Sunday Seoul: We Be Clubbin'

I don't know why,but for some reason this weekend was full of clubbing. No, not the fun, loud, dancy clubs, but the nerdy clubs. I went to the Foreign Vegetarian Club, the Seoul Bookclub, and, kind of on accident, the Korean Vegan Club. Crazy.

I'll post about most of that crap later, but it's Sunday and I have to wake up early to go to the dentist. Here are some pictures. The first one is from the book club at Aa Design Museum Cafe in Hongdae. This place was pretty kick ass. I'll have to visit it again.

Loving Hut! It's an all vegan restaurant chain in Seoul. We love them! This is where we ran into the Vegan Club on accident. They're a really nice group, but I didn't have time to eat with them. Had to get to the book club!

Vegan deserts!

Inside Loving Hut. In the background is our co-worker!

Vegan yummies!

Sorry I always get so lazy on Sundays. If you're in Seoul and you're a vegetarian (or not) check out Loving Hut. I know for sure there is one in Achasan (right outside exit 1), but there are definitely a few all over. Woo! Cruelty-free fake meat!

More on Why I Love Korea

One of my best top-level students left yesterday to go to a rival hagwan (damn you, CDI!). He gave some of the teachers parting gifts. It was a cute mug. Even better? The bag it came in.

Just in case you can't make out my crappy photo (you try taking a picture of a shiny bag with a normal camera!) it says (clock-wise from the top left):

Ballet shoes, Pink rose, Lovely Ribbon, Sweet Music, A Dream, Romantic Doily!!!, IT'S ME!!!, (and in the center) Difficult Mathematics.

DIFFICULT freaking MATHEMATICS.

Maybe I Should Quit the Gym

because while cleaning the dishes today I managed to do this WITH MY BARE HANDS.

What you can't see: The two gashes in my hand and the skin left on the cup. Yum!

Hella Cool!

Last week I told my students that if they could find and take a picture of any 'bad' English around Seoul I would bring them a candy bar. So far I haven't had anybody find anything although I've given them lots of hints (Vagetable Tuna anyone?).

That is until yesterday. One of my students very enthusiastically shoved his cellphone in my face mere seconds after I entered the classroom. The picture was of a toy. It said, "Hella Cool." I felt so bad! So I'm giving him 5 points on his next test. Plus I got to expound on some English slang for the class. Not that I should be teaching slang to anyone.

Here are some of last weeks best Student Syntax:

"My aunt lay a baby. The baby was man. . . I am happy no because I had one more bother."

and

"Baby sister is nosebleed burst."

and

"Wow! I can go faster than princess meal."

And for some reason I've had a ton of students writing about "meat parties" lately. Their dad's have all gone forth and purchased mass quantities of meat to serve to their little tykes and they just have to tell me about it. Although I've just finished reading a very convincing, omnivore-converting book, and have never hated on meat this much in my life, it's still getting under my skin! I get it! Meat is tasty. Meat smells good! I'm very happy for you. Stop!!

Here's a random picture of the random one-eyed plant at my favorite table at my favorite coffee place in Hopeyeong:

Also, I made an appointment (well, my co-teacher made the appointment) at the dentist for a cleaning! Yay! I'm equal parts terrified and excited! Nothing's better than that just-left-the-dentist-clean feeling. :) Plus, I'll get to blog about going to the dentist. . .

Wish me luck!

Sunday Seoul: Seouless

Lonely Planet has deemed Seoul the 3rd least favorite city in the world. It's sandwiched between Accra, Ghana at #2 and Los Angeles at # 4. I know nothing about Accra, but I pretty much hate L.A. so I'm alright with that one. It's easily my least favorite place to visit. (Sorry, April!)

Ah, but Seoul. So sad, yet I'm not surprised. Though I am enjoying my time here, I have to admit that the city itself is nothing special. A drab, gray background of apartment buildings and outdated architecture from the 70s and 80s filled with dirty streets and carbon-copy shops and store fronts. I'm pretty sure Seoul created beige. Boooooring.

Live a little, Seoul! I know you can do it!

Keeping Up Appearances

Ok. This is a long time coming, but I think a few recent events have finally driven me to write about it.

Alright, so I'm not exactly 'fat' but not exactly 'skinny' either. I've been going to the gym lately hoping to shed a few ungainly pounds, but, of course, it's not exactly easy. Luckily the Korean diet is pretty damn healthy. Sweet potato and kimchi? Yes, please! Hopefully by supplementing my rice and rice diet with exercise I'll be asian-sized in no time!

