Wednesday, November 26, 2008
If we were to transfer home $5000 right now... we would lose $1065. OUCH!
Worst it's been yet.
100th post minus $1000
Short Form
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Quick Update....
- we went to a Canadian/Albertan pub in Gangnam in Seoul. It was great to be with good friends. We forgot where we were for a while because of the company and the atmosphere. It was nice.
- the won has gotten expectantly worse. It cost us over $100 extra to send home $500 the other day. We are now officially only sending home minimum payments till the end.
- 5 months to go!! We will be home to see everyone!!
- My birthday is on friday and the girls are coming in from Seoul to celebrate with me. Not sure what we are doing yet, but I am happy to have company.
- We bought a Christmas tree. A fake one from E-Mart. It comes up to my waist and we decorated it. Thought buying a tree would make it easier to be away from home on Christmas, but it is definitely making us a bit more homesick right now.
- Found Campbells Tomato Soup in a "Gourmet Food Shop" in Coex mall. We laughed... gourmet?? And, they are definitely charging gourmet prices for it too.... $3 a can. Yikes. We didn't buy any this time, but at some point we will.
- Going to venture on making Christmas cookies soon. I got my mom to send me nonbake recipes because we don't have an oven.
- I really like Dak Galbi and pretty much want to eat it every day.
Not sure what else right now... we love and miss you. We will take pictures this weekend and post them for you all to see.
More Pictures....Second Post Today
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Leaf sitting on a marble staircase
Berries on a tree by Chiak Art Centre
A shot in the park
Set the camera in the grass for this one.
Leaves sitting on a bench... shot this from the end of the bench with the camera sitting it. I thought it looked really cool.
The sunlight was amazing that day
The sun shining through this leaf did all the work. The colours are real!
Leaves sitting on the cement in a pile
The Korean Won... will it ever get better?
Recently Kyle and I have been watching the exchange rate between the CDN $ and the Korean Won just get worse and worse. I am beginning to wonder if this is ever going to get better or if it is just going to continue to get worse.
It's a really nerve-wracking feeling knowing that if we were to come home today that we would lose thousands of dollars. The point in us coming here was to pay off our student loans and we know that we will not and cannot completely pay them off after one year, but we would have paid enough to give us a leg up in the world when we got back to Canada. To take the stress and anxiety of looming student loan payments off our shoulders.
To put it into perspective... over a month ago the exchange rate was at 1050 Won - $1 CDN and it was prime pickings for us to be transferring money home, so we were. In large amounts and it was so nice to watch our loans disappear from under us. Currently, the exchange rate sits at
1171 won - $1 Cdn and that is just awful. We haven't been able to send home money besides minimum bill payments for the last 2 months and almost 3 now. At this rate we will have a large sum of money to transfer home at the end and we will be losing approx. $4000-$5000. It hurts.
What do you think? Will it get better or worse? What should we do should it drop more?? Many questions floating around right now. No, we are not planning on quitting and coming home, but we just don't want to lose so much money.... ugh. I hate the economy right now. We both do.
Girl Time = Amazing
We just got back from Seoul about 2 hours ago and are exhausted. We had a great time though and every trip we have made in lately has been well worth the 6:15am start so we can catch the bus and get into Seoul on time for church.
We went out with Steph and Derek for lunch at Coex Mall and then wandered around the stores for a little bit. Shopping in Korea is definitely not my cup of tea. If you think that malls are busy in Canada, well, think of boxing day shopping and times that by 100 and then you can imagine the crowds inside the mall. It was amazing though to get together with Steph and I so much appreciate her and being able to talk with a girl about something other than appearance and even just talking to a girl in general. We both have the same feelings, although I assume hers are a little bit more intense. I have Kyle and that is different, but I do sympathize with having to be around guys all the time and never having girl time. I miss it. A lot.
It is just so relieving and so relaxing for me and such a breath of fresh air to have some girl time and to laugh with a girl friend. You take these things for granted when you have them, but trying going for 6 1/2 months with little to no female contact and then you will be starved for it. I love that girl. And Krista and Jennell.
