Month Won!

Today officially marks the end of my first month here in Korea. That's pretty crazy to say. I got here on Friday March 15th. It really feels like I've been here much longer than that. I guess that's due to being so busy every day. I'm going to use today's blog as a reflection on my first month here.

First I'm going to give a quick overview of my day though. I was alone when I woke up due to MT. I actually slept really well. I was kind of surprised at that. I got to sleep a little later than usual as well. I hit up 8 Ho Gwan for breakfast and then headed over to class. Of course today I was running a little later than usual so SOMEONE stole my regular seat. (It was a GIRL!)

I took the seat across from her because most of the other seats were taken, and ended up stealing Li Ting Ting's regular seat. In college there are no assigned seats so I'm not mad, it actually made for some interesting things. Apparently in Mongolia if you accidentally touch feet or legs under the desk then you shake hands. At least that's what I gathered. This happened today and the girl across from me reached over and grabbed my hand. I was confused but hey whatever. Then it happened again. Then it happened while she was talking so the whole class was focused on her, she reached across the table and I wasn't going to stiff her in front of everyone but it was clear I had no clue what was going on. The teacher just looked at me and everyone started cracking up. I was just like 몰라요?! (Molla Yo) I don't know?! Anyways this happened 3 times during class today and I'm pretty sure I'm married now.

We learned about time today. You use the counting (Korean) number system for the hours 시 (She) and the other (Sino-Korean or Chinese) number system for the minutes 분 (Boon), cause that just makes so much sense (#sarcasm). Man this is going to take a lot of repetition to get down. There are definitely times where I feel hopeless learning this language, and other times where I feel like I am definitely progressing and can do this. What a metaphor for life. This challenge is exactly what I wanted when I came here.

The rest of the day was pretty standard. I skipped lunch because I wasn't hungry, and right before dinner YJS came into my room and asked if I had time to talk. He told me that JTBC (a major broadcasting company here) had contacted the University about me and wanted to interview me. They want to do it tomorrow. Wow. This is crazy. I was on TV as a baby and a few times during my hockey career, but this is like a solo interview. I guess they want to come to the campus and film me teaching English to the students, teaching the students in the weight room, and also teaching them how to eat (?). I don't know if that's a translation error. I hope so haha.

What a crazy experience this is shaping up to be. I could have never imagined this would happen in my wildest dreams, let alone in the first month I was here! You know, last night as I was falling asleep I started to think about different perspectives on my life. I took some time to reflect on my time here.

I started thinking about the fact that I was a 30 (32 in Korea) year old single male living in a college dormitory in South Korea, basically working for free. I have no wife, no kids, no money, no house, (a car but it's back home). By many worldly definitions I'm a failure. Now I know most of you reading this would say "but you're living your dream!" and that's completely true, I don't view myself as a failure. However, coming from such a strong culture with a specific definition of success, sometimes it's hard to detach from that.

I had a little bout of embarrassment today in class as well when the teacher went around and calculated everyone's Korean age. Basically you're a year or two older in Korea then you are in America. If you're born on May 1st you are 1 year old instantly. Then come January 1st of the next year you turn 2. Then your birthday is basically January 1st every year. Even though it's not. Since my birthday hasn't happened yet, I'm still 30 in American years. However in Korean years, its the current year minus my birth year plus one (because when you're born you're one year old). 2017-1986 = 31 +1 = 32.

So that made me feel even better, especially when everyone else in the class is saying 20, 21, 22. Nathan is 26 by Korean years, and the girl who shook my hand today is 30. Otherwise everyone is super young, and I'm just figuring out what I want to do with my life. Honestly I'm fine with this though, because I know God has a plan for me and I'm playing by his rules, not the rules of this world.

I used to go on long walks in the early hours of the morning when I was younger. This probably started when I was about 16 years old. I was so wound up about my future and what I would do, that I just had to get out and walk and think. I would look up at the stars for hours and just dream and scheme. I always thought I had to take control of my life and make things happen. I thought about how I would be successful and achieve that American dream. How I could make a lot of money, have a beautiful wife, a nice house, and a nice car. That was the definition of success to me.

