I (Jon) haven't. I have recently confirmed that I am indeed allergic to seafood. Not severely, mind you, but enough to encourge my abstaining from sea dwelling creatures. Should the occasion arise where my allergies have finally stepped aside, I perhaps will one day try the Korean delicacy of octopus.
Koreans generally serve octopus three ways: boiled, raw and alive. I did try octopus once (I think it may have been raw) when I was still not sure about the allergy. Boiled - well, boiled octopus isn't really anything too special or spectacular.
Apparently the live octopus is a little dangerous. The octopus doesn't want to be eaten and so it will fight you, sometimes to the death. True story. Some people have died trying to eat live octopus because it has suctioned onto their faces and they have suffocated.
Other people, if they did not chew a tentacle well enough, would be later suprised to find that it had crawled out of their stomach and is now poking out their nose.
More mild forms of discomfort while eating live octopus may include (but are probably not limited to) suction cupped lips, teeth, tongue and cheeks. Remember - this fellow is alive and does not want to be swallowed. The legs are also smart enough to fight back without being attached to the head.
Rule of thumb when eating live octopus: chew well and chew fast.
Best of luck!
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Monday, March 20, 2006
Phone cards, Filipinos and Hand Shakes
So Emily and I have taken to going to a Korean sauna every Sunday after church. (See previous blog posts for more detailed information.) Long story short, it's a good place to relax and just feel like you're "getting away from it all" in the middle of the city.
This past Sunday we went there after church and before supper with a friend. We sat on the heated floor (so nice!) and did our Korean homework. We're both in Korean lessons right now and it's really doing us a world of good - we're learning a great deal, though it is a challenging language.
While we were doing our homework, a man came up to us and started talking to us. (As an aside, Koreans have far more phyiscal contact with their average fellow human being than Canadians do. When you shake hands, you will likely end up holding the handshake, or holding hands, for a large part of the conversation.) Though strangers approacing us is not unusual, this man was not talking like any stranger. We knew him from somewhere, and he knew us. We figured out that he was the man that sells us our phone cards ($16 for about 6 hours to Canada - good deal) and he bought us a traditional Korean drink (sweet rice water) and gave us some discount coupons for the sauna. A very nice gesture for a near stranger.
Anyway, we thanked him and went our seperate ways. Emily and I finished our homework and went up to shower and meet our friend for suppper. (The showers are the naked part, as a reminder.)
I was sitting in the hot pool, just enjoying myself and ignoring everyone else when, lo and behold, the phone card guy comes and sits beside me and starts talking to me! Now, this is pushing my comfort barrier, though I feel as though I at least owe him the common courtesy of talking to him, which I did.
Then it gets worse. Another foreigner (this time from the Philippines) came and joined our conversation. I had not yet met this fellow, so he introduced himself and we shook hands. The downside, though, is that the Korean fellow asked the Filipino fellow a question as the Filipino and I began our handshake.
And so it happened - the longest handshake in the history of mankind. As we are holding our handshake (naked), the conversation happens. I'm about to be late, I'm not comfortable and I need to finish showering. Really, what better time is there to talk?
Eventually, the handshake ended and the evening went on. The rest of the evening was thankfully clothed and handshake free.
This past Sunday we went there after church and before supper with a friend. We sat on the heated floor (so nice!) and did our Korean homework. We're both in Korean lessons right now and it's really doing us a world of good - we're learning a great deal, though it is a challenging language.
While we were doing our homework, a man came up to us and started talking to us. (As an aside, Koreans have far more phyiscal contact with their average fellow human being than Canadians do. When you shake hands, you will likely end up holding the handshake, or holding hands, for a large part of the conversation.) Though strangers approacing us is not unusual, this man was not talking like any stranger. We knew him from somewhere, and he knew us. We figured out that he was the man that sells us our phone cards ($16 for about 6 hours to Canada - good deal) and he bought us a traditional Korean drink (sweet rice water) and gave us some discount coupons for the sauna. A very nice gesture for a near stranger.
