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?)