Costco

Scott and I went to Costco in Daegu for the second time on Sunday. We'd gone a few weeks ago with our friends Erin and Paul, but faced with the Dr. Pepper shortage and our ever-dwindling block of Colby-jack cheese, we had to go back.

The bus is really the best way to travel out of Andong, especially to Daegu. It's 7,000 won one way (direct), which is under $7, and it only takes an hour and twenty minutes. To take a train would mean paying extra for a connection because there isn't a direct rail route between the two cities. The buses are like American Greyhounds, but with far more leg room (so far, the four we've been on have also had recliner-like leg rests that you can adjust).

The only concern we had was getting a ticket. My co-teacher Taebun told me on the phone to "just use the machines" when I asked him what to say. Of course, we learned shortly that the machines have no English option, and in fact many Koreans were abandoning them to go to the ticket lines in abject frustration. Oh no. How do we tell them what time we want to go? That we want seats together? What if they send us in the wrong direction?! It turned out all we needed to say was "Dong-Daegu" for the East Daegu bus station.

When we arrived we were scooped up by Taebun, who is in Daegu every weekend. I found out he has a girlfriend there, so it all makes sense now. He had never been to a Costco, and his most frequent word for the day was "why?" as he picked up item after item and stared at it as if it would take over his pantry and hold his other food hostage.

(photo taken from google image search- forgot my camera)

The Daegu Costco is 5 stories tall. Everything above ground level, however, is a parking ramp. There are two levels for shopping that are below ground, which are split between non-food items on the bottom floor (electronics, home items, clothing, and tool sheds that are a curiousity since everyone lives in apartments), and food on the floor above. Escalators with locking grooves for the cart wheels transport you from floor to floor (ingenious).

It is very similar to American Costco- it's the Holy Grail of imported food. Cheerios, microwave popcorn, Nesquick, bagels, cheese, salsa, the works. We could buy Caesar dressing that was made in America by McCormick, exported and labeled in Japan, then sent to the Costco in Korea. And, of course, you could buy all of the Korean staples as well, like kimchi, dried seaweed, rice, noodles, and fish. They also do food demos like we're used to. We were able to sample such things as M&Ms, curry, steak, and cheese balls.

Perhaps one of the best things about this Costco is the cafeteria. They sell pizza, chicken and beef bakes (meat and delicious sauce baked into a giant roll), hot dogs, clam chowder, soft serve, soda and iced coffee. It's not just the food that gets my attention though, it's the condiment station and how Costco patrons use it. Both this time and last time I was here, I saw this happen. The condiment station is stocked with ketchup, mustard, coffee syrup, and a bin of chopped onions with a crank to dispense them. About 95% of everyone will, after they are done with their food, walk up to the onion dispenser and pile about a pound of onions on their plate, mix it with ketchup and mustard, then return to their tables to feast on their free second meal.

It's fascinating to watch. I was waiting in line for a few onions for my chicken bake, and the woman in front of me had a pile bigger than the size of her head. Suddenly, the machine started running low, so she began to bang on it. After a few attempts, she leaned over and grabbed the arm of a nearby employee and pointed to the machine, while balancing her plate in the other hand. I watched in wonder as he too began to assist her in banging the machine. Amazing! It's completely irrelevant that people are cashing in on free condiments.

On the way out, Scott noticed pictures on the wall of Costcos in cool locations. Tokyo, Seoul, San Francisco, various places in Europe, and... Livonia, Michigan. Represent!

I imagine we'll be frequent visitors of Costco throughout the year.

Those That Stand Out

My 3rd and final post for the day! (...You were warned. I delivered.)

With a few weeks of teaching now behind me, I have begun to notice certain classes for different reasons. Because each grade has 8 divisions, and I will see each class only once a week (in the case of 4th grade, every other week. 4-1 to 4-4 one week, 4-5 to 4-8 the next), it's impossible for me to learn everyone individually. However, many classes lend themselves quite easily to a place in my memory. Those I'm not mentioning aren't bad or boring in any way, in fact most of my classes have an amazing collective of students, but I'm just mentioning the most prominent in my mind.

4-5. My Groupies.

When class ended, the whole class erupted into a flood of waving books and papers and students shouting "signature!" Just when I was beginning to worry that the rock star image was fading- I was amazed. It's the only time I've been asked to sign anything (other than my contract), and all 34 students wanted it.

4-3. Gift-givers.

I will always remember them as the class who presented me with a gift on my first visit. I've seen them now a second time, and I've found that they are a little more behind in their understanding, but they are really eager to participate. Great to see.

4-8. They Will Be My End.

