20 Things I Never Knew About Korea

20. They have amazing pastries, better than you would ever expect and more varieties of ice cream than I've ever seen!

19. They consider foreigners akin to aliens (according to a Korean woman)– beings that slightly resemble them but speak an unknown language. Therefore, we get our pictures and stared at. It’s usual to see someone staring with their mouth hanging open. Some people are scared to talk to us, and laugh uncomfortably. People get dared to say “hi” to the foreigner. On the other end of the spectrum, people like to talk to us and practice their English, so we also meet many interesting people. People like to help lost-looking foreigners.You never have to look at a map, or look confused for more than 5 seconds before someone will offer to help you.

18. They love baseball and wrestling. They are ALWAYS on T.V.

17. They put chilli spice in everything. Korean food can burn your mouth off. Although, kimchi is something that you learn to like and then crave.

16. There are many people that can speak some English.

15. North and South Korea are technically at war. Regular citizens can’t go between countries, but they can play soccer together.

14. They are very patriotic.

13. Everywhere you go you are surrounded by beautiful mountains.

12. They love crime and action shows. (Law and Order is always on!)

11. They have great jewellery, especially earrings.

10. They are very environmentally conscious.

9. They like to be the norm instead of challenging it. They don’t like to stand out, even if it’s for a good reason. Everyone wants to be uniform. It even carries over into their thinking. It’s difficult to get someone to think outside the box no matter how young or old.

8. Everything seems to be done at the last minute. Planning ahead is not encouraged even for major events.

7. It seems more normal for grandparents to raise the children. Most parents seem to work all the time.

6. Weddings are not a big deal. There are not months of planning, and no honeymoon. The parents usually still decide who their child marries and when.

5. Korean is a created language. It didn’t evolve like other languages. King Sejong sat down with the greatest minds of the time and made the language in 1446. (http://www.koreanculture.org/06about_korea/language.htm)

4. Work isn’t a part of life, it is life. Work-a-holism is the norm. True story – a Korean co-worker got into a serious car accident one morning (her car was totaled), she still came into work. When I talked to her in the afternoon she was still in shock and nonchalantly mentioned that she had been in an accident that morning. I asked her if she was okay and she said “I don’t think so. I’m going to the hospital after work.” She wasn’t there the next day. We found out that was staying in the hospital with internal bleeding. When she came back, I asked her how she was feeling. She said that she was doing better but that she needed to go back to the hospital weekly to fix her back, but she couldn’t because she had to work.

3. Korea is the most homogeneous country in the world. Only 1% of the population is non-Korean.

2. There is an English school, corner store, and coffee shop on every corner. They have enough coffee shops to rival New York!

1. Korea is one of the best-kept secrets. It’s a great place to live and work.

Halloween!

Halloween is an interesting event here. It's a HUGE deal. They decorated the whole school with pumpkins, skeletons, spiders, and even a haunted house. We had games, trick-or-treating, and even pumpkin carving! It was a big event. Although, it was interesting when I was talking to some of my kids that they don't celebrate Halloween at home or at their elementary schools. I thought that was odd considering what a big deal it seemed. My Korean co-worker told me that they only celebrate Halloween at English schools because its an "English" holiday. I thought that was interesting that its considered an English holiday. We would never have labeled it that way.

Here are some pictures of the day.

New Features

Hey everyone,

I just added some new features to this blog. If you click on the picture called "Through My Eyes" it will take you to my online photo album, http://jenniferhughes.myphotoalbum.com.

I've also added some links to some Korean Newspapers, if you want to read articles from this side of the world. There is also a link to Skype for anyone interested in calling.

Jennifer

Korean Commercials

Korean commercials are pretty funny, partly because you can't understand what they are saying. Here is a small taste of the t.v. here.

Korean Idiosyncrasies

I wasn’t sure what to expect with Korean food. I had had some before I left. Korean food is incredibly spicy. They love to add to chilli spice to everything! Their most famous dish is called kimchi. It is pickled vegetables in chilli pepper. It can be cabbage, cucumber, or radish. They eat it at every meal, even breakfast.

Two of my favourite meals here are dol sot bibimbap (bee-bim-bap), and Korean barbeque. Bibimbap is rice, beans sprouts and many other vegetables with it. It is often served with a raw egg on top. It comes in a hot pot, and you mix it together. It cooks the egg and holds it all together. Then you can put a thick chilli sauce in it as well.