Riiiight.

Ok, so here is the theme I've been feeling lately: Koreans are a little bit obsessed with appearance. Alright, this hasn't been a total lightning bolt revelation; I noticed it my first week here. Everybody tries their best to look their best, and even when they're wearing their freakin' pjs to work they look good. It's annoying. Our head teacher at work is always asking me about what kind of clothes I like to wear, and if I like buying designer purses. They comment on my co-worker's weight all the time. (Luckily I've been spared here. . . so far.)

My students are no different. I've heard them say they wouldn't be friends with somebody if they didn't wear nice clothes. Today I had a girl tell me she loves her mom (her mom is her role model, in fact) because she buys her pretty clothes.

Anyway, the Korean obsession with weight. Here's an excerpt from our listening book:

Look at her. She is so fat. She is ordering food.

God forbid someone orders food.

I think she will only eat one hamburger. She is on a diet.

Yeup! There is a character in this book named Andrew who is the token fat kid. In one of the listening dialogues another character has gone hiking. Someone asks her who she went with. She went with Andrew. The response?

Aaaaaandreeeeeeeew?

Everyone knows fat kids don't hike! Poor girl! She must have been so slowed down. I shudder to think.

And here's one more goody:

I don't like to eat. So I am skinny.

So now I know. No food. All gym. Gotcha!

And for your viewing pleasure. The same listening book that brought you these gems, also brought us this:

See if you can match:

An elephant is bigger than a mouse.

A giraffe is taller than a squirrel.

A horse is faster than a turtle.

Or. . . a horse is faster than a sandwich?

Silly Koreans. They love to state the obvious.

My Mandu Morning (at noon)

I am proud to say first and foremost that this time around I wasn't hungover and it made all the difference in the world. On Sunday three kiddos came over around 11am and we had some time to kill before Angela arrived with all our lunch-making crap, so we played a quick game of go-fish and I attempted to teach them Rummy. It's really hard to explain even the simplest of card games when they don't understand what you're saying.

After Angela arrived, around 11:30 or so, we started in on the kimchi mandu-making craziness. She made a HUGE bowl of filling and we spent the better part of an hour filling, and folding, and filling, and folding those little dumpling bastards.

Angela cutting some more kimchi for the filling. Everything was vegan! Even the kimchi! Deeelicious! The filling is kimchi, glass-noodles, onion, bean sprouts, fake meat that looked like cat food, and tofu, and this powdered almond and cashew stuff that Angela threw in last minute. It's wrapped in a dumpling wrapper and sealed along the edges with spit. Ok, no, water. Then you can fry them, like Angela did. I know a lot of people like their mandu fried, but it was a little much for me. I definitely prefer it in a soup. Which Angela also made. Well, she cooked vegan ramyeon and then dumped the mandu inside. I like the gooey texture much more than the fried, greasy one.

Folding the mandu. We learned to make a few different shapes. By the end I felt like a mandu-making expert.

See? Isn't it pretty?

This is only one plate. We had two. And this doesn't even show the mounds we had already fried, and the mounds that were to come later. I've never seen so many dumplings in my life. And although these were easily the BEST kimchi mandu I've ever had, and kimchi mandu is easily one of my favorite foods here, if I don't eat another one for a while I think I'll be alright. (Sorry, leftovers in the fridge!)

At some point during our mandu-making, about 5 more students came over. We didn't know they were coming. They just kind of showed up. This is probably the most Asian our apartment has been in a long while. It would have been nice to have a bit of a heads though. I wasn't expecting to entertain 8 Korean children on my Mandu Morning. Luckily they were all really well behaved and didn't make too much of a mess. :)

Here's Cait working her charades/explaining-game skills.

Drawing out of the hat.

Drawing for pictionary. We didn't have a white-board so we just used our giant windows. Perfect!

Around this point. One of the girls started to cry. Nobody seemed to notice or care. When Cait and I finally asked the students why she was crying they said, 'oh, he called her an 11 year-old. Her age.' She was crying, because she was insulted to be called her age. I guess she was the youngest one there and they were making fun of her. Poor girl.