My birthday is coming up in 11 days and I have invited Steph, Jennell and Krista to come out and stay with Kyle and I and celebrate my birthday. I am really looking forward to it. Kyle is used to having lots of girls around so I know that he will be okay :) Not sure what the plan will be, but I am just going to be happy to have some girls around for my birthday.
I also had another annoying experience in the taxi today. When Kyle and I got back from Seoul and were in the taxi back to our apartment I attempted to tell the taxi to stop. He didn't. I said it again and he still didn't stop. He looked in his mirror because he obvisouly heard me speaking, but since there was a male in the car with me he would not stop until Kyle said something or I was really persistent. I finally got him to stop and then he wouldn't even look at me for the taxi fare. I had to basically wave my hand in his face so he would realize that I was the one paying him. I don't have this issue so much if it is just me in the taxi, still somewhat noticeable, but not bad. But when there is a guy in the taxi its like I have no voice. I will not miss that when I go home. It really bothers me somedays. Other days I can make myself ignore it and understand that it is the culture, but I hate being treated like I don't matter.
Anyways, just wanted to let you know how our weekend was. We spent Saturday kinda lazy-ing around the house. Watching hockey and wandering through the outlet mall in the midafteroon. We went out for Dak Galbi and I was excited because they let me have extra Dak Bokki (rice cakes) and it was so good. I am really starting to want to eat more Korean food, which is kinda bad because I will crave it at home even more now than I thought I would. I will definitely miss the food. I am already finding the recipes for things online and I am thinking about what I will send in the mail ahead of me so I can make these meals for you all when we get back. Warning: our spicey sensors have severely diminished since being in Korea, so we hope its not too spicy for you!
Big leaf or Small Head??
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Is this a big leaf or does Kyle have a small head??
You be the judge!!
Fall in Korea... 3rd Post in 24 hours!!
A beautiful flower I found in a bush that looked completely dead. This is one of my favourite shots from the whole day.
Leaves hanging from a tree about to fall
A late blooming flower by the Chiak Art Centre
A cool shot from Kyle
Another cool shot from Kyle
Halloween Pictures
Kyle and his director Mihwa. Typical "peace" sign and typical "kyle face". I love him.
This is Betty and Kim, two of Kyle's coworkers. They are awesome and so much fun to hang out with outside of work. Love' em.
Kyle and Hee-Ji, you will have to ask Kyle how much he "loves" her....
This is Kyle's cutest student, Gu-Min, not sure if that is spelled right, but we playing "keep the balloon in the air" for like 20 minutes. She had so much fun. Can you tell how shy she is??
Kyle in his grim reaper outfit. Nice face.
This is my most advanced class 3-D, from the left: Lisa, Anna, Misty, Andrew (in the back), Blake (in the back), Amy Kim, Amy Lee, Jason (in the back) and Ashley
This is my 3-A class from the left: Ran, Sue, Ling, Emily, Christine, David (in the back), Billy (in the back), Caitlin and ducked down behind everyone is Nick... he is on the floor hiding and you can't see him.
This is my 2-B class from the left: Julia, Laura, John, Louis (in the back), Matthew, Tom (in the back) and Tim
This is my 2-A Class. From the left: Max, Jason, Tyler, Alice, Charlet and Lucy (my favourite student not in 1-A)
From the left: Anna, Yuna and Sara
Three girls from my 1-B class on Halloween
This is my 1-B class with their masks that they coloured.
The one on the left is Sophia and on the right Alice. Mine and Matt's biggest fan club. They are in my 1-A class. I love them, except when they text me at 5:30am to ask "do you swim?" and then not understand the reply if I was to give them one.... they are the reason for many smile and laughs each day I will miss them the most when I leave for home
This is my 1-A class... my cutest and most favourite students are in this class.
This is Gabrielle. I don't know where I would be without her and all her help. Love this lady!
Halloween & Pepero Day
Since Halloween is not a widely celebrated or participated in holiday out here in Korea, I made sure to give my kids as close to a real "Halloween" experience as possible. They had always been telling me, well for about 3-4 weeks before Halloween, that they wanted to experience Halloween like in North America. I felt bad for the little munchkins when I heard that they had never gone trick or treating before!!
