Magical Istanbul

The view of old town Istanbul from our balcony!

Istanbul, Turkey has always been some place I wanted to visit ever since my brother went there during his stent in the Peace Corps. After he raved about it, my interest has just grown the more I hear and see things about this city. With a population of roughly 15 million, it is the only city in the world that actually splits two continents; Europe and Asia!

We left for Istanbul at 12:30pm out of Seoul on August 25^th. We then had two different stops in China, and after a kind of miserable 17 hour journey, we arrived to Istanbul at 2:00am. We found the cutest little Bed and Breakfast, Hotel Deniz Houses, located perfectly in Sultanahmet and within a short walking distance to all of Istanbul’s most famous sites and restaurants. It was a great ‘home base’ during our time in this majestic city.

Me outside the Blue Mosque

Andrew in the Mosque

August 26 Being 98% a Muslim nation, we were woken up earlier than expected at 5:00am, by the call to prayer from the mosques; something that is blasted over an intercom system all over the city. After going back to sleep, we woke again at about 8am and decided to get up and start our exploration. Our first stop was the famous Blue Mosque. Constructed between 1609 and 1616, this mosque is still is use today, but it is also one of Istanbul’s most visited sites by tourists.  It gets it’s name because the interior is made up of more than 20,000 handmade ceramic painted tiles that are predominately of different shades of blue. It is a gorgeous work of art. The tiles are stunning and what an amazing, historic place for worship! Being a mosque, when we entered, we had to remove our shoes and women had to cover their knees and heads with scarves., which is why I have one over my head. There were so many people in there trying to take photos that it got ridiculously hot! But it was gorgeous!

Some of the beautiful tile

Our next stop was the Topkapi Palace and Harem. The Topkapi Palace was built in 1478 and was the

 residence of the Sultans for 380 years. Can you even fathom?! It was built in 1478…so crazy to me! The line for tickets was a bit ridiculous, and we had to wait outside for about and hour and ten minutes before even getting in. The wait was worth it. I think I took about 150 pictures of tiles alone! Every quarter we went into the tiles were painted differently. The treasury was unbelievable! Of course pictures were not allowed, but the jewels they had on display were stunning! Emerald, rubies, sapphires, and diamond covered everything from crowns to drinking glasses. That is truly how the ‘other half’ lived.

We paid the extra money to see the Harem, which literally translates to “a place forbidden.” It was the area of the palace (300 rooms) where the Sultan and his family lived. Once again, more tile pictures! A camera cannot do the beauty justice. Andrew and I were truly in awe of the beauty in the detail.

Our last stop of the day was the Grand Bazaar. Consisting of more than 3,000 shops, it’s one of the largest and oldest covered shopping districts in the world. You can buy pretty much anything there. Items ranging from Turkish souvenirs, to clothing, spices, purses, handbags, shoes, and household goods. We weren’t really in the market for anything other than taking it all in! Much like the Silk Market we experienced in Beijing, but times about five!

Inside Hagia Sophia

 August 27: At 10am we ventured back out to Sultanahmet square to see the famous Hagia Sophia. Are you ready for this...wrap your mind around 537 AD. That was the year this magnificent church was built. 537 AD!!! From 537-1204, it was used as an Eastern Orthodox Cathedral. From 1204-1261, it was used as a Roman Catholic Cathedral. Again, from 1261-1453 it was used as an Eastern Orthodox Cathedral. And then from1453-1931 it was used as an Imperial Mosque. After 1931, it was turned into a museum. I’m sorry to say that I really can’t describe my experience in there. I have never seen anything like it, and I might not ever see anything like it again. The grandeur of this church/mosque is literally indescribable. Much like Egypt’s great pyramids, it’s mind blowing to try to figure out how it was constructed. The detail, the paintings, the pure enormity of this place was unreal. Andrew and I pretty much walked through the whole thing in silence. Truly one of the greatest archeological feats of all time.

At 2:00pm, we booked a half day tour. We were taken to the Rustem Pasha Mosque, and then aboarded a boat for an hour and a half cruise along the Bosphprus; the body of water that splits Istanbul between Europe and Asia. The boat ride was wonderful! Gave us a totally new perspective on Istanbul and the sites were beautiful! Andrew and I could not get over how beautiful and enormous some of the homes and private yachts were…..gorgeous! It was a cool feeling to be on a boat and the scenery on our right is Asia, and on our left was Europe!

After the boat ride, we spent about an hour waling around the Egyptian Spice Market. Similar, but on a smaller scale than the Grand Bazaar, we sampled some Turkish treats and just did some window shopping. The ride back to our B&B took longer than expected due to rush hour traffic, but I didn’t mind. I enjoyed seeing another, less touristy part of the

Cruising the Bosphorus

city. I can’t get over how clean and modern Istanbul is. The city is literally just built up around churches, castles, palaces, aqueducts
 and mosques that are thousands of years old!

