hooray for running at 1am.
hooray for my wonderful brother who came running with me and didn't make fun of how slow i am (actually i think he was impressed that i wasn't completely turtle-like :D )
hooray for my wonderful arianna who mailed me grey's anatomy.
hooray for TV that can make me think.
and hooray for seeing new places that make me think, with people who make me think.

this is a picture of me at the korean war memorial park in seoul.


and this is julie, michelle, roman, me and my bro, out for a night of fun with coworkers and friends.


and this is seoul tower at night, which i mentioned previously that i am in love with. the part where it's green actually changes colors to red and white and yellow.. absolutely mesmerizing..

one of the ways this place has been interesting for me has been the way i simultaneously feel very beautiful and really not. the feeling beautiful comes from a lot of things.. lack of stress is a huge one. i wake up whenever i wake up every day, and stay up pretty much as late as i want (which, being me, is not very late. but whatever.). i've been getting exercise and spending lots of time juggling. i think i've also been told that i am beautiful more times in the last three weeks than in the last four or five months. i have one student that every time i teach him he says 'teacher, you are beautiful!' it's adorable, and makes me smile every time. on the other hand, i have moments of feeling just.. gross. it's so weird for me to be bigger than everyone else. in every way. to know that if i walk into a store the chance of finding clothing that would fit me (or that i could get on my body even) is pretty much zero. there are days when my thoughts are ugly, and i feel as though i can see it in my face and my eyes.. sometimes i am amazed that others can't see it.

saturday night i felt very ugly. i was tired and overwhelmed (and hungry too i think). we were on our way into itaewon to get egg sandwiches and sit for a drink at a club for a bit, and i just got black inside for a while. it was awful. i felt like dorian gray.. fine on the outside, but had someone perceptive painted a picture of me it would have been wretched. by the time we got to the egg sandwiches i was on the verge of tears and completely not hungry anymore. for a while my insides felt like they were ripping, really only being held in by walking arm in arm with Roman. that bit of contact kept me present. i felt better once at the club.. eric pulled me onto the dance floor and *made* me dance with him. there's something about spinning and just feeling the rhythm that is so good.. so true. anyhow. it brought me back to equilibrium and i felt alright after that. i have been contemplating the ups and downs and simultaneous polar feelings for the past couple of days.. i think they're just something i have to work through this summer. working through things is, after all, why i am here.

we have had a *good* night :D got off work at 9:15 and went to the grocery store.. got some milk (all milk here is whole - yummy!), yogurt, and some juice, then came home and changed for our juggling date at the park. last night, tim and i met some lovely people at the park and started teaching them how to juggle. we decided to meet again tonight and the couples would bring their children so they could learn how to juggle as well.

we juggled at the park with our buddies for almost two hours tonight. well, not all juggling.. a lot of it was playing silly catch games with the smaller children. by smaller i mean i think they were about 5? mostly it was the parents learning how to juggle, and one slightly older boy. i think he's 11. in all i think there were 5 adults and 6 or 7 kids, plus tim and i. we pretty much took over the small park. we decided that we are going to meet there at 10 pm every Monday night. looks like we've created our own little juggling/playing club! yay!

one of the women brought us a bag with about a pound and a half of kimchi, and a small container of pickled eggs and mushrooms. SO GOOD! the kimchi is better than what we've gotten at most restaurants. it's not as spicy, so you can actually taste the other things. like ginger. yum. anyhow. here are some pictures of us with random food things we have gotten the last couple of days:

tim with yummy food. clockwise from tim's head we have donuts (that were cheap and tim was excited :P ), bag o' kimchi, pickled eggs and mushrooms, mini oranges that you don't peel, cherry tomatoes we got at the wedding, and haitai yoghurt (a drinkable yogurt that we first experienced mixed with what is basically korean vodka, only tastes better than vodka and is a handy little snack)


and me loving some kimchi. mmmmm.... note the juggling clubs in the background. yeah. good night :)

