**Skiing**

I went on a ski trip two weekends ago from Feb. 11-13 at Phoenix Resort in Pyeongchang.  A while back, Hyunjoo unni invited me to go with the deaf ski and snowboard club.  I really really like skiing and figure I ought to take the opportunity to ski on real mountains (as opposed to Minnesota's trash heaps...) whenever possible, so I jumped at the opportunity~ Unfortunately, it was the weekend before my Korean language exams, but as you saw in the previous post, it all turned out okay.

Anyhow, I was to meet Hyunjoo unni was down on CheonAhn Station (천안역) on line number 1. It took me more than 2 hours to get there!!! I had no idea it was that far! lol. Its waaaaay south on the dark blue line number one, near the end of the line. From there, I met Joo unni and two other people, and we took a rental car and drove another few hours to get to the resort.  In total, there were 30 people gathering, and they trickled in from all over Korea through ought the evening and night.

Everyone except me and one other guy were deaf and they were all using Korean Sign Language. Wow~ a bit overwhelming, as I knew like next to none... Luckily Joo unni was there and interpreted for me. ^^
But people were super nice! Some people knew some American sign language, and we used lots of gestures. I also learned some KSL; basic stuff considering I arrived only knowing the alphabet and a few extraneous signs.
I had a really awesome time and met lots of cool people.

Korea has heated flooring and because there were 30 people in the condo the temperature skyrocketed!!! It got up to 40 deg. Celsius, which is 104 deg. Fahrenheit!!! sick... I was soooo hot! I didn't sleep at all our first night.  Me and some of the girls in my room got up and went to sit in the hall for a bit it was so hot... We had to wake up at 6:30 am anyhow... I was really worried I was going to be mega tired for skiing, but I was actually completely fine and didn't even go to sleep until 2:30 am the next night.
We had breakfast, got our stuff ready, and headed out.

Hyunjoo unni and me

one of the organizers briefing us before we headed out~

I opted for the all day lift ticket, so I could ski morning and afternoon.  In the morning I went out with two girls who were riding snowboards.  I realized how cumbersome snowboards are unless you're really skilled.  I had fun hanging out with them so it was fine, but I can't tell you how looooong I waited at the bottom of the hill each time.  It was like stop-go with them as well as most of the other snowboarders on the hill. The hills were literally littered with snowboarders sitting on the slope fixing their binding etc.

snowboarders... ><

on our way to the slopes

on top of the mountain!!!

The weather was pretty perfect.  Nice mild temps and later in the day we got lots of snow, which looked really pretty!  (This was right before the huge snow storm hit Korea).
Korea is awesome because you can rent just about anything here.  I rented ski pants, jacket, and googles for under $25!
[side tangent: Like everything else in Korea, skiing/boarding is totally all about appearance and presentation!! People spend a pretty penny to rent some really nice clothes and equipment!  Dang.. People get all decked out, and look super professional until they start going down the hill... lol~ but it does make the hill much more colorful]

 waiting inline for the gondola

riding the gondola~

 on top of the mountain

 look at all the snow!!!

Anyhow, after lunch, I went back out again.  This time, I skied with some of the guys, who's skills were much higher. That was awesome! Some of the had brought video cameras, so we made movies of ourselves going down the hill one by one in a train etc.  I also got to ski with Joo unni a bit which was fun!  Ohhh! And I got to ride the gondola!!! So cool! I've ridden in cable cars before but not for skiing.  I really liked how high up it went!

Anyhow, Saturday evening, after skiing, we went back to the condo and played games.  We were split up into 4 teams, and played a variety of fun games!  In my opinion, Koreans are very good at coming up with and participating in group games.
I did the pepero contest (pepero is like a long pretzel covered in chocolate), where a girl and a guy have to eat a pepero stick from opposite ends and each team tries to get the smallest amount left, and the soju game, where all the cups but one are filled with water.  The audience has to watch our faces and guess who had the cup of real alcohol.

The losing teams had to prepare dinner.  Guess what we ate?... You got it. Samgyupsal and alcohol.  This was kind of like the MT I never had.  Since on our MT with Tte (drumming club I joined while studying abroad) I missed all the fun and games and arrived for all the serious name choosing ceremony.
There was lots and lots of meat, and lots and lots of alcohol~ haha.

 getting dinner ready~

 poor guy... hehe.