August 28: Our first stop of the day was the famous Basilica Cistern. An underground water system built from 527-565 AD. It is 9,800 square meters and has the capacity to hold 100,000 tons of water storage. You enter the Cistern through such a small little building on the site of a busy street. It’s so unassuming to think that just underneath a bustling modern city, there are 336 beautifully carved columns holding up the city streets!

After visiting the Cistern, we decided to do the super touristy double-decker, hop on-hop off, city tour bus! It was such a nice view of the city from the open air deck! We each had head phones so we could listen to the English audio tour guide which enabled us to get so much more out of it than just looking at the beautiful structures. We also got the chance to cross over the main bridge that transports the citizens from the Europe to Asia side! Being on two different continents in a matter of minutes was pretty cool.

We hopped off the bus in Taksim Square. This may sound familiar to you because it’s the area where

Connecting Europe to Asia!

all the Turkish riots were occurring just weeks ago. All has passed now, and it’s a lovely area with a beautiful park, loss of cafes and restaurants, and shopping. We ate lunch and just walked around enjoying the sites and sounds of a different area than where we were staying.

We had a wonderful three full days in Istanbul! The city is so rich with culture and history! It's incredibly clean and we felt very safe. The people were nice and always willing to strike up a conversation. Turkey is a place I would love to return to. There is so much to see here outside of the bustling city of Istanbul and I know we only scratched the surface! 

Inside the entry to Hagia Sophia

On the Bosphorus boat tour

Farewell Korea

I write this reflection sitting at a hotel in Seoul the night before we officially leave Korea for our European adventure. The feeling is bittersweet.  Andrew and I feel that a piece of us will always be in Korea. Between the year we spent in Ulsan and the year in Pohang, we both did so much growing up. We learned about ourselves in ways that only traveling can teach you. The cultural situations we exposed ourselves to helped us to grow professionally, but more importantly, it helped us to grow as human beings and citizens of the world.

I had tears in my eyes as the taxi drove us away from our humble Pohang home, and we both couldn’t help but laugh when we thought about the first night we spent here back in August of 2012. We were literally dropped off to an apartment that had a single bed and nothing else. We had no food, water, toilet paper, bedding….nothing! We were so frustrated and then we were told, “School starts tomorrow, see you in the morning,” That first morning we woke up with kinked necks as we slept on sweatshirts as pillows; and to the sound of our first experience with a typhoon. Remember the whole shower cap thing? Ugh…that was our welcome to Pohang.

As the weeks went by, we grew to love this city and the people we were blessed to have met. We both made some really great friends from all different parts of the world making it that much harder to leave. It’s crazy to think that people from all walks of life are just PEOPLE! We all want the same things and strive for similar goals no matter our backgrounds.

We returned to Korea to live and work abroad again. The ultimate goal was not to come home with a larger savings account. It was to make the money we needed, to see more of the world. So we took those earnings and experienced amazing things in Korea, Hong Kong and the Philippines. We will continue to enjoy learning and immersing ourselves in this grand world as we spend the next seven-weeks traveling around Europe. Look for blog updates along the way. I will do my best to post a blog when we leave each great city. Our path is as follows: Istanbul, Turkey – Rome, Venice, Italy – Paris, France – Vienna, Salzburg, Austria – Augsburg, Munich, Germany – London, England, - Dundee, Edinburgh, Scotland – Dublin, Ireland.

“The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.” –Proverbs 16:9

Mehrmann's Meet Korea

*Disclaimer: Please excuse the sweaty nature of all of our pictures. 

Since the first time we moved to Korea, family members have been talking about visiting. But life gets in the way and unfortunately no one was able to visit us while we lived in Ulsan. Luckily we all got a second chance! Andrew’s mom, Becky, and step-dad Brian, made the trek across the pond and booked their tickets to Korea! Aside from forking over the funds and deciding what to pack for 11 days of hellacious heat, their jobs were done. Andrew and I took the liberty of working out all the logistics and creating an itinerary to maximize their visit.

On August 3^rd, Andrew and I woke up and caught a bus from our apartment to the bus terminal. We then caught the 40 minute, 8:10am bus to the Gyeongju KTX station where we would take a two hour train to Seoul. Once we got to Seoul, we took the Subway to get to the hotel we were staying in. We wanted to drop off our bags before going to the airport to pick up the Mehrmann’s! We then  took another bus for about and hour and twenty minutes to Incheon airport where we anxiously awaited their arrival.

It seemed like we timed it out perfectly because we only had to stand at the arrival gate holding our embarrassingly large, neon-green “Welcome to Korea” sign for about twenty minutes. When they FINALLY walked off the plane we couldn’t have been more excited! All the talking and planning was over, it was time for Andrew and I to introduce Becky and Brian to two years of our lives and guide them around the beautiful country that is Korea!

Their exhaustion was replaced with excitement as we talked their ears off all the way to the hotel. We greeted them there with a ‘Korean Survival Pack’ filled with fun Korean gifts and snacks including but not limited to: socks, maps, cookies and of course dried octopus! We took them on their first Seoul subway ride to get some pizza before calling it an early night. We needed them well rested for their ten day adventure!

