Heading Home for Christmas with my Family!!

I'm heading home in a week for Christmas with the family. I can't wait to see my Mother and Step-father, my sisters, brothers-in-law and my twin nieces! And of course a Sens game -- woohoo!

Life seems to have taken me away from my blog these past few months, especially with more and more people on facebook, but I vow to get back onto my blog (and posting pictures) in the New Year.

I am still enjoying my experience in South Korea ... with thoughts of staying a second year ... unless the international school circuit comes calling. I am still undecided and feel that my trip home at Christmas will likely be the deciding factor. Life is pretty sweet over here and it is going to be tough to get "back to reality".

In the meantime I have started training for a half marathon to be run in late March! It is so nice to be running again. I found a running group in Seoul, and will join them starting in January for the long, slow runs. Koreans are in such great shape with all the hiking and walking that they do, it is hard not to be inspired and stay active.

Well ... this 4:15am posting is going to have to come to a close. I have to get up in two and a half hours to make my way to Church in Seoul. It is a 45 minute subway ride, but it has become such a ritual that I really quite enjoy it. I often spend the day in Seoul and plan on some last minute Christmas shopping today!


I thought I would throw in a photo, since I haven't posted many here as of late. The picture is of the Tongil-daebul Buddha Statue, completed in 1992 is 33m high and 16.5m round making it the largest in the world. In the body of the Budha statue there are 2 pieces of Buddha's bones presented by the Myanmar government. In front of the statue stand two 17m high stone pagodas, two 7.6m high stone lanterns, and the Tongil-daejoen Hall. Wishes of Buddhists desiring the reunification of the country are saved here.

Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year!!

Thanksgiving Post ... Life is pretty sweet for Jilly Bean right now!!

Jill's "Thanksgiving" Post.

I spoke with my sister today ... and after our conversation it REALLY hit me that my life is pretty stress free right now, with very few demands on me. My greatest concern is how to keep my teaching interesting and of course getting to the bank each month to wire money home. I occasionally struggle with taking the best subway route ... but hey, if I am a few minutes late for a Museum or Palace ... it doesn't really matter too much. Although I was late for Church last month ... and missed my reading ... but someone covered for me so it all worked out!

I am really having the time of my life right now and I wanted to put it in writing that I know this and I am extremely grateful for it! I did struggle during my first few months here ... a new country, new profession, new friends (both local and visitors), etc ... but things have really come together and for that I am extremely thankful. There is a great group of teachers at my school and we are having lots of fun, site seeing and hanging out ... I am even dog sitting tonight for a friend who is in Seoul partying ... and who doesn't like to dog sit a toy schnoodle?!!

Don't get me wrong, I do miss my family and friends and look forward to seeing them at Christmas ... but I would not trade in this experience in for anything.

I am learning so much about myself - the good, the bad and the ugly. The biggest lesson to date is probably this "Everywhere you go, there you are"... I have finally learned to lighten up and not to take life so seriously ... it's only life after all ... I have to throw a special thanks to Sonja L. for some of that, my roomie prior to moving across the Pacific Pond!!

Some of my teaching days are a huge, huge struggle -- after all I am trained for teaching high school math and science ... But I know that many lessons (and probably most lessons) can be transferred so I am trying to embrace them with that attitude. Trying to garner enthusiasm out of Tweens is a challenge at the best of times, even when you speak the same language as them. When speaking a different language ... it can seem impossible and overwhelming ... I do my best and hope that they are learning. Especially the students I see at 6pm three days a week who are coming off long days and while they want to learn English ... they don't always want to do the work. Especially learning is English Grammer ... but alas I do my best to make the delivery and the class as "fun" as possible.

My Kindy kids are adorable and I absolutely love them ... the pics here and on Facebook certainly prove that ... but there are times when I would like to bop them over the head too.
The last 6 weeks have been crazy with late nights at a new local "restaurant", site seeing, site seeing and more site seeing. Getting out and around country has been fun and I look forward to doing more of it and posting - both here and on Facebook (which is more user friendly for uploading pictures)!

Love to everyone and ... Happy Thanksgiving!!

Korea ... Random Pics with short descriptions

Below you will find random photos of life in Korea for the past few months ... If you have any questions or want explanations ... just leave a comment and I will get back to you asap. I am having the time of my life!!

Seodaemun Prison - Liberation Day in Korea, August 15, 2007.

Baseball Game in Seoul
The game and cheerleaders - rather than having them on the field they are amongst the fans... great idea!!


















The beer guy ... looks like he might be carrying hotdogs too, right??!!

