The World as We Know it

We've finally settled into our new apartment on Jeju Island in Jeju city. Jeju is a really beautiful little Island off the Southwest coast of South Korea. It's a volcanic island and at the very center of the island is Halla-san. It rises 1,950 meters above sea level and is the tallest point in South Korea. We haven't been yet, but it's on our to-do list.

Our first week of teaching was both rocky and exciting! We met all our students on Monday and I now realize the importance of being able to remember everyone's name. It's amazing any of my teachers was able to do it. Lance and I teach kids that age from 5-6 all the way up to 13 and 14 year olds. We also teach adult classes in the morning. We both have an adult class at 7 a.m. then another class at 10 a.m. Lance also has a 8 a.m. class.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays we teach one set of junior classes and we teach another set of classes on Monday and Wednesday. We have Friday afternoons off.  My junior classes are from 2:30 to 6:30 (I have 4) on Monday and Wednesday and from 3:30 to 7:30 on Tuesday and Thursday. Lance's classes are always from 3:30 to 6:30. It's really not a bad day at all and we can spend the time between classes as a planning period for our classes.

Some of the English names our students have chosen are pretty surprising. Lance has a little boy named Police and another named Ghandi and I have boys named Lion and Green. It makes me wonder if they picked their names or if their first English teacher named them, like Lance had to do with his lowest level class. 

So far we've figured out the bus system, we've managed to grocery shop and eat out successfully. We eaten both whole fish (scales, head and tail), baby octopus, raw tuna, fried pork and some pretty strange "western" food. For Koreans, western food can be a combination of spaghetti and steak and it's something special to eat with forks and knives. We have mastered chop sticks. Lance's first time eating with chop sticks was on our first date back in Gainesville at a local sushi restaurant. He's come a long way since then.

We're settling in Jeju nicely, and I can honestly say the only real thing I'm struggling with (other than the language) is "yellow dust" season. Dust from the Gobi desert is pushed over China and picks up pollution and just sits on our Island. In the distance is always looks like it's on the cusp of raining and for the first few days Lance and I were struggling with a cough. Luckily that seems to be clearing up now. I miss Florida's bright blue skies and fluffy clouds. Other than that, the weather is perfect. Today it was 25 degree's Celsius,  which is about 77 degrees Fahrenheit. It was accompanied by Jeju's famous wind which can feel hurricane strength at times. It was really beautiful today.

So our apartment is nothing short of amazing. We live all of 3 minutes for our school, which takes a little stress off from having to wake up super early for our 7 am class. We made a little series of videos for you guys to see everything:

I had some technical difficulties with the video, I thought the sound was off, it wasn't. We continued with the video below.

The entire apartment has laminate wood floors so that the heated flooring can work. Our T.V. has a few stations on it and occasionally we find some English. We like to watch the National Geographic channel especially, be it doesn't really matter what language it's in we can still get what's going on.

It's considered extremely rude to not take off your shoes in a Korean living space, it can be cumbersome at times, but it really does keep your living space cleaner. We have a rule that only one pair of shoes can be at the door at a time. There's a cabinet next to the door to put extra shoes. So far we're doing pretty good at not letting them accumulate. 

One of our favorite parts of living in this apartment is the fact that we have a spare bedroom. Lance has a desk in there to work at, but we look forward to hosting our friends and family when you guys come to visit.

Our apartment has abundant storage, everywhere but in the bath. We have a small series of selves and that's it. It's hard for me, as a lady, because there's no place to keep a hair dryer (not that there's a plug) or makeup or other things ladies use. Regardless, I consider us really lucky, because a lot of apartments don't even have a tub, they just have drains in the floor and a shower head in the corner and the whole bathroom becomes the shower. Our Bathroom is also super girly and covered in pink flowers. Even the toilet has pink flowers on it.

Our kitchen is a great size and came fully equipped with pots and pans and dishes. We have a nice large sink, plenty of cabinets, a full sized fridge and a gas stove top. We also have a microwave, a mini oven and a water cooler to get cold and hot water from. Koreans don't drink their water, so the water cooler is really nice. We were worried we'd be using bottled water for the next year.

Another nice feature in our apartment is a dinning room. In the room we have a table with chairs, an ironing board and the vacuum.