We spent August 3^rd-6^th hitting the main sites of Korea’s capital. Most of the things we took them to see Andrew and I have seen before and those experiences have already been blogged about from our perspective. So I would just like to include pictures that highlight their visit!

A list of the places and sites we visited included:

August 4^th

• Gyeongbokgung Palace
• The Blue House (where the Korean President lives)
• Changdeokgung Palace and Secret Garden (However, we missed the last English speaking tour by three minutes and they would not let us just join in…so frustrating!)
• Korean Beef restaurant
• Nanta Musical

August 5^th

• Outdoor Korean War Museum
• Itaewon 
• Shinsegae Department Store
• Ate traditional Korean street food for dinner

August 6^th

• DMZ tour
• Seoul Tower
• Hongae area for dinner

Outside Gyeongbokgung Palace

Korean War Museum

Palace Gardens

Enjoying the Seoul Subway

Seoul Tower: Geological Center of Seoul

At the Demilitarized Zone

North Korea in the background

We left Seoul on August 7^th to fly to Jeju Island. Jeju was a place that Andrew and I were very disappointed we didn’t get a chance to visit in our first go-around so we were pumped to get to share this new experience with his parents. Finding a place to stay was a bit tricky as August is the high season for tourists. We settled on the Easy Stay EJ Hotel which came highly recommended from a friend. This would be the first time Becky and Brian would experience a typical Korean style hotel. The location was good relative to the island’s downtown area and airport was it was a bit far from most of the sites.

A little chilly in the lava cave

With Jeju, it’s nearly impossible to get around without a car and since we don’t have an international drivers license we were unable to rent one. So we were at the mercy of taxi drivers. 

We arrived to Jeju about 10:30am after a short 60 minute flight and we left our bags at the hotel since we couldn’t check in until noon. Armed with a map of the island and a free guidebook from the airport, we headed to a coffee shop to map out our two-day game plan.

After checking in, we changed into our exploring clothes, waited on our “English-speaking-taxi-driver” and headed to our first stop which was the Manjanggul Cave. Jeju is much like Hawai’i in that it is the result of an erupted volcano. This cave is the world’s largest known lava cave created by volcanic activity. It was about a 1,000 meters long and SO COLD! The temperature change was welcomed and the first site we had seen on this entire trip where we weren’t just dripping with sweat! It was impressive when you think about how it was formed, but it was just really dark cave. We spent about thirty minutes down there before meeting our hired taxi driver to tell him our next destination.

Our driver spoke no English although advertised it. When I gave him the name of our next stop,

Green Tea Fields

Daheeyeon tea fields, he had no idea what I was talking about. Should have been a red flag. I pointed to it in the guide book, and on the map. He didn’t know. I asked him if he had a Korean map, because maybe he just didn’t recognize the word in English. He didn’t have one. He kept telling us that it would take an hour and twenty minutes to get there, but on the map it looked no more than twenty. I pointed to the map and in my limited Korean told him there was no way. He said my map was a “mistake, mistake.” I even wrote the word out in Korean hoping that it would spark something. Nothing. He then takes his map out. And guess what…. It’s on the same spot as my map!! I pointed to his map, where he said mine was a mistake, and in Korean, said “there, it’s the same!” Ugh….after 20 minutes of this back and forth, we were finally on our way.

Ok, in the guidebook, this tea field was described as “an organic tea park built inside a natural lava cave. They also had a tea museum and zip-lining “through the mountains with stunning views of mountains and sea.”

I take full blame for the tourist trap I led us to. No wonder the driver had never been there. WHAT A JOKE! We arrived and thought, this can’t be it. We paid our $5 each (which included a green-tea drink) and then walked around. The green tea field was, well, a small field of green-tea plants. The museum was entirely in Korean and consisted of about ten displays and the zip line was four platforms that formed a square barely high enough to maybe see some sea; but definitely didn’t go through any mountains.

Waiting on our tea in the cave

Well, we did pay for a drink so we went into their “Cave Café” which was literally a coffee shop in a cave and picked from a very small menu of all green tea concoctions.  You know when something is just so ridiculous you can’t help but just laugh. And the more inappropriate the location, the harder you have to laugh? Well, this was the case for all of us. We were laughing so hard, trying to drink our tea drinks while choking down some green-tea and broccoli cookies. Oh, the memories.

Jungmun Beach

That was it for our first day on the island. It might not seem like much, but it takes a long time to drive anywhere! We spent way too much time in the cabs. But that was ok with me, as they were air conditioned. I’m not sure I stressed how hot it was. Not just on Jeju, but our entire trip. I’m not sure we have ever sweated so much in our lives!

Day two on Jeju, we decided to check out the famous Jungmun Saekdal Beach and their famous

Jeongbang Waterfall.  We didn’t stay to relax at the beach, we just wanted to check out the views. I was entirely to hot to try to layout on the sand. Yikes! After we leaf the beach area we went to Jeongbang. This is the only waterfall in South Korea where the water falls straight into the sea. It was crowed with tourists but really beautiful. I mean, it’s not everyday you get to see waterfalls!

