A great start to my first weekend

Here is a great example of how wonderfully strange Korea can be! Thursday night after work I went to a Cat Cafe with some co-workers, yep that's right a cafe with cats. You walk in, take your shoes off, order a drink (no booze, really kids, do you want drunks playing with the cats!) and go play with cats! They had about 15 different cats just running around, mostly kittens and lots of toys to play with them with. Attached is a picture of me at the cat cafe - hehe.

Afterward we went out for a few pitchers of Cass (Korean beer) and some celebration shots with Edward, who also first started and Danielle and Greg (a couple from the Midwest who recently graduated college). Korea After that we had some Korean BBQ with pork and soju. One type of pork they have looks like a super thick piece of bacon, its just not cured. Once the pieces are cooked, they still are half fat and half meat. I tried two pieces (one by itself and one in a leaf) and tore off the huge pieces of fat that overtook the meat, and yep, still don't like pork! While Korean food is great, it does include a lot of meat and I am looking forward to trying more of their veggies dishes. :) The soju taste like watered down vodka, so it is very easy to drink too much. Anyway in true Korean fashion, soon enough it was 2 AM and we made our way home. doesn't have a wide beer selection and of the native beer they have, Cass is one of the most popular and its not great but surely will due for a ice cold brew.

Korea is notorious for drinking, mostly among adult men. It is very common to see puke on the sidewalk and men stumbling around. My fellow teachers were telling me about journals from the kids talking about their dads 'eating soju' and how they wish their dads were home more. I am sure more to come of this later as I get to know my students.

Last night, Friday, we went out for a co-workers birthday after work. His name is John and he is from Shamburg and went to U of I, small world! Dinner was great, I was happy to get a chance to socialize with more co-workers. After dinner we went out to a bar where we met up with the Ilsan campus (same hogwog but different campus) and went out to a bar called Ba Boom. Ba Boom is all for dancing and drinking, they played a mix of American and Korean Pop. I was referred to as white girl, taught two Korean girls the cupid shuffle and they showed me some synchronized dance moves to the Kpop songs. We stayed out until 5:30 am and honestly the bar was still going strong when I left. At Bar Boom I was happy to hang out with Koreans because it is mostly foreigners at my school. Hope everyone is having a fantastic weekend! Love ya!

Lake Park and Teaching

Few updates for you all! Yesterday I checked out the notorious lake park, which truly I am happy to be by. Experiencing nature is so calming, its nice to know it is a few blocks away. The entire trip around the lake is about a 5K so I am hoping to catch a job this week. Also, my friend Jill sent through a yoga course she took while she was here, so hopefully I can finally complete my goal of trying out yoga! I attached a pic of Lake Park, though I will post more on facebook when I get a chance.
This morning I had a doctor's appointment, my academic coordinator, Skye picked me up (shes from Dallas but 100% Korean...I mistook her for Korean when I met her haha) and asked if I could teach this afternoon (reminder I was suppose to start teaching next Monday). I of course said yes, mostly because I was excited to meet my co-workers. After the doctor I went to campus and she went over the reading class that is now mine. I teach 5th graders from about 5-9 Tuesdays and Thursdays. I have no more then ten in a classroom and these kids are great! They speak English very well and really just need guides on vocab and tense. I also will be teaching 1st and 2nd graders. My hours will be no more then 8 a day, they were almost kicking me out of the school today to lock it up! Though, I might spend more time preparing the lesson plans, today I just read out of the books and used a ppt that my director set up for me and wished I had more resources during class....how would you describe flannel!
After work I went out with Matt, Danielle, and Greg. Danielle and Greg both just graduated college and are dating. Danielle is a talker but will def be a good buddy for mountain hiking and other weekend adventures :) Matt is my age and is a head teacher, not my head teacher though. They are all very nice and I am excited to meet the rest of them!
One last note, I wanted to let you all know that I feel incredibly safe here and that is also the reality of my neighborhood. I am in good hands here in Ilsan.
Love you all!

Just a short update, after I told Christina about my episode with the strange Korean man, she looked at me and said now I hope you won't take offense to this, but he probably thought you were Russian and therefore a prostitute. Apparently they assume white girls are Russian before American - haha weird! Off to the doctor today!

