March posts!!

Alright... so now I'll be posting what I have been doing here for the past 2 weeks in my city, GUNSAN! If you want to know where it is, you can copy and paste the following:

Gunsan, Jeollabuk-do, South Korea.


Here goes! (btw, it's a continuation from the previous post)


Feb. 27 / Saturday – woke up around 11…. Picked up Justin Lee went back to our place, chilled for a bit and then walked around for a while till we finally had lunch… we ate a ta chicken place….. kinda like the one we went to before we left Jeonju. Anyways, after that we walked around some more… found the movie theatre around here…. then we went to a café and just chilled there… tous les jours….. it was called…. And then we went back home….then we chilled for a bit…. i had ramen for dinner…. And then we went out to a bar called ‘TLC’… however, the place was full of G.I.’s and yeah, it was a bit too rowdy. Full of idiots… and then we went to antoher bar, called the Garsten or something.. german bar, but owned by Koreans I believe…. Anyways… we had a pitcher there and hten we went home



Feb. 28, Sunday – we made our way to Namwon, where Trent was living, b/c he said he was bored out of his mind and he misses us a lot. So off to Namwon we go. Justin couldn’t go with us b/c he had some things he had to do with his mentor teacher. Lola and Hanna were with their aunt and they happened to be in Jeonju, and offered us a ride to Namwon. It was a very nice thing their aunt did for us. It was over an hour drive! Or about an hour… and they came all the way from Seoul too!!! That’s like driving from my house to York University (approx. 40 mins), on Steeles, and then driving another hour West, soo…. That would be….. uumm… wherever an hour West will take you, lol…

Anyways, we get to his place, his place is huge, as he’s living in a one bedroom apartment… yes, apartment, not a studio or bachelor’s, an apartment. All to himself… what a lucky guy… after settling down we just chill and talk, then we went to this bar called ‘Wabar’ with his mentor teacher who lives 2 rooms away from him. Her name is Jennifer… she speaks English pretty well and she even drew a map of the area they were in. A very detailed map with every store name listed, where to go buy things, where to go to if Trent was sick, etc., etc., it was amazing! Anyways, so this Wabar, it has like all the beers of the world. Well, most beer anyways, so if I’m ever craving for a Heineken or some other non-korean beer, I go to this bar. But, the nightlife here ain’t cheap, so I don’t think I’ll be going out that often… hhmm…=/



Mar. 1, Monday – woke up, we were suppose to go walking around and go to some garden to check out it’s beauty, however… it was raining and it was just one of those gloomy days and so we decided to call it off and go again some other time when its spring and hopefully the weather would be nicer. We go walking around E-Mart… okay, side lesson here on Korea. Three biggest places they have here… E-mart, Lotte Mart and Homeplus. (They have Costco here somewhere, but it’s only in the bigger cities) and basically, you can find any of the first two Mart’s almost anywhere in any city. They are like the wal-marts of Korea…. Okay back on topic. So… we walked around some more, window shopped and went home. There’s nothing to do in Korea when its raining, that’s one of the downsides. So went back home, went to Lotte mart to buy my new bed, as the old one is disgusting and went home, lazed around and tis the end to another day.



Mar. 2, Tuesday – first day of school! Woke up, walked to school, got lost, had to call and see where I was going and finally made it to school for lunch. Went to the cafeteria, sat beside the teachers. Now, I dunno if they don’t like me or its just b/c I don’t speak Korean hence they don’t really talk to me, but some of these teachers seem pretty cold. They don’t bother saying ‘Hi’ (안녕하세요) at all… I dunno… it just bothers me. Whatever… I have other teachers I can chill with. So awkwardly just sat there eating lunch, once that was over with, I went on a lil’ tour with this other teacher who used to be my mentor teacher and then I met the native English speaker teacher, Connie. She’s Canadian, from Brampton, and was originally from Newfoundland. GEOFF!!!! If you’re reading this… which you should be… cheers to you for the Newfies!!!

Anyways… so we talked until it was time to go… oh, yeah, another thing… I have to stay here until 4:30pm everyday, even though I don’t have any kids to teach, just b/c I have to. What a big waste of time!!! I’ve seen my classroom and I know where the supplies are… anyways… back onto topic… talked, school was done, went home, then we met up with the other ppl that were also teaching in Gunsan and is with the TaLK program, we had dinner and then went to a bar for a few drinks and then went to play pool. And my gosh, my co-teacher (Kim), he’s a good drinker! There was this drink called ‘Bbyong Gah Ri’ (뽕가리) there’s a whole bunch of stuff in it. Midori, Bacardi, beer, coconut, banana, and basically, if you want a quick drunk, you drink this and within 10 mins you’ll be buzzed off your mind, lol. Ask Justin Lee, he got a good buzz out of it, hahaha… sorry Justin :P

I think I’ll be picking up on darts and pool. Those seem to be the only things you can do around here. Watch out Jerry :P



