Monday, February 21, 2011

Monday was Field Trip Day. We went to see an amazing martial arts show/play called JUMP. It was soooo sooo sooooooo good! We weren’t allowed to take pictures during the show, but I found a short video on youtube to share with you.

After JUMP we went to eat  a buffet lunch at a hotel that was right across the street from Haeundae beach, which is the most popular beach in Busan.

The second part of the field trip was a trip to Posco, a GIANT steel mill that the Koreans are VERY proud of. POSCO is in Pohang, which is about 1.5 – 2 hours from Busan. We all loaded back into the bus to get ready for round two.

Unfortunately, I started feeling really carsick on the way to POSCO. I stuck it out and was so relieved when we made it to Pohang. It took awhile to maneuver through the city and actually get to POSCO. When the buses stopped, we all got out to go to the restroom and take a group picture in front of an old furness that they had displayed. Afterwards, we were all told to get back on the buses. My bubble immediately burst. This was a bus tour! Not only was I going to be stuck in the bus for two more hours, but our tour guide didn’t speak English… oh my! Our orientation leaders had to translate it into English for us and it was really too complex to get a good translation. Plus, a lot of the things they were telling us to look at were covered with fences that were lined with vines and shrubs. We were able to get off the bus once during the tour. We went inside of one of the buildings to watch a giant block of flaming hot steel going down the line and being washed off and molded into a longer, thinner sheet of steel. We weren’t allowed to take any pictures for “security purposes.” We were taken back to the building with the restrooms and we were allowed to go to the bathroom, and then we were stuck on the bus for another two hours. Being carsick for 6 hours was definitely one of my least favorite things about orientation.

The girls all went to eat at a traditional Korean restaurant that night, but I stayed in because I was still feeling bad. I ended up eating snacks from the convenience store again. I also took some Dramamine to help me feel better/sleep. I must have been pretty delirious because I ended up putting my Coke in the shoe closet when I meant to put it in the refrigerator.

Tuesday & Wednesday

I forgot to bring my camera on Tuesday and Wednesday, but we were very busy during these two days. We were back to the breakfast, lectures, lunch, lectures, dinner, Korean class schedule. After all of this, I met up with my group to prepare for our lesson plan presentations on Thursday.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Thursday we had our group lesson plan presentations. My group was great. We all worked really well together and our lesson was voted second best by the class. The presentations were all really great and gave me a lot of ideas for my classroom. We were all so excited to be done that we jumped for joy!

Later in the day we were introduced to the head of our metropolitan office of education (MOE). Everyone was very anxious because afterwards we finally were able to find out where in Busan we would be and what level we would be teaching.

Then we had the Closing Ceremony & Dinner.

After the week we had, we all decided to go out and celebrate.

We started at a place called WTF? That had specials for the EPIK teachers.

Priscilla and I tried soju for the first time… Cilla hated it!

We didn’t stay long at WFT? But here’s what we found once we left…

So after WTF? we went to a place called Bob Marley, but didn’t stay long. Then we went to a place called Thursday Party. It was an absolute blast. Not long after being there we met a table of Korean university students that were having a great time singing pop songs in English. Megan found free pizza… I swear she has a pizza radar. We all just mingled and had fun chatting with a lot of people we knew we probably weren’t going to see for awhile.

Right before we left the bar we stumbled across something quite interesting…

Popcorn seasoned with curry

Also, it looks as though some guy left his phone on the seat of his motorcycle while he went out to party. I wonder if it was there when he got back…? In the US I would say absolutely not, but in Korea, it wouldn’t surprise me if he found it right where he left it.

Cellphone left on motorcycle

I think that’s enough for now! I had originally planned to write about Friday also, but once I started writing I realized that I had enough to say about Friday that it deserved its own post. It will be up tomorrow so be sure to come back to take a look!