LAZY UPDATE #10

Sorry for not updating for a long time.  Blogger was down for a a couple of days before and this week has been so. freaking. BUSY.  Like, really really busy.  But many exciting things have happened as well, and I am excited to write about them! It's been so long since I wrote my last post so I'm not going chronologically.  I'm just going to state the exciting things which happened during the last two weeks.

Firstly, I went bowling with my volleyball team last Saturday near our church.  I haven't been bowling in a long time, but I thought I was still pretty good at it.  Unfortunately, pride always comes before fall and I ended up being the ultimate loser amongst the whole group.  My scores were 32 and 41 - don't laugh.  But it was still a really fun night! I always appreciate the time I have with my volleyball team because it's a chance for me to practise my Korean.

We also went to Lotteria afterwards to eat 팥빙수 patbingsoo (shaved ice and other condiments).  It was the rule of the game - whichever team lost had to treat the other team to dessert.  My team lost spectacularly to the other team - they had the two best players out of the whole team (no...not a sore loser.  Honest! hehe) - so we bought the ice as well as some chips and ice-cream.

Another exciting which happened this week was my university's festival!  It was called LUCAUS (can't remember what it stands for) and it went for three days.  There were lots of booths around the campus selling things like beer, fruit, t-shirts and other things.  Unfortunately I didn't get to take any photos of the booths since I was normally rushing to class when I saw them.  But I did take photos of the most important part of the festival: the concerts at night time.

We had a lot of celebrities come for the night concerts like 김태우 Kim Tae Woo and No Brain, but the biggest and most popular star which came was 2NE1.  I just thought I'd bolden that word in case you missed it.  They're not the first celebrities I've seen since I came to Seoul, but definitely the ones which the most people know about it.  

The night concerts were really loud.  Each night I could hear it from my room in the dormitory, since the events are held in the sports ground right downstairs, but I attended the last one in person.  The atmosphere is pretty much like a real-live concert, with glowsticks and people jumping up and down to the songs.  After the concert a lot of people go drinking, but I didn't.  

I also dyed my hair for the very first time this week.  One of the people I sing with at church is a hairdresser, and he came highly recommended amongst my church friends, so I went to him in Gangnam.  I will be honest, as usual, and say that the colour which it turned out to be isn't what I wanted.  I actually wanted a dark red/purple colour and fully dye all of my hair, but right now it's highlighted red and gold.  It looks nice, but whenever I don't get what I was expecting in my mind I get a little iffy.  Maybe I'll change it later on, but I think I have to learn how to be patient with myself.  

MY ROOM MATE IS THE BEST

I haven't really talked about my room mate on my blog before, but I really should because she's one of the nicest and accepting people I know.  She also makes me laugh a lot because of the way she says things and acts, and I don't think I've ever gotten annoyed at her.  And that, my friends, is pretty spectacular on her behalf.  But unfortunately, I'm pretty sure that she's been annoyed at me before but is too nice to say anything about it.  Why do I say this?

Last night after I came home, I noticed that that the bathroom sink had been cleaned, my items were neatly stacked up and the toilet bin was clean.  I was like "Aw you didn't have to do that!" to my room mate, and I also apologised for being such a slob as well.  I'll be honest - I have only cleaned our room once, and that was during the first week I came here.  All the other times it's been my room mate who swept the floor and cleaned everything else.  I kept saying sorry over and over again, because I genuinely felt sorry for being so untidy and making her do all the work.  But she said something which I hope I will never forget: 

"You don't have to keep saying sorry.  Actions speak louder than words."

Of course I've heard this saying before, and I've probably said it a lot of times of as well, but it really affected me last night.  First of all, the way she said it made it sound like she was comforting me, when she was actually teaching me a lesson.  Secondly, the fact that she is patient enough to teach me rather than complain to other people about me (I think...) made me feel so much more guilty for not doing anything.  I've always been disciplined in the normal Asian way - my dad would yell at me for an hour until I was shaking and then I'd say sorry, but it would never really mean much to me.  

This time it feels different.  Why say sorry with empty words when I can show my genuine apology through actions? I've realised that I can say sorry over a thousand times and the only person it would benefit is me.  It only makes me feel better by saying sorry, but it doesn't help the other person at all.  The only way I can prove my sincerity is by making sure that I do something about it.  

