Seoul Land

Went to Seoul Land yesterday.
All nine of us who are going to Busan this Wednesday night went there.

The place was indeed fun. Though it's not as glorious as Everland and some of the buildings seems a bit old, there were quite a number of rides there.

We played most of the EXCITING rides, double decker, pirate ship, roller coaster, Aladdin's Carpet and all those.
This time I think I did quite well, vomiting only at the end^^

The Aladdin Carpet was really interesting.
After playing most of the fun stuff, we were just walking along the park when we saw this old, not-well-maintained "thing" with no body on it.
Since we were a bit exhausted after the whole day, we decided to take the relaxing carpet trip.
When we walked near it, we saw a few Koreans who had the same idea. So we hop on to it.
WOW!!!!
We were nearly thrown out of our seats.
The carpet was fast and a bit scary. What's more was that we were expecting a soft relaxing ride, so we weren't prepared.
And when the ride was coming to an end, a Korean cried out "Ancho" and the operator, after being bored for a whole day, decided to grant him his wish without consulting the rest of us!!
So they we were, flying on the magic carpet again!

Another interesting ride was the SKY-X.
" Flying as high as 55meters above experiencing thrills like Bungee jump and Sky-diving. Imagine that you are flying high above in the sky! You will fell like a flying bird."
-taken from Seoul Land's homepage-
Though I still think that Bungee jump will be more scary and exciting, the ride was worth our 8,000won.

But to me, the highlight of the day was when we came out of the theme park and gathered outside the subway station to play games and finish our Kimbap.
At tried playing a few games at the beginning, ghost story, but it was all too boring.
So finally we agreed to play Truth and Dare.
I was asked the question:" We heard that there's two people that you like in our batch, so who are the two?"
Of course as you all know, I'm good at playing with words. Since they did specify the gender, I told them the two male friend that I like.
But I may not be as lucky if they play this game again the next time.

AND, one most important secret that we were able to korek from one of our friend was the girl he likes the most in our batch^^

A day worth remembering!

After 20 days....

It's been more than 20 days since I last posted. Had been quite busy. Missed me? Hope you guys did^^

So here's the updates:

Still having my Discipleship Training every Wednesday evening and Chinese Class every Tuesday and Saturday evenings.
Got my first pay in Korea end of last April: 100.000won, about RM380. It's not much, but it feels nice to work and earn some money while meeting people.
And ya, currently I have 3students all in all^^

Then I finished my back stroke, and registered for frog style this month, but unfortunately I missed two lessons last week. Hopefully I can still catch up with the rest.

Then we had our level 3 Korean Language Exam, and the result came out just as I predicted, I got 97% AGAIN!!!! That's 3 times in a roll....

And now I'm having my week-long holidays^^

Planning to go to Busan, the second largest city in South Korea. Let's see whether our plans succeed or not....

Black Day

So it was Black Day yesterday.

In Korea, we have Valentines Day when girls give boys chocolate; White Day when guys give girls sweet and candy. Besides that, we also have Black Day, a day for those who have no couple to gather and eat Jajang Myeon (a type of Korean Chinese food, something like soy sauce noodle).

I were expecting the canteen to have Jajang Myeon as one of the menu or at least side dish, but to my disappointment there was none.

After lunch I was busy till night. When my friend came back from his Taekwondo lesson, we went to the pasar to look for Jajang Myeon, but all the Chinese Food hawker stalls were closed. So we had fried squid instead for supper.

My first Black Day yet I missed the chance to celebrate it....

Discipleship Training

Went for the Discipleship Training Programme last night at church.

At first I wasn't sure whether to join or not, since my time is not fixed and schedule are in a mess. But on the last day of registration one of the sister encouraged me to join, at least for the sake of understanding the Sunday sermon better.

The whole course is divided into 3 "levels". Level 1 will be held for 7weeks, Level 2 about 10weeks, and Level 3 for a year(?!).

So there I was last night, the first lesson of the course. And again I couldn't follow completely what was being said and discuss.
But fortunately last night was more on introduction of the course and getting to know the other group members better.

Well, hopefully things will turn out better...

Language Exchange (2)

Had our first language exchange class last night, and things turned out more or less like what I predicted.

We had some small chat before I started the class. He was like saying,
"Since we're doing it for an hour, let's divide the time into 3parts. For the first 20minutes You'll teach me Chinese, the next 20minutes I help you with your Korean, and the last 20minutes we'll do revision by our on."

But as things turned out, the whole one I hour I was the one doing the teaching. He was curious why didn't I bring any Korean books along, and I told him that our teacher teaches little by little everyday and goes according to our standard, so usually we can understand all that the teacher taught in a day.

He seemed a bit embarrassed, since it was a language exchange yet I was the only one teaching. So he told me that he majored in computer graphic design, and if I feel like learning it I can go to his office and look for him.

Haha.....but I doubt that I'll do that...

Language Exchange

Just when I thought that my life was too routined, there's something coming up.

After church service yesterday, two of the church member came up to me and said that they would like to either learn Chinese or improve their English, and since I'm learning Korean, they can assist me in the field, why not do a language exchange?

