School Birthday Party

This year was one of those dreaded years when I actually have to work on my birthday. Most of the time, it falls during the Thanksgiving holiday, so I get it off. It fell on Thanksgiving proper this year, but since I'm not in the US, it didn't matter. Anyway, I was determined not to work on my birthday, even if I had to go IN to work, so I promised all six of my Thursday classes that I would give them food and we wouldn't do any studying.

Here's the amazing lineup of food for my classes:

1:40: Buns that taste like waffles with butter and syrup from Rotiboy (the "son" of Papparoti, a popular bakery chain) and mango juice

2:30: Cake (brought in by one of the students) and pastries from Paris Baguette

3:20: I bought french fries from Lotteria, Korea's own fast food joint, and one kid surprised me with pizza and soda for the whole class, and another kid brought three bottles of soda herself.

4:10: Fried chicken from Homisil (I think that's the name) and soda

5:10: Pizza from Pizza Etang (it means Pizzaland) and soda. These bastard fifth graders (well, it was really just Jack) begged me for as many pizzas as possible, since the boys could eat two and the girls could eat two. Since Pizza Etang apparently gives a two-for-one deal, I figured I'd just get four and make them happy without killing my wallet too much. They only ate one and a half of the pizzas, so I ended up giving a whole pizza to another class after I gave a piece or two to all the other teachers and staff members.

8:20: More cake from Paris Baguette, plus some of the leftover pastries from earlier, and soda.

Man, I felt fat after that. And I'm pretty sure I spent a whole day's pay on all that food.

I was really surprised at how the kids stepped up to the event. I got almost as many birthday presents as I did Teachers' Day presents, and three kids brought in food and drink of their own to share with the class. It was quite nice. All my kids were so happy that we had a party, and all the kids in other classes were wicked pissed at their teachers for not having a party, too. They could smell the food.

Here are my second graders, Danny (cut off), Melanie, and Michelle putting the candles on my first cake, which Danny's mother bought:

The cake says Lotte Hotel, which is kind of a funny thing to put on a cake. It was probably quite pricey, though, given the grandeur of the company.

Here are my second, third, and fourth graders, Jessica, Sally, Ava, Jenny, and Lucy is in the front:

From the same class, Patrick, Major, and Joey:

This is what my desk looked like after three classes:

My third, fourth and fifth grader class, John, Pam, and Jun, watching the Simpsons:

Any and Bunny, from the same class:

After the Simpsons was over, the kids just played Nintendo DS, Jun against Bunny, and the others watched:

That's Lauren in the back, there (she's always late on Thursdays):

My fifth graders watching the Simpsons. They listened to a CD by Big Bang, a terrible Korean pop band, afterward. That's Na-huin, Amy, Nancy, Sung-sik, and Alex:

Jack and Ji-ung:

This is the cake I bought myself for my last class of the day. It says "Congratulations," and I thought about asking them to write in frosting below it "You're old," but I'm sure they don't do that here. I had to get a big cake because Leon's class meeting at the same time are also all my students, but they don't see me on Thursdays. They begged Leon to let them come, and he'd take any excuse to not have class, so they all joined us.

I must note, though, that after eating three of my own birthday cakes and at least a couple other cakes since I've been here, I have found Korean cakes very much wanting. I have yet to find any flavor in any of them, especially the chocolate ones. They all taste like air, and they're kind of mushy. I had a conversation about this with my coworkers (at my special Thanksgiving, more to come), and everyone else said they liked the light quality of Korean cakes. I guess I'm just too American, too much buttercream, sugar, and whatnot.

This is Tina, one of my newer students. She got transferred into one of my weekly classes last week because she bullied another girl too much. Then the girl she bullied got transferred into my class the day of the party. Ummm...

Wesley, hamming it up, with Eric laughing at him:

Sally (different Sally from the one above) and Hanna, getting ready to take my picture on their cell phones:

And here they are taking the pictures:

My second cake came with streamers in little cones with strings. A couple of my studens pulled them, and then I ended up wearing one in my hair, and yes, the earrings were a gift. I would never wear earrings like that without obligation.

