First Day Of Class!

Today was the first official day of classes. Kind of strange because there is a holiday on March 1 (Tuesday) so I heard most universities will actually start on March 2. However, we started today which is not a big deal for me because my schedule is super chill at the moment. Later they will incorporate exchanges into my schedule, but at the moment I only have my 5 classes spread over 4 days =) So for this week only, I have a 2 day holiday!

Today I had CID, which is a course where we seem to learn more about the school, Korean culture and people and we'll give presentations. I'm not 100% sure yet, but I read the syllabus yesterday. I also had my Korean Speaking class today. There are 3 levels in the Korean language classes. Last year in level 2 A and B were going at different rates so essentially B was the more focused class. I have no idea if that has anything to do with anything this year, but after taking the Korean placement test I was able to get into 2B. oO. I need to catch up!!! Started reading my Korean textbook yesterday, acting like the dork that I truly am! HAHA. My teacher is super nice and funny. She wants to go for Coffee and Waffles once a month as a class since we have such a small group, I LOVE her already haha.

Danimal during lunch, we ate "Big Chicken May" and it was awesome. A bit of chicken fried cutlet, egg shreads, kimchi raddish and then you add in seaweed + the two sauces Japanese soy sauce and the mayo. Mix it all together and you get heavenly goodness!

My classes finish at 1pm on Monday so the rest of the after I was free. We played some ping pong and then hung out in the Global Village Lounge and was just chatting and watching videos of Maiday's computer. Many went out to the bar to hangout but I think I am seriously still jetlagged when 10 rolled around I was TIRED. So Maiko (my suite mate) and I went back to our dorm. However we met a new suite mate and her friends so we stayed up chatting until about 1AM.

Maiday's super cute extra USB ports!!! I want one, it's sooooooooo cute =)

I am really excited to be going to school here. Can't wait for the rest of my classes this week =D

Lazy Rainy Sundays, Suite Mates & Korean Rent!

Korean winters are dry dry dry. Last time I came to Korea the climate really affected my skin. Luckily this time around I have my tea tree oil foam cleanser that is REALLY helping me out. My skin is doing ok and TODAY FINALLY my hair has decided to cooperate, only took about 5 days but it got there. I'm still waiting for my roommate to arrive, she is no where to be seen still.

More girls moved in today because supposedly it's the last day before school starts. I had lunch with Emily (she was the first suite mate to move in!) and we went to this really small restaurant off campus and had a fabulous lunch. Before I can say I was going to treat her she paid for my lunch! Koreans are way too quick I need to learn to pay before they do seriously. Then later another one moved in and she's a first year, Emily is a 2nd year student, and she is super adorable! We gathered in the common area with Maiko (the other international student in my suite) and we just chatted along with Mari & Akiko (other international students in the GV program). I think we spent an hour together before broke apart for the night. I am still learning their names it's going to take me a while before I get them all...so many names right now.

That night I went to watch a school play/musical! The school's theater majors are putting on a production of RENT right now. I went to go watch it even though it's all in Korean EVEN Seasons of Love. Sounds just as good in Korean as it does in English! Even though I barely understood anything that was going on it was excellent. Their singing and acting, everything was really excellent.

This is the opening, I tried to take a picture of everyone in the production, but I think I cut off a few people on the left and right. Everyone seriously played their roles soooo well, the actress that played Joanne has an AMAZING voice!

It was semi a girl's night out + Danimal. There were also two UBER cute little girls there. I believe they were family members of someone in the play. They had their little fir coats and perfect hair and was seriously the cutest two girls I've ever seen. I wanted to take them home with me. Another sweet moment we got from the play was at the end a student from the audience proposed to his girlfriend. I think they have been dating for four years, or that's what I think I heard. It was soooooo sweet I got teary eyed.

Korean Production (Professional production) - Seasons Of Love

Overall it was a super relaxing lovely Sunday. Monday school starts!

Seoul 서울: Namdaemun Market 남대문시장 & Myeong Dong 명동

Since it's Saturday a huge group of us made a trip up to Seoul to do some sightseeing + shopping! We went to two tourist and shopping districts that are within walking distance to each other. First we visited Namdaemun Market (남대문시장). We found a place to eat first since our long journey made us all quite hungry. After eating we walked around the market for a bit, there are a lot of stands and a lot of people compacted in tiny aisles. To my Namdaemun isn't my type of district to shop in. They have a lot of knock offs and older style clothing. This just wasn't my cup of tea, I think there are souvenirs and such here as well but I didn't get a chance to see those. I still recommend you to visit here once if you have NEVER been to Seoul. It's got it's own vibe and the food here was great so if you don't like the shopping do the touristy bit and then grab a bite to eat!

