Korea Life Blog - Don Cass


Here's a mouth-watering photo of my dinner in Gangnam, Seoul yesterday, don cass. It's a Japanese-style fried pork cutlet. It usually comes with some cabbage salad, dipping sauces, skimpy portions of rice, kimchi, and beets, and a small hot bowl of U-dong (pronouced oo-dong, but i think the u-dong spelling is much funnier). This particular restaurant also serves a cup of some sort of strange tofu/egg cream (behind the rice). The meal is not bad at 6,000 won, or about $5.25, but typically after eating Japanese food, I'm hungry not long later. I've eaten more Korean style don cass dinners with strange flat chunks of "pork cutlet" and much bigger portions of rice and kimchi. That style is also usually cheaper but not as delicious, in my opinion.



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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - Interior Designer



Here it is, the lone decoration on my wall. A stunning photo of cows. I got this out of a Pink Floyd bootleg disk of Atom Heart Mother live. I think the absence of other decorations makes the presence of the cows seem more powerful.


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - A 6-Pack of OB

It's hard to find a good old-fashion 6-pack of beer in Korea. Almost always bottles and cans are sold individually. A regular can of beer costs about 1,500 Won in the store, or about $1.30. That's not cheap, and the beer is crappy American style - like Budweiser. I really don't know why people buy cans at that price. The large bottles of beer, close to an American 40 ouncer in size, are only about 1,800 Won. Anyway I was surprised to see the store near my home is now carrying six-packs.



Here it is, a 6-pack of Korean made OB. I thought it might be cheap, but it cost me a whopping 7,800 Won, just about $6.50! What a ripoff! Oh well, it's been a long time since I had a 6-pack.



The packaging is nice. The cardboard angles to keep the cans intact and works quite well. I can't stand the plastic thing on US 6-packs - you have to tug and jerk the cans out from it, sometimes causing a few to fall on the floor. If you don't know what packaging I mean, look here: 6-pack pic with plastic thingy.

This peculiar slogan appears on each can: "Timeless enduring heritage, craftsmanship, and new rice addition delivers refreshing smoothness and clean aftertaste, making OB the most drinkable beer."

Leave it to the asians to put rice in their beer, I thought, half expecting to see real rice in it as in some sweet drinks they sell here. There wasn't any, of course. They must use it like they do in making rice wines, I supposed. Still curious, I did a little research and, wow! - check out this article: Beer Adjuncts
That's right, rice is used in making most American light colored beers including Budweiser. Another, day, another amazing discovery brought to you by Korea Life Blog.



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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - Chuseok

I'm not sure if the PC room will be open for the next few days, so I've done a few updates for you ahead of time. It's the Korean Thanksgiving Holiday, Chuseok. I'd better stock up on Ramyon noodles and water, as pretty much everything is closed in Korea on the actually day of Chuseok, which is Thursday. As we speak, millions of ajumas are cooking and cleaning in preperation for the family get-togethers (while their husbands drink soju and watch TV.) I'm not exactly sure the entire history of the holiday. All I know is that families eat a lot of food and visit their ancestors' graves. They even set out traditional foods and soju on the graves for their departed ancestors to enjoy. As for me, Chesouk means I have the rest of the week off from work!

Friday and Saturday I'm supposed to go to Duk Juk Do, an island off an hour off the west coast by ship. I really wanted to go to Geoje-do again to get a load of pictures, but it's just too far and holiday traffic is a nightmare, and it's virtually impossible to get train or bus tickets unless you reserve them far in advance. I'm not sure if we'll get to the island though. There's a typhoon warning for Friday, by my wonderful luck, but typhoons usually only affect the south, specifically Cheju-do.


My boss gave me this touching gift set, perhaps a subtle hint of some kind. There's some generic tooth pastes, toothbruses, soap, and some sort of body wash and shampoo called Rice Day? Gift sets like this are customary this time of year. Last year in Ulsan, my boss gave me a pair of socks and an imitation belt that broke a few weeks later. Life's getting better, slowly but surely.