Nope, not in Korea ... here it's dried squid ... I tried it ... yup, not a fan...










Seoul Anglican Catherdral
my church in Korea. I travel 45 minutes on the subway into Seoul regularly on Sunday mornings to attend the "English Language Mission Seoul Anglican Diocese, An Anglican-Episcopal Community" at the Seoul Anglican Catherdral. The service is held in the Chapel of St. John the Baptist - a small room in the basement, and get this ... the service is held by a Vicar from Ireland!!

















Seongduk Palace

Around the corner from my Church is as well as City Hall and after my first Sunday service I caught the Changing of the Guard (or at least that is what I thought is was). What colourful outfits they are wearing ... put the Canadian Changing of the Guard in a different light. This is the entrance to Deoksugung Palace.

King Sejong - was the fourth monarch of the Joseon Dynasty. Born May 15, 1397 he was th third son of King Taejong and died April 8, 1540.

Sejong created Hangul (the Korean alphabet) and improved moveable printing type, allowing many books to be published.






His thrown!












I spent a about an hour here, walking around, writing in my journal and enjoy the tranquility of the Palace and Gardens in the middle of Seoul. While taking photos a Korean asked me if I would like my photo taken ... so here it is!!









The palace in the middle of the city ... with the crane in the background ... old and new ... tranquility and chaos ...

Risk ...

Risk:
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk being called sentimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To expose true feeling is to risk showing your true self.
To place your ideas and dreams before the crowd is to risk being called naive.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To hope is to risk depair.
To try is to risk failure.
But
Risks must be taken, because the gretest risk in life is to risk nothing.
The people who risk nothing do nothing, have nothing, are nothing, and become nothing;
They may avoid suffering and sorrow,but they simply cannot learn to feel,and change, and grow, and love, and live...
Chained by their servitude, they are slaves;they've forfeited their freedom.
Only the people who risk are truely free.
-Author unknown

Day 1: Beijing, China

DAY 1: Tuesday, July 31, 2007:

Rise and shine ... time to get up and get ready for your flight ... this truly is an ungodly hour!


















So many currencies ... so little brainpower at this hour ... which currency am I dealing with today...?!
CAD$1 = US$0.92 = Korean WON 891 = China RMB 0.133 ...











The tickets are still issued with carbon paper ... for a country so "wired" where are the electonic tickets?!

My travel companions/colleagues, JamieLynn (from Louisiana) and Rob (from Ontario), eating bagels and coffee at the airport! Notice the KFC sign in the background ... they are everywhere, bigger than McDonalds over here! :)





While waiting for our flight, which was delayed 1.5 hours, I painted a Korean Fan for my Goddaughter/niece, Natasha. The fan came with a stencil so it was a "paint by numbers" activity. I now have a better understanding of children learning to "colour between the lines" when they are learning to use a new tool (crayon, or paintbrush) it takes practice and patience ... each of which I am known to need work on from time to time! :)

Of course it had to be perfect for my neice and before I knew it I was done and it was time to board our flight! This free activity sponsored by the Korean Tourist Department wrote something Korean on the back as well. I selected the word "Joy" for Natasha Korean (forever the proud Aunt!). It will hopefully be a keepsake for Natasha as well!



Our arrival in Beijing!
We arrive at the Beijing Airport 1.5 hours late, and find out that another traveller from Korea will be joining our tour (making the number with our tour guide and driver 4!). His plane is scheduled to arrive at 1pm and it is 11:30, we go for lunch and then at 1pm we see the flight is delayed until 2:20pm. At this point we are starting to get a little anxious and fearful of "missing" out on some of the promised highlights of our tour. At 3:30ish we finally leave the airport, less than impressed with the mixup and without the person that we waited for. Our poor tourguide was flustered by this as well.

We tried to stay enthusiastic and by the time we got going with our tourguide we were in full enthusiastic mode once again! I started snapping photos immediately to put my new 2Gb memory stick to good use! I took over 800 photos, all of which I won't be placing here but will try to select the most impressive to share here. On day 1 I snapped numerous photos of random buildings and roadways, they are so very different from North America. Take this toll bridge as an example, typical in China, but so unusual for a North American ... I just couldn't help snapping that camera. By the 4th day, on the drive back to the airport I had become used to the architecture and didn't feel as strong an urge to capture everything I saw ... well, almost!
















The first "stop" of our Day 1 agenda was to be the Temple of Heaven, but we had to skip it and head directly to the Acrobat Show for 5:15!

The unassuming building where the Troupe performs and their bus!!
