BASEBALL GAME

I went to my first baseball game ever last night!  One of my professors is acquainted with the president of the Doosan Bears so he was able to get us some pretty nice tickets as well as giving us the opportunity to meet the president and see his headquarters underneath the stadium.  The Doosan Bears are one of Seoul's two baseball teams (LG Twins) and their home stadium is Jamsil Stadium, which is the one we went to last night.  The president gave our whole class (our professor took the whole class) baseball caps with the signature 'D' of Doosan as gifts which was nice. The one below is the women's style, but I actually prefer the men's style - navy, red and white - but I'm still happy.  It was free!! Hehe...

Baseball's not really big in Australia, so I've never been too eager about the sport, but it's so different when you're in the stadium.  There are so many team chants and songs that the fans know, and then for each individual player the music speaker thing plays a different introduction song.  It's hard not to get excited when you have a thousand people behind screaming and singing along.  I couldn't really make out what they were saying in some of the chants, but there were two which I ended up following along with:

"(name of player) 안타 anta!"  = 'whoever' hit!
"(name of player) 홈런 homreon!" = 'whoever' home run! 

There are also matching clap rhythm pattern ...things...which go with these cheers, but it's difficult to write out.  The best way to learn is to actually go to a game.  It's pretty easy to pick up.  

And no baseball game is complete with three things: cheerleaders, the one guy and 'thunder sticks'.  The cheerleaders came out during the break times when the teams were switching from batting to fielding, and they danced to a lot of the recent pop songs e.g. Girl's Day, C.N. Blue and Kan Mi Yeon.  I really would not want to be a cheerleader, personally, because it gets kind of cold at night time and all they were wearing were mini-tops and mini-skirts.  Anyway, the 'one guy' I'm talking about is this one guy, dressed in the team uniform, who has a whistle and leads all the fans to cheer by blowing on his whistle.  The fans obviously know what his whistle patterns indicate, because they would always burst into a song when the one guy blows his whistle a particular way.  He's also kind of the atmosphere maker during the match.  And thunder sticks are those two plastic sticks puffed up with airs, and when you hit them they make a loud, superficial clapping sound.  Very effective and hand-friendly.

LAZY UPDATE #9

I was looking at my calendar and counting back the days to Sports Day and I can't believe that it's only been a week and a half since that sunny, winning, tiring day.  I was having dinner with Amber (pastor) two nights ago, and we came upon the subject of time; when you're in another country, time doesn't seem to follow the rules.  It feels as though time stretches out for longer than it really is - one month can feel like six months, one week like three weeks.  It's also a problem when I do lazy udpates because I have to think for a while about what I actually did during the week, instead of just going Oh! I did this this and this.  Or is that just old age catching up with me?

So for the Friday and Saturday after Sports Day, I rested for two days straight.  My voice was pretty much gone and my body felt like it needed three million years of sleep.  On Friday I only had one class at night time, and on Saturday I stayed inside my room the whole day.  I had a team project due on Monday so I was working on it from morning till evening until I finally finished it.  The project was to re-write parts of an episode of Friends - my team doesn't really speak English so after we brainstormed together, they wrote the script in Korean and I had to translate it back into English and 'Friends-ize' it.

On Sunday after church we went to the Hi! Seoul International Festival.  There were lots and lots of people there - mainly foreigners- and there were stands from many different countries standing alongside each other. There was also a food street where each country had its own little tent serving the national or most popular food.

We had a public holiday on Tuesday because it was Buddha's Birthday (The Coming Of Buddha Day) - so no classes again! Looking back, I probably should have gone to a celebration parade of Buddha or something related to that public holiday just to see how Korean festivals work.  But I didn't, so I guess it's too late.  That night I had a celebration dinner with my volleyball team in a restaurant in Myeongdong.  We had barbeque (I think it's customary to have barbeque for every celebratory thing ever here ....) and then we went to this amazing coffee/chocolate shop nearby.  It was so much fun because they were ALL Korean (i.e. their English isn't fluent), which is a surprising difficult situation for me to find myself in since most of the friends I've made can speak English to a pretty high level.

On Thursday night I met up with a friend who I had only really met once, but because we both speak Cantonese it was like there was this cultural bond between us which made it easier to become friends.  She came to Korea to take a make-up course and she invited me to be her 'model' for the night.  Over the past few years I've developed an interest in make-up - not me putting it on my face, but how to use what for the right occasions and how to match it with an outfit (roiworld...cough) - so I was pretty excited when I saw the make-up classroom and everything.

