Ocean world!!

          A few weeks ago our school decided that after a long summer camp of teaching everyday for most teachers (and just a long year of teaching everyday for us preschool teachers) that we deserved a treat. There answer was a paid day at Ocean world, a famous water park quite near our school. Needless to say most teacher's jumped at the opportunity for a fun Sunday in Ocean World followed by a buffet dinner.
         On the Sunday we left English Village at 10am and upon arriving got ready as fast as we could. Many things about Korea baffle me and Ocean World provided two more additions to my list of "But why??" questions.
          1. Everyone had to wear a cap in the pools.... Now before you ask what's wrong with that we do that in Ireland listen to the rest. It was not necessary to wear an actual swim cap! Nope in fact I think I was one of very few people there with a real swim cap the majority of people wore baseball caps. It gets better though.. it wasn't even required to have your hair up under the cap just as long as it was on your head. I arrived out of the changing room, hair tucked under my cap as I assumed was the rule and walked into the pool area to be greeted by girls with flowing hair around their shoulders but wearing baseball caps still so its all ok!!

          2. The second baffling thing at Ocean World was the life-jackets. Now I guess I should have to keep in mind that quite a lot of Koreans cannot swim (which for an island nation - by technicality - is a bit awkward). Well the rule was that life-jackets were compulsory for 2 rides in the park (which I understand because you would need to be a strong swimmer otherwise) but rather than providing and returning the life-jackets at those rides you collected your jacket at the entrance and had to cart it around with you the whole day long. Now holding it in your hand got annoying so everyone eventually ended up wearing their jacket continuously but being a warm sunny day I ended up with wonderful tan lines.
          Now Ocean World itself seemed a really fun place and the rides looked like great fun but unfortunately I only managed to make it onto 3 rides in the whole day there... a few reasons added up to this but the main one was the queues. Korea is not much bigger than Ireland at all but has 6 times our population. As you can imagine this leads to a lot of people EVERYWHERE! A sunny day at Ocean World certainly followed this general rule. The queue for the most popular ride was almost 3hrs long..so despite looking forward to that ride from the posters I couldn't justify the wait.

          The rides I did got on though were a lot of fun! Overall I had a fun day there and I loved the wave pool. Now when I thought of wave pools before I thought of little kids jumping ankle high waves in a shallow pool... this was very different. This wave pool was one of the two life-jacket required rides and with good cause. For the most of the day 6ft high waves swept people up on a rise of water and three times a day they increased the fun to 8ft! Imagine a pool crammed with as many floating people as possible and a massive wave crashing in. Thankfully the life-jackets ensured no one was under water very long and it led to a lot of laughs!!
          After a fun day in the park we were treated to a buffet dinner. Now I'll admit i pessimistically assumed it would be like the lunch we'd had that day (basically our school cafeteria food) but I was very much happily surprised! It was delicious! They had everything from salads to sushi, pasta to pizza, cheese to chow mein... YUM! I went for seconds and then thirds and would have eaten more if I thought I could squeeze even one more bite into my mouth!
          Full and tired we returned to English village after an interesting but enjoyable day!

Flood day.

          Falling asleep on Tuesday the 26th of July it sounded like someone was literally pouring buckets of water on the ground outside my window. I was grateful to be inside in my bed safe from that rain and next morning when I woke up it seemed like the rain had lightened so I got dressed as usual ready for my day teaching and started my walk to school. It wasn't until I reached the bottom of the hill that I realised just how strong the rain had really been. A mini stream ran along the road.

Some of the "lost" crayfish.

The crayfish just before we returned them to the stream.

         I waded through ankle deep running water and arrived into an empty school. There Vanessa told me that all the parents had been told to keep there kids at home, I was so excited until in her next sentence Vanessa then told me that we would be helping clean the school instead. Then much to our surprise we began finding little creatures who had been washed far from there normal homes.....crayfish! After a days cleaning we had a total of 7 crayfish sitting in a basin who had been washed away from there home in the stream behind English Village. (Don't worry all crayfish were returned safe and sound at the end of the day.)

The fountain was filled with mud as a mini stream flowed around it still.

        Sure enough we were soon handed shovels, buckets and wheelbarrows and told we had to clean all the rocks and mud that had been washed down from the surrounding hills into the main school courtyard. We began with picking up a few stray rocks and filling a wheelbarrow but then I saw that the fountain which flows through the courtyard was full with mud so after my recent mudfest adventures I decided to hop in. Hopping down into the fountain I was in mud half way up to my knees. Being my dad's daughter though I wasn't long grabbing a shovel and getting to work. Soon enough most people were either in or around the fountain cleaning the mud. As I shovelled away I heard a click and looking up I saw that one of the Korean administrators had taken my picture. Laughing he asked had I grown up in the countryside, and sure enough I happily replied that indeed I had, a farmer's daughter at that. He said it was clear and jokingly offered me a ten year contract as school maintenance rather than as a teacher. After a while Sylvia, my co-teacher, told me that more of the Koreans who didn't know me were asking where I was from.

