earth intruders.

guess who came to korea on february 16??? BJORK!!! and guess who didn't have the slightest clue??? ME!!!! grrrr. i can't believe i missed it! i found out about in less than one week too late. most bigs bands skip over korea and head straight to tokyo, so this was a big event! and i missed it. i could have seen bjork in korea. the next shows coming up are backstreet boys (seriously, boy bands are still around? who knew) and celine dion. let's be honest, i've wanted to see celine dion since i was 8 (i don't care what kind of music you prefer, that woman could knock you to the wall with her vocal chords), but tricia and i have always promised to go together. anyway, i'm bummed! i need to get more on top of the seoul music scene.

i also had some house guests this weekend. about a couple thousand of them. and i believe they've been living with me for awhile without my knowledge. i woke up sunday and saw another little black bug about the size of my fingernail crawling on my kitchen floor. i've been noticing them pop up around my apartment lately, and when i opened my bottom cupboard door to pull out my oatmeal, i saw a few more. as i looked more closely, i realized that not only were there a few more, but a few thousand more little disgusting black bugs, crawling all over my food, all through my open bag of rice, and into my half empty box of crackers. EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i freaked out. tore everything out of my cuboard, threw it in the trash, vacumed, sanitzied, vacumed again, sanitized again. i think they are coming in under my fridge, b/c i found another thousand dead ones under there (the poor souls who didn't survive the long treck to the cuboard.) apprently they are the korean version of the cockroach. the disgust and horror i felt was not quite up to the level of the "there's a family of rats living in our kitchen and grant just killed one with a brick" incident (please, don't ask...), but i was very disturbed to say the least. i've got the bug killer people scheduled for next tuesday. i will have the last laugh, my korean cockroach friends!!!!

so long, farewell.

this weekend, we said goodbye to scott and kim (scott is one of the guys who got me my job here and kim is his wife) in good fashioned out-till-4-in-the-morning danced-the-night-away style. i actually started the night in hongdae at bricxx to say happy birthday to the girl in the middle of the picture on your left, shauna. i met shauna and selena (the other girl in the picture) at the hostel i stayed at in beijing. RANDOM! shauna recognized me from a friends' facebook pictures (hannah--the girl who used to teach at my school--and shauna share the same cousin or something and anyway, she recognized me from hannah's facebook pictures.) it was so
hillarious that we all taught in korea and they even went to trinity western in bc. so i stopped by bricxx for awhile, and then i headed to a club called monkey beach in apudjeong to wish scott and kim farewell. it was way across the city, and i didn't get there until about midnight, but it proved to be a fantastic night out! (as long as there's dancing involved, i'm a happy girl.) the tunes got better as the night went on and it made it impossible to leave! just when i would think..."ok, as soon as this song is over...." they would
whip out "creep" by radiohead or "gold digger" by kanye west or
song i haven't listened to since the 8th grade or something. (unfortunately, they neglected to play anything by chicago.) it was fantastic! scott and kim will be missed!

the picture on the left is sarah jane and i dancing it up! below is sarah jane, lydia, and matt.



















above is mary and i sharing the infamous monkey beach bucket drink. (mary is the other teacher at my school.)

ca-uuuute!

ha! this is so funny! click here for a laugh. (i'd also like to say, however, that did it make anyone else a little sad and angered to see them sitting on a concrete floor with bars behind them? i hate it when animals get caged up. it just looks so unnatural.)

after all that we've been through...

last night at spinning class, as i was rockin out to the pounding korean hip-hop beats they had blaring for us to peddle to, the music suddenly changed to a pumped up version of "i'm sorry" by chicago. paleaaase oh please tell me you know this song! "everybody needs a little time away. blah blah blah blah. (i forget that line.) from each oooooooootherrrrrrrr. even lovers need a holiday. far away from the one that i love. oooooo and i. it's hard for me to say i'm sorry. i just want you to stay. oooooo and i! i really wanna tell you i'm sorry. blah blah blah blah blah blah blah......(i forget that line, too. but here comes the chorus which is the best part.) after all that we've been through. i will make it up to you! i promise you...." and then there's another line to the chorus, but i forget that too. so obviously i haven't listened to this song recently but it was my FAVORITE song somewhere around age 12. i remember stealing my sisters chicago tape and listening to that song in my walkman over and over and over again. and last night when it came on in the middle of all the korean rubish i can never understand, i almost cried! it was a glorious moment! and the best part was that they play the music so loud and the room is so dark that i could just belt out every word (every word that i remember atleast) without anyone even turning their head to notice. it was the perfect thing to get me through the middle of the workout. i would also just like to throw out a word of praise and admiration to the spinning instructor. she's this totally punked out chick with biking gloves and the bandana and the entire class, she's up on her little stage banging her head to the music, yelling out really intense korean words, smiling, closing her eyes and singing her heart out to every beat, and doing this little thing where her eyes kind of look up toward the cieling and her teeth bite her bottom lip in a gesture that says "God, i love my job. i'm dripping in a bucket of sweat and i can barely breathe and my legs are killing me and i'm still rockin out! life is grand!" she could very well be thinking "God, if i have to get through another one of these stupid classes listening to the stupid music that is rupturing my ear drum, i swear on my grave, i will cut off my left leg just so i can never bike again." but i am leaning towards the prior. i've never seen anyone look like they're having so much fun doing such a painful activity. it's inspiring!

