Aside from a few small foreign parties, Halloween isn’t really celebrated in Korea. And given my dislike for the foreign parties, I haven’t attended any. Thus, no Halloween pictures. Sorry fellas.
Life has recently consisted of presentations, class, and football. What this basically means is that aside from continuous updates on what is happening at football practice or what position I was in when I fell asleep in class, there isn’t too much to talk about. However, given it has been about a week since my last update there is enough to cover for this entry to be fairly interesting.
This week has seen my personal stress levels rise, as my American upbringing is finally starting to lead to culture clashes with the Europeans. In addition, due to football and me being me, I’ve been fairly tired and thus even more irritable. And to top everything off, I haven’t been hanging out with my Korean friends as much as I’d like, due to how busy I am and how busy they are. I think I’ve mentioned before that I really enjoy seeing my Korean friends and typically hang out with them more than the Europeans, so the shift over the past week I’m sure didn’t help the situation. Things are starting to return to normal, luckily, and now I’m seeing the Koreans more which makes me incredibly happy.
As far as school goes, the only really exciting thing, or at least could have been exciting, was a trip to the Korean Exchange (KRX). Unfortunately, KRX was pretty dull. We went to hear a conference on a variety of exchange topics, from oil to bacon, but they were dreadfully boring. The bacon talk was completely reading what was on the slides, with no extra explanation and not even a hint of passion. On top of that, after every sentence he would take a small break and allow a lady to translate into Korean. The next talk, which I left before, was on Japanese oil trade I believe, and I was told that the slides were in English, the presentation in Japanese, and the translation into Korean. I’m glad I missed it. We were also given a short tour of KRX, which is now basically empty as almost everything has been automated. The tour was the best part by far, but not what I was hoping for. It was basically a museum tour. There were no business men, nobody yelling or fighting for a better location, just smooth automated emptiness. My next field trip is to a prison in a city just north of Seoul, so hopefully that will be a little more exciting… but only a little. Perhaps enjoyable is a better word to use when referring to prisons…
Over the past week it has also become increasingly apparent that everyone is really adjusting to life here. A lot of the Europeans (shockingly in some cases) are getting Korean girlfriends or are dating other exchange students. People are starting to make their own travel plans just for the weekends. Of course, while everyone else now has a girlfriend, I’m still single. Still flirting, still meeting new people, but still single. On the other hand, my travel is increasing pretty rapidly. This weekend I’m going just outside Seoul for a thing called m.t. or membership training. It has nothing to do with any kind of training as far as I know. Rather, it is a chance for members of a club or group to spend the weekend getting to know each other better. I’m looking forward to it. The following weekend I will be traveling to Kyeong ju (although I’m sure I spelled it wrong), one of the old capital cities. A friend from one of my classes invited me and some other foreigners to go. It should be a good experience, especially going with a Korean. I’m also working on plans to go to the DMZ in the next few months.
On a different note, the weather has become markedly colder again after a brief warm spell. I’m very happy because now all the leaves are starting to change colors and everyday it’s becoming more beautiful. I can’t wait to get outside Seoul and into the mountains because at this point they should be really incredible.
I’ll try to give updates a little more regularly now that my presentations and midterms are over and I’m starting to become more active again. I think that I should have quite a bit to talk about over the next few weeks.
