Good Weather Means No Blogging

so most of you know that rebs and i like to do things in the outdoors. and just like in the states, korea's springtime weather is excellent for just about any outdoor activity. so for the past month and then some, we've been going climbing almost every weekend. here are some pics and updates.

the top picture is us standing in front of our favorite crag so far, called ganhyun (like canyon with a g). next is a photo of rebs climbing her first ever finished multi-pitch route. i was really proud of her and i'm sure she's glad to be finished with it because i know it was a bit scary for her... and she knew that i really wanted for her to be able to do it. but i have bad news. these will be some of the last pictures you will see of us in korea for a while because i mindlessly left our digital camera on the train on our way back. i've been kicking myself many times since then.

i've been reading the paper a lot since we stopped getting the bbc world chanel on our tv. i've been amazed at all the stories i'm reading about the u.s. economy. gas at $4 a gallon seems very unfathomable, but is become very much a reality. the way my mind works usually is i see a problem and try to fix. so even though rising gas prices doesn't affect us while we're here because we always take the public transportation, it will when we come home. and then what? i know fayetteville is building a paved pathway for runners and bikers throughout the city. so maybe i'll just be riding my bike everywhere. i also looked up running your car on water, basically using a converter to extract the hydrogen from water. according to internet sources, this is one form of a hybrid these days. and there's also talk of a guy who can run his car entirely on water, and he's supposedly in communication with a major american car company. http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=6Rb_rDkwGnU check it out for yourself. but it is fox news, so i'm not so sure. :) hopefully by the time we come back there will be something figured out. i'm curious to hear your stories about how oil prices are affecting you.

i'mgoing to have to be done for now because rebs is starting to study for her n.c.e. exam to become a counselor when we return to the states, and she needs the computer for that. so i'll say goodbye, though i have much more to talk about.

Basking

So, what is a girl to do on a random day off when her husband has to work? Well, today I'm getting caught up on some rest as my body continues to adjust to the time change. I woke up at 6am again this morning and can't bring myself to take a nap. It's way too nice of a day to be indoors. So... here I am back in the woods, laying on our hammock, enjoying the warm spring breeze with sounds of birds chirping and flies buzzing, while writing my thoughts on our laptop. I can hear the voices of Korean kids in the distance as they play ultimate frisbee just up the hill. It's a good day. In fact, it's a good week.

I was so excited to come home from the States. Doesn't that sound weird? Come home from the States? But yes, I'm afraid Korea has become my home. At least for the time being. My heart is at rest, my soul finds joy, and I feel alive. It was great to be in America and be reminded of how amazing my friends and family are there. I am blessed to have so many people who love and support me. Though as much as I loved being home, visiting with my family, eating familiar food, sleeping in a soft bed, enjoying the comforts I haven't had for the past six months, I felt this longing to return to my “home”. Oh, how I missed my husband and couldn't wait to jump into his arms and snuggle up to him at night. How I missed the dear friends that I've made and the adorable kids that I teach each day. How I missed my daily life: the morning runs through the woods, hearing the Buddhist monks chant in the distance, laughing with my Korean friends at the climbing gym, climbing, sharing meals with my friends, telling of our diverse lives and experiences, eating sushi, and teaching my students how to speak English and loving on them each day.

Getting away from my daily routine always helps give me more perspective on my life. After returning home to Korea I think I'm realizing, perhaps this is the happiest and most content I've been in my life. I feel, in this far eastern land, I have finally found balance. It's an art I have never been able to master. And I know that as my life ebbs and flows, that balance will come and go. But it's nice to enjoy it while it lasts and bask in God's creation on my day off. The end.

Update

Rebecca is back in the states right now. When she comes back on Monday, she will have been gone for 10 days, the most we've been apart since my road trip 3 years ago, and definitely the most since we've been married. The purpose of her trip was to be able to spend time with her grandpa. He's 84 and is well along in years. His mind is sharp, but his body is failing. So rather than go home for a funeral, she chose to go spend time with him and the rest of our family for a bit. When i talked to her a couple days ago (God bless you, skype!), she was doing well. She said it had been really hard to leave. She had stayed the longest of anyone else, and it was almost as if his energy fluctuated in accordance with how many people were there. Imagine saying goodbye to someone you won't see on this earth again. That's possibly what she was doing. Please pray for Blackie McFall, that his quality of life will be good until its end.

