I renewed my contract

Today is November 1st, my birthday month and the start of my 11th month in Seoul. About a week ago I signed a 7 month renewal contract so I'm employed through August 3, 2011. I was a little worried that they weren't going to offer me an extention so I'm very happy and relieved right now.
It's getting colder but the weather hasn't fully committed to winter cold yet, we'll have a couple days of freezing cold (by California standards) and then a couple days of sun and warmth. This past weekend was Halloween and I had a really nice time. Since Halloween fell on a Sunday I had three days worth of cosutme options and I've always been kean on making my own costume and this year was no exception.
On Thursday night I went to a Halloween party in Gangnam and it was really fun. I made a Guiness bottle costume, I worked on the label for over an hour and I was pretty proud of the result. It got a bit crushed after a night of dancing but I did get some pictures of my masterpiece beforehand!
On Friday my company encouraged the employees to dress up because in Korea people don't really celebrate Halloween. I was a soju bottle (the National drink) and it was really easy to make (green shirt + handmade soju label) much less detail than the Guiness label. My students all laughed and were really curious about the Halloween mumbo jumbo. "What do adults do on Halloween??" "Well... they dress up in costumes and drink alcohol."
Saturday I went on a solo hike up the nearest mountain Ansan, it's behind the University Yonsei which is a hop, skip and a jump away from my house. I downloaded a couple podcasts and went on a three hour hike/walk and it was really nice. The weather was perfect and the mountain wasn't very crowded, which can be a problem on the mountains here. I took a couple pictures, but my camera has the unique talent of taking ANY picturesque sight and making it look lame, so I probably wont post any of them.
Saturday night my friend Julia and I went as ninja turtles along with a Waldo, a Woody and a lumberjack. We went to Itaewon and stayed most of the night at a westerner bar called Dillingers. My favorite costume was a guy dressed as Sailor Venus from Sailor Moon. His skirt was so short and I'm chuckling right now just thinking about it.
High light of the night: Julia and I were talking to the bar tender/ DJ and he told us to come behind the bar to show us something and as soon as we walked behind it, the bar owner announced (with a microphone!) that they were having a costume contest and th ninja turtles were in it! Um... I'm not a big spot light person and we both froze for a second. There were a lot of people there! Some how Julia and I didn't run away and we actually won second place. Unfortunately Brave Heart's costume was too good. I'm glad we did it, even if we did get tricked into participating.
I hope everyone else had a good Halloween too!

Monday Update

Hey everyone. I'm sitting in my office wearing my outdoor coat because there is an uncomfortable draft coming through the closed windows. Brr. October has been an interesting month weather-wise, its rained and shined and the temperature has dropped drastically. Last night I went for a walk with a friend and my sweatshirt, scarf and long pants still left me feeling colder than I would have liked.
Exciting news: My boss has agreed to let me sign for an additional seven months, so my contract can go until early August of 2011. I'm really thrilled because I'm not ready to leave Seoul yet, I have a job, good friends and a comfortable life here and January is just too soon to leave.
I got to talk to my mom and Eva for the first time in months last week. Both of them are doing well. Eva's in Denmark and living a good life, she was approved for her Danish citizenship and she's been taking intensive Danish classes for the past couple months. I really want to go visit her there when I'm done teaching.
I had my second photo shoot yesterday. It was really fun. I like Robin, the photographer, he's fun to work with. The only strange part of the shoot was that the studio booked another group to start exactly when we were scheduled to finish, with no time in between. As we're finishing the final shoot, which required the most dramatic makeup, the next group just bursts in, and it was so awkward. I'm trying to ignore a group of people walking around us, so rude. Who does that? Robin said the pictures should be ready soon so I'll upload some.

사랑니 (Love Teeth)

Two posts in one day, impressive I know. This was just too sweet to forget: I just had class with one of my students, he's a senior in university and he's getting ready to go abroad to the US for a year. He needs to get his wisdom teeth removed before he leaves, so we were talking about the dentist and the different names for different proceedures. I told him he needed his wisdom teeth removed.
Student: We called them 사랑니 SaRangNa.
Me: SaRang means love right?
Student: Yes, they are called Love Teeth.
Me: Why are they called Love Teeth?
Student: Because you are old enough to be in love when you them.
I thought that was pretty cute and wanted to share it.

