Living In Fast Forward

Insanity has taken over my life. If my memory serves me right, last November was the slowest month of my contract. It got cold, there wasn't much going on, and we were looking forward to vacation so the month just seemed to drag on and on. This year however, November was one huge mash-up of craziness. Looking ahead to December, it doesn't appear that it is going to get an less crazy anytime soon either. So, I apologize for my lack of posts, picture updates, and keeping in contact in general.





In early November, some coworkers and I went to the Seoul Lantern Festival that was held on the 청계천 (Cheonggyecheon) Stream. The stream is about 6 km long (3.7 miles), has 22 bridges over it and runs through downtown Seoul, eventually meeting up with the Han River and then heading out to the Yellow Sea. After the Korean War, many people migrated into Seoul and built makeshift homes along the stream. The area became an eyesore, so it was covered with concrete and turned into a major highway. The area was touted as an area of successful modernization and industrialization. In 2003, the current president Lee Myung-bak (who was at the time the mayor of Seoul) initiated the project to restore the stream. The stream opened to the public in 2005 and cost over 386 billion won (about $281 million). The festival was held to coincide with the G20 and had a theme of 'Seoul, a source of beaming hope.' About 15,000 lanterns from 25 different countries were placed in a 1km stretch of the stream. The area was (as usual in Korea) very crowded when we got there. There were lines of riot police everywhere (mostly in preparation for the G20. They were everywhere during the summit) and since the weather was still really nice, it seemed like all of Korea came out to enjoy the lanterns.

I also started taking Korean classes in November. One of my co-workers found a place that gives free lessons on Saturdays and 4 of us decided to give them a try. We started out by learning the alphabet (which I thought I already knew). Turns out I knew the basics (like this character makes this sound), but just like English, there are exceptions to every rule. For example, Korean also has diphthongs, some letters make a different sound when put at the end of the syllable, and some letters are silent in certain places. We have also learned some random vocabulary (I can now say things like tree, sweet potato, bag, glasses, onion, and spider to name a few) and some phrases (I can now say 'Hello, I am American and my name is Rachel.") The classes are entertaining (even though they are at 10am on Saturday) and have definitely made me appreciate what my kids go through listening to me babble at them in English all day. Furthermore, there have been several moments where I learn something about the way things are done in Korean and realize, "Ahh, that is why my kids always make that mistake in English."

This year, Michelle and I decided to organize an "American Thanksgiving " for our staff and friends. Seeing as Thanksgiving is a time to get together with family and be thankful, and in Korea (especially this year) our staff is our family, we decided to make the best of being away from home and not having access to all the typical goods and see what we could put together. When I was home in September, I picked up some mashed potato, stuffing, and gravy mix since those are nowhere to be found here. Marie was also in America in early November, so she grabbed the stuff we needed to make green bean casserole. Finally, we hit up Costco for pumpkin pie and real cheesecake (a hard thing to come by in Korea. First off, cheese in Korea generally consists of Kraft singles. I don't know what they make their "cheesecake" with here, but is definitely not cream cheese. The cheesecake always looks good, but you take that first bite and are meet with instant disappointment). Other staff members provided cheese and crackers (real cheese, only found at Costco), bread, wine, and chicken (yep, turkeys are also MIA in Korea. Unless you live on an army base, in which case America ships them in for you). All in all, we ended up with almost everything you would expect at an American meal and great company. We all stuffed ourselves silly, partly because it was Thanksgiving and partly because many of us hadn't eaten food like this in more than 6 months. In all honesty, the worst part of the thing was probably cooking. Given that none of us have a lot of space, we had to cook things in my apartment and run them down 2 flights of stairs. We also don't have kitchen counters, so most of our mixing and preparing of the food was done on the floor.

Last Monday, I woke up in the morning to discover a message in my Facebook inbox that one of my coworkers had pulled a midnight run. This is something that I often hear about happening in Korea, but I have never actually known anyone who did one. Basically, you pack up your stuff and leave the country, breaking your contract. Our newest coworker who had arrived about 2 months ago, decided Sunday morning that she couldn't handle being here anymore and left without a word to anyone. She messaged us all after the fact to let us know what was going on, but it was a huge shock. She was one of the last people I would have expected to run and it made for a somber mood in the staff room on Monday. Part of her reason for running was because of the recent North Korea situation, which resulted in our principal being very nervous that the rest of us would follow. Unfortunately, she was supposed to be going to Thailand with us for Christmas, so that trip is now cut from 5 people to 4. We have been spending the past week calling and emailing around, trying to change all our reservations and get her plane tickets reimbursed, which has added some complications to our trip.

Speaking of North Korea, the current situation has made for some tense days, especially for the foreigners. The Koreans are still not worried in the least, in fact many of them hardly acknowledge that the North fired at Yeonpyeong. In fact, most of my co-workers (myself included) heard about the attack hours after it had happened, through American friends saying things to us on Facebook. What many people outside of Korea fail to realize, is that the Korean War never actually ended, thus the peninsula has been in a state of war since 1950. Koreans are so used to this fact, as well as North Korea's threatening behavior, that it doesn't really faze them at all. In fact, my principal was shocked to hear us say some people say that they had family members concerned back home. I believe her exact words were along the lines of, "But why? I am telling you it is safe." Of course, we have all been following the situation closely here, but feel there is nothing to worry about at this time. The US Embassy has been sending out emails and Korea hasn't made it on a travel alert or warning list (which it was on during the G20, so apparently the country is safer now than it was then). Hopefully, the situation doesn't change anymore. (Or if it does, it is for the better).

In terms of CIS, November was filled with a field trip to make a clay clock (something my children struggled with immensely. It was not easy for them to make small clay numbers that were flat enough for the clock hands to go over), a birthday party for Warren, and lots of work. As the reality hits that there are only 3 months left in this school year, I have found that I am slightly behind on my book work and thus have had to start picking up the pace. I also got a new student in my 2 day a week BC class, Yun Seo (Yoon Saw). He lived in Illinois for awhile, so his English is pretty good. He seems like a pretty cool kid, so I think he will fit in well in that class. This month brings Rina's birthday, a field trip to Nanta (a drumming show) and of course, our Christmas Party (both staff and for the children).

Hard to believe that it is less than 3 weeks until I fly to Thailand for Christmas. Also hard to believe that I have under 100 days left on my contract. After calling Korea home for over 600 days, it seems impossible that it is almost time to start shipping things home and getting ready to return stateside. I remember this point of the year last year, when Meg was getting ready to leave, and it seemed like such a distant reality for me. I never knew how fast 2 years of my life could go until I left the home I had always known and created a new one.

In the spirit of Christmas, I leave you with this picture, taken in the subway station by my apartment. While it may not be the Christmas tree I have grown up with, it does leave me with a smile every time I pass it.