Officially a Volunteer and Moving to Site

For as long as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be a Peace Corps Volunteer. I’ve wanted to be a volunteer for so long, that I stopped asking myself if I really wanted to do it anymore or if I really thought I could do it. It wasn’t until I had already accepted and started preparing for leaving that I began the process of questioning my decision. Going through training, I found myself asking myself more and more, “Do I really want to be here? Am I wasting time and resources being here?” I wasn’t having a tough time or anything, I just felt like I needed to really think it over. On the 15^th we officially swore in as volunteers, and that childhood dream became a reality. And as that happened, I found those questions that had harassed me all PST were gone and I was so ridiculously happy. I walked through town that day in my Damara dress and thought I can do this. And now I’m sitting in my flat in Karasburg, typing this up, and thinking there is no place else I could possibly be right now.

On the 16^th, two other volunteers and I made the long trek to the deep south of Namibia, I however, went the deepest. Pull out your maps of Namibia folks, ‘cause here comes a geography lesson! In Namibia, most people only consider two regions north: Ovamboland and Kavango (Zambezi and Kunene seem to be in another category that I haven’t quite come to understand). Everything else is south. Windhoek is south. Okahandja is south. So saying I’m in the south doesn’t mean anything, hence the “deep”. Karasburg, where I now call home, is so far south, the nearest big city is actually in South Africa. I am living in a teacher’s flat at school here and so far really enjoying it. I went out yesterday to buy some dishes and what not. I don’t actually have a kitchen yet, so I can’t buy much food (no stove and no fridge). I get meals from the dining hall brought to my flat a few times a day by learners, which took some getting used to. Still can’t say I’m too used it, but it’s a good chance to get to meet some of them.

I made fast friends with the Afrikaans teacher, who is about my age, and came to introduce herself to me the first night. I’ll probably end up asking her to tutor me in Afrikaans since that’s what everyone speaks here. And while I can understand a lot of what’s spoken at me, I can’t respond and I understand nothing of what the kids are saying most of the time. At least picking up Afrikaans should be easier than Khoekhoegowab, although I still hope I can learn that as well.

Karasburg itself is a small town in the middle of nowhere. It’s on a flat plain with mountains just barely visible on the horizon. There’s scrub brush all around, but nothing very tall to obscure the view of the plains. It makes me think of old west movies. In town there’s an Agra (farm store), Shoprite (grocery), Spar (grocery), and PEP (clothing and house stuff). When I walked into PEP yesterday, “Love, Love, Love” by Of Monsters and Men was playing and it was the most surreal experience ever. Sometime later this week I hope to go to Agra and look into starting a garden in front of my flat. It would be something to do in my free time and help me save money on vegetables and herbs. However, the rainy season is rapidly approaching, so I’ll have to be really careful about when I start. I also have no idea how anyone gardens in the soil here. It’s pretty much sand all around, but they manage, so I’ll ask around and pretty soon so will I.

It’s tough to describe the land around here without sounding like I dislike it, which is horrible because I really love it. It has its own sort of sparse beauty that I came to love instantly, but when trying to describe landscapes that don’t resemble home, I find myself without the proper words. I hope I can get better at that over time, because it really is pretty here. In town and in the location, people have gardens and paint their houses bright colors. When I walk around later, I’ll try to get more pictures.

I’ve been spending some time meeting the students who live in the hostel as well. They are all really friendly and I find them hilarious most of the time. A few of them are really shy, so it can be hard to talk to them. Most of the older ones speak English very well, so communication is not a problem at all, but when they aren’t talking directly to me, they all speak Afrikaans. I did manage to find a handful of them who speak Khoekhoe, so I should probably see if they would be interested in letting me practice and learn from them.

That’s it for now! I’ll try to update with more about Namibia next time! There are so many small things that are different in how people speak here that I want to make a whole post on it, so look forward to that! I also want to talk about how the school system is set up, so maybe I can combine the two. Feel free to ask questions in the comments, because I would love to answer them!

First Post from Namibia!

I’ve been in Namibia for just over a week now, so I figured now was as good a time as any for an inaugural blog post. Hello and welcome. For those who don’t know me, I’m Mina (Amelia) Sheldon, a soon to be Peace Corps Volunteer in Namibia. I’m already in country going through Pre-Service Training (PST), and until my swear-in date in October, I will refer to myself and the others with me as Trainees.

For training, we have a pretty intense schedule that started this week, but until now, it was quite relaxed. We were staying in a hostel in a town called Okahandja and going to classes at a community hall that we affectionately call the Training Center. Breakfast started at 6 every morning and we usually headed to classes around 7. Now we are all in host family houses. When I wrote this blog last week, such was not the case! But do to the scarcity of internet here, I haven't been able to post yet and this is already quite long, so I'll post about the host family later. 

Our classes are covering a wide range of topics from medical information, safety lessons (which everyone hates),language, and occasionally culture. We were finally assigned languages after more than a week, but we won’t receive notification on our permanent site placement until right before we swear in. Not knowing site placement has been driving everyone crazy, but now that we know our languages the agony of not knowing is a little more bearable. Mostly because now we are all struggling through the stages of early language learning. 

 We have an option of 6 languages we can learn to help transition into our new homes: Afrikaans, KKG, Oshikwanyama, Oshidonga, Otjiherero, Rukwangali. I personally really wanted to get KKG, or Khoekhoegowab, a click language that promises to be the hardest language I’ve ever tried speaking. I practically begged during my interview. Yesterday they finally unveiled our languages to us through a sort of game. We were each handed a slip of paper with our name and an animal on it and then had to find our group without speaking. After finding our group, we were to go to one of the trainers around the perimeter of the room and again mime until we found the correct trainer. I was a cat. I walked around and was rejected from so many different groups and trainers, I was starting to doubt that I was doing this right. I walked by the KKG tutor I already knew, but the people around him were all ‘snakes’ so I started preparing myself to have a different language than my desired one. I still couldn’t find a group. Maybe I didn’t have a group, which meant I would be alone at Community Based Training (CBT). It all made me nervous. Then I found to other people with my ‘cat’ motions. We found only open trainer, who I recognized from the KKG demo. My heart raced. We made our ‘cat’ motions as a group. We waited. Finally, he gave us a thumbs up. That was probably the happiest I’ve been since I came here. So now I’m learning Damara dialect Khoekhoegowab.

I’ve also been making a lot of friends through training. It’s been a pretty stressful week for the introvert that I am, but I realized that I can check out from time to time and no one really cares. A lot of us are introverts and everyone is really nice. Our Namibian teachers are also really kind. They tell jokes with us and teach us to sing three times a week. We love them all dearly. During down time, I have been hanging out with people, sharing media interests, playing card games, playing charades, hiking, drawing, and so much more. It sounds like we stay busy, but over the weekend we had no scheduled events and the days really dragged on. But now that we are all moving out of our hostel and into family homes I’m a little sad. I’ll miss everyone a lot, but I do think I’m ready to move to a new place with a bit more space!

Despite what I have said, however, I’ve already had a few adventures, so I’ll tell you about them now.

Our first big adventure was to the mall on the outskirts of town (or, at least I think it is). It took about 20-30 minutes to walk there both ways. We all went after class on Thursday for cellphones. It was my first time leaving the immediate area around the hostel and Training Center. I felt like I got to see a lot more of Namibia there. I could see the beautiful mountains in the distance. I’m sure I can see them from where we are, but I hadn’t noticed them as much when there were more buildings and people to be looking at. The mall itself was really interesting. It was both outdoors like a strip mall and indoors like what we would think of as a mall without actually having doors except those on the stores. It was insanely clean for being in the sandy area that Okahandja is. It took a long time to get the phones, after which I was thoroughly annoyed and exhausted. I had a good conversation on the way back with another woman in PST that really helped me overcome at least the annoyance bit. It made me realize how much I need to grow and put me at a good starting point for the next two years.