As time went on I still took walks, and the weight of this success hadn't fallen off of me. Life wasn't shaping up to be what I knew I was capable of, but I just didn't truly believe in material wealth being fulfilling. I was trying to live in two worlds. This came to a head when I truly felt Christ's love for the first time on my road trip to a Christian hockey camp in North Dakota with my bro Matt Gates. I had been a Christian my entire life, but really never had an actual relationship with God. I was a Christian in name only.

The experience I had didn't immediately transform me into a walking talking disciple willing to talk to anyone and everyone on the street about God. In fact I still struggle with that. What it did though was help me to realize definitively and without a doubt that God is real. From that point on I started to learn how to have a relationship with Him. I say learn because I'm continuing to learn. Everyday. But I can say definitively that He has answered my prayers. In ways that I never thought possible, and also ones that I never even thought about. My trip here is living proof.

While I may not have much to show on this earth, that no longer defines my success. I'm starting to care less and less as my relationship with God grows and grows. As my trust in Him continues to grow. As I'm able to lean on Him, and find rest in Him. "My yoke is easy and my burden is light". This is the truth.

Now I definitely want to follow that up with the statement that I don't have things figured out. Very VERY far from it. It really perturbs me when I meet people that talk down to others regarding their religion/spirituality/relationship or whatever you want to call it. I am a broken person. I mess up everyday. Multiple multiple times. However, I embrace this brokenness. One of the most common misconceptions that people have about Christianity is that they need to be saints before God will accept them. "I need to be a better person before I go to God". This is something I struggle with everyday as I recognize my sin more and more. Realize that God loves you as you are and not as you should be. (Thank you Brennan Manning for these words). Come to him broken, and be made whole in his love. You don't become better to earn his love, you change and become better BECAUSE you are loved. If you haven't checked out Brennan Manning's 'Abba's Child' I would suggest you do it.

Thanks for joining me for this one month reflection! So far this month I have: learned a foundation of the Korean language, made 40+ Korean friends, made multiple English speaking professor friends, started working out and losing weight, ate multiple awesome foods, found a great church, and had successive higher profile interviews (including tomorrow) about why I'm here and what I'm doing. I can't wait to see what next month brings!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day:제/네/저의/나의 (Je/Ne/Jeo Ye/Na Ye) These all mean "my". Yeah. You can say my 4 different ways. You can also say "hello" 3 different ways. Not confusing at all.

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

Midterm Day

So as today started I was a bit perturbed. Our teachers told us more than once to be in classroom 1110 at 8:15am to check in for our midterm, and I have a picture to prove it. That's no problem in and of itself, however none of the cafeterias on campus open until 8am. That means I wouldn't have time for breakfast before going to class. Not eating before an intense midterm is not my idea of great preparation, but I don't know protocol around here so I better make sure I'm on time.

PROOF WE WERE SUPPOSED TO MEET AT 8:15 FOR THE MIDTERM!

I get to the classroom and no one is there. Ok, I must be late and they moved everyone or something. Nope! Nowhere to be found. Maybe they're somewhere I don't know, hopefully they check the classroom for me then. I'll just chill in 1110 and wait. Turns out no one got there until 8:45. Like what is this? I know about Korean time, but that's just ridiculous. I am definitely not myself when I don't eat, and I didn't have a snickers to fix it either :(.

Anyways, it won't be that bad right? Just 3 hours of testing on an empty stomach. Then I get to go eat. The vocab/grammar/reading portion was a bit tough. It seemed like they introduced new vocab during the test. I don't know what Jedi mind games those are, but hey, whatever they wanna do. Then the teacher announced during our break that we will be forgoing the speaking portion of the test until next week. Score! I get out an hour earlier to go grab my food! (My mind was one track by now.) Nope, not to be. After our second hour of testing it was time to have 2 more hours of class! Definitely not how they do it in America.

