Hello everyone,

I know its been a while since our last update. For the most part, not much has happened. Amy and I are doing alright. We have both recovered from being sick. Amy had an infection that required her going to the doctor and getting some antibiotics. Scott had a small cold.

The weather has become very cold and dry. It is definitely going to be a change for both of us as we are used to Southern California winters. Nevertheless, autumn is beautiful here. The trees have turned red, orange, and yellow and the air feels crisp and fresh.

Here is a list of stuff that has happened since our last update:

1. Kindergarten field trip to a Pottery Festival: We took the kindergartners to a pottery festival in countryside of Ulsan. Koreans used to and still do use these traditional pots called "Onggi" to cook food in. It was a fun day to hang out with the kids.

2. Sports day: A twelve hour day of playing sports with our coworkers and bosses. It was forced and controlled fun and not very fun.

3. Halloween party: On the Friday before Halloween we had a Halloween party for all of the students. We didn't have to teach classes, but we did have a candy room, a haunted house, a secret box room, and a mummy room. All of the teachers dressed up in costumes. Scott was a vampire and Amy was a doctor. The kids had fun, but it was another twelve hour exhausting day.

4. Orphanage trips: We continue to volunteer at the orphanage in Ulsan about once a month. However, last weekend we went with our church to an orphanage they volunteer at in Busan. It was nice to go, but there were too many volunteers and not enough children so there was not much for us to do. Nevertheless it was a good trip.

5. Costco trips: We have decided to make a Costco trip once a month. It has been really nice to have some more Western food. We make a trip to Costco once a month.

Next week Scott has a kindergarten parents meeting. He has been preparing his kids for this meeting for over a month now. It is basically a big performance for the parents so it looks like the children are learning English. He is looking forward for it to be finished so he can go back to his normal teaching routine.

Also this weekend, we hope to go on a one night retreat with the church to a nearby mountain. We hope to bring Dori with us.

Speaking of Dori she is doing well and is as cute as ever. She seems healthy and happy.

Well that's it for now. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

One of the downsides of working at private schools in Korea is you typically don't get much vacation time. Fortunately for us, we were able to get a whole week off from work during Chuseok, a Korean harvest festival holiday (kind of like America's Thanksgiving). The holiday was on September 21-23. We used one of our five extra vacation days to get Monday off and at the last minute our school gave us Friday off as well. It was a much needed vacation after a hard week. We went to Seoraksan National Park in north eastern part of Korea. Don't worry, we didn't stray across the border into North Korea (you would have heard about it on the news already if we did). We spent three days hiking in the beautiful national park. It was very relaxing and refreshing to get away from work and the city and spend time in nature.

After that we decided to give Seoul another shot after our disastrous first attempt at seeing the city. Unfortunately we arrived in the middle of a surprise typhoon that was pounding the city with rain. This time we both had umbrellas, but we forgot to bring jackets. Also the subway stop we needed to get off at was completely flooded so we had to get off next stop and hail a cab to drive us back to the subway stop we needed to be at. After waiting for quite some time to get a cab, we were able to make one stop for us with the help of another foreigner visiting Seoul. We finally arrived at our hostel, both bodies and suitcase soaked through, after getting a little lost trying to walk to it. The only goal for that night was to find some half-decent Mexican food in Itaewon (the foreigner section of town). Thankfully, this time we were successful. The next day we were determined to get into Namsan Park, which we failed at last time. Again, thankfully, with the help of a map and Amy's amazing map reading abilities, we found our way into the park, which is less of a park and more of a mountain surrounded by a brick wall. Nevertheless, we walked through it and came upon a Chuseok festival with lots of people, traditional games, live music, and food. It was an interesting cultural experience to see. There are pictures of it on my Photobucket account. We spent two days in Seoul and left for home on Thursday.

We spent the remaining days mostly at home relaxing. The highlight of the weekend was shopping at Costco. There is a Costco in Busan, a big city about an hour away by train. We purchased a membership, got a Costco card, and went shopping. It was exciting to see and buy food that we are more accustomed to eating, like cheddar cheese and muffins. All in all it was a great vacation, so much so that we were depressed to go back to work.

