Assure

Just wanted to let you know that normal life is still happening in South Korea.

Not, like, my "I go on awesome adventures and speak in a foreign language and live in Asia" normal life... but my "I do laundry and work out and cook meals" normal life.

I think it could be easy to romanticize my experience of moving to a foreign country to start my career. Yes, I chose it for the adventure and opportunity to learn about myself and the world.... but I still do normal things here.

I go grocery shopping.
I work out in the morning.
I teach classes.
I grade assignments.
I celebrate birthdays.
I go to church.
I meet new people.
I clean my apartment.
I wash dishes.
I go to school meetings.
I send out way too many emails.
I sing and play the day away.
I dread making dinner after work.

These are all things I could have done in the United States.
I chose to do them somewhere with somewhat of a language barrier, surrounded by a culture other than my own..... but I'm still living a very normal life. It's not all solo sea kayaking, eating foods I can't identify (though I have done my fair share of that), plane rides, and "soul searching".

so, to those of you who I'll see in the states during Christmas time... don't be surprised if I'm still the same me. I'm still Emmalee, living a normal life... just a plane ride away instead of a car ride away.

Things I'm very excited for in the near future:
seeing my friends and family, duhhhhh
Chipotle.
USING MY OWN OVEN TO BAKE UP A GIANT STORM
Fairmount Avenue United Methodist Church
Clyde, Maggie, Yogi, and Snowflake (aka The Herd)
snow.
Target. I can't wait for Target.
The OK Factor CD release event!
Seasonal Starbucks flavors that don't seem odd to me.

Things I'm scared of in the near future:
my cell phone not working when I land in the US
driving a car. it's been a while.
jet lag.

Caffeine... especially in seasonal flavors not available in SoKo. That will help with Jet lag, but who knows what'll happen. I am a slave to sleep normally, having no control over where or when I'll fall asleep. This could be rough. However it turns out, everything will be awesome... because I'll be Home For Christmas.

Tokyo, T.Gives, and Transitions

The school I work for didn't have school on November 28th or 29th - the staff (Canadian AND American) knew why, but some of our students had no idea why. American Thanksgiving! 

I believe most of you know this about me, but if you don't…. I think it's important for you to know.

Thanksgiving (affectionately known as T.Gives in my life) is my favorite holiday. It's my favorite holiday for  for many reasons. 

1) Food. It totally operates around food. delicious food.

2) My bros and parents and I usually have a great time making pepperoni rolls or Christmas buttons while watching The Christmas Story :)

3) I love cooking for a ton of people

4) Black Friday happens the next day

5) It means its pretty much Christmas

Historically, #6 was Christmas At Luther, but that's no longer a direct part of my life :( 

Anyway,

this year's Thanksgivings were a bit different, as I was in TOKYO!

I flew to Tokyo on Thursday morning, arriving in the city around 1:30pm. I met up with Connie and her family at their hotel. Connie studied abroad in the small town I was born in, and we were her host family. I knew Connie mostly when I was between the ages of 4 and 6, seeing her again when I was 8 or 9. Our meeting came about via Facebook  - on Tuesday I saw that her posts were popping up on my newsfeed, coming from Tokyo. I messaged her, discovering that we'd be in the city at the same time, and we coordinated our plans to spend some time together. It was so wonderful to meet her daughter (who is now the age I was when I met Connie), and spend a holiday with someone who is like family to me. Though it had been many years, I still remember presents and time spent with Connie on holidays when I was very young. As Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, I was really nervous that I'd spend it alone with a bowl of ramen noodles, crying at the thought of stuffing and pumpkin pie. Definitely no tears, just lots of love and delicious food (from a different culture!). 

After spending some time with Connie and her family, Sydnie met me at their hotel, and brought me to her apartment where I'd stay for the next three nights. Sydnie works at an international school in Tokyo, teaching band. It was so comforting and informative to spend time with someone who's going through many of the same transitions as me right now. We went to Luther, taking a lot of courses and making music together, so we had some great first year teacher conversations. We saw a bunch of different parts of the city, I met some of her colleagues (who will be stopping through Seoul on their way to New Zealand in two weeks!), spent a day at school with her, and tried lots of local cuisine. 

 Shabu Shabu Thanksgiving with Connie and Masashi

 Sophie was tired after dinner and looking at Christmas lights

 Ms. Reynolds in action!

 Tempura lunch - yummmm

 Sushi dinner

 Conveyor belt sushi, so many delicious little fishes in my belly

 WE FOUND THE MARIMEKKO STORE!

 Visiting the Meiji Shrine

 Traditional wedding at the shrine

 Traditional bamboo flute/recorder group

 wishes left at the Meiji shrine

 4 Japanese students approached us at the shrine, offering to be our guide so they could practice their english. 

Snuck a photo of the bride - look at her hair!

So, Tokyo was great.

It was refreshing to travel and see more new faces and places along with the comforts of friends and family from home. Spending time at school with Sydnie, meeting her colleagues, and learning more about another international school got my head in a bit of a different place. I hadn't really been thinking about international teaching or what's going to happen after my 2 year contract is up, but this trip sort of brought those topics up. I by no means have any answers, but I am sure that my heart and mind are much more open than when I left Minnesota. I feel stronger and more capable than ever before, which is exhilarating and meaningful. Perfect sensations and emotions to carry me through the last three weeks of my first semester as a teacher!

I think I had it somewhere in my mind that once I transitioned into my life in Korea that I'd be settled. I'd be established. I'd have a routine. I'd have a plan. Things would be similar and familiar as long as I stay here.

Definitely not true.

It's that time of year…. contract conversations are nearly completed for next year already. (I'm signed a two year contract, so no conversations for me… but this time next year I'll probably have made a formal decision.) Rumors, conversations, and announcements have painted an unclear picture of what next year will look like at my school. Many people are leaving, some for already signed contracts, and others just know it's time for them to move on and will be searching through the spring for their next position/location. I'm so happy for my colleagues who have made choices that are good for them, but it is a little hard to already know these people are leaving. Connections are a funny thing - time has a lot to do with how deeply people can connect and how much energy they're capable of putting into the here and now. It was easy to poeticize the idea of "live for today, because you don't know who will be there tomorrow" or other such sentiments when I was in Minnesota - but unless there was an act of god or illness, I knew I'd see most of my people again within the next couple weeks. Living the international teacher life, connections can be very temporary. I was eating Sundubu Jigae (google that deliciousness, if you haven't already) with Meg and Becky and we were talking about this. I confessed my recently recognized idea that I was done with transitions for a while now that I'm "established" in Korea… to which Meg responded "No, I thought that'd be true, too, but it seems we have actually entered a life of permanent transition". 