Bibimbap

Korean Barbeque

When you go to Korean barbeque there is a little barbeque in the middle of the table. You roast your meat and garlic in the middle. Every meal comes with sides like kimchi, radish and salad. The way that you eat this is that you take a salad leaf, put in a piece of meat dipped in sauce and anything else you want. Then you roll it up into bite size and eat it. It sounds strange, but it’s really good.

Little things that are different here are that:

* after you are finished eating at a restaurant it’s expected that you leave right away,
* you give and receive things with two hands,
* you touch your arm when giving and receiving money,
* you have to flag a bus down or it won’t stop,
* bowing
* everything is planned last minute
* people sell things on the subway
* you sometimes have to climb up a bridge to cross the street
* people triple park,
* sidewalks are for parking not for walking
* pedestrians do not have the right of way
* signs cover the business buildings

Samsung Plaza

* side streets have no street signs, so many times you see three cars heading towards each other, and trying to figure out how to get past each other
* their favourite snack is squid
* outside many restaurants there are fish tanks with all sort of sea animals (flounder, crustaceans, squid, eels, etc.) for dinner
* no street names
* there are markets everywhere
* Koreans are very patriotic!

Weekend in Japan

In the middle of September, Korea has a four day holiday called Chuseok, which is where they remember the members of their family who have died. It’s a huge deal here. Anyways, with four days off work, my friends and I decided to take a trip to Tokyo, Japan. We got discount airline tickets and planned to stay in a hostel.

So the day arrived, and we were so excited. Sarah and I because we are Canadians had to change our single-entry visa so that we could get back into the country. We found out that we could do this at the airport before we left.

We left our apartment at 8:00am leaving us 3 hours to catch our flight. What we didn’t know was that the whole day would be a comedy of errors. We took a bus to Samsung Plaza to catch the airport limousine. When we got off the bus we ran across the road because it wasn’t too busy. Normally, you have to walk up and over a pedestrian overpass. When we got there the Airport Limousines were there. After we got on they pulled out, so we just made it on. If we had missed it, we would have waited another 30 minutes.

It took us exactly an hour to get there. Once there then we had to find immigration. That took us a few minutes. Once there was what looked like a massive line. But we took our number. By the time we had filled out the paper, our numbers had been called (no more than 5 minutes). So we got another re-entry sticker to be allowed back into the country. So that was a relief to get that done!

Then we went to go check in, and that’s where all the fun began. We were taking a flight with North Western Airlines. We got to the counter and were told tha

t our flight was full, but they were transferring us to Korean Air, which was fine. So we went around to three different counters trying to find our flight. By the time that we actually

checked in, and found the gate it was 10:40 and our boarding time was 10:46. So that cut it pretty close!

So we got on the airplane and took off for Tokyo. One really funny thing was that they showed Just For Laughs and airplane exercises.

So when we arrived at Tokyo Airport – Narita we were trying to find the subway. We got a ticket for a train that cost $10, which we thought was weird. So, thinking we were buying luxury train tickets we got a refund. We finally asked for some help and were told that there was no subway from the airport. So, we bought the same ticket back again.

When we got on, it wasn’t a luxury train at all, it was basically a subway. It was hard to find where we were because not every stop was listed. At one point we had to switch trains, and again we had to change trains. And again not every stop was listed, so we thought we were going the wrong way. So we got off. Finally, there was a clearer map, and we determined that we were on the right train and heading the right way, so we waited for the next train. But the next train didn’t stop! That’s when we realized that many types of trains go through there and we had to pick the right one. We ended up sitting on the platform like goofs waiting when we were probably on the right train to beginwith. We finallydecided to get on a train. We got a little scared because at one point it said, “Express to Haneida Airport,” but it stopped at our stop and that’s all that mattered.

Once we got off the train we had to figure out where the hostel was. That was a whole other adventure. We stood looking at our little map and the info map with uncertainty. Finally, a really nice Japanese couple came by and asked us if we needed help. At first, they gave us the general direction. But they were uncertain too. They finally decided to walk with us until we found it. If it hadn’t been for them, we would probably still be wandering around Tokyo! At last our grand adventure in Tokyo could begin!

On our first full day in Tokyo we were meeting up with our friend Toshi who lived in Japan. We had worked with him at Starbucks. We always told him that we would see him in Japan, but he never believed us. We were glad to have him along because he knew Japanese. He didn’t necessarily know Tokyo very well because he didn’t live there. But it was nice to explore the city with him.

We went to the Tokyo/Edo Museum and then we headed to the area of Shibuya. This is a huge shopping area,probably similar to Times Square in New York. In

the middle of Shibuya is the world’s busiest intersection. It was like nothing you would ever see or imagine. There were literally thousands of people crossing at once. It’s amazing to stand in that sea of people.

