Crazy Korea...Volume I

We're not sure if they wanted to spell Superman, Sulfurman or if they truly did mean to spell Sulperman. This is what we refer to as Konglish (Korean English) and it can be quit funny sometimes. Here's a few more funny, interesting and/or out of the ordinary things that we have seen so far in Korea. you should know that this list is merely a glimpse and not a complete list of oddities we have come across in this strange land we call home right now.

I am Sulperman!!!

This is a restaurant in the new downtown area of Andong. This part of town is called Oakdong. It is where all the young professionals hang out at night. There is also a place in this area called "Indies." It's a Korean version of a western style bar, complete with a larger than life American Indian statue in front, palm trees and pirates. I don't know how else to describe the place. You'll just have to come and see it...Seriously!!!

Ok, I don't know why this sign made me laugh so hard. Maybe it speaks for itself. I think it is a restaurant advertisement, but there are no words on it and there is no restaurant below the sign. I think it may just be someone's grandmother. This depiction of the South Korean military isn't what I would call intimidating.

I don't think we need to say much about this one either, besides WOW!...WOW!

In Andong there are a few U.S. based restaurants, like Pizza Hut, Dominos, Baskin Robins and Dunkin' Donuts, but there are some different types of cuisine at these comfort food establishments. This is an example of one of those differences. We went into Dunkin' Donuts one day a few weeks ago and amongst the chocolate covered and sprinkle donuts were donuts like this garlic glazed. I'm not sure how that would go with coffee and I don't think I want to. The "jelly filled" donuts are the ones you have to look out for though because you never know when you bite into one if you'll be getting strawberry or some sort of strange meat medley. I kind of like the surprise from time to time though...It keeps you on your toes.

Another one bites the dust...

This week, Danny and I had to say goodbye to another beloved Korean family member: Chubs. Chubs was a wonderful fish full of life and food, but sadly he passed away earlier this week. Unfortunately we don't know the cause of his death, again, but we are going to try to deal with our stages of greif apropriately before we go pointing fingers. We feel that we really didn't get to experience as much as we wanted to with Chubs, and now that he is no longer with us there is only one thing to do...wallow. Danny is taking the loss of two fish in one month pretty hard, so sympathy cards and flowers are appropriate. I only hope that he can look back on his time with our two Korean friends with joy and fond memories. We are thinking about getting another pet to help us move on with the life we still have to live, but for right now the wound is still too fresh. I know I will always remember how Chubs loved to eat and therefore he had sort of a waddle to his swim (if fish could waddle). Chubs was so heart warming and even in the breif time I knew him, he made a difference in my life.

Your memory lives on. Rest in Peace Chubs.

Danny's Birthday: the big two seven!

This past Sunday (Easter) we got to celebrate the birthday of the my favorite person! We started the day by going to church way earlier than usual...10:30. It was hard to get up, but we did it and experienced our first Easter Sunday in Andong. It seemed like any normal Easter, even though we couldn't understand what was being said in the sermon, but then after the service we walked out to the entire church gathering in front of the church. We thought that they must have heard that it was Danny's birthday, because everyone had colored balloons and we assumed that they would break into a Korean version of "Happy Birthday" at any moment. However, we then discovered that the group had in fact come together to celebrate Easter some more, but you can see where we might have gotten confused ; )

Apparently our church enjoys parading around town on Easter. The entire church followed a group of Korean drummers through the streets of Andong, and needless to say we didn't make many friends with the people trying to drive their cars that day. We walked with the parade to the center of downtown and were handed lots of eggs along the way. There are no Easter egg hunts here in Korea, people just hand out tons of hard boiled eggs and eat them in the streets so there are egg shells all over the ground.

Danny's birthday definitely started with yet another funny Korean cultural experience and so after we left the parade we went to continue the birthday festivities. We went to a movie, ate some delicious homemade fish tacos, and kept things pretty chill. The next day we went out to sushi with the people from our Bible study and ate fish head, jellyfish tentacles, and a few other slimy things that we still can't identify.

Still, the most exciting part of his birthday came on Wednesday thanks again to our amazingly generous Bible study. As our friends came over to discuss the book "Crazy Love", Danny answered the door and was surprised by a brand new bike! We had been looking for some cruiser bikes to ride around town and our friends Paul and Andrew found this awesome black cruiser for Danny... seriously, these are awesome people and we absolutely are so excited to have a new way to travel in style!

As many of you know, cruiser bikes are the "cool" way to ride around town in the States, but when Danny brought his bike to school the first day, his students proceeded to tell him he has an "old man" bike. Obviously, we both disagree with the Korean teenagers, but the most halarious thing that could have happened the first day we take our first big bike ride was this: as Danny walks out of our apartment building, a cute Korean old man rides by on the EXACT SAME BIKE! AMAZING!! I had to take a picture, but that old man was fast so I only got one of Danny riding behind him. Ha ha.

Just an interesting birthday fact about Korea: Korean age is different than "western" age. When a Korean is born, they are already considered one, then when a new year comes, they are immediately considered two years old. So if you were born on December 31st, you are one the day you are born, and then the next day, New Years Day, you are already 2! Kinda strange, because Danny and I have a different Korean age then an American age. Well anyways, we are so grateful to be surrounded by such great people. It definitely makes spending holidays and birthdays away from home easier and we are excited to see what the next holiday we experience in Korea brings. Happy Birthday Danny, I love ya buddy!

: ( Sad Face...

Sorry, just a quick post today. I decided that today I would ask for your help: I have been sick for a while (last week I lost my voice for 4 days) and now Danny is sick as well. It is discouraging that this cold won't go away, and it's even harder to teach and try to be energetic so I wanted to ask for you all to send up some prayers that we would get better soon. I thought I would attach this picture with my request because not only am I sad that we are both sick, but I am sad because there is a restaurant called "Mexicana" in Andong that has absolutely nothing to do with Mexican food. It is a fried chicken place and a beacon of lies because it reminds me that I probably won't have chili rellenos for over a year. Mexicana...why do you torment me so?

