Christmas in Korea

For obvious reasons, Christmas this year would be unlike any other we’ve had. However, instead of focusing on cons of why it was so different (mainly no prime rib, potatoes, and cheesecake) we decided to focus on the pros (this being the first Christmas we actually spent together). To make the most of the day, we decided to join forces with our friends and the result was a Korean version of a western Christmas.



The eight of us (Matt, Chantel, Jimmy, Rachel, Luke, Holly, Eric and myself) started the afternoon off by grabbing coffee at Big Apple Coffee downtown. There, we had our secret Santa gift exchanges. the only rule for the exchange was the gift could not be more than 20,000 won (around $17). The exchange was nice because it guaranteed everyone would have a gift to open on Christmas. Eric received his gifts from Rachel. He was given: two books and a six pack of beer. My gifts came from Holly. She gave me a bunch of fun accessories and a bottle of sparkling wine; all of which I was very excited about.



After opening presents, we made our way over to VIPS. VIPS is a buffet which serves up a variety of western food. Because of this, it is a little spendy but we all agreed it was worth it for Christmas dinner. To ensure I got my full money’s worth I believe I went back for forth’s before heading for the dessert table. When it came time to leave, all eight of us were waddling out of there. After dinner, we invited our friends back to our place for some after dinner drinks and some Christmas music. There we spend the rest of the night drinking wine and spending time with good friends. To sweeten the deal even more, it started snowing after dinner. So from 7pm onward we had ourselves a white Christmas.

So while I may have never imagined having a Christmas like this, it did not disappoint in the least. I hope all of your holiday’s treated you just as well. Have a great new year everyone!

Twas the Night Before Christmas...in Korea

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through Gwangju
Everywhere was busy, the streets were a zoo.
People were walking and talking without a care,
Despite there was a threat of snow in the air.

Rather than being nestled and snug in their beds,
Students were forced to learn English instead.
We quickly learned Christmas Eve isn’t special here,
It is just an ordinary day of the year.

This bit of news made Eric and I quite sad,
However we would not let our Christmas go bad.
With the flip of a switch and some researching too,
We quickly found something fun to do.

We bundled up in our scarves and our coats,
And on the way out we grab some 10,000 won notes.
We ran underground to where the subway lay
And after waiting five minutes we were on our way.

We passed: Nonseong and Hwajung and Sangchung too,
Until we finally found ourselves in Sangmu.
We climbed our way up to the street up above,
All I could think was “thank God I have gloves.”

We turned to our left and walked up the street,
Both Eric and I could not feel our feet.
We walked and we walked and we walked a bit more,
Until we encountered a big yellow store.

There E-Mart was across from the park,
It provided a break from the cold and the dark.
We walked up and down the aisles of treats,
Looking for snacks and drinks which could be discreet.

We were off to see a movie next door
And we needed some drinks to sneak through the door.
We both agree theater prices are little bit whack,
And that’s why we always bring our own snack.

With soda and candy bars shoved our pockets,
We made our way to the front ticket office.
“Two for the The Tourist, please.” We said.
“The one at 9:30?” The clerk said, cocking his head.

“Yes that’s the one, two tickets please.”
The clerk understood us with surprising ease.
With snacks in our pants and tickets in tow,
We were now ready to enjoy the big show.

The movie was over and much fun was had,
But now it was time to call us a cab.
We made it home just before midnight,
And decided it was time to turn off the lights.

Lying all nestled and snug in our bed,
Images of past Christmases danced in our heads.
Sure we’d miss the potatoes and roast,
But we have each other and that matters most.

So before we closed our eyes real tight,
We whispered, “Merry Christmas my dear, and I bid you goodnight.”

Merry Christmas!

Season's greetings from Korea! It is an extremely cold and blustery Christmas Eve here in Gwangju. This morning, on our way to work, we encountered snow flurries so we are keeping our fingers crossed that we get a white Christmas this year. While we will miss sharing this holiday with all of you back home, we are excited to spend our first Christmas together, in the same location that is. While it would be easy to be upset at how un-christmasy this year's holiday is, we know this will be a holiday we will never forget. So we hope that all of your Christmases are filled with love, smiles, and full stomachs! Merry Christmas!

Love,
Dana & Eric

Lunchtime Mishaps

I am the last person to know anything at my school. Even then, I only find out what the teachers who speak English deem necessary for me to know. On the occasions that I am told what is going on, five times out of ten I find out after the matter. Today’s lunch was definitely one of those five times when I was only privy to information after the event occurred.

School time lunches have three staples: rice, soup, and kimchi; the rest of the dishes change daily and unpredictably. Per usual, I made my way to the teacher’s cafeteria with my usual lunch dates, Sue and Su Min. When I reached the lunch line, the first thing I saw was the soup. Today’s was puréed black bean and rice soup. I’ve had this one before and know enough about it to know I don’t like it. However, being an ‘adult’ at my school I am given the luxury of picking and choosing what I want on my lunch tray. Thus, I bypassed the soup. I knew this would not go unnoticed since skipping any of the three staples is guaranteed to cause an interrogation as to why I’m not eating it. However, to my surprise no one said anything; not one teacher. This was truly a first. Relieved, I continued eating my lunch and minding my own business.

