New City: Gwangju!

Our last week of orientation is in Gwangju, which is the biggest city in the province I am teaching in, and the fifth biggest city in South Korea.  It’s also where my mom was born and lived until she was 8 years old!  I’ll have a chance to visit my family later on.

We first got to Gwangju on Friday night, and then since then, each day has been packed.

 SATURDAY:

First, at 9am, we went to the Boseung Tea Fields, which were beautiful.  Our Korean partners came with us, so we were able to meet and hang out with them.  

My partners are AWESOME, and it’s going to be so fun!  And they are both seniors in college, so we are all the same age : ).  This is me and Chanhee, one of my Korean partners.

Then we went to a Korean Folk Village.

The last thing we did with our volunteers was go to this bird museum and wheat field.  It was nice and relaxing.

Afterward, all of the TaLK scholars went out.  We first had a nice dinner at a Sangyupsal, and then I tried my first fruity sojus at a bar.  We went to a Noraebang to sing some karaoke, and last, we went to a dance club, where they played a mix of American music and popular Korean music.  It was a really long, really fun day!

OTHER RANDOMNESS

*There is no drier at this facility, just washers! (like some of you warned me about)

*Several people in Gwangju are interested in doing Bible study.  Even some who had no plans to seek God while in Korea have had changes in their hearts.  God is working, and He is so good!

“The Lord Himself goes before you and will be with you; He will never leave you nor forsake you.  Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Deut. 31:8

The Lord is everywhere, and cares for every heart on this earth!  It’s amazing to see the work He is doing, and I cannot wait to see how He will use this experience in my life, and hopefully in others’ lives through me.

New Experiences, To Say the Least...

This has been a really fun week!  I've done a lot of random shopping, LOTS of eating, and went to  noraebang a couple of times, and went to this Nanta performance (like a comedy based on cooking, and using cooking tools to make music).  

Some friends and I at the Nanta performance.  

And that's the first piece of clothing I bought in 

Korea! It's so Korean, I love it, haha:

Nighttime right outside of Ori Station, where we go to get on the subway and travel to Seoul.

Supposedly, it's the cool thing to do to take pictures of your group in a mirror.  This is a group of us in Ori Station taking a picture together.  Man, we take a TON of pictures together.  Or shall we say, we take "heaps" of them.

This is a group of us singing karaoke at the noraebang... p.s.-- almost everyone in these pics are kiwis (new zealanders), including me... ; )

Also, I got to use a squatter toilet for the first time at Ori Station.  It was kind of awkward...

But much more awkward was going to the jimjilbang... which is a bathhouse.  Four of us girls decided to go.  At first, we were very modest, since we had to be naked in front of each other!, but then we remembered the whole reason we decided to go was the embrace Korean culture!! haha... so we did : ). Then we slept over at the jimjilbang on thin mats on the floor, with hard, rectangular pillows.  Despite how not that fun it may sound, we LOVED it.  We plan to do it again!! haha.

At the end of the week, we split off into our separate provinces for a week orientation there, and then we will go to our separate schools and begin teaching!  It's getting closer and closerrr... : )  I'm excited.  But of course sad to separate from my new friends.  But, a bunch of us plan on getting together at least once a month in different cities to explore, so this won't be the end of it!  

Please pray that above all, I put my relationship with God as my priority.  I just want to place everything else into His hands.  It's been tough, but He's been challenging me and convicting me, so I thank Him for that!

Love and miss you all at home!!

One Week Down!

So, I have been in Korea for a week!  We started classes, which run from 9am-8:30pm, although we get lots of/long breaks.  So class is only in session for 7 hours during the day.  We are learning about how to be effective and fun elementary school English teachers.  Some classes are boring, but in most of them, we have been learning practical things like how to control the classroom behavior, and we have played lots of example games that would be good and fun to play with the kids.  We also went on another field trip on Saturday.  

First, we went to the Blue House, which is like the Korea white house.  So it was really high security and we couldn't take too many pictures.  I'll upload one of those pictures later, so I can finish this blog before my next class!

The second place we went was called Insa-dong.  Basically we went there to eat at one of the

many restaurants, and

 to shop around.  Here is a picture a friend, James Park, took of me in Insa-dong:

And at the end, we went to Gyeong Bok Gung Palace.  It was really pretty, and we basically just took lots of pictures and looked around n stuff.  Here is a picture of my friends and I jumping in front of the palace, lol:

Then on Sunday, a few of us went to Jubilee Church, which had an awesome message (in English!) about using our money and gifts from God to serve Him and love people around us.  Really blessing and it challenged all of us.  I also ran into a friend from UIUC (Matt Wachtor) and Susie, who Ken told me about that I should meet when I am in Seoul!  It was pretty awesome.

And my friend Kitty and I went around Seoul and visited Myung-dong, and Namdaemun Market together by taking the bus and subway.  We felt pretty hard out being able to figure out where we were going!  We had some street snacks, shopped around, and walked a TON.  It was fun : ).

Well, I should be off to class now!  My next class is called "Theories and Practices of Team-Teaching".  We'll see how it is!! : )  I love and miss you guys a lot!!  Please keep praying that my main goal continues to be seeking God and loving people around me.  <3

Partyin' Times~

I am having so much fun! I just arrived in Korea last night, and after a 13 hour-long plane ride, we took the bus an hour and a half to reach our dorm building. It's really nice, with three people per room and a bathroom in each room. And there is a computer lab, pool, ping pong, sauna, a nice cafeteria, and everything. And the best part is that the people are so funn!! They are from all over the US, New Zealand, England, and Canada. There may be people arriving from other places like Ireland or something, but they haven't come yet.

We went on a field trip today to see a Korean Folk Village, and an Art Center. They were really cool, and I got to hang out with and meet lots of new people. We were all practicing accents and teaching each other our accents, haha, it was hilarious. Anyway, we begin the actual orientation tomorrow, and I am so excited to begin learning, and to continue to get to know the people here.

This orientation will last three weeks, and then we will go our separate ways to the different locations where we will teach! I'm hoping to create friendships that will give me reason to travel all over Korea to visit, and a place to stay would be nice, too! : )

재미있었어!!! 안녕!!