GIC Day Dance

American, Irish, Canadian, South African, British, French, Australian, Korean. It's a crazy amount of fun to share in the talents of Gwangju's active foreigner community, the extent to which was showcased during Gwangju International Community Day earlier this month. Volunteers ran booths offering delectable food items, and the Talent Show was packed with gorgeous and wide-ranging performances. I could only sample the wonders of it all thanks to the nervousness that kicked in before my dance, but what I did catch was fabulous.

It felt wonderful to focus on dance again, if only for that week. My beloved Gwangju Family showed up to cheer and document my performance; and, in true family-fashion, insist that I was worthy of first prize. I did not, in fact, win a prize (or have any knowledge of the judges or their expectations), and watching the video made me squirm a bit because I'd love to do a few things differently. That said, it was enormously enjoyable to take part in the show, and I've posted the dance below, as promised. Thanks go to Brandon and Justin for filming it, and to everyone else who was there to support me!

Can you tell I forgot the last 20 something seconds and made it up on the spot? Oops! :)

To see more of GIC Day, you can fire up your Internet Explorer browsers (the video doesn't work otherwise) and check out the Korean news footage. My friends show up frequently throughout the 10 minute clip, and you can spot my face briefly a couple of times.

 To watch:
1. Paste this into your browser: http://www.ikbc.co.kr/?r=home&c=2%2F24%2F85&uid=159338
2. Scroll to the bottom of the page where you'll see orange arrows and the word "VOD" in a box
3. On the left hand side, click the 1141 video
4. Coverage of GIC Day starts at 23:49

Taiwan! Visas Ready.

In September 2002, I met Jamie Hsieh. She'd just moved from Taiwan to Grove City, PA, and I'd just switched from a private school to the local high school. We went on trips together, participated in theater productions, went to school dances, and all the while discussed what it'd be like for me to visit her home country. I knew I'd like the Pocky candy she shared with me, and I was absolutely certain I'd consume absurd amounts of bubble tea in the land of its creation. The extent to which Taiwan could potentially blow my mind did not sufficiently factor into my expectations.

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In September 2012, I hop on a plane with a bunch of friends from Gwangju and take off for Taipei. With one friend joining us after her later flight, four of us settle into the comfortable seats to make up for the less than ideal sleeping conditions provided to us on the wooden benches of the Seoul airport during the previous night. Slowly awakening to the customs cards being passed down the aisles, we lazily fill out the forms as the plane begins its descent.

One line on the card creates a bit of trouble. It reads, "Fill out your visa number below". Catching my breath, I glance at Brittany's card beside me. Her pen dangles above the same line, and I feel my head grow light. "We checked that, of course. We're all responsible people.... right?", I whisper. Her expression mirrors mine, "Yeah, of course. Let's not scare the other girls by saying anything until we're off the plane". While I don't find plane landings to be nearly as pleasant as the take-offs, this one feels far worse than usual.

Stepping from the plane, Maeve and Ciara appear no more at ease than Brittany and I. With sentiments echoing, "HOW could we make it ALL THE WAY HERE without checking if we needed visas?!", we queue up in the customs line, nauseated with the awareness that an immediate return flight to Korea is entirely possible. With only two people ahead of us in line, the internet on Ciara's iPhone kicks into gear. "Citizens of the UK... do NOT need a visa!!", shrieks Ciara, hugging Maeve. Brittany and I grab for the phone, and quickly confirm the same just as we arrive at the front of the customs line.

We meet Jamie outside the baggage claim, at which point the rest of my memories seem like a dream. She planned every second of it for us, packing each day with a phenomenal variety of activities and food samples and amazing sights. I'm still overwhelmed when I think about it all! My friend, Maeve, wrote a great article about the trip for Gwangju News, and I highly recommend reading it here: http://www.gwangjunewsgic.com/online/in-taiwan/. Also, she used my photos for the article, though the content is more exciting than the images, I think.

I'll turn it over to Maeve now, but one last note on the trip: people don't bow to each other in Taiwan. After a solid seven months of bowing at every greeting, departure, and thanks, our silly group managed to entertain Jamie throughout the trip by showing extreme courtesy to everyone we met. I'm curious to see if this habit carries over when I return home in the spring.

Bring on the SHEEP!

Hello, my dears. 

I'm genuinely confused that it's November. All continues to go smashingly well, though a bit too quickly. At school, I just completed Phase 1 of a letter exchange project between my 7th graders and the 6th grade students at Grove City Middle School. I'll be sure to share some highlights in a later post (there are many). And, with just over a month left before "Six Plays" opens, emotions in that arena range from great excitement to appalling anxiousness. There's so very, very much to do, but it's all intensely good fun. 