Then on the way back to the office, the other shoe dropped so to speak. Immediately after leaving the lunchroom, my a colleague asked me, “Why didn’t you eat the soup?”
“Oh, that soup isn’t my favorite. So I decided not to have it.” I replied.
“I see. But today is a special day in Korea. “
“It is?” Shoot, here it comes.
“Yes. Today is the shortest day. On this day every year, we eat that soup.” She explained.
“Oh, I see.” I stated slowly while trying to think of something better to say.
“It was very strange for you not to eat the soup today.” She continued.
“I didn’t know. If I had—“ I stated, but was quickly cut off.
“Well lunch is finished now.”
“Should I have just eaten the soup?”
“Yes.” She stated matter-of-factly.
“Sorry.”

Sorry was all I could think to say. I wasn’t sure what my colleagues expected me to say. I didn’t mean to offend anyone, but clearly I had. However, a head’s up on the walk to the lunch room would have been nice. I often find myself in this compromising position of acquiring information after the fact. Oh well, another day and another lunch hour survived. I think it’s sufficient to say that for the last five days of work, I will put a little bit of everything on my tray to cover my bases. Oops!

Wedding Bells

This past Saturday wedding bells were ringing in Seoul. Now before you get carried away with yourself, Eric and I did not get married; our friends Jimmy and Rachel did. Well technically, they got married on Friday, but the celebrations did not begin until Saturday.

In order to properly celebrate the nuptials of our friends, a group of eight of us made our way up to Seoul so we could have a makeshift reception on Saturday night. Wanting to shop and see some Seoul sights, Eric and I caught an early bus on Saturday morning. Once in Seoul, we spent the day shopping, eating, and drinking large amounts of coffee with our friends. We spent most of our time perusing Insadong, a street where you can indulge in some traditional Korean goods, and the H&M of Myeongdong.



After our day of walking and shopping was complete, the wedding festivities got underway back at our hostel. There we kicked the evening off with pitchers of Hite while getting ready for our night out in the Hongdae district. Hongdae surrounds a nearby university so there is an over abundance of restaurants, bars, and night clubs. In order to give Jimmy and Rachel a Western wedding reception, we started the night off with cake and a champagne toast. Nothing says “you’re married” like cutting a cake together, so we made them do just that. After the cake was cut and distributed, we held a champagne toast. Don’t worry a camera was flashing at all times so they got a true wedding experience. After this was over, the boys presented Jimmy with his “big papa” celebratory cigar; officially signifying that these two are married.

By western standards, a wedding isn’t a wedding without alcohol. To mend this we briskly walked over to Woody’s, a bar specializing in cheap, but strong drinks. After all the drinks were sipped and the cigars smoked, we decided it was time for the dancing to start. So we all meandered our way to a sans-cover dance club just a few blocks away. There Eric and I cut a mean rug and boogied the night away. And not to toot our own horn too much, but we were pretty fantastic. As the music and strobe lights continued to pulsed, our group slowly started dwindling down in numbers until finally there were only four of us still dancing. It was then, around 3 am, when we declared our makeshift reception over. As we made our way back to our hostel, a kebab stand caught our eye. With kebabs and coats in tow, the night was officially over. Overall, I’d say the Mcintyre wedding party was a great success!

The School Function from Hell

As the school year winds I find my calendar filling up with teacher’s lunches, conferences, and an end of the year dinner. I attended the latter this past Tuesday evening. To be frank, it was the oddest staff function I have ever been to. It was held at one of the hotels in town and the food spread was really quite swanky. However before we could help ourselves to the all-you-can-eat buffet, we held an hour long meeting discussing how the past year went at Dae-Sung Middle school. Let me tell you, if you think it is boring to listen to a dull speech in English, it was excruciatingly dull to listen to this dull, hour long speech in a language I didn’t understand. Once the speeches were over, I asked my friend Sue what it all was about. She said that each of the department heads, as well as the Vice Principal, spouted off a list of all the things the teachers did wrong this year and how they expect things to go more smoothly next year. Maybe not the way I would have handled the situation, but I digress.

After the berating was over, we were free to eat. The spread of the buffet was extensive; it had anything from egg salad sandwiches, kimchi, and fried chicken to raw fish and other finer Asian delicacies. During dinner a gift raffle was held by the principal. I found the whole idea of the raffle funny because rather than buy each teacher a small gift, he opted to buy just 15 gifts and raffle them off to the teachers; to each their own. Luckily, my name was drawn and I was given a cylindrical wrapped gift. I was excited at the prospect of opening it, not knowing what was inside. After I returned to the table, my principal told me through the microphone that is was a water bottle. Brilliant. But not just any old water bottle, but the “best water bottle in the world.” How exciting. He didn’t stop there, he demanded I open it in front of him so he could see how happy the water bottle would make me. So there I am, opening a gift which I already know what is inside, and I had to look excited, surprised, and grateful when I saw the water bottle. While it is a nice blue reusable water bottle, I’m not sure it is the best water bottle in the world.