I suppose the same could be said for life at home, and looking back, I think I often felt that way. 

Maybe this is a transition into adulthood and permanent transitions, or maybe its a transition into international teacher life. Who knows. 

Anyway, glad to be with the ones I am while I'm here.

Happy for those moving on, and looking forward to new faces and fun where ever I go.

Be back in the states on December 21st - can't wait to eat chipotle, snuggle with my cats, and see all my favorite people :)

But first….. two holiday concerts.

#LETSDOTHIS

or, as Ethan would say.

"And now we GO"

Two Hearted

I'm a pretty reflective person, I like to think and remember and go over what has happened - good and bad. Moving and starting a career are two really great causes for reflection, so it seems I've got a lot of good material! Recently I've been thinking more about my transition as an expat and a member of my school community. A couple recent events/happenings that have caused great reflection in my life:

1) Jenn's friend Tim is here to visit from Canada. He arrived on Friday and came out with us on Saturday to celebrate Sarah's birthday. Spending time with Jenn and Tim helped me to realize how established I am/we are here in Seoul - as a community, as a friend group, as teachers, etc. As much as I never really foresaw this city feeling like home, it's really starting to (sorry, Mom!). It's just surprising how much culture, skill, and snip-its of useful vocabulary you slowly soak up here. It was really fun to go out as a giant group to celebrate Sarah's birthday, and even more fun because I started to think about it from an outsider's perspective - remembering how I saw these people 3 to 4 months ago as new colleagues. (I've gotten crap for calling the people I work with my "colleagues". They'll say "Come on, Emmalee… we're friends. You can call us friends") So I was seeing them as colleagues and now we're all friends.

2) The national music education group (for international schools) in Korea heard auditions on Saturday for our high school honors festivals coming up in the spring. The Basement Dwellers (because the music department is completely in the basement) left Wolgye-dong at 730 and arrived in Suwon around 9 am. We got all our recordings in order, found our rooms, received instructions, and set to work. The string team heard an incredible number of auditions. This incredible number caused us to go into overtime - listening until around 5pm. Uff da! 

It was really great to gain some context about how well my students are playing and to work with other string teachers in Korea! 

Anyway, the cause for reflection-

Around 3 pm when I started to go nuts, I texted Sophie and Melinda and they came to the rescue. They had finished their auditions and had some free time. I gave some quick pointers on what we were looking for in recordings and they helped us judge one set of auditions. Life savers! There were two other judges from another school who stuck around to help us, as well. This caused me to realize what a supportive and completing colleagues I have. I actually could not have finished that day without them - I barely made it out alive WITH them. New environments, stress of rankings, lack of consistency in ratings, differing opinions… lots of confusing factors. But I had my Basement Masters with me, and felt we could handle anything.

With all of the good things going on here, the sprinkling of snow made me SO excited, but also made me miss home. I'm very excited about going home for Christmas, but know that I'll be missing Seoul at least a little while I'm in Minnesota. I'm starting to settle and feel comfortable in two places - reminding me of Oberon's Two Hearted Ale. I never quite got the title until now - how could someone be two hearted? One heart loves this freedom and adventure, and another longs for comfort, familiarity, and the people and places I'm used to calling home. I'm so fortunate to be able to satisfy both of my hearts at this point in life. Can't wait to go home and spend time with my brothers and (pretty much) sisters, my parents, my pets, home made chex mix, christmas buttons, and Mannheim Steamroller.

In case you were wondering,

9 days until T.Gives

33 days until I fly back to the states!

37 days until Christmas!!!!!!

113 days since I flew to SoKo

PS - this is sort of odd, but it occurred to me that not all of my loyal readers are my Facebook friends. I've shared this with some of you (and perhaps my parents have shared this with some of you), but for the rest of you who are dying to see more glimpses of my life, here are two different youtube videos of my high school ensemble's performances at large group competition last week (#1  and #2). 

sweet

Today is November 11th - a day that would normally pass without a second thought.
Not in Korea!
Today is 11/11 - Pepero day. (As explained by Wikipedia)
Pepero is a sweet treat that is exchanged on november 11th because 11/11 looks like four sticks of pepero. Our student council sold them last week and they're being delivered to classes today, much like Candy Cane Grams or Christmas Grams from Mean Girls. I'm just hoping to be able to say "4 for you Glen Coco, You go Glen Coco" and have SOMEONE recognize it.


Nothing to interesting going on besides that - my first normal week in a while! Not sure I'll be able to handle the normalcy - no auditions, concerts, field trips, or major due dates for me or my students. Okay, I do have some additional recordings due this week, but only like 1 or 2.

From The Other Side

When I finished my first student teaching placement (in Owatonna, MN) my cooperating teacher (who was a total wizard, by the way) gave me flowers. The card in the flowers said "Welcome to the other side of the desk!". How beautiful to be going through the same experiences but from the other side - I loved that she pointed that out to me.

Today.

Today is Tuesday.
Not any normal Tuesday.
We had large group contest at Seoul International School. As a director, you bring your group to the host school at the scheduled time, perform for a group of judges, and receive written and recorded comments, participate in a "clinic" with one of the judges, receive a rating, and then go home.
This happens to be exactly one week after my middle school concert (my first concert at APIS), and three days after recordings for our equivalent to All-State were due.

We prepared our pieces.
We recorded and critiqued ourselves.
We discussed the moods of the pieces.
We scrubbed some measures.
I transcribed some parts to strengthen our minuscule viola section.
We watched you tubes to understand the subjects of our pieces.
We used many a metronome markings.
We worked. And worked. And worked.
For nearly months (one quarter of the school year) - we worked on our pieces.

