The Two Week Weekend

  Seoul, Korea Rep.
Saturday, November 17, 2007

· Seoul, South Korea
· GMT +8:00 hours

Cutting through the superfluous stuff

01 New coat

Right, I'm gonna make, or at least attempt to make this entry a quick one (and I say that knowing how wholly inadequate I am at getting to the point). Fear not: there is plenty to tell from the last 2 weeks but having just spent the last hour and a half selecting pictures for this entry I can tell you now that it's the pictures that'll be getting the bulk of my time on this entry. You see there's no less that 46 of them....... and that's after spending the aforementioned hour and a half dwindling their numbers as best I could. So, if you're the sort of person who prefers reading my ramblings more than perusing the pictures then you're out of luck for this entry. Sorry. If, on the other hand, you prefer pictures, especially pictures of autumn (Fall for you Canadians) colours and group gatherings, then welcome to Nirvana. Well, not quite... I'd never go so far as to class anything produced by me as such.

The Weekend
The past 2 weeks, weeks 6 & 7 of camp, were dominated by last weekend's getaway to the South-east of the country, a getaway that saw us receiving, as expected, the best of

20 The weekend away begins

Korean hospitality as we were shown around some of the regions best sights. Check out the pictures for the whole weekend story. Our hosts for the weekend were five of the camp students, four from my class (Chan, Bond, David & Nick) and one from Meg's (Jo). Btw, from now on these five gentlemen will be known as 'The Famous Five'. We based ourselves for the weekend in the city of Gyeongsan, staying in Chan's apartment (well, it wasn't actually his apartment.... more like a relatives we think... we didn't quite understand the connection to be honest, not that it really mattered).

21 9-ball vs Billiards

Having arrived in Gyeongsan late Friday evening we disposed our bags before being brought, in Chan's 11-seater minivan, to the nearby city of Deagu for dinner & beers/beers & dinner in a bar owned by Chan's cousin. I then introduced the students to pool in a nearby pool hall. They have spent the previous weeks of camp teaching me billiards, the game of choice over here, so now it was my turn. We played 9-ball pool (pocket billiards, as they call it), a game alien to them and, as it turned out, one they didn't take very well to. Why? Well, although they had no difficulty picking up the rules they couldn't understand how you can win a game by only needing to pot the final ball (the 9 ball), even if your opponent had pocketed all of the previous 8 balls. Informing them "That's the rules, guys." didn't seem to cut it and I doubt they'll be in a hurry to play 9-ball again any time soon. The night was rounded off by a midnight visit to a supermarket (a Tesco store, no less) to stock up on food for our 'western' breakfast (bread, milk & cereal). And in their efforts to make us feel right at home they also made sure to place some Irish beer (Guinness, of course) and Australian beer (VB) into the trolley (cart), nodding to myself and Henk for approval as they did. I, of course, signaled that it was a great idea, not having the heart to tell our hosts that I wasn't overly fond of Guinness. It was a strange, almost surreal, feeling to be dashing around a 24-hour Tesco store (it's called HomePlus over here) in Korea at midnight with 5 Koreans requesting we fill the trolley with whatever we wanted. Trust me when I say it was one of those unforgettable travel experiences.

The following day, Saturday, was a gorgeous autumn day, a day we spent it in the

22 1 missing

touristy city of Gyeongju. The city is famous in Korea as the capital of the ancient Korean Silla Dynasty, a dynasty that rose at the turn of the 1st millennium and ruled most of the Korean Peninsula from the 7th to the 9th centuries. We were continually fussed over and were treated

24 Autumn 5

like guests of honour by our hosts as we were shown around some of the 1,500 year old tombs of the Silla Kings, a museum and a UNESCO World Heritage listed

27 Bulguksa Temple

Buddhist temple & grotto, all the while posing for countless photographs and answering endless " Hello, where are you from?" questions from almost every school-going Korean we passed. Out of the three weekend evenings it was Saturday evening that was to

35 Saturday night house party

win the 'Most Alcohol Consumed' award. We started consuming such during a gorgeous evening meal of BBQ beef and continued back in the apartment, polishing of the rest of the imported Guinness and VB that was purchased the night before. The fact that the Guinness was chilled this time didn't make it any more enjoyable.

Sunday saw us getting a proper look at Deagu, Korea's third biggest city and one of its most attractive. In weather that rivalled the previous days we were shown around a park cum zoo, a university campus, a red-light

39 Honey

district (yep... even there), a market and the downtown shopping & entertainment district, where we were treated to a 'western' lunch in Burger King... that just goes to show how Koreans view western food. The last stop on our itinerary was at the Deagu World Cup

41 World Cup Stadium

stadium, a 68,000 seat stadium which was built for the 2002 World Cup, hosted jointly by Korea and its oft-scorned neighbours Japan. We left Deagu Sunday afternoon and stopped off in a remote country restaurant on the way back to camp for another Korean

43 Tarot cards?

specialty dinner - boiled chicken (a whole chicken boiled, not roasted as is more common in the West). The restaurant looked more like a private residence to us but we were told on more than one occasion that yes, it is a restaurant. It was owned by Chan's "Younger Father"..... his Fathers younger brother, or Uncle, to us westerners. Getting caught up in typical Korean traffic jam, even at 11pm at night, meant we didn't get back to camp until 11:30 Sunday evening. We were exhausted, and went to bed wishing we could sleep for 2 days. No such luck - we had to begin the 7th week of camp at 9am the following morning. Routine, routine.

