So, I got a text message...

So, I got a text message today from my "bank". The message is as follows:

"HELLO THIS IS BUSAN BANK. I WANT TO MAKE SURE UR A/C NUMBER CUZ OPPOSITE BANK REPLY THAT UR A/C NUMBER IS WRONG. PLZ CALL THIS NUMBER"

Just like that. All caps, and texting-speech preserved for your viewing pleasure. To be sure, this was a very important text! There seems to be an issue with my banking information and they want to know my A/C number. I replied in kind:

"YOU CAN BE TO HAS A/C!!1 IS TO ISN'T NOT A WHIZEN A/C. NUMBER ARE 1. PUSAN BANK PLZ TO HAVE AIR CONDITIONING!"

Now that my air conditioning number has been cleared up... "Also, if you want to make a good spamming text from a BANK, turn off caps-lock and use full words. Seriously... are you 12 or something? Don't call me again."

I have yet to hear a reply, but I can only assume that my Whisen air conditioning unit quantity has been received and verified by my local branch. Close one, right?? I hope my pay gets through!

...Idiots...

-Garrett

***UPDATE***

Well, I feel like Asshole of the Year! Apparently, that actually WAS my bank informing me that there was an issue with my recent bank transfer to TD Bank. Whoops... Well, the issue has since been resolved and the guy understood my confusion (after I apologized a few times... in PERSON). But seriously, what bank asks for details like that via frigging TEXT MESSAGE?!

Needles in My Feet

Another fun (I use the term loosely) experience was our first real korean acupuncture.
After much time spent looking for a place that had good reviews, or at least some sort of review so we could be certain it was a sketchy hell-hole we set out on an adventure. We heard of an English-speaking one down by the beach, and we just took off.
Surprise surprise, an hour of searching only to discover it was gone.
We begin walking home very very disappointed.
My knees are still a wreck, and Garrett's back was a huge knot.
Then, we realized, hey--
that sign says "하니ㅘㄴ (haniwon), meaning oriental clinic. That was enough for us, so we went in. After miming things to the secretary we saw the doctor, who, surprise surprise, had decent English. Turns out he specialized in feet and posture.

He took our foot prints and sat us down.
Looking at my foot print, he just says "ooh, many problems. This goes to your knees." (points to my foot and compares to an image on screen).
The guy was definitely trying to sell us on these 300,000\ insoles, but, other than that, he was great!

Then, the needles. Again, Garrett held my hand. I wasn't too scared, but, to my surprise, it hurt like a bitch. The needles were all in my feet. On nerves, almost poking my bones. I was pretty miserable. They chuckled as Garrett told me stories to calm me down, but the nurse had to stop herself from laughing out loud when I just started chanting "I love muffins. Think about muffins. chocolate chips."
Garrett was also in pain, but took it like a man.
In the end, I ran out vowing never to go back--which is a shame, because it worked great! The knots moved out of my knee the next day. They were in my quad, and my calf (but that's better! There they can be stretched out), but not my knees!!

And, it was only 6,000\ each! I would do it again if I wasn't a wuss..

Will you take my apples??

So, the other day (as in way back in December), I had a weird experience. I was teaching the 5th graders by myself as my co-teacher, 혀나 (Hyuna), was speaking exams in the hallway.

To review, we were playing a game. ESL in korea is mostly powerpoint games, no matter where you are. Me and Garrett try to do more exciting things, but sometimes you are specifically asked to play a stupid, waste-of-everytime's-time PPT game.
So, that is what I did.

Blah, blah, blah, we play this game, and at the end of class, the winning group comes to collect their candy (another requirement in Korean ESL. I, again, was required to hand out candy no matter how poorly they behave, or any other stipulation.)

Candy, candy, candy. Then, one particularly annoying student decides to stick his hand in the jar and pull out as many as he can. Now, I really do love my job, but this is one of my 5 or so students that are absolute terrors. He has a habit of sticking his hand in the candy jar and running away. Needless to say, I was not impressed. As I'm explaining to him that his behaviour is unacceptable, and there's no way he's getting candy after that, I see this poor girl who had been waiting patiently for a good 3 minutes I handed her a piece of victory candy.

Loud kid isn't paying attention, knocks her; she knocks over 혀나's coffee mug and annihilates every paper on the desk.
Annoying kid sulks away; girl freaks out and helps clean the mess up.





Here's the weird part. Next day, I come in to find an apple on my desk with a note (in korean). I think, oh, sweet, I have a brown-noser. 혀나 explains that the apple is from the girl the day before. In korean, the words "apology" and "apple" are the same, so by asking "내 사과를 받아 줄래?" you are asking for someone to accept both your apology and apple. It's a pretty nifty symbol that not only gets the point across but gets you a snack.
sweet!

12 Days of Christmas

I thought I would let everyone know how our boring Christmas is going via a traditional Christmas carol. Even though I hate that song. I'll do this quickly.