Some of the stones we had to pick up from the courtyard.

          I was really enjoying my days work and kept thinking of dad the whole time. I even thought of the way he had shown me how to get the most stuff onto a shovel in one go while we cleaned the turkey house at home one day. I guess that no matter where in the world I may be I will always be my father's daughter and I am very proud to be.
       

Mudfest!

          Where can I even begin to describe Mudfest? Since before I even arrived in Korea I had been looking forward to this festival devoted to Mud and it didn't disappoint. In fact I would go so far as to say it was better than I even hoped  for (which, for something I had built up so much in my head, is amazing)!
          Our weekend began with the, by now routine, journey into Seoul. After a lovely meal (steak and potatoes...yum) and a few drinks (to get the weekend started) we headed to the jimjilbang for a nights sleep! Bright and early next morning we joined the group of fellow travelers all destined for Boryeong Mud Festival. We had signed up with one particular tour group and so had our return bus costs and accommodation all sorted but roughly 400 other people were also signed with that particular group so that is just a vague estimate of just how many people attend this festival. Apparently on just the weekend I was there there were 800,000 people.
          Arriving in Boryeong we quickly dropped our belongings off in our pension (accomodation for the night) and made our way as fast as we could to the main area (the slight drizzle at the time couldn't even dampen our spirits)! Arriving at the main area it didn't take much time until we were coated in the grey, smooth mud! To add to the fun the rain even stopped shortly after we arrived!
          After our first dosing of mud we ventured into the "mud pit" , an area purely for mud filled fun! We began in the "mud prison" posing for photos behind the bars of a jail cell, smiling and laughing until, without warning, we were sprayed with a bucketful of cold, watery mud! After a few initial screams we once again returned to laughter. Next came the mud racing! A long narrow bouncy castle with 2 running lanes had been covered in mud and was being sprayed with a hose. The aim was to run, jump and race a friend to the end first while all the time, slipping, sliding and general making slow progress! After that came a trial of strength and determination....mud style!! Another mud filled bouncy castle provided the stage for this test of will. Dee and I were both strapped together by a length of bungy cord around our waists. While facing opposite directions the challenge was to run and be the first to touch one of the bells placed at the opposing ends of the bouncy castle. Needless to explain the length of cord only permitted one winner! With the blow of the whistle Dee and I both raced at full speed towards our bells, that is until the snap of our "leashes" pulled us back with a jerk to be squiggling figures on the ground. We struggled against each other, each slightly gaining the advantage at times. But with both

of us as stubborn as the other neither of us would accept defeat and so it ended! The officials in charge called for us to stop as I think they began to understand that there would not be a winner this time! Overall a fitting ending to an even fight!