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - In My Apartment

After taking a few shots of Plantman and Plantwoman, I took a couple more pics around the pad.


I have no place to put my clothes other than a tiny cabinet, so they are perpetually hanging on this rack/makeshift dresser. They hardly ever dry anyway as it's been rainy and humid for ages. Notice all my professional attire. You can never overdress as an ESL teacher in Korea. How about those cool socks? Believe it or not, down the street from my home, there's a guy who sells socks out of the back of his truck all day long (gotta get a picture of that for you). One pair costs 1,000 won, or about 80 cents.



Here's my desk. Aha! There's the proof. I really do keep toilet paper on my desk now! There's also where I keep my deoderant, of course, and my bottle of mosquito itch reliever. Someday I have a dream that a new computer will sit there. (total donations to date: 60 cents, thanks Carmen!)

Notice how creative I am - with only a lone picture of some cows on my wall, I hung up some small windchimes I bought in the Philippines on the heat and hot water controls...sometimes I point my fan straight at them, sit back and relax, and enjoy for hours the peaceful, rhythmitic tones...(while day dreaming of a better day, a better life, more money and a "movie star aura" that should be a little better than this).


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - Plantman and Plantwoman (2)



Plantman and Plantwoman are doing just fine. They've grown quite a bit, especially Plantwoman, and have remained mostly healthy. I hope they don't get too much bigger as I will have to transplant them into bigger pots and I have no idea how to go about something so complicated...


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Korea Life Blog - The Korean English Teachers' Lessons (1) - Prank Calls are Bad

I get frustrated on a daily basis when I ask my students the most basic of questions, such as, "How was your day?" (usual response is "I'm fine, thank you, and you?") or "What did you eat for lunch?" (usual response is "ehhh!?") As is usual in Korea, the students know a decent amount of vocabulary, but it's still impossible to have even a simple conversation. Since I only teach each class once a week, I can't hold myself responsible, naturally. Therefore, I have decided to ocassionally look into what the Korean teachers are teaching.


A page from the story book, Prank Calls are Bad, which the Korean teacher's at my school were forced to teach last week. (All of these stories books, full of random vocabulary and pointless topics, are made by the company that owns our Hagwon and the students' parents are forced to buy them - a pretty good business idea considering there's a whopping 597 franchises.) This scene comes after the boy's mother found out her son made a prank call to the police and left the phone off the hook so that grandfather couldn't get a hold of her. I guess the lesson is if you make prank phone calls, your mother will make you sit on your knees with your hands in the air while beating you senseless. After reading the books, the students wrote a book report. Almost every student wrote: "Prank calls are bad. Prank calls are very bad. Prank calls are very very bad. I like book. Book good. Book very very good." On a side note, I've noticed that in almost every book, the Korean kids are being beat by their parents, made fun of by other kids, and always seem to have snot running out of their noses....hmm...


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - English Village

According to a recent Hong Kong based study, Koreans (surprise) are found to be least capable in spoken English ability among their counterparts in 12 Asian countries, including Malaysia, Vietnam and Japan. This comes despite the fact that Koreans spent $4.6 billion last year overseas education.

This study was pointed out in an article in theKorea Herald today discussing the creation of an "English Village" in Paju, a border city in Gyeong-gi privince, northwest of Seoul.


Cited as the first of its kind in Korea, the experimental village project aims to create an authentic Western setting with all its buildings, amenities and even daily necessities in Western styles and designs.

"It will be a self-sufficient community where participants are required to speak English when in class, engaged in sports activities, or buying necessities," Lee explained. "Without leaving the country, the kids will feel like they are in a foreign country," said Lee Moo-kwang, managing director of the Gyeonggi English Culture Foundation in a recent interview with The Korea Herald...