I had not been been to an acrobat show before and was thoroughly impressed, snapping photos left and right (remember the 2Gb stick to use!!) The boy in front of me was less than impressed, but our tour guide said we could take photos but no video. Everybody else was snapping too and I have to admit it was a little distracting ... but this was very impressive so I had to capture it on film.




The girls on these unicycles had bowls on their head and the show was centered around that. The girl in the middle is about to toss the bowl on her leg to her head. She did it with amazing success! AND while balancing on the unicycle. Ah ... to be young, fearless and flexible again!!

The men on the right were equally impressive with these "flags" ... tossing them back and forth like they were as light as feathers.





These two men climbed up and down these bars while bounding back and forth between them. Another impressive section of the show. No doubt the performers of this show made their start in gymnastics!












My favourite part of the entire show, hands down, is captured in the following two pictures. As a former gymnast and current Tae Kwon Do student I was not only impressed with the flexibility and strength involved to achieve these moves on ones own, but also with the skill required in working with a partner. The girl in the blue in the photo on the left, not only has to get into this mind boggling position, she also has to engage almost every muscles in her body to balance herself on the hands of her partner. As well, she must be prepared to counter any "flinches" from her partner! A wonderful and amazing combination of strength, flexibility, fearlessness and trust in your partner!

Oh yes, and I should also mention that she has bowls on her vertical foot that she tossed about while her and her partner transitioned into various positions?!





















Not hard to tell that I was completely impressed, is it?!

After the show we went out for dinner - Chinese Food of course! First I NEED to snap a few more photos! Oh look, over there ... some interesting sculptures! Click, click! And of course documenting our first dinner in China!
















. . . and back to the hotel to check in, explore the amenities and head to bed. We meet our driver at 7:30 am tomorrow and it is a jam-packed day (including the Wall!) so we want to be well rested. Not to mention we have been us since 4am today!

Our hotel and impressive chandelier.





















Day 2 will follow shortly!!

Saturday Perfomance of Korean Music & Dance

Saturday, July 21, 2007: National Center for Korean Traditional Performing Arts.






Getting to and around Seoul always seems to take more time than one alots. We made it to the theatre just in time and rushed in to the theatre right under the wire.





Unfortunately, photos were not allowed, although I did snap a photo of the curtain prior to the performance! Quickly followed by a visit from a woman telling me photos were not allowed (this of course is not by jesturing an "x" by crossing two pointer fingers. Opps, my bad!















Words can not describe the performance. The ornate musical instruments, the costumes, the steady movement of the performers, the incredible voices of the singers... incredible. The beauty of music is that it transcends language barriers, while we could not understand the language, we were given an brief history of each performance in English and then our imaginations took us on a journey with the music.

The instruments were incredible, very different from anything I had seen before, of course I have a limited musical instrument background so that might not be saying much! Many of which have Chineese roots, and I name a few here for interests sake. [the haegeum (two-stringed fiddle from China), geomungo (twelve-stringed zither), ajaeng (horizontal zither) , danso (small notched vertical flute), deageum (large transverse fluet)].
















The Yong-go. The instrument played during the Opening and Closing Cerimonies of the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games. it was designed by Park Kyun-Suk (1911-1989) who was later designated an Important Intangible Curtural Asset.






Token Jill shot!

I have more to "post" ... but I am exhausted. There was a lot of walking this weekend so I am going to take a nap.

I will continue ... soon!

Canada Day Celebration in Seoul

July 1, 2007: Canada Day in Seoul with Canadian Chamber of Commerce.

The "Bus", this lovely yellow bus continuously took Canadians from the Subway at ...

World Soccer Stadium to Namji Campground in Seoul for the day's activities.

For those of you from Ottawa, it was no surprise that we had a gloomy day with scattered showers ... but isn't that what we Ottawa folk expect on Canada Day?!! :)

We took cover from the rain one of many "tepees" on the site, and felt the need to document our Canadian paraphernalia . . . I WISH I had worn/brought my SENS shirt.

... and the Band plays on . . .






while some crazy Canucks embrace the weather and prepare for the Annual Korean Mud Festival . . . I guess?!

Apart from the thrill of celebrating Canada Day abroad, there was another attraction to this event ... a round trip ticket from Seoul to Vancouver ... the Korean woman here was the winner and her excitement was infectious! I really was happy for her!



(read: darn, why her ... why not me?!)











p.s. note my festive choice of text colour!!

Seoul Self-guided walking tour!