Every single one of my classes is well behaved- and then I met 4-8. It makes sense that they were my last class to meet. Before we went in Mrs. Im looked at me and said "4-8 is...you see." Immediately it became apparent that this class was a backward look at gender separation. All of the girls were very quiet and good listeners, while the boys were loud and unruly. When we played my game (the imaginary walk through the woods), this was the only class where I didn't have full participation. Every boy walked off and started banging on things (half of them were put in a corner by Mrs. Im, the others elected to be there), and it was no use shouting with a 50% divide (classes are arranged so half are girls and half boys, seated next to each other in pairs).

There was one small boy who was my only hope. One, of the whole lot. He listened when I spoke, and followed my lead. After I had just paraded around like an enthusiastic fool to keep the attention of the students, this boy walks up to me, taps my shoulder, and says in perfect English "You are very shy in front of children." When I asked why, he frowned and said "your face gets too red" and runs off to laugh and join the rest of the boys. Traitor.

5-3. Pennsylvania and Florida.

This is the class with the two students who spent time abroad in America. I am aware that students of this kind are scattered throughout many of my classes, but these are the only two who have made it specifically known to me (I made a mistake of trying to ask a student in another 5th grade class, but he hadn't so I think I may have confused and embarrassed him). Florida is a small boy, probably on the young end of the 5th grade, and does all the work very cheerfully. He's a little shy, so I try and get him to speak up more often. Pennsylvania is older than him, and seems to be quite a headstrong and confident girl. I don't want a favorite student, but I really see her as a welcome challenge. This week, the class was learning more letters "P, Q, R, S, T" so like last time, I had her write out words instead of just practicing the letters. I looked down after 5 minutes and she already had "queen" "quick" "quite" and "quip" written down under Q, and she apologized to me saying "I'm sorry, I can't think of too many words that start with Q." Incredible.

5-8. Troupe 5-8.

This is the closest I've ever seen to a perfect classroom. It's almost an anomaly- I can't honestly single out one student who appears to be behind. This also happens to be the class of the woman who drives me to school (I learned her name! Mrs. Min), so it really helps that I can tell her how perfect her class is. When I did the game where they put items in the house, this was the class that decided to get creative and put things like the trash on the bed and announce it with pride. There is no shortage of volunteers when I ask a question.

This week, 5th grade was assigned a role-play in which they were to act like little people discovering a large man (Gulliver) using the key words in the lesson ("What a ___ ____!"). All of these groups had the same script (I'll write it here for the full effect):

1: What a nice day!
2: What a beautiful flower!
3: Yes, it's so beautiful.
4: Let's go over there!
*all run into something*
1: What's that?
2,3: It's a rock!
4: No, no, no. It's a big elephant.
1: Wait! What a big shoe!
2,3,4: It's a man! He's very tall

In the previous class, students were mostly reluctant to present it, and not all groups did. However, in 5-8 they were all super pumped. They moved the desks to clear a spot in the center of the room for all to see. Also, just about every group went off-script (which of course made me feel overjoyed). Sometimes, the would argue longer: "It's a big elephant!" "No! A Rock!" "No!" and one group even had a fake boxing match until it was broken up by the announcement that it was in fact a shoe! Some groups cast someone as Gulliver, who woke up at the end. Once, he said "I'm hungry," another time "What little people!" and my personal favorite "Ahh!" where they all scream and pass out when Gulliver wakes up. He is, after all, a giant man.

6-2. "Monkey".

In many classes there are one or two students who are special needs. I know there is a special ed room, but I'm still unclear as to who goes there, or when. Sometimes it's more extreme than others- Mrs. Im and I had to start a class late once because the homeroom teacher was busy chasing a girl around the room who was wailing and could only be calmed by pipe cleaners and a special desk in the corner. All students have a number, so occasionally I will call numbers if nobody answers questions. Taebun has shook his head at me if I call a "wrong number," meaning, a special needs kid. Mostly, I'm told to ignore them because they won't participate- which at first I thought was a terrible notion. However, in 6-2 I learned exactly why he's so insistent.

There is a kid that sits at the front of the class that the students call "monkey." I've seen that he hangs out with friends during lunch, so I'm thinking he's a part of the joke or at least is not affected negatively yet. However, they like to try and volunteer him to answer questions, and everyone laughs. "Pick monkey! Pick monkey!" even he will laugh, then stand up, scratch his head, and sit down. It's terrible. Since this class, I've taken a bit more sensitive notice to these kids- who are mostly in the front or very back of the class. If I try and get them to talk, kids make fun of them and I hear about it later. I'm at a loss. At least when they do book work I make them copy the sentences, but I'm a little afraid for now of showing them too much special attention. Especially when I can't understand other kids' comments in Korean. If my co-teachers' only guidance is to ignore them, this might be a little harder to work through.

