gockbanjung-dong

nate and i went to bundang saturday to see sarah. it took two buses, 1800 won, 45 minutes. coming back it took the subway, two buses, 2700 won, 2 hours. bundang seemed liked a super expensive place to be. it is where many of the hagwon headquarters are located. hagwon is what they call the private english institutions. both avalon and yes youngdo headquarters are in the same building, plus a few others. the actual school that sarah teaches at is in that building as well. her studio apartment is on the 15th floor of a 25 story building with a nice view of some mountains.
here are some photos of the foot bridge that i have to cross when i come home. from this view point the buildings on the right are the start of the neighborhood that i'm in which is called gockbanjung-dong. to the left are rice fields and a mountain in the distance. to the left of the bridge, not visible in this but the next, is a large church. both photos are taken facing a southern direction.

the last is a shot from the bridge looking east at another foot bridge which has four paths that make a circle around an intersection.

the state of pumpkin pie and coffee

for thanksgiving a group of the foreign teachers went to a buffet called vips. i thought it was kind of expensive, but once again i had bi bim bop. this time it was all i could eat, so i made a breakfast version with fruit, then a more traditional version, then one with other things from the bar. i had some brewed coffee too. coffee is kind of hard to come by here. there is a french pastry shop on the ground floor of the building that i work in and they have what's called americano. i think they make an espresso then add hot water. i've been told that the dunkin' donuts here have the closest thing to black coffee in the area. don't care too much for those places but i'll deal with it. if you go to a starbucks, you can buy their bags of coffee for about the equivalent of $20. but a coffee maker cost $100 and a french press cost $40. i don't know about that either. they do brew coffee at work, but they make super, i mean suuuppppeeeerrrrrr diluted hazelnut coffee, it's basically mildly sweet tea. i guess i'll have to start drinking real tea more frequently then.
tomorrow at 11 someone from the school is coming by the motel to pick me up and take me to my new apartment. oh, that's in 6 hours. i should repack and go to sleep. after i get my things moved, i'm catching a bus to bundang to see miss neville and have a late thanksgiving with her and her teacher friends from yes youngdo. it should be super fun. she just told me that we'll be drinking white grape wine and not soju. that will be nice. well this will be the last time i get to look out the hite (yes, the cheap korean beer) motel at the sign for the white club across the street, of course there is a photo of a pasty skin white girl on it. don't think the korean club seen frequents that place too much.
annyonghi kyeseyo.

when pickings are slim and feeling jet lag, go for cass and soju

so i've been in korea for a day and a half now. it is good. the company that i work for is called avalon. from what other teachers here have told me it is an excellent first contract school. it has elementary and middle school age classes. there is also an advanced middle school program called nok ji won, which is where i am. currently there are four english teachers in nok ji won. nate and i are the new ones and we are replacing karen and dan who will be leaving saturday. yesterday i sat in on a few classes. they seem pretty straight forward. the elementary and middle school classes are very structured, the nok ji won is not. we have to make all of our lesson plans. nate has worked for avalon for a year now, he was teaching at a different school, so his experience will be helpful. karen and dan have been teaching for a few years and have been giving us a good idea of how it works.














yesterday morning i got up and went for an hour walk around the neighborhood. i stopped by a small mart and bought some apples, oranges, cucumbers and pickled radish, which then became my first meal. it was nothing new. later after coming to work, the four of us went to lunch and i had my first bi bimp bap, a bowl of rice with a plethora of different kimchi, pickled and peppered vegetables. it was very good. i'm learning real fast that the concept of vegetarian does not exist here. i'll get through it. today karen and i went to a lotte mart, it's like walmart, and she showed me all of my options, which were a bit slim. the lotte mart is close to the school, but there is a small independent mart near the apartment that i can get some things at. last night we went and checked out the apartments, they are nice, definitely doable size one bedrooms, with two gas burners on top of the washing machine, there is no bathtub or stall shower, the shower head just comes out of the wall and there is a drain in the floor. i think the neighborhood looks fine, they say it's the hood, but coming from philly's grime probably has something to do with that. a group of us went to a bar there and had cass beer, the pitcher said hite though, and soju, a rice wine which kind of tastes like vodka. fun stuff.