I didn't have any classes on Friday because my night class was cancelled for the week, so I took the time to go shopping in Myeongdong.  I was originally looking for a pair of sport shoes a la the Korean-style New Balance type, but I couldn't find any which I liked so I ended up buying other stuff instead.  I also met up with Amber for dinner in Apgujeong for barbeque (!!! ^^ ) and then we went to this reeeally nice coffee shop around the area.  The prices were kind of ....pricey, but the atmosphere was so nice.

Saturday was the second cultural excursion for the international students.  We went to the DMZ and an exhibition museum near the Blue House.  The DMZ was .....okay.  It wasn't super exciting but I guess it's part of the whole "I went to Korea" thing - it's just one of the places you have to visit when you're in Korea.

After the excursion I went out with my church friends for dinner and noraebang, which was so much more fun.      I didn't take any photos though, unfortunately, but I did get to hear one of my friends (who's quite demure and sweet) rap for the first time!

Yesterday was one of my friend's birthday.  She and the other exchange students had gone clubbing on Saturday night to celebrate, but since I was out with my other friends (and clubbing really isn't my thing anyway) I promised I'd spend the afternoon with her on Sunday.  Since the weather was so beautiful, we went bike-riding along the Han River and stopped half way for some ice-cream.  For dinner we met up with some other people and went to Hongdae.

In other news, I've been feeling tired a lot lately.  I'm thinking it's because of my eating choices and lack of exercise.  I always makes plans to go to the gym in the morning or at night time, but then I never do because either I'm lazy or I have homework I was supposed to have finished before.  T_T

HOME

"Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me." Psalm 51:10


Well hello, personal devotions.  Long time no see.  I'll keep it short.

I'm a big believer in the saying "Home is where the heart is".  You can have birthplaces, places you have great memories in, the place where you grew up, but 'home' as a definition can mean so many different things.  In the message given in today's personal devotion, it mentions a child of God is always welcomed home.  In this context, home for me would be church.   I've always subconsciously known that church is a place which makes me happy, despite all the drama which goes on sometimes, but I think this clarifies why I feel safe there.  When I first went to Samil Church, it didn't feel like a foreign church, or an English-speaking Korean church, but it felt like home.  I remember when that Sunday I wasn't really feeling that happy, but as soon as I stepped inside the building I could feel so much love going around.  That probably sounds so sappy and cringe-worthy and all that stuff which makes me shudder, but at that moment in time I felt so thankful that I was part of God's family.  Knowing that He will always be there for me, knowing that He will always have his arms wide open despite me failing all these times....it's something which can't be described.

WEIGHT, I'M NOT DONE YET

My roommate and I were talking about how we felt a different kind of pressure whilst studying here in Korea.  Both of us agreed that back at home, even though the assignments were worth more and probably needed more research or whatnot, the pressure wasn't as intense.  Here the pressure to study and do well is so apparent everywhere you go.  It got me thinking about what kind of pressures are more imminent here in Seoul than back at home and how they've affected me over these few months.  And the one which has probably affected the most is the weight factor.

Like so many other people have noticed, spoken about and warned me - the pressure to be thin is very obvious.  I am not kidding when I say that over 80% of the girls here look like bodies on two sticks.  Their legs are seriously.....진짜 장난아니다.  When you walk the streets of Seoul, you really start to understand how every girl has to be so self-conscious of her weight.  Before I came to Seoul, I read a lot of blogs where the bloggers themselves always expressed their indifference to the Korean thin-ness and how it didn't affect them.  I think it's great that they're not affected by it, but I guess I don't have their self-esteem nor their confidence to build up a wall against the slim-is-beauty propaganda.  I've never been naturally thin, and I've always had troubles with my weight.  So coming to a country where girls spend a lot of time grooming themselves and making sure they don't gain a single pound probably wasn't such a good idea, because I'm bound to be influenced by them.  And sure enough, the pressure and the constant advertisements about body lines and diets are getting to me.  The pressure to look thin and to BE thin is overwhelming.  It's one of the reasons why I would like to go back home and see some 'normal' sized people; "what is normal?" I hear you ask - well, that's another discussion for another time when I'm free.

4진 4진 화이팅!

One of the bad things about living by myself is that I never do my laundry on time.  I always leave it to the very last day when I'm completely out of underwear, and then I find myself in the same situation - wanting to take a shower but having to wait two hours for washing and drying.

Anyway.