Anyway, we thanked him and went our seperate ways. Emily and I finished our homework and went up to shower and meet our friend for suppper. (The showers are the naked part, as a reminder.)
I was sitting in the hot pool, just enjoying myself and ignoring everyone else when, lo and behold, the phone card guy comes and sits beside me and starts talking to me! Now, this is pushing my comfort barrier, though I feel as though I at least owe him the common courtesy of talking to him, which I did.
Then it gets worse. Another foreigner (this time from the Philippines) came and joined our conversation. I had not yet met this fellow, so he introduced himself and we shook hands. The downside, though, is that the Korean fellow asked the Filipino fellow a question as the Filipino and I began our handshake.
And so it happened - the longest handshake in the history of mankind. As we are holding our handshake (naked), the conversation happens. I'm about to be late, I'm not comfortable and I need to finish showering. Really, what better time is there to talk?
Eventually, the handshake ended and the evening went on. The rest of the evening was thankfully clothed and handshake free.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Picture Update
It was great to see the Jackson's smiling faces. This is them in the airport as Emily picked them up. They have since come and gone (our computer was dead for a majority of that time, hence no related postings) but here's some reminiscing for all y'all that weren't here for it.
This is a picture of us at a temple on Mudeung Mountain, the most popular mountian in Gwangju. It was cold that day, but (apparently) spring comes in March in some places in the world. This is one of those places. It's like heaven, where winter is less a way of life than it is a season.
If you go to the market, you can see buckets of pigs heads. I think that's noodles on the one. You can see the nose and ear of another in the bottom right corner. Some people think it's a little gross. I, however, see the upside. If the head is outside the restaurant, it can't be served inside.
Costco has pretty much every thing here, including fresh fish. This was probably in the ocean mere hours previous to this picture.
Us mere minutes before the Gyro Drop at Lotte World, the world's largest indoor amusement park. (We're outside here - it has an outside component.)
The Gyro Drop. It's a 70 meter free fall, so it'll get your blood going. Lotte World was really fun, but someone died on one of the roller coaster about two weeks after we were there. That is one of those things that is better to know after you leave.
Shabu shabu, quite possibly one of the most delicious meals in existence. Spicy broth, vegetables, shaved beef, noodles and fried rice to finish it off. It's an amazing three course meal for 10 bucks a person.
Shabu shabu again. Seriously, try it if you get the chance. Unless it's not good shabu shabu. Bad shabu shabu should not be done.
Anyway, that's a small taste of the Jackson's visit to Korea. More will come later - we don't want to overwhelm you!
Monday, March 13, 2006
Life in Korea
When you ask someone how their life has been, people will often give short, non-detailed answers. "Fine" or "Good" seem to be about standard fare. I think that people often think that their life is less interesting than other people. (Of course, there is the exception to that, but those people are often full of themselves, and who wants to talk to them anyway?)
So, here's an update on what has become boring and everyday to us, but maybe it'll be more interesting to you.
My (Jon's) school is still going well. My classroom is on the third floor, which I normally really enjoy. It's got less children traffic, less noise, it's warmer in the winter but hotter in the summer (though fewer mosquitoes), and I all-round just enjoy it. However, I've discovered a new favorite thing: going downstairs to the first floor at about 5:50. That's after the first class (right now I'm teaching from 5:00 - 9:00 one week and until 10:00 the next) and it's when all the grade 4 & 5 students are coming and going. If I go downstairs at that time, I'm greeted with a chorus of "Hi teacher!", "Mr. Jon, hello!" "Teacher Jon, hi!" and so on. It's a lot of fun.
Emily and I have started up Korean classes again. We each go twice a week, though on different days. Emily is in the intermediate, and it's going well, though difficult. I am taking Beginner 2, and I can keep up enough, if my partner and I work together to make sure both of us are understanding. Korean is a beautiful language, though difficult to learn. Everything has to do with the suffixes. Apparently it doesn't happen accidentally.