On the 12th day of Christmas, Korea gave to us:  
12 fellow coteachers


an 11-stop ride to Kyungsung University --->



10 Paid Vacation Days! (Hello sleep <3)



9 Homey Flavors

8  Chopsticks

7 Coffee shops ( in a one-block radius)

6 Paper Snowflakes











5 Cellphones!

4,000₩ dinners (4$)




3 Christmas Presents














                          2 Crappy Laptops







and Garrett with our Black LoveChild! (Surprise! It's a Xbox. Only slightly used)

So, Christmas in Korea is apparently very unexciting. People really couldn't care less. I popped over to the store to buy more wine for our party, and there were plenty of disinterested people wandering the aisles as though it were any other day. Instead of buying a tree or anything over the top, we settled for 5$ worth of construction paper. It worked out pretty well.

 

While our Christmas is over, yours may still be going on for a while longer.

So,

Merry Christmas! <3 <3 

 

N.B. The girl that took this picture was SO pissed at us, because we refused to take a cutesy smiling coupley photo. I think we got a way better one in the end. However, apparently Garrett makes a model than me. Not fair. I'm the one that watched America's Next Top Model, I should know my shit.

Our Intro to the Korean Medical System

Christmas Greetings, one and all! Isn't this a great time of year? All of the festive lights, the singing choirs, the spending upon spending upon spending? Hannah and I couldn't help ourselves and got two early Christmas presents for us: the first was a 4GB XBox 360 with two controllers, Halo 3, and The Orange Box (Portal, Half Life 2, and Team Fortress 2); the second was a rather festive winter cold.

Now, of the two of us, Hannah is usually the one who gets sick the most; however, this time I was the cause. I am not sure where I got it from (students, teachers, being in Korea, the communal water cup at the gym...) but I got a rather intense sore throat that kept me from sleeping and almost kept me from drinking water! A few days later, when the symptoms began to subside, Hannah contracted an infection herself! Nothing says "I love you" like sharing a disease!

Currently, Hannah is on the mend after being sick for about 4 days, but I have been sick for about 9 days at the time of writing and, whereas my sore throat has pretty much gone away, I was showing some rather worrisome symptoms that got me in a bit of a panic. Such symptoms include fatigue, dizziness, congestion, coughing up thick, brown phlegm, loss of sleep, and a series of fevers and chills the previous night. It reminded me an awful lot of my rather nasty bout with pneumonia in March and I wanted to make sure I didn't have a repeat of that. Upon Hannah's insistence, I begrudgingly took a day off work and went to the clinic for a prescription.

My guardian coteacher, Eun Jin, took me down to a clinic nearby in Jangsan. I expected to sit there blankly for the next 3-4 hours, as is usual in Canada, but had barely sat down before my name was called! We walked (I shuffled) to the doctor's office and entered. I was not in the doctor's office more than 5 minutes as he checked my vitals and Eun Jin translated my symptoms to him. He gave me a prescription with some mild antibiotics and tylenol and sent me on my way. Now, though Korea does not have a nationalized healthcare system, it was remarkably inexpensive: 3800 won (about 3.25$CDN)! The pharmacy downstairs filled my prescription for two days for the same price. In all, the visit plus drugs cost me 7600 won (about 7$CDN). I was in and out in under 20 minutes.

Likewise, Hannah has been going to visit a doctor a few times because she has been experiencing a great amount of pain in her knees. The first day she arrived, she saw a doctor in under 7 minutes, got a diagnosis (tendonitis), and was hooked up to some sort of localized electroshock treatment immediately afterward. She visited three times so far and each visit cost her something like 7000 won. She still plans on seeking acupuncture therapy as the problem remains (though the treatment did help in the short term, she reported).

Hannah showed me an amazing site a little while ago called "KikinitinKorea" and, while I have no idea what the name means, it has a number of funny-but-true observations about living abroad. Their post on going to see a doctor really does sum up this post beautifully:  http://kikinitinkorea.tumblr.com/post/23290832389/going-to-the-doctor

With luck we should both be better by the end of the weekend! We do not have a whole lot planned, but that's probably for the best. And, though I hate to admit it (much less publically on this blog), my next post will most likely be about going to the post office since... well... I haven't sent off my Christmas package yet to home. I mean, I got everything together last weekend... but I'm just scared! Let's see how much expedited international shipping is :S...

-Garrett

And now for something festive...

So, Hannah and I were walking in the Kyungsung University area looking for an XBox room and, as we passed by a cell phone store, we heard an oddly familiar song. It's a very popular Justin Timberlake Christmas song from a few years ago. I wonder if you know it...?

Season's "greetings"!

-Garrett and Hannah

Gamcheon Culture Village

Greetings!

This was an eventful weekend. Not only did Hannah and I get our fancy, schmancy new winter coats, but we also did something I've been wanting to do for some time: go to the Gamcheon Culture Village (which I call the "Gamcheon Artisan Village").