Frankly it was a bit unexpected, both of them in their late 20s and early 30s......to learn a new language right now?

The idea of language exchange did appeal to me when I first came to Korea, but now I'm packed with piano class, swimming lesson and danso lesson that I'm not even putting much effort into my studies.....
What more is that our lecturers are good, meaning not extra classes won't be necessary for us...

But then I thought that it was a good chance to get to know people, and maybe practice my Korean conversation. What's more is that it'll give me a good reason to revise my Chinese...

And ya, they were saying either English, which is the international language or Chinese, which is becoming more important by the year, so I decided to teach them Chinese.
One of the reason is that I think it'll be easier to teach them something new rather than to change or improve something they already know.

Changes are difficult, that's what I believe....

So starting this week I'll be busy Tuesday night and Sunday after service....

Arbor Day...bye bye

It's Arbor Day today here in Korea. Arbor Day started off as a public holiday after the Korean War, until this year. This is the final year Arbor Day will be celebrated as one of South Korea's public holidays....

It all started during the Korean war in 1950. The war between the communist North and the democratic South was so severe that forest and mountains were destroyed, along with the trees on them.

So, on the first spring after the end of the Korean war, the South Koreans had a country wide celebration of Arbor Day to begin the reforestation of the war ravaged country.

The Korean government designate April 5 as Arbor Day and made it a time for all the citizens to plant trees and other plants. Decades later, the forests have returned. Nowadays, citizens still plant trees and flowers and clean up the surrounding hilltops and mountain areas, and the day serves as a reminder to respect nature and the environment.

But from what my lecturer told us, the government decided to cancel this public holiday starting next year due to a few reason.
One is that since last year, most company and civil servants only work 5days a week, which causes slight drop in productivity.
The other reason is that now a day not many actually participate in tree planting on April 5, thus it's pointless to keep such a holiday.

Anyway, bye bye....my sweet public holiday

JEJUDO(3/29-3/31) Day 3

The last day on the island.
Visited 2 places before we headed to the airport.

The first was Mysterious Road.
After driving up this road, turn off the engine, shift to neutral, and the car will appear to roll up hill. Amazing?
It's actually an optical illusion due to the the angle of the road and our sight lines^^

The last spot that we went to was Yongduam Rock, Dragon Head Rock.
As it's name suggests, it's a rock that looks similar to that of a dragon. And if you look closely, you can spot not only the head but the tail as well.

Well, that ends my Jejudo trip^^

JEJUDO(3/29-3/31) Day 2

The places covered on the second day include Udo, which literally means Cow Island. Located just off the northeast coast of Jejudo, it's a relaxing place despite its 1800 inhabitants.
The island is known for its beaches: one has white sand, one has black and another has coral.
We visited all the 8 Sceneries of Udo, which took about 2hours all in all.

After lunch we headed to Seongsan Ilchulbong,which is actually an extinct volcano.
Ilchulbong means the peak where the sunrises. Thouht we weren't in time to see the sun coming up, but it was still a splendid sight.

We also went to Seobjikhoji, the place where the Korean drama 올인(allin) was filmed.

Another of Jejudo's attraction that we visited was the Gimnyeong Maze.
It's something like the hedge maze that we see in European movies.
The maze's outline mirrors that of Jejudo Island, and it is said that when viewed from above one can see icons pertinent to local culture:horse, ship etc.....none of which I was able to spot though....

Like the previous night, we didn't do any sight seeing during the night.
Instead, we had a camp fire. We were quite worried whether we would be able to have to camp fire as the wind was very strong. But fortunately the wind was on our side. No BBQs though. Just some games round the fire and BBQed potatoes and sweet potatoes

JEJUDO(3/29-3/31) Day 1

We, (65students +5teachers) went to Jeju-do for a 3days 2nights trip. We are the first batch that went to Jeju-do with our teachers instead of going to Gyeongju, where our seniors told us that it was so boring and the only thing they looked forward to was the meal.

Paradise, Hawaii, Disneyland......Jeju-do has been compared to all three and all three comparisons have their place.

Jeju-do, the biggest island of Korea, a place where honeymooners flock to, was interesting. Though we didn't get the chance to climb Hallasan, the tallest mountain in S.Korea, we were able to visit quite a few places.

We departed from our house at 5.30am to catch the 7+ flight.

The first place that we went to was Hallim Park, which is famous for it's lava tube cave, botanical garden, and a mini folk village.
The cave was most interesting as it's one of the few lava tubes in the world with stalagmites and stalactites.

We also went to a Teddy Bear Museum, where the world's smallest teddy bear is located(if I'm not mistaken).

We were at a tangerine(mandarin orange) farm, just for the sake of taking photos. As the season for tangerines is in autumn, we were not allowed to pick any of the fruits because if we do so, the part won't be able to produce any more fruits.

The other places that we went to on the first day was Jusangjolli Rocks and Cheonjiyeonpokpo before heading to our chalets and prepare for the night activities.

Each class came up with a some performance(all dramas). My class got second, but the present was something I like.
And as I was the mc for the night, I was given vouchers worth 10000won^^