Today was Samil Church Sports Day! It was a long, long day, especially because I haven't been feeling too well lately (sore throat and coughing) but it was a lot of fun.  The weather was (extremely) sunny and the skies were blue and cloudless.  The most exciting part of the day was when my group WON THE VOLLEYBALL COMPETITION!!! We've been practising for almost a month so to win was a great feeling.  I'll just put some pictures up from today's events because I'm sunburnt and tired and don't really feel like saying anything else except 4진 4진 화이팅!

LAZY UPDATE #8 (Part 2)

Lazy Update #8 Part 1 is HERE

Continuing on...

Friday was pretty quiet during the daytime.  I didn't have much to do except wait for the ROYAL WEDDING.  Did you watch it? I know there are some people who were like "Stop broadcasting it already!" while others were really, really excited.  I wasn't either of them.  I just wanted to see what people were wearing and what the wedding gown would look like.  I actually missed the dress (but I saw it later) because I had to go to my class, where the professor invited us out for dinner and drinks instead.

Let me just say this: Koreans are masters of drinking.  Like, even the Germans would be beaten by Koreans because while Germans probably stop at their limit, Koreans go wayyy past their limit.

Anyway, we had Korean barbeque with lots of meat and vegetables whilst drinking.  I don't normally drink that much, so when the professor went 'Bottoms up!' on the first drink I almost cried.  It was a very interesting experience.  The lecturers back at home will be okay for a drink or two outside of classroom hours, but none of them would ever pay for a dinner and drinks, as well as invite the whole class back to their home some other day and even initiate a 'sleepover'.

Saturday was turning out to be the worst day ever until night time so I'll keep the recap of daytime events short.  The international team from Samil Church gathered together to practise for the connection party coming up on Sunday, and we rehearsed what we would do and also decorated the room.  At night time, I went out with a group of friends to watching Thor.  I was initially debating whether to go or not because of my mood and because the weather was really bad, but I'm soo glad I went.  The movie was pretty good, but the best part about the night was the company.

On Sunday, we had the International Samil Church Connection Party.  The party turned out to be a good success.  We had lots of new people come and it was fun to be able to show that Christians aren't just stick-to-the-Bible-party-poopers at all.  I had volunteered to be in the performance part of the party, so that meant I was signed up for modelling in the cultural fashion show.  I've never ever modelled before so it was kind of awkward when we were rehearsing, but luckily it got better when we actually had to walk in front of everyone.  The outfits were mainly Korean and African style, but there was one girl who wore a 'ninja-inspired-space-looking' outfit.

I left the party straight after it finished because I was meeting up with other friends to go to ice-skating and bowling in Lotte World! It was my first time in Lotte World, and after hearing so much about it and seeing it in dramas and variety shows, I'm glad I got to go there.  Ice skating was fun but tiring.  We didn't realise that we had to have gloves before we entered the ring, so there was a bunch of foreigners scrambling around for cash in front of the glove machine right next to the entrance.  Probably would have been a funny sight for the local people.  

After that we went bowling and then had some dinner.  The dinner was so yummy.  It was 보쌈 bo ssam - meat and lots and lots of vegetables.  Some of the guys didn't join us for dinner because they were doing something else (no idea what), so by the time they came to the restaurant we were almost finished.  They had to sit there waiting for us while watching us eat all that delicious food.  Poor boys.  

To end the day, a little group of us went to have Sangria and honey bread in the little cafe near our university campus.  It was the perfect way to round out the day.  Two of the girls had brought their Go, Stop! (Korean card game which you see every ahjumma playing in the dramas) cards so I finally learnt how to play.  It's pretty simple to learn up till the point system, to which I still have no idea how to count.  

LAZY UPDATE #8 (Part 1)

(I'm dividing this Lazy Update into two parts because there is just too much to write in one post.)  This past week has been crazy - both physically and mentally.  Midterms finished last Friday so the following four days were a mini-holiday.  I got lucky with my exam timetable though.  A lot of people, especially the local students, had exams up until Tuesday which was the last day of the schedule.  The four day break was really good for releasing all that pent up stress about my mid-terms and 'refreshed' me for the next two months of school work.  Speaking of which, I feel like these next few weeks are going to be so crazy again.  I have so many projects due within the same time, plus church work, plus meeting up with friends (I know that's not necessarily...necessary...but!) plus figuring out how to fit in exercise everyday.  I am getting fat.  :(