          After this we went to eat some lunch and somehow on the way back from lunch Dee and I got separated from everyone else! Considering the mud neither of us had our phones on us and so we were officially on our own. It could have been a disaster wandering through the crowds searching for our friends all day but that is quite different to what happened next. While walking along the beach, in an almost pointless attempt to 'just see' everyone we had lost, we came to a little stand renting inflatable rubber rings for the day for the low low price of 5,000won. Dee and I rented the rings, headed to the shop for some drinks, returned to the beach and floated out into the water! Sounds simple but believe me it wasn't! Dee's upper body strength failed her everytime we waded out deep enough to float comfortably. She was unable to lift herself onto the ring while in the water, yet if she sat in at the shore the waves just beached us in a matter of seconds! In the end, after much laughter, we finally devised a plan Dee sat in her ring at the shore while I pulled her out into the deeper water and then when there I would pull myself onto my ring and we would both be floating. However, despite pulling her out as planned every time I went to pull myself onto my floating ring Dee would make me laugh on purpose and I would fail. This went on for a while until through the laughter I finally managed to pull myself up! After that we both floated around for a while fighting against the tide until we found a buoy tied nearby. We quickly tied ourselves to the buoy and there we had it the perfect place. I have no idea how long we stayed out there for but it was perfect, floating in the sunshine as the waves lapped against us with our drinks in our hands. Eventually as it started getting colder we headed for shore and back to our pension to change into warmer and drier clothes for the night ahead.
          After meeting up with everyone we lost earlier we went to the beach to watch an amazing fireworks display. Fireworks that exploded in the shape of flowers and hearts, fireworks than spiraled and fireworks that tricked down like rain on a window! Amazing! More drink followed and surprise surprise some people started streaking (just to clarify I was not one of those people!). Eventually tiredness won over and I went back to enjoy a nice nights sleep on a hard wooden floor! 
         Next morning, we all had breakfast and then the fun started all over again! We once more ended up like mud monsters and were posing for a photograph when someone grabbed my arm and pulled me around. I didn't even realise what was going on until a paintbrush of mud hit me!! Some Korean woman working there obviously decided I wasn't muddy enough for the photograph and despite all our protests that I was fine she would not leave me go until I was literally covered in mud, she even liberally painted my face, not even my eyelids escaped the mud! After walking around for a while we decided it was time to get painted with the coloured mud! So after a quick dip in the sea to wash the normal mud off ourselves (which ended up to be not such a quick dip as we played queen's chair, tried to knock each other over, had fights against 2 others while on top of someone's shoulder etc.) we went and queued for the coloured mud. As Dee, Kyle and Ness all decided exactly how they wanted to be painted I couldn't think of anything in particular I wanted. So when my turn finally came I let the girl painting me use her own initiative and I think I turned out pretty well. Now with the coloured mud on us I suddenly felt like a celebrity as photographers swarmed around us asking for photos. 
          After posing for a few we decided we had had enough fame for one day and went for a walk along the beach which ended up with Dee and I convincing everyone to rent the inflatable rings once more for the day. Together the five of us, (Kyle, Vanessa, Chris, Dee and I) floated along the shoreline for a while before paddling out a little further. Nessa and I decided that we wanted to jump off a pontoon a little further out so leaving Kyle to hold our floating rings we swam towards the pontoon and after much effort managed to pull ourselves up onto it (I blame Nessa for this. I wanted to swim around to the side with a step up onto it but Ness insisted that both of us had the upper body strength sufficient to pull ourselves up out of the water! Ok in the end she was right and we were able but it was not the easy option that's for sure!). After jumping off once or twice Ness decided to show her skills and dive into the water, I told her I had never learnt to dive and she gave me a quick lesson, which failed miserably, and resulted in me belly-flopping into the water. Thankfully it didn't hurt, in fact, it was hilarious for me as well as everyone watching! We finally decided we had better swim for shore, which seemed easy when we set out, but believe we I was huffing and puffing by the time I arrived at shore dragging my inflatable ring behind me. 

          By then it was time to go home and so ended our fantastic weekend at mudfest. To anyone intending to come to Korea or anyone here who has not yet gone... GO TO MUDFEST! You won't regret it!

The sea that never parted!!

                                                 

           So a few weekends ago the Irish and the Texans set off on an adventure to trek through muddy sand, catch fish with our bare hands and camp out for a night. It didn't all exactly go to plan. Here's what happened:
          So Friday evening after work, Kyle, Ness, Dee and I headed into Seoul and after a nice (huge) western style meal we headed to the jimjilbag to stay the night before an early start on Saturday. We chilled and chatted for a while before heading to sleep in our gender separated areas! Next morning bright and early we woke and went to meet the buses for our trip. Roughly 80 people were attending this particular trip, the main aim of which was a sea-parting which supposedly occurs at set times during the year due to tides. To start there was a lot of confusion as to which bus we should be on and all that but we eventually got sorted. Dee and I ended up sitting in front of 2 loud, obnoxious girls (Americans of course.... to all my American friends ye know ye obviously don't fall into that stereotype :P )!! Not the best place to be for a six hour bus trip but time went fast enough thankfully and despite a few mix-ups and changes of plan we finally arrived at the sea parting location.
           Relieved to have arrived we excitedly hopped off the bus and were greeted by a VERY MUCH INTACT sea. Needless to say we were disappointed but with promises of the parting happening later that day due to weather patterns we agreed to watch the net-fishing. Kyle, the only one of the four of us who actually took part, proved himself to be a true man's man as he came back, with not the estimated 5 fish that people would probably catch, but 23!!! Nessa need not worry while she has Kyle providing for her anyway.. Bear Grylls eat your heart out.

The net fishing.                                                                                                                                                                                     After  the fishing we made another attempt to see the sea.. but alas it wasn't to be. We decided to drown our sorrows and soju quickly came into the equation of our sea-parting/camping weekend!! Set on still making the most of the trip we pitched our tent and happily ate some burgers. Then came one of my favourite parts of the weekend... the search for firewood! I know, how sad but it was so much fun. Most people stayed back at the lodgings while a few of us ventured into the dark in search of anything which would catch light. We made a few feeble attempts at first with what ended up to be barely kindling in the end. But then our competitive streaks set in. The aim of the game being who could find the biggest piece of suitable wood. After uprooting a small dead tree I felt very proud but we pressed on and next thing four of us were trekking through dark woods with a tiny torch, jumping at our own shadows and discussing how it was scaringly familiar to so many horror films we'd seen. Thankfully (as you can guess) we made it out alive, and with a very impressive stack of wood. Back at the camp the boys set about getting it all lighting while the girls chilled with our drinks. A few minutes later an impressive campfire was in full swing complete with melted marshmallows! Sing songs of course followed and the night ended up being a lot of fun.

