After many wonderful people left interesting and disgusting comments of food they had eaten, Danny and I did a very fair (I promise ; ) drawing of names out of a hat and found our two winners! Ladies and gentlemen, the two winners of Kimchi for Breakfast's 100th blog post contest are...drum roll....
Seth and Anna Schuett and Chelsea Van Ryn!
Congratulations! Thank you all for your support and comments to our blog, and even though some of you didn't win, I hope you will continue to read and enjoy our stories from Korea. It's always encouraging when we hear of you guys reading (and hopefully) liking our blog...really, thank you!
We wanted to try and do something special for post #101 so we've been putting together a little compilation of stories from Korea. So many of us who live here have crazy tales and funny memories that we don't want to forget, so Danny and I tried to document some into a little movie for you all. In a little over a week, Danny and I will have been living in Korea for exactly 2 years, and man do we have a lot of memories! We did our best to add the funniest and most wacky stories we could so for those of you who live in Korea ~ I bet you can relate ; ) and for those of you who don't ~ this is just a small sampling of Crazy Korea. ENJOY!
Today is November 11, 2011 or Pepero Day so let's celebrate!
Every November 11th, Koreans celebrate Pepero Day and since this year it is 11-11-11, it is a very special day that won't come again in our lifetimes!
Pepero are basically chocolate covered bread sticks that are a common sweet snack for Koreans. The only real association they have to November 11th is that they look like ones if you hold them next to each other, however somehow they made giving them away a national holiday.
Kids and couples will buy a ton of these treats and give them to friends, teachers, and significant others. I saw these cute girls walking down the street with a ton of Pepero that they had collected from school and they were sweet enough to share and give me a box.
I heard this year that some schools banned Pepero from their schools because kids get so crazy, but even still, I saw everyone walking around with Pepero today.
A Pepero display at a local shop.
Maybe you are in Korea, or maybe your not, but either way go get yourself some Pepero and share some with a loved one! I must admit though that us waygookins will have an easier time being in Korea, but your Mrkans probably can go get some Olive Garden bread sticks and melted chocolate and I'm sure you get about the same result ;)
Tomorrow, Danny and I will officially be getting on a plane and heading back to America for the first time in 18 months. Seriously, I can't believe we have been away for that long! To us, that means we are heading back to the land of normal... or at least our normal, but really what is "normal" anymore? To me "normal" is peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and lawns, and people who have different color eyes and hair, but to Korean kids none of those things are normal in their minds.
During our summer camp, our Korean students got the opportunity to make peanut butter and jelly for the very first time and it was fun to watch. Can you imagine seeing PB&J as a strange and foreign food as all of those kids did?! It blows your mind, huh? Then I realized that PB&J may be my normal, but it's not everyone's normal. Korean kids are used to kimchi and chopsticks, and I grew up with mac n' cheese and forks : )
Even though it has been difficult at times, I am really glad that this experience is helping me realize that not everyone grew up the way I did. It makes learning about Korea that much more interesting and it allows me to share some pretty cool stuff with students to help them expand their global views too.
It may seem strange, but I feel like when I get to share a game like "steal the bacon" that I always played growing up at Camp Elim, or when I get to make Rice Crispie Treats with these kids for the first time ever, I am sharing a bit of "Americana" with them. They get to try something new, and I get to feel even more proud of where I came from.
I know now that nobody's "normal" is better than anyone else's or that because I grew up in the "land of the free and the home of the brave..." that I know the best way to do things, but I do know that I am pretty stinkin' thankful to be an American. No matter what problems we are having in that country, it is a pretty amazing place, and there's nothing like living in Crazy Korea for 1 1/2 years to make you miss where you came from! It may not be the 4th of July, but I hope this makes you feel a little patriotic today... no matter where you are from!
Recently Katy and I have spent some time discussing and subsequently laughing about the daily stories/frustrations that teaching young kids can bring.
Last week we came home after a LONG day of teaching and as I vented my frustrations of the day we couldn't help but laugh about the sheer absurdity of the scenes we find ourselves in.
Here is one such example:
For the past two weeks a small group of students and I had been working on putting together a five minute version of Peter Pan. I can imagine there would be challenging moments if trying to accomplish this task with English speaking elementary students, but when you add to it that most of our students speak minimal amounts of English (and probably don't understand a lot of the words they are saying) it can make for some hair-pulling, teeth clenching, silent screaming, yet funny when removed from the scene, teaching moments.
