I never miss you in the future.

It's the start of a new month, which means I get all new classes starting on Monday, and most likely a new batch of students. While this is often a welcome break from the monotony of seeing the same faces every day, sometimes it's a little sad to say goodbye to students. The last day of classes always brings some really sweet comments and little gifts from students, photo ops, many bows, handshakes and sometimes hugs. One student named Angela had grown really attached to me, and she gave me the note that follows. I've typed it exactly as she wrote it, because her mistakes are so cute! I've added comments in parentheses for clarification.

Hi~ Anne~! I'm Angela
I become tense very much. Because...I write to you about the while in English study class with you. I have enjoyed every time we've had together and I really enjoyed talked with you. I appriciated your consideration very much during last month. I'm very poor to speak English in the beginning. but, My ability is better and better after met with you. So, I'm very happy and thank you for your consideration very much. I never miss you in the future. Anne, Do you mind, if I ask your E-mail address? I would like to keep in touch with you forever. I hope your Korean ability is better and better. and...I hope you have a wonderful tim during stay in Korea. I want to invite you when I get Merry. I would like to see you again and...I like Anne more than Park Hae-il (he's her favorite Korean actor)!!! True Mind! Anne, I'm glad to have met you. Goodbye and keep well. Good luck, Anne!!

Once in class I asked Angela who she admired most in the world, and she replied, "My dad." When asked why, she responded, "Because he's my dad, he's my friend, and he's my boyfriend." For a moment, I felt like I was back in Kentucky.

If you were a fruit, which one would you be?

I've been teaching job interview preparation classes for the last three months. I'm getting tired of asking people the same old questions provided by my boss, so to spice things up, I'm constantly searching for new job interview questions to ask my students. For example:
How many bottles of soju can you drink?
How many cockroaches are there in Seoul?
If you were the interviewer, what question would you ask?
Why is your GPA so low?
How many push-ups can you do? Prove it.
Want to arm wrestle?

Once I asked my students "If you were a fruit, which one would you be?" Dumb question, I know, but I found it on a website and I was desperate to get away from "What's your biggest weakness?" Here's my favorite response to the fruit question, from a shy student named Jae-Ryel: "If I were any fruit, I would be a lemon because then I'd get the chance to swim in beer."

In a conversation class I taught last month, I asked my students if they had ever had any pets. Key, one of my favorite students, responds:
"Once we had a dog, but we ate. My mom cooked it in soup. When I ate it, I cried, but it was so delicious."

Ski slopes at night and my slow-motion pro snowboarding photo

I was actually going really slow in this photo.

I am a walking bruise

It's been two days since I went snowboarding for the first time. I hurt everywhere. My Austrian friend Stefan and I went with a tour group of mostly foreigners to a ski resort called Phoenix Park, located a couple of hours from Seoul. After about 10 minutes of instruction from Stefan, we set out on the easy slope. It was really crowded, and I still don't see how I avoided killing anyone. It took me over an hour to make it all the way to the bottom. I fell time and time again, but it was so much fun! After my third painful time down the slope, I wised up and bought wristguards and kneepads. I couldn't afford buttpads, though I could've used them.

Each time I descended the mountain, it got easier and easier, and by the evening I was only falling down a couple of times per run. I'm so proud of myself, because I went down the intermediate slope a few times, and Stefan was very impressed, saying I was a natural. Maybe he was just humoring me, but it gave me the motivation to keep climbing back on the lift and battering my body over and over again. I have the bruises to prove it, and I can barely move, but it was worth it. I can't wait to go again!

Why I love Korea...

Cheap haircuts. Today I met Leslie at her hairstylist's salon, where for $15, I got one of the best haircuts of my life. A great guy named Jun cut my hair, plus they washed my hair twice (once before and after the cut) and gave me a scalp massage. Here's a pic of my new 'do.

My pyromaniac pals

Leslie and Alice shoot fireworks at Seoul's downtown New Year's bash. Notice the Korean traditional drums beating in the background.

Lotte World

David, one of my students, invited me to go to the amusement park Lotte World (a big rip-off of Disney's Magic Kingdom) today. It has an enormous indoor area with rides, a shopping mall, a pool complex and an indoor skating rink, plus an outdoor park with even more rides situated on the 'Magic Island' in a manmade lake. In this photo you can see the amusement park in the top level, then the shopping mall and at the bottom is the skate rink.

Seoul New Year's Eve Fireworks

This is a sign at my workplace, YBM

Doesn't anyone in their advertising department think before they create signs like this?!

New Year's Eve

My new friend Alice and I at the street celebration in Jongno, Seoul's citycenter.

Leslie and Alice in downtown Seoul

2007 is the year of the pig, so that's a golden piggy bank in Leslie's hand. Notice the insanely close fireworks in the background.

New Year's Eve

This is Seoul's Millenium Tower, under firework attack.

Police Barricade at Seoul New Year's Eve Celebration

Seoul New Year

One of the most glaring differences that Americans face when going abroad is safety. Once you leave the U.S., you realize how hard our government works to try to protect its citizens from senseless harm and death. Korea's New Year's celebration is a prime example of the fun, excitement and danger that can accompany the absence of such protective regulations. My pals Leslie, Alice and I joined the hundreds of thousands of people gathered in Seoul's citycenter to hear the 33 rings of the massive Bosingak bell. Hungry pyromaniacs (including ourselves) snatched up 2-foot-long handheld fireworks launchers from street vendors, and as midnight approached, the air grew so thick with fireworks smoke that we couldn't even see the surrounding buildings. In every direction all we could see were the blazing trails of fireworks. I should've worn a hat: hot embers sizzled in our eyes and hair. There was extensive police presence, but only to block off certain roads and sidewalks, directing the flow of foot traffic. They seemed oblivious to the hordes of fire-wielders. Amazingly, out of the hundreds of thousands of people I saw launching fireworks, I only witnessed two men actually aiming them at each other. Everyone else responsibly kept their firesticks pointing skyward. It was all very civilized. Notice in this photo the small child holding her own stick not even higher than an adult's eye level.

Samgyeopsal, a heavenly Korean bacon meal

This is my favorite Korean dish, grilled thick slices of bacon put in lettuce leaves with grilled garlic and spicy fermented cabbage...and of course soju, Korean liquor.

My wonderful students (who pay for dinner and give me Christmas cookies)

These are some of my students from my job interview preparation classes. From left to right: David, Jaeki, Khan and me.

Me after my first taste of Seoul snow...tastes the same!

Buddha in winter

Temple in Gangnam, Seoul

Snow-covered Buddhist temple, Gangnam, Seoul