Board Breaking and Breaking the Boredom

The Taekwondo lesson this morning was fascinating.  First there was a show of Taekwondo moves by those who would be our teachers, and it was impressive.  However, I did notice that the boards they were breaking as part of their show seemed to have charges set in them, as there would be a flash when they were hit, as well as a puff of smoke.  Unless I seriously missed something when it comes to human anatomy and the abilities of the body, I don't think that was just created by the force of the board being broken.  But I wonder why the charges were set?  This is something I must look into.

As for the lesson, I had been expecting a dinky little lesson, enough to appease curious Western teenage minds, but it turned out to be a bit more than that.  Had I known, I would have worn clothes that were not nearly so warm.  We learned four kinds of blocks (high, low, inside and outside), and four kicks (front, side, roundhouse, and drop), as well as a few self defense moves.  Then we were given time to practice with a foamy target held by the (very brave) volunteers.  I say very brave because we were very bad, and there was a high probability of one of them getting kicked in the face, or other undesirable area (not like there are desirable areas to be kicked in, though some are more preferable than others).

After all that, if we wanted to, we were given the chance to break a board by kicking it.  I hadn't planned on it because I wasn't terribly interested, but one of my suitemates, who usually doesn't get really into anything got extremely animated and wanted to do it and have me go with her, so I went.  I didn't kick through the board on the first try, mostly because I couldn't get the order of which leg you jumped with and with leg you kicked with right.  I knew I wanted to kick with my right leg, but somehow that move required kicking the left leg as well, and my brain couldn't process all this at once.  The second time I made it through, and they gave me the board to take as proof that I did it.  Now I really hope the TSA doesn't mind me taking it home in my luggage.

After that and after lunch (today it featured both spaghetti and pasta salad and rice . . . a little heavy on the starches), we watched a movie called JSA: Joint Security Area.  It was highly entertaining, and I recommend it.  I won't say to much about it in order not to give the plot away (and because I'm lazy), but it would be interesting even to someone not really interested in Korea, it's a very sweet and sad story, though filled with quite a lot of humorous moments.

After the movie, we were going to go watch Harry Potter, as it opens here earlier than it does in the States, but then we realized that the tickets would be sold out, as it only opened this morning, so that will be part of tomorrow's agenda.  Instead we just wandered around outside of school, and I got some more perfume as I am quickly going through the bottle I brought, as I am trying to make up for the washed-clothes funk, and the fact that it's always hot and humid, as well as trying to do a better job of matching these Korean girls in their made-up-ed-ness.  They still always look cute and put together, and I feel like a slob.  Maybe it's just because I'm taller and fatter than 90% of them that does it.  Or maybe it's because I dress like an American - ie, goofy.

HHI

The club night at the hotel went well, though we all agreed that the DJ seemed to have ADD, as he would only get maybe halfway through a song before switching over to a new one.  And he also liked to stop the music to shout out things, but he only spoke Korean, so when he did this, half of the dancefloor would just stop moving out of confusion.

Yesterday we briefly visited HHI - Hyundai Heavy Industries.  This was mainly the shipbuilding division of Hyundai, and we were given a very scripted tour of the area and told not to take any pictures.  It was interesting to learn about the founder of Hyundai, but the whole thing was so Stepford: "Here are his shoes, which he wore for 30 years because he believed in being frugal," "Hyundai cares about its workers," etc, that it was hard not to believe some deep dark secret was lurking underneath it all.  But maybe I'm reading too much into all that.

That was followed by an unending bus ride back to SWU, with lunch at a rest stop.  I ate something called a "pizza hot dog" because I had heard there wasn't actually a hot dog in it - there wasn't any pizza either, it just tasted like a blob of BBQ sauce that was battered and deep fried.  Strange, but I was hungry.  Luckily for dinner we had actual pizza from Korean Dominos, so that was enjoyable.

All my clothes smell are gross right now, because though my wash from about a week ago is dry now, it took far to long to dry and had time to get funky.  I don't really know how to avoid this problem, because everyone says the dryer in the wash room doesn't really work and the laundry soap provided is unscented.  Maybe I should spray everything with perfume after I get it out of the wash and before I hang it up to dry?

Today we are to learn Taekwondo, though we only have about a 2-hour lesson, so I'm not sure how much knowledge we'll gain in that limited timeframe.  We're also watching a Korean movie this afternoon called JSA: Joint Security Area.  The writeup sounds interesting, but at the moment I'm not even sure if it's in Korean or English, which may or may not make things a bit confusing, as I've found that a lot tends to get lost in translation through subtitles.

Gyeongju

Today we had our tours around Gyeongju.  This meant about 3 hours of actually touring, with about 6 30-minute naps on the bus sprinkled in-between.

In the swanky hotel we're at, we had a full breakfast, and I hadn't realized how much I'd missed pancakes and coffee for breakfast until this morning.  It was a treat, but now knowing I probably won't have it again (at least not until I get home) after tomorrow morning is kind of depressing.  Not that I don't like the Korean food, but it is different.  I had thought that perhaps the meals would be very Americanized to make them more acceptable to us exchange students, but they haven't seemed that way.  Maybe the Korean students would disagree, but considering I have to ask what half (on average, sometimes not for much, sometimes for everything) of everything is, I'd say the meals are fairly Korean.

Then we went to Bulguksa Temple.  Unfortunately I couldn't catch what much of the tour guide said about it, seeing as there was one guide for a group of about 30 of us, but I did get that it was very old, and very sacred, and when my "bus buddy" (we have assigned seating on the buses) and I walked around, just the two of us, it was incredibly peaceful.  Made me kind of wish I was just visiting South Korea by myself and not in this huge group like I am.