When we got tired of English games we just started playing cards. We went through a few rounds of go-fish before we all got pretty bored. Next up, Spoons! We played with metal chopsticks first, but the girl in red (the eleven-year-old) who is in fact still crying (again) in this picture is proof that metal chopsticks were not a good idea. You can't tell in this picture, but in addition to some sad, sad tears, she is also sporting a brand new band-aid!

After chopsticks/spoons got old, Angela taught Cait and I a new game. I don't remember what it was called, but it involved drawing a name out of a hat and moving around in chairs until one whole row was filled with your team members. It was kind of hard to understand, and we couldn't use our real names because Cait and I are stupid foreigners who can't remember 8 Korean names. We used colors instead. Like Reservoir Dogs. Nice-uh.

It was around 5 pm when Angela asked if we wanted to play the chair game again that I had to say, "NO!" I had a wicked headache and my belly was starting to feel queasy from it. It had been a fun day, but there were way too many students at our apartment for way too long. We definitely needed a break. I looked at Cait across the room and could tell she definitely felt the same way. Angela graciously passed out the remaining mandu and left.

She called Caitlin a little bit later to say that she hoped I felt better.

I went straight to bed. Wicked headache and all. What really sucks I think is the fact that this was in no way a hangover headache. I figure if something is going to hurt that badly it might as well be because of something really, really fun. Anyway, I napped, and then went to the coffee shop for a few agonizing migraine-y hours before thinking I was going to barf all over my favorite barista and went home. Took some Tylenol PM and passed the fuck out around 11:30.

There Will Be Hate: Part II

I have to continue. I remembered something that actually really disturbs me about Korea.

I mentioned in my previous post that we were once denied entry into a bar once because we were white. The guy at the door told us to go to Itaewon (a popular foreigner hangout because of the military base). This was taken as a huge insult by my friends and I. We don't like Itaewon. It's where you go to meet sleazy men who want nothing more than to get in your pants. It's seedy and even when you find a good place to hang out you are constantly reminded of the English facade that surrounds you.


We were told to leave the bar because we weren't Korean. At the time I thought it was kind of funny. We laughed it off, and, I think, actually ended up in Itaewon later that night anyway at the insistence of some friends. It was kind of like a novelty to me. Hey! We've been racially profiled (in a way)! It seemed kind of cool, like a game. But the more I think about it, the more disturbing it seems to me.


Usually the racism doesn't go that far. At least not for me. I've definitely read some interesting accounts from other people. In fact, usually it's the total opposite. We are treated like royalty when we go places. Yeah, they might be saying mean things to us under their breath, but they bring us free shit all the time and go out of their way to make us comfortable.


Up until about a month ago that was as far as I though the hate in Korea towards foreigners could go. Then I heard about AES or the Anti-English Spectrum.


AES was started when a group of Koreans saw photos from a 'Sexy Party' that some foreigners threw. This group of foreigners was supposedly called the English Spectrum and they posted pictures from their party online. The Koreans saw these pictures and thought that Korean woman were being objectified and treated badly in the photos; they immediately put the blame on all foreigners. Who wouldn't? It's always true that a small minority of people speak for the whole. . .


Thus the AES was born. Born with the drive to expel the drug-taking, Korean-women raping, child-molesting, uneducated, AIDs giving foreigners from their midsts. AES, more or less, feels that all foreign English teachers are here to bring debauchery and ruin to the great nation of Korea. I've heard some pretty amazing claims. The Korea Harold sums it up quite nicely:



Aside from propagating the use of false statistics and admitting to stalking foreigners, AES has made a name for itself with dozens of propagandistic posters. The main themes: Illegal teachers are drug takers, sex fiends, gamblers and are unqualified; some are pedophiles; they are the source of Korea's HIV/AIDS problem.


There are reportedly thousands of Koreans in this group. I know it's only a small percentage of the population, but it definitely makes me not want to go out alone in certain areas of Seoul. Before I would have had no problem with it.


A few weeks before Christmas AES sent a threat out to all foreigners saying that they were going to throw acid on us during the Christmas holidays. It was a scary and disturbing claim. They later came out and apologized for the threat (I'm pretty sure), but still their mark was left on me. Why would anybody want to do something like that to another human being? It's beyond me.


Probably more disturbing than their threat to thrown acid on foreigners, because of it's extremity is just seems untrue, is the fact that they will stalk foreigners who they think are behaving against the Korean moral code. They have reportedly posted photos of foreigner teacher's homes on their website and harassed them. I can think of nothing creepier. As of November, Naver (the site that hosts their blog) has not found anything on the AES site that goes against their rules. They are allowing the site to stay. I've heard some people say that they've taken down the photos of teacher's homes, but I'm not sure. I'm sure they're somewhere.