We were working on acting out the first scene where the brothers, Michael and John are pretending to sword fight in their bedroom. This practice just happened to be held in our "Grocery Store" classroom, where we have teaching aids such as plastic fruits, which kids can't seem to keep their hands off of.
I like to think of my teaching style as pretty laid-back and especially when teaching 5th graders you've just got to "embrace the chaos" most of the time. So when Michael and john started using plastic baguettes and bananas as their prop swords, I thought okay, this is fine, but I told them "let's not use the baguettes because they break too easily."
I turned my back for ten seconds to speak to Wendy and when I turned around again Michael and John were sword fighting with the baguettes again.
Well, I finally had to lay down the law and say in my most authoritative teacher voice:
"WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT SWORD FIGHTING WITH THE BAGUETTES?"
Let's just say this was only one of the many ways that my patience was tested in this practice.
It wasn't until later that night as I was recounting this tale of Peter Pan, bananas and baguettes to my lovely wife that I realized how loony and comical my teaching frustrations can be.
Ok, I know I said no more baguette fighting, but even a grown man knows that you can't just shake off a stab wound from a dangerously sharp plastic baguette.
As a final note this little guys name was Gary (aka. Roley Poley) and he is by far one of the cutest yet clueless kids we've taught here in Korea. Katy made him "Ham" in her groups version of Toy Story last week but we both agreed that he would have been better as a "squeaking alien"... "Ohhewww, the claaaawwwww..." Man, Korean kids are funny.
Last time Danny and I went on a trip with a Korean Hiking club, it was literally the craziest day of our lives… and I’m not kidding. One might think that we learned our lesson and would never repeat that experience again, but when a Korean man we know from our gym, Yune Han, asked us to hike Seorak Mountain with his club we decided to give it one more try… let’s just say that we weren’t disappointed.
** Warning: This post is not inappropriate, however it does contain the male phallic symbol in the form of pottery and stone so just be warned family or friends before you go showing children or grandparents ; )
This trip was in one word: INSANE! We had learned some things from our last experience so we knew how to prevent things from getting out of control such as just saying “NO!” to drinking Soju at 9 in the morning and definitely NOT letting anyone pour beer all over you. However, one thing you should know is if you ever spend a day with a Korean hiking club, crazy stuff is going to happen whether you like it or not!
We started the day at 5:40 in the morning… yikes. I know you are thinking that should have been the tip-off that we shouldn’t have gone, but Seoraksan is supposed to be the most beautiful mountain to climb in Korea, so we thought we could suffer through the early morning. Off we were on our 4 hour ride to the mountain! Suddenly in the middle of the trip, the bus stopped for what we assumed was a mandatory bathroom break… WRONG! Danny and I, instead, found ourselves walking up to a sculpture park which we also assumed would just contain normal Korean sculptures… also WRONG! This particular sculpture park happened to only feature the male phallic symbol and lots of it… thus started the madness.
Before we knew what we were walking into.
We found ourselves in the midst of a bunch of 40 year old Koreans who were laughing, talking, and playing with penis paraphernalia. This particular sculpture park had penis cups, spoons, key chains, hat racks, and basically anything else you could think of. It took us a while to get over the shock of where we actually were, and from shock we went right into laughing hysterically. So far the trip wasn’t disappointing us and if a penis sculpture park was part of the itinerary, then who knows what would be next! ; )
The time back on the road was basically uneventful except for the fact that the Soju (Korean sake) was already flowing at 9:52 am, but we stuck to our first answer of “no thank you” and we made it to the mountain with no problems.
Our host: Yune Han and his wife.
Seoraksan is a beautiful hike that goes by a river, but who cares about hiking anyways? Korean hiking clubs should really be called anything but that because the hike was really the smallest part of the day… maybe call it “Korean Drinking Club” or “Crazy Middle Age People Club”, that would fit better. On the hike one of the funniest parts was that our Korean guide, Yune Han, kept stealing my camera and forcing Danny and I, and every other couple on the hike, to take “couple” pictures at every picturesque spot, which was about every 5 min as well. Another part that kept us laughing was that Yune Han somehow got it in his mind that if we were over 50 ft. away from him, we were in danger so he would call “Danny?”… “Candy?” (Katy must have been too difficult to say) and make us come stand near him.
After our camera was stolen... again.
After a couple more hours the hike was finished and, again, rather uneventful. We started to worry as we saw cases of beer taken off the bus and plates of compressed chicken that the low-key hike that we were hoping for was coming to an end but it wasn’t too bad. We drank some beer for good measure but said no to the compressed meat, and after some toasts and making fun of the waygookin’s (foreigners) we were on the road again. Again, we were pleasantly surprised that the Korean drinking party didn’t last a few (or five) hours as it can tend to.
