Smiling

I know I'm behind on blogging (I'll catch up soon, I promise) but I just have to write a small blurb about my love for my students (yet again).

I just started back to school for the new semester and, while 7 of my second grade (sophomore) classes changed and I now have 5 new second grade classes, I still have all 12 of my first grade (freshman) classes. I also got a new time schedule, and I was disappointed to see that I have 2 days that I have 3 classes back to back... last semester I was tired after just 2, but 3?! Wow, that is going to take a lot of energy.

BUT NOT WHEN YOUR FIRST CLASS IS YOUR FAVORITE.    EVER! (well, on Tuesdays anyways, Fridays are a different story)

My first class on Tuesday mornings (I have 1st, 2nd and 3rd period classes on Tuesdays) is my favorite class and this morning was my first time for teaching 3 in a row... they are angels. ANGELS I tell you. I love those boys. They all trail in and nearly every single one greets me in a raised, high tone, excited voice. "HI TEACHA!" "LONG TIME NO SHEE TEACHA!" Ah, these kids. They were all so energetic walking into class. We talked, we joked (I gave them a hard time for liking this HORRIBLE girl group KPOP song- then they talked me into letting them watch it if they had extra time at the end of class, and of course they did, and of course said horrible song is stuck in my head).

But these boys, I just really can't describe how amazing they are. They all participate. They all ask questions. They have a pretty decent level of English. They all pay attention. Yes, every once and a while they get a little loud, but that is probably because I'm laughing so hard I think I might pee myself. By the end of class, my face is always hurting from laughing so much.

Anyway, I couldn't contain my love for these boys, I just had to share :)

Infinite World Tour

My last summer trip: a weekend in Seoul to fuel my new obsession… KPOP.

After a week of deskwarming, I hopped on the fast train to Seoul to meet up with Adrienne, who had flown in from Tokyo earlier that day. The next day was the event we both had been waiting for for a long time. The INFINITE concert. We were pumped. We even got shirts made from the shop in my college town that I picked up during the wedding trip.

Saturday we woke up and headed out shopping for a bit, taking advantage of the H&M and Forever 21, before we headed back to the hostel to get ready for the concert. 

The fans donate rice and the group gives it to charity

After a winding walk in the subway station, hopping off the wrong subway just in time (and Adrienne literally having to leap over an old lady and her luggage) then finally getting on the right subway, we were off! We realized we were on the right subway when other Infinite fans were surrounding us. We got off the subway and were immediately immersed in street venders trying to sell us merchandise. We really wanted glow sticks, but we waited to get closer to the concert where we picked up our tickets. Lesson #1: the good merchandise isn’t near the concert. In Korea, it is all sold out by the time you get there, so we were out of luck and had to end up buying cheap, generic glow sticks. We found our way inside and found our seats, where there were signs waiting for us for a “fan project”. We would hold up this particular sign when Infinite was singing their last song. As a surprise for the group members.

Inside the venue

Glow sticks- a must

There had also been a ton of “no cameras” signs everywhere, but I had planned on ignoring them and hoped not to get caught. If I did, what would they do? Scold me and tell me to put it away. I could deal with that. So I was trying to take a few sly pictures when I saw a security guard go over to another waygook, ask for her camera, then asked to follow her out of the concert. She never returned. Lesson #2: They will kick you out of the concert if you try to break their rules. So I kept my camera hidden the rest of the night and planned on borrowing pictures from the internet later.

My only 2 pictures

We enjoyed the concert so much. They are great live performers. They really engage the fans and try their best to make everyone happy. They threw signed paper planes to the crowd, they did “fan service” (basically hugging and joking with each other), one member “proposed” to a fan and gave her a ring and a flower and they even took selfies with fans’ camera phones. Wait, I thought no pictures allowed. Oh well. But it was a great concert. And when we held up the signs at the end, they all were really touched, some even crying.

Borrowed from the internet :)

It’s a big thing here apparently. Fan projects and making the members feel appreciated. Fans here even collect donations for the idols’ birthdays and send them a large amount of gifts. As if they don’t already have everything they will ever need.

Again, borrowed from the internet

After the concert was over, Adrienne and I headed out. Only to be greeted by a huge line for subway tickets. Lesson #3: Get your return ticket before the concert begins. We waited for EVER. And we were starving. But we had a great time. I hope to get to see them in concert again.

After the concert- happy girls!

The banners we held up on their last song- it says "I'll be waiting Infinite"

Jeju Island

Again, I was forced to quickly unpack, do laundry and repack for another great adventure. This time, I would be heading to the lovely Korean island of Jeju. Jeju is famous among Koreans, it is said to be the Korea’s Hawaii. And I do have to admit, it was quite beautiful.

After 1.5 days back in Daegu, Adrienne and I set off for the Daegu airport and hopped on our quick 1 hour flight to Jeju. We arrived, grabbed our bags, and jumped on the shuttle bus that would take us to our first destination- the city of Seogwipo. When we arrived, we wandered around trying to find our hostel. Luckily, we were traveling with phones, so we could use our GPS (a great perk of traveling in your own country). After we found the hostel, checked in, were invited for drinks in the lounge area, we decided to head back out for a quick bite to eat before turning in early. We were both really tired.