June 22, 2007:
My second tourist trip to Seoul was to take the "New and Old Downtown Walk" (self guided walking tour) compliments of The Lonely Plane. Final destination, N'Seoul Tower 4km walk (without getting lost or "off course). We started out early, meeting at 9:30am. The subway ride to Seoul took about an hour (with one stop), with our first stop at the travel agent to drop off our passports for Visa processing for our China trip. We spotted a Starbucks and had to head in for a Latte and a Scone -- oh happy Jill!

We jumped back on the Subway for one stop and started our tour. I was happy to be the "tour director" for this journey but was not sure how detailed the tour was or how easy it might be to get lost. Our first land mark was referred to as a "boulevard covered with giant black and white piano keys".




We turned the corner and found these! WooHoo, I was not bad at this tour director gig! :)

Now this what I call a piano ... I should have paid better attention in piano lessons in grade 3!!





We walked along the keys and of course had to stop to try our hand, or should I say feet, at a tune! I should have practiced more in grade 3!! ;)















Next, we found Cheonggye Stream where a massive US$313 million dollar restoration project was underway to help beautify the downtown core. While waiting in the "cue" to cross the stream I noticed a man with something unusual clipped to his shirt - they look like giant rabbits feet ... I must research their significane. Click on the photo to enlarge it and check it out!!















Across the stream was the following wall. Very interesting and of course snapping a photo of the details allowed me to share them! Isn't the digital age great?!


The royal palanquin for King Jeongjo, but the king riding a horse is behind the palanquin carrying Queen Hyegyeonggung, his mother. To the front are a horse carrying royal seals, a royal spokesman, a royal bodyguard with a sword, and veiled court ladies, followed by 50 military officials headed by Minister Sim I-ji. Next are officials bearing royal ceremonial flags decorated with various animal designs including a lion, a phoenix, and a red bird, and behind them are large flage of the pheonix and dragon, symbols of the king.

I saw these women crossing the street and had to take a photo! I am a "tourist" after all, so isn't it expected?!




Who knew ... flight attendants still dress like this! :)
Maybe I will see some for myself when I go to China, I'll keep you posted. The polar opposite to West Jet's philosophy!










Jamie and Jill at Seoul Plaza with our South Korean Flags. The background behind us is a collage of postcards/small flyers that were strategically placed to create a greater picture! This wall was blocking a construction site so I don't know if this was done for the festival or if this is the norm for all construction site in Seoul, but a self portrait with our South Korean Flags (being handed out as you entered the Plaza was a must!











Seoul City Hall and Seoul Plaza















Children cooling down on a hot day at the Seoul Plaza next to City Hall!





After this short stop at Seould Plaze and City Hall, we got back on "tour track", walked through the Namdaemun market and zig-zagged our way to the N'Seould Tower.









N. Seoul Tower - a view from the cable car on the way up! The tower is on the top of a very blush tree covered hill/mountain





Seoul Monument from the Joseon Dynasty:
This smoke signal station on Mt. Namsan was the central station where signals from across the country were gathered. The beacon signal system used fire and smoke to send warnings to central and border fortresses, as well as to warn citizens of emergency situations developing on the borders.

The information collected here was compiled by the Minstry of Military Affairs and presented to the Royal Secretariat early each morning. The Secretariat would then report to the king. In times of emergency, these reports would be made even in the middle of the night. As part of the "Campaign to Restore Mt. Namsan to its Original Appearance", one of the first stations as restored here in 1993.









The N'Seoul Tower from its base.













A postcard that displays the various heights of towers around the world! Of course with the CNTower at the top of the list, I just had to buy this card!
CNTower: 553m
N'Seoul Tower: 479m








A trip to the top of the tower appealed to me more that my friend Jamie, so I took the ride up to the top solo and this self-portrait is my evidence! In the background, the "hill" the tower is on and the city of Seoul. Unfortunately it was a hazy day with limited visibility. I will make another trip up the tower on a clear day for more photos. I love the contrast of the "concrete city" and the plush green "forest" surrouning the tower!







After my trip up to the top of the tower I joined Jamie and we sat down for a rest when we were approached by a Korean man who said he was learning English and wondered if he could have 5 minutes of our time to speak with us. I had heard about this and was happy to oblige. He knew quite a bit about Canada and the US so conversation came easily.



After a fun-filled day we made our way back to the Subway and returned to Uijeongbu. We stopped in the market at an Indian food for dinner and made it an early night. We were obth exhausted after our 10 hour day. But what a great adventure! The next morning would be my first trip to the American Army Base for Church (of which I have already posted the details) so I wanted to be well rested.

Another fun day of playing tourist!!