It's hard to follow such a somber subject. I'm missing Rebs a lot right now. I have a small amount of anxiety that keeps me from always being able to read my body. For example, I didn't feel tired last night while I stayed up packing for climbing this weekend and watching a movie. When I finished packing, I sat down to watch the movie a bit longer. I felt tired, but not sleepy. Then I looked at the clock and realized it was after 1 a.m. But I didn't feel tired yet, so I decided to stay up and watch the rest of it. I didn't go to bed until 2, but by then my heart rate had risen and I was a little bit shaky. Even when I laid down, I didn't feel sleepy, but I knew my body needed rest. It's as if my mind is battling my body. The effects of separating the one body of marriage.

I went to feed the homeless on Wednesday night. It was a new experience. I remember going with my family and church friends downtown to feed the homeless when I was little and it was always a little scary because of the environment. But I didn't feel scared this time. I feel like God has shown me His heart through this. Rather than seeing the dirty, smelly, aged-beyond-their-years people that they are, I saw a society in need. They were people no different than anyone else. Our jobs were relatively simple. We helped carry hot water and tables and things downstairs to a small, circular pavilion-like area in the subway station. Then we put aprons on showing we were workers, bowed to each other and to the crowd (the leaders of this thing are Buddhist), and then got to work filling paper cups with instant coffee and hot water. They also handed out triangular rice cake things that could easily sit in one hand. This was their dinner. Everything was passed out on trays rather than going through a line, which was to keep the people from feeling like they were lower.
Pride is a big thing in Korea. One of my friends told me that they were once trying to donate money to the head guy before they left and mistook one of the homeless men for the worker and tried to give him their money. The guy wouldn't take it. He instead pointed them in the right direction. In America, people seem more willing to take handouts. And if they get them often enough, they begin to expect them.
Something about the way the Korean government works. If you don't have family in Korea, you can expect for your life to be very difficult. Many Korean people live with their parents until they get married. The average age to get married for men is in their early 30s, and women in their late 20s. One of the reasons for this is because housing costs are outrageous. So if you don't get along with your family or you lose your family, your life is expected to be difficult. The second part of all this is that the government does very little to help people who are homeless. There are orphanage-like places where parents take their kids if they can't afford to give them proper care. But as far as adult programs, my understanding is that the government's welfare program consists of giving a homeless person the equivalent of $30 a month to live off of. There are no programs to get people back on their feet, get them educated, even get them a shower. And if a dirty, smelly, Korean came into a gym wanting to pay money to take a shower, I wouldn't be surprised if they were turned away for the sake of "saving face" and not scaring off the other customers. It's a really sad thing. So as I poor coffee, I can't help but wonder, isn't there more that can be done?
In the past, I think I knew that there was a lot not being done. So my way of dealing with it was ignorance. If I didn't involve myself, then I wouldn't know. And not knowing sometimes seems better than realizing an ugly truth. Because when we see an ugly truth, we feel an urge to do something. And that means that we have to give up some of our precious time or money. And ignorance is often-times pretty comfortable.
My challenge to anyone reading this is to open your eyes to those around you who are the lowest of the low. How do you treat them? How does your culture treat them? What changes need to be made, and what are you willing and able to do to make those changes happen?

My birthday was last week, and it turned out to be a really good week. On my birthday, Rebs and I went out to eat at a cool little place in Itaewon, called Sid & Mel's. That's Austrailan short for Sydney and Melbourne. Rebs got the fish and chips and I got a tasty burger. Then, after eating half our meals, I remembered that I had seen a Cold Stone across the street when we came out of the subway. So we bagged the rest of our dinner and enjoyed some nice dessert. It was a simple birthday for simply turning 26.

Then on Friday, we had sent out an email earlier that week to meet up with people that night. So around 8pm, we went to a cool little Italian place called Di Matteo's. The prices were fair, but when we got our food, wow! There was so much cheese! I ordered lasagna and had trouble finding where the noodles were because there had to have been a pound of cheese melted on top of it.

