A Day of Culture

Lizze and I have been wanting to spend some time at Insadong, an area with tons of galleries, so last Sunday we cleared our calendars and prepared for a day of “culture”. We got there and walked around a bit, waiting to meet up with Steve, another friend. We passed several signs for galleries, but didn’t go in. Then, one caught my eye, “Knife Gallery”. I don’t know why it stood out, but I suggested we take a look. We weren’t expecting much as we walked down the narrow stairway and I laughed a little at the sign on the door that read, “PHOTO? OK!” Then we walked inside. We ended up walking around for quite a while, taking lots of pictures, and even waiting for Steve to get there, so we could show him too. Here is some of what we saw:

After that we walked down to Toto Gallery. Now, I had read about this place before going and thought I knew what to expect, but it was way crazier than I had imagined. I only purchased one souvenir, but took a bunch of pictures. We probably circled the place at least five times, always seeing new things. It wasn’t even the items themselves that were all that interesting in many cases, but how they were arranged. Here are some examples:

Yes. Yes they do...

Look's like Hellboy's movin' in on Fiona...

The 'backside' of one of the displays.

I'm going to have nightmares about this one.

"Over where?"

"Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!"

Random nativity...?

Don't we all need a pair of these shoes?

Hellboy's domestic side.

Run Cinderella! Run!

The original plan had been for Steve to join us for a couple hours before leaving for a soccer game, and Lizze and I would finish the day at Insadong on our own. However, he invited us to join him and his friends and we decided that, as it was FC Seoul’s first home game of the season, we would do that and save the other galleries for another day.

Our boys are in red.

The other side...

Our first game! ^_^

And so, a day of “culture” turned into a day of knives, toys, and soccer – not too bad, I’d say.

(As always, more pictures at http://www.flickr.com/photos/scribbledjourneys/)

Odds and Ends

You know that drawer in your house that is the catch-all for odds and ends? I’m convinced that everyone has one. No matter how well you organize, there are just some things that don’t have a particular home, and some times when you don’t have time to find the perfect place for things. So everything gets thrown together into one drawer and they all go together simply because of the fact that they don’t. Well, this blog is like that.

Dumpster-diving and thrift-store shopping: Now, I know there are thrift-stores in Korea because I visit one often, however, many times when people want to get rid of things they just put it out in the trash area (it’s not actually in a dumpster, to I’m not actually diving in, but whatever). There is often nothing wrong with these items other than that their previous owners decided to get rid of them, so they are perfect for people like me and my friends who want to furnish our apartments for, um, free. So a stroll through the local apartment trash areas can prove to be quite profitable. For instance, I looked at several stores trying to find a shelf of some sort to store my kitchen items, but had no luck. Then Lizze and I visited a couple dumpsters and I found the perfect new addition to my kitchen. (Is is gross to store food in something I technically got from the trash? I promise I cleaned it well and even lined the drawers). I’d show you a picture, but my kitchen is really messy right now and I don’t feel like cleaning it… maybe later… I also really enjoy visiting my local thrift-store. While the prices aren’t quite as good as the dumpster, they’re pretty close. I heard from a friend of mine, who speaks Korean and can actually talk to the people who work there, that the store gets new items every day, but there are a bunch of older women who show up early and get all the really good stuff. So, on Saturday Muang, Lizze, and I went right at opening (we seriously waited in line with three other women until the doors opened right at 10:30). We found some great things and I got a tall lamp that is exactly what I had been wanting for my apartment. It was pretty intense, but our dedication was rewarded.

Joint-custody: Lizze and I decided to adopt a child together and have joint-custody. Our baby is a little 5 octave keyboard and is currently living with me, but Lizze is allowed to visit on weekends. We adopted her from a guy in Ansan and brought her back to Bundang via the subway. This meant a 1 ½ hour trip there, then a 1 ½ hour trip back carrying the keyboard and stand (no case) up and down stairs, and in and out of different trains as we switched lines. We got some funny looks and woke up the next day with sore arms, but she’s worth it. Now we can play and write music to our hearts’ content… until we have to put her up for adoption again in about 10 months…

A new term: March 1^st was the beginning of Spring term, which will last for the next 13 weeks. Last week I was sad to say goodbye to my students as I had really grown attached to them. Sure some of them are little brats, but they were my little brats! I’m teaching some different classes this term, so I will have to get used to those, but I’m sure that in 13 weeks I’ll be just as sad to leave these students… at least, I hope. Here is one of my favorite “student stories” from this last term:

We were doing a project where they had to get in groups and pretend they had been hired to get rid of ghosts or monsters. I walked up to a group of three boys who had chosen to get rid of zombies.

Me: How do you kill zombies?

Boys: Fire! Throw it in sea! Bomb!

Me: You have to get in the head – shoot its brains out!

Boy 1: No, that doesn’t work.

Me: What?! Haven’t you seen any zombie movies?

Boy 1: That’s just movies. That’s not real.

Sorry, I forgot we need to be realistic about our zombie slaying….

Okay, in closing this blog of random thoughts and happenings, here are some pictures. A few I took recently, and a few, appropriately, I forgot were on there and just uploaded.