Today was the day.
We took three buses of kids to another school, practiced, listened, warmed up, performed, and worked on stuff with a judge. I was with my 23 high school orchestra students from 845-3:35 and loved almost every minute of it. (The minutes I did NOT love where those when I couldn't find one of my first violins. That was fun.) Our performance was admittedly not the best we've ever played - but it'll never be 100% at the exact moment when you want it to be. They did their best and they listened to what I and the judges had to say. As a musician and as a teacher I struggle to define success. I'm a pretty Type-A person who tends to procrastinate and be a little too lenient. How that works - I'm not really sure. So going into this, I set some goals. My goals were pretty basic - I wanted to place at the same level as a school and I just really didn't want to get a bronze. (The awards given were bronze, silver, gold, and platinum).  I wanted band, orchestra, and chorus to be equally strong - which is rumored to not have consistently happened at my school in years past.

My school rocked.
My kids rocked.
We met my goals. We placed well, and so did the other ensembles from my school.

As soon as the performance was over, I felt as though I could sleep for the next week straight. The buildup and pressure I'd put on that performance had finally released and it took everything I had not to fall asleep. We returned to school and finished the school day. I had invited Meg, Meg, Becky, and Jen (all the single ladies) over for dinner, but my apartment was a mess. I hurried home and downed a Coke and got busy. Cooked up a meal, cleaned my apartment, and got ready. We had some delicious foods and great conversation. Near the end of the night Becky and Jenn pointed out to me that I've only been here for 3 months. I checked my count downs - 18 days to T.Gives, 50 to Christmas, and negative 100 days to "Fly To Korea!". I made that third countdown probably February 2nd of 2013 and it's been running ever since. I didn't really think about it from July to October… but it caught my eye on my dashboard in October and I realized it stopped counting down and was keeping track of how many days SINCE I'd moved to Korea!

I can't believe it's only been 100 days since I moved here. It seems like forever ago and yet like no time at all. I use twitter as an emotional outlet, and today I was re-reading some of  my tweets since I've moved to Korea. It's unbelievable what I've encountered and done in 100 days. Realizing the short amount of time I've been here makes me even more proud of what my students accomplished today.

So here I am, on the other side.
I remember the day my countdown to Korea went from triple to double digits (I believe I tweeted about it, truthfully).
and I've just now made the jump from 99 to 100 with my orchestra placing well at large group, recordings submitted, middle school concert completed, and christmas music ready to begin!
Can't believe this is my life - it's only been 3 months, but I think I could get used to this!
:)

What I Owe You

I feel as though I owe you some photos of my life.

So here you go - In this first photo you can see that my "bedroom" is above the rest of my apartment. I can almost stand up entirely in my room - it's really just where sleep. You can also see the stairs on the left side of the photo which are the best storage EVER. They're all closets/drawers/cupboards - love it.

This photo is my window? It's opposite the kitchen/bedroom (you can see in the window reflection). 

Washer in the kitchen - totally normal. I also manually turn on the gas every time I use my stove. So that's a little different than home.

My big fridge - with one USD on it, because I found one in my wallet after I moved here.

Someday I might get more ambitious and post more photos on here, but I mostly assume that if you're reading this, you're my FaceBook friend. I think I've been pretty good about posting lots of photos on FB, but if you've got any questions or are wondering about specific things in my life, let me know :)

du gae lists

That's two lists, for you non Korean speakers.
List #1: Things I've Gotten Used To
I. Carrying Things. I didn't realize how convenient cars were until I had to carry groceries (or anything I purchased) home. I don't own a car here so everything I do is through public transportation. Luckily, taxis are really affordable here. Anyway, whatever I do - I use public transportation. Getting my school stuff, lunch, violin, and sometimes work out gear to school has turned me into an even larger spectacle on the morning bus. I just didn't realize how much I relied on my car back home - that was a seriously convenient and useful mini van.

2. Not Knowing. There are so many times a day I say "I don't know" and it's in a way that I never said it back home. Went to a bakery today… wondered "What do you think is in that bun?"… and I didn't have to ask because I KNEW the answer was "I don't know". Someone calls my cell phone, and I answer thinking "I don't know who this is", knowing that "I don't know what they are saying to me". Literacy is a serious tool and strength. Without it, I sort of feel powerless, but…. still capable? I live in a WORLD of "I don't know".
(2.5 Figuring it out. Context clues. Miming. Asking for help. Google Translate. These methods are sometimes the only method to get through things.)

3. Lack of open container laws - you can consume alcohol pretty much anywhere, anytime here. I'm a fan.
(3.5 Not getting carded. Nobody checks IDs here. .)

4. Korean manerisms - half bowing all the time, handing things to people with two hands/touching my wrist (as explained by EatYourKimchi), repeating myself, responding with "Oh really?", etc.

5. Chopsticks. Hell yeah for acquiring skills.

6. Soup all the time. My friends back home made fun of me for how much I love soup, so it makes sense that I've moved to a place on this planet that ALWAYS has soup :)
I've recently tried Pho for the first time, and there's a delicious tofu soup restaurant near my apartment as well as a Shabu Shabu establishment. Winter in Seoul is rumored to be bone chillingly cold, so I'm looking forward to consuming lots of warm soup this winter yummmmmm


List # 2: Things I Haven't Gotten Used To
1. Everything is sweet. Okay, so everything isn't sugary sweet - but there are very few things I consume here that are actually salty.

2. Getting paid to do things that I like.
I seriously am not used to it.
Once a month I get an email saying "This is how much you made this month!"... and I sort of stare at it. Like, what? You pay me to be here every day? This is too good.
I get to do things that I love. I get to learn so much... and I get to do it with hilarious smart kids.

3. Prices. I still compare things to back home. The exchange rate changes, but has been pretty regularly around 1,000 won = 90 cents. In my head that turns into 1,000 won = 1 USD. I still think "how much was lettuce at home?". I'm just really not used to paying for groceries. Things are often either dirt cheap or pretty expensive here.

4. Walking everywhere. I need to invest in some more intelligent footwear options. I mean.. I have some cute shoes... but those don't really get you far. Or, they will, but they'll give you blisters.



