What's "normal" anymore?

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!

USA... HERE WE COME!!!!!!

Baguettes and Bananas... Crazy Tales of Teaching Koreans

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.

An in depth look into Korean bathrooms...

Growing up in America has made me accustomed to certain things.  There was always soap in public bathrooms, people showered in shower stalls, and you only squatted when you were camping.  Being in Korean has made me realize that none of those things are the norm here.

Bathrooms or "hwa-jang-shil"s are one of the cultural differences that I thought I would never get used to, however nowadays I find myself used to how those things are done here.  Squatting toilets were one of the things that avoided for as long as possible because I thought it was weird and difficult to master.  In some ways, though, I might have to agree that I almost prefer them because you don't really have to touch anything so it's more sanitary. (If I was awarding points for bathroom smarts, it would be Korea 1: America 0)  I'm still not quite sure they always put a mirror in front of the toilet... I guess it's a good place to check your makeup? ; ) One thing that I don't abide by still is how they usually want you to put your used toilet paper in a trashcan next to the toilet instead of flushing it.  I have heard they don't flush paper because there are a lot of old pipes that can get clogged easily, yet I and many foreigners I talk to prefer to flush. (Korea 1: America 1)

Another difference I have come to accept is that it is only a pleasant surprise if I find soap AND toilet paper in a public bathroom.  You might, and I say might, find one or the other but finding both is a special moment. Danny and I often enthusiastically take note of bathrooms that have both and make a mental note of them for the future. Another point goes to the States...Korea 1: America 2

Danny and I have realized that Korea is the land of polar opposites.  On one hand bathrooms leave room for improvement, on the other hand, I have never seen toilets with such interesting technology as in Korea.  

Who knew that you could get a toilet that has a seat warmer, a self cleaner, bidet, a fake flushing sound in case you have a problem with bathroom shyness.  All of these things help with definite "rump relaxation" as Danny would say but sometimes when you don't know exactly what they will do, it can be a little nerve racking to go pushing unrecognizable buttons : )  Even still, I've gotta give one to Korea... Korea 2: America 2.

The last big thing that is different about Korea is the bathroom/bathing situation.  As we have mentioned before, Korea goes for the open shower choice as opposed to using bath tubs or shower stalls.  I have read many reviews of hotels when we travel and noticed that Westerners often complain about "open" showers in Korea, but you are often hard pressed to find otherwise unless you go to a really nice hotel.  Now its second nature to put on slippers before I go into any bathroom so as to protect my feet from getting wet.

No longer am I surprised if the floor of any bathroom is wet or the whole bathroom is damp as a matter of fact.  Because the whole bathroom is made to be constantly soaked, clean up is quick and easy just by rinsing everything off.  That would make the bathroom score Korea 3: America 2.  However because everything is constantly wet, that also means that mold is easily found in most bathrooms which isn't exactly my favorite thing... Korea 3: America 3.

I guess for now we'll have to call it a tie in the Korean/American bathroom race.  There are good and bad to the "hwa-jang-sil"s they've got going on, maybe you will just have to make a list of pro's and con's yourself and let me know what you've come up with.  On that note I leave you with a ridiculous song that is related, in some ways, to our topic today.  Who knew you could learn so much about poop, or "dung" as Koreans call it, from a kids song.  Let's just say it's another proof that Korea is crazy ; ) (Be warned... this movie is not only informative, but a little gross so watch at your own risk)

Yikes...right?!And that ladies and gentleman, is all I have to say on the subject of Korean bathrooms.

WE'RE COMING HOME!!!!!!!!!!

 It is officially less then ONE MONTH till Danny and I come home (just for a visit) to Colorado!  We get to come home for 2 1/2 weeks starting on August 26th, and it's an understatement to say we can't wait! We will have been out of the best country in the world for over 18 months, so we are due for a Colorado fix.  I hope we will get to see many of you at that time, eat lots of great food together, and breathe in a little freedom!  The countdown has begun... The Land of the Free, here we come!

We were excited to see a little Colorado when we were in Japan.

Gross but True... A story of Katy and her gall stones.

Now this isn't my normal kind of post, but I just thought it was so interesting that I had to share it...

So some of you know that I, Katy, have been suffering gall stone attacks for the past couple years.  Occasionally I get a severe pains in the gall bladder region due to these stones so I finally decided to do something about it.  I wanted to try to get rid of my stones naturally (even though most people suggest surgery) and I have been reading about different ways online so this week I decided to DO IT!  I had no idea if it would work at all and honestly I more lingered on the side of it not working, but I thought, "What the heck!" and so the past week I have been doing a "Natural Gall Bladder Cleanse".