I told them about when I was little and used to take out a pillow case and fill it to the top with candy and eat candy for the next few months... well until my parents would decide the candy had gone bad. I still think they took it and ate it themselves. Also, I know parents have to check their children's candy (especially after hearing about all the tainted candy this year in Ontario) but I think parents totally take advantage of it and steal a bunch of the good candy "to test it". Ha!! Evil. Matt and I also reminisced about the intense candy trading that would go on after one would arrive home... "I'll trade you 3 caramels and a sucker for that bag of chips and a hard candy?" This would go on for days... especially when you would run out of a certain candy or snack that you preferred and your sibling or friends still had many. Maybe sneaking into your sibling's room and finding their candy stash under the drawer in their bed and taking what you desired was a little evil, but sometimes you needed it just that bad... and I... I mean... hypothetically, one doesn't get caught ;)
Anyways, I made my kids say trick or treat at my door to come in and then we made Halloween masks and I gave them lots of candy throughout the class. We also played pin the tail on the black cat. I almost got mobbed a couple of times leaving classroom with the candies because they figured out saying "trick or treat" gets the candy from the bowl into their mouths.... it was fun. The kids had never heard of "pin the tail on the donkey" so my game was a huge hit and they laughed so much. I would spin them about 20 times and then point them in the wrong direction... when they felt the door they would turn around and say "TEEEEEEEEAAAAACHER!!!!" I laughed hysterically to myself the whole day. One kid even pinned the tail to my penguin calendar which is on the opposite wall from where the cat was.
The next day we had Halloween at Kyle's work. It was done on a Saturday and I went down with Kyle to keep him company. I ended up doing a whole bunch of balloon jack-o-lanterns and then I got suckered into face painting. I was quickly put to shame by Ryan (Kyle's coworker from Scotland who finished his contract today and flew home an hour ago) who has a degree in art. I held my own, but he was definitely one-upping me the whole time. It was fun. Kyle was dressed up as well, more forced to dress up, as a Korean Grim Reaper. This only consisted of him wearing a black robe that came down to his knees and a funny looking wire hat that hurt his head. He looking nothing like a grim reaper. Phil, the new guy from England, was forced to be a clown in a one piece... so funny, Andrew was dressed up like Jet-Li (definitely forced and he took of his fake hair every second the director was not around) and Ryan just refused to put on his costume.
One kid saw me from the back sitting in the computer lab printing some stuff for activities and thought I was one of the teachers wearing a blonde wig, so he came in to see my costume and when he saw it was someone he didn't know he jumped like a foot backwards and didn't move or saying anything. Then ran out to tell someone I was in there and Kyle told him I was his wife, the kid wouldn't leave me alone after that. It was nice to meet some more of Kyle's student's though. His kids are definitely more a handful than my own... no doubt.
But that was Halloween. I didn't get any candy. I got candy yesterday because it was "Pepero" day, which is a day that a chocolate company made up to sell more chocolates. I got about 15 boxes of the chocolate covered wafer sticks and a bunch of large single ones... quite the stash. I am sick of eating them though, so I am slowly going to take them back to work as if I bought them and give them to the kids as rewards.
Jennell was out on the weekend. It was great to have her out. So relaxing. We went out for lunch at a local restuarant here and then we went to watch the new James Bond movie. I liked it even though all the reviews are awful. Everyone I went with liked it.... so I don't think its that bad. I can see if you are a hardcore Bond fan that you may not like it, but it was good. Then we came home, sat around and chatted and Jennell and I played Nintendo DS against each other. SO MUCH FUN! I have been playing by myself since I bought it but she bought one after trying mine so now we can play together when she comes out. We went out for coffee at our favourite coffee shop and had freshly baked chocolate cake (single cakes that they bake for you when you get there) and hot chocolate. The next day we spent the entire day taking pictures. It was a lot of fun. I will post Halloween pictures and some fall pictures right after this.
Well... there is another long awaited update. Next time, I will try to talk about how I am tired of male taxi drivers not listening to me because I am female, plastic surgery in Korea and I will post you a video of one of the most popular Korean songs right now so you can fully understand the "cutesie-ness" and "annoying-ness" and "some other descriptive word I can't think of right now" music and commercials and everything we see and hear everyday.
