Friday, December 28, 2007

Holy Moley!

Well, a lot has happened in the past year.... brown hair to red, Mokdong to Hongdae, single to relationship, hagwon to university.... I don't know what all next year will bring but there is one certainty--- Korea to Thailand!!!!

Yep. It's a done deal now. Allister is leaving for Thailand on January 28th, I will follow in August when my contract is completed. In the meantime I will move into one of my school's apartments (not a dorm, a subsidized apartment for foreign teachers) and I will try to pick up some extra classes while preparing for my move this summer.

Living in Daehangno will be great. I'll be a short walk from my school and I'll be in one of the loveliest parts of Seoul-- mountains, old palaces, swanky wine bars, and theaters.

We had originally planned on staying here another year but Korea drastically changed their visa requirements just this past month, the same week that Allister's school decided to dump all of their part-timers (he does a lot of home and phone teaching as well). Two days later, he was offered the Thailand job, it all worked out perfectly!

His old friend Matt lives there, in a city called Ubon in Ubon Ratchathani Province. It's a small city, about 100,000 people with some Western amenities but a lot of traditional living as well. I'm picturing Nassau without the Lyford Cay element. Matt has been trying to get us to move there for a while and the two of them may start their own school. I've met Matt before and his wife, who he actually met here in Seoul, they're both really nice. Matt speaks Thai and works at the university as well. It will be a pay cut but the cost of living is extremely low so I'll still be able to make the bills and travel a bit, no worries. There's a Chinese program at the school so I won't have to give up on that. I won't have to drop the Korean either because I'll have Matt's wife to practice with. It'll all be a big change but we're looking forward to it. What a way to start out the New Year!

Thursday, December 27, 2007

More Christmas Pics

Here are two cute ones that Amber took...



I'm telling him to "Smile in this one!"



A good, for the fam pic. :-)

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Christmas

Yay, what a great Christmas Day! It was a small group of us at our house Christmas Day, eating and drinking well into the night. We were a motley crew, a Canadian, a Kiwi, two Aussies and myself. Al made some delicious food and a good time was had by all. It's nice to have a real vacation (three day weekends just aren't enough)! No other plans this week but I'm sure we'll find something fun to do. I hope everyone had a merry Christmas as well! Love you guys!

Christmas Night


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Originally uploaded by MacKensie!.

My favorite photo from the evening. Amber, with Marcus to the left, at Stereo in Hongdae.

Christmas


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Originally uploaded by MacKensie!.

Al making Christmas dinner in our kitchen.

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Christmas Time!

Yay, it's almost Christmas! It finally feels like Christmas time this week as it has gotten cold and the whole city is decorated now.

We went for a walk tonight along the Cheongyecheon Stream in downtown Seoul. It's a neat spot. The whole thing was built up only in 2005 and it's always a nice place for a walk. Now it's all decked out for Christmas.

I feel relaxed for the first time in a while. My last classes were last week, this week is just entering final grades, organizing things, and doing a little bit of preparation for my January classes. Tomorrow (Wednesday) is a day off because Korea's having their presidential elections then.

When we first got to the Cheongyecheon there was a political rally going on for Lee Myung-Bak, the guy most likely (according to popularity polls) to win tomorrow. He's responsible for the rebuilding of the stream as he was the town mayor at the time. We caught a glimpse of him over the crowd.

Here are some pictures from the evening...



At the entrance of Cheongyecheon, the crowds watching Lee Myung-Bak.



Lee is talking from that white vehicle in the left side of the picture.



Pretty lights!



Me and Al.

Sunday, December 09, 2007

Rant

I have been banned from a cafe in my neighborhood today!

Was I being loud? Only ordering water? Did I run out on a tab? Was I rude to a waiter?

No, no, none of those things.... I'm guilty of studying Chinese. Yep, that's not allowed there.

I have been meeting with my Chinese tutor there every Sunday for the past two months. They have banned us from having lessons in their cafe, claiming that we take up their tables when other customers, who would order more should have the table. Here's the thing, they have never been more than half full any time we have ever been there, and today, when they banned us, there was only one other customer there! There are 12 tables in this cafe. We are not loud, and we always ordered coffee.

We had noticed before that these people were not friendly and had speculated as to why. One other time they said we were closed, which was confusing because we go there at the same time every week.

I wonder, if I was studying Korean, instead of Chinese would we have had the same response? Do they kick the Hongik U students out who study at their cafe? Hmmm....

I couldn't be more angry right now.

There have been other times when businesses have refused to serve me, at those times I could almost justify it in my mind (which is better, to me, than just stewing over the likelihood that they were just being racist) but I can't conjure up a good one here. When I was apartment shopping and I would walk in the door of a Realtor to be met with a loud "No!" before we had even exchanged greeting, I could tell myself-- maybe he thinks it would be too hard to communicate. When a taxi with it's light on refuses to pick me up, I can think, maybe he had a really drunk foreigner in his cab before and is afraid I'll act the same way. But here--- no excuse-- blatant discrimination towards me and my Chinese friend. The worst part is, I can't do much about it. If I say the name of the cafe and complain,here or on another forum, I can be sued for defamation (it has happened to foreigners before). I do not know enough Korean to express my anger in a constructive way to them or to any organization that might be available to make a real complaint. So, basically they will suffer no repercussions and are free to humiliate the next sorry bunch of foreigners who try to have a cup of coffee at their place. Despicable.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007



A recent picture of me and Allister at a club in Hongdae.

Photo taken by Shelton Bumgartner.
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