For those of you super eager to find out, yes we did introduce a new conjugation today! Yay! This one was a doozy too. This particular conjugation is used for polite speech with someone you know. For instance a grandmother or grandfather, but not to use while addressing a group of people you don't know such as a speech in front of business associates or on a news broadcast. The better part is that it's conjugated exactly like adding "please" from before! Sweet right? That makes logical sense, you'd be asking a person respectfully to please do something. Nope. Totally different. Just the SAME. EXACT. SPELLING.

I get it, you listen to the context of the sentence to figure out what the person is actually saying, but I wanna know who decided this was a good idea. I mean I know the great King Sejong invented the language, but I doubt he was chillin in his throne room saying "this one will get em, we'll make everything sound alike but mean totally different things!" Or maybe he was, who knows. Regardless I have massive amounts of studying to do.

After class I went to lunch with Monkmandakh the Mongolian Monster. He was apparently a professional DOTA player for awhile which is really cool. I really enjoy watching pro gaming so this intrigues me. He told me during class today that he had won a few regional championships and had played some sponsored teams that smashed his team. Good times.

After lunch I invited him back to the dorm for some Alex and chill. He showed me a few of the DOTA events that he had participated in, and after an hour or so he had to go to play basketball. I took a quick nap then headed to the gym before dinner. Otherwise I've just been chilling in my room watching twitch and looking over Korean.

I got a bit of a relaxing day because my entire floor is empty! The students that didn't go on the senior trip to America went to what is called MT until Friday night. MT is Membership Training as I mentioned and I don't know what that is. All I know is that now I realize how boring and empty my life would be without these students and other RA's. As much as I love it here I can't imagine coming here alone to study. Now I realize things would be different if I lived in the international dorms. I certainly would have more American friends, and probably friends from all nationalities that could speak any kind of English, but it wouldn't be the same.

I am so thankful to God for my position here. I have been afforded the chance to really be in the heart of Korean culture and I have been inserted in a place where I am immediately accepted and helped. Glory be to God, and thanks to Dr. Carol Burns and Dr. Kunyong Rhee as well as all the other people involved for making this happen. Tomorrow marks my being here for 1 month officially! Time really flew, I can't imagine what will be happening at the end of next month let alone 11 months from now, but I'm really excited to find out.

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 여헹 (Yeo Haeng) This means "travel". This was also one of the things that was introduced to us on the test. It was also an essay question. So I had to make up a bunch of stuff about how awesome "여헹" was without knowing what I was talking about. I'm sure it was mentioned before the test, but it certainly wasn't talked about extensively enough to make a dent in anyone's mind. Love the mind games, you win this round Korea! *Shakes fist vehemently*

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

Early Night

Tonight I'm going to call it early. I have a midterm tomorrow morning at 8am, plus today was pretty busy. Also the students are leaving early for MT so I will have the dorm pretty much to myself Thursday and Friday.

Today was pretty standard despite all the excitement yesterday. I woke up and got breakfast at 8 Ho Gwan with YJS. Chicken Curry Bap is the new standard. It's basically Dak Kalbi with curry flavored rice. Good stuff. Then I headed to class early and finished up my homework before the other students and teacher arrived. Today started with a review and then an intro into family members as well as the number system used for counting.

Are there separate verbs for things like "name" and "age" and "house" and "sleep" when it comes to formal vs informal you ask? WHY YES THERE ARE! And I'm sooooooo happy about it. That's right, there's two verbs for all of those things. If you're speaking to a person above you that you need to use honorifics for you not only have to change the conjugation of the verb, but the actual verb changes too. This is gonna be a snap.

Anyways, after class I came back to the dorm. I wasn't all that hungry so I skipped lunch and got a quick nap. Then it was time to head over to the K-PACE center for the English conversational class. That's always fun because I get to interface with other English teachers here. I've met BB and her husband James for a few weeks now. They run the K-PACE English conversational classes. James plays hockey and BB is Korean-American I believe. They are extremely nice and offered to help me with anything I need. I really appreciate this! They also said they go out to dinner together sometimes. That would be a welcome change for me.

My Business Card.

I forgot to mention that they gave me 3 stacks of business cards today. It's official! I should have had them put Wang Hyung Jun on it haha. That would have been silly though having people actually call me that. I also forgot to mention that the guy taking pictures was there again today at the English conversational class. That was fun to explain to all the English teachers lol. They're all like who is this guy? And all of a sudden I have a camera man following me around.