We then moved onto Myeong Dong (명동) which is a district that I LOVE. I like Myeong Dong because it's a combination of EVERYTHING. You've got your street food and street stalls all lined up on the main walkways. Then you have the middle range boutiques and shops plus restaurants all intermingled. Lastly once you cross the street you come to the department store which supplies you with the upscale! It is all here, literally, your one stop shopping destination.

EXIT Number 6 on Line Number 4. This is the entrance into the wonderful shopping district of Myeong Dong!

I personally didn't get much shopping done this time around besides my dorm essentials which I picked up from Daiso (다이소). Just like Japan and unlike Vancouver this is a 1 dollar store here in Korea. Some items are over 1000 won, but they don't go that far beyond it. I did run around with Olliver looking for a coffee machine we came back empty handed. However, I saw this UBER cute cup from Starbucks that I am so tempted in buying but it's 9000 won...we'll see.

Here is Nathan with his fuzzy fox hat. This is the view from Yong San (용산) station as we waited for our Cheonan Rapid line train to head back to school. The tall building in the middle says Seoul Station Tower and in the last picture the building with the white lights it's actually a video or a digital light display or something. Things were moving and everything, really neat.

1st picture everyone is DEAD tired from all the walking we did.

2nd Alli is super happy we're watching True Blood that night

3rd Olliver telling us something amazing I'm sure.

Lastly this was my favourite purchase of the day! My Panda garbage can =) Ain't it the cutest thing you've ever seen (NAT every time I look at it, I think I see you...hahah). It's like Kung Fu Panda in garbage can form. 3000 Won from Daiso, oh yeah!!!

Orientation Day

Today we started off bright and early at 8:30am. Our orientation included breakfast which consists of "toast" and orange juice. Now when I say toast it actually means a sandwich. They have toast here, but when you go to a "toast" stand like Isaac toast or your little restaurants on campus when you see toast it's a sandwich. Sometimes they toast the bread but the few times I've had them its just a sandwich. I really enjoyed it was a ham egg salad sandwich.

Then we started our orientation. The School of Global Education & Exchange (SGEE) runs the Global Village program that I am in. The Global Village (normally referred to as GV or EV) program is where we English speaking International Students participate on various exchanges with Korean students, who have paid extra and signed up, throughout the week. We also had an introductory presentation from the Global Exchange Director in charge of connecting and recruiting with sister schools, Park Hyun Hee. We also saw a promotional video promoting tourism in Korea - Land of the Morning Calm. Then Jae Sam, another Global Exchange Director, went over the details of the program, what is expected of us and rules of the dorm. We picked our classes today we MUST take Korean Writing & Korean Speaking + a cultural class (I chose Beginner Cultural Korean Dance) and then two elections - Korean Society & Culture + Global Strategy of Korean Business. We also have to go to CID (this is where we meet as a group and information about trips and such are relayed to us as a whole), then our exchanges that are sprinkled around our schedule and the Korean students schedule through out the week. Since we have a smaller group of 42 (or 8...) we may have 2 or 3 students we do exchanges with.

We also filled out our documents for our Alien Registration card, which is used as ID in Korea and bank information to open a bank account. They already filled out as much information as they can and then we had to sign and date a million times. They gave us instructions that were really easy to follow so everything went by really smoothly. Jae Sam also will help the students to buy and load a cell phone (pay as you go plan). It's not done on the same day as orientation he gave us time to think about it and get back to him on Monday. It's highly recommended to go through Jae Sam to get the phone if you completely have no other means (ie. you've been to Korea and have one, you have enough friends you trust to help you etc.) because he knows the people he is buying the phones from and if there are any problems he can easy go to them and get it fixed for you. If you do it on your own essentially you are on your own.

The new dean of SGEE also dropped by to say a few words to us Oh Yoon Sung. He is SUPER friendly and seems like a really great teacher (he has a few classes). I always imagined a dean to be super strict.

Then we had a lunch break. After lunch there is an optional Korean placement test. For those that do not take the test they are automatically placed in the lowest beginner level and if you are a returning student you just get placed in the next level up. I was told, since I can read Korean, to try and do the level test since the beginner class learns the Korean alphabet for the first month and then they move onto very basic greetings and such. So I decided to take the test, it was challenging considering I never formally learned Korea. But I was surprised by how many I could actually answer. Oral was a bit of a disaster though haha.