I will explain: during the Korean war the South Korean and UN troops were losing the battle to the North Korean forces and were ultimately pinned down to one last stronghold: Busan. During this time, many of the refugees were forced into living in makeshift shanty towns in the hillside. These shanties were very small (maybe 10x10 feet), made of cold concrete, and very densely packed into the mountain. One of these impoverished towns was Gamcheon. However, as we all know, the South was able to win a few decisive battles and gain the upper hand. Hence, the refugees were now able to leave the shanty towns and rebuild their countries. Now, up until the 1980's, many people (most being elderly) remained in these shanties to eek out a modest, but impoverished existence. However, efforts were made by artists (and the government) to remodel and refurbish these shanty towns into artistic meccas. And so, whereas few people now live in these homes, many have been transformed into studios and galleries. Even the streets have been made into a bit of a "living museum" with bright colours and tasteful graffiti painting the drab houses. Today, many of these former shanty towns are very popular tourist destinations among foreigners and Koreans alike.

Now, we had a very difficult time trying to find directions to the place. Hannah pointed out to me that I should put the info out there for other struggling waygookin trying to find the place... and so I will comply. We first took the subway (orange line) to Toseong Station (one past Jagalchi) and exited through Exit 6. After exiting, we took our first right up the hill, past the Pusan National University Hospital and climbed for about 2-3 minutes until we reached a bus stop by the hospital entrance.  We took bus #2 (one of the small ones with 12 seats inside) up the hill to the very top and exited to the left side of the street. It is very obvious where the entrance to the village is since there is a sudden abundance of colourful statues and murals on the buildings. Apparently bus #2-2 goes the same way as well. Bear in mind that the bus will take you to the top of the village, if that's any indication of when you should stop. I figure it's about 4-5 stops up from the hospital.

Near the entrance of Gamcheon Village

If you see these creepy Bhudda-faced pigeons greeting you from atop the buildings, you know that you are in the right place.

Seriously... what the hell?! It's the stuff nightmares are made of!

 As you continue walking along the main road, you will come across a large fish on the wall made of smaller, wooden fish...

Your adorable and drop-dead handsome tour guide, at your service, in front of said fish(es).

...and across the street from the head of the fish is a very hidden-away building where you can buy some artworks and maps of the village.

It is in the ground. Seriously. The roof and sign are just a head higher than street level.

Inside, for the price of 1000KRW, you can get a high-quality map of the village. As a bonus, you can do somewhat of a "scavenger hunt" around the village where you visit 8 locations in the village and stamp your map accordingly to indicate that you were at the specified place. If you get them all, you can collect a couple of free post cards, so I have read.

Sadly, your dashing and sexy tour guide did not get all of the stamps. 7/8 is still a fail :(

So, there you have it. Probably the most visual and specific guide to getting to Gamcheon Village you will find written in English on the internet. Actually, I'm pretty certain of this. It is bloody hard to find directions aside from "get a cab and shove your smartphone in his face."

ANYWAY, once you are there and walking about, the place is otherworldly when compared to the chaos of Nampo and the general Busan downtown. For one, it is quiet. For another, it is older than 50 years. For one more, it is positively quirky in sharp contrast to the "same-ness" of all of the identical tombstone-like rows of officetels and apartment buildings throughout the city.

As I previously mentioned, there is a fair amount of tasteful graffiti adorning the walls, which adds to the quirk-factor.

Boys playing hide-and-seek.

A fragmented Korean poem about nostalgia hangs, like a cloud, over the street corner.

Many of the areas are broad enough to fit two cars, but many are quite tight (as in the buildings are literally shoulder-width apart!).

I do not mess around with the word "literal"!

It is very easy to get lost in this city as there are many walkways of various widths to trek across. However, helpfully enough, there are friendly-looking arrows and fish guiding your way along the path. Some examples below:

(Author's note: the fish heads are intended to point in the direction you are meant to go.)

I love this "tree"! I regret not taking my photo beside it.

Some of the former homes have been hollowed out into exhibitions:

The cow-like fuzzy things seem to be from a Dr. Seuss book of some sort in "At Home" house.

Likewise, the "heels-over-head" thing going on at "Peace House" seems like something from a children's book.

Ultimately, we spent about 2 hours wandering the streets of the village. After a while, I became less interested in the art and more interested in the people living here. I think it is very easy to forget (and very seldom discussed) that people do, in fact, live here!

Here, an elderly woman tends to her plants as we pass by.

Drying laundry, oddly enough, was oddly photogenic among the concrete slabs... perhaps because it seemed out-of-place in the "living museum".

Whereas most of the residents ignored us and went about their business, at least one was particularly friendly!

For some reason, the little bugger REALLY liked me and kept sitting by my feet. It would have been too easy to take him home with us!

Little guy jumped right on my lap as I crouched to take a photo!

I definitely recommend going here for an afternoon or (ideally) late-morning excursion.

One last funny thing, while Hannah and I sipped on some rose hip tea at a cafe, our travel companions were pinned down by a TV crew for an impromptu interview!

The fellow in the middle is NOT a 6'4 Korean, but Julian. Poor bugger was there for 10 minutes!

Though it would have made for a very interesting end to an interesting day, I am quite thankful that I was not up there with them at that moment! I HATE cameras!

-Garrett