Here's Cathy with the streamer before she gave it to me:


Cathy and Emily:

Back at home, here are all my gifts:

I got a scarf and mittens set, another scarf, two pairs of gloves, two pairs of earrings, a set of two embroidered handkerchiefs, some roses, three nice pens (two Parker pens), two pairs of socks, some doughnuts, two candy bars, some candy-covered chocolates, a bottle of handcream, and two jars of Dream Cacao chocolate, 56% and 72%.

Here are some closeups:

Here is the birthday ceremony for my last class, plus Leon and his class. I demanded they sing to me, but they didn't put up a fight. Wesley loves Abba, by the way:

Birthday

I got a surprise birthday party today. It was funny. Heather said she would take me out to lunch today, even though my birthday isn't for another two days. Apparently her husband's birthday is the same day as mine, so she's spending time with him Thursday before work, and she said today we would do the birthday lunch.

We went to this huge gourmet buffet restaurant, and as we stepped onto the elevator from the garage, I saw Grace, one of the Korean teachers in there. I was like, what the hell, why is Grace in the elevator? I almost said it was a small world (because in Korea, it really is), but then Heather pointed out that Leon was right behind me and I realized what was going on. Then I noticed Grace was carrying a cake. In retrospect, I noticed she had a really guilty look on her face when we got in the elevator. One of the other teachers, Sue, showed up once we were seated, too, so it was a nice little group.

The surprise was a little botched, since I wasn't supposed to see anyone until we actually sat down, but that's okay. I noticed Heather was stressing about time when we were driving to the restaurant. I thought it was because it was so late in the morning and we had to be at work soon, but I guess it was because we were late for our reservation. Grace said we were about ten minutes late when I asked in the elevator, but I guess we were all running behind or they'd have been at the table already.

Heather said on the way to the place that this restaurant had "one hundred foods," according to her friend, and I think she was right. And almost all the food came in individual tiny dishes, each of which was a little work of culinary art. The food was really good, but sometimes it seemed the art had become more important than the food. For example, there were little wedges of avocado in one dish, with a ball of shredded seafood salad and a pile of tiny cubes of pineapple, but the avocado was so tough, I wasn't even sure it was real. I was really excited about that avocado, too.

Before we ate, they showed me the blueberry cake they'd gotten me and sang to me and had me blow out candles. We didn't have time to eat it at the restaurant, though, as we had gotten there with only about an hour before we should have been to school (I was five minutes late to my first class, haha). Leon got me some cheese as a present, which was awesome. I bet he paid a pretty penny for it, too. Sue got me a scarf and mittens set that happen to be the same color as my armoire, my sheets, and my bathrobe, all of which match by total coincidence. I think sea foam green is my destiny.

Foreign Ugliness Nearly Scares Toddler to DEATH

On Sunday I was walking through a store and I saw a little two- or three-year-old girl. She was at a coffee shop in the store, and hanging on to a low-backed bench, looking out the back. As I often do with little kids, I made a funny face. All I did was widen my eyes. This startled her enough, somehow, to lose her balance, fall backwards onto the seat of the bench, then start to slide head-first, on her back, toward the floor. Luckily, her father was close enough and alert enough (although he'd had his back turned on her before, naughty, naughty) to grab her and flip her back to upright. I guess I should check the balance and stability of toddlers before I look at them around here anymore.

Amethyst Caves

After the wedding last weekend, Heather took Leon and I to the Amethyst Caves, which weren't too far from the wedding hall.

This is the outside of the caves, with waterfall. They turned the whole place into a small amusement park, which you can kind of tell from the picture:


Here are the mountains nearby the caves:



The carousel and the base of the mountains. It was pretty cloudy and foggy back there:

This is inside the caves:

This appears to be a tree growing within the rocks, but I'm not sure if it's real or artificial:

The caves had all sorts of lame science shit, like this evolution of man exhibit:

Apparently man evolves into a cell phone-toting advanced primate:


Here's another exhibit showing Korean miners. It's freaky:

A group of people on the boat tour, which we also took later:


Amethyst, I assume:

Amethyst scattered within the walls:

There was an Egyptian exhibit for some reason. It was so lame I didn't even bother taking pictures of it, except for this mummy:

There was a circus inside the caves for some reason. Here are some shots and videos of the teenaged gymnasts from China:

Here's a video of our boat tour (yes, the boat was spinning around in a circle a couple times):

The whole thing was kind of boring, but it was still nice to see. It's funny, when Heather pulled over and asked some old guy for directions, he kept saying to her, what do you want to go there for? There's nothing to see. He was sort of right, but the boat ride was cool.

