Winter Time

Winter in Korea has been very cold. Most days it doesn't get above 10 degrees F. Actually yesterday it was about 30 degress F. It was noticibly warmer, thankfully. So warm in fact that the ice that has coated every street for the past month finally melted. It was a nice change of pace to finally be able to see the pavement again and not slip your way around. The slight warm up also brought clouds, or was caused in part by the clouds, clouds that in warmer weather would have brought rain brought snow, lots of snow. But for the first time this winter when we woke up to find the ground freshly covered, the snow was not packed tight or frozen, it was light and fluffy, shining in the sunlight. There was a few feet of it and people everywhere were emerging from their homes and business to shovel it off their front walk. This is the kind of snow I don't mind, where everything looks perfect, like a set from a movie or decorations at Disneyland, with the snow sitting among branches and shrubbery. Instead of freezing and slipping on my way to school today, instead I looked around and smiled, hearing the snow squish and crunch beneeth my feet. In a few days things will undoutably be icey, dirty and slushy, but for now, I welcome the change.

Because the weather has been so downright COLD I haven't been up to much in the past month. I don't think I'm the only one either. Many of my friends are also buckling down in their apartments, bored yet unmotivated to go out, eagerly awaiting their vacation plans which will take them home or to tropical lands. In three weeks Jason and I will be going to Thailand and Cambodia for a little R&R and sightseeing. I can't wait! Until then we've been very content watching episode after episode of the X-Files and Avatar, the Last Airbender. We met up with friends Saturday night for what turned into an all night eating and drinking fest, which I think was much welcome by all of us who have a bit of "cabin fever." We also spoke of the underlying stress that keeps us all up at night, its just the stress of it being winter coupled with the fact that we are nearing our six month mark of living in a foreign country, a mark always cited as the time where you reach the hight of your culture shock and homesickness. Saturday was a fun relief from it all, full of laughing and funny stories. I'm sure the taxi driver who picked us up at 4am thought we were crazy. A group of four foreigners asking for a norebang, standing outside in freezing weather, otherwise totally alone? But we did make it to the norebang, for better or worse (I think the worse, our singing voices were not good come 5am.)

Jason and I also did emerge from our cave for a short trip on Friday. We booked a night at a small resort spa just an hour outside of Wonju in Pyeongchang. (Pyeongchang just made a bid for the 2018 winter Olympics, let's hope they get it, third times the charm, right?)  It was an excuse to get out and into the country. The resort was small, with only a handful of rooms. We stayed in the "Patio" room which included a cute patio area with BBQ (all covered in snow of course), a flat screen TV set up to play Wii and a private jacuzzi tub! It was super cute and lots of fun. We had breakfast at the resort in the morning and were able to choose an "American breakfast" instead of Korean. That was awesome. We stared in wonder at our plates filled with delicious food: french toast, garlic bread, tater tots, egg, bacon, sausage, fruit... oh it was delicous!! Its been so long since we had a proper breakfast like that. Breakfasts in Korean usually consist of rice and kimchi.

Originally we were planning to just head back to Wonju after the hotel but Scott and Amber called saying they were going to go to the Pyeongchang Trout Festival. Since we were in the area we decided to meet them. It turns out Amber and Scott were on the wrong bus and took the wrong route to get to the festival so Jason and I accually arrived two hours before them. We tried to stick around a wait for them but it was so cold we left after and hour and a half, missing them compleatly. (But we did see them for dinner.) The trout festival was the one we had planned on going to with my family but due to an outbreak of foot and mouth disease they had temparerly canceled it when they were here! But Saturday we made it to it. It was a funny sight to see. The river was a huge frozen mass that you could walk out on, skate or sled around on. Farther down the river there was a designated area for the trout fishing. This consited of either pre-purchasing a tent for you to sit in or on the spot buying the cheaper day pass to the come as you please area. Jason and I did not enter either area because we didn't want to trout fish, but we stopped and looked. People took large poles and had to dig their own holes in the ice to fish from! They would scrape out the ice and then stick some bate in the hole! It was strange and hilarious! There were all kinds of people too, from old men to little kids with thier families. Everyone just sat or stood around hoping for a bite. If they got one the fish was hooked and they pulled them in. We saw a few people leaving with trout. We later learned from Scott and Amber that farther down was the area where for 10,000 won you could put on a sweatsuit and jump in a portion of the river and try to catch the fish with your bare hands. Apparently Scott did this!! I was sorry to have missed it. He even caught a fish! What a man!

The rest of the festival included food tents and areas for sledding and ATV riding. A John Deere tractor was pulling people around on these giant sleds, so they would go quickly over the bumps and hills. I slid down a slide made of ice that was cut into the hillside. The festival was fun to see but it was also very cold and we weren't dressed that properly for it. When the wind picked up and blew the ice around the frozen river it was quite the chill.

I have one more week of teaching before I get a week off! I thought I would be "desk warming" all winter vacation, meaning I have to come to school and just sit at my desk instead of teaching (because no kids are here, its vacation) or instead of sitting at home. But my school actually put together a schedule and I've been teaching for three weeks, two classes in the morning then a two hour conversation class in the afternoon. Its been surprisingly fun and okay. Its the higher level kids and the classes are small which is awesome! In my conversation class their are actually only two girls, of very different ability levels, which makes it a challenge to plan for them. Usually we just end up talking, which is also hard to do for two hours. But I can't complain, the girls are nice and hey, Thailand in three weeks!