Well, I’m afraid that I’ve put off updating this for so long, I’ll never get caught up! I’ll try to (somewhat briefly) go over some of the highlights of the past three weeks.

The weekend before last, Ace and I headed about an hour and a half away to spend the weekend at Golgulsa Temple. The temples here have programs that let you spend the night and eat traditional meals, meditate, chant, bow, and do martial arts with the monks. The site was just gorgeous- they have Korea’s only cave temple, and the hills were ablaze with fall colors. Girls and guys slept in different quarters on mats on the cozy heated floors. We toured the place, ate a dinner of rice, tofu, kimchi, seaweed soup and veggies, practiced Sonmudo (a rare meditation/martial art) and were in “bed” by 10. We woke at 4:30 to a monk chanting and whacking a wood block, chanted, bowed and mediated for an hour, then did a traditional breakfast meditation. It was the same meal as the night before, but with incredibly precise rules and absolute silence. No grain of rice or bit of spice was wasted. We saw a few sights in the area, had chrysanthemum tea made from their garden and talked with the monks again, had lunch (same as the other two meals) and took off. It was a really good, interesting experience, but it was definitely more tiring and less peaceful than I’d expected! I think my favorite part was just getting to spend so much time in such a naturally beautiful area.

The next weekend we did salsa class Saturday night and hit the local amusement park, Woobang Tower Land, on Sunday. We went with five good teacher-friends and had a blast riding all the roller coasters and checking out Woobang Tower (like the Space Needle, except with Sky Toilets and bungee jumping off the top!) I’ve got tons of great pictures from the temple stay and the amusement park, so check them out on the photo site!

This last week flew by, as usual. Things are going well at school- we’ve successfully survived a few milestones, like our first manager observations and parent open classes. I’m definitely learning every single day, trying to improve my very imperfect techniques and trying to figure out this whole discipline thing. Knowing when, where and how to draw lines and react to all the situations that come up in the classroom is definitely not something that comes easy to me. I’ve been unhappy with how I’ve handled certain things, but I think I’m definitely learning from my mistakes. I can’t help but envy my coworkers who have had more experience with kids (babysitting, siblings, church, whatever) and are totally comfortable with laying down the law for the little ones. I think that I’m getting better at finding a good balance between a friendly and laid-back atmosphere and a strict no-nonsense one in some of my classes, but I still have such an incredibly long way to go! I have to remember that teaching isn’t something that many people are born great at, that it’s something you learn how to be, but it’s hard; I want to be a great teacher, now!




I kept myself pretty busy during the days this last week, but when I’m not running around, I’ve got a pretty good routine going. This is a pretty average day for me-
*9:30 or 10- get up, have some tea, eat some oatmeal and read the news on the internet.
Bustle around, clean up the apartment, poke around emailing and facebooking for a few.
*11ish- head to the gym. I usually to 40 minutes of cardio (spinning class, elliptical or treadmill) and 40 minutes of weights.
*1ish- head downstairs to the locker room/public baths- maybe sit in the hot tub with some naked ajumas (Korean older ladies) for a while, shower and change.
*1:30-2:30- sit in a coffee shop next to the gym, study Korean
*3:00- back at the apartment, chat with Ace, eat, make sandwiches for dinner at work.
*4:00- go to MoonKkang, prep.
*4:40-10:20- teach six classes
*10:20- wait outside to meet up with other MoonKkang teachers in the area. Sometimes we go out to eat in the area, sometimes Ace and I just head home to relax, drink tea, and watch an episode of a favorite show or a movie we’ve downloaded.
*1:30ish- bedtime, when we’re being responsible.

This Friday I had the awesome opportunity to learn a traditional Korean tea ceremony. A very generous Korean etiquette and tea ceremony teacher offered to teach any MoonKkang teachers that wanted to learn for free. I went to her lovely apartment with 6 other MoonKkang ladies (the guys have to learn next Friday- their rules are different) and she dressed us all up in traditional dress (hanbok). We spent two or three hours learning all the precise ways to bow, sit, warm the cups, make the tea, pour the tea, etc. It was really interesting and fun, and also a great photo op- there’s not very many opportunities for foreigners to dress up in hanbok! She’s offered to teach more classes in a few weeks, and I’m definitely interested in doing some more.
Saturday Carolyn and I went shopping downtown for some winter clothes- it’s starting to get really cold here! Shopping has usually been a frustrating experience for me here, as most stores don’t let customers try on tops, but we were lucky and found a place that let us try on their sweatshirts. Then we went to a delicious dinner and salsa class with more friends, then headed back to our neighborhood for a few games of pool. Today Ace,Carolyn, Grete, Brent, Krista and Mary met up with the Korean teachers from our branch for some bowling and dalk galbi (yummy spicy chicken and veggie stuff). It was the first time we’d all hung out together outside of work, and it was really nice- they’re all really fun women. I’m really hoping to make some closer Korean friends; there’s so many nice teachers in the area it’s really easy (and fun, of course) to just hang out with them all the time, but I’m sure I’d have an even better experience if I could spend more social time with some local friends.
Well, I’m all caught up for now, and it’s getting dangerously close to the 1:30 mark, so I’ll call it a night. Love to you all!
Kait