Today’s a lazy Sunday and I don’t know where the day has gone. It’s already 4:00pm here and I’m still in my bathrobe. I wound up staying up a little too late doing nothing when I got home from the city last night and wound up waking up somewhere close to 11am this morning. A new record for me! Usually I wake up between 6 and 9 no matter what, which is a shame. (before I forget. The photo above is my name written in Hangul by a pro calligrapher!)
Currently I am sitting here eating a persimmon that I blended up with ice and brown sugar to make a sort of puree-sorbet thingamajig. It’s really a great and healthy snack:
My friend Ikju who runs the cafe (Amicus) near me with her husband, Kim, showed me how to make this. I feel like when I have a persimmon done right, I really like it. Persimmon makes me think of a tomato that made up its mind and became a fruit that hangs on trees like most other sensible fruits out there (unlike tomatoes which are debated to be one or the other. The confusion is so real that I’ve literally seen cherry tomatoes on cake here). It’s also great because of the many ways you can prepare it! If it is hard you can eat it just like a fruit, but if it gets soft and gelatinous you can do what I did here or skip blending and get a spoon to eat it with like a custard or something.
It is currently persimmon and tangerine season here in Imsil (and perhaps Korea in general). Getting seasonal fruit is the best. In the US where I lived I think we got seasonal apples and pumpkins. The only time I could really tell when a fruit was in season was either when it was cheaper than usual or overly advertised. No matter what, fruit just stayed the same flavor, which was kind of dull. Here it is better! you can get any fruit any time of year but it will be like in the US; dull tasting and expensive. Here it’s great because you will get tons of fruit that burst with flavor at an affordable price. I get happy and sad buying fruit here because it goes bad before I can eat it all and I am always so busy that I forget to take extras with me to give as gifts. I’ll get better I swear!
I mention this first because it is so cool to see these little cultural nuances and also because I’m trying to make my diet healthier. Currently I sort of drink beer and eat kimbap for dinner unless I run into a friend somewhere and go out to eat. For example, I had this “cheese kimbap” last night!
I feel like I am living an in-between state of healthy and not-so-healthy but my portion control has gotten so much better! I don’t drink as much beer as I did back home because it’s expensive and crappy and my busy lifestyle gets in the way (cry). Although I do like Soju, I only really like drinking it with other people. When I drink it alone I don’t feel right. For breakfast I tend to drink a yogurt cup, eat a bowl of cereal, or do something with eggs, toast, and marmalade (or a combo of all that!). Depends on how much time it takes me to look like I am alive in the morning. My dinner is usually kimbap or rice unless I go out with friends. Despite my questionable diet my skin is looking much healthier (somehow) and I’ve lost a little weight! Last night I tried on a belt that previously took some heavy effort to wear. Instead of the usual affair of wishing I was dead, the belt fit on just right and snugly. I WAS SO HAPPY! I think I gained a few lubs (lbs) in the summer because of all my partying and drinking in preparation to depart to Korea, so seeing a drop has me relieved.
Speaking of eating things: I got to go to the Imsil Cultural Festival last week! It wasn’t a huge event, mostly just a small thing at the community center for the students and some teachers to go to. While I was there, I got to meet and have a traditional style Korean lunch with the director of the Imsil English Center. She is a very nice woman and I am happy I got to spend time with her! Here is a picture of that lunch: The hot stoneware made everything so delicious and cozy! From heated floors to heated stone bowls, Korea really knows how to utilize heat in the most comfy of ways.
It was soooo good! Maybe tonight instead of kimbap I will do a bibimbap because that is a delicious rice-dish that cooks itself within a heated stone or clay bowl too. After lunch I walked around the festival some more and saw a guy doing cotton candy (fairy floss?) but it was done in all these crazy designs and made to be super huge! I probably got diabetes from eating it. I asked if he could make me a Mario-mushroom shape and he did.