In case you were wondering, life's pretty good in SoKo.
I had my first concert last tuesday (October 29th) - Middle School orchestra, band, and chorus (they don't say choir here). It went really well, even though I was SUPER nervous about it. My high school ensemble is heading to another international school on Tuesday for large group contest, and then we've got parent teacher conferences on friday and saturday. I submitted recordings of 7 students for the international honor orchestra festival and we should be hearing back within the next week or two...
AND BEST OF ALL:
we're starting christmas music :)

Go Time

Friends.

Seriously, how did it get to be the middle of october already?
seriously.
I don't understand this concept of time passing.


We are now 2 weeks away from the middle school music concert (October 29), three weeks away from large group festival (November 5), which means 3 weeks and a day from starting music for the christmas concert (December 18 & 19). Recordings for AMIS and KIMEA festivals are due October 25th, so the students and I have been working on their audition materials and recordings.

The school year is happening.
I sometimes have to pinch myself.
I get caught up in the little stuff - I have to turn this form in, I haven't figured out weather or not I've paid my internet bill, did I send that email to Brian, I wish I knew how to get finale to do meter changes, do we start talking about half steps/whole steps now or wait until after large group contest, what concept is next for grade 5, do I have the right shoulder rests for the different sizes of violins for grade 2, how soon should I make copies of scores for competition, ooooo permission slips for the competition - I should find those on the staff portal, did I double check the roster?

 the list goes on and on.

This is what I came here for. It's crazy. It's new. It's incredibly challenging - but I wouldn't have come here if I thought it was going to be easy. I was looking for this. I wanted to learn about my profession and about myself.  That, dear friends, is happening.

With that, I give you two things that I find incredibly interesting right now:
1) HOW DID THIS PERSON ACHIEVE THIS
2) NERD ALERT As the days grow darker, and I face challenges, my mind travels back to this piece. The text translates to "Bide with us, for evening shadows darken, and the day will soon be over." - what a comfort to ponder and hear.
3) I'm pretty jacked about baking on Friday with Melinda (and maybe Sophie?). The dudes on staff are going to a 4D movie - which I totally would've gone to see, but they made it "No Girls Allowed" so whatever. You can't have my cookies - no boys allowed   :P
4) Tomorrow is day four of Insanity. Yep - we meet at 5:35 and taxi to school to do insanity before the sun is up. So far, I'm lovin' (and simultaneously hatin') it. DIG DEEP.

:)

1) I am always counting down to Christmas - I just love Christmas and countdowns... and that hasn't changed just because I moved to a different continent. 73 days until Christmas! What has changed are the titles of my countdowns (yes, plural). I used to count down to going home from Luther for break and other things.. but now I'm counting down to flying back to the midwest. I forgot to reset one of my countdowns titled "Fly to Korea!" and it has since started counting the days since I flew to Korea. I've been in Korea for 77 days, and will be flying home in 68. Time really flies!

2) Saturday I went to Severance Hospital's International Healthcare Clinic at Yonsei University. I made it without a hitch and got what I went for (prescription for my inhaler). I felt pretty proud of myself as I paid for a doctor's visit and vaccines (that I requested - look at me go!).

3) I found a beautiful Caribou Coffee in Seoul.

4) I started reading "Teaching Music through Performance in Orchestra" - good stuff. Loving it so far.

5) I attended an event and celebrated a birthday this weekend - each of those including their own wine buffets. I now know more about wine than I used to. I tried sparkling red wine for the first time - delicious! But let's be real... I was there for the food. :)

6) I met up with a classmate from Luther today - Katie. She's been here for over a year and might be leaving in 1 month or 3. It was so fun to meet up with her. We chatted about Decorah, our classmates, adjusting to Korea, and everything inbetween.

7) I don't think I could have done this 10 years ago. Email, Facebook, Kakao and Skype all play a huge role in my stability and happiness currently. I talked with Maren on the phone for 15 minutes the other day through Kakao - beautiful. I'll be skyping with my whole immediate family on my monday morning/america's sunday night. The words, smiles, recordings, messages, and love I get through the internet is a serious blessing.

Recent Learning

My students have had two days off now while we (the teachers) have been at school doing professional development. For those of you less familiar to the world of education, it's kind of like school for teachers. The formats and focuses differ from school to school and year to year, but generally PD consists of large group meetings/lectures/workshops on something the administration thinks will help you as a teacher. It's pretty cool - we as a school are dedicated not only to our students' learning, but our continued learning as well. We welcomed a man who directs a school in Nagoya, Japan to our school for two days to learn about assessment. I was not too jazzed about assessment, because seriously when's the last time you took a music test (I am not looking at you, all my music major friends). I was thinking very mainstream, very classical, very... in the box. We learned about learning outcomes, styles of assessments, planning, and rubrics (among other things).

One of the biggest transitions I've been making since moving to Korea is working and living independently. Living is going well most of the time - its more like college than I thought it'd be. People are always around if I need some social stimulation, but I get to have my alone time and I DONT HAVE TO SHARE A FRIDGE! Anyway, I always thought of myself as an independent learner and worker, but I didn't realize how heavily and frequently I required input or affirmation until it's not been readily accessible. I have a great supportive work environment, but we have different jobs. This is one of the first times that I've been solely responsible for a different task that really matters. It's hard to not be able to say "I'm going in this direction with that assignment, but I'm struggling with this aspect... what do you think?". We have different assignments, different applications, different students, different teaching styles, etc. This is me accepting ownership and trying to make a program what I want it to be. I'm responsible for what musical knowledge these kids leave with in May. That's big - it's huge! It's what I've been wanting since I was 17, but now I have it and I'm stuck puzzling over what to do next. It's such a large task I get stymied and take it day by day - I don't think that's really working for me or my students so I'm glad that we worked on planning and assessment for PD.