However, we did go back to work and were met with Rochelle's replacements. Our friend Rochelle, who we went to college with and who helped get us these jobs, had her last day on the Friday before vacation. It was sad to see her go, but she will remain in Korea for a few more weeks doing some traveling and we hope to see her one more time before she leaves Korea. They replaced Rochelle with a British couple, Jack and Colleen, who have taught for a year in Korea before. They seem nice and are very experienced at working at a Korean private school.

We were also met with changes to our schedules, which is not uncommon. Scott got the better deal and now has three breaks a day. However, Amy has to work an hour later on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. She does get off earlier on Tuesday and Thursday.

We ask that you continue to pray for us and that we have strength to get through this year. It is getting easier in some ways and Amy and I are set on finishing a year here. However the job is draining and sometimes feels pointless and soul-crushing. More importantly, Amy and I have yet to make many friends, which has been hard on us. We continue to do things together and strengthen our relationship between each other. For example, this weekend we took Dori and walked along the river near our house and went to an art festival (pictures on Photobucket). Nevertheless, we desire to form some other relationships with other people and our failure to do so has made us homesick. If you could pray that we make friends that would be great.

Alright, this blog entry is long enough. Thank you for your support and prayers.

The past month

Since our vacation in Jeju, we have been very busy at both work and in our free time.

The highlight of these past few week has been a new addition to our home. We are "fostering" a dog from a local pet sanctuary until the end of our time in Korea. Her name is Dori, and she is a small, quiet white dog (at least part Maltese) who loves head rubs and knocking over the kitchen trash can to find food. When we took her in from the sanctuary, she was having a difficult time adjusting to life at the shelter (she had recently returned from another foster stay) as the other dogs were picking on her and not letting her eat her food. We are very happy to provide her a temporary home, and it makes our lives a little more joyful to have a little one to excitedly greet us when we return home from work. We have posted a picture of her in our photobucket (click on the link under "Pictures").

Both Scott and Amy have had highs and lows at work this past month. We cherish the small moments when one our students improves either in behavior or learning, or simply when they do or say something funny, but still both struggle with our "problem" classes (mostly the jr. high level students) and with the ridiculous and sexist management of the schools. Amy also had a hard week when her boss, who she got along with really well and felt like she had good communication with, suddenly left the school. We are unsure whether she quit or was fired, but either way Amy misses the positive atmosphere that her ex-boss brought to the school.

Next week Rochelle, our friend, will be leaving the school and a new couple will be coming to replace her. Scott's schedule will therefore be undergoing some good changes and he will most likely have less classes as there are two new teachers instead of one. Amy's schedule has also been undergoing changes lately, for the worse, and she now has to teach an extra 50 minutes (until 9:20 pm) on Wednesday without any extra time off or pay. As her schedule gets later and more erratic, it makes keeping a consistent eating and sleeping pattern difficult, and also makes sharing meals as a couple difficult.

In our free time, we have been doing our best to go on adventures, meet new people, and make friends. We occasionally go out to dinner with co-workers and their friends, and we recently have a discovered a British-style pub that we enjoy spending time at. We also volunteer at the orphanage when we can, and attend church most Sundays.
We are excited for the cooler weather that has just started to arrive, and we are hoping to explore more of Ulsan and go on hikes often.

Next weekend we will start a 6-day vacation for Chuseok (the Korean version of America's Thanksgiving), and we will travel to the northern part of the country for some time in a national park and then in Seoul. We are looking forward to spending some time away from Ulsan.

Jeju Island

Last week was summer vacation for our academy, which meant we had a five day weekend. We left on Thursday morning for Jeju Island, Korea's version of Hawaii. We took a bus to the airport in Busan and took a 40 minute plane ride to Jeju. When we arrived, we took another bus to the southern part of the island where our inn was located.

The best part of our trip was our stay at Tae Gong Gak Inn, a small 15 room hostel-type inn. The owners were very personable and remembered our names throughout our entire stay. They spoke fluent English and were very helpful in giving suggestions and directions for what we wanted to do.