in other news, i cannot stop eating gaucomole. i seriously eat almost a tub every day. i wake up and i crave it, i am eating fajitas non-stop just as a means to dump spoonful after spoonful of delicious bright green costco gaucomole on top. i don't know what to do! it's the only thing i want! are their any health risks to eating too much gaucomole? i know it's healthy thing, but is there such a thing as an overdose on avacados? what would the symptoms be? what if my skin starts turning bright green? i could change my name to elphaba. :)

over the hill.

the end of this week marks my 6 month anniversary as a resident of korea. i feel like this is sort of a big deal. since christmas, i've been thinking in my mind that i've been here "6 months or so," and i've found myself thinking in the past 6 weeks..."have i seriously not hit the 6 month mark yet? seriously? i'm still on my way up the hill???" but as of this week friday, my journey (at least my journey at this school) is all down hill. i'm not sure why, but it's a really nice feeling to know that i am over the half way mark. these past few weeks i've been feeling overwhelmed by the fact that i still have over half of my contract left at this school. but now it's just half. and every day that passes by means less and less of half. does that even make sense?

despite my frustration with my school lately, i happened to have quite a good monday, which i find is rare. mondays are always the worst day--none of the week behind you yet. but today i was in quite good spirits and had incredible patience when my kids spent a solid 5 minutes blowing their noses and then deciding they hadn't cleaned it all out, so blowing their noses again, and using about 3 times the amount of tissues necessary, and when my entire 3:30 class thought it would be hillarious to use the sleeping song as "let's all roll around like we're balls and see who gets the biggest bruise" time. i give myself a big pat on the back.

IS WINTER OVER YET!?!??!?!?!

pink lipstick and sunflowers. ya.

happy valentine's day!!!!!! is it valentines or valentine's? does the day belong to valentine? was that a person? i can never remember. wasn't he a saint or something? saint valentine? imagine having a day named after yourself. maybe in 100 years they'll be saying "happy carolyn's day!!!" and having the same dillema wondering if carolyn was a person or not.

valentine's (i've decided to keep the apostrophe on the incling that valentine was, infact, a person) day can be so controversial among the singles crowd. you know the whole "i don't have anyone to buy me flowers" sob story. or the "i just broke up with my boyfriend, i don't want to be reminded of love" tears. blah blah blah. i LOVE valentine's day. always have. and i don't think i've had a boyfriend on this day since i was....um....have i ever had a boyfriend on this day? oh yes, i think when i was 17. i got candles and the movie "when a man loves a woman." (i thank God everyday that i'm not 17 anymore...) but each year it comes around, and each year i love it just the same as last year. you get to wear pink, make cards with enough hearts to make you want to gag, wear bright pink lipsticks (all of which i did today), and best of all, it's the greatest excuse to tell those closest to you just how much you love them. i have never found anything about this day exclusive to only those in relationships.

i also wanted to teach a song about love to my kids today. my mind drew a complete blank and the only one i could think of was the song they sing at the end of barney. you know..."i love you, you love me, we're a happy family..." it was either that or whitney houston's "and IIIIIIIIIII-EEEE-IIIIIII will always love YOOOOUUUUUU" and i was afraid my kids may not have the lung capacity.

