T'was the Night Before Christmas

The Christmas Corner

Today is Christmas Eve, In the spirit of Korean Christmas, I spend it with my boyfriend. Korean Christmas is a little different than American Christmas. Here in Korea, the holiday is for couples. It is like a winter Valentine's Day. Also, it is all about Home Alone. Everyone loves Home Alone here. 

So, for my Christmas Eve, I started the day with school. We played games in all of my classes, since it is the last time I will meet most of them. Then, the last 2 periods were dedicated to a Christmas Party,. Students showcased their singing and dancing. Here are some pictures of my students. :) 

The Dance Club doing "Fantastic Baby." One of my favorite students, Minji, danced to G-Dragon's part. Then, one of my favorite first year students from my after school class danced to T.O.P.'s part. It was AWESOME.

 My 2-2 girls doing a mash-up, They were one of my most energetic classes, and it was good to see them channeling that energy :)

Then, after getting home and taking a short nap, I decided to make use of some of the lovely gifts my family sent me. For dinner, I had stuffing (made from a box of premade stuffing mix sent from the USA) and Gravy (made from Turkey Gravy Powder). We also had steak, baked potatoes, vegetables. This was after our appetizer of Bread and Cheese. Yumm,

My Oven :)

The Appetizers 

Making the Steak

The Final Product

Close Up!

Olivier couldn't finish....especially after I gave him all my left overs

Now, I'm too full. I feel pregnant with food triplets and I just want to roll over and sleep. For my sister, I watched the "Christmas Shoes" video a few times, Maybe I'll put on "The Santa Clause". Good Night to you all and I hope you have a Merry Christmas.

Can't wait to wake up tomorrow and make Christmas Crepes and Cookies. 

Korea in the Fall

Fall in Korea is the prettiest season., The weather is still pretty warm and the leaves turning are beautiful. This year, I had the chance to got to Changdeokgung twice. Changdeokgung is an old palace with a secret garden. Here are some of the gorgeous photos:

My co-teacher Christine at Changdeokgung. 

Changdeokgung Secret Garden

Foliage hadn't quite hit, but my lovely mom and aunt came to visit! :)

My After School Ladies and Gents

One of the most fun experiences at my new school was my 11 person after school class. Despite the less than stellar attendance record and mixed level, the class ended up being a really fun way to engage some students. We had 18 classes total and many different activities. Here is some of the work that these 11 amazing students completed. Not depicted here - the zombie game. 2 of the girls said this was their favorite activity, but it was all speaking. Sorry, no zombie post.

Acrostic Poems: In order to learn a little more about the students and to nail down their names, I made them make and present Acrostic poems the first week. They...didn't like this activity as much, but they still made some pretty fantastic poems. Some are just nonsense, but they're pretty entertaining.
 
 
 
 


Su-Neung Day: We made signs for this years students taking the big Korean examination.

Postsecret: In our after school class, we made post secret cards. Here are my students. I need to mail them in :) (The "So Cute" one was just an additional present for me)

Back Side

Front Side

The Thanksgiving Lessons: This year, I was particularly homesick for Thanksgiving so I decided to bring the holiday to my students. On the first day, I told them both stories of Thanksgiving. The second day was dedicated to Thanksgiving food games. The third day was dedicated to...eating homemade pumpkin pie. Noms. 

 
 

  

My favorite: The Fire Breathing Turkey.

The End: On the last day of class, I had all the students write a nice thing to each other. They also made one of these cards for me. Like most days, attendance was a problem, but I was lucky enough to have most of my students. They were all incredibly sweet. I taught them the term "suck up," by the way, whiuch is why one of the boys was calling out his friend. Two of the girls, I won't get a chance to teach again after this semester. They will be third graders and I will only see them rarely in the hallways ㅠ,ㅠ. They were some of my sweetest students. The others, however, I will have the pleasure of teaching next year. :D This is our after school chicken party on the last day.

