Aussie Blog

I've started my Australia blog. It can be found at

http://itmandownunder.blogspot.com/

And so the laziness continues

I fly home on December 8th. I've done a lot that I have failed to post about and for that I apologize. I very much doubt I will be able to create the effort to catch up before that time, so I will do it very briefly right now.

What I have missed talking about were a couple trips to Busan and Seoul. There were no huge adventure stories to recap there. I also went to Thailand for 6 days last week. It was fun, but I didn't do anything I wanted to do because it rained the whole time. Pretty dissappointing really. I also misplaced my camera and was unable to take any pictures while there.

Some Korean things to note is I have gone at least a few months without a cab driver being confused where I live. I am able tp pronounce it pretty good now I guess. In fact, one cab driver told me I had very good pronunciation. Further, I have noticed I am able to have some basic conversations with Koreans who speak little to no English. I kinda understand what they are asking me although I am unable to ask them the same questions. Usually they want to know where I am from and what my job is. I've also had some conversations with people I do hapkido with where we understand eachother but I have no idea looking back how.

Anyways, thats it for me...and perhaps the Korean blog. I'll probably attempt another for my adventure in Australia.

Busan War Memorial

My birthday ended up on a Wednesday (I know, over a month ago) and a friends ended up on the following Wednesday...so we took a trip to Busan to celebrate.

We partied pretty hard as always on the Saturday night...mostly along the beach. Spent the next day on the beach and then at a United Nations war memorial. Here is a link to some pictures of that:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2085420&l=75377&id=119104630

Sorry about the brief posting, but in an attempt to catch up on the blogging some of my stories will be cut short. Less then 7 weeks until I am home and you can ask me some stories in person! Also, I made an album of the students I teach and have been updating it all week. You can find it here:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2085420&l=75377&id=119104630#/album.php?aid=2085267&id=119104630&ref=mf

It's been too long

I'd like to apologize for the lack of posting my blog has progressively been garnering. It's been over a month since I last posted and it has been a pretty eventful month, so I don't have any good excuse as to why I haven't posted. I guess I have just been lazy.

My last post was about going to the doctors. It took me about 2 weeks to completely get over that. I mean after about 5 days it was pretty ok...but there would still be bowel surprises at random times.

It is becoming very apparent to me that my time in Korea is quickly dwindling. I will be here for less then 2 months now. My flight itinerary was handed to me earlier this week. I leave at 11 am Korean time on December 8th and arrive in Detroit at 12 noon Ontario time on....December the 8th. I only technically lose an hour of December the 8th, while I fly half way across the world.

There are a lot of things I want to do in Korea yet, and plan to. Hence my schedule is getting packed in my next Seven weekends here. Seven weekends left here. Seven. I'm in a bit of disbelief.

In fact, before this posting, I was already starting to do things I wanted to do before I left. One of those was visit a University friend in the small city of MokPo. This guy was the first person I met in University. Some of you know him as Steve. Others don't know him. He took philosophy, just like me so discussion always seems more complex then it has to be. Everything must be defined. Another thing about Steve is a quote completely taken out of context by our friend Katie:

"A little dangerous and perhaps stupid is not the equation for fun.....but the formula that makes up Steve's physical being
and soul"

So while in MokoPo we did one thing in particular that fits the mold of the Katie theory. We climbed a mountain. I know I know, I've made a couple of posts before about my mountain climbing escapades if you call them that (I wouldn't). But as my quote to Steve, taken a little out of context and made just after we climbed down the mountain,

"I forgot what climbing a mountain in Steve terms meant."

suggests, climbing a mountain with him was a little different. We climbed the mountain...we climbed it beside the path pretty much the whole way up. At times we would have been pretty screwed if our foot slipped or we lost the grip in the hand holes, or things we used as hand holes. I was pretty sore the next couple days, but I think that was the funnest mountain climbing experience I have had.

I was skeptical of many climbs so I usually just waited to make sure Steve could do it to start. My rationale was if Steve can do it I can do it. Often I seemed to do it quicker and make it look easiar...but to Steves credit he was overcoming his fear of heights at the same time.

