October!

     Sorry I haven't written for so long. The weekend of Oct. 2nd we went to Lotte world. It was a lot like Disney World on a smaller scale and Asianized. It's mascot was a raccoon which was hilarious. It was also surprisingly cheap or about $16. It was raining though so we spent time inside and outside. The ride lines were kinda long but the rides were different. There were only two coasters and both of them didn't have huge drops they just went really fast and upside down and sideways and all over the place. It was a bit intense. Also when you were getting onto the roller coaster there were 6 park employees (men) singing a song in Korean and clapping to the beat. I think they were telling us to how to get into the ride, put on our seat belts and enjoy the ride. When we were leaving they all waved big and said bye in Korean and English because we were on it. This is pretty common in Korea and they use this technique while making a traditional candy to sell it. It's very fun but I couldn't see an American boy ever doing it. We went to fireworks on Friday night but they were hard to see. They were some of the best in the world because this week was the international fireworks festival in Seoul. (I have been really bad about bringing my camera this past two weeks. Sorry!)
      On the weekend of October 9th I did a bit more. On Friday night I went to an apartment with some Finnish and French friends from language class. This was a blast! I was going to try to make bread but then I realized even if I could find flour I wouldn't know what it was in Korean to pick out which kind. After that I gave up the bread. We just made spaghetti with some mystery ground meat of some sort and a salad. It was good though. It was nice to be in a place other than the dorms to see what normal Koreans live like but once getting there we realized that this couldn't be a normal Korean place. It was huge and very gorgeous. The lady that we were borrowing it from was gone to Jeju for the weekend and this was her second home. The Finnish couple had lived there while they were searching for a place to stay in the beginning.
        On Saturday I really needed some warmer clothes because I didn't bring enough. Go figure. So we went shopping and I got some clothes. I was still running into the troubles of them all being one size fits all. This really doesn't work for me when all the other people around here might fit into a size 0 or smaller. They also don't allow me to try stuff on since in theory it should be one size fits all. My cardigans fit well but I bought a dress that is a little tight and so I must wear a cardigan over it. This is the problem with one size shopping. Then after that I went with the french girls to sam-gap-sa or Korean BBQ. This isn't really my thing because it's all fatty pork but that's ok. I usually just get some spicy tofu soup and its ok. After that we went to the fireworks show but we were too late and missed the whole thing. There were soo many people there. It is on this island in the middle of the han river which is pretty cool.
      Sunday I got the privilege to hang out with Jina and her boyfriend all day. He has a nice brand new car (the companies here help their new employees buy cars) and he took us around. First we went to On The Border which was the most delicious Mexican food I've had in awhile. Jina didn't really care for the enchiladas but they really enjoyed salad and quesadillas. During lunch we kept on trying to get Jina to say legitimate the right way but she just can't. There are too many rs and ls. After that we came back to campus and worked on homework for the afternoon. It was really nice because we could sit outside on a picnic table on campus. After that we went to a place for some Korean soup which we cook in the middle of the table with a bunch of veggies and some beef on bones. It's pretty good but I feel like maybe an acquired taste. Definitely healthy though. This Korean food makes me realize how they stay skinny over here. Lots and lots of veggies. We really needed some stuff from the store so opah (Jina's boyfriend, Opah is the honorific term for older brother used for any guy older than you) took us to the supermarket. This supermarket was huge and kinda like a Target with more of everything. It was also in the world cup stadium which I thought was interesting. They don't waste any space here.

    On Tuesday of that week we got to go to the Japan vs. Korea friendly soccer match. This was really fun to see because it was also in the world cup stadium. All around there were people screaming chants for Korea and I thought it was really cool. My German friends thought it wasn't that exciting but I've never been to a European game so it was great. There were some really famous players on both teams but I don't know any of them. I just knew when they came on the field because the Korean girls behind me started to scream really loud when they were announced. One of the really cool things about food in the stadium here is that anyone can bring whatever food they want in. It isn't just owned by one company that jacks up the price of everything with terrible food. It was interesting to see everyone bringing in pizza from outside.
    The next two weeks after that were really really boring. I had midterms so we just studied a lot and didn't do anything. I only had one good story from midterms where I had a teacher speak in Korean during the test for 15 min telling the other students what to do. I could pick out some of what his words were from konglish and my limited Korean skills. It turned out to be fine in the end because he either went really easy on me or threw out some of the questions or everyone missed them. Overall it was an ok midterms.

Opah (brother) and I

Omah (mother) and I

    As soon as midterms were over I got to go to Jinas!!! This was so exciting. I took the subway and then the bus to where she was by myself and got there fine. Then her mom came and picked us up. Her mom is soooo nice. She made us supper and Jina had told her I was picky so she tried really hard to make everything I would like. I really tried to tell her that I wanted to try everything but Jina wasn't good at conveying this message. She made us spicy pork and tofu soup both of which were delicious. There was also Jina's favorite which was clams and crab uncooked in spicy sauce. I didn't care for the clams or the crab but I tried both. She had so much fruit I was in heaven. I ate watermelon, parsimon, and tried mussmelon. After that the other Opah (actually Jina's older brother) took us to a coffee shop near their home and we had honey bread and played cards. This was really fun. I taught them all the different American card games like bs, slap jack, kings corner, go fish, and others. Before we went back to the apartment we had to stop to get "post" for my breakfast. They were really insistent on my eating cereal for breakfast. The whole family was probably the best hosts I've ever had in my life. They wanted so much to make me as comfortable as possible. We then watched Letters to Juliet which was good. Its the first movie I've seen since being here. Their apartment was also rather large which surprised me. I thought that all Koreans live in small apartments but theirs was probably the same size as our first floor at home. They had 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. There was also a type of balcony where the glass doors were open and then it was outside even though it was inside. When we first got there there was a little boy who ran up to me and said Hi! Then he asked Jina a million times in Korean where I was from. She told him to ask me and I told him and he said he knew one of our songs. He started to sing his ABC's. It was so adorable. They are starting to teach the kids English really early here.
        Saturday we slept in and then we went to a few museums. The first one that we went to was an art museum of Paek Nam June. This was very interesting because it was all with TVs. Appearently he is very famous but I'm just not up on my art. Then we went to a Korean history museum of the area of Gyeonggi-do (or something like that). It was really cool they had all of the old stuff and many old pots and clothing.  We also saw many kids here and they are so adorable.

      Sunday: We went to Nami Island with Opah (boyfriend). This was a blast! It was like mackinaw island only without cars. This is where all of the dramas are filmed and it's normal to ride bikes around. We took a ferry out to the island and then walked around all day. We pretty much just took pictures the whole day which was fun. This area is known for its spicy chicken bbq. This is where we cook it in the middle of the table again and it was delicious. They also had mushrooms and rice cakes to cook on the grill and then soup and spicy noodles. It was so good. Way better than the pork bbq (sam-gap-sa).
   I promise to post soon about Busan (Pusan) and post pictures of all of this on facebook!