Then the returnees to the program took us noobs on a tour of the campus. Korea as always is all about presentation presentation presentation. So their library is beautiful! However, I heard during exam season it's impossible to find a seat anywhere in there.

From left to right:

1. Premier Zone: where you can grab a dvd and come here to watch it. There are 6 flat screen tvs here for you to enjoy.

2. Manny sitting on the giant SCH letter blocks that are in the hallway

3. Study Lounge: this place is really PACKED during exam season, my friend said if you are not Korean you probably won't be able to find a spot. Not because we don't study, we just don't study AS MUCH as they like to.

4. Book Cafe: I think you can actually drink and read in there...I'm not 100% sure yet I just really liked the book shelf!

(I'm using clickable thumbnails today cause blogspot wasn't letting me upload pictures so these are done through photobucket...sorry Nat about your eyes =p)

They had trees in their library! It's so pretty. On the right is the future tunnel Jay (from Australia) and Hugo (from France) are walking through and it looks like they are getting bigger as the tunnel gets smaller lol, lucky shot really Hugo is in the perfect spot for that affect to work.

This is the Gym! They offer a TaeKwonDo class for us and that's where we would go if we signed up. As you can see it says "Rocker" Room on that sign because the ㄹ character in Korean is a mix of an R/L sound. They have a total of 5 cafeteria's I heard, but I've only seen 3. This is the cafeteria in the Student Center building, this building also consists of a hairdresser, an eyeglass store and a mini store. The Family Mart is located in another cafeteria and there is a bakery to it's right.

After the campus tour SGEE prepared a westernized dinner for us, it was banquet style and the food was really amazing. I enjoyed everything!

We finished off the night with a celebration at EZs a pub across the street. It's tradition in Korea for the Seniors to take the freshman out the first night so everyone can get to know each other. Drinking culture is very big in Korea, it's a time for everyone to let loose a bit and really get to know each other. We learned to play a pattern game called Zoomy Zoomy. Each person playing has a number. We hit the table in a rhythm starting off slow and we call each other's numbers within the pattern. If someone calls zoomy zoomy we speed up the chanting! It's a really great game.

1st Picture is Kristen, Freggy & Perpetua playing the game.

2nd Maiday is teaching the new people that joined the game how to play

3rd We found out John Wong has no rhythm as he screwed up starting the game successfully for the 3rd time in a row. Oh John.

Soon Chun Hyang Opening Ceremony 순천챵대학교 2011 학년도

Today we joined the 2500 new students to Soon Chun Hyang University. We were taking a bus into Seoul and it took about 2 hours. The ceremony was held at Jamsil (잠실) Olympic Stadium, Seoul in the indoor stadium. This is where the 1988 Summer Olympics were held. It was a HUGE event there were cameras everywhere. If you did not know already, Korea is definitely all about presentation.

This ceremony was only for the brand new 1st year students coming into Soon Chun Hyang this March. We started to head inside the stadium and received greetings from "clowns" (they were not scary, thank goodness) that were making balloon animals.

Inside is where the ceremony was held, look at all the students!!! Unfortunately for us besides a translator telling us what will happen next, ie. The Dean of SCH will be giving a speech, EVERYTHING was conducted in Korean. So the ceremony felt super long and a bit boring. However, there was a game period where this freshman won 100 baek man won = 1 000 Canadian dollars and a Korean idol group was performing!!!

These are two famous news anchors in Korea.

2NE1 was at the opening ceremony!!! This is Dara =) My favourite member.

Here is all of them from left to right: Dara, Park Bom, CL, Minzy. I was so excited since they are a group I really enjoy and I got to see them for free! What was also really cool was that the other international students were also really into them. Not that other Korean groups are not great, but normally if you are coming from America listening to musicians in other languages could be strange. Especially if they have genres which are slightly different or more authentic to the Korean culture that may not exist in America. However, 2NE1 is one of the groups that has more American RnB and Hip hop influences in their music so I think it was an easy adjustment for everyone. We all had fun during their short 4 song performance!!!

After the ceremony we headed straight back to SCH. Since it ended at around 5:15pm we were stuck in traffic and did not make it back to Asan till around 8pm. I was so hungry so a big group of us went out for samgyupsal (삼겹살) which is pork belly. You sit down at a table and barbeque your own meat. Then you wrap it in lettuce and put whatever you want in the wrap. I normally enjoy it with garlic, onion, rice and mixed soy bean paste. I love this stuff so much and I am so happy I am in Korea so I can enjoy this very often!