Mar. 3, Wednesday – went to school again, talked until end of classes again with Connie, as we both have nothing to do until next week. Went with my mentor teacher to the Immigration Office to pick up my passport, just to find out that its not ready until Friday actually. And I need to exchange money, and I don’t have my passport =(

So I gave the money to my mentor, as her friend works at a bank and her friend will transfer the money into my account, which I hopefully remember the PIN to… yeah I know, fail -_-…

Got home, then went out to dinner with Connie and her family. Met the husband Troy and their daughter Meghan… Troy is a minister and also teaches at a high school here in Gunsan and I met the daughter already the first day I met Connie, she’s more comfortable speaking Korean than she is speaking English and she’s 8. She’s gonna have lots of stories to tell when she goes abroad =)

We went to Pizza Hut… yes, Pizza Hut, it was pretty good and a taste of Home I guess you can say and we got the one with the crust that has the cheese/sweet potato inside and you take it off and you can dip it into this fondue and eat it. It was pretty cool :P



Mar. 4, Thursday – the mattresses arrive today!! Well, the ones that me and Bryce ordered… so got up, made instant noodles, cooked some veggies that look like spinach, not sure if it is and boiled two eggs, b/c I don’t have a frying pan yet to actually cook them. I’ll need to start cooking the rice soon so I can start making curry rice and other stuff. I’m craving rice again =(

The mattresses arrive and now I have a new bed! No more disgusting bed for me to sleep on… hopefully this bed will give me some comfort as I haven’t been getting quality sleep lately. I keep waking up, so I’m pretty tired during the mornings. Anyways… I just typed out the last few days of what I’ve done b/c ppl have been complaining about me not updating my blog. I’m at school right now as I’m typing this on Word… ti’s 3pm!! 1.5hr to go before I’m done today and start again tomorrow. Monday I’ll start to actually teach, I think they have some kind of interview/test here where they interview the kids and if the kids pass, that’s how they get into the afterschool program. Its kinda sad, that only the smarter ones get in but not the not-as-fast or not-as-smart ones. Regardless, I have no control over this, and I’m new to it, so I’ll just play the game as it comes I guess.


Okay… so after school I went to sleep b/c I was feeling sick. I wake up an hour or two later feeling like crap, then I had projectiles coming out of me orally and it wasn’t nice at all.



Mar. 5, Friday – suppose to go to Jeonju this weekend, but since I wasn’t really confirmed and Trent was sick, the girls went up to Seoul to see their aunt and we just stayed in our cities and chilled.


Mar. 6, Saturday – Me, Bryce and Justin Lee we went to have lunch at Lotteria.. its like Korea’s own version of fastfood…. So yes you can find corn as a side here and you can find a bulgogi burger here, just like you can at mcdonalds. Afterwards, we walked around and we found the local market that Bryce have seen while riding on the bus to go to school. We walked around in there for a while, it was kinda interesting, lots of spice peppers, fish/stingrays layed out, vegetables, and oh yeah…. DOG… after that we went to CGV… the newer theatre that’s very close by of Lotte Cinema… whoever owns the chain products of Lotte… is a very rich person. Anyways… so we saw ‘Alice in Wonderland’… it was interesting… but I wasn’t impressed or liked it a lot… it was just…. Okay, lol. Afterwards, we went to eat dinner at this chain store that I’ve seen around often… we also found a Jimjilbang place… hopefully I can go soon, and if nobody goes with me then I might go myself… check it out and see how it is.



Mar. 7, Sunday – went to Lotte mart and shopped for appliances with my mentor, bought my rice cooker, electric tea kettle and microwave! Bought a pan, some bread and a wooden spatula… now I can actually start cooking… sweeet



Mar. 8, Monday – first day of actual teaching! Holy crap was it hectic… I didn’t know the schedule, or rather I wasn’t given anything… the kids all spoke Korean and not even a little English…. They spoke like words and maybe phrases… only a few knew very basic English. Luckily, Connie, the native English speaking teacher that works at my school was still there and doesn’t leave till 4:30pm (when I’m done work) helped me out… I was drowning and luckily she saved me.



Mar. 9, Tuesday – today was slightly better as my co-teacher, JuHyeong, was there and he helped translate a little bit to the kids to explain what’s happening and we continued on. Although, maybe we did a little bit too much translating because the kids weren’t really listening to me, but rather to him. The TV STILL doesn’t work yet… and until they get that problem fixed, I can’t do ANYTHING with the kids in terms of actual teaching and games, etc. as I have them all on the computer…. GAAAAHHH!!!!!!! We’ll see how it goes… oh and yeah… my internet hasn’t been working the whole night before same with all of today!!! Wtf?! Technician coming in tmr, so hopefully that goes well. Justin’s birthday today as well, we went out to a place called ‘The Galbi’… the food was awesome, but it was quite expensive there… friggin’ everything in Korea seems pretty expensive… hopefully we can find another place somewhere next time and it won’t be as expensive. Afterwards, we went to a bar called ‘Page’, a quiet cozy bar. I like it… maybe I’ll start going there… if I can find ppl -_-… but its also expensive, so I might want to start finding different alternatives.