Best Family Ever

Nothing is better than receiving a package when you live out of the country. When someone sends you a package, you know it's a big deal. They had to pick that stuff out, put it in a box, go to the post office, and pay the absurdly high fee to mail it across the world to you. Being on the receiving end of that kind of love always feels awesome.

Also, just getting mail is pretty awesome. I'm not going to lie, I even get excited when something I delivered to myself comes in because it feels like I'm getting mail. Although, now that most of my mail is bills, maybe my love for mail is changing. Packages, though. Packages are always awesome.

That being said, some packages are more awesome than others. Like when my Dad sent me a whole lot of developed photos to put around my house as decorations, that was pretty awesome. I rarely develop my photos these days so going out of the way to develop them was incredibly sweet.

Then, there are the packages that after being opened are a little less exciting. It's like the process of opening them is more fun than what's actually inside.Like, when my mom sent me a package last week. Sorry mom, I love you, but this was one of the cases when getting the package was more exciting than what was inside. Probably because this was inside:

 Ok mom, I know it wasn't exactly from you (and don't show this blog to emo), but this skirt reminds me of Christ the King and MSJ's strange Shrek like love child. (Christ the King is the elementary school that fed into my High School, MSJ. It is a Catholic School. CKS had uniforms, MSJ didn't.) But, that being said, the package was still great. I got a Christmas Card to add to my non-existent collection on my fridge.

And then, there's times when someone sends you a package that is so great and wonderful, it really makes your entire week. Actually, more like the entire Christmas season. I get all of my packages at school, so I was sitting at a desk when an office worker struggled over with a huuuge box. "Sandra 선생님, For you" It was from my sister and brother, Erica and George. 

Quickly, I tore open the package and found this:

The note said that Erica and George wanted to bring Christmas to me since I could not be home for Christmas. Each present is marked with a date so I know when to open it. They don't start until December 20th. Some of the wrapping paper is a little torn (probably because of customs), but I still can't see what any of the things inside are. I'm so excited to start opening~~ Getting the presents home were a little difficult. I borrowed a huge bag from a co-teacher and filled up my backpack. As I was leaving, the teachers told me I looked like Santa Claus.

There was one package I could open and set up to add Christmas cheer to my apartment. 

Here is my Christmas wreath. :) :) :) Best Family Ever.

My Morning Commute

Last year, when I talked about Seoul, one of the aspects I spoke most highly of was the subway. "It is so clean! And it has both heat and AC! It's just so convenient and easy to get around on," said a year ago me. Well, none of those things have changed but my attitude sure has. I mean, the subway is still one of the best I've ever been on, but yeah...riding every day definitely puts me in a love hate relationship.

The love part is pretty easy to explain. Cleanliness, music, heating, and many other great things (like discount shopping in stations). Here, I'll let Michael sing to you about it...

And the hate part. Well, not to talk down about the "ahjussi," but sometimes they make my subway experience less than enjoyable. For those of you who don't know, an Ahjussi is a 40-50 year old man. It really applies to any 40-50 year old man, but the word is usually also associated with a Soju riddled man of this age. Soju, Korean rice liquor, is ridiculously cheap and the beverage of choice in the Ahjussi community. 

So, when the subway is particularly crowded an an Ahjussi cuts in front of me to grab the only open square foot of room in the subway (or to make a spot for himself in my personal bubble), I know I'm going to be breathing in Soju breath and cigarette smell the entire way to school. Granted, I think this is pretty standard on any morning commute in public transportation, but that doesn't make it any more pleasant.

Also, since personal space is "less of a big deal" here in Korea and staring is not rude, that always makes it fun to ride to and from school. Although, to be fair, usually, the ahjussi spends his subway ride harmlessly sleeping...and saving room for cats.

Meow?

And, of course, there's the constant companion of Plastic Surgery advertisements. My feelings about plastic surgery in Korea are a little bit complicated, but it never makes me entirely comfortable to see 3 different ways to change my face on my way to school.

So, all in all, my morning commute isn't so bad. It is fast, convenient and affordable. But, before morning coffee and sunrise when I'm going to school on Monday, everything sucks.