Work/Play - Work Weeks 6 & 7
The weekend split two weeks of camp, two weeks that saw less and less academic stuff getting done, making the whole two weeks feel like a two week weekend. This can be blamed on two things:

1 - rapidly decreasing lack of student motivation and,
2 - increasing consumption of alcohol.

Week 6 will be remembered as the week the whole camp seemed quite content to drink itself into oblivion and suffer one long hangover. The timing of that couldn't

06 Getting sillier

have been worse for me considering it was the week that saw me free to drink again, having completed my course of medication for my ear infection. The students knew this too, having responded to my Monday morning declaration that I'd received the all clear from the hospital with a collective "Aggh, so you drink now". Thus, not only did I not

09 Tuho

have access to any 'get-out-of-getting-drunk' cards but I also had to make up for lost time. But that's okay - I have a good wife to help me through the worst parts, which on this particular week was a Monday night session that involved copious amounts of beer, soju and whiskey (pictures 3 to 6). Btw and just in case you're wondering, as long as you're able (the fact that you may not be willing isn't even taken into consideration) then saying "no"

15 Ahhhh

without a valid excuse (just like the one I had last week) in Korea isn't good manners. The students ever decreasing lack of motivation meant the whole camp took Monday afternoon off for an 11-a-side soccer game, my class spent most of Tuesday afternoon watching The Godfather, part I and the whole camp again took Wednesday afternoon off, this time to hop on a bus for a trip to a Korean Folk Village (pictures 7 to 17). Yep, after 6 weeks of "repeat after me", role plays, case studies and grappling with grammar rules, motivation levels for studying anything other than a soccer pitch, a billiard table, a golf driving range or a beer/soju/whiskey bottle are quite low.

This has also been the case this past week, week 7 of camp. Monday saw the return of afternoon DVD time for my class (this time for The Godfather, part II), Wednesday afternoon saw all

45 Kick Volleyball

students compete in a camp kick-volleyball competition which Meg's class won (picture 45), Thursday afternoon we all headed to a local school ground for another 11-a-side game of soccer and yesterday, Friday, saw my class, collectively nursing a big hangover, playing 110, a variation of the popular card game 45's. I made the mistake of teaching it to the students the day before and now they are right into it (at least they have learned sometime from me). Us teachers are left assuming that if the students were as motivated about their studies as they are about organising lesson-dodging activities then they'd all be fluent by now. Not that we really mind. We're quite happy to toe the line and participate in the activities, knowing that we are, just like the students, still getting paid. It's a kind of sweet deal really. And it's not like it's a total loss cause and there are no academic activities happening at all. Nope, we're still keeping the students pretty focused in the mornings (and some afternoons), and in fairness to them, they work hard when they have to; my guys even finished a book on Thursday of week 6, an accomplishment that saw the class heading out for a fancy Chinese meal that evening (with drinks, of course).

46 Little Mangu

But regardless, there is no getting away from the fact that 7+ weeks of constant classroom lessons is enough for anyone studying a second language, no matter how focused they may be from the outset or how many activities they may fabricate to break up those lessons. There is one more week of this camp to go (following a week break) and that week will, no doubt, be a little different to the previous 7 weeks; as it is the last week of camp it will be spent mainly wrapping things up, preparing for camp-ending interviews & presentations and saying our goodbyes, something none of us are looking forward to. Whatever happens in the final week we have no doubt it will also include a sufficient amount of lesson-dodging activities and brain cell killing nights out. We can only imagine how hardcore the last Thursday evening will be.

What's Next?
As I type it's 9am Saturday morning and we finished week 7 of camp yesterday. We're in Seoul right now and have this coming week off from camp duties. We return to Yangji this coming Sunday, November 25th, to begin the 8th and final week of camp.

We're off to Busan this morning, in the south of the country. It's Korea's second city and its biggest port city. It also happens to be my favourite Korean city. I've been there before..... 3 times actually, the longest visit being in July 2004. We're meeting Nick, one of my students, in Busan. It's his hometown/city. Nick is one of 'The Famous 5', the 5 students who treated us to the weekend away last weekend. We've no doubt he has something planned as way of entertainment for us westerners, as he gets to have us all to himself. We'll spend a night or two in Busan before hopping on the ferry to Fukuoka in Japan. We're looking forwards to a few day there and as we wait for our work visa (the one that will allow us to work in Korea when our present camp finishes) to be processed. While we're waiting, and all going to plan, we intend to hop on the bullet train to Kyoto for a night or two. I was there in July 2005. It was a stinking hot time of year to be in Japan and I'm anxious to see what the city, one of Japan's oldest and most traditional, looks like in Autumn. As for Meg. Well, having only ever seen the inside of Narita airport in Tokyo (and a hotel room not far away) she's quite excited to see a bit more of the country. Oh, and I've been warmed; she wants to see a Geisha too. As always we'll be sure to report on how we get on, no matter where we actually end up. It's going to be a weird to have a week off. It's amazing how quickly one can get used to working again, if work is the correct choice of word for our duties in camp.

Btw, no observations this time around. Sorry. But make sure you check out the pictures. All 46 of them; I really shouldn't give myself so much work.