I know groups like this are everywhere. I know we have them back at home. Xenophobia is alive and well in many, many places. I've just never been targeted before. I suppose in the end it's a good lesson though. Maybe more people should really feel what it's like to be hated for no reason. In addition to making you angry it also humbles you a bit.


I know I'm here just as a spectator and I make no claims to want or try to change anything about Korea, but sometimes their racism is a little over the top. Not just towards English teachers. Japanese, Africans, Mexicans. . . it goes on and on. I hope one day they can learn to play well with others. On numerous occasions I've had my students tell me somebody was ugly in a book we are reading because their 'color is dong.' Maybe this is something that many kids go through? A racist phase?


I've just about run out of steam on this one, and I feel like I'm starting to ramble, but if you want to read more here are a few links.


The Korea Herald


Gusts of Popular Feeling


Gusts' list of AES Achievements


Brian in Jeollanam-Do

Mom, don't freak out.

Sunday Seoul: I Can Finally Fit In

-to a pair of shoes!

Yay! Warm toe-sies! Finally! And they only cost me 18,000 won! Steal!

Finding a good pair of jeans is proving a little bit more complicated though.

There Will Be Hate: Part I

A fellow blogger posted the other day about why he is so harsh towards Korea on his blog. He said an interesting thing. I won't quote it exactly, because I'm too lazy to find the quote again, but it essentially said that he talks about the shitty side of Korea because that's the honest thing to do. He said that talking about how great and happy it is all the time is more insulting to Koreans than saying the truth (that all the 'Mooks' can do is drive badly, spit, and be overall racist and horrible people).

I have to disagree with him. I don't think giving your opinion on something can be that insulting. Especially if it's a positive opinion! Yes, there is shit here, but there is shit everywhere. Yes, I've never been more insulted in my life. Yes, people are rude and stare and call us bad names sometimes. Yes, I've been turned away from a bar because of my skin color. Yes, I've been turned away from a store because they swore nothing would fit me. Yes, my kids are usually ungrateful, disrespectful, lazy little shits who smell pretty terrible a lot of the time.

The store that I buy groceries from sometimes has a very distinct shit smell. The elevator always smells like fish. I can't tell you how many times I've been in a taxi sure that it was my last living moment. My boss is a dictator wannabe and treats us like we're slaves. We work overtime all the time and if we bring up wanting any kind of compensation for it you can be sure they're looking into a plane ticket back home for you. We don't get vacations. Everybody shoves. Everybody spits everywhere. I can't remember the last time somebody held the door open for me when I was behind them.

Oh my god I could go on and on.

It just seems really bad sometimes because we are the foreigners here. Everything seems magnified to us I think. It's a strange and unsettling feeling to get used to and I sway back and forth between liking it immensely and wanting to hide under a rock. You stand out every single day. Don't have time to shower? Good luck 'blending in' on the quick run to the corner store. Everybody is going to look at you. Not just a glance either, I mean a full on stare! A lot of the time I don't think they mean to be rude by doing this. They don't see a lot of white people, especially in Namyangju (we're a smaller city outside of Seoul), so when they see one they want to really get a look. Hopefully they're thinking, 'But she doesn't look like she eats babies."

As for them being rude to us a lot of the time, I think usually it's just cultural differences. Holding the door open for people is just something we grow up doing. We hardly think about it. Here, not so much. Spitting in public is highly frowned upon back home. Here, not so much. They have a different work ethic and their insultingly blunt honesty isn't insulting at all.

It's hard to get used to. But it's the way it is.

Then, yesterday while shopping at Coex (a task I hated before and have grown to hate even more now) I came across a lady who was having trouble with one of the dressing rooms. The door wouldn't lock. So in broken English and pantomime, she told me that if I watched the door for her she would do the same for me. It was really sweet. Nobody ever did that for me back home, well, at least no strangers.

The pants still didn't fit though.

Stupid, skinny-ass Koreans. :)

What was my point? Not all Koreans are bad. It's the same here as everywhere. I think the bad stuff just gets magnified to us, because for once we're on the shit-end of it. Welcome to the world, it's just as imperfect as we are.