With the mascot of Jeju

We had worked up quite an appetite by now so we decided to walk the streets for something to eat. Literally, all there were were fish restaurants. Not being in the mood, we finally found a pork place. Long story short, we settled on entirely overpriced Jeju black pig barbeque that wasn’t even very good. So we left unsatisfied and heavy stomachs.

Waterfall

Our last stop of day two was Mt. Hallasan national park. Mt. Hallasan is that tallest mountain in all of Korea so I figured there would be stuff to see all around it since it’s a national park. Not the case. Our driver drove us to the hiker drop off point which was a 15-minute mountain windy mountain drive. For those of you who don’t know, I get incredibly motion sick, so I had my eyes closed the entire time.  Well, we weren’t about to hike the nine-hour round trip trail at 4:30pm, so we looked at the mountain, and left. Bummer.

On August 9th we left Jeju Island at 3:30pm for a 40 minute flight to Busan. Before the flight we decided to take it easy and head for some inside duty free shopping. Sadly, it wasn’t very big but we took advantage of the air-conditioning and looked at every store! The flight was quick and then it took about two hours to reach Pohang by bus. We checked the Mehrmann’s into the Galaxy Hotel which is only a seven minute walk from our apartment and right on the beach. We then went for a late dinner at one of our favorite Vietnamese-Korean fusion restaurants. 

August 10^th was a breather day. We showed them our apartment for the first time, took them downtown for lunch, gave them their first Pohang city bus experience, toured the famous Jukdo fish market, got caught in the rain, took them to HomePlus to buy dinner for the night and then went back to our place. We decided that we had been eating out way to much and Andrew cooked us delicious fajitas.

Bulgulska Temple

August 11^th we boarded the intercity bus heading to Gyeongju. The historic city which was the capital of the country during the Silla Dynasty. There is so much history packed into this little city. Our first stop was the famous and beautiful Bulgulska Temple. We spent a few hours just walking, sweating, and taking in the sites and sounds of a mountain temple. We then took a bus to the City Museum which Andrew and I had always wanted to visit. Unfortunately, we saw a scaled down version of the museum as it was under construction, but it was a good chance to see some ancient Korean artifacts. It’s hard to fathom things from 400 and 500AD! We made it back to Pohang just in time for a delicious green-tea marinated pork BBQ dinner. Yum, yum, yum! 

Delicious pork dinner

August 12^th was of course another scorching hot day. We headed to Ulsan to show them our old stomping grounds. It wasn’t a very long trip but it was nice to show them our old apartment and both our schools. We did a little air-conditioned shopping in their new built downtown area and enjoyed yet another Korean city!

August 13^th (my 27^th birthday) we made it another Pohang day. We started the day with a sweaty walk along the beach. We then headed to our schools where we could take them inside and show them what our school lives were like so that was pretty cool.  After that we went downtown for a street food lunch the relaxed and got ready for my birthday dinner! I was excited that Belle and Juan-Hee were going to join us. It gave Becky and Brian the chance to meet some of our Korean friends and ask they questions about Korea. Belle even brought Becky a traditional Korean wind-chime…so sweet. We headed to Baskin Robins for some birthday ice cream before parting ways.

We woke up early on the 14^th to meet them at their hotel. We wanted to ride with them to the bus station so they could catch their 8:20am bus to Incheon airport. A bus isn’t ideal, but it is the easiest way we could think of to get them to the airport hassle free. We said our goodbyes and waved as they pulled away. It was such a memorable trip filled with awe, fun, unforgettable experiences and so much laughter. The only thing I wish I could have changed was the weather. It was so hot!!! But I guess I’d take super hot days over really rainy.

We were so blessed to take them around and are so thankful they made the trip to see us. We wish we had the chance to take all of our friends and family around this beautiful country!

Some July Happenings

A Proud American in the Parade

Nothing super eventful has happened in the last month. But I thought I'd post a short recap of July.

The semester officially ended! July 19th was my last day of teaching the majority of my students. I was happy to leave the sixth graders but it was sad to finish with the third as they are so stinkin' cute!

So, now that the semester has ended, it's time for summer school...yeah. So for three days, I had to teach a "summer camp" which consisted of three different grades. The planning was a bit chaotic as the leader of the summer camp does not speak much English. One of the days I decided to make a 'cooking day' where we talked about different foods all over the world and I had them make puppy chow. If you can imagine, 25 third graders, powdered sugar, melted chocolate, chocolate Chex cereal and peanut butter; I'm sure you can visualize the outcome. The kids LOVED it but the room was a disaster!!!

Once the official camp was over (the school hosts one just so they can get money from the district office) I have to teach my 'vacation classes.' Not much differs except myself and Belle are the ONLY teachers in the school. So, for 13 days, I have an hour and half of third grade and then and hour and a half of fourth grade; while Belle has her own classes upstairs. Our classes end at 12:10pm, but we have to stay until 4:40pm because my principal is such a stickler...

It's doesn't sound so bad, teaching three hours a day, sitting for five. However, about two weeks before these classes started, I was told to plan for two classes of first grade. I had never taught first grade nor did I know what to do with them for three hours and no co-teacher. But I planned the 19.5 hours of material thankful for the two week notice which is rare.