In other news,
I've had some big successes.
I think this is particularly fitting because today in our workshop, the leader asked us "What is your most recent learning? How did you know that you were really getting it". I talk often about being a life long learner, about always being open, about always viewing challenges as opportunities to learn - but when he asked me "what's the last thing you learned?" I struggled. I came up with a couple options, but did I really learn or did I just survive in these instances? Anway, I now realize my most recent learning:

I went back to Yongsan electrical market with a handwritten note, a receipt, and a faulty macbook pro charger. The note explained that after 20 minutes of use, the charger started smoking. The man at the store was so kind! He read the note, and asked if I wanted "change or money"... I said (mimed) that I didn't know. He plugged in a new charger with my adaptor, let it charge up for a while, monitoring the temperature of the charger, he tried it another ten minutes with his adaptor, we plugged it into different outlets, he smelled the faulty charger, he smelled the charger he wanted me to take.... and away I went. No more money spent, and I got the right charger! Wahoo! It took probably an hour and a half to get there and back, but time actually spent in that gigantic market was minimal. most excellent. By the way,  I have not learned to write in Korean - one of the Korean teachers at school wrote it for me (shout out to Nam Hee for helping me to get my poop in a group, and shout out to Sophie and Jeff for letting me borrow their extra charger for a week!) See, I told you I work with the best people! (What did I learn: it's okay to ask for help - particularly in written form)

Secondly - Today I paid bills (besides student loans) for the first time! 

I also had my gas shut off for the third time since moving here, but... we'll let that slide. In case you were wondering, this is what it looks like when they've shut off your gas.

What was surprising to me is the amount that they were hung up on. My bill was 7,500 won - about $7. SERIOUSLY!? whatever. So, I found my bill (which I had already tried to pay, but got confused), and off to the bank I went after school today (shout out to my principal Scott and his wife April for taking me to the bank and walking me through it!). I figured out how to do bank transfers recently, a very popular and common form of payment here in Korea. It's just transferring money from one account to another - but you must know the account number. I was able to pay my 2 bills via wire transfer today. This is remarkable because previously these services were not available in English at the ATM. This is also remarkable because normally you have to use a certain ATM that is designed for bill payment, and only works in Korean. Today friends, I worked the system. I paid my bills, and I have gas in my apartment. But, by the way... if this ever happens to you, you can just pull the lever back up and use the gas. They only bolt it down (shutting it off) if you owe more than $100. I find it particularly amusing that this is THE THIRD time I've had my gas shut off since I moved here because during the first week, one of my principals said "oh they'll never shut your gas off, I've not paid mine for months before and they've never shut it off". These were the first bills that I was required to pay because someone else lived in my apartment last year and owed some from then, and then there was no tennant this summer, so the school paid those... it's just been a process... full of cold showers. ha. 

THIRD,

Tonight Melinda and I went to the Nakwon Music Arcade in Insa-dong tonight. We made it there, not getting lost, and found most everything we were looking for. What's even more is that Melinda haggled. Way to go, Melinda! I got some rockstops, shoulder rests, and rosin and Melinda found a sopranino recorder and ORFF BOOKS IN ENGLISH. It was a great nerdscursion that ended with dinner by Don. We mixed their makgeolli from a festival with Acai/Grape juice - tasted like a wildberry smoothie. Some photos of the market/arcade:

 SO MUCH STUFF

 as she's singing "I'm in heaveeeeeen"

a quality/hilarious find: a bow less, inadequately clothed violinist with poor posture. why not.

Road Blocks

Life as of late has been going well - the normal ups and downs of working life.

I attended the KIMEA Conference last week and met the orchestra teachers of other international schools in Korea. It was a great opportunity to get to know more of "my people". We selected the rep for the honor festivals coming up, had some conversations that have improved my outlook and instruction, and I got to see some friendly Luther faces again! It's pretty much a norse globe, not nation. There were so many Luther Norse at this conference - Luther on da map!

Since coming to Korea I've been going non stop. In my past life, I took a lot of me time.. a lot of lazy time. I love me some TV dramas and junk food. Since coming here, those things have been hard to get (spare time, junk food is different, I had to set up a VPN to watch Hulu and Netflix...), but on Saturday I got my me time and I got it right nice. I made some ramyeon soup for lunch, adding tiny mushrooms, bean sprouts, and egg whites. This is totally my new comfort food. So easy to make. So delicious and warm - I seriously love soup. And plus, when I add the veggies and egg whites, I feel like it's almost healthy! :) After lounging for way too long, I went for a run on the river. Got home in time to shower and head to Jen's for some home made pasta. Her pasta sauce was deeeeelish. We headed to Itaewon and found the country bar AND the canadian bar. I ran into people I knew from choir at the canadian bar, where there was a sassy sequin-clad cover band.

Sunday I went to choir - my first Messiah rehearsal! Wahoo! It was great to see choir people again, and I loved working on the melismas. mmmm I love me some melismas.

This week, I've been facing lot of road blocks (see title of blog).
In obtaining and inhaler (see previous blog post), I have learned that insurance just really isn't my jam. I think cosmically I was supposed to go through this shenanigan at the same time as the insurance/congress mess back home.
Trying to buy my tickets home for christmas - I have to bank accounts in Korea - one in USD and one in KRW. I wire USD to my home account which takes me leaving school as soon as the bell rings, playing charades with the teller, and a lot of signatures. I was all set to go to the bank today until I found out it's a national holiday. Of course it is. Ugh. So now I'll be waiting until Tuesday morning to transfer money. Uff da!
I've been in serious pursuit of pumpkin spiced ANYTHING and it just isn't happening here, at least not easily. I knew this would be challenging for me, so I brought a jar of pumpkin pie spice. I've been putting it on ice cream, trying it in my coffee (bad idea, for the record)...but I knew I needed more. I scoured the internet for a Pumpkin Spice Latte recipe that would be easy to do here. I got maple syrup from a coworker (because I just didn't have the hutspa to shell out $25 for the bottle at CostCo), steamed an acorn squash, and cooked up some pumpkin spice syrup to add to lattes. I put my syrup in a thermos, went to Dunkin Doughnuts on my way to work and asked them to make a latte in my thermos. He promptly washed out my thermos, noticing there was something in there. When he gave me my latte, I went back up to my 9th floor apartment, added syrup, and then went to work. Uff da.

There's a pep rally for volleyball today during 8th period - so no orchestra for grades 9-12 today.
Last night, Renee, Dawn and I found a delicious italian restaurant in Nowon - definitely going back again.
Excited for our department meeting this morning - we are deciding on our Christmas music!
It is an incredibly beautiful day in seoul - an actual blue sky!
Chiggity check this post if you feel as passionately about pumpkin spice as me.