On our first full day, we decided to hike Mount Halla, which was a total of about 20 kilometers (12.4 miles). It was a beautiful hike, but very difficult on our feet as we did not have proper hiking gear. Parts of the hike were jagged, slippery rock, so it was a long process and our feet and legs were sore for the rest of the trip.

The next day, we were sore and exhausted so we tried to have a relaxing day at the beach. Unfortunately, it was hot, humid, and there was absolutely no breeze, so we ended up pretending to be guests at the Hyatt hotel (right by the beach) in order to enjoy their air conditioning. In the evening, we took a walk to a waterfall near our inn. It was quite pretty and the mist from the waterfall was cool and refreshing.

On our third and last full day in Jeju, we took a long (hour and a half) bus ride around to the eastern side of the Island and took a ferry to Udo Island, a very small island near Jeju. We rented an ATV and spent a few hours riding around the circumference of the Island. It was quite beautiful with many green fields and open spaces, and the coast line was gorgeous. It's atmosphere is surprisingly very similar to that of the Irish coast.

Our trip home the next day was very smooth, which we were very thankful for after our experience in Seoul.
We had a nice summer vacation and are looking forward to more travels when we have more vacation time.

Last week marked the end of our second month teaching in Korea, and the time has been going very slowly. It feels as though we have been here more like 6 months rather than 2. Teaching is very hard work: though sometimes rewarding, it is often frustrating as the curriculum we are teaching the children is of little to no value. We have also encountered some ridiculous rules and micromanaging at our hagwans which make the whole experience even more frustrating. It is difficult to take this job seriously, but we are doing our best to find the good and at least teach the children something of value.

We will write more later.

I know it's been awhile. We haven't done a good job keeping you updated, but here's what's happened in the past few weeks.

Scott's birthday was on Monday July 19th. Amy cooked him birthday pancakes for breakfast and we had macaroni and cheese for dinner, which was sent to us from Amy's parents. Scott also received a cake at work, great gifts, and cards from my family. All in all it was a good day. Unfortunately the same could not be said for our weekend trip to Seoul.

When we arrived it was raining quite hard and Scott did not have an umbrella because it was accidentally taken by one of the students at his school the day before. Also we found out that the rain jacket that Scott bought from H&M, was not actually water proof. Needless to say Scott got very wet. It continued to rain hard most of the day making it hard for us to really do anything or see much. We were able to grab a decent lunch at a Thai restaurant, hang out at a coffee shop, and buy some books from an English bookstore in the foreigner section of Seoul. The rest of the evening was spent relaxing in our nice hotel room; one of the few highlights of the trip.

The next day was extremely humid. Our only goals for Sunday were to go to Seoul tower which shows you a great view of the city and get some Mexican food from the foreigner part of town. It should be mentioned here that Amy started getting sick on Friday and had a nice cold during this trip. So we set out for Seoul Tower via subway, got off at the correct subway, and continued to walk. Unfortunately Seoul Tower is located on a hill in a large park that has twenty foot high walls surrounding it, with no visible entrance that Amy or Scott could see. With it being so hot and humid and Amy not feeling well, we gave up frustrated and hungry for Mexican food. We were disappointed once again as the Mexican food was sub par. We ordered enchiladas and what we got were not enchiladas. After that we decided to give up and catch the earlier train home.

Of course we did not budget enough time to get back to the hotel grab our bags and make it to the station in time for the train and we missed it by one minute. It was either wait another couple of hours for the next train or take the express train which was a little more expensive. Scott decided to take the express train, but in order to take that train we had to go to another station to catch it. We got our tickets and waited for the connecting train to come. However, it came late and by the time we got to the station the express train was leaving. So we marched up to the counter and tried to tell the ticket counter attendant in very basic English what happened. As result of our efforts we got only half of a refund and had to pay for two more tickets. We finally got on a train headed towards the direction of home. We arrived in Busan found out no trains leave from that station going to Ulsan, so we took a subway to another train station waited another hour and finally got on a train going to Ulsan. After an hour and a half train ride we made it back to our apartment in Ulsan at 11:00.