Well, five days before these classes were to start, I was told that now, instead of two classes of first grade, I was going to have one class of first grade and one class of third. Oh super, another 19.5 hours to plan because the stuff I planned for first grade was not level appropriate. Oh, but it gets better. Three days before the classes start, once again, things had changed. I was no longer going to teach first grade. But one class of third and one class of fourth! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?!

I was so irate I stopped planning. As I write this, I have just finished day seven of these classes just winging every lesson. I'd have to say, I think I have a hidden talent for making up lessons on the spot and fun games to go along with them with random material I find in the classroom. A skill I know I inherited from my dad. He was always making up games with us as kids :)

All in all, the vacation classes are kind of terrible. The kids don't want to be there at all. Most of the kids in my classes are the trouble makers that I know were sent to me to babysit. It's their summer and they want to be out with their friends. Not stuck in a room with me speaking only English. Poor kids...

July 28th was mine and Andrew's 1st wedding anniversary. We wanted to do something special so I called and got reservations atop the Galaxy Hotel for dinner and a view of the beach. The fireworks festival is going on at the same time so I thought it would be romantic to dine and watch fireworks on our anniversary! Well..to be honest, the food was terrible but the view was nice. We also said no gifts. Well, me, loving any holiday where I can give presents, I of course broke this pact. I looked up the traditional first wedding anniversary gift, and it said paper. I knew just the thing!

In our downtown area we often stroll by a caricature artist drawing anyone who would stop. I begged Andrew to do this countless times but he always said, "later." So I took matters into my own hands. I took a photo of the two of us to this artist and in a mix between English, Korean and charades, I told him I wanted a picture of us drawn wearing traditional Korean wedding hanboks. He shook his head and told me to come back in an hour.  To his defense, the picture I gave him was SUPER dark because the printer at my school is terrible but I thought it was obvious that the girl in the picture was me. Well, when I looked at the drawing I just burst out laughing! Maybe he doesn't draw many westerners because we look Korean. We both have black hair and dark brown eyes. When I gave the picture to Andrew he laughed and said, in all seriousness, "Is this us?" Anyways, makes for a special memory of our first year of marriage and living in Korea.

The 'Korean' Lacy's!

As I mentioned before, the Pohang fireworks festival is going on at the beach next to our apartment. Well, there was a Facebook invite going around that they wanted members of the foreigner community to walk in the opening parade. There wasn't much interest until it was revealed that we would be given a free t-shirt and glow stick. I'm in! Andrew just laughed and said he'd sit out and take some pictures; so my South African friend Kate and I showed up at the designated spot, got our t-shirt, glow stick, and country flag and took our place in the parade! I mean, how often do you get to walk in a parade? And in a foreign country no less?! We had to! All the other acts in the parade stopped and did performances. Sadly, we just walked behind a bag piper from Texas, waving our flags and smiling at all the little kids who were probably wondering why their English teachers were in this parade. The walk was a short 20 min, kind of awkward, but worth the shirt.

That's all for now. There will be one last post before we leave Korea and then off to Europe for just shy of eight-weeks!

"Don't worry, it's just for fun..."

I wish this was taken on the opposite side so you could have seen the crowd!

Short but kind of funny story...

On Saturday, June 29th, I was checking Facebook and noticed one of the girls in my Bible study group was asking for a volunteer to play volleyball later that evening. She said her team was one girl short and needed another player. I wrote back that I would be her last resort and that I was terrible since I hadn't played in three years. (Since the whole Ulsan elementary school volleyball fiasco...)

She wrote back a few hours later saying they needed me to play and if I could show up at Bukbu Beach at 6pm wearing all black, that would be great. Again, I reiterated my lack of ability but she said, "Don't worry, it's just for fun." So I walked the seven minutes to the beach, Gatorade in hand and dressed as a ninja.

When I arrived I saw no foreigners. I assumed because it was "just for fun" we would be playing a bunch of other four-player foreigner volleyball teams. I sat on a bench for a bit waiting until people started showing up. A girl named Paulina came up to me and asked if I was Kelly's friend Sarah, I nodded and she said "thanks for coming." She proceeded to mention that we will be practicing since our game doesn't start until after 8pm. Confused of what she meant by 'game', I asked her. She said, "Oh, we play Korean ajuma's (older women)." Taken back, I asked her to clarify. She said, "Ya, they are really good. We play around 8pm after the boys game."

At this point, I'm thinking about all the ways I can murder Kelly and get away with it. She left out the minor detail that this was a real tournament game with official nets, referees and an ever growing crowd! Being that I am in Korea, I should have suspected something like this. Nothing is ever done just recreational. It's always a serious competition.

I met Meg the other girl on "my team" and we began practicing. After about 30 minutes of hitting the ball around with each other a group of Korean women who we though were our opponents came up and wanted to practice with us. We welcomed the warm-up competition and boy were we terrible. It was clear we had never played together and it took us about 30 minutes to get the hang of things. We began to gain a little confidence in our ability and were getting excited to play this team for real.