Church is going well, also. We are making good friends and we're really starting to fit in. We love the preaching and it's a great place to spend time in God's presence with other Christians.
After church is our Bible study groups, which lasts until four (blech!), but then Emily and I have taken to going to the sauna (in Korean, 짐찔방, I think. That may not come up on your computer, depending on the fonts you've got installed.) It's really relaxing and a great way to just end the weekend and start the week.
Right now we are in the midst of trying to figure out what we're going to do for the next five or so years. Both of us want to go back to school and (money wise), Korea is the perfect place to do that. We do need to find schools that will be good enough to accomodate our particular needs (Emily's got a good thing with the IBOLT option, but I'm not so lucky).
Our computer has been broken as of late, but we should have it back from the service center by tomorrow. Apparently, it was just too full of dust, so it was overheating and shutting down. It was incredibly frustrating, let me tell you, but it's good to have it all fixed up. It is really dusty here - if you sweep your floor one day, it will likely need to be swept within hours. Nobody knows where this dust comes from, but it is everywhere.
Having Emily's parents here was really nice. It helped to open up the wonder of Korea once again. After enough frustrating and embarrassing experiences (which we have had enough of over the past 8 months), you can sometimes just give up on shopping or trying new things. Having the Jacksons, though, helped us to try some new things. We had a grand ol' time together and it made us really miss Canada.
Right now Emily and I are in a PC room - an internet cafe where you pay about $1 an hour (it's an expensive one) to use computers and play all sorts of online games. StarCraft is among the most popular, with a national league and people that earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to play this computer game professionally.
Well, that was a long and essentially uneventful blog post. Life in itself is often interesting, though, which is something we are learning.
So, here's an update on what has become boring and everyday to us, but maybe it'll be more interesting to you.
My (Jon's) school is still going well. My classroom is on the third floor, which I normally really enjoy. It's got less children traffic, less noise, it's warmer in the winter but hotter in the summer (though fewer mosquitoes), and I all-round just enjoy it. However, I've discovered a new favorite thing: going downstairs to the first floor at about 5:50. That's after the first class (right now I'm teaching from 5:00 - 9:00 one week and until 10:00 the next) and it's when all the grade 4 & 5 students are coming and going. If I go downstairs at that time, I'm greeted with a chorus of "Hi teacher!", "Mr. Jon, hello!" "Teacher Jon, hi!" and so on. It's a lot of fun.
Emily and I have started up Korean classes again. We each go twice a week, though on different days. Emily is in the intermediate, and it's going well, though difficult. I am taking Beginner 2, and I can keep up enough, if my partner and I work together to make sure both of us are understanding. Korean is a beautiful language, though difficult to learn. Everything has to do with the suffixes. Apparently it doesn't happen accidentally.
Church is going well, also. We are making good friends and we're really starting to fit in. We love the preaching and it's a great place to spend time in God's presence with other Christians.
After church is our Bible study groups, which lasts until four (blech!), but then Emily and I have taken to going to the sauna (in Korean, 짐찔방, I think. That may not come up on your computer, depending on the fonts you've got installed.) It's really relaxing and a great way to just end the weekend and start the week.
Right now we are in the midst of trying to figure out what we're going to do for the next five or so years. Both of us want to go back to school and (money wise), Korea is the perfect place to do that. We do need to find schools that will be good enough to accomodate our particular needs (Emily's got a good thing with the IBOLT option, but I'm not so lucky).
Our computer has been broken as of late, but we should have it back from the service center by tomorrow. Apparently, it was just too full of dust, so it was overheating and shutting down. It was incredibly frustrating, let me tell you, but it's good to have it all fixed up. It is really dusty here - if you sweep your floor one day, it will likely need to be swept within hours. Nobody knows where this dust comes from, but it is everywhere.