Why This Was A Bad Idea

Please understand, this comes in a moment of frustration.

Why I thought it was a good idea to start my professional/adult life in a foreign country is escaping me right now.

I do not understand health insurance, nor have I ever had to deal with it before. (Thank you Mom and Dad! Shout out to you, Roseville Public Schools, and Blue Cross Blue Shield Insurance for taking good care of me).

I can't speak Korean... and more importantly I can't understand Korean. When the "International Health Clinic" automated appointment line is in Korean... I am SUNK.

I have a job that happens to be far away from international health clinics.

People have schedules. I get that.

When you say the only appointment is at 2:30, that means I have to take a half day off of school to spend nearly an hour and a half on the subway in order to get there and back. THAT AINT GON' HAPPEN!

but seriously, I just want to know -

CAN A GIRL JUST GET AN INHALER!?

I want to breathe (for those of you who don't know, I've got me a good case of Asthma), 

and that soon will not be possible if I don't get my poop in a group and get this figured out.

Chuseok

Korea celebrates their own sort of Thanksgiving - Chuseok (chew-sock). It's a harvest festival, and it has to do with when the moon is at the height of its awesomeness. Depending on when it falls in the week, the companies and schools may give people anywhere from a whole week to 3 days off. This year I lucked out and we got a whole week off of school! I went on a trip with All The Single Ladies (Meg, Meg, Jen, Becky and I - the single lady new hires) to Japan! This is the chronicle of our adventure :)

On September 14th, we met at Hagye station at 7am... and left on the subway around 720. We wanted to get to the train station near downtown early in case there was any confusion getting our tickets. We have some great colleagues at our school who helped us a lot with booking parts of our trip, including renting a car, hotels, and train tickets. We arrived with plenty of time, got our tickets, and chilled on the platform enjoying some dunkin doughnuts coffee. The train was pretty empty, but it filled up at the next stop. It was a 4ish hour journey from Seoul to Busan (NW corner of SoKo to the SE corner). We weren't all sitting together, which was fine because most of us slept or read anyway. 

Once we arrived in Busan, we used their underground (with our same public transportation card! go TMoney!) to get to our "hostel". I put it in quotations because they called it a hostel, but it was really a hotel. So nice! The view was pretty great, and we all got to share a room with our own bathroom - pretty sure it was a family room... but we're pretty much family so its all good :)

 our "hostel" room

 chalkboard walls - lots of different languages!

view from le hostel

We checked out the beach quick, found some delicious indian food, and then went back to the hostel to get our swim suits and spend some serious time in the sand :)

Once the sun was going down, we headed back to the hotel to order some pizza. I believe I've posted previously that pizza here commonly comes with corn and sometimes sweet potato.... we asked the man at the desk to order pizza for us (I'm not THAT good at Korean, yet!) but said ... please no corn. He recommended a pizza and we were like, sure... why not!? It had corn on it. Thanks, Neil! Anyway, we took it up to the roof and enjoyed the skyline with some sweet potato, corn, and cheese pizza (which grew on me, I'm not going to lie). We went and chilled on the beach some more in the dark, found some awful mexican food - I think I ate a block of cheese in a crispy tortilla... and walked home. I consequently experienced heart burn for the first time. Uff da! 

September 15th

We woke up at the butt crack of dawn and cab'd it to the International Ferry Port. It was more than a challenge to get there, however. We required two cabs - 5 girls... lots of stuff. I was in the "lead" cab, and we told the driver the station to go to. He drove, asked us questions, the two cabbies stopped next to each other (IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD) and shouted, we took off.... he asked more questions in Korea. We showed him the map. Everybody was freaking out. Finally the cabbies just stopped (not in the middle of the road, thank the Lord) and chatted extensively about where we were going. A Korean/Canadian man saw that we were having trouble and asked us where we wanted to go. We told him the International Ferry (which is what we had told the cabbie 15 times). He looks at the cab driver and says "international ferry" but with a Korean accent... and the cabbie says yes. Seriously!? It's like "costUHco" versus "costco". COME ON! Anyway, we got there. Figured out our tickets.... got bumped to a later ferry somehow.

 Meg and Becky on the boat

 Our ferry: The Beetle

Check ya later, Busan!

Once we got off the ferry we went through customs and met a nice police man. I think he was looking for foreigners doing "Visa Runs". I was unfamiliar with this concept but the single ladies told me some visas require you to leave the country every so often. He helped us locate our rental car, shepherding us into the station and calling someone on his phone.

 Helpful Tsushima police

 The lady who rented us the car with her incorrect signage: "Mr. Mergan"... uh... do you mean Ms. Megan?

The Merg-Mobile! (A Nissan March)

We drove to our hotel - navigating in Japanese, driving on the wrong side of the road.... lots of laughter! We made it, but were too early to check in. We changed into our swimsuits, and asked for help regarding where to eat lunch. They gave us a map, and we were on our way. When we got to the restaurant, it looked closed... but it wasn't. There weren't any pictures on the menu, so we just pointed to what other people were eating. Ended up with some pork cutlet soup, some vegetables in goo, noodles, and ... more stuff? Way too much food.

The restaurant.

 Pork cutlet soup?

look at all dat food.

Next up, we headed to the beach and enjoyed the sand and sun :) Our hotel had its own beach, which was empty for most of the time we were there. There was a sweet man made break water, and some rock forms that we adventured onto. Just beautiful. So calming.

 The view of our beach from the hotel.

Hotel Kamisou! Great place.