Off to the Doc

I went to the doctor for the first time here since getting my check-up on day two. It was definitely an experience. I went into the office, luckily very close to my home, with what I had WebMD diagnosed as my problem written in translated Korean on a piece of paper. The ladies at the front desk looked at it, wrote my name down off my insurance book-thingy, and gestured for me to have a seat.

I went and sat down. They stared, and giggled. When they saw my insurance book and learned that I worked for Reading Town, they said, "Reading Town? Hmmm." Great. Now everybody in Namyangju is going to know that RT has a sick teacher. Faaantastic. From what my boss says at work, all of the RT moms gossip about as much as they breathe. I bet 1,000 won that my boss knows I was at the Dr come Monday.

Anyway. The Doc finally calls me into his office. I sit in a chair and show him some medicine I'd been taking that was making me feel worse than the original sickness. He tells me he doesn't speak English and then proceeds to translate the instructions on the bad-medicine box. He does a damn good translation. He tells me to keep taking the medicine, even if it is hurting. I tell him I won't do it. I try to tell him that I self-diagnosed myself, but he doesn't seem to understand. He writes me a prescription and tells me to get it filled downstairs and then bring it back up to him so he can explain what to do with it. When I get the prescription it is a single pill. It costs less than a dollar. Surely this can't be right?

I take it back upstairs to him, ignoring the nurses looking at me like I'm crazy for coming back into the doc's office with my prescription (I can't get them to understand that he told me to), and he says yes, this is all I need. One pill.

Which sounds great! One magic pill and I'm cured!! Except that at no point did he ever examine me. No temperature. No blood pressure. I didn't even take off my jacket! This seems really strange to me. More like a place to get some meds rather than an actual doctors.

I'm going to take the one pill and then ask my boss on Monday where there might be a doctor that speaks better English. My roommate and my friend have been going to this guy for a while now and I think he is just a 'stomach' doctor. Maybe he wouldn't have known what was wrong with me if he had examined me. Who knows. We've seen him for everything. Pink eye. Colds. UTIs. You name it, the three of us have gotten the meds from this guy.

Surely he hates us.

It Only Takes a Second

It only takes a second for a tragedy to strike and luckily only a second of your time to do something to help. No, we can't all fly across the globe to personally help those in need, but what little we can do is always appreciated. Whether that be the dollar you found in your laundry this morning or that 'rainy day' money you have collecting dust in your bank account.

In light of the recent tragedy in Haiti I urge you to donate any penny you can spare. I already give to Doctors Without Borders so that was an easy choice, but I went with Charity Water as well. Clean water after a catastrophe is sometimes not on the forefront of people's minds, but it is a huge issue that costs many in impoverished countries their lives.

Doctors Without Borders

Charity: Water

Here are 6 more ways you can help.

You can't do all the good the world needs, but the world needs all the good you can do.

Rambling

I promised myself I would blog 3 times a week, but I do not have the energy to do all the research and work I was planning on putting into said tri-weekly blogs. So here's what you get.

:)

This week, so far, has been just like any other week. It will be the first week, however, that we will have classes everyday. It's been almost a month since this has happened. It was really nice. -sigh- Oh well, good to get back to the grind I guess.

I'm really excited that my parents and my brother are coming to visit in March and then Tim is getting to visit in April. It's going to be the best spring ever! I'm looking forward to it way too much. I made the mistake of counting the days. . . ugh.

I bought a pair of Toms a few weeks ago (and by I bought I totally mean my momma bought, thanks momma!) and I'm really excited to get them in the mail! A better shoe buy miiiight have been a furry boot or something that won't freeze my toesies off, but oh well! This weekend I'm hitting Seoul in search of some warm footwear. Pray for me and my fat feet! I don't think I can stomach another weekend in Seoul buying leg warmers off a sock vender and then parading around in them like a tool.

It's been an interesting month or so. First my best friend from back home was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. It's nothing too serious (she had surgery that will result in an awesome, tiny scar someday). She won't have to have any other kind of treatment except some pills I think, but still! It was really terrifying to think of something really bad going wrong at home and me being so far away! I wanted to punch something! Instead I cried. It's the womanly way.

It got me thinking though. I love my life here, I love it a lot. I've been thinking of staying another year closer to Seoul, but I miss everybody back home so much. I'm afraid that if I stay I will be missing so much there. Yet there is so much from back home that I don't miss. Fast food. Understanding spam messages on my phone. A billion channels of English TV to watch. Being able to eavesdrop on conversations around me. No public transportation. . . the list goes on and on.