Another adventure was going to the doctor’s office. As could be expected with me, I’ve already been to the doctor’s! Like when I was in Korea, my left ear has yet to pop from the plane. I told the Peace Corps Medical Officers (PCMO) about it and they gave me a few tips of medications I could take from my med kit and told me to contact them again if those didn’t work. They did not, so on Friday I told our head trainer and he contacted the team in Windhoek for me. Within 30 minutes I was at the doctor’s office here in Okahandja. It was such an interesting place and I’m not sure I could describe it. It was much more like a US waiting room than the ones in Korea, but there was definitely something different about it. I met the doctor in his actual office where he tested my hearing by whispering words at me from behind to see if I could hear them out of both ears. The words he used were “Jesus, Joseph, and Joshua.” It started getting a bit predicable after Jesus. In the end, they couldn’t do anything for me. I had an appointment scheduled for an ENT in Windheok, but it started getting a bit better over the weekend so I’m going to see if it’ll just fix itself after a week.

We also went for a hike into the mountains on Saturday morning. Hiking in the sand was really hard, and moving in the group kicked up a lot of sand, which made it a little hard on my asthma. I ended up choosing a spot to stop early on with a friend to sit and draw. We saw some beautiful birds and made a good halfway point to help direct people back as they came back down. I now have a pretty painting of the mountain and surrounding bush.

I'm really pressed for time and internet now, but I'll try to get some pictures up next time. I also wrote a post on some interesting history that I will post next time I have internet! There's also a good chance that I need to make a new blog for my service, so please give me ideas for names!!! I like alliterative things!

Hanging in Helsinki

It’s been a pretty crazy few days for me. I caught a nasty cold on Thursday and as a result spent my last few days in Prague trying to get better as soon as possible to avoid a miserable flight experience. I did, however, manage to spend a few hours out and about with friends and buy a few last minute gifts.

The really exciting part, however, is that I did this crazy side trip to Finland.

Before I start telling of my adventures, two little side notes about myself:

1.       I am a spontaneous traveler. I don’t like making lots of plans when I’m going somewhere. I am much more the kind of person who gets on a bus and figures things out as I go.

2.       I have wanted to come to Finland since I was pretty young. When I was in middle school, we went camping up in Michigan and on the way home found a university (one of seven in the US) that taught Finnish. I bought a sweatshirt and some textbooks to study with at home. Through most of high school, I planned on going to UC Berkeley because they not only had an Asian Studies program (a good one too!) but also were one of those 7 schools with Finnish.

So, I land in Finland. I have a booking at a hostel, somewhere. I have a bus number, a stop, and an address. I get mildly lost in the airport. Luckily, my luggage slept over at the airport and didn’t come with me! I am pretty sure I walked out the wrong gate and all the way to Terminal 1. For those of you who haven’t been to the EU before, they have this little agreement thing called the Shengen Agreement. Because of this, you can travel anywhere within the member countries without going through boarder control. I knew this. But it still freaked me out that I literally just walked right out of the airport without seeing ANYONE. It’s quite convenient though.

Finding the bus was pretty easy, finding my stop was not. At first, I asked a girl a year or two younger than me who had picked up two foreign exchange students from the airport. She didn’t know because she had just moved to Helsinki. Another passenger overheard and said he thought it was about at this one place. Then another guy (who sounded like an American expat) said he was sure it was there. But then when it came up, he wasn’t… And then a lady behind me piped up that it was this next stop and gave me directions as I hopped off, which I barely heard because guess what!? I’ve lost the hearing in my left ear again! Well, then someone else got off the bus. I’m pretty sure he shouted at me as well as I was getting off, but again, can’t be sure since I can barely hear. He was from Latvia and happened to be staying at the same hostel, so he helped me find it. Lovely lad.

The hostel was really nice. Everyone there was really nice. I felt awful for coming in so late (midnight) and waking up pretty much my whole dorm (20 people!). I had a top bunk and the guy below me woke up while I was stashing my stuff in my locker. I tried to be quite but I guess I wasn’t? He felt bad because his stuff took up the whole hallway where the bed was (tiny, tiny space). But was super nice about being woken up? He moved some of it for me. I had brought clothes to sleep in, but by the time I got settled in, I didn’t feel like changing, so I just slept in my street clothes. It was not the best sleep of my life, but it wasn’t horrible either. The place was clean and it wasn’t that loud.

I woke up at a decent time in the morning. Got my stuff together, washed my face, brushed my teeth, and then headed out into Helsinki! Like I said earlier, I went out with no plans. I found a bus, got on and rode until I thought I saw something that looked like a downtown. It wasn’t. But I did find a convenience store and got juice and bread for breakfast. This was when I realized that my backpack set off all the door alarms. But no one stopped me, so…..

I ate breakfast in a park. This part of town was pretty much just offices. I didn’t even take my camera out. One thing that struck me as sort of odd was that compared to London, York, Prague, Munich, and Nurnberg, Helsinki is the one that reminded me the most of Asian cities. Not because it was tall or crowded, but because of the way they managed space. The sides of the buildings were all labeled with the businesses that owned the space, just like in Seoul. Not that I could read any, but….

After breakfast, I got back on the bus and decided to take it all the way to the end, which I figured would lead me somewhere. It did. Right down to the Sea. Okay, not right to the Sea, but pretty close! But I’ll get back to that. I was trying to find a book store to get my Finnish copy of the Little Prince, which was actually pretty easy, since everyone speaks English and is super nice! The book was a bit expensive (more expensive than the copy of Harry Potter next to it!) but since I do collect them, I had to get one. It’s called Pikku Prinssi. After that, I did a little souvenir shopping. Set off all the alarms again. They had the cutest sweaters. I really wanted one, but Helsinki is painfully expensive.

After the shopping times, I went and sat in the park. There was an interesting statue surrounded by benches so I decided that I would just sit there for a bit and draw the statue. I don’t draw from life very often, especially things that aren’t people, so I ended up screwing up the proportions. As a result, I just drew the parts that were interesting all over the page. Still, it was a lot of fun. After I had had enough of messing up the Finns pretty statue, I decided to walk down to the other end of the park. That was when I saw the sea!! It was beautiful! And right there on the wharf was a artisans and farmers market. It was beautiful! I wanted to buy some more gifts there, but everything was outrageously expensive. I ended up just walking around and window shopping until I got to the other end. From there I could see a pretty church across the bridge. Since I was in Europe, I figured I might as well go see it up close. It was closed but the building was still nice to look at. It was also on a hill, offering a nice view of everything below it.

I also went to a café back over by the bookstore. That was where I discovered the magic of Helsinki City Free WLAN. It totally made up for the ridiculous amount of money I had spent on everything else. I got to read that day’s update of A Redtail’s Dream, a Finnish webcomic I’ve been reading about a man and his dog who have been thrust into the world of Finnish mythology and must save their village. It’s quite good and getting quite dramatic. I can’t think of anything more perfect than actually reading it in Finland.

Around 1:00 I decided to head for the airport. I was able to find the right bus and buy a ticket properly. I got in with plenty of time to spare and decided to start typing up this blog entry instead of exchanging my euros for yen. That was dumb for reason I will go into more when I talk about Japanese bureaucracy.

Normal Prague Life + A Couple Crazy Events

I haven't been updating much because the most exciting things to happen to me are usually me getting a new student. I'm up to 10 and possibly 13 if I accept another family. Not sure how I feel about that....

Anyways, my typical day in Prague as of now is getting up, making coffee and something to eat (food varies, coffee is forever!) and then heading out to the villages to tutor my students. One of the families I tutor (I tutor the mother and two of the three children) has half adopted me and lets me stay over for lunch occasionally. When I'm not teaching, we tend to slip into lots of Konglish. It's seriously the best. And I get food. And everyone gives me coffee. I am currently up to about 4-5 cups a day depending on how many students I have/how long I'm at home before 6:00PM (when I switch to black tea....)

I started working with a new family (and my only non-Korean family) last Thursday. I'm tutoring the son in writing, but he also happens to have an elder sister who is only a few years younger than me. So we are tentatively making plans to hang out. 