Soo, last Tuesday was the last day of my four-day mini holiday.  The weather was so horrible and it was raining all day, but I had to go out and do some gift shopping.  I had no idea what I was going to buy, so I was station hopping around Seoul in hope that I could find something good.  I ended up finding what I wanted at 이대 Idae (Ewha University) and 명동 Myeongdong.  That night I went out to have dinner with my room mate for the very first time!  We've been getting closer and closer lately, which I really like because this was how I wanted to be with my room mate in the first place.  It only took two months to get to this stage....
Anyway, after that I joined some other exchange students at a nearby bar where I met some Koreans who frequent the E-Lounge (English Lounge) in our library.  We then proceeded to the noraebang and spent an hour just singing and tiring ourselves out before walking back to the dormitory in time for the 1 am curfew.

Wednesday was the first official day back after mid-term exams, and for some reason it felt really good to have classes again.   I guess I like the structure and order of school.  After my classes finished, I went to meet up with a friend who had come from Hong Kong.  She and her other friends were in Seoul for three days and they asked me to join them for dinner.  We went to 광창시장 Gwangchangshijang near 남대문 Namdaemun and had tastings of three kinds of food - 김밥 kimbap (rice rolls similar to sushi), 빈대떡 bindaeddeok (green bean pancake ...soo good) and  육회 yookhwae (raw beef strips).  The first two items were really delicious, but the raw beef wasn't really my thing.  I ordered a bowl of 냉면 naengmyeon (cold noodles) instead.  At the beef restaurant, one of the owners started asking us how to say things in Cantonese after finding out that we were from Hong Kong.  It was really funny hearing him pronounce the words wrong, but I honestly applaud him for trying to learn it.  I guess you learn whatever you can and whenever you can; that guy will definitely go far.

It was really nice to see my friend again, and to meet her other friends as well.  After dinner we went to Doota, one of the biggest shopping malls in Seoul.  The group of friends spent a long time looking around and trying unsuccessfully to bargain with the shop keepers.  That's one of the things here - you don't haggle that much.  You can ask for discount but it's seen to be rude if you start haggling.  I guess that's the one of the differences between Koreans and Chinese people.

Thursday was really tiring, but one of the best days during my week.  I had originally planned to visit my buddy's home and have dinner with her family, but her mum thought I was coming next week instead.  It didn't matter though, because we ended up going sight-seeing in Seoul instead.  First we went to 청게천 Cheonggyecheon which is the small river running through inner Seoul.  There were lanterns hung up everywhere in preparation for Buddha's Birthday.  Apparently it's really beautiful at night time when the lanterns are lit up, so maybe I'll go have a look when it's closer to May 10th.

After that, we went along 광화문 Gwanghwamun which is the gate right outside the biggest palace in Seoul.  There's a massive statue of King Sejong and statues of the three inventions he's most famous for - the sundial (pretty sure that was invented by someone else ...), celestial globes and of course, Hangul.  There's also a huge statue of one of the best soldiers of Korea.  I can't remember his name, but he was the one who defeated the Japanese back when they invaded....so I guess that's pretty important.

We arrived at our destination - 경북공 Gyeongbukgong - the biggest palace in Seoul.  This was the place where the king and queen used to live during the old days.  It was humungous.  And SO pretty.  I don't think I've ever seen so many trees in one place since arriving in Seoul, and the flowers were all blooming and out.  It was also really peaceful and quiet which is another thing you don't get a lot in Korea.  My buddy kept saying "Oh I feel so refreshed now" (sounds kind of funny in English but makes better sense in Korean) and I knew exactly what she meant.

Walking around the entire palace would have taken over two hours, but we had other places to go so we left after only an hour.  We were looking for 북촌한옥마을 Bukchonhanokmaeul Bukchon Hanok Village, but it was already six o'clock and we were really hungry.  She took me to this restaurant which is famous for 수재비 soojaebi (noodles in hot soup) and it was soo good.  Especially since the weather was kind of cold, the hot soup and 'noodles' (it's similar to 餃子皮) made me feel SO much better and energized.  

My buddy didn't actually know where the village was so she asked a couple of policeman.  They were entirely unhelpful so we had to walk around and look for signs ourselves.  Eventually we walked into the right place and behold - silence.  There are actually signs saying that you shouldn't make noise as to not disturb the residents, so it was extremely quiet.  Even though there weren't signs saying you couldn't talk, my buddy and I felt compelled to speak in whispering voices rather than normal volume.

Part 2 will be up soon....