My dedication to yoga has dropped to once a week classes with the kids, though I've since supplemented my exercise routine with practices for an upcoming dance performance. Two weeks ago, my friends said, "Hey, we're helping to organize a talent show for the Gwangju International Center, but no one has signed up. Do you want to dance?" Hearing that first, second, and third place winners receive the equivalent of 300, 200, and 100 dollars respectively, I imagined doing a simple dance on a small stage in front of a few elderly Korean people. And so, to help my friends, I agreed.

Fast forward two weeks: I hadn't heard anything, so I assumed the show was off. But, no. Three days ago, I got an email showing my time slot in the performance that will take place on November 10th. It seems I'll be doing a solo dance after a kung fu demonstration and before a traditional Nepalese dance on a large stage near the city's main event center. The show also features traditional Peruvian dance, tae kwon do, and a wide mix of other performances. 

I may be entirely out of my league, but some friends who critiqued the two-thirds of the dance I've choreographed thus far suggested that I won't embarrass myself entirely. Actually, they were more encouraging than that, and I'm having way too much fun practicing to drop out of the competition. I also value dancing on the same level as breathing, the extent to which leaves me somewhat unconcerned about actually winning any money for the performance. Still, I am planning a January trip to either Vietnam, Thailand, or the Philippines, so the extra cash would be lovely! I'll be sure to let you know how it all goes, successful or otherwise. 

The biggest news of the past month is: I have future plans!! For a variety of reasons, I've decided to finish my contract at the end of the year, return to the U.S. for 8 weeks, and then take off for a year in New Zealand. Life in Korea is, and continues to be, intensely wonderful. I've also felt acutely that remaining here for a second year without any dedication to learning the language is a little sloppy. I value this experience so much, and I also think that being able to converse with and remember the names of your students and co-workers is important. Like, super important. My knowledge of hovers around a shameful 5% score in that category, and signing up for a second year without any intention of improving the situation is absurd. My attention is too focused elsewhere.

So, New Zealand it is! An EPIK friend tipped me off to the idea about a month ago, when she enthusiastically described the year she spent there through a company called BUNAC. Barring unforeseen opportunities, I won't be teaching in New Zealand. My friend worked for a government office, and I've read there are loads of opportunities to develop my skills in sheep farming. Also, the country boasts a fabulous variety of cheeses, a point in which Korea falls drastically short in comparison (a country with 70% mountains leaves little room for large animal pastures). Here, you can buy the equivalent of a low-grade package of Kraft singles for around $6. Heartbreaking. 

For the next (ah!) 3 months, I'm completely dedicated to soaking up the joy of living in Korea. Brace yourselves for the inevitable overly-emotional, gushing blog post that I'll likely produce sometime in February when I decide that good cheese isn't a sufficient reason to move countries. Until then, I have an extensive to-do list, the first item of which includes completing my After School Conversation Class lesson plan for a group of students who all but refuse to speak in English. I'll keep trying to inspire them, but I sympathize with the fact that their attention is too focused elsewhere. It's hard to get frustrated with them when I have the same problem. 

Neighbors, Food, and Mind Reading

A while ago, a friend of mine posted the following note online: "I just answered the door to a huge bang. Shoved into my hand was a giant packet of toilet paper and a phone. The woman on the phone says, 'Construction will happen and it will be noisy. Please accept the toilet paper as our way to say sorry.' Classic Korea!" Rapid construction, consideration for the happiness of another, and the gift of toilet paper- her tale summarizes so much of what makes Korea so lovable.

The interactions with my neighbors have been slight. Aside from hearing the occasional light switch turn off, or a cough or shout, or passionate love-making session that echos through the shower drain while I'm quietly brushing my teeth, I rarely see the people with whom I share my paper-thin walls. There is, wonderfully, one exception. My landlord's mother lives on the third floor of my building, and her knowledge of my whereabouts leaves me almost certain that she monitors the security cameras.

My security camera theory explains her quick appearance at my door after I've just returned home for the evening, though it's only an easy explanation for the curious actions of this adorable little woman. With an almost perfect record to date, every (truly, every) time I've decided to splurge on a heap of tomatoes, cucumbers, -you name it-, she brings the exact food item to my door as a gift. It's happened with an uncanny variety of food, and it's not as though both of us are making only the most in-season selections.

Her thoughtfulness is so appreciated, and since buying food for her seems odd (particularly since I'll have to assume she already has whatever I choose), the best I've given her is a little card with a painting of a flower I made. I'm due to give her another gift, as one of our funny exchanges happened again only a few hours ago when I returned home with the first large bag of apples I've purchased in a month. What did she hand me? The most delicious, giant apple I've tasted in recent memory. If only we could speak the same language, I think we might have more in common than an odd habit of purchasing the exact same food on the exact same day. I'm very happy to enjoy this much, anyway!