Lets go!

Our first night in Jeju

The next few days we spent walking around and looking at rocks and water. Literally. That’s what we did. Looked at rocks and water. But they were beautiful rocks and it was amazingly beautiful water. HAHA. We went to see many waterfalls and to see many cliffs. The waterfalls were all so beautiful. Well, most of them.

Oedolgae Rock

Jusangjeolli Cliffs

Yakcheonsa Temple

Jeongbang Falls

Cheonjiyeon Falls

On a random walking trail

One day, we spent nearly 30 minutes getting to a particular waterfall. One that you had to walk down many steps and then finally climb back up them after you got your token pictures and looked at its beauty. Except, when we got down to the “waterfall”, there was no water. WTF. Apparently, if there hasn’t been much rainfall, then there isn’t enough water to make the water run over the barrier at the top of the fall. But the water that was stagnant at the bottom was a beautiful turquoise, so it made up for it.

Cheonjeyeon Falls

Probably one of my favorite memories of the entire trip was going to Jungmun beach, which is the tourist area of Jeju. Everyone there had rented tubes to float on, so Adrienne and I decided to rent one between the two of us. We definitely earned several odd looks because we were the only two people in bikinis. Well, rather the only two people that were in bikinis that weren’t wearing outfits over the swimsuits. Note to self, Koreans swim in clothes. Boys and girls. Except us (we were also sporting some really sexy sunburn lines from our shorts and shirts from the previous day). Strike one. Then, we decided to try to get into the water . We quickly realized, however, that if one of us got in without our own tubes, we would most definitely die. Literally, we would drown. The waves were the roughest that I’d ever seen. So I sulked back over to the bag, grabbed some money, and rented my own tube.

Jungmun Beach

Intense waves

Once I joined Adrienne, we headed out to sea. It was a roped off area, and there were lifeguards not only on the beach, but also on jet skis. You had to get past the initial 30 feet or so, where the waves were crashing down on the sand, but once you passed them up, it wasn’t nearly as rough. The waves would come in and you had to swim against them to stay out in the water, but it became quite fun. A workout, but fun. When I started swimming around without the tube around my waist, however, the lifeguards starting paying more attention to me. I noticed every time a wave would come my way, they stared, hoping that the Waygook wouldn’t die on their watch.

At some point, we weren’t paying a lot of attention and we let the waves bring us into shore. Big mistake. All of a sudden the wave slammed us into the shore, sand was going everywhere. The waves came in sets, so right after the first threw us into the sand, the second came and tried to wash us around a bit. Next thing I knew, my tube was floating away and there was sand in my bathing suit. Dense, rocky sand. The waves were tugging at my top and bottom. I literally had to lie in the fetal position and hang on to my bathing suit for dear life. I really didn’t want to flash any Koreans. Somewhere in the distance, Adrienne was yelling for me to grab my tube, since it was floating away, but it wasn’t my biggest concern. I was still trying to stay decently clad. Adrienne had regained control of herself and her tube, so she ran after mine, but as she passed me, a third wave hit and it swooped me right into her legs, entangling us and causing her to fall again. Strike 2. We continued to flail about for what seemed like eternity before we both regained balance and were able to chase down my tube. When we got a chance to catch our breath, we realized that the lifeguard was literally standing not 2 feet from me, waiting to see if I would actually need help. Looking back, I’m sure we were providing great entertainment for everyone watching. I really wish I had it on video.

The waves...

After a few minutes of catching our breath, we headed back out, prepared to swim our hearts out to get past the initial waves hitting the shore. You had to time it just right, so you could jump over one and swim under the second. We played around out in the water for a while, enjoying the break from the heat. But we were enjoying ourselves a little too much, and got thrown back onto the shore, though not as hard as the first time. Strike 3. I was done.

After turning our tubes back in and rinsing off as much sand from our bodies and bathing suits as possible, we headed back to the hostel, but not before enjoying a partial sunset and watching the surfers on the water.

After a few days in the southern city of Seogwipo, we headed north to the main city of the island, Jeju City. In route, we stopped at Hallim Park, where there were beautiful gardens and caves to enjoy. But it was so hot that they literally had huge blocks of ice on the tables for people to rub their arms and cloths on to cool down.

Jeju is known for their black pig bbq

We decided that we could cool down at the beach across the street, so we headed over, placed our bag near a rock that was quite a ways away from the water, and headed in. The water was really shallow for at least the length of a football field, if not more. It was a nice change from the water that we encountered at the previous beach. This water was calm and allowed us to relax. But after about an hour we decided to head back in to get our things and continue on our way to Jeju City. But as we headed back to the shore, I noticed a clump of rocks that most definitely weren’t anywhere near the water when we first entered the sea, but now they were completely underwater. Oh no. The tide had quickly come in. We rushed to our bag, hoping that it was far enough up the shore to have been already washed away. We were really lucky. When we got to the bag (that contained our phones, wallets, cameras and locker keys for our other luggage), the water was only a few feet from it. And within another 20 minutes it was underwater. We relocated our bag, grabbed a few pictures, then headed out.

