Oh to live on Jiri Mountain..

As you may remember from my last post, I had big plans this last weekend: Jiri Mountain. So this is how the story goes...

I spent my Friday night being good. I took a little nap, went to the PC Bang to watch my favorite American TV and was in bed by midnight. Unfortunately that little nap disrupted my big sleep time so I actually didn't fall asleep until about 3:30am. Normally for a Friday night that's all good and fine because I can sleep in on Saturday, but nope. We had plans to meet at the bus terminal at 8:40 am. As usual, I was the only punctual one, and Holli literally woke up at 8:30 so we were cutting it close. By the time the five of us all got there we had mere seconds before the bus left and we all jumped on. Thus began a weekend of amazing sights, shin splints, and even a little soju.

Our first stop was Namwon. I'd say it was about an hour away from Gwangju and I even got a little snooze on in the bus. Although I was a bit fascinated with the old man in front of me with the crazy hair.

From Namwon, well, I couldn't even tell you where we connected to. I just know we jumped from bus to bus a few times before being dropped off at a bridge covered in cute neon lanterns. We also got to get a glimpse of a giant buddha carving that was being made not too far away. Unfortunately my camera couldn't pick it up, but Chris was able to get a good shot. I was excited for our little adventure through the mountains and also extremely happy to be spending time with Holli, Lucy, Chris, and Ryan.

The first thing I really realized about this trip was my giant amount of appreciation for Lucy for not only coordinating this trip, but also being our translator, leader, and story teller. From the beginning she was always ready and willing to approach anyone for directions. She was also quick to tell us any old tale regarding the mountain, temples, or towns we were in and as always was her lovely Lucy self.

After maybe an hour or two walking around we stopped for lunch where we shared rice, crackers, peanut butter, bananas, and all kinds of other goodies. Then we realized we were only moments away from the main attraction for this trip. The temple built into the mountain (which I have forgotten the name of, woops). It's always a bit strange and obviously awesome to see these things. Most of the time in America if you see anything like this its some cheesy restaurant with fake carvings and it's hard when you see the real thing to really realize that this is old and real and not just a restaurant. Here are a few photos that me and my friends took:

If you look closely you can see Lucy and I near the bottom.

After spending a bit of time exploring this area we decided to head towards our next temple adventure. This one was also quite lovely but we all felt like a nice break was necessary. Luckily for Chris and I there were some plastic chairs where we plopped and discussed how lucky we were to be able to sit with such amazing sights around us and to have our simple happy lives in Korea.

Relaxing

Finally we decided to hike back to our starting spot and then hitch a bus to our little village where we would be staying. By this time we had been out for a good 8 hours and we're starting to get a little tired. To make matters worse the bus only dropped us off a few miles from our village so Lucy's friendly self stopped the first moving vehicle to hitch a ride. As soon as we got in it felt like something out of some teeny country rebel movie, riding around in a truck. All we were missing was a beer and some loud music.

Hold on tight!

When we finally reached the village it was quite the sight. Very small, maybe 45 people living there. It was sort of hidden away and definitely a new experience for me. We had arranged to stay at the chiefs house which was more of a collection of little houses. However, the Chief had recently built a new building for his visiting family members to stay in which was like a completely out of place (but very pretty and new) 3 story building. We got in and were greeted with a big screen TV, brand new kitchen, and even plastic still on the dressers.

A glimpse of the village.

Old meets new in Korea. Nothing like a Kimchi Pot and satellite TV.

Our newly built house

After spending a few minutes getting settled we headed down for the dinner they prepared for us. We were quite blessed to get the special treatment. The Chief put us in him and his wife's house/room and they even brought out a brand new table they bought just for our arrival! We all sat around this small table in this small room and helped ourselves to endless amounts of Korean style side dishes, soup, and rice. As always it was amazing and the company couldn't be better. The chief and his wife would sporadically come in and share stories of their village, their opinions on current Korean politics, and I even got to really hear some of my FIRST HAND opinions of North Korea from an older Korean.

The kitchen right next to our make shift dining room

After dinner Lucy headed to bed and the four of us headed down to the end of the village, a mere few steps away, and plopped down with a few beers, soju, and talked away. We all shared a few embarrassing moments, or should I say Holli and I just shared our dating disasters while the boys responded in horror and laughter. The night ended quite early because we were exhausted, had a big day ahead of us, and most obviously, we were out of beer.