By now, we had warmed up for an hour and a half and my arms were already starting to bruise and get tender. The nerves and worry kicked in when our game time neared and the crowed grew bigger and bigger. I mean who wouldn't stop to watch a sand volleyball game where four young American women were playing four older Korean women? It had to be comical.

Turns out, the team we thought we were playing, we were not. We were playing a team that was apparently REALLY good. Just great. They introduced us, we bowed, shook hands and it was game time. I'm literally shaking at this point just hoping I don't get a spike to the face. You see, in Ulsan when I played, it was a nine-man team. Six guys and three of us girls stuck in the back. I never had to touch the ball! But in this case, there were only four of us, so touching the ball was inevitable and taking hard spikes was a reality.

We played to 21 points, best out of three. On their very first serve I pulled my left quad. It should have been an indicator of how this match would play out. Needless to say, the first game was over in about five-minutes as it was CLEAR we did not have our groove. The crowed started to feel sorry for us and turned into a whole section of cheerleaders which was nice! Sadly, we lost the second game as well but we played SO MUCH BETTER. We started to figure out everyone's strengths and Andrew said we actually looked pretty good :)

Considering it had been years since I played I was very proud of myself. Being that we had never played/met before Saturday, our team did better than expected. We hung around after the game and played another 45 minutes to practice before I had to call it quits. My body was aching so bad, the walk home was a bit torturous.

Two days later, I can seriously hardly walk, but look forward to 'subbing' in future games!

Culture in the Classroom

Celebrating with a pizza dinner!

In March I was told that I needed to write a skit so our school could participate in the city wide English play contest. The only guidelines I was given was that it needed to have some sort of message and could be no longer than the allotted five-minutes. Belle told me that last year popular topics included bullying, taking care of the Earth, and Dokdo Island rightfully belonging to Korea and not Japan. With all of these pretty serious topics in mind, I decided to take a risk and go the lighthearted route.

I decided to make my skit about things I experienced as a foreign teacher in Korea. Easy enough right? I mean, I am a primary source for information on this topic. Being that it was only five-minutes and I had never written a play before I approached it like an essay. I mapped out my three main topics, wrote a thesis statement and a concluding line to wrap up my ideas; then, all I would have to do is fill in the details.

The basis of my skit was as follows:

• There are five characters: The foreign teacher, an exchange student from America (Britney), and three Korean students.
• The Setting: The first day of school at a Korean elementary school
• The First Issue: The teacher is wearing her "outdoor shoes" inside and didn't know that "indoor shoes" were a thing. --Korean students politely explain the significance
• The Second Issue: Exacto knives. In Korea, students carry exacto knives around instead of scissors. Something that catches ALL foreign teachers off guard the first time you tell them to "cut something out." --Again, Korean students explain why.
• The Third Issue: Fan death. The foreign teacher turns on the fan because the students are hot but she does not open the window. The Korean students act dramatically about how they are going to die because there is a fan on and no window open to circulate the air so they fear their own fan death (TRUE Korean theory). --The teacher secretly closes the window and Britney points out that the Korean students are all alive.
• The Theme: Explaining differences to other cultures helps us learn new things. You are not right and I'm not wrong in the way we do things, it's just different

Then, Belle thought we needed a song at the end. I agreed so she sent me a popular 30-second commercial in Korea and asked me to change the words. I obliged and it actually turned out really cute! The cheesy song lyrics are below. Feel free to click the link and sing my lyrics instead :)

You and me, you and me.

Korean, Thai, American, cultures are unique.

I'm not right and you're not wrong no matter the technique.

I might think one way is best and you might disagree,

If you are confused I want you to just ask me.

Exacto knives? Alight!

Changing shoes? Allllright.

You and me, you and me, oh ya, ya

You and me, you and me!  Hooray!

Okay, now that you have the gist of the play, let's talk about the casting and practices. In  May, my school had their own speech contest for 3rd-6th graders. Being the only native English speaker I had to judge the three day after school event. Anyone who knows me knows how sensitive I can be. Well, I was beaming like a proud mama while my other co's sat with their stern, serious faces. I cringed and held back tears for the kids that were obviously pushed into the contest by their parents, and lacked all confidence in their abilities.

Their ending pose :)

They were fidgeting, sweating and holding back embarrassed tears of their own. I made it to the last day without tears. And then one of the sweetest sixth grade boys walked in all dressed up. He handed us his full paged English script and began. He made it through about a sentence before what little confidence he had escaped him. I spent the rest of the time feeding him his lines one word at a time, and then when he teared up, I lost it. We were both sweaty (bc there is no AC) and wiping the endless streams of tears that were running down our cheeks.

It took me back to my own speech failures. I relived 7th grade speech and drama class where I had to perform a 5 min skit on my own in front of the class. I didn't eat for like three days prior. I started crying in the middle of it because of my nerves and tried to play it off like it was part of the skit (which no one bought). But we've all been there, and bless his little heart I wanted to show as much compassion and support as I could. However, looking back, I'm sure he was like, "What the heck is wrong with Sarah Teacher? I'm the one messing up here..."

