who's birthday was yesterday.
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Lacey
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im luaghing: "and I'm always sore from doing nothing." ha, wow. "a total of ONE star." wow. Yay, hanging out with Koreans...you learned Korean things: drink soju! take advantage of live performances! Glad your friends enjoyed fishbowl, fun! And hilarious story about that girl taking pictures of you 3 times and not like it!!! hahaha.