Rewind 2013- Happy New Year!

Habits in Korea

Old habits die hard right? It's true! Some things you can't kick even when you try your best. However, when you are thrown into an entirely different culture, you may find yourself having to get over some of your vices and picking up new ones.
Jamie is an excellent study of a girl with her vices. Her happiness is in fact controlled by her vices. An example would be Diet Coke. In Korea, it is nealry impossible to find. When you do find it, it is a variation of Diet Coke called Coke Light (apparently it's not the same). And Perrier water- the ultimate hangover cure is very difficult to find. Some more things are bourbon, avocado, good wine, and cheese.

My canadian vices are good coffee and vegetarian food... both are nearly impossible to find here. Here at my cubicle, I find myself drinking some instant coffee after a lunch of pork and seafood soup and sulk that I can't have some freshly roasted coffee and an avocado and eggplant panini.
Things I miss about Canada:
1) As stated earlier, COFFEE.
2) Avocados and most especially avocado vegetarian sushi
3) Deoderant: There is this magical thing about Koreans.. they don't sweat. Or when they do they do not stink of body odour. It is a truly fascinating phenomenon. However, it does not matter how much kimchi and rice I eat, my pits will reek if I do not use deoderant. So, this is a hard thing to find.
4) Regular tasting toothpaste: For some reason I must have pick the worst toothpaste possible in Korea- salt flavoured. Just wrap your head around that.
5) Bread that is not sweet

However, like anything in life, there is an upside to Korea and I am sure I will have some tough habits to kick when I get back.

Things that are going to be hard to live without after Korea:
1) No tipping: Here, it is considered rude to tip anyone. They are insulted and feel as though you perceive them as a beggar. Also, tax is included in prices so splitting bills is never a huge issue with people's phone calculator's coming out.
2) Cheap transportation: A regular city bus ride is $1.30. A train ticket for a 5 hour train ride across the country is about $36.
3) Kimbap triangles: These delicious snacks are delicious (delicious has got to be Koreans favourite English word). You can buy these puppies at any 711 or corner store for about 80 cents and only 1 traingle has 96% of your daily calcium intake! Two of these are a hardy meal for me.

 

 

4) Server buttons: On tables at restaurants in Korea, they have this brilliant invention- a bell on each table. So you can look at the menu for a long time without the server awkwardly coming back to your table to see if you are ready yet. Then, once you have your food, you can eat without the constant fear that they are going to come back to do the "check" and you will have your mouth stuffed full of delicious food when they ask you "how is everything so far?". Instead, if you need some more spicy sauce or God forbid you run out of kimchi, you can just ring that bell and they'll come by. GENIUS!

5) Compliments: Being told you are beautiful every day and having little girls ask if you are a princess is not so bad. The flip side though, you cannot go anywhere without being stared at blatantly and even pointed at.

Other cool things:
1) Wedding Halls: I have yet to go to a wedding in Korea but I would really like to. I have talked a lot of them with my Korean co-teachers. Here you have a well-oiled marrying machine. There are halls similar to hotels scattered around cities where you choose your wedding. You rent a dress, go to the next room to have your hair and make-up done, then go to the next room where you have pictures taken with your guests as they arrive. Guests bring an envelope of cash between 30-100$ and then proceed to the buffet of food. As you eat, you watch the wedding ceremony. Wham bam tahnk you ma'am! The whole wedding is over in less than 40 minutes.

2)Dangerously cheap alcohol: Soju, tastes like watered down vodka and has horrible side effects like: drunkeness and the worst hangovers you will ever experience. The size of a mickey of soju is $1.10 at any corner store. Mekju (beer) is also some dangerously cheap stuff. If you are buying a 2 litre bottle of some Korean beer which tastes an awful lot like Coors Light or Molson Canadian (Yick!) it is about $4. Furthermore, the worst and best parts about drinking culture here is that: A) no tipping at bars, B) cheap drinks at bars, and C) no last call. Take a look at this site to fully appreciate how much Koreans drink... http://blackoutkorea.blogspot.kr/

 

Merry Christmas!

I made mugs last night for my co-workers :) And baked like a mad woman. Sadly, no chocolate crinkle cookies this year.

Korea and food

This is kimchi. Kimchi is served for every meal. I mean it... EVERY meal. It is a spicy fermented cabbage side dish that has been stewing in fish sauce, ginger, brine, radish and shrimp sauce fr a couple of months. It's not so bad but who really loves eating spicy, fishy cabbage at every meal?... except Koreans.

 This is a very typical lunch cafeteria meal. As you can see, you've got your kimchi and rice. God forbid if you went a day without rice and kimchi. You would most certainly suffer in some horrible way.. like fan death. (Remind me to tell you all about that if you haven't heard of it before). Moving on, you usually have some type of pork, chicken, fish, or if you are lucky like this guy, some quail eggs and beef. Then you have your standard spicy seaweed soup with some unknown seafood in it (may be octopus, mussels, clams.. who knows!)