After the English class I headed back to the dorm to see if YJS was ready for dinner. We waited a few minutes and headed out to 8 Ho Gwan. No hot dogs this time, I got Dak Kalbi. Yes I am one of those people who finds what they like and sticks with it. It's just too good and filling to not get. After dinner it was time to head back to the K-PACE center for the last singing and dancing rehearsal before the student's MT session.

I haven't talked much about the girls in the K-PACE program but let me tell you, they are a HOOT. Every morning when I walk into breakfast they all yell "Hi teacher!" and try to talk to me in English. They're loud too lol. Well one of the girls somehow learned the phrase "Look at me!" and she uses it nonstop. Oh, she also knows "You give me high five!" Classic. I don't mind it, they don't mean it disrespectfully, and YJS and I get a huge laugh out of it.

Well the reason I bring this up is that she hadn't said it in awhile, so YJS and I were commenting about it to each other. In walk the girls for the rehearsal and what do you know one of them says "Look at me!" Only it's not the girl that normally says it, its 3 of them! The "Look at me!" disease is spreading! Save me! Haha they all want high fives and then they giggle about it and run away.

Some of the sketches are getting pretty good. One group is singing "Sweet Little Kitty" by Cherry Filter which is hilarious. The song is in Korean but every once in awhile they say Sweet Little Kitty in English. (나는 낭만 고양이) Na Neun Nang Man Go Yang E is Korean for sweet little kitty. I got in there and played some air guitar and air drums to help them get into it. The other groups aren't quite as energetic, though one group is trying to dance and sing to "Growl" by EXO.

Following an hour and a half of dancing and singing everyone is tired so it's time to head back to the dorm. I am about to hit the hay, but thanks for stopping by and I'll let you know how my midterm goes! Good night from Korea!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 형/누나/남동생/여동생 (Hyung/Noona/Nam Dong Saeng/Yeo Dong Saeng) Older Brother/Older Sister/Younger Brother/Younger Sister. I'm not going to go through all the family units we learned today, but that's a start so you can start calling your siblings in Korean. Have fun!

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

I'm Gonna Be Famous!

This one is pretty silly. Today was a big day with a lot happening though. I'll start from the beginning so I don't go off any too many tangents. I wasn't really prepared for what the day brought when I woke up. I'm also pretty tired so please forgive any lack of cohesion I might display.

I woke up and hit the bathroom like any other day. About 8am it was time to head to 8 Ho Gwan and feed my belly. Dak Kalbi looked good so I had to get that. Actually come to think of it I ate at 8 Ho Gwan for every meal today. That's a pretty good day in itself.

After breakfast I walked to the global lounge for class. I was there even before the teachers who open our classroom up, so I waited outside. They showed up relatively soon after though so I wasn't waiting long. I put my books down and went to the bathroom. After leaving I saw a white guy outside so I said "hi" to him. Turns out he is an English teacher there from Canada (surprisingly there are a lot of people from Canada here). I told him why I was here and that I was interested in teaching English. He asked me if I had met the head of the English department, and I informed him that I hadn't but that I had been wanting to. He told me that he would introduce me next time he gets a chance. I look forward to picking his brain on the best way to get myself ready to teach English here in the shortest amount of time possible.

After that chance meeting I went back to class feeling pretty good. Class time was rolling by and the teacher asked if we all had health insurance. I just signed up for global heath insurance, but Nathan the other American guy in our class told me that you can get insurance through the school and it's pretty cheap. I went to the OIA (Office of International Affairs) and asked about it. They told me to check in during the next break but unfortunately I didn't get a chance. I can see what they found out tomorrow. Nathan also informed me that the director of the English department was his teacher for his other class he's taking. That's fortunate, I'm going to try and meet him Thursday after my class. Things are falling into place today!

