Finally Time to Write A Blog!

I have been pretty busy for a person who works for 26 works a week lately. If not teaching, I have been trying to run everyday as I prepare to run (hopefully) a marathon in Seoul in March. As of now, I can run for about 12 km in a little over an hour, but I have much work to do in the next 5 months. Also, my school celebrates halloween by creating a haunted house for the students, which has taken much time and effort from all of the teacher's at my school and is now finally over! With the exception of my school and a few other English schools, halloween does not exist in Korea, so it is nice to bring a holiday to children who have never seen it before.

As for what I have been doing over the past few weeks, it has been the usual for life in Korea. Enjoying riding around on the motorcycle, getting out for some good dinners and drinks with friends and finally playing in a soccer game! This past Saturday some friends and I finally had a chance to play in a game. At first, we played against a Korean team at field down by the University. We just showed up and were lucky enough to find an open field and a team that wanted to play. Most fields in Korea are dirt, and this was no exception. It was quite different from the usual grass surface I was used to, but we quickly learned. Our North American and European skill was no match for the Koreans as we found the net four times for a 4-0 victory. We also played in another game, but this time we had to split the foreigners onto both teams since there were so many Koreans. It was more of an informal game, but it was good just to kick the ball around. We must have played for two and a half hours by the time it was all over.

Now to get to some pictures from back in the beginning of October. this is from Sunchung (I think) Mountain. It is about one hour from my city by car and offers breathtaking scenary and challenging hiking. It is a perfect way to spend a Saturday morning/afternoon.



This is a view from the top of one of the mountains that we climbed. I did not know that we were going to be doing some hardcore hiking, so I was only in sandals. Needless to say, my feet were a little painful after. The buildings you see are for a Buddhist Temple and there are monks that live in the buildings as well as a giant golden Buddha. There are also remants from the Korean War there as there is an old statue that has been damages from bullets.

This is me at the top. I had to take a picture to prove that I was there. Also, I am doing the traditional Korean "V" as it is quite common for Koreans to do while taking pictures.

Another view from the top. It looks like much more than an hour's drive from this direction.

This is at the bottom of the mountain. A very cool waterfall!

More views from the top...

No, I am not talking about how big the fish I caught yesterday was. There are just so many mountains around!

Another waterfall. You have to take pictures of waterfalls, right? No further explanation needed.

This is a suspension bridge, the "Sky bridge" as they call it. It joins two mountains. Walking over it is an awesome experience., It bounces up and down quite drastically as you cross and you would certainly plummet to your death if you fell.

I was trying to feed this nice squirrel... why wouldnt anyone tell me it was fake until after they took a picture?

That's it. Next up: Halloween in Korea.