These are only 2 out of the 10 attempts we did to take a group photo without a photographer

The next morning we were all up and at the breakfast table by 8am. Breakfast consisted of the exact same thing as the night before, plus some potatoes and spicy Korean style pancakes (oh so delicious!) Then Holli and I sat around for a bit, discussing the view and the fact that we are sitting in Korea in some random village and of course about how she will be leaving soon. Meanwhile the rest of the bunch was laying in our room on the toasty warm floor talking, napping, and being generally lazy before we headed back to our bus stop.

Chillin' with our Hostess, the Chief's wife.

After an hour or two of walking we finally made it to our first bus stop, which was also a little old ladies house. We stopped inside and she sold us some snacks and beers and we decided that we were in no hurry to get back to the cement covered city of Gwangju. So we sat there, for a good few hours, had a few beers, and watched as the random country people came in and out of the bus stop, staring at the massive amount of foreigners drinking beer on the old ladies porch. We were even greeted once again by our chief who knew our porch hostess!

Our hangout for a few hours and our new host, on the far left, about half my height.

Finally, after hours of travel, we made it back to Gwangju. Although I had spent the day walking I decided to get off a few miles from my house on the bus and walk the rest of the way home. I knew that this weather was going to end soon and it was a perfectly lovely evening for a walk... Minus the crazy Christian lady trying to get me to join her Korean speaking Church.

Kids Say the Darndest Things

However, I really didn't know that until recently because my little ones have finally started to know the English language. I shouldn't say finally like it has taken forever, because it has been a complete miracle considering the amount they have learned in the last 10 months when they started off knowing nothing. They have picked up on everything from everyday sayings, colloquialisms, and are even able to recite entire stories to me. The best, however, are the little things, that I find myself cracking up over.

For example, my name is Molly, and my co-worker's name is Oliver. For short, and to make it easier, we call him Olly. When my students started to realize that he had not one, but two names, they began to question it. They also learned that their own English names are actually short for longer names. Andy is short for Andrew, Jake for Jacob, and the ones with only "one" name seemed to feel a bit left out even. Then it hit Andy, an epiphany of epic proportions, "Molly teacher, if Olly's name is Oliver, then you are...... Moliver?!?" Obviously his little brain has always tried so hard at English and always used logic to make learning it easier. I had to quickly explain that it was not a logical conclusion, but just a random way of American names. But he knew he could get away with calling me Moliver especially when it was accompanied with his devilish grin. So, in case you need to get a hold of me, I now go by Moliver.

Andy has also thrown out a few classic lines in the last few weeks. I must say he is the king of being a ham. Or he's just cheesy. Or we'll just call him my little ham and cheese. But either way, his English is on par. He's really one of those kids that you can tell will go far because he's smart, has a good personality, and can get away with anything. Despite all of his amazingness he currently seems to be in physical self destruction mode and gets severely knocked out every couple days. But, unlike all of the other children he never seems to cry. Just the other day he was standing on a chair professing his love for me (and I know I shouldn't have let him stand on the chair, but like I said, he can get away with anything) and all of a sudden he fell smack backwards on his back/head. Immediately I rushed to him and checked to see if he was okay, but as always he wasn't crying, which is strange considering that seems to be a 6 year olds favorite past time. I went up to him in English and Korean "Are you okay?!?" He lifts his head up and looks at me with the utmost sincerity and seriousness, "Don't worry Molly teacher, I'm ALWAYS Ok. I'm NEVER hurt!" I was initially taken back by his ability to throw down words like "don't worry" and emphasize his feelings with "always" and "never" and then decided to make him feel better by asking if he was Superman. Once again, looking at me as if I just asked the most foolish question ever he said, "No Molly Teacher, I'm a monkey!" And then made the signature monkey face. Gotta Love it.

I'm also really proud of Amy lately. This girl had the hardest time in the beginning. Simple phonics like B-B-Bee would push her to tears but now I can't seem to shut her up. I was reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears (or the strange version my school's Franchise made up) and she quickly started reciting the story as I was reading. Afterwards, with the greatest of ease she managed to throw together key lines, some verbs, and somehow repeat the entire story in English. Of course it wasn't perfect, but anyone who somehow didn't know this story would be able to get the jist from her.

