Happy Pepero Day!

Good Morning everyone, and happy pepero day.

(First of all - I know that today is Rememberance day and that is a much more important and valuable holiday and this post is in no way trying to lessen the importance of rememberance)

Today in Korea it is a day the school children have been waiting for, Pepero Day! First of all a little background:

• Pepero are long and skinny cookies dipped in Chocolate which are a popular snack here. They come in many different varieties and can be bought for about 50 cents a box.
• The story goes that a group of middle school girls in Busan, South Korea first came up with the idea of giving pepero to their friends every November 11th. Since November 11th is 11/11, it looks like a bunch of pepero all lined up.
• The more likely and probable story that most people really believe is that some very smart marketing directors at Lotte Confectionary came up with the "holiday" to sell more Pepero!
• Last year around pepero day, Lotte reported its highest sales of any single product ever! I would say smart marketing scheme guys!

You would be shocked at how much pepero stuff is everywhere right now. In the grocery store yesterday they had shelves and shelves of pepero, pepero gift sets, really long pepero, bread dipped in chocolate to look like pepero, key chains, necklaces, cellphone bobbles (very popular here) And to top it all of they had this theme song playing on repeat over and over again!

I have already experienced a random Pepero-ing. I was waiting with Jon at the bus stop on Wednesday and these three girls walk by with their arms full of pepero, they stop, look at me, and start handing me pepero out of their bags. Now keep in mind that I had never seen these girls before nor will I likely ever see them again! Ah the joys of being a foreigner! Alas, poor Jon sitting next to me didn't get the same treatment...

So that brings us to today, actual Pepero day. We have been good teachers and stocked up on enough pepero for all of our students. (Really cool ones too!) And we are awaiting the arrival of much pepero for us. One of the other foreign teachers at the school said that last year it took him quite a while to get through all the pepero kids gave to him! I say bring it on!

New Pictures!

Here's a new picture of the staff from MunHwa. It was taken near Puan (on the west coast in the middle of Korea) at this movie set that was a reconstruction of some ancient time. It was pretty neat. Anyway, starting from the front left, it goes Emily, Arwen (Tyrone & Gabriella's daughter), and 5 math teachers (names forgotten/unknown). In the back on the left is Mr. Lee, Jon, Tyrone & Capulet (I'm sure that's not spelled correctly), Eun Gyung, Gabriella, Jung Hae, Gumi, Mr. Moon, Michael, Mr. Kang (my boss), 3 more math teachers and then the 2 secretaries at the English school. (Just so you know, Mr. Kang owns a math and an English school and this was a little getaway for both sets of staff.)

This is Emily and I with the Yellow Sea behind us. (No, we did not pee in it. That is the name of the body of water.)

This is a Korean BBQ. Mr. Lee (the fellow on the left with the sunglasses) is cooking using a portable gas burner and a frying pan. He is frying meat and the lady with the pink hat is handing out rice from the styrofoam container. Gumi (the lady in the black with her back to the camera) is sitting by the lettuce that you wrap the meat and rice in. There is also red pepper paste, green chili peppers and kimchi, all of which make up your essential Korean BBQ. It's quite fun and rather tasty.

This is Emily & Arwen. Arwen has absolutely fallen in love with Emily while she continually screams and runs away when she sees me (Jon). It's just not fair. (All of the preceding pictures were taken on the MunHwa staff picnic day.)

This is me with some Korean fellows that we went out for tea with. They speak English, they're male, they're my own age and they're Christians! So far, that's been a bit of a rarity. It was a direct answer to prayer (and a most welcome one!) that we met these two fellows. The fellow on the left (sorry for the perspective!) is Ryan and his sister's name is Leah. We met her but she left a couple of weeks ago to study for some English tests in Australia. She came for tea with us but she left before this picture was taken.

This is an example of a quasi-typical Korean meal. This is called galbi, which is the meat in the middle. It's amazingly delicious. (I think it was pork ribs, essentially.) Traditional Korean meals come with (literally) about 15 side dishes, which is all the other plates. Some examples are cold raw crabs cut in half (still in the shell with legs, etc.) in a sauce, blood soup (we both tried it - it's not bad), bean sprouts, dandilion sprouts, seaweed, rice, coleslaw, more bean sprouts, pickled radish, kimchi (of course!), eggplant and other such things. The side dishes are various and rarely are they ever all consumed. It's rather fun to eat Korean style - every dish and plate is fair game, except for your rice bowl (when you have it).

Finally, this is Emily and I in Sajik Park, a park quite near to our apartment. It's one of the largest in our city and it's quite beautiful. We went there for a picnic last week (when this picture was taken). If we look a little awkward, it's because we were. Foreigners here are still a bit of a novelty, and beautiful foreigners (like Emily) are especially an attraction for Koreans. In this case, we were using the timer on our camera. However, we were beginning to draw a small crowd of people watching us. Okay, they were watching Emily, but I was there too.

Emily will regularly get people telling her how beautiful she is. One older fellow (about 65 years or so) said she was a second Cleopatra. Another fellow called out "Good looker! Good looker!" as we walked by. She will often get people striking up conversations and giving her free things when she goes shopping.

Me... Well, people would often rather stand on the bus than sit next to me. But that's the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.

Anyway, stay tuned! We're going on two more hikes this weekend so we should get all sorts of pictures after that. We love you all and miss you. Please keep the e-mails coming (it's wonderful to hear even the "boring" stuff!) and we'll update soon.