Thailand.. a welcome break from Korea

On December 30, 2006 I boarded a plane to Bangkok, Thailand to have a break from the Korean winter in the tropical 90 degree climate of Thailand. It was a well deserved vacation. I think it was the longest stretch of time I had ever worked without a break since I usually only work for 4 months in the summer before returning to school. But this was a solid 5 months of work without a vacation! There were two places I had planned to visit in Thailand, the first stop was Bangkok, the capital.

Thailand is a very religious country, with the majority of its citizens prescribing to Budhism. Statues such as this one in front of my hotel are quite common and people walking by often turn and give a slight bow to the statue.

This is a famous weekend market in Bangkok. It is famous because they say you can find almost anything here. It covers the same ground as ten football fields. I was told that you could even buy monkeys at this market, but after a lengthy search, I was empty-handed and monkeyless. Maybe next time. Although, I still found some very good deals, such as t-shirts for $3.

I really like the picture. It reminds me of old meets new. A peddler trying to make a day's wage tries to dodge rush hour traffic in the middle of Bangkok.

A view of the market from one of the busier walkways. Looks like everyone in Bangkok is looking for a deal!

Lucky for me, I found a deal! This nice big coconut full of coconut juice to keep me cool during the hot day.

As it turned out, I would be spending New Year's Eve in Bangkok. Unfortunately, there were a series of carbombs during New Year's Eve day that disrupted many plans for that night, including Bangkok's equivalent to New York's Times Square party. It also made people a little edgy, but that quickly wore off after a couple drinks. This picture was taken on Khaosan Road, a haven for foreigners and the biggest street party in Bangkok on New Year's Eve.

I forget what they were doing, but I'm pretty sure it was funny at the time.

This is the local 7/11 On Khaosan Road. It is hard to discern, but there is a large mob of people waiting to get inside in order to purchase their drinks of choice to celebrate the new year.

I love Thailand! You can drink anywhere. Even when I was feeling hungry and went to the local Burger King I was able to enjoy a beer while waiting in line.

Some more people enjoying themselves on Khaosan Road. I mentioned that some people were a little edgy after the carbombs during the day. Shortly after this picture was taken, there was a loud noise similar to an explosion on the road. This sent even the drunkest people running for their lives in the opposite direction. It turned out to be a false alarm, but it shows how uptight people were on the drunkest day of the year because of the events earlier in the day.

The best way to recover from a New Year's Eve party is to take a relaxing boat tour through the city of Bangkok. This way you get to see many interesting sights without having to move much.

This boat looks like a building.. or does the building look like a boat?

Another one of those boat buildings. They can really cram the people on one of those things.

A nice looking building with some Chinese architecture. Please don't ask me what the building is or what it's for.. I have no idea, but it looks good!

This is the entrance to an old fort in Bangkok. It was the first line of defence in the case of an aquatic attack back in the day. It still has 5 or 6 cannons there if you look closely (though I doubt they are operational).

More strange buildings with the classic Thai design. They often have what looks like flames coming up from the roof at about a 45 degree angle.

I think contrast fascinates me because this building was mixed in among the other pictures seen above and I find it very interesting. While all the pictures of Bangkok have been of nice big buildings, it still has many people living in poverty as can be seen here. Whoever lives here can get flooded out of the first floor of their house if the water level rises another foot (and this picture was taken during the dry season).

Some sort of religiousless significant place. I don't know what purpose it serves but these types of places seem to be everywhere.

That is one tall statue!

A closer look of the statue. I'd guess it to be close to 5 or 6 stories tall. Notice the tiger in the middle of the picture. Don't worry, it was plastic!

Some more Thai buildings. Could the intended purpose of those flame-like spirals coming from the roof be coat hangers for giant statues like the one in the last 2 pictures? Think about it...

Crikey! It's a croc. Take a look at the teeth on this one. There was a crocodile farm on the boat tour.. the question you have to ask yourself is, why NOT stop?

Look carefully, there is another croc. Don't get too close, this one looks a little angry and he may feel the need to defend his territory.

Oh no! This man has foolishly walked into a pack of wild King Cobras. I hope he knows what to do!