One of our many practices

Ok, anyways, so it was from this pool of participants that we casted our five member play. We had two fourth graders, He Young and Seung Min, two fifth graders, In Ah and Seo Jeong, and one sixth grader Chae Eun. Our practices started May 27th and everyday after school, we spent TWO HOURS rehearsing this five min play. Oh, ya, I not only wrote it but I had to DIRECT it as well. Not my forte but the kids were good sports with me constantly changing my mind. 

My biggest complaint was that other teachers from my school would just wander in, knowing nothing of the plot because it's all in English, and began correcting my students' actions and offering their opinions. The student's were given so many different directions from different people that I could feel their frustration. But in Korean society, the older the person, the more their opinion matters. I had to play the "foreigner card" and wave everyone off. The student's were getting nothing but criticism from people that DIDN'T SPEAK ENGLISH! I really had to hold in my emotions (and vent to Andrew later).

I didn't realize that every elementary school in Pohang would be competing in the June 27th event. Belle told me that last year they did horrible and the other schools were amazing. She said other schools had students that spoke perfect English and they had awesome costumes. I'm thinking, "Oh great." And the kicker, the Principal is putting a lot of pressure on my two co-teachers to make sure we get a medal. We were competing against 28 OTHER SCHOOLS!

Performance time! -Mi Young and I with our "cast".

Fast forward to June 27th, performance day. We arrived at the auditorium, homemade props in hand and nervous butterflies in our stomachs. I tried my best to give as much confidence to the students as I could because two days earlier one of my co teachers went off on the students about how bad they looked and we wold never win a medal...ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! We were as ready as we were going to get. When it was our turn, I put on my proud mama smile and my over done cheerleader facial expressions and encouraged them all the way! THEY DID AMAZING! I was so proud and they felt so good afterwards which was the best reaction I could have hoped for. Their confidence level was so high and their smiles were so big that all that hard work had paid off. So naturally, we headed to get pizza and celebrate. 

We won't know the results for a couple of weeks so keep your fingers crossed! You can watch their performance below :)

Temple Stay: A Growth in Spiritual Maturity

Posing in our uniforms

I want to warn you; this post holds a lot of personal and spiritual thoughts for me as well as our experiences during our temple stay.

"You shall not bow down to them [idols] or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God..." -Exodus 20:5

This is the verse that has been occupying my mind for the last week. When we were in Korea the first time, I was really interested in participating in a Buddhist overnight Temple Stay, however, we just never got around to it. Around 23 percent of the Korean population classifies themselves as Buddhist; and we are exposed to Buddhist symbols and temples everyday. I even have several co-teachers who practice buddhism. So I thought it was an important cultural experience to participate in to gain a better understanding of the people and culture around us.

Being a strong Christian and a follower of Jesus Christ, I was torn on whether or not I should participate in the rituals at the temple. Bowing down or worshipping idols is a sin. In this case, Buddha is an idol and I know that bowing is part of the experience, so I was really apprehensive.  An idol is something that we ascribe value and worth to that would surpass the value and worth we should be giving to God. It isn't just bowing down in a physical sense but  elevating something above God.

After praying about it, I realized that the God I worship is an invisible God. The Holy Spirit is always with me and I am given an opportunity to take this Buddhist meditation time as my own private reflection with Jesus. I began to feel empowered and excited that this 24 hours would give me the opportunity to reflect and continue to build my personal relationship with God.

Ok...now on the temple stay!

Belle and Juan-Hee

I ran across this particular temple on the internet about a month ago.  Golgulsa Home of Sunmudo is located in Gyeongju City, about 45 min from where we live. I had invited my co-teacher, Belle, and her boyfriend, Juan-Hee, to join us and we were so excited when they agreed. So at about 4pm on Thursday we drove to the temple.

We arrived just before five, checked in and then went to our rooms to put on our temple stay uniform. A lovely faded mustard yellow vest and huge gray pants. First on our agenda was dinner. Now, I had read somewhere that they have a dinner ceremony where everyone HAS to finish every last bite on their plate, clean their plate with a water and radish and then eat the radish. Andrew and I were a bit terrified of this. But when we walked into the dining hall, we found out that that only happens on Saturday and Sundays. But we were to STILL eat every last drop of food that we took. Needless to say, we both didn't take very much in fear that we wouldn't be able to finish. The boys had to sit on one side of the dining hall, and Belle and I sat on the other. It was a very salty vegetarian meal of rice, cucumbers, bean sprouts and soup. We were both able to finish and ready for the next activity!

Rice, cucumber, tofu, soup

Orientation began promptly at 6:30pm and lasted about 30 min. We were briefed in English on Buddhism, bowing techniques and Sunmudo. I found the history of Buddha fascinating with similar teachings by Jesus of contentment, love and compassion towards others. The bowing was the quickest demonstration I had ever seen. She did it once and then we had to do it on our own...I was terrible, but it was an interesting learning experience.