6-3. The Comedian Reigns Supreme.

There are three boys in this class that really approach my class as a stage for their act. On my first day meeting them, every time I finished a sentence they would stand up and prompt the class to cheer.

"My name is Sara"
--"OH! SARA!" *clap. cheer*
"I am from Michigan"
--"Michigan!!" *cheer*
"This is my family..."
--"Family!!" *cheer cheer*
"My Mom..."
--"OH! MOM!!!" *clap cheer*
"My Dad..."
--"Papa!! Oh!" *cheer*

Taebun had to stop it at some point, or my 5 minute PowerPoint introduction would take the whole 40 minutes. I've seen them again, and the pattern surfaces each time. At first, it was very funny. Well, it's still sometimes funny, but my encouragement has to be muted to a degree. The three ringleaders will stand up when I ask a question, or very loudly repeat what I say. The problem is, I've learned, that just because they are enthusiastic to participate, they do not have all the answers. Mostly, they like to be the center of attention, whether or not they know what they are talking about. These three will always speak, which takes away the incentive for the others to volunteer a little bit. And I found that a lot of the quieter students have a lot to say.

I mean, believe me, nobody thought "My mother is July!!" was funnier than me when I asked the class to tell me what month their mother was born in, but it's not the sort of spotlight I can encourage every day.

Cooking with Sara!

So I've been put in charge of a class with the teachers at my school from 3-4 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. There are no rules or guidelines on how I am to run the class, or what I should teach, so it's complete freedom. The purpose of the class is to give the teachers an opportunity to talk in English (or just listen) to me.

Mostly the class is attended by women, and I learned that most of them really like to cook, so on Tuesday I decided to teach them cooking terms and recipes in English. I started with the basics: chop, slice, mince, boil, measure, etc. Then I moved on to recipes, choosing french toast, bruschetta, lemon pepper chicken, ratatouille (a big name, but a super easy recipe), and no bake cookies. I also showed them a video of Fried green tomatoes.

I had two intents for this particular class. The first was to show them something I knew they took an interest in, using recipes that I am familiar with. I also told them to bring their own recipes for me if they wanted to. The second was to show them that I am capable of cooking. It was starting to become a daily ritual to ask me what I had to eat for breakfast and dinner outside of school hours, and give me instruction. Even my co teacher Mrs. Shim wanted to help me learn cooking in the days leading to my decision for the class. She would make sure that I knew things like "be careful when tossing pumpkin in flour" then demonstrate the wrong way to do it: shaking an invisible bowl so forcefully that flour would go everywhere.

For Thursday I brought in food to make with them- bruschetta and tuna pasta salad. The bruschetta was easy enough, and I'm pretty sure they will forever remember the word "chop" after watching me chop tomatoes for 10 minutes. I also wore a chef's hat that was given to me in Seoul at orientation during a "Cooking Nanta" performance (think of "Stomp" only in a kitchen with knives and other utensils. Very cool.) when I was pulled up on stage to assist in a dumpling competition.

During the pasta salad I almost lost them. I already had the noodles prepared, a can of tuna, and chopped up/minced onions, peppers, and garlic with them. That was fine, but I think they wanted to have me committed when I made the sauce.

I started with "1/2 cup of mayonnaise, then pour it in"
*sideways glances as it plops into the mixing bowl*
"1/4 cup vinegar, then pour it in"
*a small gasp*
"1/2 cup oil..."
*muttering in Korean and an interruption from Taebun: "no, they say too much oil"*
"Trust me, it will be great!"

After adding some pepper, mustard, salt, thyme, and oregano, I had what looked to be a disgusting mess in this bowl. I showed it around the group, and nobody wanted to lean in too close to it. And then, the magical English word "mix!" and the mess transformed. It became a creamy light yellow sauce with the dominant scent of oregano, and they all passed around the bowl to smell it. After I mixed the final product together, they all very happily ate it and went back for seconds. Yes! Which is good, because I'd never made this before, so I didn't even know if I could trust me with it.

I figured this would have them all convinced that could cook, and finally take away some of their concern over my welfare. That is, until the next morning when the woman who gives me a ride looks over at me very concerned and asks "How often. do you. eat. pasta?"

It's strictly rice and kimchi for me now.

Saturday Escapades

I started and ended my day the same way: swaying.

Scott and I woke up at 8am to a 3.5 earthquake shaking our apartment. Taebun told me later that I was "very lucky for the experience" because many Koreans don't get a chance to feel one. I'm not sure my heart at 8am shared that sentiment. The whole building shook for a good 10 seconds, and our front door was shaking and banging violently in the door jam. I thought perhaps a truck had crashed into our apartment building. It wasn't bad enough to do any damage or to stop the tennis match being played down by the river next to our building, but it was a fearsome thing to wake up to.