Love and miss you all. 170 days to go!!!! And the exchange rate still sucks!
Pictures from the Zoo
Sunday, November 2, 2008
There is a huge gash in the monkey's arm here... hard to see, but you can really understand how little care these animals get.
This is my favourite picture of the day. Really grasps the feeling that you can see in the eyes of the animals. Their cages are so small and there is no one tending to them at all while people poke and tease them one after another. Heart breaking. This Malaysian Sun Bear was so hard to look at. He cried and growled a lot.
This little guy was very curious/frightened of my camera. When I would pull it out he would come over and look and then swim away quickly and stay away till I put it away and then repeated. So cute.
A sample of the beautiful fall colours out here right now... breathtaking when you see the mountains covered in these colours.
A giraffe kissing his net of food
Cute Meerkat.... I love these things. Could be from my obsession with "The Lion King" when I was really young...
The ostrich that you could definitely tell was being fed by the zoo patrons.... it followed you everywhere along the fence and answered to your whistle
A Bit Anticlimactic
Saturday, November 1, 2008
I guess I am making myself out to be quite the liar these days....
I am kinda in a bad mood right now, so I am not sure how long this will be. Let's see...
Last weekend we went to Seoul on Saturday morning and met up with a friend of ours and went to the Seoul Grand Park zoo. It was a lot of fun. A lot of animals that we had seen before, but we able to get a lot closer to (good or bad, not too sure) since the regulations here are nothing up to the standards of North America. Took a bunch of really good pictures. It was funny, at one point we went inside and everyone was crowded around this one cage. We thought it was a very tropical animal or something, but it was a beaver. We laughed. Quite the attraction here I guess. We saw some mountain lions fighting and that was quite loud.... but it was a lot of fun until it started to rain.
We left after that and searched for a costume shop, that we never found and then headed off for our Prov reunion in the Insadong Starbucks (the only Starbucks in the world with their sign in Korean). It was great to see familiar faces and catch up with people. It is amazing how many of us are actually here in Korea at the same time, not even half of the people were able to make it to the reunion, but it was mostly people from our years there. It was a lot of fun. We thought it was cold out that day and that there was no humidity, but Mark Little who came to visit was dying from heat and humidity. I guess we have just gotten used to it. I wonder what it will feel like to be in the prairies again??? It was so nice to have a Caramel Macchiato done properly.
After that we headed to a house warming party for the boys. It was fun. We met some more people, but I found myself mostly just talking to the prov people that we there. Kyle and I get a lot of reactions when people find out that we are married, so we kinda got tired of the reactions of "oh, you're too young" or "you will never get to meet new people" or "why would you do that" or any other rendition of those.... so we stuck with people who knew us. I get tired of saying the same things to everyone over and over again sometimes. So, its nice to speak with people who already know you and where you are in life and who can fully understand you. It was a great relief.
Not long after we took the subway back to Krista's house and slept there for the night. I was up all night sick with the cold (we both have a really bad cold right now). It was so nice of Krista to let us stay with her. We had a great time and it was nice and cozy fitting three of us in a bachelor suite. I love that girl. It was so nice to be out there with her.
The next day we went to a church. I was hesitant after our first experience with Korean church, but everyone was saying that it was a great place. We went and we have never felt that at home in a church in a very long time. We are actually going out there again tomorrow, catching the 7:30am bus into Seoul to go back there. It was so nice that I can't even describe it. We just felt at home there. The music was great and the pastor (who grew up in Philly, and before I knew that I thought he must have some black in him somewhere by the way he talked) was hilarious. I have not laughed that hard in a service, I think, well, really ever!
After church Kyle and ditched the main group of 15 people going for Vietnamese food and went with Steph (another Prov friend) to TGI Fridays. The food was great and we had great conversation as well... even though we kinda feel like we dumped on Steph a little bit, but I hope she didn't feel that way. I will have to ask her tomorrow.
Alright, I am done. Sorry this has been anticlimactic after I gave you the "preview" and made it sound all exciting, but as I said, I am not in the best of moods right now and I am very tired and a knot in my back is killing me sitting at the computer.... so I will post some pictures tomorrow when we get back from Seoul.
Next entry: Halloween parties and candy at ELC and Princeton
