Started on Tuesday morning - with a quick tip on the KTX to Busan to visit friends (Hi Mpho, Ica, Novia, Sakhelle and Chloe and Jaegi). The KTX is one of those super fast trains like they have in Europe. The picture of the monitor is from when we were going 299km/hr.
Arrived in Busan mid-Tuesday afternoon and we used the subway - just like the Subway in Seoul but less complicated - visited a water and light show - awesome, more pics on Facebook - and had dinner at a vegan restaurant! So nice not to have to worry about what might be in the food. Have given up trying to be vegan and am settling for staying vegetarian. However have a few times had to pick the meat out of food. Gross!!! (Last week I ordered a veggie dish and when it arrived with little shreds of beef - added extra for 'good service.' So under-whelmed by their service!!!!!) And met one of Mpho's students Chloe, she joined us to show us around for the evening. Everybody say 'Hi' to Chloe, she just friended me on facebook :-)
Busan is an overgrown fishing village that turned into a city. It is also very lovely! The city contains approximately the same number of people as all of New Zealand. That is kind of freaky, a smallish city space-wise and my entire country's population is squashed into it.
Wednesday another of Mpho's students, Jaegi, drove us round and attempted to show us the sights - he would have had more luck if it not been so foggy, but still was a lovely day.
That evening I learned an expensive lesson. On my ticket said it 6.29 in big numbers followed by Korean characters and 18:00 in smaller numbers also followed by Korean characters. I arrived at the train station at 6:03pm thinking I was half an hour early. Sadly my train was gone. I had to buy a whole new ticket - Jaegi did get me a 15% discount which was great. However I now have a new 'Note To Self' which says: "Even though the ticket is written in 'foreign' make sure you know the difference between the date and the time."
Another lesson I learned in Busan from Ica and Novia; If a man offers to carry your bag you have to let him, even if it only weighs like three pounds and you could carry it yourself without burning any extra calories.
They were both shocked and disapproving of my unthinking refusal to hand my clothes bag over for 'man-handling' when we arrived at the train station. I had tossed it over my shoulder and was about to set off into the station, but apparently independence is not feminine or something. Anyway I duely handed over the bag when the offer was repeated and then trailed along behind it until it was time to climb on the train. Then it was solemnly handed back to me. lol - apparently I still have a lot of things to learn about men and their ego's.
Thursday was a sad day. My lovely flatmate Sinny left Korea. Woke up at 4:45am to hug her goodbye and wave her off. Then I moved into the big room! Since then we have discovered that the new teacher who replaced Sinny is a guy so he was moved into Chan's apartment, which I think is quite fabulous as it means I get to live by myself for the next 2 months. No garrantees after that, but I shall totally enjoy these next two months. Been sooo long since I've lived entirely on my own!! All the people I've lived with have been lovely and I miss them all but I'm going to luxuriate in the space!!
The holidays were finished with a retreat at the English Village at a place about an hour out of Seoul that I can't spell. Was a Bible camp - Korea's equivalent of GYC in America. Justin Kim was the main speaker. A very inspiring weekend. Here is the link to all the messages. The English Village itself is very odd, a little piece of idealised America, made me think of Stepford, lovely buildings with shutters and stuff - complete with a mini statue of Libery (Mini-Lib.) All very nice but I never saw anything like it in real life the whole time I was there last year. Was planning to take pictures on the Sunday but then the weather was dreadful. Will be going back in just over a week so will take pictures then.
Now I am back at work, one week down, 7 to go before the next weeks holiday :-) Not that I'm counting or anything ... This term I have a lovely timetable. Start teaching at 6am, and teach right through till 11am 3 days a week, and 12Pm on Mondays and Wednesdays. Then I am free until 6pm, when I have two classes of teenagers. Finished and going home by 8pm every night. So not complaining!!!!!
Today I put my plan of relearning piano into practice, after lunch I went into the chapel and practised for half an hour. Am planning to do that every day and work my way through the hymn book. Tomorrow am planning to put my plan of joining a gym into practise - there is one about 10metres from the door of my building - it is underground.
And on Friday I found a place that sells canvas, so I am the proud owner of a nice blank canvas - just have to finish the plan and then I will spend some time painting most days as well :-)
Hope you are all enjoying life as much as I am,
Hugs etc.
Cat
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