A hodgepodge of sorts

Pictures!Brown Class Kinder Graduation Ceremony

Stanford Class Graduation Ceremony

Seoul Museum of History

I think an old map of Seoul.

The 4 most influential Kings of Korea.

Palace. Once you've seen one you've seen them all. They really are all the same.

A picture of me of course (shameless)

Some tombs of Soldiers in the middle of Jamsil.

More tombs.

Tombs plus city backdrop.

I went to a wedding on Saturday and it was so cute. When I walked out of the subway station they had written this on the side walk. I thought it was the cutest idea ever. They also had arrows every couple of yards pointing you in the right direction.

This was at the Dragon Hill Lodge on an Army Base in Noksokpyong.

And probably ruining their privacy here is a picture of them haha. She just looked so beautiful I had to share with everyone.

The Long Awaited Conclusion of Incheon

So the next morning when we leave we get Dunkin Donuts and find the subway to go to Incheon. When we get there we find the bus we need to get on and go to the port area. First though we found some street fair. It looked pretty shaddy and I have issues with rides now a days (getting old :( ) so Jess S and K went on what looked like the viking. They said at first they were fine and having fun but then it started to go really high and like I said shaddy.

We leave that little area and head over to the ferry's that take you over the tiny islands. For some reason we decide to go on a cruise boat instead. Little did we know this cruise boat would be filled with halmoni's (very old women all dressed in the same flowery shirt and giant visor) as well as a few foreigners. The boat was literally a party boat. There was loud music and even shows you could watch. The halmoni's really enjoyed these things. I don't know why considering the beautiful ocean view we were experience on the outside but whatever floats your boat (oh I'm so hilarious).

On the outside of the boat it was actually a little chilly and these giant seaguls were following the boat the whole time. They would fly up really close to me and then turn and look at me. It freaked me out so much. I mean they were freaking LOOKING at me with their scary food seeking eyes.

After about an hour and half of the halmoni fest we got off the boat and headed over to the China town portion of Incheon. We ate "Chinese" food which isn't anything like Chinese at home. I miss you General Tso's and crab rangoon! This little area reminded me a lot of San Francisco. Anyway after that we ended up going back home. It's about a 90 minute subway ride from Incheon to Cheongdam with one or two transfers. My butt was numb by the time I got off of that thing.

Yeah sorry that wasn't very interesting to make everyone wait so long for. I really am going to try and update this a lot more I promise.

Incheon

Last Friday I set off on an adventure to Incheon with my friends Jess S and Jess K. It was definitely an interesting experience but pretty fun

So at around 9:15 pm I meet up with Jess S to take the first leg of our journey. We were meeting Jess K in Sindorim which was still at least a good hour to Incheon. When we get there I had to pee really badly. I go wait in this long line when these four teenage girls come stumbling up to the line. Two of them are really drunk. One looks dazed the other like she's going to puke at any minute. Soon her and her friend are pushing there way through the line and she's throwing up in a trash can. Her friend is beating her on the back. Sounded more painful then helpful. Jess S says that she can't be around this so I'm waiting by myself.

Jess K soon sends me a text saying that she thinks that this might be the second to the last train for Incheon. So I run out of the line and up the stairs to the plat form. I call and ask where they are cause I can't see them and she tells me, "Oh, just kidding. They were all running so I thought it was the last one." I give up on peeing and get on the subway.

Well after about 6 stops I look at the subway map to see where we are going. After looking at the line we are supposed to be on for Anyang (the subway stop we were approaching) I find out that we are going the complete opposite direction we should be on. We get off of the subway and go back up and transfer at the right spot and again are on our way to Incheon.

That is until we get a call from Jess S' friend saying why are you going to Incheon you should stay in Bubyeong. So at midnight we end up in Bubyeong. I still have to pee. We get something to eat at a kimbab place (I get bibimbab which is just rice in a big bowl with veggies and red sauce) and we go to try and find Jess S' friends. After hanging out with them for about an hour we try to find a place to sleep. Lucky for us we stumble upon love motel street. We tried four love motels before we picked one.

First was White Castle which wanted 60,000 won. Then Topaz that wanted 40,000. Then this really shaddy one with no name. We walk in and the old man kind of looks at us and gets this hobbit looking lady to come out and talk to us. She sort of like grunted at us and ended up going fron 30,000 to 20,000. Jess S says she's going to run away from the situation so we leave. The last place we go, Black Hole we got for 35,000 and it was amazing. An actual tub with jets. Big screen tv. It was nice. And that was the night. Alright have to go to work but I'll write about Inchecon later.

This is my boss

There Steven.. happy?

Half Way Point

Wow. I have been in Korea for 6 months now. I can't believe how fast it has gone. I know these next few months are going to go by equally as fast and I don't know how I feel about that. On one hand I'm excited to never have to work at my school again. But I'm going to be leaving some of the most amazing friends I have ever met. I know I won't lose the real ones, but I have a feeling there will be a few I will end up not talking to again. Eh, so is life right?