That night we tried to get some sushi, but because it was Sunday, it was closed (or so we thought... can't read the Japanese). We ended up going to a restaurant that was straight out of the 70s, decorations wise. We ordered some salads with barbeque chicken - by salad, I mean cabbage shreds/fluff. We were pretty glad they had pictures on their menu :)

September 16

Woke up - had a delicious fish breakfast. Wait, what? Okay, so I wasn't so sold on it being delicious. The common reader may not know this - but I don't generally dig the sea food. I gave it a go, even though it came to me raw, and cooked right in front of me... eyes and all. There was some delicious tofu, and breakfast always came with a salad. A little hard to process at 8am but whatever! It's fine! (had to Sandra Peter it up). That day we headed out to drive the whole island. It was beautiful - so much coast, lots of mountains, coves, beaches... awesome. We saw some ruins from the war - a giant gun turret thing? You can tell, I'm a real war historian. We also stopped at a scenic stop - complete with pagoda and informational boards (my mom has rubbed off on me). We made it to Tsushima city in time to eat a lunch in their mall. Pictures on the menu! Hooray! I ordered what I thought would be a noodle soup with mushrooms or chicken (big white circular things in the soup)... which turned out to be something I'd describe as goo balls. Legit. Like, liquidy, sweet dumplings that had been fried.. but not finished. Not a fan, but whaterr. We headed up to the public foot bath, getting a little lost. Those are the tiniest roads I've ever experienced. Along with finding the footbath, we found what we assume to be the only white guy on the island. He was doing an interview for a Japanese TV show... so we ended up getting interviewed for Japanese tv. Why not!? Drove home, ending up in a fantasy freaky forest right after the sun had set - we tried to plan enough time to not be on the road at dark... but... island time, you know. Went into town to try a different restaurant - no pictures on their menu. There were, however, pictures on their sign outside the restaurant... so I brought the sign inside. The ladies were more than amused, and it all worked out well :)

At the foot bath

 pictures helping us get dinner!

 japanese tv. no joke.

 drying squid. yum.

 breakfast. yummmmmmm?

Becky and I in the water at the shrine we visited

September 17

I woke up and went for a run - its really easy to get up early when its beautiful and sunny! Such great views! Breakfast that day was cooked for us - I think they knew we didn't know what we were doing, because they didn't bring us any more raw fish while we stayed there, haha. We headed to the "hot spring" after breakfast, not really sure what to expect. What we found out was that it was a naked bath house - pretty common here... but still a surprise. It was a smaller operation, as we were on a small island with fewer people. There were three hot pools (two with jets), one cold bath, lots of sitting showers, a power blast shower (which was just a little too intense for me), and a sauna. No orientation - we just kind of watched and did what the adjumas did. I lost a lot of layers of skin... and am now a much smoother, cleaner person. (Side note, if you want to know more about this... read this) We ate some ice cream from a vending machine, tried out some massage chairs, and dropped Jen off at the beach. Meg, Meg, Becky and I went into town and finally got some sushi! The chef knew a bunch of english, so we ordered a "sampler" for each of us, along with a bowl of noodles, and some sake. I ate some octopus, among other things. I tried it all. I liked almost all of it. By the way, sushi here is what I've known as "nagiri" back in the states - not rolls, but just slices of raw fish over rice. We got a bento box (take out) for Jen, and headed to the beach. The rest of the night, Becky and I went down to the beach while the other ladies went into town to return our rental car and pick up more sushi for dinner. 

September 18

This was our last day in Tsushima. Meg, Becky and I woke up early to watch the sun rise on breakwater. Meg tries to do that every time she leaves a country/state/location on vacay - what a great ritual (I might steal it from now on).We went back to bed, waking up to pack up and check out, leaving our bags in their storage room. Meg walked into town and explored while Meg, Becky, Jen and I spent some more time on the beach. We worked very hard via translator apps to order a taxi at the appropriate time to take us (and all our stuff) into town. We met up at the sushi restaurant for one last delicious meal (yes, three meals in a row of sushi... except for breakfast which included fish anyway) before getting on the ferry back to Busan. We got to the port earlier than planned, so we just chilled out at the port. Once we arrived in Busan we took a taxi to our Hostel (same company, different building). We showered and went to The Wolfhound, an Irish pub. I shamelessly ordered chicken tenders and chips (fries) with a double Jameson ginger which ended up being a glass of whiskey, but who's complaining. Played some darts, met some guys from the UK, a couple from South Africa, and a girl from Hopkins! Night life is seriously bumping in Busan, which I really didn't expect. 

September 19

We made our way to the bus with a couple of issues... but it happened! What we didn't really know is that we were traveling ON the holiday, which to me means empty roads. Like, the roads are never packed ON christmas. Not the case here. Our bus ride from Busan to Seoul took twice as long as the train because we sat still for quite a while. Uff da. Anyway, took a taxi from the bus station home... and went to bed with serious intent to sleep. 

The Charger Challenge

Since coming to Korea, my MacBook Pro charger has broken. Sad day.

I've been making it work for probably 4 weeks - no big deal.

This week, when I returned from Japan, it decided it had gotten tired of being forced to work. No more power for my little MacBook. I decided to go in search of a new charger here in Korea instead of trying this newfangled thing called "international shipping". I heard and read about certified apple retailers in SoKo, but decided to go rogue and look through this maze of technology. 

After a 45 minute subway ride and asking 10 separate people for directions to one specific store I found the place I was looking for! Unfortunately, not the product. They had 45 watt and 85 watt chargers, but mine is 60. The 60 watt charger is only sold through the service center (God knows why...) which is open Monday through Friday. I was there on a Saturday. Oy. After leaving the store to process (and google the shit out of 85 watt chargers), I went back in and bought that puppy for 109,000 won. Jen and I wandered back towards the subway station, intending to eat and then head home. She spied a sign in a smaller stand that said "apple service". I approached them, and found the charger I actually required for 60,000 won. WIN! I bought that, walked back to the other store, returned the incorrect 109,000 won charger and felt happy.

Got home much later, used my computer for a whole 20 minutes... and I heard a "pop". My screen goes a little dimmer - the charger is no longer providing power to my computer. And then the charger starts smoking.

Here we go again.

Back to the maze of technology I will go sometime this week.

Oy.