The biggest differentiator of Golgulsa to any other Korean temple is this focus on Sunmudo, an ancient form of "meditative martial arts." It originated during the Shilla Dynasty, 57 B.C - 935 A.D. In Korean history, monks were often soldiers and called to lead people both spiritually and protect them temporarily. In the early 1990's the grandmaster established that Golgulsa would be the world headquarters for Sunmudo and wanted to introduce this art form to the public to ensure it's survival.

So after our orientation, we had evening chanting and meditation for 30 min and then we started our Sunmudo training. It was explained to us that because of the circumstance of this temple, being so heavily focused on Sunmudo, both monks and Sunmudo masters lived here together. The master that gave us our lesson was not a monk. It lasted an exhausting hour and a half. The moves were very slow and involved a lot of muscle strength and control. I got stuck in the second row, and therefore often corrected by the master...so that was a bit embarrassing. We all had a good time and definitely had an experience we will never forget. We ended the training with 10 min of meditation before we walked back to our rooms for the night.

Belle and I stayed in one room while Andrew and Juan-Hee were in the next as men and women cannot share rooms at the temple. The rooms were better than expected. I figured we had to sleep in one giant open room, on the floor, with all the other temple stay participants. We did sleep on the floor, but it was nice that there wasn't a bunch of us in there. Well, a bunch of people I should say. This place had no shortage of HUGE grasshoppers, centipedes, and cockroaches. ...Did I mention we slept on the floor?! I'm sure I had a few "friends" in my bed throughout the night. Lights were out at 10pm as we had an early morning. At 4am we were to wake-up and hike the mountain at a steep vertical angle to the top for morning chanting and bowing.

Our room

4am came early and we began our accent to the top. I was out of breath with shaky legs from the Sunmudo training seven hours previously so the walk up was not fun. We we arrived, there were only a few floor cushions left, so again, I was in the front row! Super awkward as I had no idea what was going on. It looked very different than the chanting the night before. At the front of this small temple was a statue of Buddha. My fear had been realized. I was on my knees at the foot of an idol. At the orientation the night before, it was explained that bowing at a temple was a sign of respect, much like we do on the streets to elder Koreans as we say hello. It wasn't just bowing down to Buddha. So during the 30 minute chanting service as I fought to stay awake, I decided to just soak in the whole experience. At 5am, the Sunmudo master from the night before led us in our 30 min silent meditation. At this point, my back

4:30am morning chanting session

was so uncomfortable I no longer had to fight to stay awake. 

I began to use this time to really focus on God. The serene environment was the perfect place to meditate on my own saviors greatness and all he has done for the world and me. For by his grace, I was given the opportunity to be in this place at this exact moment thinking these exact thoughts of gratitude. Even though I was surrounded by lotus lanterns, Buddhist paintings and statues, and monks, I just asked God to fill me with the Holy Spirit once again. I was at peace with being in this place, and participating in these rituals because my heart belongs to Jesus and there was no fear of infiltration. I humbly asked him for a fresh supply of grace to reignite my heart's affection towards him. It was such a peaceful moment.

Walking meditation

After the 30 min sitting meditation, we followed the master in a very slow, 30 min walking meditation down the mountain. In a single file line, we walked in silence. Listening to the calmness of the morning, smelling the fresh air and listening to the songs of the birds; it was a  peaceful, leg-shaking walk. When we finished walking, we stood in a circle as he led us in some morning stretching. We then ate breakfast (the exact same meal as the night before) and then went back to our rooms for an hour before the next activity. 


At 8:30am, we had another hour and a half of Sumudo training. I was not ready. Actually I was scared, and I wanted to make sure we got their early so I was not stuck in the front again! However, to our surprise, this training was much softer. We ended up doing Zen yoga the entire time. It was relaxing, comical, and calming all at the same time. When the yoga ended, we had a 30 minute break before we had the opportunity to bow 108 times or not. We decided to opt out and hike once again, to the top of the mountain to rest and get good seats for the Sunmudo demonstration. 

At 11am, the demonstration began. I was a little disappointed because their normal performers were out of the country performing so we had a really watered down version. However, it didn't take away from the incredible strength these men had. We were blown away by some of their moves! We ate lunch at 11:30 (again, the EXACT same meal as the
 two previous) then we collected our stuff to check out!


Overall, it was a fantastic experience. To get to participate in rituals so ancient, as a non-believer was something that I consider a privilege. The simplicity at which these people live and enjoy life is inspirational. My fear of idolatry was just, but once I dug a little deeper, and prayed about it, God used this opportunity to draw me closer to him.

A Korean experience not to be missed!

"The road to a mountain always leads to a temple;
The road to the temple eventually merges with the road to nature.
Leave all worldly sufferings behind,
Let the nature breathe into you.
Reflect on yourself;
'Tis the time for meditation and moderation.
It is a healing process invoked by seeing yourself, bared in the midst of nature and made aware to every passing moment."

Belle's favorite Sunmudo pose

Gulgolsa Temple Stay

 

 

At 8:30am Sunmundo training

       

Our group posing

      

Sunmundo master and his bamboo stick....