Random Korean Cultural Trivia
- Seoul is the first city in East Asia to have electricity, trolley cars, water, telephone and telegraph systems all at the same time.
- When you receive a shot/glass of alcohol, you're expected to return the shot/glass back (assuming their cup is empty). In Korean culture it's also common courtesy to encourage others (especially your elders) to drink up and receive a shot from you (apparently it's a sign of friendship or bonding or w/e). Being the youngest of the teachers I'm expected to do this to everyone within my reach. Also, each teacher is expected to go around the room exchanging shots with everyone. When there's like 30 teachers plus about 15 parents, that's 45 shots in the time span of 15 minutes, plus receiving a shot from each one of them over the span of 2-6 hours. -.-
Chocolate ice cream in a condom! lawl I'm joking, it's called turtle egg ice cream. This is the weirdest kind of ice cream I've ever seen. Basically you gotta bite off the jizz catching bubble at the top (the ice cream is in a rubber mould) and then just suck away on the ice cream..... they did this on purpose. One of the girls bit off the top and squeezed it too hard a whole bunch splattered onto her face (I swear I'm not making this up). The irony of that was just so funny I just burst out laughing my ass off.
Let's start with a recipe~ Spaghetti~!
Ingredients
500g pasta noodles
6-8 mushrooms
2 green bell peppers
1 red bell pepper
1 Onion
3 tomatoes
1 grinded garlic
2 tbsp of vegetable oil
200g of meat (preferably sliced beef or diced ham)
2 jars of tomato sauce (in this case garlic and onion)
3 pinches of salt (one for the water, one for the veggies and one for the meat)
Instructions
Boil the pasta noodles in boiling salted water and stir occasionally.
Cut the veggies into little pieces (about 1 inch wide).
Cook the veggies in a frying pan with 1 tbsp of oil until the veggies are a bit soft (not mushy).
Cook the meat well and mix with the veggies after it's done.
Drain the pasta noodles and rinse in cold water (to prevent them from sticking to each other).
Put it all together in a heated wok pan and mix well.
Add some seasoning of your choice.
This spaghetti has become infamous in my school and I've cooked it on several occasions for teachers, parents and some of the kids. In fact I'm supposed to cook it next week for two of the kids' birthdays. (Their parent's are the science teacher and the Grade 5 teacher). =)
So what have I been up to these past three months..
- Drinking weekly with the school staff
Staff drinking parties in Korea are common (in my case once or twice a week). Especially in Wando (arguably the poorest town in the country) there's nothing to do except drink. About half the staff are from other richer cities so they understand how I feel. Each drinking party lasts about.. two-eight hours depending on the day ahead. (Last night lasted about six hours). In Korea beer bottles must always be popped off (no such thing as screw bottle caps here). In these past three months I've mastered popping bottle caps off with a silver spoon, wooden chopsticks, silver chopsticks, a lighter and another bottle of beer. Over here, men are too manly to use a bottle opener like everyone else, saying you only use the bottle opener if you're a puss. The 4th grade teacher isn't a strong drinker but loves to drink. Almost every time he gets wasted and ends up falling asleep, in fact three days ago me and the 6th grade teacher had to walk him back to his house but ended up drinking even more by the sea side at 2 in the morning with his neighbor. When we got to his house he just passed out on the floor like this:
Where's he putting his left hand?
It's moments like this that make drinking all the more hilarious. xD
In Korea, foreigners are very common. But in Wando they're almost non-existent. If you're a gyopo (overseas Korean) you're not considered a foreigner and as such you're expected to know the language and follow the customs. Since I know most of the language and most of the customs they find it incredible that someone who left when he was three and a half can speak Korean as competently as I do. Now apparently the school kids' moms have taken a liking to me. When I get drunk I tend to get a little ridiculous with what I say or my gestures. In Canada I never got truly wasted when drinking with my friends unless it was with my Korean friends. (yea thanks guys -__-). So they're all like: Dasol! Come sit beside us! Normally I'm supposed to call them 어머님 (mother), but they don't like that. Most of them are in their late 30's and early 40's so they want me to call them noona (older sister). -___- They find me really cute apparently are always harrassing me (mostly physically). Now this is when they're drunk, when they're sober they treat me like a normal teacher. Thankfully none of them showed up last night but still it happens most of the time.