So I've been here 6 months. What have I learned? Well I can tell a cab driver how to get almost anywhere I want to in Seoul. All you have to do is add "yok" (which basically means subway station) to the end of any place in Seoul. For example if I'm in Myeongdong and I want to take a cab back to where I live, in Cheongdam, I just have to tell the cabby "Cheongdam yok." And off I go into the general direction of where I live. I also know how to tell them to go left or right and to stop "right here."

I've learned that Tuesday Wing Night is an amazing way to bring you back from a crappy Monday and more then likely a crappier Tuesday. I literally count down the minutes to when I can run out of the building screaming "ASAH!!" and onto the subway headed towards Itaewon. Meeting up with your friends at the same bar every week may seem "boring" and "old" but I really love it. Beer also helps.

On that note I've learned how to drink really crappy beer. Through my college years I never drank the stuff. EVER. I hated it. I would have an amoretto sour here and there but never would I order a beer. In Korea (especially on wing night with 8000 won pitchers) beer is a staple. There are two kinds of beer in Korea, Cass and Hite. I'm not to sure which I like better but I do tend to drink more Cass.

I've learned that there are rude, stuck up, mean, racist people everywhere. Shows you that regardless of the country people are the same.

Though I already knew this it is now engrained into me, thanks boss, that no matter how hard you work you will not get recognized for it. However the instant you do something seemingly wrong to management you will be talked to. Love that. Luckily that hasn't messed up my hardworking mentality.

I've learned that life feels the same no matter where I am. I thought that coming to Korea would be this big life changing thing. But really it doesn't feel much different. Sad? Not really. Maybe I won't realize the extent of what this "adventure" did to me until it's over.

I'll try and post more. I'm sorry that I have been slacking so much. I blame ugly, cloudy and cold Korean weather. Like I've said time and time again I don't do much worth posting. I work all week and hang out with my friends on the weekends. Soon though we're going to be going outside of Seoul and actually seeing Korea.

Guam (or where I learned I don't take enough pictures)

I'm a little disappointed in my lack of pictures that I took while vacationing on the beautiful island of Guam. Luckily my friend Michelle is a stalkographer (stalker photographer) and I stole some pictures from her mostly of pictures with the whole group. I'm more of a scenery pictures taker then people one apparently. I had a really great time though. It was amazing just to relax and be outside.

Michelle took this picture and I really liked it. So I stole it. Thanks Michelle!

The whole Guam group. Michelle, Jess S, Dave, me and Bill.

I also realized I'm a bad vacationer because I don't know what this place is. I think Tumon Falls but don't quote me on it.

Waterfalls

The guys climbed up to the top.

I only put this on here to show how blindingly white I am. I have a comparison picture down below.

Sunset. I don't know who took this picture for me but they did an amazing job. I was upstairs taking a shower getting ready to go out for the night.

We were driving around and saw this place and figured it was a nice picture spot. Beautiful blue water.

Another place where we were just driving around going somewhere and stopped to take pictures.

Michelle taking a picture of everyone taking pictures.

This is called Two Lovers Cliff, or something like that. Legend has it that a couple jumped off of it because they weren't allowed to be together.

The other side of the cliff.

Another sunset.

Don't know where we were. Again just driving around the island and stopped.

Waves

More waves

The guys, of course, were jumping off of this ledge into this watering hole.

Looks like they are sky diving.

An area where a Vietnam War memorial was.

Michelle took this picture at two in the morning while we were waiting for our 4 am flight. I like it because in the 5 days we were there I actually look dark.

Anyway there is the short version of the trip I just wanted to get up here. I'll write more in detail what I did later. I just wanted to get some pictures up for people to see.

Leaving for Guam

Back in December I booked a trip to Guam with Bill, Jess, Dave and Michelle. And the time has finally come where I get to actually go on the trip. I leave tomorrow, Friday, at 9:30 pm. We don't get to Guam until after 2 in the morning. Then, thanks to Bill, we all have to be at some meeting place by 9 am to go on a 3 hour hike to some water falls. We're all going to be dead tired but it'll be worth it!

After that we'll probably just lay around on the beach, go snorkeling at some point and just have a good time. It's crazy because this is the first vacation that I have taken that I have paid for myself. I feel like an adult.

Anyway I just can't wait to get out of Korea. Today is my 5 month anniversary of landing in this country and though I like it here I'm excited to go somewhere where I'll understand what everyone is saying. Beach and warm weather are also a major bonus.

When I get back, which will be Wednesday morning at 8:05 giving me exactly 1 hour and 35 minutes to get to work (umm yes there is a possibility I may not make it), I'll come home and upload pictures. That'll be a sad day.

Kinder side note: Sally in Brown comes up to me and goes, "Ashley teacher, I changed name. I'm Serena." And I was like, how do you spell that because though I would pronouce that Sir-e-na she says it like Sir-in-a. I looked at her and said, "I'm going to call you Sally." She seemed a little defeated.