It's hard to write about the experience in a way that can accentuate the goodness of it. It wasn't the food, or necessarily just the atmosphere, but just a really dynamic group of people. We ended up staying until the waitress came over and told us that they were closing. Our conversations were just fun and funny and interesting. It was a Brit, a few Americans, and a few Kiwi's (New Zealanders).
On our way out, we were talking about where to go next because we wanted to find a good jazz bar to hang out at, and one person suggested Jazz Story, which happened to be a place that our friend Luke had been looking for online for some time. So the rest of us gladly obliged. Jazz story turned out to be this awesome atmosphere, though there was a cover charge and slightly pricey drinks. The owner had renovated the building to look sort of rustic/woodsy. The windows were made with rebarb and glass in the shape of an eye. Our table was a 4 inch solid wood lathe table with the lathe still attached at the end. But again, our company couldn't have been better. We stayed until close to 2 in the morning, talking, hanging out, and one of our friends who is a musician went to talk with the owner about playing sometime and the owner suggested that he play then. So he jammed for about 20 minutes before we left. It was just a really good night.

Next time, I'll have to bring the camera and get pictures.

For those of you who haven't seen Rebs' facebook albums, here's a picture of our elephant ride in Thailand.

A bidet, compliments, and indecent exposure

Musings about some of my experiences in Korea:

- A few months ago I had my first encounter with a bidet. You know, the toilet thing that squirts water to clean your bootie. Well, Dusty and I were at this restaurant enjoying drinks on a date. I had to use the bathroom. Ahem, I had to go number two. I put on the special bathroom slippers (weird) and went ahead and did my thing. Then I went to flush. Hmmm! There were several buttons with pictures (no words) and no obvious flusher. So I took a guess. As I pressed the button, I leaned over the toilet to make sure it was would flush. But instead, I heard a bell-like noise and water started to squirt up at me. It hit me right in the face. "OH, NO!" I thought to myself. Frantically, I started pushing buttons until the water stopped. Then, I tried another button thinking maybe it would be the magic flusher button. Just in case, I leaned up against the side wall of the stall so any water would miss me. Wrong again. This time, the water squirted out in all directions drenching me even more. Aah! Why would it ever be necessary to have water douse your entire bootie after using the toilet? Finally I managed to hit the stop button again. I looked in the mirror (that was in the stall) and realized that I was pretty drenched (in toilet water). Gross! I took one more look at those buttons. "CRAP!" No pun intended. I couldn't bring myself to push another button so with wet floors and walls, I quickly left the bathroom, found Dusty, discretely told him what happened, and we left that place. Now whenever I see another one of those toilets, I always think twice before going. I still don't know which button to push to flush but so far, I've been able to avoid another shower.

- Earlier this week I wore a long peasant skirt, a short sleeved shirt, and chacos to work. It's the first day I've worn sandals since we've been here and my feet were so excited to finally get to breathe again. When I walked in to teach my English Land 5 class, one of my students exclaimed with great excitement, "Teacher, your outfit is fantastic! You look beautiful." Well, it's not often you get a compliment like that let alone from a 10 year-old.

- Then I went to my English Land 2 class. When I walked in the room two or three of the kids squealed and laughed. They said, "Teacher, your arm muscles are very big." Now, I'm not sure if this was a compliment or not but they made the motion with their hands like I had two big humps on each arm. I took it as a compliment since they just as easily could've told me I was fat. Then I tried to explain that I rock climb but I'm not sure they got it. Side note: People here have no problem telling you you're fat. Luckily, nobody has said such a thing to me since we've been here.

- I went for a walk a few days ago down by the river near my work. It wasn't as nice as I had hoped. The water was nasty and smelly and... I saw two men pee in public in broad daylight. Yes, that's right. TWO! Can't you get arrested for that in America? I almost couldn't believe it when I saw the first guy. I looked around to see if anyone else noticed. Everyone seemed oblivious. Then, on my way back I saw another guy peeing in the exact same place. What the heck?

