A week in the Life (Part 2)


Advertisement
South Korea's flag
Asia » South Korea » Jeollanam-do » Yeosu
November 23rd 2012
Published: November 23rd 2012
Edit Blog Post

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Wednesdays are usually a good time for me. There are only three classes and I'm done by lunch. This day was much like the rest except that I had to fill in a double class of after school students, which was brought to my attention in the morning. So, without adequate time to get a lesson planned for 80 minutes I did what my coteacher recommended and put on a movie.

Overall the school day was pretty good. We even had a decent lunch, bibimbap. For those that have never had it it's basically a bowl of rice topped with various vegetables and an egg. You mix the bowl together and and load on as much red pepper sauce as you like. It's the pinnacle of school lunches. I don't eat it a lot on my free time but I never used to eat a lot of corn dogs and chili frito's back in my youth either but when they show up on the lunch menu you know it's going to be a better day than most.

After work, rather than head to they gym like we do on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Friday we headed up to Suncheon, the next town up. On the train we made it there in about 25 minutes. We weren't heading up for any sights or cultural happenings but instead to go to Homeplus, a department store. Of course we have department stores in Yeosu. Three actually. But for familiar western foods Homeplus is the best option outside of Seoul and with no Costco in sight. It's funny but I know get so excited when I see Greek olives, Feta cheese, various pasta noodles, sardines in olive oil and load of other stuff I would just take for granted back in the U.S. I will also pay completely unreasonable prices for things just because. I'm pretty sure I've never spent $10 on a crappy plastic container of parmesan cheese before and I'll probably never do it again after Korea. I don't even look at the price of chunky peanut butter. If it's there I'm having it. All these prices and that's before I even get to the beer sections. $9 bottle of I.P.A.? Well, I guess you've got to treat yourself sometimes. Throw it in.

The reason we were in need of a few home ingrediants was Thanksgiving. I've had four of them over here. Each time we've done really well for ourselves. Even managed to get a turkey, something completely out of this world over here, 3 of the 4 years. Last years turkey, $90. Buy like I said, you do these things to treat yourself. You also invite a bunch of friends to eat it and share in the cost. This year wth just the two of us it was chicken and a load of sides.

We made it back to our apartment around 10:00 after lugging our shopping bags to the train and from the train to a waiting taxi. I then set into getting things ready for the pumpkin pie I would make in the morning. Having set the crust and hoped for the best we drifted off to sleep.



Thursday, November 22, 2012

Woke early today and threw the pumpkin pie together. I sleepily whipped the cream for the top and forgot to add the sugar, something I would fix when I made it home that afternoon. I usually can't stand my Thursdays. Because we're in such a small town and not everyschool can't affoard an English teach some decide to share them. I'm one of the them. Last year I was lucky, my school was good. The students were well behaved and I had my own computer in the library for my down time. This year I wasn't as lucky. Now, I should love Thursdays. I get to leave at 3:10 instead of hanging around til 5:00. That's the good part. The kids though are another story. Actually, the 4th and 5th grades have gotten better but the 6th grade. Man, they're tough. Easily in the running for the worst classes I've ever taught. In fact, I just thought about it and yeah, they just won. They're completely disrespectful and give absolutely no effort. My co-teacher doesn't seem to mind as she text messages on her smart phone at the back of the room and I have to lecture the kids at least once on listening and doing they're work.

This day was no different. I went into my first 6th grade class and spent 40 minutes talking to a wall. Great fun. The second class, I went in knowing that I was going to be speaking to the wall and ended up speaking to the wall and one kid so I'd call that a win. 3:10 hit and I was flying out the door to prepare dinner.

Back in our apartment I studied our two burner stove, lack of an oven or microwave and tried to figure out how to cook everything and how to keep it hot. Suddenly it came to me, aluminum foil. I diced up the celery, onions, and bread for the stuffing. Started making the cranberry juice. Took my bacon wrapped asparagus spears and placed them into a foil pouch with half a lemon and placed it directly on the burner to cook. After 20 minutes that was done so I carved the chicken and heated up the meat while the potatoes boiled away. Once the chicken was heated I then placed that into foil and folded it up air tight. The potatoes were finished so I mashed them and mixed in my chives while starting the stuffing. With that going and everything still warm, I whipped up some gravy from my chicken stock that I'd made and as Jen came home with the wine we were ready to eat. There was no football game in the background but my stomache felt like it was Thanksgiving. And when we polished off two pieces of pumpkin pie each I knew we'd been successful. It wasn't as good as the real thing but over here you never strive for that. It's all about making it close enough. A replica Thanksgiving meal.

Friday, November 23rd, 2012

Well today's the day. 30. I always here people dreading that number but it hasn't bothered me. I woke this morning with a big smile and still feeling like a teenager and laughing at things that are way to stupid to laugh at so I'm not sure what it means to be 30. It'll take awhile to get used to dropping the number 2 from my age but I think I'll be fine with it. So far it's been a really great birthday. I had to work but it's been good, even my afternoon class was cancled so happy birthday to me.

This morning when I woke up Jen told me I had to watch something. She wouldn't tell me what it was so I was curious. As I sat down I saw a couple of our old friends, back in England, with a recorded message wishing me happy birthday. I was caught off gaurd and really enjoyed watching it and then she told me there were more. Through out the morning I watched videos, some short and to the point, others elaborate and choreographed for what looked like days. All were great and they went down well with my raspberry and whipped cream crepe's that Jen made for me.

Now I'm sitting at my desk waiting for the hours to go buy before we go to properly celebrate my birthday. We're off to Busan this weekend to swim with some sharks in the aquarium. I had been trying to think of something memorable to do for my 30th and what could be more memorable than possibly loosing a finger to some gnarly toothed shark? We have a couple of friends heading down as well so we'll either celebrate retaining all of our limbs or look back mournful at the pieces we'd lost in the tank. Either way, we shouldn't forget it.

Advertisement



Tot: 0.101s; Tpl: 0.009s; cc: 6; qc: 54; dbt: 0.0579s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.1mb