After that we went to Seokgulam Grotto.  There was a beautiful statue of Buddha there, as well as hundreds of paper lanterns that families had written their names on, strung on wooden frames.  Made me wish that America had more of a culture where everyone was on the same page as far as festivals and things to do along those lines . . . I can't think of anything similar to festival lanterns in the US.

After that was a lunch of Bibimbap, which was delicious, but we've had it twice in two days now, so everyone is kind of OD-ed on it.

Then we went to the beach of the East Sea, which was absolutely wonderful.  Though it had rained earlier in the day, it was sunny at the shore, and the water was refreshing.  A number of people got thrown in, but considering I had gone in willingly, I avoided such issues.

Then we came back to the hotel to change, and then went out to Cheonmachong for dinner.  In that area there are many burial mounds and a lot of treasure has been found there.  The burial mounds were something to see, as they were quite pronounced and there's no way they could pass for natural.  I think now I want to go out west in the US to see our American Indian burial mounds.

Now we're back at the hotel once again, and tonight is club night at the club in the basement of the hotel, starting in about an hour.  The first round of drinks is free, which, given how much I know the room I'm sitting in costs, as well as everything that's been supplied for on this trip, makes me wonder who is paying for all this.  All I had to do was pay for my plane ticket and a $200 registration fee . . . that wouldn't even begin to scrape the surface of how much this program must cost to run.  Hmm . . .

The photos for everything I'm mentioning are on Facebook, as I assume that anyone reading this is my friend on Facebook, and it saves me time to not have to upload twice.  If anyone isn't on Facebook and wants to see the photos of everything I've described, drop me a line and I can send the links to the albums.

South Korean Weekend

It's now been a week since I've gotten here!  Time flies when you're having fun.

Currently my roommate and I are in our room at the very snazzy Hyundai Hotel in Gyeongju.  This ranks up there as one of the nicest hotels I have stayed at.  For some reason I had been under the impression this place was going to be like a hostel or something, and I couldn't have been more wrong.  I feel like we're tainting it with our collective presence of like 120 college students.

Yesterday was the International Entertainment Night, and we performed a dance that goes to the song "Nobody" by the K-Pop group Wonder Girls.

We didn't win the grand prize of 150,000 won (no surprise, there were some GOOD performances last night), but it was okay, considering participation was mandatory.

Today was day one of our 3-day field trip to Gyeongju.  Mostly we just sat in the bus for hours on end, taking two breaks at Korean rest stops, and also at a very nice restaurant for dinner.  In the morning we stopped at a Korean Folk Village, which was supposed to be a replica of an authentic historical village, and it was nice, except for the rain which complicated things a bit.

As an aside, there is a cup sanitizer in the cafeteria back at SWU that fascinates me.  I can't find anything online about it (probably because the pages I need are in Korean), but it's interesting.  The only cups in the caf are thin metal, and when you get them out of this cabinet, they are warm and presumably germ-free.  I should remember to take a picture of it before I leave.  For how advanced America likes to think it is, we certainly don't sanitize our cups like the Koreans.  Nor do we have high-def flat screen TVs in the buses for watching movies on long bus rides.

Music and More

Today was rather a full day.  In the morning, we listened to a performance of music done with traditional instruments, and then were allowed to have an attempt at playing them ourselves.  That actually went better than I had expected, but with a group as large as ours (over 100 students total), there were no were near enough instruments for everyone, so there were some backlog and sharing issues.

Following that we left for Samsung-Dong and Bukchon Villiage, which are both these little authentic areas of Seoul, with old-style houses and some art galleries and little shops.  It kind of reminded me of parts of the Mediterranean or little cutesy towns along the coast like Martha's Vineyard or whatever.  We stopped in  a coffee shop that's part of a chain called Beansbins, and got Ice Cream Waffles.  Apparently Belgian Waffles with Ice Cream are a big thing here, and it makes me wonder why a chain carrying them has never caught on at home.  With the American appetite what it is, you'd think they would.

We then continued walking past the US Embassy and the Blue House, which is kind of like the Korean White House.  My guide book had said that it was just offices, but when I asked the Korean girls with us about it, they said that the President actually lives there.  I'm starting to worry about trusting my guide book too much, as it's making me say things that make me look like an idiot to the Koreans.  Hmm.

We then went to a small park in Seoul, which for the life of me I cannot find the name of, but it was directly across from The Plaza hotel.  There was a stage set up (apparently sponsored by UNESCO for some reason) and a band playing.  After that a group of little schoolgirls in cute little blue-and-white outfits with bows came up and did a song-and-dance performance for the moms who stood in front of the stage.  We sat farther back and clapped when they finished too because it was cute, but we looked a little bit like creepers by doing so.  We kept getting stares from the Koreans in the park for exploding in laughter or whatever.  Typical American tourists.

Then one of the Koreans said we should try traditional Korean liqour.  We thought that this would mean getting up and heading to a restaurant, but it turns out that it's a-okay to drink alcohol in public in South Korea.  So they went off to a grocery to get some makgeolli, which is sort of like a rice wine.  It was very strange to sit in a park and drink and not feel like a total delinquent.

Then we walked to a theater where we saw a performance of the NANTA Cookin' show.  It's like STOMP with food and chefs, and was quite entertaining.  It really made me want to go see the actual STOMP, because I enjoyed this and would like to see how it differs from the US version.  Also, there was audience participation last night, which always makes me nervous during a show, spending the whole time trying to avoid getting called on to do anything.

Now it's the next morning, and I slept until 10am.  I guess I was sleepier than I thought.