On days when I am not teaching, I try to get up at a decent time (9:00), fail and get up a bit later (about 12:00) and then attempt to use the rest of the day to explore things. I'm getting really good at moving around the city. For example, today I wanted to see the astronomical clock in Old Town, so I figured out how to get there, then went on a hunt for a coffee shop, failed to find one, then some how managed to get back to the tram stop at the bottom of the hill where I usually catch the tram to go home. Another time I really wanted a scarf (and more coffee). So following the guidance of a friend, I got off the tram near between a theatre and the Charles Bridge and then started randomly walking the side streets searching for a corner shop with cheap scarves. Scored one for 100Kc (about 5USD). Then made it back to the tram (even though I had no clue where I was) and on to the coffee shop. It's like you can't get lost here. 

I've met up with a Mac alumn, who is totally awesome. After hanging out with her, I was reminded of why I love Mac so much. We all just get along so well. Usually I'm really shy and awkward around people when I first meet them (and I still was haha) but she was so nice and even though we study two totally different things we found loads to talk about. She showed me an amazing coffee shop that is pretty easy to get to and very cheap with great customer service, as well as a bunch of other cool places in Prague and the surrounding area. 

My crazy events are.... well one is crazy, one is just a little not what I'm used to. We'll start with the not-used-to one. I went to my favourite Indian food restaurant this past week for dinner. The food there is so good that all I've thought about since I realized I would be coming back this summer is going to eat there again. Yeah. That good. But this particular time one of the waiters started chatting with me and by the end of the dinner I had been asked out for coffee. Can I tell you the number of times this has happened to me?Answer: 0. So, ummm yeah. Now I have a tentative coffee date with the waiter at the Indian restaurant. Maybe he knows how to roller skate..... 

And the crazy event is something that just happened and shook me up pretty bad, but also made me really appreciate the kindness of Czech people. As some of you may or may not know, I'm watching two cats in addition to tutoring and watching the house. One is the cat of the actual owner of the apartment, Jaye, and the other is a friend of hers from work. The friend's cat really likes to go outside, but he has no claws and the apartment is the third (and top) floor of the apartment complex. The cat has snuck out before, since I usually keep the windows open to help keep the apartment cool. I usually try to keep them closed enough that he can't get out, but sometimes I forget (usually with the bathroom window because I leave it open after a shower). and he gets out. So tonight he got out. And fell off the roof. From the third floor. Into my neighbors-whom-I'd-never-met's garden. Luckily, his owners were very smart and wrote my number on the collar. They called me, luckily spoke English, and then helped me get him to the vet. The man stayed with me and helped me translate at the vets office and then when I tried to give them money, they refused it (I did manage to give them cookies I baked for 4th of July though!). The cat is okay now. He has a small cut on his lip, but otherwise fine and running around the house and making noise as usual. I am now shutting all the doors and keeping windows closed in rooms the cats are in. Thank god cats always land on their feet or who knows what might have happened......

But yeah. That's almost all of what's happened since my last update. I will try to do more exciting things to talk about. Emma is coming next week, so more silly adventures will probably ensue! 

Getting into Prague Life

I'm writing this post while consuming a somewhat late breakfast of toast and beet/grapefruit/lime juice that I just made a few minutes ago. Despite the fact that it's almost 9:00 and I'm just now eating breakfast, I've actually been up since a bit after six. Around 7:00 I went for a run in the local park. Can I please be this motivated every day?

I've been pretty busy these last few days. I moved to Prague last Friday. Since then I've been roving around with Jaye, learning how to get around town through the transit system, where to shop for groceries and clothes. On Monday I met one of the families I will be tutoring for and then managed to navigate my way home. Yesterday I went to actually tutor the mother for an hour. By the time I got home it was about noon and so hot that I could hardly stand it. I made some lunch and tried to work up the courage to go back outside. I really can't tolerate heat. I don't like sweating and I prefer weather to be no higher than 75F. It was so hot that I debated with myself for quite awhile on whether or not I wanted to make my planned trip to the mall to buy tanktops to wear in the heat.

Finally I sucked it up and headed to the bus stop. Getting to the mall I went to is pretty easy as it's just one bus. Getting back is a little more tricky, however, because only every other bus actually goes all the way up the hill to where my bus stop is. Sadly, on this particular day, I forgot that. But it was fine. I just had to wait outside for another 10 minutes or so.

I actually had two missions at the mall yesterday. One was to buy tank tops, which I found at H&M on sale for 70C (less than 5USD!!). The other was to get price estimates on roller blades. You see, the park by my house has a really nice paved path for bikes and roller blades. And on the weekend there are so many people out having fun and roller blading that I really wanted to attempt it myself. I'm currently looking for a used pair, but I haven't had any luck and I would like to get a hold of them soon so I have time to put them to good use. I've managed to find a few pairs for about 60-70USD but most of them are more like 100-150USD. I'm not sure how I feel about dropping that much money after just having spent that on a phone....

Before I went on my actual shopping spree, however, I decided I was in dire need of caffeine. There was a Costa Coffee (England's number one coffee chain!) in the mall, so I stopped in there for a bit. I sat at a table and doodled some. It felt so good to just be able to draw without pressure. I didn't feel guilty like I should be doing something else, like studying, but I also didn't feel like I was just forcing myself to draw for the sake of drawing, which is how I've felt for about the past month. So yeah, that was really great! After I'd been sitting for a bit, one of the baristas came around with a tray giving out lemonade samples. It was awesome.

I had such a good time being out yesterday that I'm going to attempt the same this afternoon if the weather holds. Apparently it's supposed to rain a bit today or tomorrow. This is only a concern because the only way to cool down the apartment is to open the windows and pray for a breeze.

Now that I'm a bit more settled, I'm going to attempt to keep this more regularly!

Getting to York and the first two days

It’s been a crazy last two days. Three days? I still get my flying time mixed up. I last left off in JFK, where I was miserable being stuck in the arrivals section of the airport. It really wasn’t as bad as I made it out to be, I just don’t like JFK. Finally the time rolled around and I was able to head back to the baggage drop off. It took forever to make it through that line, and then I had to wait in the painfully long security line. I have never in my life had to wait to long, and I’ve been to a lot of airports. It was so crowded that this TSA woman came over and escorted a handful of us over to first class security so we could speed up getting people through. The first class lounge is sweeeeeet. Perfectly air conditioned, nice chairs, clean….. On the other side of security was an actually decent terminal. Apparently it was new. It was actually pretty nice.

My flight to Iceland, I was both amazing and awkward. Firstly, Iceland air is AMAZING. Best airlines I’ve ever flown. The first class seats were all named after Norse gods and the economy seats taught you Icelandic. You got complementary Icelandic spring water when you boarded, the blankets were actually warm and soft, and the pillows had little lullabys on them in English and Icelandic. This is the English:

Bye bye and hushabye

Can you see the swans fly?

Now half asleep in bed I lie

Awake with half an eye

Heyho and welladay

Over the hills and far away

That’s where the little children stray

To find the lambs at play.

I don’t know, I think it’s cute. I was stuck sitting in the middle seat in a row of three for the fiveish hours of the trip. The boys on either side of me were brothers and kept speaking Icelandic over me. Occasionally the one at the window seat would climb onto the seat and then step over me to go to the bathroom. It was weird. I tried to sleep most of the time.

My layover in Iceland was sadly pretty boring…. There not anything in the area of the airport. Outside is just barren land. . . I had a really good chicken tikka masala sandwich though.

Second flight was in better company. A young mother from Minnesota flying to meet her husband and his family in England. The baby was not just cute but also really well behaved!

After landing in England, it took FOREVER to get through customs. It was even more difficult than trying to get back into the US. After that I went to take the Picadilly Line to Kings Cross. Everything was going great. Then I found out the Picadilly Line was closed halfway through. So a guy came on, ushered us off the train and onto some busses. Then we drove through London. Which was actually pretty cool. Then we had to get back on the trains. By the time I made it to Kings Cross I was stressed and tired. I had planned to get my tickets for the 3:00 train as it was 2:20 and that would give me time to find Platform 9 ¾. However, when I bought my ticket the guy gave me one for the 2:30. At that time I had 5 minutes to run for the train. I had no idea where I was supposed to sit and I couldn’t read my ticket. I asked a woman in a station uniform for help and she was just like “look for an open seat.” Great. So the train was starting to make noise and I was running up and down the platform trying to figure out what to do. Finally she just told me to hurry and get on so I just got in the nearest car. Turns out my suitcase was too big to fit down the aisles so I needed to find a spot in one of the two cars on either side of where I got on. I finally did and sat down. Because of the rush, I hadn’t called Ellen. I used the 15 minutes of free wifi on the train to message her everywhere so I wouldn’t get stranded in York. After awhile, I was finally able to calm down again and enjoy my train ride. Across the aisle from me was a friendly Canadian couple who I talked with some.