I'm really starting to like having millions in the bank and playing like I'm a freshman in college again, but how long can it really last? What if I move closer to Seoul, start working for a different school, and then begin to loathe Korea?

And that's where I'll stop. This has been a way more personal blog than I intended. This is what happens when I force myself to write something. I end up just typing the first things on my mind. Apologies!

Here's a picture of Cait giving Steve his birthday punches.

Sunday Seoul: Hongdae

I don't know why I'm calling this 'Hongdae' other than the fact that that's where I was last night, and that this whole Sunday Seoul thing is supposed to be telling you about things going on in Seoul. . . but I never really do that. It's kind of an idea that I've let slip by. What can I say, I'm a lazy blogger.

So last night we ventured into Hongdae. Hongdae is an area near Hongik University. It definitely has that University, party atmosphere about it. There are cool bars, urban-chic coffee houses (we saw one aptly named 'Snob' last night) and enough shawarma carts to feed a small army. Usually when we go we head to either Jane's Groove, Gogos, or the many Ho Bars in the area, but last night was special!

We found a NEW bar! Yay! It's called Club ta (for a video of what it kind of looks like, if you care, go here). Even more yay is the reason we went there though! For Christmas I wanted to give my brother a taste of Korean music that is neither K-Pop or any thing involving dancing in a circle beating on a drum. So I googled like mad, and found Apollo 18. They're fantastic! They were playing last night at Club ta so of course I had to go check them out. The only problem with their performance is that it was grotesquely short.

The show was fantastic. The band was exactly what I'd hoped they'd be in person. I love smaller shows like that. Usually I don't like going to see bands I like, because I hate the atmosphere of large venues with the band being presented like a film. I like seeing bands like this though. I could have gone up and touched them if I'd felt so inclined. Alright, so even though I did want to touch them I refrained so sadly my pictures are of less-than-stellar quality. Apologies.

You can watch their video for 'Orbis' here.

The other bands of the night were the surprisingly fantastic Donawhale, the one I can barely remember because I was sleepy, 3rd Line Butterfly, and the one with the kick-ass girl with a mohawk, SmackSoft, (though I didn't love her music).

Donawhale

SmackSoft

We also went to FF, because they have live bands as well, but both of the bands that we heard there were pretty terrible. Hopefully this isn't always the case. I'll have to stay open-minded and stomach the $10 cover at least one more time. I keep hearing good things about it.

Our book club meeting this month will be in Hongdae as well. At aA Design Museum Cafe. It's another one of those artsy coffee shops, but it looks pretty cool. I'll let you know.

Snow II: Revenge of the Snow

So I know I've been waxing poetic about the snow here, but today just cut the cake. It snowed so much that our hagwan CLOSED! I was so shocked when my head teacher told me we weren't having classes that I almost fell out of my chair. Of course, in true Reading Town fashion we still had to be at work all day, but that's alright. I mostly just got ahead on a full month of lesson plans. January is going to be pretty smooth sailing.

We have a meeting tomorrow to discuss 'The Schedule.' Considering the last time we had any emergency 'holiday' our New Years vacation was revoked, I'm afraid what they are going to tell us. . .

The snow is fabulous though. As a Texas girl, I can honestly say I've never seen this much snow in my life! The banks are up to my knees! I love it! I've heard a few different reports, but the most common is that this is the most snow Seoul has seen in almost 100 years. That's a long time, people. It's still snowing so here's fingers crossed to a similar day tomorrow!!

And the movie playing at the gym tonight? The Day After Tomorrow. Duh Duhh DUH! :)

New Year Resolutions I'll Never Keep

In honor of all classes at school being cancelled today due to epic snowing (EPIC SNOWING!), I'm going to go ahead and post my New Year resolutions. I know I won't be able to keep most of them, but I'm going to put a window on the side of my blog so I can check them off as I do them. Enjoy watching me fail (and win!).

I stole this idea from here.

Emily’s 2,010 things in 2010!

