Visitors!

This past weekend I had some visitors come hang out with me in Gangwon-do (the region of Korea that I live in).  Hadley and Addie came! We met on Saturday morning in Chuncheon (the capital city in my region, it is about a half hour north of Hongcheon). I’ve only been to Chuncheon a handful of times so I’m not that familiar with the city, however, I did know a little bit and was able to figure out a few places to hang out. We first met by the E-mart (Korea’s Walmart) and ate right away in the food court. We then started to walk to the shopping area, which is pretty famous in Chuncheon, and were stopped on our way there by someone yelling my name. It was one of my teammates. I did warn Hads ahead of time that people may do that to me in Hongcheon but that’s the first time someone has recognized me in Chuncheon. She told me she was studying and that she had a test tomorrow… I think at least, haha! It was raining a lot so we decided to check out the underground mall first. Down in the mall they had little rest areas where you could sit down. Korea did not let us down here with its tackiness. Hads took a pic of Addie and I sitting by one of the lovely waterfalls; take a close look at it! Haha

The rest of time in Chuncheon consisted of wandering around the shopping area, stopping in at Paris Baguette for a snack and Starbucks for coffee! Around 4pm we headed back to Hongcheon. When we got to Hongcheon we came and relaxed for a bit then invited Dajeong out for dinner with us! She loved it! We told her to walk us to a Korean Barbeque restaurant and she ended up running into her uncle on the street (who happens to be the uncle that works at the Hite beer factory I’m trying to tour soon) and he told us to get in his car and he would drive us to a nice restaurant. It was really tasty! After dinner Addie, Hads and I headed to Wabar for a beer. The owner of the Wabar is actually one of my students’ mom. One of the first times I went there a complimentary fruit plate appeared at my table for free… I’m assuming it was a thank you for teaching my student fruit plate, either way I enjoyed it! Wabar was a good time though; they had some live music for a while and played a couple of English songs! While I was walking to the bathroom I heard someone call my name. It ended up being one of the guys who plays for Hongcheon’s 30+ team and his wife! I swear everywhere I go these days I see at least one or two people on the street saying hi to me that I know. 

Wonderland! The outside of my school.

Sunday I made some delicious pancakes for Hadley and Addie then we put on our matching purple ponchos that Hadley and Addie bought on their way over to Chuncheon. Thanks again guys, it was a great purchase! I gave them a walking tour of Hongcheon in the rain that actually cleared up a little as the day went on which was nice. We took a walking tour with stops at a few food places obviously and then spent some time at a really cool coffee shop called the Bath House which used to be an actual bathhouse but then was converted into a coffee shop. After the coffee shop Hadley and Addie headed out for their adventure home to Seoul. It was a fun and relaxing weekend, I’m always happy to have visitors come! Thanks for coming guys! 

Walking on the bridge by the river. 

The mountains always look so pretty when it rains.

This weird blue guy is my town's mascot, haha. (Addie and I)

Hads and I with the blue raindrop!

The little flower thing is the town's symbol.

Walking to the sports fields.

This is one of the tiny little fields that I practice at.. it's astroturf. 

 Our sweet purple ponchos which got us many comments walking around my town... three white girls in purple ponchos. 

Forest Field Trip

At our school we go on a forest field trip once a month. Last month our trip was cancelled because it was sprinkling outside… don’t ask me how I feel about that, I think you should know! The month before that we hiked a huge mountain that my co-teacher had a hard time going up and here we were taking 4 year olds… again, what are you thinking Korea. Anyways, this month we went to a little open area where the kids learned about a couple different bugs and then made some, what I like to call, “wall art”. When I first got here my room was bare so when I went places with Hadley like the play and the soccer game, I would take home a poster or banner and put it up on my wall to fill up my room. This project that I did with the kids was no exception. I obviously made one myself and proceeded to put it up on my wall at home. We took a cloth and folded it in half with a flower pedal or leaf in the middle and then smacked it with a hammer to get the impression to stick onto the cloth. It was actually really cool. After they made these impressions we hung them up and they got to play in the open field area. 

The old man forrest instructor! He's great with the kids... they love him!

Sally teacher with the kids and her sunbrella... so Korean!

Lucy pounding away at her art creation

Sharon teacher!

Mine's on the left, Joseph's is on the right

Scott! One of my favorite students...

Lucy and Louie, they're brother and sister!

Maya on the rope swing

Elizabeth Teacher and I

I'm helping Ellen with her pounding.

The kids tried to challenge me to soccer... they were all chasing me around the little field area. I got real tired... I didn't attend practice that night. Haha

I'm playing with the kids on their little ropes course type thing...

Jessica Teacher

Now clearly these pictures weren’t taken yesterday seeing as it’s MONSOON season here in Korea…. Yes that’s right. Monsoon season has arrived. I’m not really sure what that means but I know that it does mean that the rain never stops coming down… this has been going on for about a week and a half now and I’m told will go on for the next month. I think it’s about time I invest in yet another pair of shoes… this time not for soccer or for casual use but strictly for the rain! 

Sokcho tournament!