He showed those snakes who the boss is. Who's draining who's venom now? The snakehandler was really good, but too many close calls!

Finally back on the boat with no snake bites to speak of. I'd consider this a lucky day.

Straight ahead and finally back on land after almost 3 hours in a boat!

If I wrote this blog early, I might have remembered the name of this place. But I do remember that it is one of the more famous places for tourists to visit and you will see why in a few pictures.

Hey Look! Something shiny! I think I will stand in front of it... these were my thoughts at the time.

Who looks tougher.. me or him? Be honest...

As it turns out, there were many of those spiral things. Many, many, many....

This is the head of Buddha. This is a famous statue of Buddha lying down. The height of his head alone is about 3 stories tall.

I felt like I just ran a marathon, but these are his feet about 100 feet away from his head at the other end of this enormous building.

The bottom of his feet are made from some rare material and so no one is allowed to touch it. IT certainly had an intricate design.

Oh yes, there was a recent military coup in November that overthrew the government. I had almost forgot. There is still a significant troop presense on the streets in Bangkok, but it was business as usual in most parts of the city.

The hotel room view from the 14th floor overlooking Bangkok.

Look down below, it's a pool. The bad news is that it was almost always shady due to the way the building was shaped. Oh well, it looks nice though!

One more picture of Bangkok and now that it's Tuesday, January 2nd I am flying further south to Phuket Island.

It's a whole different way of life in this part of the country! Time for some parasailing!

Getting higher... getting higher.. OK that's high enough!

Some views of the beach...

They never seemed to have cloudy days here.

Hmmm.. jetski.. ocean. That gives me an idea! It was a little overpriced, $30 for half an hour, but I've always wanted to try it!

Remember, whenever in Thailand, you have to ride a bull!

Some views of the beach from a little higher in the moutains at a restaurant overlooking the beach.

And another.

This is a hard picture to see, but there was a boxing stadium in Patong Beach, where I stayed. The guy on top of this truck is the current champion so he was driving around with his belt on advertising for the stadium.

Oh no. How did I get way up here? I want to get down!

I guess this is the only way!

Just follow the person bouncing on the giant elastic band.

Still bouncing...

Is it over yet?

Finally, solid ground again! This was called Jungle Bungy jump because it is set up in the jungle just outside Patong Beach. It was a decent price, for the jump, a t-shirt and pictures came to $60. Definately worth it for the experience. I even got a certificate of bravery!

I also did some other things that I wasn't able to catch on camera, such as going to a shooting range and finding some very good deals on t-shirts, sunglasses and I even picked up six seasons of the Sopranos for $45. All too quickly, the week was over and it's back to work for another 7 months before I have anything more than a long weekend off. I hope I can handle it!

Coming next: Getting back into the Korean life after vacation.

The short life and long death of Kitty

A kitten came into my possession approximately four months ago. A student at school had found one in the street and it needed a home, so I decided to take it in. It was a kitten that struggled from the very beginning, needing immediate surgery to survive. He has since time needed an additional surgery costing about $650 altogether. Below is a picture from the early days. I had brought kitty into the school to show my students. Korean children are not often exposed to animals, which can trigger a fear of the unknown when they do see one. This results in a crying fit all from setting their eyes on the beast revealed below.

These are some of the braver students willing to risk contact with Kitty.

These are some of my other students.. they were too afraid to be in the same room as they ill-mannered and uncontrollable beast.

Sadly, the life of kitty, or KaeGoGi (meaning dog meat) in Korean was cut short as he had a genetic disorder that could never be fixed. He suffered a seizure/stroke the morning of February 8th and never recovered. He needed to be put to sleep later that night. Kitty and I didn't always get along due to: his constant staining of my floor, clothing and bedding with his urine, his endless inability to find the litter box, the vicious awakenings at 5am as he jumps on my face and lastly, his indiscriminate spraying on my laptop computer that cost me a motherboard with a price tag of $360. But he certainly will be missed.

Next up: Thailand vacation!

So it's been almost two months...