 Now THIS. This is my love. This dish makes me love Koreans. It's bibimbap! Basically it is a bunch of vegetables on top of rice with spicy chili sauce and a raw egg. You get it in a hot stone pot and you mix it all together. The heat from the pot cooks the egg and the rest of the dish while you eat it. It is typically a vegetarian dish and is my go to in Kimbap nara restaurants (essentially a diner type restaurant for korean food) a dish like this will cost on average $3 to $7 at the most including tax.

The dish here is called ddukbokki which is a rice cake noodle. It is quite sweet and has some type of sweet chili sauce on it. They consider this kind of like "junk food" and they love this stuff. You can get a cup of it from street vendors like you would get a hotdog in Canada.

Considering how much extra sugar there is in the instant coffee, in the bread, and in their candy, it is surprising to find that desserts are not all that huge here. This is a traditional dessert though called songpyeon- it's a dumpling with black sesame paste that tastes a bit like peanuts in the middle.

 So you want a regular old night out for food the good old fashion Korean way? Korean BBQ or "bulgogi"  it is. They give you a ton of side dishes, a bunch of lettuce and leafs then you choose beef, pork or both. You throw it on a grill in the middle of the table, chuck those pieces of meat in a leaf with some bean paste or chili sauce, fold 'er up and shove it all in your mouth. Jamie and I aptly named it "meat and leaf restaurants". You really should have at least 3 people if you try to go to one of these places. My Canadian friend has told me of the one time she tried to eat at a meat and leaf by herself. They would not serve her and turned her away at the door. I couldn't imagine one person eating all that food, but c'mon.. let a person give it a try!

Season's Greetings!

Greetings from Korea! Because we have shit all in Korea regarding Christmas (our tree is a drawing of a tree taped to Jamie’s window) we decided to send you this beautiful festive greeting. So here are our updates and goings on from South Korea, where we currently reside. As you all know, we have traveled abroad this year to teach English in public schools in Jeollanamdo province, South Korea, the most rural province in the country. We arrived in mid-October and will be working here until October 2014. Living here so far has been an exciting adventure and not with- out its share of challenges. We have made a ton of friends, both Korean and from the in- ternational community, and are slowly settling in to our new lives. While the December holidays from home are not widely recognized here, we are looking forward to our vacation time in January, where we will spend a little under 3 weeks visiting Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam with Tristan, Jenny and Jenn. Oh, what are you doing in January? Yea.

Jamie is living in Gwangju, which is the 6th largest city in Korea, and travels each day to a town 40 minutes away called Jangseong to work. She teaches at two schools, splitting her week between an all-boys middle school and a vocational high school. Her students are insane. Once they told her they wanted to lick maple syrup off of her, another time a male student tried to guess her bra size in front of the class. He was more successful than some of her previous lovers, but moving on…. In her free time, Jamie usually explores Gwangju’s vibrant culture (and nightlife) or visits friends in neighbouring cities with Dana to visit fresh and new nightlife. Because Jeollanamdo is less densely populated than the rest of Korea, she has had some chances to get out to the great outdoors and hike the beautiful mountains of this region. Jamie is very much looking forward to the spring, when she plans on buying a tent and spending as many weekends possible camping around the country.

This past year saw two moves for Jamie, almost ten years of being best friends with Dana, and yet another year of being single, all of which were pretty awesome things. In 2014 Jamie hopes to live each day like it’s her last, not get pregnant, make new friends, recreate a Kate Bush music video and learn how much soju is too much soju.*

Dana is living and working in Hwasun, a small county on the outskirts of Gwangju. Adjusting to the small town lifestyle has been no easy feat after spending 4 years in downtown Toronto, it has been a lot to get used to from having an old lady stroking her hair at a crosswalk to walking through paprika fields to get to work. Dana is working at an English Learning Centre that is tucked away in the town’s biggest elementary School with an amazing 1,000 students. Alongside 3 other teachers, they lead an English field-trip program for a new group of children every day. Currently, the activities are focused on popcorn making, origami with sea animals, feelings, and Dana’s hospital section where they learn phrases like “I have a stomachache” and “I have a fever”. It is repetitive but is a very fun and energetic environment; she loves the kids and the ridiculous things that they say. However, some days she wants to strangle them as she is yanking flyswatters out of the hands of flailing screaming children. Such is life!

Being a city kid at heart, Dana spends a lot of her free time in Gwangju with Jamie and taking Jamie home after too much of said soju* has been had. This year, Dana hopes that both her and Jamie will survive their introduction to Korean alcohol and no last call bars, avoid eating live octopus with her Korean co-teachers, and to only get herself completely lost on purpose.

We miss you all like crazy. Have a shot of some tasty Canadian whiskey for us.

All the love, Jamie and Dana
*Soju is a rice liquor that Koreans drink. Its like one dollar for a mickey and can be blamed for many life mistakes.