so today i was in costco on my lunch break, talking to katie in grand rapids, and as i was checking out, i was telling her that i just went past the flowers section and maybe i should get someone some flowers today. she said "we could buy ourselves flowers and have them be from each other..." and before i knew it, i was explaining the different flowers they had and we were deciding which ones she would like to "buy" for me. we settled on sunflowers. i was so happy! i just got flowers from my friend on valentine's day from across the world! tomorrow, she will be getting daiseys with some colorful flowers thrown in. (or that is what i suggested.) see, this is why i love this day! you would never do that on any other day!

the downside of talking to someone on the phone while you are grocery shopping, is that you don't realize how much you are buying and whether or not it is carry-able. i had to leave my bike and walk home (i tried to steal a cart, but i couldn't get it through the pillars outside--they are very clever those costco people...putting the little pillars just close enough together so as not to let any carts through), all the while talking to katie, trying not to completely squash my new sunflowers she had just given me. a walk that normally takes me about 3 minutes took me nearly 30. i had to walk ten feet, and then take a break and sit down and catch my breath, and then walk a little further, and then sit, and so on. my hands have rope burns from the handles of my bag. lesson learned: buying in bulk and talking on the phone do not compliment each other.

happy valentine's day to all!!!!

ch-ch-ch-china!

my china excursion has proven to be FANTASTIC and i wish i could go back. i think beijing is probably one of the coolest cities i've been to. and my hostel was so great, i met so many cool people from all around the world, i loved the great wall, i loved wandering around the city with new friends, i loved having a rockin chinese new years eve, complete with fireworks that were set off way too close to me, and i loved getting totally sick and spending half my trip feeling like i could fall over and never get back up at any moment. WHAT!?!? just kidding. i did get totally sick, but love is not the word i would use to describe how i felt about it. ya, so i got some sort of food poisening (or actually i think it was the flu cuz some of the people i was hanging out with at the hostel got it too), and spent a good share of my trip trying to shake it, and i still haven't. do you know what's worse than being drapped over a dirty, community hostel toilet that smelled like a sewer throwing up for 3 1/2 hours straight, thinking the whole time that i would die here, in a random hostel in the middle of china all alone? nothing. that's what i discovered on this trip. absolutely nothing is worse than that. i just wanted my mom and a room that wasn't shared with 7 other people. but it was all part of the china experience, and it will most definetely be a memory! the great wall was just so cool. it's quite hard to explain actually how impressive it is to be up there, walking on top. it was a little tough b/c i hadn't really eaten in a couple of days at that point b/c i had been sick, so my legs were a bit shaky, but i pulled through! and really, what was probably the best part were all the cool people i met at my hostel. i made good friends with two girls from denmark the first night, and we spent the majority of our trips together, as well as a few guys from sweden, some very fun aussie girls, a guy from france and a couple from germany who were all staying in my room, and a really cool guy from england that i met the last couple days i was there. it's so fun meeting such easy going and good natured people from all over. i had a moment where i was taking a long shower after my day at the great wall, and i was right next to a window and the sun was going down over all these classic looking chinese roof tops, and i was in a dirty community shower, and i still felt sick and sort of weak from not being able to eat much, but i just felt so content and so at peace with things and so happy to be where i was. seeing new places and meeting new people makes me feel so alive!

so i will give you my photo albums that you can check out, and that will give you a good idea of what i did while i was there. as usual, i took way too many pictures, so you can skim if you want. just click on the albums.
album 1
album 2
album 3
album 4

from rat trash to headlight.

so here's some pictures of my new do. i went in and said "give me the brightest most craziest blonde hair you can." and she (actually they--there were about 7 koreans working on my hair) did. i feel sort of like a mixture between a punk rocker and an alien and a headlight. the pictures really don't do it justice. everytime i look in the mirror, i stop, gasp, put my hand to my open mouth in a shocked gesture, and then i start laughing. it's so funny! but i know i can make it work. very dramatic eye makeup and bright lipstick will be necessary for the next while. hooray for a little nudge in the style department! lately i've been in this slump of un-uniqueness, mostly due to the fact that i sit on the floor with little kids playing musical games all day long. and also b/c it's so cold in our school and i just want to be warm! those two factors often result in black flowy pajama-like pants and my bright orange wool sweater that could keep a polar bear warm in the middle of an antartic winter. but this hair is not gonna let me get away with mediocre style.


i leave for china on wednesday morning. i'm really excited! i'm doing a few tours--great wall, forbidden city, summer palace, temple of heaven. i also got tickets for the chinese opera one night. and i'm taking an extraordinarily large suitcase b/c i plan to do a lot of shopping! i'm ready to get my bargaining game face on. bring it on little old chinese women!