I have neglected my blog as of lately. It just seems that whenever I think of writing it, the amount of information is overwhelming. So I will try the best that I can to recall things from the past two months. But instead of the usual chronological ordering of things, I will have to do it as I recall from my memory.

First up, Korean ski resorts. Over the Christmas weekend, I went with some friends to Muju Resort located about one hour from where I live. It is a large mountain compared to what I would find within such a short distance at home, but the amount of people is something else altogether. Christmas eve day was our first day there and the lineups were unbelievable. It took somewhere in the neigborhood of 30 minutes to get up a chairlift to enjoy the slopes that lasted under 5 minutes. That made it seem somewhat of a waste of time. However, Christmas day was much better and were cruising up the lifts in no time at all. I did however learn a valuable lesson: When it's busy in Korea, it's REALLY busy.

You can't even see the lift.. but believe me, it's there!

Some views of the mountain (and the crowds of people!)

Look! More mountains (and people).Why do i feel the need to write under every picture?The snowless mountains.. no wonder there's no ski resort over there!

That's Matt doing the classic pose.

We found this scary guy on the bus.. oops, thats me.

That's the Muju ski resort adventure. I will try to post some more blogs and pictures as soon as I can. I have almost 2 more months to make up still...

Christmas is coming!

It has been a while since I last posted a blog, but that is because life has been pretty much the same as always. Things have started to calm down quite a bit since the weather turned cold. No more mountain climbing or other outdoor activities for a while... The stretch between Thanksgiving and Christmas has been a long one with no days off in between and many hours of overtime, but it's almost over!

We had the first snowfall of the season in Korea last night. It came out of nowhere. I had finished dinner with some friends and we went to someone's apartment to play some drinking games before going out for the night. We were inside for only 2 hours and there was no snow on the ground, but by the time we came out it was a winter wonderland and traffic was at a standstill. So we promptly had a snowball fight since we haven't been able to do that for quite some time.

I recently picked up some private tutoring lessons (illegal in Korea but very lucrative). Because of this, I have decided to go to Thailand for my Christmas vacation. I will leave December 30 and stay for 3 days in Bangkok, the capital. Then I will fly to the island of Phuket for the next 4 nights before returning to Korea on Janaury 7th. For the Christmas weekend, I will be going to Muju ski resort with some friends. We rented out a chalet so that should be fun. I am excited to try the Korean ski hills.

My kitty, KaeGogi, has been a challenge lately. As I write this, he knocked over a pile of things, breaking a light and making a big mess. He also is not litter trained, due in part to a medical condition, so he often leaves me lots of cleaning up to do after a long day of him by himself in my apartment. I hope he will change his ways as he grows because it is quite frustrating having to clean up after him after a long day of work.

That's about all for now... I can't wait to finally have some days off. After I return from Thailand, I will have surpassed the half way mark of the contract with my school... 6 months already. I can't believe it!

Merry Christmas everyone! Enjoy the holidays!

November Recap

It has been a while since I have been able to find the time to sit down and write a blog, but better late than never. I have 3 topics to discuss today: Teaching in Korea, Foreigners (and things we do) in Korea, and Kitty!

First, Teaching in Korea:

Teaching at my school up to this point has gone relatively seemless and without incident. It is surprising even to me to think that I have been teaching at my school for 5 months in 2 weeks. It wasn't until this month that a few issues final arose. Rather than getting into details, there was a miscalculation in my pay for the month and the secretary swore that she was right. It ended with me refusing to work anymore overtime unless I got the money I demanded. After a long drawn out battle, I was awarded the money, although in retrospect I kind of wish I didn't get it.
Shortly after my confrontation with our secretary, one of our foreign teacher needed to go back to Canada because of an emergency situation. This has left us one teacher short, which means: much overtime for me. I am working very long days now (and for the foreseeable future) in order to cover the extra classes. This leaves me with very little time for fun during the week. On top of that, there doesn't appear to be a teacher on the way anytime soon. In fact, I have been put in charging of leading the search. Why? I don't know.. I have only been here for 5 months. Perhaps, it is because I am the one that suffers the most being short one teacher so my need and drive to find a new teacher is the highest. I do enjoy getting paid overtime, but sometimes the money isn't worth the free time you are forced to give up.
I am hoping that we will find a new teacher soon because there is no break in sight. Our winter vacation does not start until the first week of January... an eternity from now! I am still trying to decide where to go for the vacation. If anyone knows some good places in South East Asia, I am open to ideas.