I head back to the dorm to see if YJS wants to grab some food. I decided to go big today. That's right, I got the hot dog I've been waiting a month to try. These hot dogs look like giant corn dogs. I found out the hot dog itself was pretty tiny, and there's about 3 inches of batter deep fried on top of it. I also got some chicken curry bap to go with it just to wash the hot dog down with. I have to be completely honest, I wouldn't get the hot dog again. It only cost about $1.25 but it just wasn't good. Here's a pic so you can imagine what it tasted like.

Chicken Curry Bap and a Hot Dog for lunch!

YJS and I planned on hitting the gym around 3pm. He knocks on my door about 3pm and says that the director of the publicity department for the school wants to interview me today. He had messaged me earlier in the day to ask when a good time to be interviewed was. I told him Thursday around 3pm would work. I guess the director decided to stop by the K-PACE center today and wondered if I would come over there. Well that works for me!

I don't remember how much I mentioned about this yesterday so I'll fill you in. The K-PACE center did an interview on me (which I posted some pictures of earlier). That interview was sent to the publicity department here and I guess they thought it was an interesting enough story to take on themselves. That brings us to earlier today when I got interviewed by the publicity department. Choi Young-Moo (yes he spelled his own name that way) interviewed me. He knew about my blog and had actually read some of it. (안녕하세요 최영무 씨!)

He asked me mostly the same questions that I had been asked for the K-PACE interview. What I was doing before I came here, how I liked Korea so far, what were my motivations for coming, etc. I was and always will be happy to talk about it, even though as most of you know who I have discussed this with, I don't have a definitive answer. God put it in my heart to come here, and I listened. End of story.

This has already been a crazy ride. I didn't expect to get any attention for coming here, but they seem to think this is a pretty big deal. I am so grateful to God for all the amazing opportunities and just plain cool things I've already been a part of.

This one is even better. Apparently the publicity department likes my story so much that they want to write an article on me and try and see if some of the news stations here are interested in it. That blows my mind. It's hard not to let your imagination run wild when something like this happens. What if they put me on TV? What if some big news station in Seoul gets a hold of this and brings me there? What if this blows up and I'm famous in Korea?! Haha fat chance, but fun to think about. All things are possible with God, and I'm gonna go where His plan takes me. I harken back to one of the last things my boy Freddy Lee told me at church before I left. "Don't let them put you on TV." I'll try Freddy, I'll try.

So after the interview they mentioned that they'd like to get some video or pictures of me in action with the students. The students have been working on song and dance routines for their MT (membership training, don't ask me what this is) this Thursday and Friday. I was invited but unfortunately I have my midterm Thursday, and class Friday that would be too much to miss.

I figured that was the end of it. Then I went to dinner and this guy was there taking pictures of me. I literally felt like I was a Kpop star or something. Haha it was pretty awkward I'm not gonna lie. He did a great job, but never having this happen to me I didn't really know what to do. I acted as natural as possible but it's hard not to smile all the time when you know people are looking at you. Imagine the scene: not only am I a giant white dude in Korea, but I walk into a cafeteria full of people and this dude is walking around taking pictures of me.

Luckily I recognized him as the same guy who ran the camera while they were filming my interview at the K-PACE center earlier in the day. Otherwise that would have been so random and confusing. Like why is this guy just following me around taking pictures? Haha classic. Anyways, this lasted for about 4 hours. We went to the K-PACE center so the students could work on their routines. I went from group to group so the guy could get good pictures of me. I did my best to be natural and get what were good shots, but what do I know about what looks good? I'm just a giant dude who doesn't shave and I get my hair cut once every few months. Why is this happening to me?! Haha. Don't get me wrong, I am absolutely loving the adventure and I know God's plan is in action for me. I made sure the interviewer knew it too.

I finally got back to the dorm with the students around 8:30pm. There was time for more pictures. We got 5 students together with me to take staged pictures doing silly things like making Korean hearts. Finally about 8:45 it was time for him to go and I got a chance to start working on homework and visiting the students. Today was wild, but I'm excited for where the future is going to take me. I am learning more and more each day to trust in God, and this experience is definitely taking me closer to Him. Maybe I'll get a chance to reach a lot of people for Him. Maybe not. Either way I'm in full submission to His will.