I don't know which I like best - the strange menu, or the punctuation...

Me and the friendly Tin-man

Who says you can't pick your friend's nose?

My two beautiful friends

Probably the greatest picture of Lizze ever!

The Amazing Noodle Lady

Aren't they, um, cute?...

I just had to take pictures of these guys swimming in little bowls in the alley.

Well, I hope you have enjoyed looking through my junk-drawer. It's good to empty it out every now and then.

Adventures In Cooking: Part 2

Sara, one of my coworkers, hosted a tapas party (Spanish appetizers/snacks) on Saturday for the rest of us from our school. Those of us attending were asked to bring drinks or desert. I decided to be adventurous and go with desert, hoping to make a tres leches cake. Ok, it’s not Spanish, but it’s Latin American and I love it. I knew from the beginning this was going to be difficult, but figured I could do it with equal parts Google and determination. I was sure to photograph the process so I could share with everyone my amazing talent… or my pathetic attempt – whichever one became reality.

Now, perhaps the most important part of this desert is the cake, but I lack an oven, so I opted for a store-bought cake. Muang and I went to the grocery store Friday before work so I could pick up my needed ingredients. We found a nice dense cake with relative ease and heavy cream was with the milk where one would expect it. Finding sweetened condensed milk, however, was a little more challenging. Muang eventually typed it into her phone, got the Korean translation, and asked a store employee for assistance. It was with the powdered milk and baby formula, of course.

Friday night after work I mixed together the “glaze” in my cooking pot, since I didn’t have any bowls. There is also no such thing as cream in Korea (at least as far as we know), so I used some whole milk and heavy cream instead. As I mixed this concoction of cream and sweetened condensed milk that would be poured over the cake and left to soak overnight, I began to wonder what I was going to soak it in. I opted for my sole piece of Tupperware, which was a large square (it wasn’t quite big enough, so I had to cut off the end of the cake, but I’ll enjoy it later).

As I worked I thought about my task for the next day, and decided another shopping trip was in order for some much needed tools.

Saturday I made some new additions to my kitchen supplies and went to work on the frosting.

This required mixing 2 cups heavy cream with 8oz of sugar until “stiff peaks are formed”, according to Alton Brown. Well, my cream was measured in milliliters and I had no measuring utensils for the sugar. However, since I know (or Google knows) that 250ml is one cup, as is 8oz I used one of the cream containers (which was conveniently 250ml) as a measuring cup for my sugar. I know. I’m brilliant.

Well, that was the easy part. I now had to beat this creamy goodness until stiff peaks formed...

(I know this is an awful picture, but do you know how hard it is to whisk and take a picture at the same time?)

I beat, and I beat, and I beat, and while it got thicker, the only things getting stiff were my back and arms.

I took a break and took the cake out of the container (then decided to put it back in and frost it once there since I had to transport it).

Back to mixing… I began to wonder if it was humanly possible to produce these elusive peaks without the aid of an electric mixer. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I ran out of time and had to stop beating before I had the chance to find out.

Once there, I frosted the cake and topped it with strawberries. The frosting was still a little runny, but tasted great.

It wasn’t as amazing as Mom’s, but I think I did pretty well, all things considered.

One Month

I arrived in Korea one month ago today. Wow. Has it really been a month? I feel like I should write some profound, or witty blog to mark the one month point, but I really don’t have anything that interesting to say. I do want to thank all of you who have been praying for me. I have been so blessed at every turn and I know I would not be having this wonderful experience without your support and prayers. Our God is so good and I experience His love and grace new every day.

This is week 10 at my school in a 13 week term. We’re doing testing this week, which you know the students just love. The tests they take this week will determine whether or not they “level up” for next term. So there is lots of pressure and they do a practice test their first class of the week and then the real test the second class of the week. I hope they all do well and make me look good... er, make their parents proud…

So Sunday I went to Deoksugung Palace with Muang. More pictures on flickr, but some highlights include…

This guy's teeth! Twins?

Contrast between old and new Korea...

SO THIRSTY!!!

Oops....

I also bought some notebooks at the craft/office supply store downstairs and then took pictures of them for you. What’s so interesting about notebooks? Well they each say funny things in English. Now, I know that we in America have clothes or other items with foreign languages on them that often make little or no sense. Unfortunately, I don’t speak those other languages and cannot appreciate the humor. I do, however, have a pretty good grasp of the English language and found the following things pretty funny. I hope you do too.

So the English on this one isn't that strange, but still funny since almost all the coffee I've seen here is instant. And do you think that's a coffee farmer? Hm.

Personally, I like the milk pan (what?) and yes. I do English today. Do you?

Sometimes, I anxious too, but then I remember that fruit...

Ok, first of all, "indefatigably" is a real word (I looked it up) but, honestly? It probably has not been used by a native English speaker in over 100 years and just sounds ridiculous. And then, "STUDT"? Obviously, someone needs to take their own advice...

I’ll watch for more creative usage of the English language, but that’s all for now.

There are many other thoughts rolling around in my head right now (I guess I had more to say than I thought) but I will save them for another day. I hope you are all well.

God bless!