I got to York in the end and got to see Ellen. We went back and had cottage pie for dinner. Then she gave me a tour of Heslington, which is the village her University is in.

On Monday we walked into York proper. We walked up and down nearly every street, went into the Minster, went to the train station and the museum, walked back to the city center, then to the supermarket, then home. I feel super fit. We got to see all the interesting places in York. The wall that surrounds the city was originally built by the Romans. The Minster ‘s stained glass is so old that all of it needs to be replaced.

We ate lunch at a local restaurant and got fish and chips. The place was packed with a group of German kids on a fieldtrip.

We did so much walking that both of us were terribly sore. Even today.

Today we went to Ripon, which is the town that the Crawley family of Downton Abbey are always visiting. Modern Ripon is, well, modern. And bigger. We got there pretty early and were freezing. While waiting for the bus to Fountains Abbey, a famous ruin, we looked around town. We got coffee from the nicest barista ever and ended up in the cathedral. Unlike the Minster, this one was actually still in use, though it was also a museum. We donated some pounds and walked around. There were a line of bishop statues or something that were in chronological order. It was interesting to see how their names represented the different groups in the area throughout the years.

After that we went to the Abbey ruins. They were beautiful. At first I thought it was just a tower and some other rooms, just like the Minster and other places we visited. Then we walked down the hill and into the valley, walking around what we could see to discover a vast collection of ruins. The ones we had see from the hill were just the most intact. Behind them were the remnants of what would have fit both of the other Cathedrals we had visited. It was really amazing. After having a picnic in sight of the ruins, we hiked the trails around them. Eventually we ended up at a deer park where we saw lots of awesome deer!!

Hello from JFK (AKA Hell)

Hello and welcome back to the Mina Diaries!

I am finally going on another adventure! And this time, adventure is actually a bit of an understatement. Today I left my house at 6:30AM to catch my first flight (of four today). Right now I am en route to visit a very good friend in York, England. I'll stay there for about 5 days before heading over to Prague, Czech Republic to house sit for another good friend. I'll be there for another 2 1/2 months or so before moving to Osaka Prefecture, Japan until December for a study abroad.

Today is my first day of traveling. It started off with a bang when the security stations at KCI were closed because the fire alarm went off. That was a fun experience. When I finally got on my plane, the captain came on to inform us that one of the air conditioner units on the plane was broken and someone was coming to look. They decided we would just fly without it (since everyone was on the plane already) and just fly lower because the cabin wouldn't be fully pressurized due to the air duct breaking. then there was another wait for a fuel truck to be brought out to insure that there was enough for the extra gas it would take to get to DC. We finally landed....and got to walk on the tarmac to the terminal because apparently there were no gates for us.

We land on time, amazingly, and I join a group of people from the flight running madly to catch our connector to NYC. We landed in terminal A and had to hop a terminal connector to terminal C, running to our gate at the far end of the terminal. On this flight there was a last minute maintenance check that left us all sitting on the tarmac an additional few minutes, making me regret having run all the way from the other side of the airport. Oh yeah, and we weren't at a gate again, so we boarded from the tarmac. I found out during this flight that United Airlines doesn't give free snacks like Southwest or Delta. I never thought I would hate an airline more than Delta, but I think United has claimed that spot. At least Delta has those yummy cookies.

When we landed at Hell JFK, we were escorted onto the tarmac again and into the terminal. Gates? What are those? At this point, I was officially done with my US airlines flights, so I had to go pull my bags out of baggage claim and go recheck them with Iceland Air. This is where things start to go wrong. For some reason, even thought I wrote down my flight time last night, both my mother and I got it in our heads that my flight was at 5:00 something. I tried to recheck my bags, but it turns out that my flight isn't until 8:00 something. This brings us to where I'm at now, sitting in JFK, my least favourite place in the entire world, for 8 hours. I can't even go through the gate to get decent food for another 4 hours or so. I would go out and see New York except I 1) have a ton of baggage, and 2) I hate NYC anyways.

After I finally get going, I'll have one more layover in Reykjavik, Iceland before landing in London, England. Not only will I get to see Heathrow but also King's Cross Station! I am super excited!

Amazing Weekend

A lot happened this weekend, so I'm going to update a little!

Friday evening, I was privillaged enough to go to Dongdaemun Night Market, which is a sketch, wholesale market where you can only buy more than three items at a time and only if you are in the retail business (or something along those lines). So we went with a friend of Aunt Lee's and had a lot of fun! I bought almost an entirely new wardrobe (sans pants) for less than 40$. One of the dresses I bought had a retail price of 50$ but I managed to get it for 15$. I bought rainboots that usually cost 40$ for 22$. I'm pretty proud!
There was also that fun moment when we ran into a family (this was above ground, not in the market) where two of the boys debated in Korean whether or not their should speak to me in English. Eventually, I went "Hello" and they both jumped, which was hilarious. They then tried to tell me they were from New York.
It was a great night.

On Saterday, I traveled down to Akira's station and we went on an adventure in the boonies to get to Bucheon. I say the boonies, but thats only because it wasn't packed. Though, for that beautiful stretch where the train was above ground, all we saw were trees and nature. It was beautiful. We traveld on two train lines we had never been on before.
Now, why did you go out to Bucheon again? Because that's where the famous vloggers of Eatyourkimchi live. We got to meet Simon and Martina at this cute (and overpriced) little cafe near their old appartment. Akira and I judged that it would take us about an hour and a half to get there, thinking we would get lost at some point. When we transfered onto the dark blue line (line 1) we thought we had gotten on the wrong train, but it ended up just being an express train to the stop we needed. So guess what~!? We got there early! After getting out of the station, we hailed a cab to get to City Hall, the area where the cafe is located. We ended up being at least 15 minutes early, but Simon and Martina were already there, so we struck up a conversation and started asking about Korea.
I learned a lot about what it's like to be a teacher here and got some tips on preparing for it back home. They also told us some funny stories about things that had happened to them since they had been there.
They were super nice and just as funny in person as in their videos. Sadly, I haven't been able to watch any of their recent videos for the past two weeks. . . T.T So you should all go watch them for me! (link in the sidebar~)
So after the meetup was done ( a lot of people showed up!) Akira and I hopped over to a park for lunch. We were eventually joined by Alexia and Marina, both of who were at the meetup, before we left. Martina had given us a shortcut to get home (a bus route) so we all boarded the bus, but since none of us had been on an express bus before, we sorta didn't even know if it was going the right way! I ended up asking the guy sitting next to Akira and he said we were heading towards Hapjeong, which is in Seoul and almost eveyone knows where it is. So we were set. Until I looked up and noticed my appartment complex about 10 minutes from the Hapjeong spot. Since Akira and I both live on line 9 and the line 9 entrence is near my house, we both got off. Alexia, who thought we were getting off at Hapjeong, got off too. We started following the road back, missed a turn, and ended up very very lost. Here is one of the best things about Korea: lost? Go up to some woman and go "ajuma, ______ eodi e isseoyo?" It works every time. Except this time when the people we asked had no idea where we were trying to go. We ended up finding someone who could take us to the nearest subway station and bam! We made it home~

Sunday, it was pleasently raining. But that was all okay because for once Gayoung didn't say "ansaranghaeyo" (I don't love you!) to me! She actually said "Amellia eonni! Saranghaeyo!!" I died inside. Then Aunt Lee decided it would be a good day for me to see the ocean. So I put my new rainboots on and we left for Incheon! Somehow, we ended up on a ferry that took us to an island. We had fun feeding seaguls shrimp chips. We ate at a small little place by a beach and took some pictures. Even in the rain, it was really fun!
After that, we went to the cutest little town called Provence. No clue where it is, but it would be very very far north. All the buildings were painted bright colors and the arcitecture had a very European feel to it. I loved it. We got coffee and shopped around.
Then, as we were driving back, the right side of the highway was suddenly covered with barbed wire and there was a huge river. Aunt Lee pleasently said "Oh, that's North Korea." Gayoung was very upset when I asked her to trade me seats so I could take pictures.
The other side was mostly just mountains and trees. Very rainy, just like the rest of the Korean penninsula. There were a few buildings here and there, but after awhile the river forked and we were staring at Incheon again, not the North. All and all, it was pretty eerie. . .