Hey Again

The summer has come and gone and I didn't make any time for my blog, sorry about that. I'm turning into a white stereotype I guess. The other day I was in a book store, looking for some new reading material, when I came across the book "Stuff White People Like". I picked it up and after too many of the items on the list applied to me I put the book down, I ain't no stereotype. mutter mutter. One of the items said: Starting a Blog and Never Updating it. Gah. So to prove that list wrong, here I go.
I got a new office at work and it's definitely an upgrade. More space. More windows. 3ftx4ft World Map over my computer? Holla. I really like the map and it gives my daydreaming mind even more inspiration to imagine my extensive post-Korea travels.
It's starting to get a bit nippy outside, I pulled my jacket out of the closet and it's been a constant companion this week. I'm not ready for Korean winter again. It was so cold last year.
This upcoming weekend should be exciting, there is a free local music festival in Seoul on Saturday followed by a fireworks show and then on Sunday my Canadian friends want to have a Canadian Thanksgiving dinner. It'll give me some good blogging material (hopefully).
I'm doing well and I hope all of you are as well :)

You haven't REALLY lived in Seoul until strangers yell at you on the street

Like I mentioned before the Spring never happened and we are already rapidly plunging into Summer and its heat and humidity. The sudden weather change has left me in a dilemma of what to wear. I've been happily wearing dresses with tights, but now with the high temps and humidity ratios, tights are not a pleasant option but neither is getting stared at for not wearing them.
The other day I bought a couple of dresses at one of the underground malls, these places are awesome in the sense that I can buy three dresses and a cardigan for $35, but less than ideal when there are no dressing rooms. I've gotten pretty accurate at holding the dress up to myself and judging the length appropriateness but not always. One of the dresses was... a little short when I tried it on at home...but it was at an inappr-pro debateable length. It's not THAT short... errrr?
This morning I woke up to a coffeeless house and I couldn't quite think straight as I retried my outfit. I studied the dress in the mirror... maybe if I wear the cardigan with it! Tights? No tights? No tights got me down one flight of stairs until I felt like I was walking around without pants on and I ran back up to my studio.
I took the train to work and I was walking through the station feeling uncomfortably aware of myself, why was she looking at me? Is it because of the dress length (*Note to people back home: the average dress length in Korea is super super short compared to back home) Then a crazy ranting man that was waving an empty soda bottle in the air started directing his indiscriminate shouting at me, in Korean so I didn't know what he was saying. A;; I heard was "happa" or what I had thought was "heffer".
I asked one of the Korean tutors at work, "what does heffer, or haffa mean in Korea?"
Korean tutor, "not haffa, happa. it means "you're easy".."
Well I guess that answers the question about my dress being inappropriate.

MAY!!!