Just when I thought things couldn’t get any weirder, a cake cutting ceremony was held. It was a three tiered cake, but the bottom two tiers were plastic, and all the tiers were separated by white columns; very 1970s. Furthermore, the ‘real’ top tier did not match the other tiers. It was real classy. To make things even more bizarre the cake was cut by both the vice principal and principal using a sword. Please do not confuse this with a long knife. I mean a three and a half foot, hilted sword. It was great. What was not great, was that us forty teachers had to share one nine inch round cake.

I’d like to tell you that was the end of my weird end-of-the-year meeting, but it wasn’t. While I was enjoying my small sliver of cake, the teacher next to me started asking me about my return to America. She wanted to know the exact dates, and times, I’d be moving back to Portland, where I would be living, and who I would be living with. I thought this was odd, and invasive, but told her I did not know for sure. All I knew was that I would be staying with friends for a bit while I looked for an apartment. I could not explain to her that I would ultimately be living with Eric because that concept just doesn’t exist for her because we are not married. I was curious where all of this was heading, so I asked her why she was asking. Well it turns out the daughter of another teacher at our school wants to finish college in America. Well the woman I was talking to, who will remain unnamed, convinced the daughter of this other teacher to go to Portland State University. Apparently the daughter has been accepted and is starting at PSU in March. After this background story, the woman I was talking to asked me if I would live with the other teacher’s daughter in Portland! Can you believe that?! I honestly did not know what to say. I was shocked that they would put me in this kind of position. Once I regained my ability to talk, I told her that wouldn’t work for me, but once I get a cell phone again I can email the daughter my phone number. This was met with the response, “Oh. Well I told the daughter you would have lunch with her on Thursday after school.” Again, I was at a loss for words. I told her this would be impossible because I have already made plans for Thursday afternoon. Who just volunteers another person’s time? After that I saw some other teachers leaving and I just made a break for it. Not the most mature way to handle the situation, but I did not know what else to do. While the food itself was nice, that was by far the most bizarre teacher’s function I have ever been to. I think it is safe to say that I will not miss those meetings when I leave.

It's Good to be a Foreigner...somtimes!

My apologies for being a lazy blogger these last few weeks. Eric and I have been watching an unhealthy amount of Criminal Minds and I haven’t been able to tear myself away. Pathetic, I know, but I’m back. So I know I’ve touched on some of the difficulties that come with a being a minority in Gwangju; the constant stares, being ignored, having our business turned away, etc. However, I want to write about some of the perks that come from being a part of a small foreign population—free stuff. Often times, large events that are held within our province, South Jeolla Province, admission will often times be free for foreigners. For example, when the Formula 1 race came here, foreigners could sign up in advance for free tickets. Also, members of the foreign community will often host events and admission will be free for all participants. This is to help bring the foreign community together, but to also help bridge the gap between the Korean and foreign populations.

Last Friday night, December 10, was one of these events. GFN, Gwangju Foreign News, hosted an Indie Rock Holiday Party downtown in the Kunsthalle Gallery. Four bands (B.O.B., Betty Ass, Used Cassettes, and Seoul City Suicides) were solicited to play three songs each. Even though the event was a holiday concert, the bands played their own material rather than Christmas jams. All of the bands were pretty decent too, considering they all met while working abroad in Korea. After the bands were finished, a DJ was hired to play music until 11pm. It was a lot of fun and really busy too. In addition to the free tunes, the concert hosted a free gift raffle, free beer, free coffee, and free t-shirts! To sweeten the deal even more, Eric won us two tickets to an art exhibit in town from the gift raffle. Overall, the concert was a very fun and affordable way to spend our Friday evening. So while I may complain from time to time about the inconveniences we encounter day to day, we are treated to some pretty nice perks as well.

Then on Saturday we had plans to spend the evening at Jimmy and Rachel’s to celebrate Rachel’s birthday. Eric and I figured that since we got away with such a cheap evening the night before, we’d treat ourselves to some barbeque for dinner. We frequented our favorite neighborhood establishment and order the usual. As we were ready to leave, we were stopped from paying for our meal. One of Eric’s students, and her family, were also eating at the restaurant, and they wanted to pay for our meal as a thank you to Eric. Of course we still offered to pay, but the mother would not have it. We ultimately just had to say thank you and move on.

So what should have been a spendy weekend turned out to be one of the most affordable weekends we’ve had here. So I guess sometimes standing out has its upsides!