Comments. . . are looking sparse T.T

Kayla: I miss you too! And we are supposed to get more rain all week T.T I'm so sick of it!!

JT: What are you going to do now that my mom is out of town and you can't race her??

I AM ALIVE

I hate rain.

Both the Han river and the other river by my house are still horribly bloated, but not as bad as they have been. The flooding here is intense. Some of the subways flooded and when it rains. . . just stay inside if you can. Koreans have been saying this is the worst weather in 100 years. Look, I grew up in Kansas, where fierce thuderstorms happen all the time, and I'm still going "wtf!?" Anyways, it's still cloudy today, but it isn't raining now so I'm happy.

Now that that's out of the way, I guess now I'll appologize! I've been really busy the past week!

Last Wednesday, Akira, Emma, Alexia, Emma's host sister, Akira's penpal and I all went to the Everysing noraebang in Apgujong. Why is it so important that I tell you the exact location of this noraebang? Because Kim Heechul filmed his M&D music video there. Our room was in the video and we got to see the room he was in!! ^.^
Celebrity spazzing aside, noraebang was really fun! Emma's host sister spent the first 10 minutes playing Super Junior songs so that Emma and I would get up to sing/dance to them. . . except we didn't know the words xDDDDD
We stayed there for well over an hour (maybe two?) and afterwards went to the store downstairs, which was a mini shrine to all the pop groups under SM Entertainment (except Amber Liu, as Akira and I wish to point out). I bought a Yesung cellphone charm and a clearfile! Alexia and I took sticker pictures where you could make it look like various SME celebrities were with you. I now have sticker pictures with Yesung and Hangeng~!

On Thursday, my support group met up with Akira's and we went ice skating. Interesting fact: Gayoung happens to be taking skating lessons over summer break. So she was there! Akira and I skated around, yelling at my supported, Sungwoo as he skated circles around us and literally pushing us to go faster. Towards the end of our session, Akira and I found him on his butt and it went something this:
"Seungwoo! I thought you were good at skating!"
"No! nonononononononono! I'm good! just-" at this point we were just laughing. Revenge!
That night, I met up with my long-time penpal Sohyun and we went to Super Junior Kiss the Radio(Sukira or KTR) at KBS together. Sukira is a radio show hosted by Super Junior's Eeteuk and Eunhyuk. They usually have guests and that day it just happened to be Jungmo from TRAX (a korean rock group I like) and who helped Heechul with the M&D project ^.^ He played guitar in the studio and I have waaaay too many pictures.

That weekend, we went to Bucheon for a camp. My host family went to Busan because of family issues.
In Bucheon we met up with Korean high school students and went on scavenger hunts around the city. After dinner we had free time and we played Korean games until after 2 in the morning when they finally told us to go to bed!
The the next day we had a talent show, where both NSLI-Y kids and the Korean students preformed. I have lots of videos, but my I had my small memory card in so I didn't get full videos. And now my flashdrive is full so it's way too hard to upload them >< I'll go buy a new flashdrive or something. . .
Sunday night my host family wasn't going to be back until Monday, so I went with Akira's sister to jjimjilbang again and had fun! But I think her sister thinks we are crazy.

Monday my host family came home, so I bought them a cheese cake.

Tuesday, is a very special date for many reasons. I met up with my friend Dayun, the damn rain from hell started, and Yesung's family opened a cafe, so naturally I went! Let me tell you in great detail about htis event so that you can understand why I now hate rain.
Akira, Alexia, Emma and I get off the train and are standing in the exit of the station. It looks bad out, but we figure it'll be okay if we just run into the Tom n Tom's not 100 yards from the exit. We put up our umbrellas and go for it. . . It was like someone took the biggest, deepest bucket they could find and dumped it over Seoul. Even with umbreallas, we were soaked. For awhile we were standing under the awning of Tom n Tom's, then it started too look suspiciously like it was gonna blow off. So we moved inside. Eventually we met up with Dayun and the rain stopped enough that we made it to Handel and Gretel. It was pretty packed and we waited more than 30 minutes for a table. Why is that bad? It's a coffee shop! Who waits for tables at a coffee shop?
But we got one. The coffee was amazing. I ended up buying two plus a sandwich. Apparently not long after we left, Yesung showed up. I missed my chance T.T But it's okay. The coffee is good enough that I'm going to become a frequent customer. There is hope!!

Wednesday we learned Talchum and I learned to hate rain even more. Talchum is traditional mask dancing. It's actually really fun! We got to make masks and learn a little about the culture behind it. The activity was actually fun enough to make it worth the hell we had to go through to get there:
Most of Seoul, by this time, was flooded. It was about a two mile walk from the station to the school where we learned. It was pouring down rain, and the roads were rivers. By the time we arrived, even the girl with the rain coat was drinched. It was disgusting! I felt like a drowned rat!!
That night, Akira and I went out with some Korean friends and learned the words for colors (because this had not been taught in class yet) and also had a good discussion on the differences on Korea and America.

Thursday Akira and I met early to get coffee and a muffin and Handel and Gretel. It was amazing, as usual. I'm getting really good at order coffee in Korean. After class let out, my host mom took the two of us to this huge bookstore and we bought comics to practice reading! We also have gone through our entire textbook, and the teacher said we aren't getting new ones, so I guess I'll go buy the next set from the Sogang book store because my grammar is still pretty limited. I also guess that means I'm past Korean 2 in high school and Korean 1 in college. WOO!

And now, I want to study a little!!! I'll try to get pictures up, but if I can't save them anywhere, it's a little more difficult ><

Sorry to be so late!!

Quick Post~!

Saturday, was recovery day. Highlight: Watching Korean TV, namely Mnet Countdown and Music Core (I missed B1A4 and Block B though T.T). It was even funnier when Gayoung would point to the preformers and call them "ajuma" and "ajeossi" which literaly translates to aunt and uncle, but the terms are used to name older people you judge to be about the age of your parents (or consider too old to call "eonni/nuna" and "eoppa/hyeong" which is literally brother and sister. This is only used to address people older than you but still look young enough to be a sibling). I take one look at these people and tell Gayoung that I'm about the same age. I'm not an ajuma!! T.T We also watch some other popular shows, like "We Got Married" which I was surprised to find Gayoung liked...?

Yesterday I woke up with lots of energy. So much engergy, I at a whole three bites of rice soup. Yesssss! Actually, I was feeling pretty good, just not really hungry. So, since I was super bored of being cooped up in the house the day before, I asked if we could go for a walk in Hangang Park. Because I love the Hangang. And Saturday was my first day not seeing it since I've been living here T.T
Instead of going to Hangang Park, we went to Seonyudo Park!!! Yaaaay! Seonyudo Park is an island in the middle of the Hangang and you take a little bridge over. It is really really beautiful! Seonyudo Park is a perfect example of why I really love Seoul. It's so green. Every where: green green green green MOUNTAIN. (No mountains in Seonyudo park though. . .)
When we got home, Jaehak had come back from Busan and had made spaghetti. I ate almost a whole bowl! We then all sat down to watch a movie together, which was really fun! Jaehak is a Korean business man which means he's almsot never at home, so this was one of the few times we've done something together!
After that, I went to meet up with my new friend Dongjun, who is not only going to Mac next year, but majoring in Linguistics as well. Yes, we get along great!
We walked around Gangnam and had sushi for dinner (I also had tonkatsu and was amazingly hungry enough that I ate a lot). I bought a cute headband, dragged him to sticker pictures, and answered questions about America. We also went into this huge bookstore and I bought Le Petit Prince in Korean. I can't wait to start reading it!