We then headed to Tokyo Tower, which kind of looks like the Eifel Tower except orange. We went up and saw and amazing view of Tokyo at night.

The next day we walked around the Imperial Gardens, and went to the National Art Gallery of Modern Art. Finally, at the end of our trip, we went to a shopping centre and temple area near where our hostel was. I really like Asian architecture. It's very interesting and different.

It was interesting to see the differences between Korea and Japan. There are more

differences between people. Individuality is more accepted and encouraged. In Korea, no one wants to be different in any way. In Korea, if you look the least bit lost someone will ask you if you need help within a few seconds. People love speaking English to you in Korea. In fact, you could say Korea is obsessed with English. There are as many English schools as there are coffee shops and convenience stores, and those are on every corner. The opposite is true in Japan. You have to approach people. It’s not that they aren’t friendly. Once you approach them they are very friendly and helpful. It seems like many people do speak English, but they don’t volunteer it.

I really enjoyed visiting Tokyo. I would love to go back and see more of the country.

More pictures at: http://jenniferhughes.myphotoalbum.com/

My New Camera

I just recently bought myself a new digital camera. It's a Nikon D60 SLR. I bought it here in Korea from E-Mart. Thankfully, I can find an instruction manual online in English. I'm so excited to use it!

Away to Busan

Wow, it's been a while since I've written. Time just flies by here.

The end of July brought about a week vacation, my first at my new job. Sarah and I decided to head down to Busan for a few days. Busan is on the southern tip of South Korea. The morning of, we got up early and took the subway to Seoul station.

(Seoul station - heading toward KTX tracks)

The subways here are really easy to navigate. Everything is labeled in English and Korean, and some Chinese. They also have really good signage and announcements of stations. I like them so much better than the ones in Toronto. They are much cleaner and better organized.















(Korean subway station) (inside of the KTX) (inside the KTX)

Anyways, we got to Seoul station and got on the Korean Train Express (KTX). It's a high speed train that travels around 300km/hr. Although it goes so fast, it doesn't feel like you are moving unless you walk down the aisles. It was interesting travelling through the length of Korea. No matter where you are, each city and each country side looks the same. There are not a lot of defining features.

The train trip was about 3 hours. We booked a hotel online, and we stopped at the tourist centre in Busan station, and someone told us where to go, and wrote the hotel name in Korean for us. So we hopped into a cab and were on our way. We went to the hotel, which we had made the reservation with. It was a really nice place. We got to the desk and they were very confused, which made us somewhat worried. They finally figured out that we were at the wrong hotel. So we got back in a cab, and drove all the way back to the train station. It turned out that the hotel that we wanted was a literally right beside the train station. So we spent $5 on cabs to right next door to where we were. The confusion was that we booked online under one hotel line, but I guess it transferred us to the more inexpensive one. It was a silly mistake, but it wasn't anything horrible.
















(view from our hotel of Busan station - we were that close!)


(a sign at Busan station)


So once we finally checked in, we went off to explore. Busan is a port city, so we went down to the harbour. We went to the Jagalchi fish market. It was interesting, but very fishy smelling - go figure. That's one thing that I noticed there, was that the water smelled really bad. It was a mixture of fish and sulphur. That's one of the reasons why I'm glad that I didn't move to Busan, but it's a nice city to visit. We walked around the area a bit, went into an underground shopping mall and were typical tourists.

(Jagalchi Fish Market)

(Busan Harbour) (Sarah and I at Busan Harbour)



Later that night, we headed down to a beach. There I walked along the beach at night and looked at the skyline. The bridge was all lit up. Other nights they have light art, but they didn't have any that night because there was a talent show going on.




(Busan sklyine at night)


(Busan skyline at night) (Gwangali bridge) (Talent show)

On our second day, we went to one of Busan's beaches, Songdo beach. We went on a good day, it was a little cooler so there weren't many people there. Even with less people, there were still umbrella's everywhere! Going to the beach is one of Koreans favourite past times it seems.

The first part of the vacation was really good. The second half was a little disappointing. We would be all excited about going to an attraction, and then find out that it wasn't what we expected. The most exciting things that we found were the simple, and free things like underground shopping and the beach.

It was really nice to visit another part of Korea, but it was also really nice to come home. Going to Busan made me really appreciate where I do live in Bundang. Everyone will tell you that it's the nicest place to live in Korea, and I think they're right.