Taxi Ride

Please keep your hands and arms inside the car at all times. Thank you.

Fact: Korea has the highest accident ratio of any county in the world.
Korean entertainment ranges from bowling, to ice skating, to amusement parks but the most inexpensive entertainment in the city will come right to your doorstep. Taxis. For less than 5 U.S. dollars you and up to three of your friends can experience a simulated high-speed car chase down the crowded urban streets. Bounding down the two-lane streets at close to 80 KPH your driver will effortlessly make a 90-degree turn narrowly missing oncoming traffic and the chicken-delivery man as you and you friends fumble for the seat belts. For no extra charge the driver may launch you and your friends off of a rare city speed bump only to discover that the cabs suspension needs to be reworked. After blowing three consecutive red lights and experiencing gravitational pulls equal to those on Saturn you will quickly understand that there are only traffic suggestions in Korea. After five minutes you may or may not arrive at your intended destination but by all means you will have gotten your money’s worth and will be more than glad to get out of the cab. For a more heightened experience try taking a cab after 12 AM when the cab drivers assume that you have downed at least one bottle of Soju and will attempt to turn the neon city lights into an Anime nightmare. However, I must warn you that despite the added thrill, the cab driver may be a little tipsy and your safety is not guaranteed.

*Note: It is useful to know Korean when the tipsy taxi driver attempts to charge you extra for the intoxicated drive.

Stereotype: an operational point-of-view derived from a subtle truth.

Good days Bad Days

So we just completed our first indepenent travel experience in Korea. Originally our idea was to make it to Japan but after realizing that we knew absolutly nothing about Japan or the languange we decided to hold off for a better date. We decided to make use of our summer vacation and head to the city of Busan instead, thinking that the coastal atmosphere would be relaxing. It turned out to be worse than Cancun on spring break. Apparently there is only one good beach in Korea and apparently its only good in the summer and the only time the Korean have time to make a trip to the beach is during the first week of August, which happens to be the day we showed up. *FYI there are 50 million Korean in South Korea... we saw about half of them there. While the beach plan was far from relaxing it was um... ah... interesting. So was getting lost in the subway system for three hours when we first got there and so was walking past dozens of motels in the middle of the night thinking how nice it would be if we knew the Korean word for sleep. But don't get me wrong we did enjoy our time there. From the beautiful hiking in Kumjang Park to Busan Aquarium to the Beomeosa temple build 600 years after Christ, the city sites were indeed spectacular. We even found a remote temple in the mountains that was half carved out of rock. Our explorer juices are definately starting to flow... even if we have a hard time finding our way.

Korea

Hello everyone,

Jolene and I have been here a little over a week and enjoying ourselves greatly. The first few days were a bit hectic as we were trying to adjust to jet lag, observing and teaching classes, and moving from a motel to our apartment. Our apartment does have two bedrooms but it is very small. Jolene and I bet on whether it is bigger or smaller than our last apartment. I said it was bigger. Jolene won. With a grand total of 277 sq. ft. our new apartment is about half the size of our one in Dana Point.

We live in the neighborhood of Poong-Am in the City of Gwangju and are about five minutes walk from the two schools we teach at. Jolene's schedule has her teaching 4-7 year olds for five hours in the morning and 1st and 3rd graders in the afternoon. My schedule is a bit different as I teach two 6 year old classes in the morning and have a full schedule in the afternoon with kids from 1st grade to 8th grade. Our classes have a wide range of English levels. At 5:10 p.m. I teach four kids the basics of english including Hello, my-name-is, and listen-to-the-teacher-because-I-don't-speak-any-Korean. At 8:00 p.m. our class discusses the greed of king Midus and whether the Greek god Dionyseus was cruel or just.

The food here has been great. Jolene and I have both found favorites in the Korean cuisine. Jolene likes the Kimchi soup and the flavored milk (banana, stawberry and coffee), while I like the Korean BBQ beef wrapped in lettuce leafs with sardines, pickled onions and a red-pepper, garlic sauce. We have made some friends here who have been escorting to various places in the city and helping find the authentic Korean food places. I must say that Jolene and I both agree that the best food we have tasted here has been the Sushi. It is far superior at nearly half the price compared to American resturants.

Our classes are on summer break right now and our friends have gone so we will be trying to figure out what we are going to do with our time. We want to travel a bit but it is fairly expensive at this time of year and there is still plenty of things we want to see here in Gwangju. We will update you all next week when we return and hopefully we should have a host of pictures to accompany this boring text. Thank you all again for your support and interest in our lives and experiences.

Cheers,

-David and Jolene

Palm Springs (1 year)

Hey! We made it!

I know that one year doesn't seem like that long (actually its gone by really fast), but hey we gotta celebrate something right. So our something was a little vacation to Palm Springs. Although the weather was a bit warm we had a blast lying out by the pool, catching a couple of flicks, spending a day a Knott's Soak City, and of course enjoying the fine dining in downtown Palm Springs. I even got Jolene to try out a bit of golfing and despite what the picture might indicate (look close) she did very well. Thanks Grandma for letting us use the condo and if this is any indication of how anniversary celebrations are like, I look forward to many many more.

Joshua Tree

Here are some pictures from our trip to Joshua Tree in April. Josh and Michelle Fox joined us on this desert adventure which included an almost sleepless night trying to find an empty camping spot. At 12:30 AM we found an isolated campground near Joshua Tree lake (I didn't know they had lakes in the desert...). Anyway I humored myself by trying to take pictures of all the desert flowers that were in bloom. Cheers to our romp in the rock filled wilderness.

Whales Parade

March 1st, 2008:

Dear Diary,

I think I'm going crazy. We saw a barbie pink hummer today that was going down the street playing "I'm a Barbie girl, in a Barbie world... Life in plastic, its fantastic." What the heck is up with that? Anyway, I found the Nacho Libre Mask at one of the booths...Now if only I could find the strechy pants to go along with it...hmm. Gotta love the wife...(oh sorry you didn't see it...it was the "are you serious" look). Was a good day overall.

Trip to the Snow

These are some photos of our trip. I am not going to write a story because I have been recently informed by my wife that “No one really reads the words, they just look at the pictures.” So I have decided to curtail my journalistic tendencies and limit my words to a bare minimum. I was once told that the sign of a good writer is being able to tell a story in the least amount of words possible. So here goes:

Christmas money blessing, winter storming dressing. All our friends must stay, but we go to Mammoth anyway. Arrive at Stovesand lodge, greeted by unexpected barrage. With our re-united friends, mischief hot-tub mission then begins. 6 degree snow field in the middle of the night surprised drunk, raging, naked hippies… what a sight. Slip into the warm hot-tub, gaze at endless stars above. Stay up late, wake up late, we’re late to the best skiing day of the year. Pass Mammoth mountain, ride the frozen chair at June to untracked corduroy slops and shed a tear. Frozen carrots and peach tea, non-stop skiing and fresh tracks all day. Sleep hard, wake up sore and realize muscle make you pay. Ski from top to bottom, best fun on the day, we think were dreaming. Ski same run again and now our muscles are screaming. Ski till four, just can’t ski anymore. Journey home must begin. So quickly Christmas, please come again.