In this regard, the foundation is seeking to attract overseas branches of teachers of English to speakers of other languages divisions, affiliated with top universities in the United States and elsewhere, in a win-win strategy for the TESOL candidates as well as Korean students.



Often big projects like this for improving English are announced but then are never heard about again. (Whatever happened to that plan announced last year to hire several foreigners for every school in the country at 3,000,000 Won/month and nice new single apartments?) However, if this is true, I can't wait until 2006 when the project is scheduled to be completed to see what exactly this "English Village" looks like (with all of it's western buildings, amenities, and even daily necessities!?) Perhaps, having a degree in English education but no TESOL certificate, and certainly not affiliated with any top university in the US, I can get a job at the local Burger King taking orders in English with all a regular native teacher's pay and benfits!

I just wonder what will happen if a student is unable to speak English well enough to buy toilet paper at the local Walmart. And I'm curious as to how western necessities differ from Korean necessities. Does that mean my drinking water will come out of a tap instead of a bottle? Will pencils have erasers on the end? Will eggs be white instead of brown? Will there be a proper place to put my garbage? Don't tell me I can't buy kimchi?!

Anyone have any comments about this magical English Village?


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - At the Hagwon (2)

This week I taught the kids sports names. (My job is really easy because I only teach each class one time in a week. Therefore, I only have to make-up one lesson for the whole week.) After writing the words on the board and enacting the sports and having the kids repeat, I have the kids do a word search to get them more familiar with the spellings (not so that I can sit down and read the newspaper and write in my journal or walk around tickling the kids...)Then I have them fold their papers into squares and write a sports name in each square, then they spend the rest of class drawing. This kills the time while keeping the little monsters quiet enough for me to do whatever, and I just love the little pictures they draw.


A typical example. I dig the basketball drawing, expecially the expression on the shooters face, and also the spectators faces. The boxing one is pretty good too. I don't think Korean kids know what real wrestling is. They always draw WWF. It's extremely popular here, unfortuantely. (How many times do I have to be called Shawn Michael?)


Not the best artist, but cute nonetheless. This kid finished too fast so I had him color. He finished coloring too fast so I had him write the sports names 3xs in his notebook. He finished that too fast so I had him clean the room and erase the board. After that I made him do pushups. You'd think after this routine, he'd learn to slow down in the future, but of course not- there's one like him is every class, inevetibly.


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - Apartment Madnesss in Nowhere-dong

I live in a small country town, for the time being. Even here, in the middle of nowhere, new apartment complexes are constantly under construction. I can't believe this many people actually live here, but perhaps apartments are much cheaper here and the people are commuting to Suwon, which is not far away.



They slapped this "Samsung Town" together within several months. Han Shin Apartments, where most of my students live, loom in the background.



This is a massive bunch of apartments being built just next to Han Shin Apartments. Now there's pretty much no scenery left to look at in this little country town, only apartments, a main road, and a string of usual businesses housed in plain, flat concrete buildings.


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written by shawn matthews   -|link

Korea Life Blog - Sam Gyeop Sal


I ate sam gyeop sal with my coworkers last week and snapped this mouth watering picture. I just love everything about this meal, from cooking everything up yourself, to mixing it together in leaves and eating. My favorite method is to take a big lettuce leave and then put one of the green leaves on it. Then on that, place a piece of feshly cooked meat, a little onion, a piece of garlic (cooked or uncooked) a little of the salty sam gyeop sal sauce and then a piece of fried up kimchi and maybe a little rice. Then roll it up and stuff the whole thing in your mouth, chew for several minutes, moaning in delight, then wash it down with a swig of beer or soju. Yum! The only thing I don't like about the meal is smelling like dinner for the rest of the night. The smoke envelopes you as you cook. Some reastaurants have incorporated the use of suction fans that come down above the grill and whisk away the smoke, but, while these help, you still end up with hungry cats following you home.


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written by shawn matthews   -|link