Post Three (Feb 27th-Mar 1st)

It is Friday morning and we have reached the end of the week which is always a great day. Last night while Tate, Jillian, Daniel and I were at dinner, we received a phone call from our boss, Jade. She is the vice principal at the school and told us that her Mother (The Principal) insisted that the foreign teachers join the Korean teachers for a one night workshop about two hours from Dongtan. Instantly, I thought it was a great option for us to get away and see other parts of Korea other than where we live. It will be the first time we have been out of town since we got here. There were five of us foreign teachers, about 15-20 Korean girl teachers, the principal, the vice principal and a couple other workers. We all took one of the Brown School of English school buses to get there. It was not too comfortable but we were able to meet some of the other Korean teachers who speak little English but enjoyed trying to learn from us. I don’t understand much when they talk in English though. When we got to our destination, it was Canadian themed and really nice (We were surprised to see a Canadian themed hotel in South Korea). We unpacked our luggage and met for dinner by the barbecue's set up and we grilled up pig belly (which look like long and thick pieces of bacon), ate some kim-chi, peppers, cucumber and different types of leaves that we wrapped the pig belly in. It was delicious.

After dinner we all met in the conference room and when we walked in, there was a karaoke machine set up and we quickly learned before the workshop began, we were going to have to do karaoke. For me, karaoke is a good time but I have a TERRIBLE voice and in the U.S., we think of karaoke machines being at bars with drunken people. This was not the case and I knew they were going to make us do some sober singing. It turned out to be contest. There were four teams against one another; the 5 year old teachers, 6 year old teachers, 7 year old teachers and the foreign teachers. The winner won 100,000 won and second place team got 50,000 won. We took second place and won the 50,000 won. I bet you are wondering how we won. There were various games we played throughout the night and we needed one person from our group to sing a song and score well and she did. Then, as a group, we had to choose one song and do a performance in front of everyone. We chose the Macarena (not sure if you spell it that way but check out the video, you will get a kick out of it) and did the dance moves to it. I would never have thought in my right mind I would do this sort of thing sober! Daniel and I also were called back up and had to dance in front of everyone (again, check out the video on this, it is really funny). This night turned out to be a lot of fun.

The next morning we woke up at 8 for breakfast and were served a rice soup, kim-chi and baby anchovies. I ate very little to say the least. We then left the hotel to head back home. About a half hour into the trip, we stopped at this place called "The Garden of Morning Calm" and it was indeed a big garden up in the mountains that had a lot of gorgeous views and some plants. I am sure in the spring, this would be an awesome place to visit. I still enjoyed the garden and will have some pictures up that I hope you not only enjoy, but can see how gorgeous it is. After spending a couple hours here, we headed back home where Jillian, Tate, Daniel and I all went out on the town and had a few drinks. All in all, our Friday and Saturday was great!

On Sunday, Tate, Daniel and I went to the Central Park and played three on three basketball against some Koreans. We won all three games and that pretty much wrapped up our Sunday. Daniel and I are now preparing for the new week to start because we will be teaching our own classes alone and with the new students. It should be interesting and I will be sure to let everyone know how it went within the next couple weeks. Wish us luck!