We had a lot more fun in Mokpo, and since I have been to Seoul and am going to Busan for a fireworks festival this weekend. That means there is potential for many more blogs before I leave Korea. I just have to find the time and ignore the distractions from making a post.

One last blog note. I went to school to teach today in shorts and a T.

Visiting a Doctor

Warning: Parts of the following may fall under the heading too much info.

I've been pretty lucky thus far having stayed away from being sick in Korea for 9 and a half months. Well, other then the alcohol induced sicknesses that is. But that streak unfortunately did not last my whole stay here. Saturday evening I had to sit on the toilet and it was not solid like normal.

I was fine afterward, spent the night watching a movie...no big deal. Got home from the movie and it all hit me. I was sitting on the toilet at least once every hour. Not very helpful for sleep. It continued on through Sunday. I had to leave my Sunday, holiday, drinking expedites in order to deal with the constant bowel movements.

Monday spelled the same such disaster and began to get me worried. When it was still happening Tuesday morning when I woke up I called my boss and told him what was up. He decided it would be best for him to take me to the doctor.

I met my boss at my school and I think he saw a little of the real English language. I forgot to bring my medical card, and frustrated mumbled "fuck I should have remembered that." I'm pretty sure he heard me and he kind of chuckled.

At the doctors, I was asked some questions, translated by my boss. He told me I shouldn't drink anything cold or eat anything fatty and then I seemed to be on my way...or so I thought. I walk past a curtain and my boss tells me I am supposed to go in there for a shot. I get a shot in the ass, and walk awkwardly down the stairs with him. We go to the drug store where the doctor prescribed some sort of jelly stuff for me to eat one hour before a meal and pills to take after each meal. Sounds a little excessive, no?

After that my boss takes me to a place that sells jook. He told me jook is like ground up rice and should give me energy while not upsetting my stomach. Along the way I saw a foreign friend of mine and he asked hows it going to which I inherently replied 'pretty good you.' My boss looks at me and says "You are not good." I explained that its pretty common to just answer like that regardless, especially when its as you pass.

At the jook place my boss orders a couple different orders for me and when I see them pour this stuff into the bowl it makes me gag. Really not looking forward to trying that, it is sitting in my fridge right now and I'm not so sure I will try it. It's not supposed to upset my stomach but I am not so sure due to my overly sensitive taste buds.

My final synopses on the whole situation is that I should have sucked it up and found myself a diaper.

Dog Cafe

A couple weeks ago, I took another trip to Seoul. One of the attractions was a dog cafe.

What I initially thought was this was a cafe where you could order dog as a meal. Strange, perhaps but at this point I would not put it past Korea. Also, it is not unheard of to eat dogs.

This however, was not like your typical cafe at all. We got in there and there were dogs everywhere. Instead of buying coffee or treats for yourself, you would buy dog biscuits for the dogs. Quite the life these dogs had. All the attention they could ever want, and more...plus being constantly fed dog treats.

Perhaps not all that healthy though. Dog biscuits aren't the best thing for dogs and they all seemed so lazy. I'm sure they felt like kings too. Being white, people were more then willing to let us feed the dogs with the treats they had purchased.

Body Painting Festival

Last Saturday I went to a body painting festival in my home city of Daegu.

The festival was an international event, models and artists from all over the world came to paint and show off their art work. There were a ton of amazing art designs that these models wore instead of clothing.

We never got to see the models getting painted as we showed up too late. We did however get to see them on display during the runway walk. It was kind of a neat experience but grew old pretty fast. It was held at World Cup Stadium, a stadium built specifically for the World Cup a few years ago. That in itself was pretty cool.

I also didn't get to take a whole lot of good pictures. We couldn't get close enough during the runway walk and my cameras zoom feature isn't very good. But thanks to facebook I found a picture that someone else took while the model was being painted and I have shared that with you.

I'll try to update the blog a little more frequently in the coming weeks. I have a couple experiences I can share coming up and a couple more trips planned that may inspire blog postings.