i have found the hippies in korea.

wow, so much to talk about!!! my internet connection has been very sketchy the past while, which may be a result of the fact that it's not actually my internet connection, i'm stealing it from someone named "iptime4". but tomorrow i get my own internet!!! my apartment is really coming together now. koreans don't believe in re-using anything, so everday when i come home from work, i skip to the garbage and see what they threw out today. so far i've found a large bookshelf, a desk, hangers, a little table, a coffee table, and today my big garbage grab were a full set of speakers. i was THRILLED. so above is pictured my archnemisis (or however that word is spelled...i don't think i've ever actually written it...), the purple couch. but alas, today i discovered that the couch cover comes off! after a full week of glaring, frowning at, and squinting my eyes in such a way that shoots darts of disaproval and hatred, i have finally ripped the puke purple off my couch and now it is just black and sort of naked looking. but that's better than puke purple.

this weekend i went to a korean music festival out in the woods called flow fest. i had no idea what i was getting myself into, but at about 5 pm on friday, i got a call from josh confirming their plans, and just a couple hours later, i had a bag packed for the weekend and my "ready-to-dance" game face on, and i was on the subway headed into the heart of seoul. it was my first experience on the subway here and if i were to compare the seoul subway system to that of chicago, i would have to say it's like a donkey compared to a cheetah. chicago's being the donkey--slow and stubborn and constantly being yelled at-- and seoul's being the cheetah, fast as lightening and spotted. no not spotted, but that would be cool and would also help my metaphor. and i met josh and his friends there and we were on a bus, headed somewhere 2 hours out of seoul. i had no idea where we were going or what i was going to exactly, but it was all worth the ambiguity. we got there late friday and stayed till sunday and it was a rockin time. it was in the woods somewhere (i still don't know where we were at), surrounded by mountains, peaceful as music festivals in the woods ought to be. saturday night i danced my little heart out. my bum is still sore. i got home sunday and headed out to a soccer game here in ilsan. the under-17 world cup. england vs. germany. mary's boyfriend (mary is my co-teacher) is british so we were all cheering hard with him. so in short, i have been in korea for a week and it feels like a lifetime already. i think this weekend, there will be more staying at home going on.

tango pango (my school) is going better everyday. it was very difficult at first because here in korea, they don't have a word for communication. just kidding, i'm sure they do, but i bet no one here knows it because it's never used because it doesn't happen. i'm still not sure what my role at the school will be--english teacher, music teacher, piano player, professional cutter-outer of crafts. it's a very new school and i think the vision of the place is still up in the air. the director would really like me to be the music teacher, but the way the classes are set up, it would be difficult for me to teach music on top of teaching english and helping with the lesson plans. there are 4 of us teacher--hannah, raquel, mary, and myself--and we plan the lessons together and share the teaching load. here is a funny (actually not funny, infuriating) teaching story before i end this blog. today i was teaching a class of 8 little korean kids (obviously korean) and they were getting out of control. i mean, in my entire year of teaching kids from the ghettos in chicago, i have never had a classroom like this. their moms are all standing RIGHT outside the door peering in the window the whole time, the kids are getting up and running out of the room to go the bathroom, to get a drink of water, to be spoiled by their mamas who apparently have nothing better to do than to stand in front of a door and analyze every move i make and every word i say that they don't understand but still find a reason to criticize, and i was just not having it anymore. so i put a chair in the corner and in the simplest english and biggest gestures i could muster, explained to them that this was the time-out chair and if they didn't listen or left their seats, this is where they would end up. so sure enough, on we go and at one point while they were coloring their "when i grow up i want to be a..." pictures, my room turned into a hurricane of tiny korean voices, none of which i could understand, and i said, "ENOUGH!!!" and i pulled little luke into the corner of the time out chair. and i mean PULLED. he fought and i fought and i finally got him into that chair and what does the little rascal do? he bawls. bawls like i just sent him to prison. tiny little korean prison. so i leave him there to cry and tell my korean assistant not to console him and the kid does not shut up. so i finally go sit over there to explain to him why he got put in the time out chair, but let me ask all my readers: how do you explain to a bawling kindergarten prisoner the reason for their punishment in a very logical and leveled tone of voice when neither party has any idea what the other is saying? so since our words were lost on each other, what does the little rascal do? he pukes. that's right. PUKES! all over me and my new hot pink skirt that kate made me before i left. i could not believe it. and all this while his mother stood outside the door, peering in, judging me every second of the way while i babysat her little brat of a child and cleaned up his puke. unbelievable. you will not get the best of my little luke!!! i have fight left in me!!

this is the longest blog in the history of blogs. and to make it even longer, here's some pictures from my weekend.













from the porch on our pension we stayed in. (which was just one huge room with about 10 little pads which were thinner than blankets that we all slept on...atleast the view was nice!)






the entrance to the festival included walking under old train tracks.










walking in the rain trying to find food.







a few of us that went.








korean performers. you can't see it very well in this pictures, but this is to prove that koreans where high HIGH heels in ANY kind of weather. this girl is walkign thorugh the mud, in the rain, with the highest heals i've ever seen.





SUCH a beautiful place we were at. mountains everywhere. so refreshing.