Well, third week is officially done and tomorrow I enter into the 4th one. I forgot the main reason for my last post. We had a Civil Defense Training Drill last week. My co-teacher, a student and I went to my apartment to hook up a new computer and get a couple things figured out. We got back to the school and I hear an announcement (clearly I have no idea what it actually is) but then sirens start going off and everybody is leaving the school. We're all waiting outside on the field, I still have no idea what's going on but the kids all get grouped together by their classes and the sirens are still going off and there is a long announcement coming over the speakers. Apparently on the 15th of every month towns will literally shut down for this civil defense training drill that attempts to create a scenario in case North Korea ever actually invades again. It's crazy how on the brink of war everything still is here. Technically they are still at war, but it's like a temporary (hopefully permanent) ceasefire. I'm hoping that sometime soon a group of us can go on a demilitarized zone tour. If we get a group big enough we can actually get a legit tour. For that luckily we (as foreigners) can actually visit the zone. If a Korean were to visit they'd have to actually apply for it and do a bunch of paperwork and go through other formalities. So it will be intense to actually see that.
Had my first visitor to the apartment. Christina from North Bay who lives in Seoul was able to come down for a weekend visit. Plan was to check out the Hwaeomsa Temple up in Mt. Jirisan. It was phenomenal. It's so surreal to be up in the mountain, every is just so picturesque it doesn't seem like it should be real. Plus it was a phenomenal experience just to walk through the temple itself. There were a bunch of gift shops though, so that kind of took away from it a little bit, but it was still amazing. The statues were pretty intense, but the temple was filled with big and small Buddhas. There are also monks that live there. We ended up taking a path that no one else was taking that crossed a stream and was just a rock path basically which went up a hill. Just before going up we actually passed a pair of monks which just added to the surrealistic feel of the place. Will definitely be going back up that way in the future when I want to hike up to the Nogodan plateau. Wish we could have done that one, but it was getting a little late and that's a solid 10.5km trek uphill, so that'll be for another day. I'm hoping to get out there to see the "Sea of Clouds", looks phenomenal in the pictures I've seen so I definitely need to hit that up. Plus, this might be a bigger undertaking than I'm making it out to be, but Jirisan is supposed to have the best view of the sunrise in all of Korea. Hopefully one day in the late spring/early summer I make this trek. It's a solid 2+hour hike up the mountain which means a super early morning, plus finding a way to actually get out there. At 4am nothing really runs in this town soooo....might have to get something figured out.
Anyways...actually got the chance to explore Gurye. Have to admit, there's more here than I was thinking. Last weekend didn't give me a huge impression on what was actually available. Turns out there are a dozen or more coffee shops that are actually way nicer than they should be. Plus there's a Korean BBQ joint next to the bus terminal that is super cheap and wicked good. And we actually found some decent pub-like places that are chill. I love that for every order of drinks they treat you like gold with snacks and munchies. No matter what, you're always given a platter of food. Plus there are more billiard rooms than I thought. There are at least 3 in this town that I know of. And there's a place right by my school that actually makes decent tasting pizza. Garlic sauce sucks, but the hot sauce makes up for it. It was an adventure getting back to the apartment though. We got in a taxi, but the taxi driver had no idea where I actually lived. Luckily I've learned some landmarks and was able to guide him like a connect the dot, and he understood "Keep going" so that definitely helped. Taxis are ridiculously dirt cheap too. Cost us less than $2 to get into town today. So cheap. They go up at night, but even last night it was only $5 and we actually went further so really, that is nothing considering how much we would have had to pay back home.
So that was fun. It was nice to actually have a conversation with someone without having to slow everything down and make every sentence incredibly simple. I think I exhausted my voice though. But it was great to see a little piece of home again and talk about familiar things. So great weekend for sure. Next weekend adventure=Seoul. That'll be a bit of a different scenery considering the population of this province is only 20% of the population of Seoul. Definitely going to be an overload, but it will be fun. It'll be a good change to actually get into the city again. Plus, thanksgiving dinner. How can I turn that one down?
Oh! Actually got to teach a lesson on country music to my little country school. I put together a sloppy lesson last minute, but surprisingly the kids actually really liked country music. I showed them a video of a kid playing the banjo and they just loved it. Followed that with a barn dance and Cotton Eye Joe. Gotta admit, it absolutely blew my mind when half of the kids just starting tapping their hands and feet to the beat of different instruments, and perfectly in tune with the actual song. Wish I actually could have captured it, it was just amazing to see them get right into the music. Then what was just the topping on the cake, came this question: "Can you put on some Taylor Swift?" Mind officially blown. Especially that they actually like her music. So now it's going to be a weekly thing to do these music lessons with at least this school. I don't know how it'll work with my main school, they're way more into sports and these kids are way more into music so I'll probably just skip that one. They requested rock for this week, so how can I turn that one down?
Well, week two of teaching was another success luckily. So far so good, no problems arising just yet. I'm expecting something to just hit the fan though, things are going a little too smoothly, so I'm just trying to keep myself prepared for anything of that sort. Hopefully nothing comes up, but something's bound to occur. Ah well, just gotta keep enjoying everything for how it is.
Still no webcam or anything, so contact is still nil. Webcam is on the way though, couldn't find any in the town that were worth how much they actually cost, but one is being shipped to me and found it for $5 so can't complain about that one. Hope everything's going alright back home! Been seeing some pics of snow already suckas. Coldest we've got is a little wind, and I like it like that.
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