Holidaze: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, & Seollal

The holiday season came and went so quickly. I have officially been here 6 months of my 1 year anticipated stay. After the first 3 months, Thanksgiving was already here. To make do with what Korea could give us, my friends and I figured what better place to celebrate this American holiday than at KFC. What could be better than Because we all get off work at 10pm, we sadly found KFC closed. Despite our broken spirit, we did go to an Asian fusion restaurant and had amazing Japanese/Korean dishes paired with soju and megju to celebrate "the friendship of the pilgirms with the indians." Thankfully, CDI provided us with a Thanksgiving lunch. They brought in traditional food from the US army base such as turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie! Although this Thanksgiving was away from my family, it didn't feel so lonely because I have spent the last 4 away from my family since Thanksgiving break is so short and NYC is so far from Texas.

When Christmas came around, reality checked in. Unlike Thanksgiving, this was my first Christmas away from my family. Last year, I was busy with finals and desperately trying to catch some mode of transportation to La Guardia or JFK to get home a mere day or two before Christmas. This year, there was no rush to the airport or stress from final papers and exams, but just "matter of fact" feelings. Thankfully, my co-worker Nic had a select few come to his apartment on Christmas Eve and celebrate with Carlos Rossi, bags of chips and pistachios, and some home-cooking from Nic-spaghetti and John-mashed potatoes. We ended the night with a classic, Love Actually. Juliann and I swear by it, but the boys did not agree. By the end of the movie, they were all asleep and claim it was the worst movie they had ever seen. Nevertheless, it was good to not be alone on Christmas Eve and to be surrounded by friends who are all going through the same thing.

Christmas Eve at Nick's Apt w/ Co-workers

Sitting Around & Being Merry Around the Carlos Rossi

Christmas Day was again spent with co-workers. What other alternative do you have when you are a foreigner and the only other people who relate to you are other foreigner teachers. Nevertheless, we all went to Andy's who cooked a fabulous turkey and provided amazing side dishes such as stuffing, salad, cheeses (all very uncommon in Korea) all paired with boxed Franzia wine. We watched a horrible English film, but couldn't refuse since Andy is of course British, its his house, and we are eating for free. Buggered from the movie, we moved the party to Marc's, our Faculty Manager, apartment. There, a few people made batches upon batches of cookies. It was so good having freshly made oven baked cookies. Thanks to CostCo, we had an assortment of peanut butter, chocolate, oatmeal, and a mix of cookies and brownies. Others played Cranium and Play Station. It was very nice for most of the co-workers to get together and celebrate Christmas. I got to hang out with some co-workers I'd never really hung out with before and also see how quick on their feet they could be (ie 1 fish, 2 fish...3 fish, 4 fish --Answer is Red Fish, Blue Fish). Although unconventional, we made the best of what we had being in a foreign country who doesn't really celebrate Christmas. Thank you CDI for giving us a day off!

Christmas Day at Andy's with Co-Workers

New Year's soon followed a week later. Unfortunately, CDI did not give us the day off. Unwilling to let the New Year to come and go, my co-workers rang in the New Year in the Nowon area. We all had to work till 10pm on New Year's eve. It would have been cool to go to some posh club in Gangnam or Hongdae, but too tired and too hungry to travel and perhaps miss the countdown, we went to galbi across the street from the branch and ate heartily. Then, we went to Vinyl Bar, a bar that plays nothing but vinyl records. With such limited options, we all decided that rum and coke would be our drink of choice. It was of course disastrous. Many people fell asleep in the booths and on the tables. Although it wasn't the dressy New Year's eve party that I wanted, it was very fun to let loose after work and celebrate the New Year with friends.

New Year's Eve in Junggye at Vinyl Bar with Co-Workers

Deep Discussion Perpetuated by Jack Daniels

Dave & Jack: Best Friends

Dave had no idea.

January 1st isn't that big of a deal in Korea. What is a big deal is Lunar New Year, otherwise known as Seollal. This is a time when Korean families get together and spend the day cooking with their grandma's, playing traditional games, and enjoying the company of relatives not often seen.

Taken from Wikipedia: They practice Sebae, a traditional practice of paying respect to one's elders on Korean New Year. Children wish their parents a happy new year by performing a deep traditional bow and the words saehae bok manhi badeuseyo (새해 복 많이 받으세요) which translates to may you receive many blessings in the new year. Parents typically reward this gesture by giving their children new year's money (usually in the form of crisp paper money) and offering words of wisdom.

I asked my students about their Seollal, and most of them said it was boring and that their relatives have no Sagaji--manner. Haha! Nevertheless, they were happy to get money. Kids are so ungrateful!

As for the foreign teacher population, we took a ski trip to Vivaldi Park. It was a unique group of my co-workers and my friends via Jessie. Jessie and I met through Perry Jackman. Perry and I were besties on Semester at Sea. Perry and Jessie were housemates and sorority sisters at University of Kansas. When I went to visit Perry, she introduced me to Jessie, who apparently "loved the world" like me. Well we both came to Korea together, but we do work at different hagwons. It's awesome to have a friend from the States here, but also have a friend outside of work. So, she brought a bunch of her friends and then the foreign teacher network grew.

Me, Ashley, Shannon, Anna, & Jessie at Vivaldi Ski Park

I haven't snowboarded or skiied since I was 16. My version of snowboarding is slaloming down the mountain side to side. Thankfully, I brough Mike and Dave who are novice like me because we wouldn't be able to catch up to Jessie and her advanced level friends. Dave, Mike, and I ended up on Upper Intermediate on our first day! One funny thing that is different about American lifts and Korean lifts, no one wears their board on the lift. They just ran off holding their board hoping to avoid the lift making its turn. Although we fell a lot, I lost my camera, and hadn't eaten all day, it was an awesome day on the slopes!

Girls Taking It Easy after "Shreddin Some Pow" in the Cabin

Wine, Kings, wrestling, fireworks: a combination that creates shenanigans. At one point, all the Canadians sang their national anthem in English and French! The Americans battled back with their national anthem, and the Canadians typically gave in and sang the American national anthem. I also played spoons (knocking 2 spoons together to produce a beat) to "She'll be coming around the mountain..."

Me, Dave, & Michael: Upper Intermediate Boarders

Yes, we did Day 2. I was suckered in although I was dead tired and hungover from the day before. I guess I had to since I probably won't go again this season or for another 8 years.