Last weekend I headed to the east coast for a soccer tournament. We played in Sokcho, it is really pretty there! We left early Saturday morning. It took a little over an hour to get there. We had our game on Saturday at 10am. The game ended in a tie, 0-0. Coach always has me playing forward. I think I would’ve been more effective at midfield myself because then I could actually get the ball. It’s hard to score when the ball never gets up to the forwards. Anyways, we had a shootout and they had me go first as usual. Pass to the corner, I taught my team to do that. We won the shootout, all five girls scored! After the game we headed to a restaurant near the coastline. When we got out of the van there was this man wandering asking for help in finding a internet café or anyplace with wifi access. I walked over to him and he spoke a little English. He was actually French, which I took in high school and college (I don’t know French that well, I only remember bits and pieces). Long story short this man ended up coming to the restaurant, eating with us, and using the owner’s office area to e-mail his wife. He was super thrilled with how kind Koreans are. I would definitely agree with him that Korean’s are some of the friendliest people I know, and I’m from “Minnesota nice” so that’s saying a lot! The French man was traveling throughout Asia. He had been in China before Korea where he got to meet his son that worked on a cargo ship that was ported at China for a bit. He was retired man, retired at the age of 48. Makes you jealous huh Dad? He like his son now worked on a cargo ship doing manual labor or something like that. Now his life consists of traveling the world. He takes a trip with his wife every year to different parts of the world. Last year it was Australia, New Zealand area and the year before that it was in Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia and before that was somewhere in Africa. This year his wife was tired and told him she was staying home! Haha. After lunch the French man wrote down the name of the stadium that we were playing at on Sunday morning so he could come watch us play! He was so excited to have had lunch with us. I was the only one who he could really communicate with. 

After lunch we headed to a different soccer field that was right next to the beach. We watched 4 different games. When I got there I called Kalie and told her it smells like vacation here, we need to come here soon and hang out at the beach! Two of them were our Hongcheon teams; 40+ age group and the 30+ age group. Coach played in the 30+ game. He’s a pretty good player. When Hongcheon was finally done playing we went to dinner at this little restaurant overlooking the beach. The food was all seafood and a lot of it was still moving so I didn’t eat it but I loved the view. The president of the club and another board member ate with us. The other board member just happened to have a kid that goes to Wonderland and I teach a class to him. He saw that I didn’t like the food so he ordered pizza and chicken for me. Haha. That’s what my team told him I like I guess. It was really good though. He paid for it and said “Julie thank you for my son, teaching Wonderland”. When the food came all the little kids flacked to me and wanted my dinner. It was quite annoying, not going to lie. After dinner I went with a couple of my teammates to walk near the water. 

Random camping site next to the soccer field. 

Coach, number 10!

Oksun, Yoma, Meekyung

Coach making his move... he didn't score. Haha

The sidelines

This was next to the soccer field. It was used that day as a parking lot... I'm sure glad they have stands for this field... 

Dinner by the shore!

The view from the restaurant

Yoma and Oksun!

I'm not sure what the girls name is sitting next to me but it was her birthday! 

My camera got stolen and they were taking random pics! Haha

The president and Coach.

The guy in black is the one who bought me dinner, Ricky's dad!

Meekyung

Had a little birthday celebration as well!

Meekyung shook up some sort of champaign and sprayed it all over, she's so obnoxious! haha

Oksun and Paksun. Oksun is a tae kwon do instructor with her husband and Paksun has a farm in the country. The team keeps telling me she's rich. I want to go see her farm soon! 

The restaurant is the building in white to the right.

Hanging out on the rocks?! haha

Paksun really wanted me to take her pic.

Sunbok came to check out what we were doing and then of course wanted a pic! She's super funny. 

The tanks of seafood creatures in front of the restaurant. Waitresses were constantly coming out to get food for people inside.

I was so tired that night that when we got to the hotel I took the first shower and fell asleep right away when I laid down. When I woke up in the morning, we opened the curtains and saw that our hotel was on the beach! It was amazing. I got up quickly when I realized where we were. We got to walk by the beach a little in the morning before breakfast. At breakfast they had fried eggs and potatoes as two of the side dishes. I LOVED it. In Korea they eat Kimchi and rice for breakfast most of the time, which isn’t a breakfast in my eyes. Our game today was against a team that we’ve played before in our first tournament. The team had 3 girls marking me. It was extremely annoying. We ended up in a tie, 2-2. One of our goals was really pretty. It started in the back making passes on the ground making it up to me in the left corner. I made a cross to one of the midfielders and she had a perfect shot into the left-hand corner of the goal. Anyways, we ended up having a PK that we lost; yes I went first and yes I scored my goal. I was actually ok with losing because I was tired and didn’t really want to play the next game… So we ended up getting 3^rd place in the tournament. 

I took a pic this time of our room! This is a typical hotel room in Korea. You have a pile of blankets that you lay out on the floor and sleep on. 

The French man showed up too! It was fun to see him again. 

Coach! 

The view of the field. It was gorgeous with the mountains in the back. The field was grass too!! It was the first grass field I've seen here that was well maintained. 

Jonglan, me, Emily, and one other teammates little daughters. 

After the game one of my teammates who I’m closest to, Jonglan, took me with her family for a ride on the coastline. Jonglan has two kids; Emily and Kevin are their American names. Emily is 10 and Kevin is 7. I love them. They’re so cute! When we were driving we were heading north and they were telling me that the North Korean’s sometimes come to this part of the water to spy on the South Korean’s. Don’t worry mom, we turned around after that. We headed to a restaurant and they ordered me special food because they didn’t think I’d like what they were having. Emily and I had some sort of Chinese pasta. It was weird and not my favorite but it was ok. We went to a beach after lunch and got to walk in the ocean. I’m definitely going back to Sokcho to hang out. When we got back to Hongcheon we met the team for dinner. 

Emily wanted me to teach her how to swim... She's ten and doesn't know how to swim! Neither does Kevin. I wanted to go but didn't want to go swimming in my jersey and have to be wet for the trip back... 

Sunbok, me, Eunju, Jonglan, and Jonglan's husbands sister and sisters husband. Those two came to the beach with us. The sister spoke a little english because they honeymooned in Hawaii. One of their relatives lives there. They were super nice!