 먹자!!! lets eat!

 ice cream!!!

 see how ice cream makes everyone happy?~ 

It was really fun; just ate and chatted.  Someone also brought Baskin Robins ice cream, which was gone in like 3 seconds.  By then, I had picked up enough KSL and people knew enough ASL for me to have a conversation without Joo unni interpreting everything.  Easy stuff, and given everyone had had something to drink... haha!  (Really great, but after I got home, I realized that mixing ASL and KSL for 3 days straight was not the best idea... because I am to take my ASLPI (American Sign Language Proficiency Interview) this coming Monday and now I'm kind of confused on what signs are what language...AND the sign for correct in KSL looks the same as a bad word in ASL... watch me royally mess up in my test and sign that and have my interview freak out... Oh no!)

항선 오빠 making kimchi fried rice with the leftovers

Anyhow, we ate ramen for breakfast the next morning, packed up, cleaned and everyone headed back to their respective cities.  I took the bus with a few other people back to Sinchon, the area in Seoul that I live in, and we were back by 12 or 1 in the afternoon.
Then I hit the books hardcore for my Korean final. ^^

Final Exams... whew.

Hiya~

Sorry for the long lapse in posts... The past few weeks have been pretty busy.  I had my final exams for Korean last week and I have my final interview tomorrow morning. Wish me luck... If I don't pass my exam, I can't go on to the next level...

I know that I didn't ace my tests, but I think I passed~ We shall see. There was an entire page on my reading exam that I had no idea what to write. lol~ ugh.
I can't wait until this is all over!

Then I can focus on the rest of my graduate school applications and get ready to take the ASLPI (american sign language proficiency interview) test. ugh. test after test. But once that is out of the way, I think things will ease up a bit. Or so I hope~ ^^

Some of my students are making movies in English, which I am hoping will turn out well.  The first class I decided to try this with made their own story.  I did this a few summers ago at work and had the students create their own story to film.  However, I didn't take into account that these student's English proficiency isn't the greatest... They wrote a zombie story~ and got really into it, which is great, but that means that after I left work, they wrote an entire story (2 pages long) in Korean.  So, of course it needed to be translated, as I teach English  class...  Well, my Korean is definitely not good enough to do that, so Nik, being super nice translated it for me ^^ Thanks Nik!!!

So, when I decided to do it at another school, I decided to have them do Korean folktales because they all know them and it does not need explaining.  This has gone much much smoother so far.  The older kids, there are only 2 of them, are making a music video to the song Sorry Sorry by Super Junior.  I showed these kids a few videos from Sup Ho, which they really enjoyed.  They thought it was really neat to see American kids who are learning Korea, making movies.  It's the same as them, but with English so I think it boosted their confidence a little to see that other kids had successfully made a movie~

 making props for kongjwi patwi movie

zombie movie 

I went skiing last week, but I'll save that for another post~ I spent this weekend at Soyeon's house! She came to Korea for a short visit, and it was really nice to see her and her family!  The weather has started to warm up a bit, so we went to Changdeokgung Palace 창덕구 with her aunt, uncle, and cousin and walked around and took pictures!  It was really fun and a nice relaxing way to spend the afternoon~ It was nice to decompress after studying all week for finals (although I still have one more exam to go...).
(*btw, I had my interview and did a lot better than I expect and was surprisingly pleased with my grades ^^)

Soyeon, her aunt, uncle, and cousin

Soyeon and me

Soyeon in the arboretum 

cute ducks

Temple Stay

*video of our temple stay (click here) or go to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgmOjnA4aak&feature=youtu.be


Last weekend I went on a Temple Stay tour.  A week before, there was a flyer in my Korean class that was passed around advertising a temple stay tour free for foreigners.  I am a HUGE sucker for free things, so I and a few of my classmates signed up.  It turned out there was limited space, so by some stroke of luck me and one other classmates (from Malaysia) got to go.

(fam tour means free apparently...)

We left from the Hana Tour office early Saturday morning at 7.  The only person I knew on the tour was my classmate, Edwin.  There were other students from Sogang's Korean Language School, but as we are in different classes and different levels, I hadn't met any of them.  There were also Korean language students from Korea University and Konkuk University.  In total, there were 19 foreigners and 10 Koreans, all staff, I think.  For some reason, they had down on their list that I was from Russia?... lol! There were students from the US, Russia, Mongolia, Japan, Malaysia, France, Sweden and China.  The bus ride was about 2 hours to the temple, but we made a few stops along the way to see other sites.