we went to a korean wedding yesterday.. super cool. our coworker sean was the one getting married. he was all concerned that we shouldnt go because it was 'so far away!' .. but tim and i absolutely could not think of anything better to do on a sunday afternoon than go to a wedding, so we hitched a ride with two of our coworkers and went up there. the first half of the wedding was western style and the second half was traditional korean. here are my pictures:

this is the happy groom, our coworker sean:


and the beautiful bride:


i have more pictures, but blogger is being a pain right now with the uploading.. i'll try to post a picture of them in their traditional korean wedding clothes and one of tim and i at the wedding too.. but not now. my battery is almost dead, and it's just about bedtime.

oh! and also, today was 'teachers' day' here.. so the kids had off of normal school. some of them brought gifts for us. i got a rose (only the second time i've received flowers from a boy that wasn't for prom, etc. exciting and he was SO nervous about it!), a cute handkerchief, a cell phone charm and a bar of lavender soap. the kids were so cute... 'teacher! teacher! it is teacher's day!' and then they'd hand the person a gift and scamper off. one of the teachers didnt even get a chance to say thank you b/c the student was so shy about it. pretty soon i will figure out a non-awkward reason/way to bring my camera in to my classes so i can post pictures of my students. really, you'll melt. the cuteness is astounding. sometimes i walk into the room for my younger classes and just want to take them all home. then i think about how insane that would be and rethink it, and just enjoy my time in the class.

here is so good for my soul (seoul? *groan*). i really suggest that anyone who can take the opportunity to do something like this. it's just.. wow.

PICTURES!!!! we have internet again yayy! here are some fun pix for you all!

these are some drawings some of my students did. we were talking about animals. i think there must be some pink bunny character that korean children know, because these two were not the only ones who drew their rabbits pink.

in korea, you get your pizza tied with a red bow! i later found out that the bow is for carrying purposes, but it was exciting on our third day in the country :D

the teaching crew. the guy to my right is our roommate (from Hartford, WI.. who would have guessed?). the black guy at the back of the table is tim's friend eric who brought us here. yayy eric!

korean children's day festival. similar to mothers/fathers day in the US, except that everyone gets off work and school for a day. i took this in the park by my house. the YMCA set up a bunch of activities for everyone. i think this was some sort of dance competition? not too sure, but i know one of the kids got REALLY embarassed and looked at the floor most of the time she was up there.

this is an *absolutely* amazing view of the mountain going up to seoul tower, standing on a bridge near eric's house in itaewon. the tower is infinitely cooler at night time, but i dont have any good pictures of that yet.

for tara, heidi and arianna.. i ate some baba gannouj!! aka baba gannoush.. hehehe yeah. tasty stuff, by the way.

the itaewon food festival. there were cool fireworks happening just to the left of this picture, but tim didn't catch any of them. everywhere is a hill/mountain around seoul, so just about every time you turn a corner you see some other amazing view. pretty sweet.

we found a green bay packers fan in itaewon!! he started crying while i tried to take his picture.. i think his dad thought it was funny.


ok it's bedtime. peace out.

so.. still no internet at home.. but our boss is going to call the internet company for us today to look into it. so hopefully tonight?? would be nice..

we spent this weekend in seoul. i've decided that i've fallen in love with seoul tower at night. it's absolutely beautiful. from our friend eric's rooftop, you can see the buildings on the mountain all lit on the way up the mountain, and then colorful seoul tower standing at the top, glowing and changing colors. as tim put it, it looks like you can just walk up the rooftops and get to the tower. i have pictures.. will post as soon as i can.

we spent most of the weekend in itaewon, which is part of seoul (similar to how coral gables is part of miami, or the bronx is part of new york). it was built specifically for foreigners, so there are lots of english bars and even places where you can pay with american money. mostly just spent time wandering around and going to various clubs/bars. lots of food, lots of dancing, not much sleep. good times!

i have to go teach. i'm using the computer in the teachers' office again and the bell just rang. yayy teaching!