All in all it was a terrible trip, but we definitely learned a lot from the experience.

This last week marked our first month living in Korea. So far it's been a very up and down journey with a broken bathroom, spicy food, a fun volunteer experience at the orphanage, a fixed bathroom, good students and not so good students. We look forward to the many more experiences and adventures in the coming eleven months. But enough of that; on to this last week's highlights.

Last Sunday, we went to a foreign church service at Simin International Church in Ulsan. It was good to worship with other believers together after more than a month of not attending a church. Unfortunately the main pastor was out of town so a member from the congregation preached a sermon about names and their significance. It was okay but we want to go again to hear the main pastor give a sermon. Also, apparently, in summertime church attendance drops as many people leave to go on vacation, so there were even less young foreign teachers there than we expected. Nevertheless we were able to go out to lunch with a group of foreign English teachers in attendance that Sunday. In celebration of July 4th we decided to go and get the traditional American food, burgers and fries, at a burger place pretty close to where we live. The food, although a little pricy, was not bad and it was good to connect with other Christian English teachers.

The work week was fairly uneventful for both Scott and Amy with a few exceptions. On Monday, Scott was informed of a kindergarten field trip to the Ulsan whale museum happening the following day at 9:30 am that he was required to go on. Despite the very short notice, he had a fun time with his students at the museum. There were dolphins, a small aquarium of many different fish, and a 4D movie with sharks, a giant squid, puffs of air and water, and, therefore, many crying children.

On Thursday evening after work, Amy and a fellow foreign teacher at her school, Rachel, were invited to their boss, Cathy's house for pizza and chicken. Amy had a nice time getting to know her boss more and the free pizza and chicken wasn't bad either. On Friday night, Scott attended a farewell dinner for fellow Korean teacher who was quitting. It was a great farewell dinner with delicious food. Yesterday, Scott and Amy cleaned the apartment in the morning and went to Ilsan beach with Rochelle and a couple other foreign English teachers in the afternoon. We had a relaxing time talking and laying on the beach. Finally, today was spent lounging around the apartment reading and relaxing. It has been raining since last night non-stop, which swayed us against going to the orphanage and in favor of having a lazy day at the apartment.

We are looking forward to several trips coming up, including an overnight trip to Seoul this coming weekend.

Well I need to get to bed now. We will write again soon.

Quite a few things have happened in the past several weeks, and we are finally feeling more settled in Korea. We got our bathroom fixed a few weeks ago, and we are starting to get used to the fact that the shower in Korea is merely a shower head attached to the wall.

We also finally got our alien cards (a form of Korean ID), so we were able to set up our bank accounts on Friday and get our cell phones yesterday (we are still trying to figure out how to make our phones work in English).

Last week's teaching was a bit more stressful than usual. On Tuesday Amy had a parent's meeting, where one of her classes performed memorized speeches and other English-speaking skills for their parents. It is a way for the hagwan to impress the parents with their child's English skills (although it is not really English skill, merely rote memorization). They feel that this will convince the parents to keep their child in our hagwan and not send them to another one. These meetings are stressful for both the foreign and English teachers because they are expected to put on a perfect performance for the parents. It falls on our shoulders to make sure the students know their speeches, as well as for us to memorize comments to say to the parents. Parent's meetings are probably the worst part of working at the hagwan. Luckily, neither of us have a parent's meeting coming up in the next few months.

On Thursday, we switched schools to get more "training" and to be observed by teachers at the other school (which of course was completely pointless as the two campuses do things very differently and we were already in the swing of things at our own schools). We were both observed by the school's directors as well as some of the teachers, and they gave us "comments" on our teaching. The one thing we learned from the experience is that Amy's campus is overall much better than Scott's--the schedule is better planned and everything is much more organized. There is also more collaboration between the Korean and foreign teachers, which helps the classes run smoother. It was also interesting for us to experience teaching each other's kids, as we have both heard so much from the other about them.

