Hi June. Bye June.

June just sort of happened. When the weather is great and you have every weekend planned, the weeks just sort of mesh into one long day. 

JUNE 22 (Friday): TGIF! Friday will always be my favorite day of the week. Whether I'm the one learning or doing the educating, the weekend can never come soon enough. One Friday after classes, the teachers and staff gathered in the cafeteria to eat abalone and scallops(?) with watermelon and beverages. It sounds like an unappetizing combination and an unusual after school snack (Anyone heard of pizza?), but you can never go a day without seafood in Jeollanam-do. I don't know the retail price of abalone and scallops, but I'm pretty sure we casually feasted on hundreds of dollars worth of seafood as if this happens all the time. It was unbelievable. Abalone that big should be held in captivity. The abalone felt rubbery and hardly stretched from its pearly white shell. It also contained a salty, green sack. Not sure what it was, but it was gross. What was the other thing? Scallops? I don't know. I could only stomach 2 abalones and maybe 3 scallops before I lost my appetite. The watermelon, on the other hand, tasted juicy and sweet. I'm pretty sure I've had the best watermelon in Korea!

Plates upon plates of gigantic abalone with fresh chilis & garlic slices

What are those on the right? Scallops?

JUNE 28 (Thursday): "Am I the only one who works in this family?" I came home and dined on veggie burgers on garlic toasted buns with lettuce, tomato, cheese, sauteed onions, and tater tots. Ade and Joanne both had a day off, so they made themselves useful (partially kidding) and cooked dinner. The burgers were delicious, and the garlic toasted buns and cheese added a nice touch. Joanne and I were so stuffed after that ... but that didn't stop us from sharing a green tea patbingsu at Angel-In-Us Coffee afterwards. Then we were really stuffed.

Garlic toasted buns

Home-made veggie burger -- YUM! Thanks guys!

Green Tea Patbingsu @ Angel-In-Us Coffee

JUNE  30 (Saturday): Joanne, Nari, and I planned a surprise birthday party for our friend/coordinator, Joo. We created a private Facebook event and invited everyone from the province out for dinner and drinks in Mokpo. Dinner consisted of kamja tang (감자탕), potato stew with pork spine, vegetables, kimchi, and spices followed by green tea chiffon birthday cake. About 24 people attended our event, which was a decent number of people granted the torrential downpour and the distance that some people traveled. With the help of someone from my school, I managed to get a special message projected in the Mokpo Sea Fountain Show ... but due to the weather, the show was cancelled. The message was going to read, "Happy Bday Joo ♥" proceeded by a spoken message and accompanied by the song, "Hey Jude" by the Beatles. On our last day of Gwangju orientation, our group had sung "Hey Jude" as "Hey Joo." It was a cute gesture.

Taking turns decorating the cake

My art major skills making a difference in the world

Dinner is served

kamja tang (감자탕): potato stew with pork spine & vegetables

Cutting the cake

Joo, Nari, me, Joanne

Meanwhile, the weather has been crazy. Every day I see the thunderbolt and question mark and never know if it's going to rain. We don't see much of the sun anymore. It's just cloudy and humid all of the time.

Thunderbolt + Question Mark = Scattered Thunderstorms

Thunderbolts: All day, everyday ... maybe?

I ate this for dinner one night:
Spicy chicken with glass noodles

Did I mention the drastic increase in mosquito bites? Below is a picture of Joanne's left arm. Homegirl gets bitten a lot at night.

Better sleep with one eye open, homegirl.

One day I woke up with a swollen right knee. There was literally a flaming hot knee cap on top of my actual knee. This has been my worst bite so far.

So itchy!

Pretty flowers a-midst trash. Mokpo is so ghetto.

Little Samsoon, aka Vidal Sassoon, biting on my fingers.
She's grown up a lot since she moved out of the rabbit cage.

Food Poisoning & the Flu

Came down with the flu last Wednesday. Patiently sat through a dinner with the teachers/staff called a 회식 (hweshik). We ate at 전복 마을 (Abalone Village), a seaside restaurant located in Mokpo. If we had sat on the floor as we usually do, I think I would have died. I don't know how all these old people can sit on the floor for hours without collapsing from aching back or joint pain. I'm normally fidgeting and cringing by the end of the meal because the floor is so uncomfortable. Anyways, we sat in chairs this time and dined on various kinds of sea foods including abalone. I don't have any pictures of it, but it was sliced up nicely on a plate. The texture was chewy and crunchy, at times it was gritty like sand. It was gross, but other people seemed to enjoy it.

 

 

Happily filled with beer & soju, the teachers and staff wanted to go out for 노래방 (noraebang / karaoke) after dinner. I declined and got a ride home. I went once, and it was really awkward. They sing a bunch of Korean folk songs that sound sappy and dated. Not doing that again...

I didn't sleep well. My body ached, I had chills, and I had a splitting headache. I woke up feeling more sick, but went to school anyway. I had a slight 99^F fever, which the school nurse gave me medicine for. She kindly offered to take me to the hospital --in Korea, going to the hospital means getting a ~$5 miracle booster shot-- but I declined. 

Thursday night was worse. Another sleepless night and a bigger headache than before. There was no way that I was going to teach on Friday. I went to the nurses office, asked her to take me to the hospital, and laid down in the bed. We went to a hospital in 삼호 (Samho). No one spoke English. I tried to communicate my symptoms in broken Korean, while pointing at places on my body. They only took my temperature, which I already knew was 103-04^F. They didn't take my blood pressure. Didn't ask to look at my throat. Didn't listen to my breathing. Didn't give me a miracle booster shot. Just printed out a prescription, which we took to a nearby pharmacy. I took the bus home and stayed in bed for the next 3 days.

I put myself on this amazing thing called the bread and soup diet. I also took 3-4 different mystery pills 3x's per day for 3 days. After the first dose, my headache disappeared. It was a miracle.

 

 

I still have a cough and congestion, but it's manageable.

On Tuesday, I went out for dinner with Joanne and Nari at the Emart food court. Joanne and I ate 알밥 (rice topped with raw fish eggs). Never again. Both of us got food poisoning probably because the eggs or veggies weren't fresh. I woke up at 2:30AM feeling digestive discomfort. I experienced some temporary diarrhea and spewed the rest. Joanne wasn't so lucky with the vomiting. She had bowel issues for the next day or two. No bueno.

알밥 (albab)
Photo courtesy of Google Images