Long overdue update

Hello. Well, life has been really enjoyable for us lately. I started a new job a few weeks ago. I now work at Nowon English Village which is approximately 5 miles away from Suyu English Village where I live and Dusty still works. It's been such a great change for me. This job suits my strengths and personality much better plus, I've got tons more free time. Yay! Nowon is a much smaller school and is run more like a hagwon than a camp. A hagwon is just a term used for a specialty school. I generally have three, forty minute classes a day. Though I have to go in to work around 2pm, I typically teach from 4:30 or 5:00 to 7:25pm everyday. I'm back home by 8pm every night. Some days I have to go in earlier and teach situational classes but even then I'm only teaching another one or two, thirty minute classes which is a sinch. So, I've got a lot of time now to do other things. I've started studying Korean and I can already read and write. It's the speaking and understanding that's going to really be a challenge. Also, I'm FINALLY starting to study for my National Counselor's Exam that I'm going to have to take when I get home in order to get a job as a counselor. There are lots of other great things about my job that I love. I have the same classes every week with the same kids. This means I get to develop relationships with them even if they are 'little turds' sometimes. I know how to lay the smack down by now. I also work with far fewer people. There are four of us foreign teachers and four Korean teachers here. That's it. So I get to know the people I work with much better. And, having my work be away from my home is much better for me psychologically. I can come home and relax and know that I'm away from work. I also love having more freedom, independence, and time away. I get home and realize how much I've missed my husband and friends. I appreciate them all so much more and actually want to spend time with them versus always wanting to get away like before.

Also, the weather is warming up. I can't express how much better I feel in every way. I feel mentally, physically, spiritually, and emotionally healthy. FINALLY! The winter was rough on me. It was so dark and cold everyday and I was sick the majority of the time. Plus, being away from family and friends over the holidays and working my bootie off was no fun. I'm so glad that time is over. The longer I stay, the more I feel adjusted to life here... not home, but at peace and relaxed. I know how to get around, I'm used to the food, I'm learning the language, I'm educated about the culture (though I still don't always understand it or think it makes sense), and I get to spend time with my husband and good friends everyday.

With the weather warming up, I get outside to play and exercise as much as possible. We went climbing outside last Saturday which was my first time to touch the rock here. I had such a great time. We took a train down south to a place called Ganhyeon. We met our climbing friends from Arkansas who live about 20 minutes away from there. We all climbed together and had a blast. It was warm and sunny and the air was so fresh and clean compared to that of Seoul. It was the first train ride I've ever been on and my first time seeing Korea's rurual country which actually reminds me a lot of Northwest Arkansas. I feel like myself again. I'm realizing that I really struggle with mild depression in the winters. Looking back, I can see a similar pattern that keeps repeating itself each year. As Dr. Lampton (my psychopathology professor) would say, "It's kind of a low-level yuck". So yeah, I experienced that from about November to February this year. Four months of yuck and now I'm ready for some yipee-eye-aye. My energy level and mood seems to go up with each passing day.

So... Dusty and I have talked a lot lately about future plans. We've been bouncing around ideas for awhile but the latest one has me the most excited. Keep in mind this is only an idea, not a definite by any means. We've been thinking of spending the winter this next year at home in the states. Our contracts finish out at the end of October. Perhaps we'll stop in Greece for a couple weeks on our way home and visit our friend Erin Rowe. Then spend the holidays at home with all our friends and family. Then come January, we would probably take off traveling for a month or so to somewhere cheap and warm. Then return to Korea in the spring for another year of work. Our financial goals keep us comitted to working here two full years. The money is just so easy. I mean seriously, I work like 2-3 hours a day and get paid pretty dang good. And then we have next to no expenses. I'm often astonished that this is legal. There's no way we could achieve the same thing in the same amount of time anywhere else.

Anyhoo, the possiblity of coming home for awhile gets me really excited. I'd love to be able to skip the winter here. It's so cold every day. For someone who loves the outdoors, it can feel like a prison sometimes. The weather in Arkansas is much more mild plus, even if it gets cold, we'll be spending time with those we love most. And, perhaps I can bypass getting sick so much. I've learned not to cling to things too tightly so we'll just have to see what God has in store for us.