We first stopped at ChoJung, which is famous for its natural sparking water.  We all tried some straight out of the fountain and wandered around a bit.  Then we had lunch - they served us bulgogi (korean style bbq beef) because once at the temple, there would be no more meat.  After lunch we made one more stop at some famous bakery that was featured in a Korean drama "Bread, Love, and Dreams" (제빵왕 김탁구).   I'd never heard of it before, but... it was cool anyhow.  The town is full of handpainted murals, which was fun to see ^^

my classmate, Edwin

After the bread shop, we headed to the Sudeoksa Temple (수덕사) near the town of Yaesan.  We got there, checked in  and received a set of clothes to put on.  Since it was cold, most people kept their normal clothes on and wore the temple stays overtop.  

entrance to the temple

A woman gave us a tour of the temple and explained the basics.  We also met the monk that was going to be with us on and off for our two day stay.  He was really nice!!!  
Since we were basically guinea pigs for Hana Tour, they had a video camera man and two others taking photos, almost constantly.  It really wasn't too annoying though. And they posted them on facebook afterwards, so I got some sweet pictures out of it~ 
Almost all of the participants were Korean langague students but our levels ranged from 1-6.  So, there was also an interpreter who interpreted most things into English.   


There are three times that buddhist monks (all? I don't know, but at least Korean Buddhist monks) believe there should be absolutely no talking: eating/meal time, while in the bathroom, and while praying.  
The monk (스님) taught us how to ring the dharma bell.  This bell is struck 28 times in the morning and 33 times in the evening.  There is also a big drum, a gong, and a large wooden fish that is played during this time by the monks as well.  I was in the morning group, so I got to ring the bell 5 times at 3 am!!! 

the bell I run at 3 am~

Our first evening, after dinner, we watched the monks play the drums, gong and wooden fish, and then those who were in the evening group went to hit the dharma bell and those who were in the morning group went straight into one of the temples for chanting and prayer.  

Monk teaching us how to ring the bell

Afterwards, we did 108 prostrations, aka 108 bows and made our own prayer bead necklaces.  So, for each bow we did, we were to add one bead.  It was actually less difficult than I initially thought.  I'd say only the last 10 bows or so seemed a bit taxing~  It was really cool to come out with a tangible object though!  

We were supposed to have lights out around 9, when the monks do, but we were a bit behind schedule, so I think it was more like 9:30 or 10~  All the Sogang girls (7 in total) shared a room and the floor was so hot I couldn't fall asleep!!!... Koreans generally sleep on the floor and the heating system is all in the floor (called ondol).   


Anyhow, getting up at 3 in the morning wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to bed. I was out ringing the bell by 3:15~  After the belling, we went and joined the others in the 703 year old temple for chanting and prayer (we just followed the actions and obviously did not participate in the chanting^^)  The temple we were in was 703 years old!!!  It was a really neat experience - the place was lit by candles and there were murals of buddha all around the room.  

foreigners~

monks~

After the service ended and we went outside, we found that it had snowed about an inch or so and everything was covered in pristine untouched snow~  We then walked in a circle around a stone structure three times.  The meaning or significance was lost to me... But it was cool to see the stars so clearly~  

After chanting, we did meditation (that was probably around 4 am...)  I couldn't tell if I was super super relaxed or half asleep...  Here is a picture of the monk fixing my posture~ haha!

We had a traditional buddhist breakfast.  The monks are strictly vegetarian and do not believe in wasting.  We spent nearly an hour learning the steps to the meal before we actually served and ate.  We each received 4 bowls stacked with a set of chopsticks and a spoon, grey linen cloth, and white towel.  We weren't supposed to make any noise, so when taking your bowls out, you need to grab them by your thumbs and lift them out.  Since you can't talk, when you have enough, instead of saying stop or something, you wiggle your bowl.  In addition, the eating process includes cleaning your bowl with a radish, which you later eat and rinsing your bow and drinking the water!

  

cleaning my dishes after the meal

cleaning his bowl with the radish

not supposed to see your mouth when eating, so you stick your face into the bowl

I somehow got to sit right next the monk, which was a bit nerve racking... But the food was delicious!  The monks clean their bowls so well, I don't know if they ever actually wash them. I doubt it.  

Later, we got a chance to try some traditional style temple painting.  I was really really impressed by how well everyones turned out.  We ate roasted sweet potatoes for a snack and then had a wrap up session.  

we put in a $10 donation and got a roof tile to decorate - they use these when the roof needs repairing

monk in front of the 703 year temple waving goodbye to us

On our way back to Seoul, we stopped at some spa, which is where one of the scenes from "Secret Garden" a really popular drama was filmed. Of course, I haven't seen it...  But in any case it was cool.  We went to the 목욕탕 aka public bath house aka no clothes. lol! It was really fun and relaxing though.  There was a hot tub of "coffee water" and "green tea" water etc.  


The weekend was a really cool experience. I feel I really got to stretch my mind a bit and got a completely new experience.  During our stay at the temple, I really felt that all of what the monks did was with purpose.  I think if I try to put more purpose into all of my actions and think before I do, I could be way more productive. ^^