Having Emily's parents here was really nice. It helped to open up the wonder of Korea once again. After enough frustrating and embarrassing experiences (which we have had enough of over the past 8 months), you can sometimes just give up on shopping or trying new things. Having the Jacksons, though, helped us to try some new things. We had a grand ol' time together and it made us really miss Canada.
Right now Emily and I are in a PC room - an internet cafe where you pay about $1 an hour (it's an expensive one) to use computers and play all sorts of online games. StarCraft is among the most popular, with a national league and people that earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to play this computer game professionally.
Well, that was a long and essentially uneventful blog post. Life in itself is often interesting, though, which is something we are learning.
Friday, March 10, 2006
If you can't go to China, China will come to you!
Being in part of Asia makes you want to see the rest of Asia. Jon and I would love to travel to Thailand, The Phillipines, Malaysia, Japan and China. But if we never get the chance to go to China, apparently this weekend a little bit of China will be coming to us.
As one of Jon's students informed us yesterday, this weekend the yellow dust is coming. Oh no, not the yellow dust!!!! Brought in on a lovely wind all the way from the Gobi desert, Chinese sand will soon clog our lungs, give us rashes, scratch our eyes and cover our furniture in enough dust to write our names in.
This phenomenon apparently happens each March as the sand in the Gobi desert dries up and the winds blow a certain way. We haven't seen evidence of it yet but it sounds pretty cool in a "I hope I can breathe tomorrow" kind of way. :)
We have been instructed to wash our faces whenever we come in from outside and to wear masks and long sleeves. We are also supposed to avoid excessive sweating and harsh skin cleansers. I think the whole thing is kind of cool personally, how many people can say that they have been attacked by yellow dust from China?!?!?!?
When the giant clouds of yellow dust appear on the horizon I will let you know, but for now I will breathe easilly albeit perhaps for a short time!
As one of Jon's students informed us yesterday, this weekend the yellow dust is coming. Oh no, not the yellow dust!!!! Brought in on a lovely wind all the way from the Gobi desert, Chinese sand will soon clog our lungs, give us rashes, scratch our eyes and cover our furniture in enough dust to write our names in.
This phenomenon apparently happens each March as the sand in the Gobi desert dries up and the winds blow a certain way. We haven't seen evidence of it yet but it sounds pretty cool in a "I hope I can breathe tomorrow" kind of way. :)
We have been instructed to wash our faces whenever we come in from outside and to wear masks and long sleeves. We are also supposed to avoid excessive sweating and harsh skin cleansers. I think the whole thing is kind of cool personally, how many people can say that they have been attacked by yellow dust from China?!?!?!?
When the giant clouds of yellow dust appear on the horizon I will let you know, but for now I will breathe easilly albeit perhaps for a short time!
Friday, March 03, 2006
Finally, some justice
Two days ago, Emily and I went to a sauna with her parents. It's essentially a giant hang out room with different hot saunas (temperatures from -13 to +70 degrees celcius), tv & movie rooms, a computer room, cafe and a bunch of relaxing chairs and stuff. Basically, you can just go and hang out. It's really nice.
When you pay your five dollars to get in, they give you a uniform (clay-brown for the girls and white for the guys) and the girls also get two towels each. At first, I was a little upset. Why do the girls always get better bathroom treatment?
Finally, some justice.
The girls were given two towels because that was all they get for the day. The guys have unlimited access to as many towels and face cloths as you wish. The girls will often have no face lotions, hair gel, etc. whereas the guys have it in abundance.
This is the first time where the guy's bathroom is finally better than the girls.
When you pay your five dollars to get in, they give you a uniform (clay-brown for the girls and white for the guys) and the girls also get two towels each. At first, I was a little upset. Why do the girls always get better bathroom treatment?
Finally, some justice.
The girls were given two towels because that was all they get for the day. The guys have unlimited access to as many towels and face cloths as you wish. The girls will often have no face lotions, hair gel, etc. whereas the guys have it in abundance.
This is the first time where the guy's bathroom is finally better than the girls.
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