That's it for today, not a whole lot of interesting stuff. (LOL) It's time for me to pass out and digest all the things that happened. I thank you once again for joining me! 잘자네 (Good Night)!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 시험 (She Heom) EXAM! THURSDAY! OMGGGGGGGGGGGG HALP! Jay Kay El Oh El...I'll be fine...I hope (ohs noesssssssss)

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

Taking Care of Business

Today was a day to get things done that had built up. I ordered some stuff of Amazon, and they sent me an email stating that Korea will not allow packages in without a customs pin number. I normally don't have the data on my phone turned on, I just use wifi for everything. Today I decided to turn it on though so that I could call customs to figure out the pin number and also call my bank to activate my debit card. Of course this was something I should have done before I left, but I never use my debit card so it slipped my mind.

After some googling, I found there was an English counseling number for the customs house. I called the number and it was no longer in service. Wonderful. I did some more googling and found the main line for the customs house. I called the number and it was a hospital. Wonderful. Luckily, the receptionist at the hospital spoke some English and was able to give me the actual number for the customs house. The number wasn't in service. Wonderful.

How does this happen? Seriously? Ugh, I can't wait until my Korean proficiency is enough so that I can just do what I need to do without having to rely on translation. Man what a crazy wild goose chase. Turning on my data costs $10 for a 24 hour period. That's why I don't use it much, however when I do I get things like 2 week old voicemails from x-sport telling me that my membership expired and I should renew. Thanks guys! I didn't purposely discontinue my membership for any specific reason or anything.

I haven't called my bank yet because of the time difference. They are literally open for the hours that I am asleep. I have to stay up late just to talk to them. Hopefully everything gets squared away during this time period and there are no hoops to jump through. I'm not holding my breath. I was also able to email the Director and Manager of the K-PACE program in order to try and get our Skype session up and running in a few weekends. I guess we need permission from them in order to do this. I also emailed Hubert! That's right! My Chinese friend from the Royal International Hotel where I had so many adventures in only one night. What a great guy, I really hope to stay in touch with him. He went above and beyond for me, and if it weren't for him I might not be here right now.

Class today introduced yet another conjugation. This must be the language of conjugation because wow, they just keep coming. This one adds 네요 (Ne Yo) to everything, and is an exclamation of surprise. For example 마시다 (Ma She Da) is to drink. Conjugating to 마시네요 (Ma She Ne Yo) at the end of a sentence would be saying "I can't believe you drank all that!" Or something of the like. Welp, add it to the list haha.

We are finished with our books and start new ones on Wednesday, then we have our midterm on Thursday! I'm actually not nervous. I know I will learn all this, it just might take longer than I want it to. I have to study also for a dictation test tomorrow. Those are super wonderful, trying to figure out WTF the teacher is saying to you.

Something cool happened this evening. YJS came in my room and told me that the director of the publicity department for the university wanted to know my blog information. I'm gonna be famous ya'll! Not really. Though that would be pretty cool. Apparently there might be a newspaper journalist who's asking about any interesting things on campus and since YJS just sent my interview to the publicity department they decided to tell him about me. They also asked my eye color. That one is beyond me.Anyways that's a cool thing and I'll keep everyone updated on anything I hear about it. Now I have to call my bank! See you all tomorrow, and as always thank you for reading!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 날씨가 어때요? (Nal She Ga Eo Dae Yo?) This means how is the weather? Pretty safe topic for water cooler conversation. Definitely use that one on your English speaking co-workers today, then walk away shaking your head after they look at you confused.

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

A Day of Rest

Today I decided to take the day pretty much completely off. Only having one day off between weeks of classes made me realize I could use a day of rest. I looked over some notes from class and took a few naps. The dorm was still completely empty up until about 4pm because all the students went home for the weekend.

I didn't go to church today. I didn't feel like spending 3 hours on a bus. However, Ray from church messaged me and asked if I was coming. When I told him I wasn't he suggested I do a devotional and read my Bible. I let him know that I do that every day but that I would definitely do that today as well.