(Juuust kidding)

~~Adventure and Play~~

1. Go to the park more (0/5)

2. Go hiking (0/5)

3. Ride a horse

4. Go on a templestay

5. Go to 10 new places in Seoul (0/10)

6. Visit the DMZ

7. Visit a new country

8. Sleep under the stars

9. Go to more Museums/art galleries (0/5)

10. Go to a music concert/show (0/3)

11. Attend a sporting event

12. See a theater play

13. Go to the beach

14. Get to know 10 new bands (0/10)

15. Try a new sport/activity

16. Participate in a protest/rally

17. Have an Epic Night

18. Blow bubbles

19. Climb a tree

20. Watch the sunrise

21. Watch a 3D or IMAX movie

~~Mah Brain!~~

22. Take a class

23. Watch 10 documentaries (0/10)

24. Read 100 books (1/100)

25. Learn the history of 5 places (0/5)

26. Have a conversation in another language

27. Write a Korean journal (0/50)

28. Practice watercolors once a week (0/5 misses)

29. Fix three items of clothing myself (0/3)

30. Send stories/poems to 20 journals (0/20)

31. Enter writing contests (0/20)

32. Apply to grad school

33. Take a Class

~~Health & Body ~~

34. Get a massage

35. Get a pedi/mani

36. Go to the place where the fish nibble your toes

37. Go to the gym at least 4 days a week (0/5 misses)

38. Floss every night (0/10 misses)

39. Go to the dentist for a cleaning

40. Secret goal (0/15)

~~Foodie~~

41. Try 20 new vegetarian recipes

42. Be more adventurous with food

43. Eat eggs less

44. Stop drinking milk

45. Cook at home more

46. Find 10 new tofu recipes

47. Make gnocchi

48. Go on a picnic

49. Find a tea I enjoy!

50. Try 5 new foods (0/5)

51. Visit new cafes (0/15)

52. Visit new restaurants (0/15)

53. Try 3 new global cuisines

54. Grow something edible and eat it

~~Giving and Fun Things!~~

55. Donate to a charity (0/5)

56. Buy someone flowers

57. Donate $5 to charity for each item on this list that I do not complete

58. Visit the dog cafe

59. Host friends for dinner

60. Tell people how much they mean to me

61. Send snail-mail letters (0/20)

62. Write e-mails out to my family (0/6)

~~Momma Earth!~~

63. Take bags when grocery shopping (0/10 misses)

64. Donate old stuff

65. Don’t buy anything with a label/logo/packaging for a month

66. Take shorter showers

67. Turn off the water when washing dishes

68. Recycle everything recyclable

69. Host a Toms party!

70. Get rid of 15 things you don’t need (0/15)

71. Stand up for something I believe in

~~Other~~

72. Find out what the noise in our apartment is

73. Keep my room clean

74. Buy new jeans!

75. Get warmer boots

76. Blog 3 times a week (0/10 misses)

77. Blog about something controversial

78. Save $10,000

79. Dress up for Halloween

Extra Stuff I'm Adding Here so I Don't Have to Renumber Everything

80. Get 100 hits on my blog

81. Write something everyday (0/10 misses)

82. Start a book club

83. Buy a Kindle to cut down on paper consumption :)

84. Wake up by 10:30 am every day (0/15 misses)

85. Get another tattoo

86. Take down dead Christmas lights

87. Study Korean 3 times a week (0/5 misses)

88. Drive a car in Korea

89. Find out what that funky smell in the fridge is

90. Write my 2, 011 things for next year

Sunday Seoul: Goodbye 2009, Hello 2010!

In Seoul the equivalent to Times Square on New Year's Eve is definitely the pagoda that houses the Bosingak bell in Jongno. The bell is only rung at midnight on New Years. It is rung 33 times by people who have made important contributions to the community and the world. Below is the story that ran in the Korea Times.

Sixteen people have been selected to toll the bell at Bosingak in central Seoul on Thursday at midnight to ring in the New Year's.

The 16 includes celebrities as well as ordinary citizens.

The bell-tolling ceremony first started in 1953. Since 2005, the participants have been selected by surveys. Except for Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon and four other city officials, citizens choose who they want to ring the bell.

Included in the list are Korea's national football coach, Huh Jung-moo, who will lead the team at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, and Um Hong-gil, the mountaineer who conquered 16 peaks in the Himalayas in the shortest period of time in the world.

Actress Park Eun-hye, who received the Korea Sharing Award 2009, is the only entertainer on the list.

Also on the list are Army Master Sgt. Kim Jong-hyun who has given blood 265 times in 18 years; Lee Jeong-rim, winner of the Seoul Welfare Award 2009 for donating for 13 years to support low-income bracket children and seniors; and Kim Su-ja, who donates some 70 percent of her income despite living in a rented apartment.