Here is Anna Lee (from the Philippines) cooking the food and Olliver & Perpetua is right beside her.

After dinner we went over to a Japanese restaurant to continue to hang out and enjoy the Korean culture. Karen, Perpetua and I

Olliver (Canadian Buddy! Woot), Me, Karen, Perpetua, Freggy & AnnaLee

I got a video of 2NE1 - I Don't Care LIVE. This is one of my favourite songs from them!!! I love how you can hear my other international friends clapping along to the beat =)

Seoul 서울: Gangnam 강남 & My Birthday 생일축하해

The last time I spent my birthday away from home was when I was 3. At this time I was on a family vacation so even though I wasn't in Canada, I was still spending it with family. This year I am spending my birthday in Korea! I took the train into Seoul (서울) and boy was it a super long ride! The ride in took 2. 5 hours. There are faster options to get there, but that means I have to pay more. That timing is about average, if I caught the Cheonan Rapid train I can cut that time off by 10-20 minutes, BUT that is if I am lucky enough to catch it!

Today was another LONG day since I had to travel to and from Seoul. I made this adventure all on my own, it wasn't hard it was just lengthy haha.

I decided to walk to Sinchang Station (신창역) because it was sunny again and it only takes 15-20 minutes depending on my walking pace. This is the last station on the number 1, dark blue, line. I found out today line number 1 has multiple branches so I have to pay attention as to which one I am riding on.

Here is a view of my school from my walk. It's up on a hill and I can really feel that I am living in the country side, but I really don't mind.

We can go fishing as an extracurricular activity if we really wanted to! Haha.

I met up with a few friends for my birthday. There were 5 of us in total Christina, Emma, Kelly, Jae Chul and I. We were suppose to meet at Gangnam (강남) Exit 7 at 12pm, but I was slightly late. I also forgot my notebook with everyone's phone number in case I couldn't find them...LUCKILY Jae Chul saw me and then everyone just showed up after that.

We settle on eating at AnDong Jjimddak 찜닭 (that's the name of the restaurant and the name of this lovely dish below). This was the smaller size for 3-4 people, even with 5 we couldn't clean the plate.

After we went to Burger King to get a appokado (아포가토), I am actually not sure if I remembered the name of the dessert correctly. Basically it's soft serve vanilla ice cream with caramel swirled in it with a shot of espresso. Super delicious and Christina found out BK sells it for 2500 won when coffee shops sell them for approx. 7000 give or take.

After that Jae Chul and Emma tried to help me set up my cell phone! Thank you Korean friends for doing that. Since I don't have my Alien Registration yet and I was getting pay as you go the sales associate said one of my Korean friends can fill out the information for me and voila now my phone is up and running!!!

Next we wanted to go to noraebang 노래방 (aka karaoke or singing room if translated). For some odd reason we had the worst luck in finding one...first we went to a multibang (bang meaning room) and the place said they only allowed a max of 4 people in a room. Then we went to Luxury and they were under maintenance we finally settled on M Play which is also another multibang.

The guys running this place was so nice, they were worried we thought the room was small but it was just right. It was super cheap 30 000 won (which is 30 dollars, 1 CAD = 1000 Korean won) for 1.5 hours (split between 5 people) and this price includes all you can drink water, all you can eat popcorn, cookies and ice cream! Plus they had the cutest art on the their walls!!! So adorable.

We walked around for a bit while waiting for my friend In Jae to get off work. Gangnam is a more upscale district in Seoul. However intermingled with the nice stores are also street stalls! This one was selling TONS of Hello Kitty things, crazy so pink!

When In Jae arrived we grabbed a quick small dinner since i had to make my long journey back to the school. We settled on eating at Kim Lee Topokki (not the correct romanization, but that's how they spelt it on their sign). This meal was so good! Looking at this picture is making me drool. I forget how spicy some people make their ddeokbokki (떡볶이) so after I while I was drinking A LOT of water. Even though it's so spicy I couldn't help but continue eating, seriously so delicious!

Lastly I got a present from Emma and Kelly!!! They got me a Korean picture dictionary and a super cute agenda diary. At first I was kind of sad I'd be away from home for my birthday, but I am blessed to have super great friends even on this side of the world =D