Last Sunday we went to the Ulsan orphanage. Scott had a great time playing soccer with the high schoolers, and Amy had fun playing with preschoolers and babies. The orphanage seems very well run and not over-crowded. The buildings seem fairly new, and the children have plenty of space both inside and out to run around. It honestly felt more like a day-care center than an orphanage. We also met quite a few foreigners--mostly Americans and Canadians. We plan to make the orphanage visit a bi-weekly event.

The next few weeks of teaching should be much less eventful than last week. Both of us our hoping that our worst classes will improve their behavior. Amy's worst class just changed from having 9 students to 13 which will be an added challenge to her days.

We are looking forward to celebrating Scott's birthday on the 19th, and to our summer vacation from July 29th to August 2nd. It is only a 5 day weekend, but we are taking a trip to Jeju Island (the Korean version of America's Hawaii).

The start of week 3

Sorry it's been a long time since we blogged, last week was very busy.

Last Friday we had our first full day of teaching. We were both observed by the other NSTs (native speaking teachers) at our schools and given some pointers and advice.
Friday evening we went out to dinner with the entire staff of our school--bosses, Korean teachers, and NSTs--went out to a traditional Korean meal where they serve you raw steak and bacon and you cook it on a little grill that is on your table.
Then, you combine/dip the meat with one of the dozen of side dishes on the table and eat it. Also, the meal was eaten sitting on cushions on the floor. There was also a lot of Korean beer and Soju (a type of Korean liquor similar to but not as strong as vodka).
After dinner some of us went to a "nori bang," where your party gets a private room with a karaoke machine. The entire evening was a fascinating cultural experience to say the least.

We had a relaxing weekend going hiking on Saturday and taking a day trip to Hyunduae beach in Busan on Sunday, a city that is about an hour train ride from Ulsan. Busan beach is very similar to beaches in Southern CA--sandy beaches and children playing in the water. The only difference is that the building next to the beach are high rise buildings rather than expensive beach homes.

Our first work week was exhausting but we both felt that we learned a lot about our jobs and the kids we will be working with.
We are excited to build relationships with the kids we are teaching and hopefully make a positive impact on their lives.

On Wednesday we finally were able to move into our own apartment. It is much smaller than Rochelle's, but also much newer. It was difficult moving in the middle of the work week because we did not have the time or energy to get properly settled.
This weekend we spent most of our time shopping at "Home Plus" (the equivalent of Wal-Mart in America but much bigger and better quality) for some necessities, cleaning, organizing, and trying to resolve some issues in the apartment. As of now both our sink and toilet are broken, and probably won't get fixed until late this next week (apparently in Korea a broken bathroom is not a big deal).
Korean bathrooms are VERY different from America. The bathroom is literally the size of a half bath (room for a toilet and sink) and there is a shower head right above the sink that you take off and rinse with standing right by the sink and toilet. There is a drain in the middle of the bathroom that all the water runs down to. It's lucky for us that the bathroom has a drain, because other wise our bathroom would be flooding right now from our leaking toilet.

On Sunday we took a break from cleaning and took a bus to Ilsan beach (the beach in Ulsan) that is about 45 minutes away. This beach is rocky and very similar to beaches in Oregon--more people hike and exercise rather than sun bathe or swim. We hiked for about 2 hours, then got some Korean food at a local restaurant. It was nice to get away from the city, get some exercise, and feel the cool ocean breeze, a nice break from the still, humid air in our area.


We will update more later!

First Day at the Hagwan

Yesterday, we parted for the first time since arriving in Korea and went to our separate hagwans (Korean after-school tutoring centers). Scott's is within walking distance of Rochelle's apartment, and Amy took a bus to get to hers (the situation will be reversed when we move into our own apartment). We both spent the day observing the Korean teachers and NSTs (native speaking teachers). Class sizes range from 3 to 16, and ages range from kindergarden to middle school.