Anyways, I just wanted to share a few of my working highlights which are probably much more entertaining when you're actually there.

In other news, I will be heading to 지리산 (Jiri Mountain) this weekend. My friend Lucy has coordinated a big hike to the mountain where we will visit ancient temples that are actually built into the mountains, hidden away for us to see. We will also be spending the night in some random Korean family's house so it's sure to be interesting. I'll try to take pictures on the mountain but you're not allowed to take pictures in the actual temples (which is lame because they are absolutely breathtaking). Oh yah, what should I be for Halloween?

Fun in the Fall

So this week was a goodun'. Started off Monday and killed it at the gym (and kept up this pace all through the week). I helped confirm my friends contract to Korea (with bomb ass money and vacation) and finally sent my computer back to America to be fixed.

The highlights as usual though are my days/nights out on the town. Friday after work I took a long needed nap and woke up to harassment from Dom to work on our rap. As you many know, this rap has been in the making for many months, and we still have a bit to go. Normally I'd be in no hurry to finish such a lyrical masterpiece, but she has to send back her Mom's video camera asap so we need to get this done.

We met at our usual rap writing spot, Speakeasy, and decided that having a beer or two first would help us. The normal Speakeasy bar fly's were there and after a few more beers our night ended up being an early 90's R&B/Hip hop sing-a-long (instead of a rap writing session.. but I suppose it was good practice since we were still "rapping"). I must say, it was a damn good night. Oh, and I even had my brand new fake hair in so all in all the night ended up being quite lovely!

The next morning, as usual, was a painful bust but I met Jess and Vinita downtown to hitch the subway to the Sangmu neighborhood for the Gwangju International Food Festival. There were definitely a handful of pro's and con's to this event. The obvious pro's was the fact that I got to divulge in a handful of non-Korean food and it was CHEAP. Any festival (especially food based festivals) in the U.S. puts you back 6 bucks for a tiny cup of beer, 8 dollars for a damn hot dog, and the prices just keep going up. Here it was super super cheap, and most of it was quite delicious. The only downside was the tiny size of the festival and its lack of dishes. There was still a large portion of the festival that was represented by Asian countries too, which was basically the last type of food I was craving (though I would have died for some Pad Thai or fresh spring rolls... which they DIDN'T have.)

After this we headed back to Holli's house, who lives a few steps away from the Convention center and relaxed for about an hour. We finally decided to go to the park with a bottle of wine and live our lives like teenagers who can't drink at public establishments. The night became even better when we realized this little park had rentable peddling car/cart/3 man bicycle thingamabobs. See here:

The best part was that I was able to sit my plump behind in the middle and have them do the peddling (I had a good excuse, as I said I killed it at the gym that week and my legs were toooo sore).

We then headed to the vibrant downtown Sangmu area and as usual I do wish I would have had a chance/reason to go there more often because there's tons of food and fun there. We had Shabu Shabu and discussed everything from politics to the up and coming reality that Holli will be leaving Korea in less than a month. As we drank endless bottles of Hite it really hit me how sad I will be about this and how time has FLOWN by.

A little before midnight we hitched a cab downtown and went to German bar where I managed to clear the entire bar out with singing Bob Dylan (for the 12039204923490th time). Then we ran into a handful of buddies who convinced us that the hot spot tonight would be a dance club and, believe it or not, I don't think I was drunk enough for that. Luckily we got side tracked on our one block walk to the dance club by a dog cafe. No, not a dog eating cafe (which is an actual type of establishment here) but a dog petting cafe. At first I was a little hesitant, entering a modern looking little cafe with a handful of cats and dogs with their hair colored pink or orange or even the short haired animals having things written on them in dye on their fur. But, after about a minute with a giant as dog that was fluffier than life I was in love. I miss pets, especially nice ass docile ones like those. I definitely had one of those "when are you gonna do this ever again?" type of moments. After about 15 minutes there we realized we probably had worn out our free stay there (because I think its like 5 bucks an hour or something) and headed to the dance club. Plus side to this: Free beer. Downside: Free beer. Finally after dancing away for a few hours we retreated home.

All in all it was a good weekend. I'm happy to come back to the reality of working and looking forward to Halloween, my friends arrival, and going home shortly after. Not looking forward to Holli leaving and the fact that I blew all my money for the next 10 weeks, hahaha.