And, since I have lots of free time during the week, we met up again this morning and went to Jongno-go, where the Gyeongbokgun (Gyeongbok Palace) is. In Japan, there are temples, in Korea, there are palaces. If you go to Korea ever, I think it's a must to see some of them. I'm still totally in awe of ondol heating. There are a lot of really beautiful pictures, but they are taking forever to upload so I'm not going to post them here!
Before we went to the Palace, we saw the giant statues of Admiral Yi and King Sejong the Great. Admiral Yi is infamous for being one of the greatest naval comanders in miltary history. He once led a fleet of 13 ships against the Japanese forces who out numbered him by more than 25 to 1, and won.
King Sejong the Great is also very famous in Korea for helping creat the written alphabet. During the second year of his reign, it bothered him that so many people could read or write because of the difficulty of Chinese characters, so he formed an institute to create a uniquely Korean alphabet. The shapes of the characters are apparently based on the shape your mough, tongue, and teeth make when saying them.

And this post took me way too long to write. I'm going to go study now, because recently I've been very bothered by how little Korean I know.

What's Up With Me, and a Few Pros and Cons to Living In Korea (Pt. 1)

After my last post, Aunt Lee and I went up to Insadong. Insadong is pretty much a tourist district, with lots of expensive, handmade Korean goods! Many traditional looking trinkets are for sale at prices that make you shiver and are sold at every street vendor for the next mile or so! For the most part, Aunt Lee told me to wait to buy something because we are going to Dongdaemun this weekend~! YES. Cheap shopping is my best friend, and there is a lot of it in Korea!
Aside from shopping, Insadong also has an art gallery that we went through, displaying many traditional arts that are still practiced by people today (see the pictures). A lot of the artisans working that day were really friendly (from the Korean I could gather) and the kind ajuma making horse hair hats even insisted for a photo with me! The hat I'm wearing? Yup. That's horse hair!

The ajuma in the picture is wearing a traditional korean outfit called a hanbok. I really really want to wear one sometime, so if I do, I'll definitely upload some better pictures!!
Another really interesting fact about Insadong is that all the shop names are required to be in Korean. There are subtitles for most things to help out foreigners, but where in other parts of Seoul you will see shops like Tous Les Jours and Tom n Tom's Coffee, you won't in Insadong. English (and other languages as far as I know) aren't allowed. For instance, this is a picture of the Starbucks there, which is (supposedly) the only Starbucks in the world where the sign is not written in English!

While we were there, we met up with Aunt Lee's brother and his family. Together, we ate patbingsu which is a little like shaved ice, but with a little more oomph (still working on food post. A better description will be there!). After that, we went to this really cool roofless shopping mall, where instead of having steps up to each floor, the whole building is a continuous spiral. At the top is a cafe and an outdoor eating area. I think I've mentioned this before, but one of my favourite things about Seoul is that there are huge, forested mountains right next to the city. In Insadong, the buildings go up and up and suddenly BAM! there's a mountain! I love it!


Monday before school, Akira and I met up for coffee and Tom n Tom's, which is pretty much a Starbucks knockoff. It's good though, and they have this bread that's cheap and it's a pretty decent place to study. Both of our families are gone in the mornings, so we get pretty bored after awhile and usually meet about an hour before classes start.
After classes, Akira, Emma and I went out for patbingsu because Emma hadn't had it before (I don't know that Akira had either actually. . .). It was delicious, as all Korean food is, and we had a good time talking about various aspects of Korea.
Emma lives about an hour and a half from Sogang, so she had to leave when we finished. Akira's family wouldn't be home until around 10 that night, so she and I went to Paris Baguette after that. I ended up buying a small cake for my host family and she got a sandwich. The bags are really cute and say "Mon Amie, Mon Amour, Mon Paris Baguette." Yes, I'm keeping it.
On the subway home, we stopped by a magazine stand and I found the recent issue of W Korea, which has pictures of Super Junior in it from when they were in Paris. Don't worry, I bought it! I really like the photography in general of Korean magazines, so I was really happy to get this ^.^

When I got home, Gayoung greeted me at the door (which is rare) and gave me a hug. This girl is adorable, I tell you! Anyways, I managed to hid the cake from her, before I took my shower, slid it onto the table. Not five minutes later, Gayoung came into the kitchen and went "Cake!?" Mission: success.

Later that night, I decided to take a few pictures from my apartment landing.

What a view!
Aunt Lee said there was an even better view at Mapo bridge, so we hopped on our bikes and took the Hangang trail to Mapo! Seoul at night is so beautiful!

Tuesday we met with our supporters and studied. It was interesting. After class, I went home and we went to a restaurant that served Korean style soup. The waitress was one of Aunt Lee's friends who was in Gapyeong.Her daughter, who is my age, also came along so I got to make a Korean friend~! Gayoung was being silly and Aunt Lee would tell me how to scold her in Korean, which made everyone laugh. The food was really good and I really want to go back sometime!!

Wednesday. . . here is were things start to get complicated! On Wednesday I was planning to post (actually, I had written most of what is before this Wednesday morning!) but then, while randomly surfing on facebook, I noticed on the the RD's (Gooseul) for the program posted a picture of everyone doing Taekwondo. I was suddenly very very confused because I had no clue it was so soon. Well, it turns out the other RD had been sending out emails and text messages about it all (none of which I got), and it really was today. Naturally, I got very upset, very quickly. I'm not usually one to cry, but ever since I heard we would being doing Taekwondo in Korea, I'd been looking forward to it.
I checked my email again multiple times, and then went through all the documents we had been given since coming here. Sure enough, in the handbook it was printed that we were doing Taekwondo today. Sadly, I still had absolutely no clue where to go. At about 10:30, Gooseul called me and asked if I was coming. I managed to tell her that I had no clue it was today and didn't know how to get there. She told me to hail a cab and then call her again. So I quickly through everything together for class and dashed out the door. I learned how to hail a cab and after some confusion, I was able to get there!! The cab driver was really nice especially considering I speak very limited Korean. Also, please understand that in Korea, traffic signs are more of a suggestion than a law. Red lights only mean look both ways before crowwing the street. . .He got me there in under 20 minutes and I got to actualy participate. We sparred a little, which was a blast, and then they had us break boards. We wrote down dreams on them and one by one broke them in two. It was really great! I still have my wood in my suitcase!
After that, my friends Sofia and I went to lunch at one of the bakery/coffee shops near Sogang. I bought a sandwich, but only ate about a fourth of it (remember this sandwich!)
When we got to school, Emma and Sofia were moved out of my class so it was just me and a girl named Katrina sitting at our table. During break, I ended up giving Katrina the rest of my sandwich.
That night, my childhood ended. Heres a little surprise. I had thought all along that Harry Potter came out the 14th here. This is a lie, and I must not tell lies. It came out on the 13th, so naturally, I asked my host mom if we could go see it. Turns out, she and Gayoung love Harry Potter, so on the 12th, we reserved tickets.
Quick fact about reserving tickets in Korea. Actually, quick fact about trying to sign up for anything online in Korea: YOU MUST HAVE A KSSN (Korean Social Security Number). In other words, you must be a ressident of Korea. Or you can't sign up. This is uber annoying.
Regardless, on the 13th, I literally ran home from school and barely made it home by 6:00 (our movie is at 6:20). After lots of confusion we made it to the theatre!

Oh my god. If I typed up everything I had to say about this movie, I would make this post so long none of you would read it (if you are still reading this far, I aplaud you!). For the last time, I was sucked into the world of Harry Potter, the world that I've grown up with. Watching the actors on the screen was like seeing old friends after a long time, seeing how much they had grown, seeing what they had become. It was all very moving.
It also gave me a really warm feeling inside. Here I was, sitting in a movie theatre in Korea, half a world away from where I had seen every other movie, and yet, it felt exactly the same. People still gasped, laughed, and cried with every scene. The only difference, really, was that I was the only non-Asian (most likely non-Korean, but I can't be 100% sure) in the theatre, and there were Korean subtitles on the bottom that I couldn't help but read every so often.
After the last scene faded, I realized that was it. There wasn't anything else. it was over. It was time to grow up a little more, and move on, taking with me the happy memories to cherish forever.
Although. . . it bothered me a little bit that there wasn't a "The End." before the credits. . . I really wanted it to say that . . .

