Christmas

I can't believe Christmas has already past. It truly feels like Ian and I just started working at CDI. The past five and a half months have flown by. Fortunately, we were able to have Christmas off, which was spent relaxing and eating delicious food! Since we currently have no need for Korean gadgets, we decided to spend our gift money at Costco. We bought cheese, cheese and more cheese! Living on a Korean diet makes you deprived of a certain food that we love dearly (cheese), so we decided to splurge and eat enough of it to fill us for the next year! After stuffing ourselves we watched a favorite movie of mine, The Family Man. It was very weird being away from home but at least we didn't have to work and were able to enjoy a relaxing day not thinking about the kiddos at school!

Seoul got its first substantial snow the other day. It was only 3-4 inches, but let's just say it reeked havoc. Since it has been very cold, the snow immediately stuck to the ground, causing very slick roads. It was the first time I have been on a bus that fishtailed down a major road and then got stuck. Even though the conditions were horrible, the McDonald's, Domino's, and Fried Chicken delivery boys were still in action. Nothing stops them!

We start intensive this upcoming Thursday. I'm excited to teach an addition/different class, but I'm crossing my fingers we don't get sick. Working from 9-10 (Tues, Thurs, Sat) with a few hours of rest in between is going to be exhausting. Ian is teaching Critical Speaking and Writing Level 1, which will be full of the smallest kids at CDI. It's a little challenging teaching the youngest kids because they understand, if you're lucky, about a sixth of what you say. Let's just say you draw a lot of pictures and use a lot of hand gestures. I'm going to be teaching Grammar Level 2. The students will be about fourth-sixth grade. I've heard I can play some games with the students, so I hope it will be fun.

Ian's parents arrive in two days! We will update their travels in our next blog. Happy almost New Years!

We also uploaded a new slide show. The pictures are from our trip to China Town, the local mosque, and City Hall. Enjoy...

Birthday Weekend

The best part about international birthdays is that you get two of them! Friday was my Korean birthday, and Saturday my American one. What an awesome treat!

My birthday this year was pretty low-key, thank God! Let's just say that my last two birthdays had less than spectacular endings. SO I ended up eating a lot of meat with friends and then getting to bed around 1:30 A.M., which I was very thankful for.

The next day we ate at a local spanish tapas restaurant called Three Sister's. It is one of best restaurants in Seoul that actually offers European style food. Most Italian restaurants in Korean put a sweetener in spaghetti, but fortunately Three Sister's makes pasta just like home! Thanks to Jay and Sue, we splurged and ordered drinks and multiple tapas, including sauteed mushrooms in garlic and wine, spanish meatballs, an orange salad, and spaghetti with tomatoes and basil. It was absolutely delicious and a great way to end the weekend!

On Saturday Leslie and I headed out to Incheon, a port city about 20 miles to the east of Seoul. Well, technically Incheon is a separate city, but actually it is just the place where the sea stops the urban jungle of Seoul.

Incheon has a small and quaint Chinatown that Leslie and I wanted to check out. In fact, its South Korea's only Chinatown thanks to the Chinese alliance with the North during the war. It was basically a few streets bathed in a sea of Communist red paint, lanterns, the ubiquitous Chinatown lampposts, and entrance gates. We found a dumpling restaurant and had delicious dumpling soup. After stuffing ourselves on dumplings, we took a short stroll, might I add a very cold stroll, around Chinatown. We were even able to see part of the sea, which was surprisingly refreshing. Being constantly surrounded by gigantic buildings, we tend to forget what open space feels like. It was very enjoyable to say the least...



The Korean winter has finally arrived and it is extremely cold. Even walking around with long johns under jeans, a down jacket, hat and gloves, you get stung from the bitterly cold wind. Thankfully it doesn't rain or snow that much here, so it won't be a wet winter. Something we always get a kick out of are how the Korean women dress. Us Americans thought that the usually fashionable Korean women would actually cover themselves up during the winter time. To our surprise, the Korean women still feel the need to impress by wearing tights, even shorter skirts and high heals, and jackets that barely cover the body. Let's just say bundling up for the cold is so out of fashion in Korea.



Fortunately, we are getting Christmas day off! Our head instructors fought long and hard and finally convinced our boss that getting Christmas day off would boost morale. Unfortunately, even though she agreed to give us the day off, she is making us come in on Saturday to make up for the missed classed. It was a little disappointing, but at least we can celebrate Christmas on the actual day!



Merry Christmas everyone and safe travels!

Sorry for the delay...

The past couple of weeks have flown by with the start of a new term. Even though it's sad to bid some students farewell, it's exciting to teach a new level. Ian says his Albatross class has been great to teach. The students are very fluent and are fairly easy to entertain. Even though the reading topics can be somewhat dull, the students make up for it. Eagle has also been enjoyable so far. The past two topics were gambling and smart technology. It's very interesting listening to the student's opinions and ideas. I was signed up to teach a Saturday class, but fortunately it got cancelled because there was only one student one the role. This means that Ian and I will actually have weekends to celebrate for the next three weeks! It is only three weeks because intensive classes start at the end of December.

Even though we have not ventured far from Seoul these past couple of weeks, we have been introduced to some delicious eateries. We recently ate out with some friends and were taken to a Japanese Teriyaki meat restaurant. You basically get a bowl of rice covered in Teriyaki meat. You also get a side bowl of Japanese noodles in a beef broth. It was quite tasty, especially since in only cost about $5.00 each! Our friends also told us about a restaurant that only serves Chinese noodles. Since we have yet to learn Korean, we just pointed to a woman's dish that looked tasty. It's a little risky doing that in Korea because you never know how something is going to taste! Fortunately, the dish, which consisted of noodles sauteed with vegetables, was delicious. The newest eaterie is a Chinese Dumpling restaurant. All I can say is that Ian has found a new love! The dumplings are made to order, by one person, and are steaming hot with delicious pork goodness. It's a nice change from Korean mandu because the flavoring is less powerful and has a thicker dough.

Some exciting news, Ian's parents are visiting us at the end of December! We have already started to plan their week vacation and are thrilled to show them what Korea has to offer. We are also planning on taking a mini trip this weekend. Since we can actually enjoy a weekend, we figure that we should see a little more of the countryside, even if it will be very chilly!

If anyone is curious, the Thanksgiving feast turned out delicious. It was amazing that everything actually turned out. It was nice to eat a complete non-Korean meal with great company. It definitely helped us feel less homesick.

Again, sorry for the delay in posts! Happy Holidays everyone.