I won't go into specifics (but if you suffer with gall stones, give me a shout and I will tell you more) (and also I hope this doesn't gross anyone out ; ) but I will basically lay out what this cleanse looks like.  For the past week I have been eating noting but 6 apples a day and a small salad at night.  This is supposed to "loosen" the stones and get then ready to pass.  Then on the last day I only ate two apples in the morning, then drank 2 cups of salt water (yuck... oh my goodness... yuck) and then proceeded to drink about 2 cups of fresh lemon juice and olive oil mixed (another big YUCK).  Now you might be saying, "This sounds like a disgusting thing that someone would dare someone to drink!" but I found many websites with various versions of this recipe.  THEN after all of those "lovely" beverages, I was supposed to go to bed laying on my right side.

Not feeling that anything was happening, I began to wonder last night if I put myself through drinking some not  great-tasting drinks, and missing eating pizza with Danny, and skipping an Easter BBQ for NOTHING!  Never fear though, ladies and gents, because this is a tale of success and not defeat!

I finally woke up this morning and had to use the bathroom.  Now, skipping many details, I basically found that not only had this cleanse WORKED but it worked marvelously!

I am simply AMAZED at how many gall stones I had in my gall bladder!  In the picture there are a lot, but there were probably 50 more small stones that I didn't even save.  Now I know there are many people who laugh at the "natural" way but I just have to say that a week of changing my diet for an empty gall bladder is worth it to me instead of surgery.  That's right, I think the score now is Katy: 1, Gall Bladder: 0. Sucker!

Well now I feel like a new person and ready to face the world gall stone-free!  That is my tale of me and my gall stones and, again, I'm sorry if it grossed you out ; )

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Some Big News!

I guess I should get straight to the point: Danny and I have some big news... on Christmas Eve we accepted another year-long position teaching English here in Korea! (Haha, I bet a lot of you thought I was pregnant, didn't you? Sorry!) Yeah, I know... what are we thinking? Well let me explain our thoughts and hopefully it will help put you, and Danny and I, more at ease because we are still not sure what we got ourselves into.

Christmas Eve we accepted jobs teaching at Andong National University. We will no longer be at our boys high schools but instead teaching different students at a place called the English Village. Basically it is an intensive English program that students will come to for 4 days and learn English in a kind of "camp setting". We aren't really sure of all the details but we know that we will teach different students every week (also like camp), and my favorite part, we will only have 4 day work weeks! Oh yeah! (I find it ironic that we left jobs at a camp to come to Korea and get into another camp setting... God has a sense of humor I think ; )

Again, Danny and I have mixed feeling about this next year. We are excited about the possibility of being able to travel more, save more money, and spend more time in this carefree lifestyle, but of course we miss our friends and family. Especially during the holidays it is hard to be away, so I know that it will be even harder to be away for another year, but we feel like this is the right thing to do, so here we are! I hope this next year we will have more visitors (wink, wink) to help us not feel so far away from home. ; ) Just a thought. Anyways, I'll share more info about this crazy decision in the future, but for now we are excited to see where God takes us in this next adventure.

I thought I would just add some random pictures onto this post to give you a little glimpse of things that we will be seeing for ANOTHER year. Good times in Krazy Korea!

Here's a traditional looking mask that we see often being in the city that holds the annual Mask Dance Festival

The cutest harmony's (grandmothers) ever playing the Korean game Yunnori.

Koreans love to get decked out to go hiking... fashion is important even on a mountain!

The cutest Korean harl-a-boji (grandpas) playing Chang-gi (Korean chess) by a park. You can tell I have a thing for the old people here... I just think they are so cute!

Lotus lanterns at a temple.

A lady making tdeok (Korean rice cake). She's got to have some awesome arms muscles to do that!

A Korean symbol shaped like a bird that is everywhere that is supposed to protect the village or house.

Koreans are the masters of side dishes!

Barefoot is not just a comfortable thing here, it is a requirement in many places.

We'll definitely be seeing a lot more of this: a view of the river from a bridge in Andong.

Again, for a shameless plug, you too could see all of these wonderful sites and more when you come to visit us! Oh yeah! To conclude all of this, I think the lesson I am learning in life right now is that things never really turn out the way you think they are going to. Who knew that Danny and I would live in Korea for 1 year, let alone 2! I guess you and we will just have wait to see what other adventures are in store for us here in Andong! Until then, have a very Happy New Year and don't forget us!