So, then came Thursday. Well, I was supposed to go to norae bang with my group, but remember that little sandwich? Yeah. It gave me food poisoning. So I spent the morning miserable in bed waiting to feel well enough that I could go to school. I learned that in Korea, why your stomache hurts, you drink warm water. Aunt Lee would also come in from time to time and massage my stomache and body, which, actually, helped a lot. By the time I had to leave for school, I was feeling well enough to go.
After talking a little before class, I found out Katrina had the same thing the night before. Oh little sandwich. . .
During that class period, a very odd thing happened. Katrina said her foot was hurting a little where she had a blister, and by the time it was 5:30, her ankle had almost double in size. Turns out, a boy in another class had a similar issue with a cut on his hand.
After some thought, and talking it over with various people, we've sort of decided there must be some kind of bacteria that isn't in America that is making people sick/swell (I'm not the only one who's been sick).

Friday morning rolled around and I still wasn't feeling well, so I went back to the doctor. I have four different meds I'm now taking, but they do make me feel a lot better. However, one is really weird. . . It's like toothpaste thats sat in the sun so its gooy... bleh. I would like to add, however, that my two trips to the doctor plus my medicine still haven't reached more than 50 USD and that is without insurance.

Other than having no appitite and being rediculously tired all the time, I'm feeling a lot better now. Hopefully, I'll be up and running again soon so I can do more than sit at home!!

Comments:

Bryan: You beat Mum AND Jillian! Congradualtions!! I have to say, your comment made me laugh. And I haven't found it yet. I've been on about 5 different subway lines but no luck yet. . .

Shelbi: I just go to the local place with my host mom. There is a pharmacy next door.

Mrs. Dossey: Not a problem! I harrassed her about it the other day, so maybe she'll put some up soon!

Mom: I've missed you and JT talking to eachother through comments xDD And Gayoung is adorable! ^.^

Uncle Mike: English is taught here starting in Elementry school. My host sister already knows quite a few words and phrases and studies English for about an hour every day. English and surprisingly French are pretty popular. Though I don't know anyone who speaks French here, it's on lots of clothes and many shops have French names.

Aunt Nancy, Lena, and Grammy: I have so much to say about Korean food that I'm working up a whole post about it (with a little help from my host mom!) I have lists of things I've eaten and I've been tryign to take as many picture as possible!! Breakfast here is pretty much a smaller version of every other meal. We have rice, some type of main dish, and then side dishes. Lots and lots of food!

Mrs. Sharpnack: I'm so happy you are reading!! Studying isn't so bad. Though I haven't memorized every piece of vocab, but I usually start to pick it up after a day or two. The pace of our classes is super fast. We cover a unit every two days.
As for slang. . . yes and no. Korean has three (four?) ways of speaking formal, polite, and plain. Plain is considered super rude to speak to anyone older than you or people you don't know well. So when I speak, I always try to use the polite, but sometimes my host mom corrects me when I talk to Gayoung and asks me to use the plain, which then usually messes me up and I'll speak plain to people older than me. It's really confusing and I usually end up repeating myself a few times to make sure I'm not being rude!

And typing this tl;dr has completely exhausted my energy reserves. Today, Aunt Lee said we would just stay home so I can rest.
Next time, hopefully I won't be suddenly, and randomly busy/sick and I'll update sooner~!

Subways, Hello Kitty, and Gapyeong

Okay, so I haven't posted in almost a week because I was waiting for something really interesting to post about.
My past week has pretty much gone like this:
Get up, eat breakfast with Aunt Lee and Gayoung (Jaehak leaves super early), see Gayoung off to school, then find something to do until 12:40 when I leave for school. I've decided I don't like afternoon school. Not one bit.
On Tuesdays and Thursdays we meet in groups with a Korean supporter who gives us extra tutoring sessions and takes us around Seoul. My group members are Sarah and Peter, our supporter is Seungwoo. Seungwoo is hilarious in a very dorky sort of way. He obviously isn't comfortable with his English, so he tries to make a joke out of it (even though his English really isn't that bad. . . .). On Tuesdays, we meet him at his university to study and on Thursdays, we go somewhere. This Thursday, we went to. . . somewhere (I can tell you the subway stop, but not the town ><) and made traditional Korean paper fans. Then we went to another place where there is a giant market for lunch. I got to see pig heads. . . Sadly, I didn't get any pictures ><

As for school, it's pretty great. Monday we took a placement test, and somehow I managed to end up in intermediate. Tuesday was a complete joke. We pretty much just reviewed hangul, the Korean written alphabet, for 4 hours. Wednesday it picked up a little and Thursday we got our textbooks, and we are actually learning things now~! Yaaaay!!! We also have at least 10 pages of homeowrk a night (record to beat is currently 20 pgs).

Monday, since it was the 4th, Akira and I went out to "celebrate". We went to Tom n Tom's Coffee, one of the thousands of coffee shops in Korea. (Basic layout of a Korean street: coffee shop, make-up shop, cellphone shop, restaurant, coffee shop, clothes shop, cellphone shop, make-up shop, stand selling iphone 4 cases, coffee shop.) We ordered italian sodas and apple cinnamon bread/toast. We were expecting the usual, Starbucks size scone or something. . . holy crap we were wrong! It was huge and we didn't even finish it >< Pictures posted.
After that, we roamed Sincheon and went shopping! We found this super cute clothes store and I bought two dresses and a long shirt for less than 25$. I love it. Otherwise, we didn't find much else. . . .
When I got home, Gayoung, Aunt Lee, and I went for a walk on the Han River. I think I may end up dedicating a whole post on the Han River, because it's so beautiful. I cross is every day on the way to school, and it's my favourite part of the ride. I'll have to take some more pictures. . . Anyways, on our walk, I finally saw fireworks on the 4th for the first time in 3 years. I was pretty darn happy!

Tuesday evening I went to get a new phone because mine liked to shut off when ever it felt like it, and Thursday was my trip to the doctor. I'm happy to say I can pretty much hear again!
Wednesday, Emma, Akira and I went to Ewha where we saw the most offensive shirt we've ever laid eyes upon, Korea hipster, and more cheap clothes. Afterwards, we went to McDonalds, which, I must say, is a must while abroad.

Friday, Akira and I met up for lunch, since we live super close and have nothing to do in the mornings, and then met up after class and went to Hongdae. There was a very particular reason we were going to Hongdae: the Hello Kitty Cafe.
We took the subway to Hongdae and within 10 minutes, got lost (well, we could get back to the subway, just not the cafe). Akira had been there before, but they had gotten lost on the way there as well, and we went in a lot of circles. We asked about 5 different people how to get there and eventually found it. OH MY GOD HELLO KITTY CAFE ALKSJFLAKSDJLAK.
Yeah. That was pretty much my mind then intire time. We ordered caramel macciatos and waffles shaped like the cat herself! It was super yummy ^.^ Then we navigated home and found a much quicker route from teh subway, so we can get there easier next time!

Then, yesterday I went with Gayoung and Aunt Lee to Gapyeong! Gapyeong is up in the moutains and I'm not really sure how far away it was because on the way up we were stuck in traffic and on the way back, Aunt Lee got lost!! But we pretty much went up to this little area where you could rent a super small house and stay for a bit. There was a stream that was so clean you could drink from it, and lots of trees and mountains. It was very lovely!! We ate a late lunch/ early dinner with some of Aunt Lee's friends on an outside, traditional table. I felt like Anthony Bordain, except, I wasn't allowed to drink. Sorry Anthony. There was a TV on a covered platform next to us (there are pictures so you can look for a better description) and they had Music Core on, which was interesting to watch. I picked up a few works here and there and over all had a good time! On the way home, Aunt Lee got lost and we didn't get home umtil after 10:00!!