Mmmmm... compressed chicken and soju.
As Danny and I sat back on the bus and were on our way home, we thought, “Maybe this isn’t going to be as crazy as we thought,” and from that moment on we were jinxed. Here were the next 6 hours of our lives…
Help me!
4:00 ~ No rae bang. These people really loved their “trot music” and let’s just say it could possibly be the worst music in the world. (Here is an example... just imagine listening to music like this for 6 hours straight!)
4:01 ~ I sneak my ear plugs into my ears so I don’t go deaf.
5:00 ~ We realized that we weren’t on our way home but in fact going the complete opposite way for a seafood dinner.
Still trying to enjoy the loooonnggg day ; )
6:00 ~ We arrive at dinner where we are basically forced to eat food until we want to die… and then we had to eat some more.
7:00 ~ Back on the bus…Lord please help me the “dance party” has begun!!!! : ( This is the time when we found out that ONE song can last over 45 minutes… oh no.
The loudest “Throat Music” + drunk Koreans + us being forced to dance in the aisles = a very sad and tired Danny and “Candy”… oh and by the way this is when we were told we would arrive back home : /
They wouldn't take no for an answer!
8:00 ~ Still not home, the music is still bursting eardrums everywhere and people are even more drunk. Poor Danny is starting to lose it.
9:00 ~ The crowd has subsided and all that are left are three VERY drunk individuals dancing with toilet paper wrapped around their heads. Danny is really loosing it now and has that look in his eyes like he’s gonna kill the next person who tries to make us dance.
How I was really feeling!
10:00 ~ People have finally tired themselves out so they have to sit down, however the horrible “Throat Music” is replaced by even worse, even louder synthesizer music. Danny has lost it and is on the verge of a mass murder of drunk Korean hikers.
10:30 ~ We FINALLY arrive back in Andong and say goodbye and good riddance to the hiking club.
There you have it. Our 2nd Korean hiking club experience. It may not have been the party train like last time but it was MADNESS just in a different form of transportation. We spent 17 hours with a group of middle aged Koreans and lived to tell the tale. We laughed, we almost cried, we almost puked, and more but let’s just say that we will never do that again.
In the end, if you are looking for an unforgettable and wild experience, join a Korean hiking club, but consider yourself warned, my friend, that you will never be the same ; )
Well, hello there friends and family. It's me Danny. Most of the time you get Katy's commmentary on these blogs but Katy really wanted me to give my insights into these pictoral scenes.
It's kind of becoming a running joke that I am becoming the "apple guy" in Andong (and I don't even eat apples) and I would tell you otherwise, but I'm truly afraid that it is actually becoming true.
The following ridiculous situation is proof.
One day a few months ago during the yearly Andong Mask Festival, we were walking around when we saw about a dozen men walking through the grounds dressed to impress and looking like they were on a mission, so of course we followed suit.
They stopped in front of a large apple stand and were being handed white gloves and scissors, obviously for some important
apple ribbon cutting ceremony type thing...?
Katy was joking with me that I should tell them about how I am a local apple model and grab some gloves to join in on the ceremony. After all I am kind of a big deal around here now.
But, I laughed it off telling my wife that she is crazy (and she is).
But just then an older man wearing traditional Korean clothing started to gesture for someone to to come over.
After some confusion (as is usual for me here) I discovered that he was gesturing for me to come over and would not take no for an answer.
So I came over and was handed my gloves and scissors and told to cut the ribbon with the rest of the important men in attendance. Asking why? or what it was for? would have been a silly and unimportant question, so I cut away and smiled for the many cameramen photographing this momentus occassion.
There we all are. Each of us men an apple official in our own respect.
After I cut the ribbon, I shook some hands told everyone thank you for coming and tried to get the heck out of there, before I was forced to eat them all with my new brotherhood of fellow "applelites."
Next came Katy, who was not about to be forgotten in the days honorable roles.
Here is "The Man" choosing her to be a rice cake cutting official.
If I had to do it so did she and let me tell you she performed her role with talent and pride.
It was a cake made of rice (as most things are here). And to say it was a large rice cake would not do it justice...No this thing was huge. Those are whole large apples pressed into it. Look at her. It's like she was born for this moment. Most of those guys aren't actually even doing anything. As you can see their hands aren't really on the knife, but Katy, Katy's holding it full on, like the pro that she is.Yet another adventure in our apple filled lives in south Korea.
