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!

한국 음식

The long awaited food post arrives!

It's been awhile, but I've literally been trying to shove everything I can into these last two weeks. It's a real headache. Last Friday I bought the Yesung edition of SJ's new album. Since then, Gayoung has enjoyed dancing around the house shouting "Amelia loves Yesung" in Korean. It's a bit annoying, but she's seven.... Wednesday I went to Myeongdong with Akira, Alexia, my penpal Dayun, and Akira's penpal Gonwoo. It was super fun! Last night Dongjun and I went out and bought an electronic dictionary for me and then went to Namsan Tower. Namsan has one of the most amazing views ever. Period. Afterwards, we got a little lost and ended up walking all the way down the mountain. Ow. Then today was graduation. Oh my gosh my life is moving so fast.

Anyways. Food.

I've pretty much come to the conclusion that the idea of "breakfast food" doesn't exist in Asia. As in Japan, in Korea your breakfast is a full meal. I've only eaten lunch in my house a few times because I usually go out with Akira for coffee, or meet my supporters. But a traditional lunch is just as complicated at the breakfast with sidedishes and such. Dinner is even more food. Usually more meat I would say. All meals are eaten with the family together, too. The first week or so, all of this was fine, but recently I just can't eat a full meal in the mornings and I feel aweful when there is food left in my bowl

Another interesting fact about Korean dining: almost all of it can be eaten with chopsticks or a spoon. Koreans use spoons a LOT. I was really surprised. Also, Korean chopsticks are flat. It took me forever to adapt and I still can hardly pick up noodles.

As far as the contents of the meal, in my house we have three staple sidedishes that come with every meal: kimchi, sweet black beans, and these tiny little fish that are possibly candied with nuts and the most amazing things I have ever eaten. I have no idea what I'm going to do when I can't eat them anymore. Probably cry. A lot.

There is always rice served, of course. I also think it's more common to serve soup, but we don't usually have it. When you eat the soup, its also very common to put the rice IN the soup. Also, rice is mostly eaten with a spoon, not chopsticks.

Main courses vary. There is always meat. Korea actually eats a lot of meat. A lot. There is always a lot. Not as much seafood as I thought there would be though. But I guess that's okay. I don't think there is a meat Koreans won't eat. Dog is apparently very common as well, but my host mom loves dogs, so we never eat it. We usually have beef, but chicken and pork come along sometimes too. Food is usually mixed. ie. Bibimbap, which is a multitude of veggies and meat mixed with rice, hot sauce, and egg. There is also something we usually eat that is like rice mixed with minced veggies/meat. Bulgogi is common. It's beef thats been shredded and cooked with some delicious sauce. . . so good. Then there is kimbap, which is veggies and rice rapped up in seaweed. It's like sushi, but without the seafood! It's super good! That's what I ate for dinner tonight actually.

Another thing I must talk about, of course, is kimchi. I had eaten kimchi in America, but dear god, its just not the same. Kimchi here is SOOOOOOOOOOOOO good. All of us NSLI-Y kids talk about how our host mom's make the best kimchi ever. And really, my host mom's kimchi is to die for. It's amazing. She's been laughing at me recently and saying "You eat kimchi like a Korean!"


Anyways, it's not as spectacular as I had hoped, but that's a small window into Korean food. Feel free to ask questions!

Comments:

Ellen: *gives cookie* thank you~~~~ the rain sucks >< It's raining again. And Spudgy didn't come T.T We met up in a coffee shop, so pets were a little difficult....

Kealey: thank you~~ I feel like the London Underground would be a thousand times scarier than being lost in Seoul. It's super safe here, which is nice.

Shelbi: they were kimchi cookies :P I can't wait to see you Monday~

I have to start packing now (FML) so I better wrap this up! See some of you state side in two days T.T

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!!