Food Food Food

Last night I tried Korean BBQ :) Most, if not all of you know, I recently changed my diet to limit meat and dairy...I have quickly learned that unless I want to spend mucho on food, I will have to change my eating habits back slightly. First of all, Korean BBQ is delicous! You cook the meat yourselves, dip it in a Korean BBQ sauce (best part!) and then put in a large green leaf (they give you several different types to try, all are very flavor full and foreign to me) with things such as bean sprouts, radish, onion, garlic ect... Another thing about eating out in Korea is they give you MANY sides, most of which are good. Christina told me that if I don't hate the cabbage at this point, its a good sign :) One thing that I surprisingly liked was yellow radishes in vinegar, probably because of the sugar and the salt ;)
Today I went grocery shopping and it was quite an experience! There is not much American food and if there is any, it is very expensive. I spent a large amount of time in the produce section trying to figure out what the greens are, none of which looked familiar. I couldn't find any bread, any sugar-free soymilk, and many other things but they have fresh tofu! I ended up picking up veggies that I am not positive what they are, but know the general family :)
Other notes, mostly Koreans are pretty self-conscious so though most will stare, they are shy. Today walking down the street I had an experience that was an exception to this rule. A middle aged business man came next to me, put his arm around me and started talking Korean. I explained that I did not speak Korean, he tried to talk to me for a few minutes, then looked at me and said 'American?' I answered yes and smiled and went on my way.
I don't start work until next Monday, so will filling up my blog with little not as exciting tid bits this week. Love you all!

First Day in South Korea

I have arrived in South Korea! The last 36 hours have been filled with many different emotions and pure exhaustion. On Friday, the day I left for South Korea, about 4 hours before my departure, homesickness fell on me. I had completely forgotten how it felt to be homesick and how awful it is! Saying goodbye to my parents (and Louie my dear papillion) was rough, but as soon as I entered into O'hare International airport, my homesickness went away. Both of my flights were timely, which was great! For any of you who have flown an Asian airline, you know how silly and fun they are, all of the uniforms are very exaggerated however expect excellent service on your flight :). I enjoyed a traditional Korean dinner on my flight over, but did not have the same courage for a breakfast of green tea porridge...something I need to try. When landing into Seoul, the plane played Canon in D...and so my marriage to South Korea began!

I arrived at my offictel (which basically means studio) at 5 AM on Sunday morning. My officetel is located two blocks from la feista (main shopping, eating, going out area) and two blocks from Lake Park (a large lake), the wikipedia link I provided in my email talks about both. Upon arriving, I talked briefly to John, my academic coordinator, who also went to U of I (GO Illini!). After he left I went up to Christina's room (who is a friend of a friend that happens to live in my building!) and we talked for nearly 2 hours about life and Korea. We spent a large part of the day at the equivalent of Wal-Mart which was quite a trip! First of all, many Korean woman would look inside my cart, Christina told me that because I am white and American, they are very interested in what I am buying. All of the sales associates try to sell you products, though I am not sure why because they do not work for the brands but for the store. Buying shampoo took forever since this sales associate kept on talking to me in Korean and opening bottles of shampoo to smell! Lucky for me, Christina came with me and was able to translate and was so patient as I found my way around the store. The brands here are very different, for example, they have Dove and Pantene Pro V for shampoo and conditioner, but that is it! The rest are Korean brands, one of which I tried. The only western toothpaste they have is Arm & Hammer, which is very expensive, so instead I aimed for one that had a large mint leaf on it, since mint flavor is not as common of a flavor here. Other quick notes are I have learned that the water is non-drinkable, even by Koreans because they have so much bacteria in it, they put it through such a process that it is instead filled with chemicals. I was also told that because I am 'super white' that my employer and the student's parents will like me, who knew my pale skin would come in handy. Christina is officially my angel, she has walked me through so much of Korea already and has explained so much, I cannot imagine doing this without her. Off to check out la fiesta for some grub and for some more purchases!

Shown is a picture of what's outside of my window. Once I get my place up to par I will be posting more. Love you all!

Blog Created!

Herro family and friends,

Many have suggested that I start a blog to document my year in South Korea, and so, this is my attempt to do so. Nothing exciting yet, as I am still in the states packing up! I did however want to say thank you very much to everyone for being so fantastic! I do not think I could venture out if I did not have such loving and supporting family and friends, I love you all. With that, best of luck to you all this next year and we'll keep in touch.