I woke up today in a suspiciously good mood (has someone been putting something in my morning coffee?) the sun was shining, I enjoyed the company of a student who is usually good at monotonistic attempts to lull me to sleep, and I had another really good conversation with a student about the current North-South issue at hand.
A friend from back home recommended a podcast called "Risk" to me, and I've been listening to it nonstop for the last week. So obsessively have I been listening that I've gone through the entire series. What's good about Risk is that each episode features multiple standup comedians and if I like their stuff I can just go to their own websites and listen to more. This is very good because usually when I finish a stint of obsessively watching a series like Six Feet Under or True Blood, I'm left feeling very empty after I watch the last episode, wondering "what do I do now?". Well, with Risk "now" I can move onto each comedian I like. Today I spent most of my break listening to Elna Baker, a mormon standup who lives in New York and who wrote a book called "the new york regional mormon singles halloween dance". She's such a good public speaker and story teller and I've been captivated by her all day. I think it's pretty impressive when someone who you have literally nothing in commong with can be interesting and funny and oddly easy to relate to. Go check her out!
It's been quite a while since my last update, and a lot has happened, so I'll try to remember the good stuff and make it sound interesting. May has been probably the best month I've had since I've been here. The winter FINALLY threw in the towel, Julie came to visit, and I got to take off almost an entire week for vacation and I really, really needed it.
This month I've also been expanding my social horizon and spending time with more people and forcing myself to get out of my rut... I mean routine.
When Julie arrived it was so surreal to see her. It was surreal in the sense that it didn't feel weird at all, I felt like I had just seen her the day before. Julie is one of those friends that I feel like years could go by and we would just pick up right where we left off. We chattered all the way from the bus stop to my house, catching up on all the substantial scandals and gossip. "She did what??" I squealed with excitement at every little tidbit of Korean culture that I could point out along the way, marveling in the fact that for once I could play tour guide instead of tourist (take that Tyler and your all knowing knowingness!). I pointed out the dokbuckee stands, and my favorite restaurant, and my local market and then we (well mostly Julie) dragged her suitcase up to the top floor of my hot and sticky apartment.
The next five days were some of the nest days I've had in Korea. There is so much to do in this amazing city, but with my current schedule its pretty difficult to find time to do them. I had a packed itinerary planned for Julies trip, it was a little overly ambitious and reality called and some plans were canceled.... due to hangovers... I mean lack of sleep. But we did manage to hit all the important touristy spots, we went to Namsan, Namdaemon market, Insadong, Hongdae, World Cup Stadium for a friendly match between Ecuador and Korea and we even went to the DMZ. We went to the DMZ the day before SK declared that it wasm in fact, NK that sunk the ship in March.
The DMZ was interesting but strange, every minute was monitored and controlled. Whenever we went to a location we had "five minutes of free time" and most of the interesting places were in the NO PHOTO ZONE so most of our pictures are on the bus, or standing around in a random place that could be anywhere. The third tunnel and the joint security area were my favorite places. I technically have been in north korea now.
One of the most humorous and awkward parts of the day was the Julie-And-Nadja-Try-To-Take-A-Picture-With-A-Soldier challenge. First we were too shy to ask any of the guards permission, so we tried to take "candid shots in front of buildings" oops, did he end up in the picture in the background? But those pictures were taken haphazardly out of fear and ended up pretty bad and would not make the facebook cut, so next we considered asking them.
At the observation tower (where we couldn't see north korea due to the weather) I kept dancing around one of the soldiers trying to muster up the courage to ask if I could take a picture with him, but right as I was about to blurt out the question with my eager camera in hand a Japanese tourist started poking the DMZ display with his umbrella and the soildier ran at him. Fail #2. Finally we went to the JSA and we got to enter the building that covers north and south soil. In the building there were two soldiers, frozen in their military stance like the guards at Buckingham Palace, with aviators and clenched fists. The tour guide informed the group that we could stand by them and take pictures ... "but don't get too close!" she warned. So Julie and I went to take our pictures with the soldiers and let me tell you.. taking a picture without someone's permission is a what-in-the-michael-cera awkward! Not only do you stand next to this poor soldier that can't move, you also have to worry about getting too close. What is too close? Will I vaguely hear the word "Anniyo!" before being battoned over the head? So, after we took our pictures and looked at them they were so awkward that I might send them into awkwardfamilyphotos.com (just kidding julie... I deleted them...) so Fail #3. Did I mention we were wearing brigth yellow and blue rain ponchos?
Much more to write but I have to do some work. More updates soon(ish) I swear.

I suppose Winter is officially over, not because Spring is here, but because it's Summer now. Where did Spring go? Where is she hiding? Just a mere five days ago we had the coldest recorded day in April in 100 years, and now it's hot, humid and muggy... say what?
Though I did not like the bitter cold, due to my poor circulation and being overly coddled by California weather, it did serve an important function: masking the Seoul stench. This morning as I walked to the bus stop I tried to think of the best ways to describe the smells that were attacking my nostrils... but nothing could quite compare, no words to do these smells justice, until I remembered the Labyrinth. Walking along the streets and going down wind of the sewer is like taking a trip to the Bog of Eternal Stench. Don't let one of those greyish puddles touch you or you'll never get the smell off! and don't even get me started on the Pigeons, the pigeons back home look like cuddly Disney characters compared to the ones here. I'm been contemplating making an album entirely devoted to these decrepit creatures, but maybe I shouldn't permanently scar myself and others.
May is shaping up to be pretty great so far. Last weekend I forced myself to break my usual weekend routine and spent some time with new people and it was great. I went out with two of my friends that I hadn't seen in a while and I met their Italian friends. Imagine the aggressively flirty Italian stereotype paired with shy and reserved Korean girls, it was like an ongoing comedy sketch. "Pretty lady, you have boyfriend??" There must have been three different groups of girls that came and sat with us and then quickly got freaked out by all the thigh touching and sexual innuendos until they ran off. Pretty hilarious.
On Saturday I met a group of Canadians and everyone was so nice, it's true what they say (except about Tyler) about Canadians being the nicest people. Even though I had just met them I felt really comfortable talking with them, and it was an all around positive experience.
Then on Sunday I went to a Doosan Bear's baseball game and enjoyed my sunday with some Cass, friends, and a slight sunburn.
Even though today is Tuesday, it's more like a Friday because we have tomorrow off as a national holiday. I was planning on going to the beach but alas, nature has decided to literally rain on my parade, so I'll have to come up with something else. Cheers!