These hagwans are owned by the same people and have very similar curriculum. The curriculum is very focused on rote memorization, which does little good in helping the students truly learn to speak English conversationally. Because it is a business for privileged families in Korea, the hagwan is very focused on keeping the business of the parents, so they have the students memorize speeches and conversations to display to their parents. If the student does not perform up to the parent's expectations, the parent will simply pull the child from the hagwan and send them to another one next door (there is literally a hagwan on EVERY corner here). Thus, it is a very big deal at the hagwan to make sure the students are well-prepared to "show off" their knowledge to their parents.

The Korean teachers are very strict with their students and many use corporal punishment (slap on the back, flick on the head, slap on the hand with a ruler) to punish them for bad behavior and even for incorrect answers. This kind of punishment is the norm in Korea and the children seem very used to it. It causes the students to be very attentive and well behaved, but also quite terrified of their Korean teachers.

The students' time with the foreign teacher is thus viewed as a break from the intensity of their Korean teacher, which is why many of the students either act out with pent-up energy or feel comfortable putting their heads down and showing how tired they really are. It is a very heartbreaking experience to see these children (many of them are very sweet, kind, and truly want to learn) spend their entire days in such a strict environment with little room for fun or recovery.
It is going to be a great challenge for us to find a balance of getting through the curriculum to the owner's and parent's satisfaction, getting them to have a little fun, plus actually doing our own thing that will help them speak better conversationally. All in 30-40 minutes sessions.

We went out to dinner with all the other foreign teachers after work, and had a good time getting to know them all. Other than Rochelle, we are the only other Americans. There are teachers from England and South Africa. Amy is hoping to come home with a British accent since the only proper English she will hear around work other than her own will be with spoken with a British accent. :)

Please pray that we can find small ways to get through to these kids, and find volunteer opportunities to help out in other areas. There is a weekend orphanage trip that we are interested in getting involved in, and Amy would also like to find poorer Korean families who can't afford hagwans looking for English education and tutor the children for free (or perhaps for a home-cooked meal and some Korean lessons).

Please also keep in your prayers our health. We are both struggling with the spiciness and fishiness of the food, and are eating considerably less than normal. Amy is also struggling with stomach aches and head aches. We are hoping not to get sick as we adjust to our new environment.

Today we will be doing some more observation, and tomorrow we will be teaching most of our classes. We are looking forward to the weekend, exploring the city, and hopefully going to church on Sunday.

Thank you all for your support, and we will write again soon.

We made it to Korea safe and sound. We arrived at our friend Rochelle's apartment around 11:30 pm last night. However the trip to get to Ulsan was a little more involved than we expected. After the 12 hour flight from LAX to Seoul, we went through customs, grabbed our four suitcases in addition to our 4 carry-on bags, took a 30 minute bus ride from Incheon Airport to Gimpo Airport to catch a flight to Busan. Once we got to Busan we got our bags again and boarded another bus and an hour later we arrived in Ulsan. All in all we were quite exhausted by the whole trip. Unfortunately Amy was jet-lagged and did not sleep very well.

In the morning, we got up and had some breakfast and coffee with Rochelle and relaxed. Once we showered and got ready we went with Rochelle to a little restaurant she eats at often and had lunch. Amy had bibimbop, a standard Korean dish of rice, egg and vegetables mixed together. Scott had gogi mandu, Korean beef potstickers. After lunch Rochelle had to leave for work so we walked down to a nearby park and enjoyed the beautiful scenery. On the way back we stopped by a cafe and got a mocha for Amy.

Tonight Rochelle is going to cook us a meal at her apartment. Tomorrow, we will try and do some more exploring. We'll write again soon.

So it's 11:45 pm and we're still trying to pack and make everything that we will need for a year fit into four suitcases and carry-on bags. Tomorrow we will depart from LAX at 12:30 pm for South Korea to teach English at a hagwon (private school) called Blue Ocean English School in the city of Ulsan. For those of you that are not up on your geography Ulsan is located in the south east part of Korea just north of Busan, the second largest city in South Korea. We will try to keep this blog updated of our adventures teaching, leaving and traveling in the land of kimchi.

Well, I need to get back to packing. Amy and I would love to what's going in your lives as well so hit us up on Facebook or send us an email. We also appreciate your prayers as we travel to Ulsan. I hope all of you have a great year ahead.