Oh, yeah, and because we were going there right after the wedding, I had a chance to feel very Korean. I had worn high heels to the wedding, of course, and then went trekking around caves and rode an inflatable boat, which I thought I was going to pop. Wearing heels totally inappropriately is the sign of a real Korean woman.

A Korean Wedding

Last weekend I went to a Korean wedding. Kristen, one of the teachers at my school, was getting married. Now she has to move to Seoul where her husband's job has been transfered and become a housewife. She's not too keen on that.


The wedding was largely like a Western wedding, with a few obvious differences. The first thing I noticed was that people didn't bring gifts. I brought a gift, which was a surprise to Kristen, but everyone else was dropping off envelopes with money at the sign-in desk. Just like in the Godfather, but with no pillow cases. There was also no guest book to sign, and seemingly no souvenirs at all for the bride and groom, save the clothes and the rings.

My favorite difference was that Kristen entered the wedding hall to the Star Wars Theme. I got really excited for a second, but they only played about 30 seconds of it, so I couldn't get my video camera out in time to prove it was really happening.



There were also these sword chicks involved with the ceremony. They were dressed in little red uniforms and the bride and groom walked under their swords. Heather says that's not traditional--it's just the way this wedding hall operates. Usually the swords are part of military weddings.


The whole atmosphere was much less solemn and serious than at Western weddings. It was actually treated more like a show than a ceremony. There was actually an emcee at the front of the room, announcing over the speakers what was going on through every step of the wedding (I assume that's what he was saying, anyway). The guests were pretty casual, too. Although everyone was dressed to the nines, not all of them chose to sit down, but instead stood up at the back of the room and talked the whole time. I felt the steady din was quite rude, but I guess that's what they do here.


After they were married, there was a quiz, which I thought was pretty cool. Wasn't there some newlywed gameshow that tested couples' knowledge of each other? Maybe that's where they got the idea. They had big cards with answers gotten prior to the wedding, and they had to answer the questions. Actually, I think it may have been only Kristen who had to answer the questions. I don't recall ever hearing her husband speak. Maybe I just wasn't paying attention...

Here is the wedding hall with the groom at the front, talking to one of the sword chicks:

These flower towers are an obligatory fixture at Korean weddings and other events. I see them all the time:

Here is Leon and I with Kristen before the ceremony. I read about a Korean superstition that if a bride smiles at the wedding, the first child is supposed to be a girl. I was curious to see if she put any stock in it, but I guess not.

Here are Kristen, some kid, and her primper:

This is the beginning of the ceremony, when the sword chicks escort the mothers to the altar to light candles:

The bride's procession with her father:

This is when the bride and groom first meet and bow to each other:





These are from the ring ceremony:

I took this from the back row, so my focus is off from the zooming, but here are Kristen and her husband after they were pronounced married:

Here is the cake cutting ceremony. I don't know what happens to the cake, because we sure as hell didn't get to eat it. Heather said only the top part of the cake is real. I did notice that some people were tipping the table at a 45 degree angle with the cake still on it before the ceremony began.

Here they are walking back up the aisle after everything was over, and that was the last we saw of them.

Korean weddings don't have a reception like ours do. They generally include a buffet for the guests, but the bride and groom leave for their honeymoon, or for home, immediately after the wedding. The wedding hall had a restaurant a floor above, where the buffet was served. Some people ate, some people went home. The only traditionally required food at a wedding, I've read, is noodle soup. There is a saying which goes, "When are we going to eat noodles?" It's a way of asking when someone is going to get married.

I think it's ironic that there's no reception after, and the whole ceremony seemed kind of isolated, with people just talking amongst themselves and not necessarily paying attention to the wedding. It seems antithetical to the whole community/family-oriented culture.