When we woke up the second time, we decided to jaunt into town in search of festivities for Buddha's birthday. We couldn't find much except for strung up paper lanterns and an inflatable baby Buddha on a lotus flower, so I think all the partying must happen at the temples. Our co-teachers were gone for the weekend, so we didn't have anyone to ask. After a good two hours of wandering, we decided to go see Wolverine. A movie here is comparable to America, about $6.50. Seating is assigned, and our only theater (for now anyway, one is being built 5 minutes from our apartment) has 5 screens, with assigned seating. They play about 3 American movies and 2 Korean movies at any given time, so I shall not miss out- and you can bet I'll be seeing star Trek 14 hours before it opens in America!

After the movie, we met up with a few more of our foreign friends at a bar downtown called IDA. Andrew, who works at the middle school next door to my school, and Katie and Danielle. We drank about 4 pitchers of delicious fruit Soju (pineapple and strawberry), which taste like blended fruit smoothies. It's a good thing that these places give you very small glasses, or there could be trouble.

I should stop and explain about Korean bars, or as they call them "hofs". They are designed more like restaurants, with booths and tables to sit down at; in some places separate rooms. Nobody stands around or hangs out at the bar, and someone brings you drinks. If the booths are full, then you have to wait or find another bar. It's standard to also order food when you're there, and if you don't they will be really worried about you.

We continued on with Katie and Andrew and ended up at a bar called "Candy," which is where we went on the first night out with the foreigners. We were placed in a room in the back, with a window shared with another room full of enthusiastic Koreans that fed Andrew fried pig intestine. The room was very hot, and we learned that the air conditioning unit was broken, so one of the employees opened up a panel in the wall that had dark stairs leading up.

Oh yes. Could you resist either?

At the top of the stairs Scott found a door to the roof, which shared another window looking in to our Korean neighbors. They also embraced the discovery, and climbed out of their window and back down through our stairs. This may have gone on for a long time, but there was a very angry woman on a balcony above us. After about 15 minutes she called the bar, but the solution was not to scold us, kick us out, or even put the panel back on the wall. No, instead the bar delivered us a free plate of french fries out of concern that we may be drinking too much.

And then, Nori Bang. Korean Karaoke rooms. You rent out a personal room with couches and a big screen on one end (we were there maybe 2 hours for $12). We had two microphones, two tambourines, and two more bottles of Soju. I'm not sure if my dancing or my singing was worse. The evening went everywhere from Weezer, to Grease, to the Lion King, to the bathroom. I accidently pushed my Soju limit at the end there, but it was a great day.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the day between Buddha's birthday weekend and Children's Day on Tuesday. I'm pretty sure my school is the only school in the city who elected to have school in session, just without classes. So I shall be sitting in the office all day while the kids watch movies and play outside. During this time, I plan to play catchup on blogging- I have a few drafts still saved but not posted. For those of you still reading this, I give you my apologies now and also want to thank you ahead of time for your patience.

You have been warned...

Priceless Language Moments 2

The woman who drives me to school in the mornings now likes to prepare a few specific things to say in English about current events, which is really awesome. Today, this is what she had to say:

"10 men die handshake Obama," and tried again after looking at her notebook:

"10 men die shaking hands with Obama"

Now, my first thought was that my president has the handshake of doom. This IS big news. After a little while I figured out that she was trying to talk about the Swine influenza, and how she read that Obama went to Mexico and was shaking hands with people that were sick and later died.

Kids Climbing Mountains

Sorry, as Scott also mentioned in his blog, sickness came upon us this week (though more him than me). It led to being both very tired and extra busy while I tried to keep up with work.

Anyway! Right before the sick started, last Saturday, I joined Scott's school (Dongbu Elementary) in the climbing of a mountain (I think it's called Yongnam). I thought, when invited, that I would be going with faculty from his school since it was Saturday. I forgot, however, that 2 of 4 Saturdays a month all of the students have school (mind you, it's not in our contract to work weekends though), so it was a school outing. The mountain was right behind his school, and the hike lasted about 2 hours.

So without further ado, Kids climbing mountains:

The road was steep and treacherous...

The strong found brief moments of refreshment...

...the smaller and weaker tripped and fell...

And finally, finally, the end was within grasp! What would be over that final rise?!

This is not a joke.

After a 1 hour climb, the 1st through 6th grade students of Dongbu reached the top of the mountain to discover an excercise park.

Koreans let their kids climb mountains with steep drops and no rails without having their mothers sign waivers. They exercise after climbing mountains without a water fountain in sight. Incredible.