I had a good deep conversation with one of my friends today as well. This is something that I haven't had in a long time. I think part of it is because I had lost the ability to care deeply enough about someone to invest enough energy into a conversation like that. I used to want to have those conversations all the time with people, and then I started getting tired of people.

As I've said here before I feel that God is using my time here to heal me, and prepare me for my next step in life. I am learning to love again, something I had somehow lost in my journey. I am so happy to be able to regain this ability. Love can change lives, and we are called to pass on the love that God has shown us. I want to do that.

I also had the chance to Skype my parents which was nice. I had cheese tonkatsu (don ka su) for lunch and finally got a picture so you guys can see what it looks like. I also walked to a market with YJS after lunch so he could get some chocolate and I took a picture of the alcohol section so everyone could see how cheap soju is compared to beer (and everything else).

Cheese Tonkatsu!

Soju bottles, just over $1.

Beer! Not expensive, but much more than soju.

Back to the grind tomorrow. I need to get to bed because Korean class comes early. I'll see you all tomorrow!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 비싸/싸 (Pi Ssa/Ssa) Pi Ssa means expensive (like the beer) and Ssa means cheap (like the soju).

TL:DR I'm in Korea.

Saturday Class :(

Was this detention? A punishment? No, but it felt like it. We have various makeup classes throughout the semester and this was one of them. However, it was a makeup in advance. We are missing a lot of class the first week in May due to some holidays and the presidential election here.

I'm all for more learning and the challenge this is bringing, however I am less than thrilled about only having one day off before going back for more. I will learn and endure though. Life is more than just pleasing yourself, and you have to work for what you want.

Morning at the empty 8 Ho Gwan.

Today introduced more conjugation, dear God how many are there? I took a pic of our workbook and all the conjugations we currently know of. There's joining of two like verbs (positive connotation and positive connotation), present tense with conflicting verbs in the same sentence(positive connotation and negative connotation or vice versa), present tense polite (formal), present tense informal, past tense, adding please to a verb, and suggesting to do something. I put these in order for the picture, top to bottom.

THE CONJUGATIONS FROM HELL.

The fun part about these particular verbs that we're conjugating is that the받침 (Paht Cheem) or bottom consonant of each syllable changes from a D sound to an L sound when it's conjugated. This is atypical and creates crazy havoc in my head. There are actually conjugations that we have learned that aren't on this sheet. Also not included is polite adding please to a verb, and future tense. Those are just the ones that I know are coming, who knows what else. Welcome to level 1 Korean 4 weeks in!

CHERRY BLOSSOM SEASON!

Alright enough complaining. THE DORMS ARE EMPTY. This is so weird. The only two people on our floor are me and YJS. The senior students and Heavy G, and An Hyo Sang are in the U.S. for the next week, and all the other students went home for the weekend. I'm not really sure what to do with myself. I hung out watching my boy Alex stream for most of the day while looking over my Korean notes. I took a break to hit lunch with YJS, then hit the gym for a good workout before dinner. My buddy Park Jeong Bin wanted to come over for dinner so I setup a pizza idea with him and YJS. Here's how it turned out.

This looks good right? RIGHT?!

That pizza...that one right there ^^ above, had corn on it. CORN. A ton of corn. It was a half cheese, half chicken pizza. I just don't even know. I saw the picture on their ad and had to try it. Oh well, it was worth it. I was filled up afterwards so I can't complain. All during this Jeong Bin was being extremely entertained by Alex's stream. They are kind of an item right now. Check out this video of Jeong Bin after he typed a message to Alex in chat.

After dinner we went for a walk. The days have been so beautiful here lately, and tonight was no exception. I was happy to get out of the dorm and spend some time with my boys. What a relaxing day. Except for class. That is never relaxing. Thanks again for tuning in! See you tomorrow after church!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 주말에 같이 영화 볼까요? (Joo Ma Reh Kat Chi Yeong Hwa Bol Ga Yo?) This means "Shall we see a movie together this weekend?" Joo Ma Reh is weekend, Kat Chi is together, Yeong Hwa is move, and Bol Ga Yo is a suggestion to watch. So if you have that cute Korean girl in your life you wanna ask out, you're welcome.

TL:DR I'm in Korea.