End of the Winter Semester

Another semester down and two to go. Yes, that's right, two more semesters left in Korea then who knows what's going to happen next. That is of course, if my FBI Background Check arrives in time. I sent it a month ago so I shouldn't have any problems. Then again, you just never know. It was a good semester, a little quiet, which is good and bad, but overall, things went well. Here are a few photos of the students and of our end of semester staff dinner, this time at Outback.

(Smarty pants - Heidi and Eunsuh - highest level in Elementary School)

(Eunsuh lived in Canada for over a year so her English is pretty solid - and she's smart!)

(GA kids - second highest level. We have Shawn, Nick, myself, Christina, Ann, Alice, and Rina)

(Nick during debate)

(Alice preparing to speak about the cons of nuclear weapons.)

(JI - Big Boy, Marky Mark, Tony Moly, Lisa, Alexander, Kel, Jennifer, Jason, Liz, Jammy, LG, Eileen, Alice, and Lisa2)

(Eileen hard at work)

(Big Boy blocking the shot by holding up his newspaper)

(Busy with their workbooks)

(Tuesday and Thursday JI - Ferris, Loy, Tommy2, Tommy1, Daisy, Julie, Tina, Nick, Hanny, Sally, Alice, Sally2, Izabel, and Adella)

(One of my all time favorite students - smart, loved to participate, and put a lot of effort into her homework.)

(Tina was another favorite student, mainly because she was just so darn cute)

(Tina trying to stick her tongue out at me)

(Hanny and Sally)

(Tommy1 has a question)

(Last class Tuesday and Thursday with LG, Jinie, James, Richard, John, Jake, Mario, David, and Clarence)

(LG and Jinie not wanting their pictures taken)

(Clarence doing some Writing Book work, working on his essay)

(We finished the semester at Outback to celebrate the long and grinding winter semester. I did enjoy my steak. Here we have Spenser and across the table, Chelice, Drew, and Katrina.)

(Group shot)

(From the other end of the table)

(Lindsay, Justin, and Harry. Sadly, this was Justin's last semester at Avalon.)

After a month...

To be honest, winter in Korea is cold, brutally so. In fact, it makes it a bit difficult to do much of anything. Which, is why, I haven't updated in a month or so. For those of you that follow, here are some photos of a hike Katrina and I went on. Hopefully this will get me back in the flow of things and with warm weather right around the corner, hopefully there will be a few more events. Enjoy...

(Katrina hiking along)

(Nice view)

(No swimming? Warning: Deep Water. Ok, that makes sense...)

(Yep, you are on a mountain, it might drop off...)

(Interesting little bridge we found...)

(Same bridge, farther away)

(Frozen reservoir, just to give you an idea of how cold it was...)

(Interesting little wooden sculpture)

(Katrina with a nice background shot)

(A king or general of sorts that did something special)

(Plaza area before the hike)

(Yep, it's cold)

Bongeunsa Temple

We've been on the lookout for shoes for quite some time. Not for myself, but for Katrina. She wanted to get a pair of warmer shoes instead of slip-ons since it is indeed winter time. So, we headed to Co-Ex Mall. Epic FAIL! At least in terms of looking for shoes. However, before we left, I did some poking around on the internet and found Bongeunsa Temple very close to get to. It was about a two minute walk once you get out of the mall. It was nice to go to a temple seeing as how we haven't been to one in quite some time. The highlight - a giant stone buddha and a monk chit chatting on what appeared to be his smart phone; I guess living a simple life has taken on a new meaning in the 21st century. Anyway, apologies for the delay.

('What did the monk say when he ordered a pizza? 'Can you make me one with everything?')

(Front of the temple, I guess you could call it that)

(Giant statue)

(Thirsty? Why wait?)

(Ceremony of sorts which I still do not understand)

(Another view of the temple with Spenser's fish eye lens)

(Regular lens)

(Fish eye lens again. It captures so much more in a photo. It is close to a 180 degree shot of the plaza where the statue stood.)

(This just gives you an idea of how close the temple is located to some downtown buildings)

(I liked the ribbons and this painting)

(The ribbons began at the entrance of the temple and ran to the picture above which was a shrine in the heart of the temple. This is Katrina and I as we are leaving.)

(Again you can see the shrine with ribbons)

(2012 - the Year of the Dragon. I wonder if the Chinese New Year predicts an apocalypse in 2012???)

Christmas Korean Style

The title is a bit deceiving seeing as how it isn't really Korean style. From what I gather, Christmas is a little different to each and every person in Korea. Younger couples use it as a Valentine's Day of sorts. Families will often by Christmas cakes to celebrate. And a rare few will get gifts from their parents. Of course, there are probably millions who do not even celebrate the holiday. While some of my students were going to spend the whole day at church. Christians in Korea have seemed to accepted the importance of Christmas in their faith without bringing the materialistic expectations we have in the West into the holiday. I guess you could say, for many, it's what Christmas was meant to be - celebrating the birth of Jesus. For me, it's just another holiday. Unfortunately, it fell on a Sunday so we didn't get any time off of work. Again, just illustrates the importance of X-mas in Korea.

With that being said, we had a delicious lunch with lots of food: ham, garlic mashed potatoes, creamy mashed potatoes, tuna casserole, home-made mac 'n' cheese, corn, rolls, and black bean burgers for the vegetarians in the group. We also had a few cocktails as well as ice cream and cheese cake (thank you Chelsea) for dessert! Afterwards, we continued on tradition of ice skating in Seoul for the second year in a row. It was a wonderful Christmas year and I'm thankful I had such wonderful people to spend Christmas with.

(Our Christmas spread on the dining table. The table itself was about 6 inches off the ground so we all ate on the floor.)

(Black bean burgers for the vegetarians)

(Here we have the meat and potatoes, as well as the corn and tuna noodle casserole)

(Drew and Harry hanging on the couch afterwards)

(This shot idealizes everything Chelsea is, at least in my opinion. Katrina is rocking a new Christmas shirt she got this year.)

(It was a great time and I had a smile on my face most of the day!)

(Katrina and I at the subway station before going ice skating - cute picture)

(Nice artistic work by Spenser)

(This was the ice skating group - Spenser, Harry, Katrina, myself, Lina, and Drew)

(Whoooooo - great time in my rental skates, pulling Katrina around. Actually, she does a pretty good job skating and I don't even have to pull her that much! Great times!!!)

(Katrina enjoying her skate)

(Katrina with the tree in the background)

(This was our Christmas ice skating experience. In the heart of Seoul, skating on a little sheet of ice. It was a fantastic day!)

(This is me standing with the rink in the right of the picture with the giant tree behind me)


(O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree - my bamboo tree)


(Katrina's tree which was hand made by her mother and shipped over last year)


(How could a Christmas be complete without stockings? Compliments of Katrina's mom.)


(I would say we were both good this year. It was nice to be able to have some gifts this year and be able to celebrate Christmas. I know we both felt love, from friends, family, and each other.