Foreigners (and things we do) in Korea:
The foreigner community in my city is really good. We have a website dedicated to events for foreigners, a homestyle breakfast (rare in Korea) every Sunday at the local foreigner bar and even a monthly quiz night to show off your useless knowledge. I also play on a recently formed foreigner soccer team here. Our uniforms will arrive this week and we will have our first (official) game against a Korean team on Saturday. It is even on a grass field! There aren't many of those here. We have been practicing and playing other teams every Saturday, so we are hoping we will be able to make quick work of our first opponent.

I have recently started taking Korean lessons at a school every other Saturday morning for 2 hours. Saturday morning.. I must be dedicated. We even have a text book and it is written all in Korean. I take it with only 2 other foreigners, but it seems like we will have a good class together. I just hope I can wake up that early on Saturdays.

Going out with foreigner friends is always a good time. It seems that every Saturday night is a huge spectacle. For more weeks than I can remember, we end up at this one bar with 20-30 foreigners sitting along a big, long table. To add a foreigner twist to things, we end up playing the 'flip cup'. For those that don't know what it is, it is a game that is a race between two teams of equal players. All players must drink their beer and then 'flip' it over to the side of the cup. The person beside you cannot start drinking until you have successfully 'flipped' your cup. Our games have gotten crazy big with teams of 15 shouting the "Ole" song at the beginning (as is tradition).

Kitty:

I have adopted a kitty. A student at my school found a young kitten abandoned without his mother and needed to give it a home. After much internal debate, I decided to rescue the kitty. Perhaps it is good that the kitten has fallen into my hands because due to its malnourishment, it has needed various medicines and surgery and even a 4 day long hospital stay. Needless to say, it has been expensive. But now he is home resting and recovering. The name of the cat now is (Korean pronunciation) Kay-Go-gi, which means Dog meat. Although I may soon change it to gong-dung ja-goom (means kitty in Korean), although it is quite long and difficult to say for something that means 'Kitty'. The kitten is quite small due to his malnourishment. Although he is two months old, he can still stand in the palm of my hand and he is black in color. I will try to take and post some pictures of him as soon as he recovers (and gets his stitches removed).

That is everything that I wanted to discuss today. Random things to mention: I still have my motorcycle, getting colder, but its still the best way to get around town. I bought my first Korean clothing the other day (a sweater) because of the falling temperatures. And lastly, I really want to see the Borat movie. That catches you up on life in Korea... until next time.

End Note: Please leave comments. I enjoy reading what you have to say and telling me what's new back home but the comments have been declining in recent posts. Keep me informed!

Halloween in Korea

Unbeknownst to me, halloween is a largely North American custom. The popularity and even knowledge of the holiday belongs to only a small percentage of the Korean population, mainly the foreigners. My school does an annual haunted house for the students as well as the public in order to show Koreans what halloween is all about. While it was fun, it did cut into more of my free time than I would have liked, especially when on the Saturday I had a halloween party to get to but was stuck cleaning up until 11pm. Needless to say, I am glad its over now. My costume was Batman. Quite a strange costume to find here I thought so I had to buy it.

On my way to the big party...

At the halloween party, I did something I was quite proud of. I came in 2nd place in a limbo contest! I never thought I would be able to do that since I am on the taller side, but I think the Batman costume helped a little. I should also mention who I lost to: a five foot tall Korean gymnast. Enough said...

A few friends and I decided to hit up a Korean bar after the costume party decided to get a little scarce. Remember... halloween is basically non-existant in Korea, so they were very surprised when Batman suddenly showed up at their bar. I wish I was joking when I say that they really thought I was Batman, but I'm not.

All and all a fun halloween weekend in Korea. This is the first halloween I can remember in a long while that I could actually go out for because I didn't have crazy amounts of essays and/or exams to worry about. It's a fun time!

Next up: A recap on teaching in Korea after 4 months.