Blogs from South Korea, Asia - page 334

Hello Everybody! This blog is about our two dear friends, Tara and Calvin....who both left English Village about 2 weeks ago. They are now safe and sound back in Canada (in a little town called REGINA - that rhymes with fun, haha!), enjoying the holidays with their families. Soon they will be looking for jobs, a house, a car, and putting the final touches on their wedding day - which will occur this June! (Wow...sounds exactly like what we'll be doing when we return to the U.S.!) These pictures are from a few of our last couple of outings with Tara and Calvin. The largest set of pictures are from their E.V. Going-Away Party (with most of the other teachers here) at our local pub, the Double Decker. Here, we all shared in a few good ... read more

So my Hagwon ( school academy) director Joseph gets his arse into gear , some teaching cover is arranged, which allows me to obtain my E2 work visa = a trip to Japan !! Emma haS to stay behind to work so off I go alone to the ' Land of the Rising Sun’ - YES ! .........SUMO, SAKHI & SUSHI have always wanted to go there- . Cutting edge technology, the chance of experiencing an imminent earthquake even..... - Don't get me wrong Korea is fascinating , querky and often infuriating but Japan for me has always had a certain allure. Ever since I was captivated as a 7 year old when I first watched the kids cult classic ' Monkey' ERM plus some documentary showing a bullet train speeding through skyscraper at some ridiculous ... read more

Ill have to admit, the powers of Karaoke rested latent inside me until somewhat recently. Not unlike a young Clark Kent who discovered his talents set him apart from other mild-mannered journalists, yours truly has leaped his own tall building of sorts and came down nothing short of super. The Korean people take their Karaoke frightfully serious and any type of foreign invasion could tip the balance of an already slippery sino-american state of relations. I, of course, took this great responsibility into consideration before I stormed the stage last Saturday. A brief note on the history of Karaoke: The year was 1895, a young Korean man named Sang Kim-Long was working in a small, out of the way, soju joint in the area now known as Busan. The nation was still reeling and rife ... read more

Wine Party About a week ago, Dave organized a little wine party for anyone who was interested. He was able to gather about 12 of us and naturally it ended up being mostly foreign teachers. So, this wasn't the kind of wine and cheese party where everyone brings something and all share, or the kind of party where Dave is kind enough to supply several bottles of wine for the enjoyment of others. Though Dave may be a generous guy, he's a bit smarter than that. If you're going to have a wine party, how about you find out a way to make the wine free for everyone? Dave found an add for a wine distributor that puts on wine tastings for large groups. He spread the word, gathered enough of us, called the guy, and ... read more

For those of you keeping track, it's been awhile since I last posted a blog. I hadn't really done any traveling around Korea and work has been keeping me busy (and I've been a little bit lazy). For the whole month of December I've been working with my Kindies practicing our play - Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer - for the school's winter Drama Festival. It hasn't been the easiest thing to do, but I think once we finally present the play to the parents, it should turn out okay. I thought it would have been a lot harder for the kids to memorize 6 lines each and 2 songs, but they've worked really hard and are able to get through it! Anyways, this weekend I decided that Sunday would be a good day to venture into ... read more