Mmmmmm, things that move in your mouth are tasty

Remember the show "Empty Nest"? I'm totally watching that right now. It's bringing memories of nights spent at my Grammas back in the day. Blast from the past . . .

Anyway, last week was the pits for various reasons, but this week is off to a somewhat better start. Today was Teacher's Day at school - a holiday that I now firmly believe should be implemented in Canada. Basically, the kids and parent's say thanks by buying you presents. Ashley and I scored the most today. I got lots of lotions and washes (including way too expensive Lancombe face stuff that I can't use because it's to whiten your skin), 2 watches, lots of scarves, and enough flowers to make my desk at work look like a small-scale flower shop.

I got lots of cards like these - how cute is that? This one was the sweetest, though

Anyway, in my last blog account I wanted to give more details about my trip to Busan on the South coast. We went there for a beach holiday, and we got one decent day in but on Saturday it torrential rained - a glimpse of monsoon season. The first night we stayed at love hotel named "Drama" that you had the option to rent out for the hour - yeah, sketchy. There were four of us gals in the room, so not a lot of privacy in the first place. But the bathroom didn't help - the wall between the room and the bathroom was only frosted glass. Well, mostly frosted glass, there were some definate just glass parts. So we definately got to know one another closely that weekend!

The next night we went and stayed at Karen's Korean friend, Sayhee. Her, her sister, and her sister's friend took us out for drinks and what they described as a "Korean delicacy" for dinner. It just showed how differently what we consider a delicacy to be. Apparently their idea of it is live octapus, 'cause that's what showed up at our table, among other raw fish and other undefinable sea creatures (some of which also seemed to be moving). But I did suck it up and try all of it.

The live octapus was definately the hardest to work up the courage to eat. First of all, it was hard to pick up with chop sticks because it was swirming and the tentacles kept sticking to the plate. Plus, when you put it in your mouth you had to chew like crazy because it kept moving and sticking to your teeth. And, as they told us later, people have died from eating it because they didn't chew enough and the tentacles stuck to their throats. Needless to say, it was a definate experience. Not the most delicious thing I've ever ate, but definately the most fresh! I have video of it that I'll send along to some of you.

So no post would be complete without some pictures - so here's a few. Hope you enjoy! And I'd love to hear comments at the bottom from any of you who have stuck with me and are still reading this thing. I have no idea how many people are or if I'm just writing this for my mom and dad these days! So please let me know!

Chilling on the beach. Unfortunately, not bikini weather.

Well its Ladies Night and the feeling's right . . . you know the rest. Or maybe not . . .

Deep Down, We're All Fanilows

Time to post some pics again. The past 2 weeks have been somewhat eventful here in the K-town. Two teachers finished up their contracts and went back home and we welcomed their replacements, Matt and Andy (or as I like to call them, Mandy), with a Noraebang night. Lyndsey and I even appropriately sang them Barry Manilow's "Mandy". Oh, c'mon, don't tell me your not a Fanilow of the Manilow.

The last couple of weeks have also been stressful work-wise. I had two open houses in a row for my preschool classes. Basically, this is when the parents come and watch you teach your class. It's not a comfortable position to be in - I was sweatin' like a whore in church the whole time. But the reviews came in and they seemed to be impressed. How could they not be? The first day I taught their kids they barely knew "hello", now they can read books and speak in full sentences. Hats off to Allison teacher, I say.

Thursday we had "mini-olympics" with all of the preschool classes at a park not too far from the school. Basically, this is track and field day except that the parents come and get involved in the races and games. It was pretty sweet, really. Us preschool teachers got to spend the morning and lunch outside in the sunny, hot weather and we didn't have to teach. Just cheer and make sure the kids got in line when they needed to. Plus, for lunch we had a massive picnic made entirely of food the parents made for us.

We competed against another English hogwan owned by my boss as well. It got pretty intense, I have to say. We kicked ass in the relay race but later got out asses handed to us in the games. However, we then came back with our awesome cheer that we've literally been working on almost everyday for a month. It's a fairly complicated (especially when some of our preschoolers are just 3 years old) dance and cheer to "YMCA". But the kids did great and we blew the judges away - just not enough to win the entire competition. Ahhh well. . .

Here's some pics from the day . . .

Yeah, I guess this guy wasn't into the whole thing as much as we were. Anyway, this next picture is from my neighbourhood. There's a river with soft sidewalks that every exercises on - it's really nice. I'm going to go out and take some more pics of it this week.

And more pictures again from this hike that Karen, Julie, Julia and I took with a tour group. What was supposed to be a "casual walk" ended up being a hellish 4 hour hike straight up a mountain, most of which I spent plotting the tour guide's death.

I look somewhat scared in the last photo - probably thinking about the walk back down. This was about 3 weeks ago, since then, the mountains have become covered in vibrant green colours. There are flowers blooming everywhere, it's really quite beautiful now. This past weekend I went to the coastal city of Busan, but I'm tired right now so more about that later on in the week! (Tune back in, I've got some good stories, most of which involved alcohol. But the best stories usually do, don't they?)