Now, in this post I've talked a lot about the subways. Why, you may ask? Because they are amazaing. I walk about two blocks to my subway entrance and once I'm on, I can get pretty much anywhere in Seoul. It's absolutely wonderful!! Aunt Lee gave me a little pocket map I can keep in my purse which makes transfers super easy! The only thing I don't like about the subway is the fact that it is a subway. Except for crossing the Han River, it's all underground, so there's no view >< But it's still very convienient!

Now to reply to comments, since JT is so desperate for them! ^.^

Ellen: I'm sorry >< I will have to check with you before I post something about language again!!!

Mom: Come on! Leave more of a comment than that!

Zach: You will love this: my trip to the doctor and my two bottles of antibiotic cost me less than 25$. And that's without insurance! And I'm actually not teaching English (you have to have a degree to teach) but I'm going to a university here to learn Korean. Thank you so much for reading though!!

Emma's Aunt Susan: I'm sorry!! But thank you for reading!!

Jen: Thank you!!

Jt: :p this better??

찜질방

So, I thought instead about blogging about every single aspect of my day, I'll talk a little about what I did, then some intersting aspect of Korean culture. Today: 찜질방.
But first, what happened yesterday. After blogging, we ate breakfast and Jaehak (host dad) turned on the news. When it ended about 30 minutes later, much to my horror, my host mom suggested another show to watch. Her suggestion was based on an accidental occurance the day before, where I had my Korean notebook open to the particles page (particles. . . don't exist in English, sorry, can't explain them). One of the practice sentences was from when Emma was over during her Spring Break and read "수퍼주니아를 사랑해요." I can already hear Shelbi laughing. . . . Anyways, in English, that reads "I love Super Junior." Oops. I was trying to avoid annoying my host family with my obsession, but Aunt Lee (host mom) is just too clever I guess. . . .
So some channel with music videos was switched on. Most. Awkward. Moment. Ever. . . But Aunt Lee likes Nickhun? Despite Jaehak obviously not liking anything to do with k-pop, I think she is a little more open to it (seeing as how later in the car, she started playing various other artists from her iPhone ). I would also like to point out for those of you who like k-pop and watch MVs a lot, they look like cheap soaps on korean television. I don't think I'll watch them again. Now, I fully plan to have a post about how obsessed Korea is with idols, but I'm waiting until I have more pictures to give you a full example. Today is 찜질방. Not idols. 찜질방 is better.

After lunch, we went to 북천 (Bukchon) which is a nice little town where there are many tradidtional houses and a huge palace. We went to the 한옥 (Hanok) museam, and I learned lots about how Korean houses were built. Interesting point: the stove area was built lower than the rest of the house and the heat from it was carried through vents under the house to a chimny on the other side, thus, heating the entire house through the floor. I thought was pretty awesome. . .
And, since it was pouring down rain (does it ever stop rainning here?) we headed for the car, but not without stopping by a coffee stand where I had the single best caramel macchiato I have ever had the pleasure of tasting. I want to go back *.*

Now, the important part: 찜질방. Read: Jjimjilbang. 찜질방 is the Korean sauna. But to explain the Korean sauna, you have to take step back to talk about the Korean bathhouse, which I actually don't know the name for . . .
Korean public baths are pretty much the greatest things ever. You go, shower, and then soak in various degrees of bath water to your hearts content. Some pools have jets to massage you, some pools have jets that help pound down fat (they hurt T.T) ect ect. You can even swim in some (see: Gayoung, who brought goggles). Afterwards you feel super relaxed and super clean!!
When you have soaked to your hearts content, you wash off and go change into these orange. . .outfits and go to the 찜질방 which is a coed area with like 10 diffrerent saunas. Its pretty much this big room, with mats laid out, and there are many many other rooms with glass windows where people sit and overheat. Its wonderful~!
For this next section, please prepare your celcius converter. We worked our way up. Starting at 43C degrees, we progressed up to 49C and 57C. Then we hung outside on the mats for a bit and I learned a few new Korean words! Then we went to the ice room, which was -1C. Across from the ice room was an oddly shapped room with no windows, just a low door to a circular, clay-walled room. I asked Aunt Lee what it was and she said it's super hot and asked if I could try. So we went in~! I have no idea how hot it was, but within about 10 seconds, I was sweating and in a minute I was drenched. The lights inside were dimmed and it was crowded, but oddly comfortable. A sand timer sat in the middle of the room to keep people from staying in too long.
I have no idea how hot that room was, but it was hotter than the 67C room we went into next!

Over all, it was really relaxing. both the bath and 찜질방 are really good for your health and body. I'm definitely going back!

Sadly enough, it didn't fix my ear. Still can't hear out of my left ear. Becoming concerned ><

Today I have a test, so I'm going to go study now!
Happy 4th of July USA~!

And so it begins. . . .

Well, after last summer's failed attempt at blogging, I will actually try to keep up this summer. For those who don't know me, or are just a little out of the loop, I'm spending this summer in Seoul, South Korea through the NSLI-Y program. Exciting huh?

I leave on Sunday (the 26th) and don't come back until mid August.

In preparation for my great adventure, I've been studying Korean, riding the hallyu wave, and learning to play Starcraft. . . Yeah, I'm completely unprepared xD

The reason I'm writing today is because I finally have my host family information~! I have a father, and mother, and a little sister who is younger than Michael. Apparently my sister speaks better English than my mother. I'm super excited! No English for me while I'm in Korea~ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

Anyways, stay tuned~! I'll definitely write more when I actually have things to talk about xDD

Wonderful Weekend!

Even with all the stuff coming up, I'm still hanging out with my friends.
Yesterday I went over to my friend Kayla's house and hung out with her and Ariel for hours. We worked on writing stories and just hung out.
After a taco dinner, we went outside to play soccer. I had fun kicking the ball over a tree in Kayla's yard. lol

Ariel fetching the soccer ball XD (its behind the bird bath!)

Kayla and I after that I went with my friends Caitlin and Jessie to an old cemetery with an amazing statue of an angle on a headstone:


And then there was the dog that like to roam the place, tearing up the decorations. He was sweet, just a little ornery:

And then there were the drums. . . We were walking towards and old rusted sign that had the name of the cemetery on it to take a picture, when we heard this weird, tribal drumming. We all froze, even the dog. Freaked out, we started to slink back to the car, even though the noise sounded like it was coming from just down the road from the car. By the time we got there, the drumming had stopped and there was no one around. So we went back to the sound. the dog came to of course:

We took the actual road instead of the path the second time...

Caitlin, the dog, and Jessie

The dog just loved us. And when he would behave, he was really cute! ^^ In the end Caitlin named him Octavian after the Emperor of Rome.
Following that we went to another friends house, Catherin's, for a movie night. First we were just watching Harry Potter 4, but then someone brought out the scary movies >< I'm not so good with scary movies.
We ended up watching Quarantine, which, even though it is completely unrealistic, scared the crap out of me. I couldn't stand being alone that night, and we didn't even finish it. It was late when we got there, and Caitlin and Jessie had to be up early the next morning. I can't thank them enough!!

And that's not even what went down today! I went to visit my grandma, Hahn, and my aunt, Megan, had left me a bunch of little Japanese things she had picked up! They were so cute! I'm going to take pictures of them when I can!

Well, it's late and I still have school tomorrow. Only two days left! Then to Colorado!!

<3>

Once In A Lifetime

Every so often we are presented with the chance of a lifetime. Whether or not we take that chance is entirely up to us.

Lately, I've felt that my big chance has come. This summer I'm going to Japan to live with a family I've never met. As of right now, all I have is a date; I know that June 7th I will leave my home in Kansas City, and head out for the Land of the Rising Sun.

I'm starting this blog so that on my adventures, my friends, family, and whoever else finds themselves reading this, can follow along.

I'm going to try to post multiple times a week, but everything really depends on how often I can get access to the internet overseas.

Even though I'm not there yet, there is still a lot going on! Plenty of preparations, and, of course, I still have a week left in school, not to mention a trip to Colorado!

So stay tuned to see what wacky things happen as I pursue my dreams!