Before the tide came in

After the tide came in

Kumnung Beach

Sunset with surfers

Lets cool off in Hallim Park

The next day we decided to travel to the east side of the island to some of the tourist landmarks. We saw Seongsan Ilchulbong, or “sunrise peak”, along with some lava caves and a hedge maze. It was a really fun day, the caves provided a great break from the heat, though it did rain a little.

Kimnyong Maze Park

Manjanggul Lava Cave

Seongsan Ilchulbong- Sunrise Peak

The last day in Jeju was spent just walking around. I had to leave that night, so we ventured to another famous rock and tried to find a good seafood place, but ended up at a really good pizza place before I had to pack up and head out. Adrienne was staying behind for the night because she was flying to Japan the next day and all of the flights back to the mainland were sold out. I actually had to ride “first class”, which didn’t even include wine. What a disappointment. When I landed in Busan, I quickly grabbed my bag and headed for the bus. I was lucky enough to get the last one to Daegu for the night, so I settled in for the 3 hour ride and finally got home around 2am before having to turn around and go to work the next morning.

Ansan Valley Rock Festival

After my quick trip to America, I didn’t have much time to recuperate before jumping into another trip. I got home on Tuesday night (well more like Wednesday morning) and had to go to work within hours. Luckily, the students were on “vacation”, so I didn’t have to teach… But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t have rather had been in my own bed. Though I did catch some shut eye on my desk.

I didn’t have much time before I had to be unpacked, do the laundry, then repack because I was taking the day off Friday to go to my first ever music festival. So that Friday morning, I met up with Papa Ninja, aka Adam, and headed for Seoul where we would transfer to a shuttle bus that would take us directly to Ansan. 

Ready to roll!

Since we would be camping at this music festival, and it would be hot, and it would be raining, it didn’t take much to pack. Looking back though, there would be things I would definitely do differently. Like not camp. HAHA. When we got there, Adam and I had to grab 2 lanterns, 4 sleeping mats and 6 sleeping bags. Luckily, the site had some sort of mix up and gave us pre-pitched tents, so we didn’t have to deal with setting them up on our own, which we definitely would’ve had trouble doing. We got lucky.

Our tent and supplies

Then we headed into the festival site where Roy Kim, a new Korean singer that has the sound of Jason Mraz and John Mayer (to me), was scheduled to begin. He was the entire reason for coming earlier than everyone else, and it was totally worth it. I love his sound, though Adam said he needed much more alcohol to get through his set. We then walked around the grounds, bought some food and some souvenirs. The festivals here are so much different than in America (well, not that I’ve ever been to any festivals in America, but I can only imagine). The food is decent priced, the beer was cheap, and the souvenirs weren’t that bad either.

Roy Kim

Adam and I

One HUGE difference was the way the entire festival was set up. In Korea, things seem to really focus on electronics. Girls would be waiting in the bathroom with their phones plugged in. There were 2 types of charging stations, where you had to fill out an entry form for a contest or something, then you would leave your phone with them for hours to be charged for 15-30 minutes. Though I do have to say, I got sucked into the “I need my phone charged” craze several times.

Another thing that astounded me was the fact that these Korean girls were wearing entirely too short of skirts, and tons of them had heels on! High heels! IN THE MUD! Crazy Korean girls and their image. One of the great things about this festival though were the bathrooms. They had these little trailers that had 2 doors each, then inside each door there were 4 stalls and a vanity. The most amazing thing, they pretty much always had toilet paper, were well kept, AND they had multiple trailers that were female only restrooms. Multiple times I laughed to myself because the girls’ rooms usually only had a wait of 1-2 people, but the men’s rooms always had lines of 10-15 people. It was a great change. Though, the line for the (cold) showers in the mornings weren’t always the most fun thing (though you learn to wake up extra early), at least there WERE showers.

But the great part was the music. There was honestly GREAT music at this festival. And I had forgotten how much I love live music. And the fact that I got to see Vampire Weekend, FUN., Stereophonics, Roy Kim, and Yellowcard was great. And I have to say, the one headliner, Skrillex, that I didn’t anticipate enjoying at all was probably one of my favorite sets of the entire weekend. He is a great entertainer and looks like he is just having a ton of fun.

Stereophonics

Skrillex

FUN.

The festival was supposed to be great fun, which it was. But it would’ve been a lot more fun if we had gone on a weekend that it wasn’t pouring down rain the entire time. The music was great, though I did realize that some music just isn’t for me. The Ansan Valley Rock Festival was my first ever music festival, but I have to say it might be my last. It was great fun, don’t get me wrong, but just not my scene. Maybe I’m getting old. 

Last day- a complete mess

 After another long, and grueling trip home from Ansan I finally arrived home at 5:30 in the morning. Just enough time to shower, take a quick nap and head to work! Next stop- JEJU!