- Getting hit on by the school girls
I like to think that I'm a good teacher (which I am according to the staff and kids). But a lot of times this happens. I'm a guy teacher and a very young one too. (Most of the staff are in their 30's to 50's) So the school kids like me a lot due to the age gap being smaller. The homeroom teachers tell me that the kids don't like their class and want me teaching them instead. =) Now because I'm a young teacher the kids don't really see me as a real teacher (which I'm technically not) and see me more as a friend. The girls have taken a liking to me too (like mother like daughter -__-). Harassment includes hugging me, grabbing me, feeling me up, jumping on me, humping me and in some cases licking me. o_O One of the 4th grader girls asked me to marry her when she got older.... I'm not gonna go into that but you can guess what happens. About 80% of these kids don't have parents and usually live with relatives. Most haven't even seen/don't remember their dad's faces. Sad story isn't it? So I guess I kinda make up for their lack of a father's love. Oh well, I guess it get's me some practice for my own kids. xD
- Playing volleyball with the school staff
Every Wednesday the staff play a three-out-of-five volleyball tournament with each other. Two teams (Cheong-hae and Bada) consisting of 6-8 players, I'm on the Bada (sea) team. Every month they play a volleyball tournament with other schools so it's like practice for us. Our school got 3rd place last time so it's not too bad. I suck pretty bad at volleyball, but my glory comes from my serving, spike blocking and random moments where I just power hit the ball over the net and it somehow lands in an obscure corner of the court. Yesterday I got about 10 points in from these random moments and our team won 3-2 with the last game score at 21-19.
- Camping with the 3rd-6th graders
Two weeks ago the kids had an overnight camping trip. Events included a magician, a fashion show, a cooking competition, an obstacle course, karaoke competition and of course a campfire. The only notable thing that happened was in the fashion show, Ji-Ae and Do-Hee (the girls I mentioned above) forced the younger boys in their team to wear dresses in the competition and not surprisingly they won. LOL When they ran off the stage after they won to get changed, I stopped them and forced a few group pics. ;)
- Saw Wheesung perform live at the Jeonnam University festival in Yeosu city
I met up with my friend Hyun-min (현민) in Yeosu city to see a top Korean singer Wheesung (휘성) perform at his girlfriend's university festival. I couldn't take pics cuz it was too dark but to say the least it was amazing. He's a pretty funny guy too, he said: "I know most of you are downloading my songs instead of buying the albums but it's okay." He sang six songs and an English song to prepare for his US debut (his English pronunciation is outstanding). I had to take a piss throughout, but I couldn't just leave so I had to hold it in until he was on his 6th song. The goddamn toilet was on the other end of campus so we had to walk like 10 minutes just to get there and another few minutes because there was a huge ass lineup.
Someone managed to fancam a couple of his songs that night.
사랑은 맛있다 (Love is Delicious)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g-NqKLls0A
Just Once
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUCPNIgZxI4
Someone managed to fancam a couple of his songs that night.
사랑은 맛있다 (Love is Delicious)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g-NqKLls0A
Just Once
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUCPNIgZxI4
Keep in mind this is the abridged version, there's a ton of other weird shit that happened to me but I don't really wanna say anything about them in public. If you're really curious ask me personally.
Yesterday, I received a letter from the 6th grade teacher. A fourth grader girl wrote me a letter but didn't want to give it to me in person, so she asked the teacher to do it for her.
Translation: For the English Teacher <3<3<3
Translation: Hello English Teacher, it's me Hye-sun. Thank you for teaching me until now, I've learned a lot thanks to you. I love you. 2010 June 8th Tuesday. From Kim Hye-sun
I gotta say I've been having a pretty shitty day until I received this letter. She's not in the group of girls that physically harass me so I was kinda surprised to get this. It seemed like a goodbye letter (as if she was transferring to another school) so as soon as I saw this I bolted out the door to find her and ask if she's leaving or not. Thankfully she isn't and she just wrote this as a letter of gratitude. Until now I've always been wondering to myself: "Am I doing a good job?" "Are the kids learning properly?" I've only received positive feedback from the homeroom teacher and the vice principal (the principal sometimes disapproves and tells my uncle about it). But to see it in writing from a student took a huge weight off my mind. =)
Well that concludes my summary of what I've been doing this past three months. Hope you had a good read.
Cheers!