Day by day

Secondary retreat went well - it was really great to see kids out of uniform, not focused on school work. We did a high ropes course, zip lining, orienteering, and a teamwork timed task competition. Outside of that we had a lot of chapel, ice cream, and pick up soccer. On the last night, I chaperoned a high school dance - that was one of the biggest cultural learning experiences I've had since arriving here. Not only was it music that was bumpin (http://youtu.be/9dOsAoziDfM), but there were school owned strobe and club lights. The DJ was a student, there was a brief "talent show", and some of their behaviors were a little different than what I expected. Alright, so there was almost NO crossover in the dancing category - dudes danced with dudes and girls danced with girls. I would have been less surprised by that if it had been a middle school dance, but the most surprising thing to me was the difference in where they drew the line between sexual and affectionate (towards friends) behavior. There was some serious dancing going down, but none of it was intended to be sexual. It was surprising also because I've heard quite a few times that homosexuality is not accepted here in Korea. It didn't make sense at first but after some time it made sense - the actions that screamed "Gay!" At me were taken as something friends would do because homosexuality is SO taboo that it doesn't occur to them that this action could fall under that category. All serious cultural evaluations aside, it was a really great time. Some of the student council boys performed this dance which is currently the biggest thing since sliced bread (http://youtu.be/yMqL1iWfku4).

We got back on Friday around 3. I went home and ate two separate dinners. It was awesome. :)

I spent Saturday with Ryan, the director of the choir I joined. He took me to see Weston Noble in the hospital. Weston came to Korea for many reasons, one of them was to direct the national Korean choir in concert and give a lecture on the Lutheran choral tradition. Unfortunately, he fell in his hotel and fractured his pelvis, causing the lecture to be cancelled. I thought another conductor (Helmuth Rilling) was going to fill in and give a lecture on Bach, but that actually didn't end up happening. I went to the Seoul Arts Center for the lecture, grabbed a soy iced chai (my current jam), and then found out it wasn't happening. Ryan said "get in a cab and give the driver the phone. You can come with me to the hospital". So that's what I did. I met up with Ryan at a kinkos somewhere inbetween the arts center and hospital. The cab driver tried to tell me something.... And then complimented my Korean, which was ironic because I hadn't understood what he tried to tell me. 

I think about once a week, my coworker Melinda and I look at each other and say "what a weird life we live!". Lately it's been in relation to having no control over things we are used to having control over - like knowing where we are going in a taxi. 

This is a more than fairly disjointed blog, but it's what I've got right now.

We have a school break from September 16-20 for Chuseok (Korean harvest festival), during which four other ladies and I will be traveling to Busan and an island between Korea and Japan (Tsushima?). Sorry if I already told you that - I'm pretty excited!

Non Stop

Some things:

I now have an alien registration card, two bank accounts, AND a working cell phone. 

It's really starting to set in that this is a new home; that this is not a vacation.

It was really hard to say goodbye to all the people I love because I knew I would miss them. What I didn't really know is how much I would miss being around people who completely know me. It's been a struggle, but I'm learning. I have really great coworkers, and plenty to keep me busy, but I still find myself thinking "And Why did I choose to leave all my favorite people?". 

So, I'm looking at cats. Cause cats make everything better? Now you all know that I have a great potential within me to become a crazy cat lady. But seriously, I'm looking at cats and kittens. Hopefully soon I'll be able to add to "the herd" (the name we gave our pets back home) internationally.

On friday we had back to school night - a time when parents came to school to meet teachers and learn more about syllabi, expectations, common practices, etc. We had some delicious pizza hut before the parents came - a real treat. no corn on the pizza! It was nice to see parents faces and associate them with their child/my student. There was a big presentation/worship service as well that helped me to learn more about my schools identity and christianity within our community. 

That night a bunch of ladies and I ended up playing Cards Against Humanity with a couple drinks in one of our apartments. Loved it. The next morning, Jen and I went off to Itaewon (the foreigner part of town) to collect some things she'd purchased on Craigslist. We started the day off right with McDonald's breakfast and public transportation (missing our transfer... wooops), and had a great time. We found pedicures, starbucks, delicious sandwiches, indian food, furniture, an irish bar, and so much more. 

On friday, Renee mentioned that there is a Subway sandwich store in our area. Saturday when Jen and I got back from Itaewon, I asked her to go with me up to Nowon to find indian food for dinner. We walked along a route we thought would take us past Subway, but couldn't find it. We DID find the indian food - super delicious. I wandered my way home, and jen went to find some other craigslist things. Its about a mile from Nowon to my apartment, and it took me quite a while to get home because I was stopping at whatever store I wanted. I found a stationary store, bought some produce from a street vendor, visited some bakeries (scoping out the wheat bread scene in Seoul), and found a fancy department store. Once I made it home, I unloaded my purchases and went grocery shopping. Unloaded all of that, and then decided I had too much energy to go to bed. I went on a journey to try and find that stupid subway. Even though I wasn't hungry and it was closed once I found it, I loved this search. It was night time, nice and calm. I'm generally not accustomed to being lost - I'm good with directions... so I had to let go and use some instinct and strangers' input (in broken english) to find my way. 

Sunday was excellent - went to school to sort out some details for the coming week and then headed to church with Sophie and her husband Jeff. They took me to the International Lutheran Church (near Itaewon) in their car. The church is one of 4 in the world to be both Missouri Synod AND ELCA, so that was interesting. The pastor is from Mankato, MN! After church we went to Vatos, a relatively new mexican place. Best choice everrrrrrrrrr (I'm salivating thinking about it). We had chips and guac, salsa, kimchi fries, and 18 tacos. Sophie and I drank a pitcher of water.... which the waiter brought after we'd consumed a couple of their tiny carafes. They were meeting up with one of Jeff's former coworkers, and were kind enough to let me come along. It was a really fun afternoon filled with my favorite things - funny people and delicious food. We got done eating around 2, and I had choir rehearsal at 3 near by, so they dropped me off and I got some practice time in before rehearsal.

Yesterday I went to Nowon with Janice to get my cell phone up and running. We taxi'd there from school and sat down. It was kind of strange... I handed him my phone and pointed to the plan (in english) that I'd selected and then about 40 minutes later he handed me my phone all good to go. Oh! I did give him my bank book (kind of like a checkbook?), but that was pretty much all of our interaction. So yeah. That was easy.

Tomorrow I'm going on retreat with the 6-12th graders. We'll be going to the same camp as our staff retreat, but one of their other... camps? I don't know. Should be fun. I've really enjoyed getting to know all my students and I think this will be great.

When I return, we'll be celebrating a birthday friday night, and then I get to see Weston Noble give a lecture on the lutheran choral tradition on saturday morning.