Our bedroom is pretty fantastic. We have a full sized dresser, wardrobe, desk, bookshelf and bed. Out the window you can see our utility/sun room where we did our laundry and it's now drying.  The bedding is soft and warm, but the mattress is rock hard. It's a cultural thing. Remember, in Asian countries many people used to sleep on the floor and some still do. I think that carried onto their mattresses.

Gyeongbokgung palace

On Saturday we went out with everyone to Gyeongbokgung palace. It's a reconstructed palace from the Joseon Dynasty. It was destroyed during the Korean war, but the original dates back to 1395. It was insanely beautiful and intricately detailed. I've seen European architecture, which is also beautiful, but this palace was beautiful in a different way completely.  

It's strange that such a place exists smack dab in the middle of Seoul, with all it's enormous skyscrapers and busy city streets.

We arrived in time to see a little bit of the changing of the guard and we got to see some traditional Korean costmes.

I can't say much that you can't see in the pictures. This place was truly beautiful.

This is the group of girls we traveled with :

And the boys:

And my boy:

I spent some time practicing my Asian poses.

And Lance practiced some too.

We couldn't resist taking a quick picture of how cute these little girls were.

At the middle of the palace is a folk museum and also this really beautiful Zodiac garden. We each took turns taking pictures with our Zodiac. Here's lance with Mr. Snake.

 

And I posed with the best sign of them all: The    Dragon! 

We didn't get very much time in the museum, but the things we did get to see were pretty amazing. This is a funeral casket cover. We also saw real silk and pages after pages of preserved writings. 

I couldn't resist taking a picture with a traditional Jeju Statue since on Sunday we were flying to Jeju to make it our new home.

They had a pretty eye-catching way of advertising this museum. Notice how they used the trees?

Here's what's left over of some of Seoul's original city gate. The juxtaposition of the old and new in this place is a little eerie. 

After we left the museum we all had the munchies and we headed to dinner! We found a really neat traditional restaurant nearby and we were led into our own little room to sit on the floor. It was cold outside and the floor was heated so it was heavenly to sit on a warm floor (we had little cushions). We all ordered something different. I had a pork dish, which was basically just spicy slabs of bacon and Lance had bulgogi, which is traditional Korean BBQ. Korean food is also served with a variety of side dishes which included tofu with a spicy sauce, seaweed served in a spicy marinade and (of course) Kimchi.

Here's a close-up of my yummy dinner:    

It was so cold during the week I snapped up the first pair of earmuffs I came upon in the streets. Lance says I look like Princess Leia, but I like them. 

N Seoul Tower

We're a little backlogged in Korea. We've had a very very busy week and haven't had a chance to share our most recent adventures with you! On Friday we visited Namsan tower with some of the people we met during our orientation in Seoul. I think we've made some life long friends in just a short couple weeks. We met people from New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa and everywhere in North America. It's pretty fantastic to have friends who literally come from all over the world. 

You can find a really informative link to N Seoul Tower here. We had to climb some pretty steep hills to get to the cable car that took us to the top of Namsan Mountain. I got some altitude sickness because I'm just not used to going to high and it didn't help that I wasn't over my flu. 

Once we got to the top though, it was all worth it. We took a cable car up and the view was incredible. We could see all of Seoul. It was also incredibly terrifying and made me question what I ate for lunch because we were packed in the car with a lot of other people and the car swung on the cable ever so slightly. Not so good for someone afraid of heights.

By the time we got to the top of the tower the sun was beginning to set and we got some really lovely pictures. It also became increasingly cold. The higher we went and the later it got the colder it became.

 At the very top of tower is a lookout point and literally every surface is covered in locks. (Locks you can buy, by the way, for 5,000 won on the way up). The locks symbolize locking your love so that it will stay eternal.

I'm such a sap, so of course we bought a lock and locked it to the fence  near the highest point in Seoul.












After you've locked your love, you throw away the key into this red mail box looking thing. You're supposed to both hold hands as you let go of the key, hence the awkward positioning.


 You can see all the locks behind us. Amplify what you see in this picture by 100.

 The view from the tower is nothing short of stunning.

 I defaced this sculpture, but all the cool kids were doing it!













This is actually the highest point in Seoul. We didn't go to the top because...well the line was long, we were cold and everybody's tummy was rumbling. The picture was enough for this adventure.

Everything on the tower was saturated in cute. The benches inclined towards the middle so you'd have to sit right next to each other. They had trees covered in love locks and even their wet floor signs had adorable bears with hearts on their chests.

We had a really spectacular adventure on Friday, even if it was freezing and we were both still sick.