Sejong University student Kim Young-seok was chosen in recognition of his participation in the city's study aid program for elementary to high school students.

Marie-Helene Brasseur, or Bae Hyon-jeong, a Belgian-turned-Korean, was picked for having cared for low-income families and terminal cancer patients for some 40 years after she was naturalized.

Another participant is An Seung-gab, who was homeless for 10 years before publishing an essay.

Dorg Tseveen is a married immigrant from Mongolia who came to Korea in 2002. She won a filial piety award for taking care of her ill father-in-law.

Mark Breitenberg, president of the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design, will join the bell tolling to celebrate the World Design Capital 2010 Seoul.

The ringing of the bell originated in the Joseon Kingdom (1392-1910). In the early Joseon period, bells at Seoul's four main entrances and four small entrances were rung in the morning and evening to notify the opening and closing of the gates. The bells sounded 33 times in the morning to start the day and 28 times in the evening to announce the curfew.

The Bosingak Bell will be rung 33 times at midnight Thursday.

Before the bell tolling, congratulatory performances featuring K-pop singers will be held.

Although it seemed a little bit crazy to go out in the freezing, arctic temperatures for New Years and the number one place to be for the city, Cait and I figured we really only had one chance to do it! Why go all the way to Korea and not take advantage of the biggest party night?!

Since Cait and I didn't get off work until 8:30 we got to Jongno a little bit late (around 11pm). Yet it was already CRAZY crowded. I have never in my life seen so many people in one place. Literally hundreds and thousands of people. We got off the subway at Jongno-sam-ga, thinking that the stop at the bell would be closed and walked for about five minutes to the pagoda.

We actually ended up really close to the bell and were excited for a bit thinking that we would really get to hear it ring, when the crowd suddenly became very crowded. More crowded than either Cait or myself was really ready for. Caitlin dropped her mitten at one point and just had to say goodbye to it. There was absolutely no way she was getting it back. I'm pretty certain that if either of us had tripped we would have been trampled immediately.

Noooo bueno!

So, we decided to leave the crowd in front of the bell for a less claustrophobic area. Both of our phones were about to die. Well, mine had just died, and she had maybe one more call left in hers. We were meeting up with some friends and luckily she was able to call someone and pick a place to meet them before her phone died for good. We would have NEVER found ANYBODY in that crowd. (My camera also started to die at this point. You can tell how well we prepared for this evening. . .) We eventually found our friends in a slightly, less crowded area of the group.

We were a little further away from the bell and only close enough to the stage to hear snippets of the K-pop bands performing, but at least it didn't feel like we were going to be trampled to death. . . yet! As soon as the countdown (in Korean, hehe) was over and the fireworks were exploded, the entire crowd began to leave at once! And they all began rushing towards the subway which was coincidentally located right behind us. We weren't ready to leave yet and the crushing and pushing of the crowd made it VERY difficult and life threatening to stay. Yet we somehow managed. Well, except for Brian who got swept away with the crowd for a while until he could grab onto a tree to stop himself! At one point I had exactly zero feet on the ground, just being carried backwards by the swarm.

CRAZY!

I don't know if I'll be doing it again though. Maybe if we had arrived earlier for a better view it would have been nicer? I don't know, but I'm not a crowd person and this was definitely a crowd event.

Afterwards we hit up some bars in the Jongno area, chatted, drank, played darts, almost got away with the giant bottle of Corona, and then headed home. It was cold and surprisingly a little dead at the bars. I expected everybody to go straight to all the bars and clubs located near the bell, but the didn't. Most people seemed to head home as soon as everything was over. How boring! Overall, I'm glad I did it though. It was definitely an experience to remember.

A firework! This wasn't the one I shot off, thanks Bri!, but I did get to shoot one for the first time ever! I almost hit some poor passerby's. My bad!

This in no way represents the numbers of the police force that were out. I've never seen so many police in one place in my life. They had riot shields, and were linked in rows wearing face masks. VERY intimidating. Yikes!

This hopefully shows a little bit of the crowd. The brownish-yellow blur in the front is the bell pagoda.

Some traditional Korean dancers that were scattered all around the area. Fun, but way too cold to stay and watch them.

I hope everybody had a fantastic New Years! (And a wonderful birthday, Uncle David!) Keep reading for more adventures in 2010!! I'm going to try and include more posts about the history of Korea, as well as some current issues here. It's pretty interesting stuff.