Kitty...R.I.P.

Kitty-Kat-The Fish

3/9/10-4/1/10

This brief post is in memory of our beloved pet gold fish: Kitty. He was a good fish. He swam like no other and the joy he brought us was unsurpassed.

On Wednesday Katy noticed that he was belly up at the top of the bowl. We quickly changed the water in the tank (ice bucket) in hopes of creating a more oxygenated environment for our friend. This seemed to work and Kitty was back to, what seemed like normal by the end of the night...

...BUT, when I got home from school on Thursday and went to feed our little orange friends I was sad to find that Kitty had in fact bit the dust.

I regret to inform you that Kitty-Kat The Fish joined His fellow comrades in that big toilet bowl in the sky.

We are still not sure of the cause, but I do have some theories. 2 to be exact.

1. The environment we created for Kitty and Chubs was too low in oxygen, thus causing Kitty to die of a lack of oxygen...

OR

2. Kitty passed away due to starvation. Now, I'm not one to point fingers and so I won't name any names, but another, possibly "chubby" gold fish may have been the cause of Kitty's demise. Kitty just never seemed to be able to reach the top of the bowl in time to have His pick of the daily cuisine. Other larger more "bullyish" fish would constantly beat him to the top and gorge Himself...I mean itself on more than It needed.

The investigation into this heinous event is ongoing and i promise to not stop until I get to the bottom of the mystery.

5K in Korea

This weekend we felt really in shape when we participated in the 5K run in Andong. We had to get up early on our weekend, so really, that was harder to do than then 5K. It was my first race so I was excited to see what it was like and weren't disappointed! We arrived at the university stadium to see serious Korean runners all around us preparing for the run. There was also a 10K and a full marathon going on that day, but I didn't want to show everyone up so I just did the 5K (yeah right).

In the middle of the stadium, I was amazed by the hundreds of people doing organized stretching as a man yelled different commands from a microphone. I don't know if we could ever get a group of 10 people this uniform in America, let alone hundreds. A lot of people were pretty excited that foreigners had taken the time to come run the race, but it was another moment where I became extremely aware of being the minority among the masses.

We ran with a group of EPIK teachers, like our friends Garry and Monica who came from Pohang (a city about 2 hours away). We felt awesome as the race started and we ran out of the stadium to "Eye of the Tiger" being blasted on a speaker...it almost felt like home! Danny and I were lucky enough to get numbers for the race thanks to some of his fellow Korean teachers helping us to get organized. One of them saw Danny pass him in the race so somehow by Monday the rumor had spread that Danny had won the race! He quickly had to tell his school that he didn't in fact win the race, but we still felt like champions!

After the race, we received medals and water and these little cake things that looked like faces with a cream filling and then in proper Korean fashion, the craziness began. It feels normal to see mascots walking around, and usually you expect some sort of big headed animal, but Koreans like to be a bit different so they had vegetables and fruit walking about. I luckily got a picture with these melon heads and it made me feel great because it reminded me of my nephew, Dante...I love ya little guy!

Danny became good friends with the mascots as well and found that he couldn't stay away from the gigantic mushroom walking around.

There were booths handing out all kinds of free stuff outside the stadium, but my favorite part was the 4 or 5 large barbeque pits grilling a large quantity of beef and pork. It was some of the best meat I have had, but I was amazed that people said, "Let's get up early on a Sunday, go run a marathon and then gorge ourselves on meat!"

Danny had found a few of his students in line waiting to eat their weight in pork, and whether or not he had won the race, they were very impressed that he came out to run among the people. Come to visit just so you can have the feeling of being famous like we get most days. All in all it was a great day, and we hope to do it again.

P.S. On a side note: our fish Kitty had a close call last night. Our friend Sara found him floating on his belly but fortunately we were able to get him in some new water before it was too late. He seems to be doing good but your "Get Well Soon" cards would be very much appreciated! ; )

A Korean Obsession: No Rae Bong

We took our first train ride to Yeongju where we went to hang out with our friends David and Sarah and have our first run in with No Rae Bong.
I had heard about No Rae Bong on a travel show before I came to Korea, but I had no idea what it really was all about till we came here. No Rae Bong is Korean Karaoke... but if you imagine what American Karaoke is like and picture it in Korea, you have only skimmed the surface of No Rae Bong. NRB is a countrywide obsession and Danny and I live actually live above one. We can hear an old man singing his heart out 6 out of 7 nights as we fall asleep and let's just say he's no Billy Joel. That doesn't stop Koreans from singing though, they sing if they sound like Celine Dion or if they are tone deaf. Danny and I were lucky enough to have our first experience with NRB when we crashed the birthday party of a random Korean girl named Subin, and these are some of the pictures.
NRB is different than American Karaoke in a few ways. Most NRB places let you rent out your own room to sing your heart out, you really don't sing in front of a large group at all. They have a TV and a mic and you can sing with other people or rent it out on your own when you need a little music fix. I have heard of many Koreans going to NRB by themselves after they have had a hard day at work, or my fellow teachers like to go after a few bottles of Soju. I have asked the question, "Why do Koreans like to sing karaoke so much?" and this is the answer that I feel makes the most sense: they work long hours and live in a culture that is very "proper" and has a lot of hierarchy and history to it so KRB is one way they can let loose. They can melt all their cares away by singing "Oh!" or a Girl's Generation song. Just imagine all the serious businessmen getting into a N Sync song at home and you can sort of get the picture ; )