The festival itself was on a Thursday, which is a day I should have been teaching. My teacher at Jisa Middle, Mr.Han, showed me the students rehearsing on their traditional drums for the festival. I thought it would have been cool to go see them perform and so he started calling everyone up. Before I knew it, I was free to enjoy the day. My co-teachers have been so kind to me here!
The day proceeded with an opening violin and cello performance done by the Imsil Students. It was very well done and beautiful. You could tell they had been practicing for a long time to sound that good. Many students I talk to tell me they play the violin, cello, or piano (even in 3rd grade!). They are very popular instruments here and so refined! Also, Although I didn’t see any at the festival, the ocarina is a very popular instrument here too. I tend to hear my upstairs neighbor playing it, or the kids around school, and even older people hanging around the gazebo. This lead me to believe that perhaps the ocarina was a traditional Korean instrument. This is true and untrue. There is an instrument called the Hun that is a traditional clay Korean take on the ocarina. However, the ones I always see around are the sweet-potato shaped ocarinas. Sweet potatoes are also very popular here too so I thought it made sense. Turns out, according to some people I’ve talked to, the ocarina became popular primarily because of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Yep… That’s the reason. I’m all for it to be honest, I mean everyone in the US wanted to play this instrument when I was a kid but music teachers told us (me actually) to not be an idiot and choose a real instrument like the clarinet. I think I still got clarinet splinters in my face from 3rd grade. Oh but meanwhile it was totally cool for us to play the recorder which is possibly the ugliest sounding instrument thing known to human kind.
After the wonderful opening ceremony which was marked with an explosion of confetti, we were prompted to go outside and look around. They gave me a little stamp book and if I did the cultural excursions at each booth, I’d get some kimbap as a reward. I did a lot of them without getting stamps but they gave me 2 rolls of kimbap anyway (people here always give me too much food, but I appreciate the thought). I was so full after eating one but thankfully I found my friend Autumn and passed it off to her. My hands were so full of things too! I was literally just about to become that guy who keeps a roll of kimbap in his pocket like some sort of pleeb. Granted, all the kids around her started passing her tons of stuff they didn’t want but took a lot of her newly gifted kimbap anyway. I think one of them gave me a tofu soup of some kind.
The excursions were hosted by the different colleges and trade schools around, presenting ideas for the student’s potential future plans (something kids in Korea have to decide very young). There were robotic and mechanical displays from the colleges of science, cheese from the Imsil college of cheese science (cheese is a big deal here in Imsil), video game colleges, the millitary, fire-fighters, beauty schools, culinary schools, cultural preservation clubs, and so on. There were activities like calligraphy, flower arranging, making cute cakes, playing with robots, and testing video games. I got to play with an Occulus Rift for a student-made first person shooter and it was very cool. Below are photos from some of the cultural booths, starting with Autumn making a clay pot:
I had more photos but when I switched phones from my non-working American phone to my new Korean phone I lost a ton of them (Galaxy 6 Edge+ Emerald edition. I’ll have to do a post about Korean “servisu” or service because that is an interesting cultural point that makes life here great. When I signed up for my phone, with help of a Korean friend, they gave me $100 in cash for some reason lol). But these were just some of the things to see here!
After that I sat in and watched the performances. I thought I was only going to see my Jisa middle school students there, but I also met with students from the elementary school, and even Samghye! I got pictures with most of them too!
The performances were very amazing. Some did traditional Korean fan-dances, others did dances to kpop, and some did traditional drum music (like my Jisa middle school). It was very cool to see the ways that students identify with their culture past and present. I also saw some dances done to Taylor Swift and Ke$ha. Very funny and surprising. All of which done very well!
Some of my Jisa Elementary Students before their performance
The Jisa Middle School students doing their traditional 4-drum performance.
And then they did the dance. It was fun to watch 🙂
This fan-dance was done by a different school. It was very well done. I’ve seen professionals do this same traditional dance and these girls did a great job even in comparison.
It was such a fun time!
Well, That’s all I’m gonna write for now. I still have to go out for dinner and finish writing all my lesson plans. So much work but if I finish before it is too late I will hopefully get a good sleep. Night all!
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