The dead tree I uprooted.

          Next morning we decided to stroll along the beach by our camp and somehow Roxy ( a girl we'd befriended on the trip) and I ended up spending our time trying to capture the little scuttling crabs in the rock pools! This surprisingly became a joint first place with collecting the firewood for the highlight of the weekend for me. I felt like a little child as we hopped along the beach peering under stones and into the pools of water watching for movement....and then the chase began. Believe me those little crabs are faster than I had ever given them credit for. By the time Kyle, Dee and Vanessa had turned around from there walk and were back to meet us we had caught a grand total of 14 little crabs.

After letting them go Kyle successfully taught me how to skim stones. Once again I felt like a child for the second time that morning, as for the first time in my life, I watched a stone that I had thrown take 2 little hops along the water's surface.                               
          After our chilled morning we went back to camp and Kyle once again proving his Bear Grylls traits showed us how to gut the fish he had caught the day before. I was surprised at how simple it was and by how it didn't make me squeamish as I assumed it would. They turned out to be a yummy lunch before boarding the bus once more to make the long trip home.
          Luckily there was one stop on the way home at the Jindo dog training academy. Jindo dogs are a native Korean dog only found in that particular area and are known for their loyalty and tracking abilities with one story of a dog being lost on holidays and tracking his way half way across Korea back to his home....3 months later. Amazing. The dog show was cut short due to the extreme heat but from what we did see (the dog opening the fridge, getting milk, closing the fridge and bringing it to his trainer, turning on and off lights and raising the korean flag on the flagpole) we were impressed.
          After a long trip home we were happy to be back but a weekend that had started in flames had somehow managed to rise from the ashes and prove to be fun after all..... despite the sea that never parted!

Teacher's day

                                   
          Ok, so back on the 15th of May Korea celebrated a wonderful day called Teacher's Day!!! It was and still is the only day where I was thankful for having such a large class... more pressies for me! :) In the days before I eagerly wondered what presents would come my way and I wasn't disappointed in the end. I got a little of everything from body and face washes (by far the most common present), to cookies, vouchers, lipglosses, dinners etc.
          One of the dinners we went on was absolutely delicious. Two of my kids mother's took me and my co-teacher Sylvia to a traditional Korean restaurant. Now I have to say going there I wasn't exactly excited as I haven't developed a great love for Korean food but I was pleasantly surprised. From the moment we entered it was clear that it was a step above most restaurants I'd eaten in. All of the servers wore the traditional Korean Hanbok dress and the presentation of every dish was amazing. From the first appetizers (no idea what it was) I was happy with their choice of restaurant. The food never stopped coming either as soon as we'd finish one set of dishes more would appear all equally delicious that is until the fermented skate!! This "delicacy" was something I had already read about before coming to Korea on a list of  Korean foods to never eat...(which of course meant I was dying to try it), they weren't lying. My kids mother's and Sylvia my co-teacher looked on as I placed the fermented(a.k.a. rotting) fish in my mouth. At first I was like "what's so bad?" but then..... Oh God, the taste. I actually thought I was going to vomit on the table right there. My eager audience burst into laughter at my expression at this point and I can't blame them. Somehow and I don't know how I managed to swallow the foul-tasting dish (with a little gagging) and rinse my mouth with glasses of water. After I had swallowed it the Koreans then informed me that non of them would eat it either! So not an experience I would ever recommend but still one I am glad I tried.
           Oh and I almost forget to tell a funny story that when along with that restaurant adventure altough it had nothing to do with food. When the mother's arrived I was happy to see they brought along my 2 kids with them but Winnie was holding a paper cup in her hand. She ran over and informed me that she had a little frog in the cup. In an effort to show me the frog her captive cunningly hopped right out and found itself jumping freely within a restaurant. Now despite the fact that Winnie had been holding the cup she obviously hadn't been the one to catch the frog in the first place as she backed away and refused to re-capture it. Sylvia was equally unanxious to go near the little green creature so the job came to me. I can't imagine what the other diners were thinking as a western girl with blonde hair weaved her way through the tables in chase of a runaway frog. I cornered the little guy though and had him back in his cup soon enough, thankfully!
           But the most interesting (in a Korean way) presents that I got involved 2 sets of factor 50+ sunscreen and the cheery on top of the Korean's attempt to keep me my optimum white skin tone came in a Chanel gift box. When I opened the bag and saw a neatly wrapped Chanel bow staring at me I happily let myself imagine what could be hiding inside waiting for me to find. I carefully took off the shiny black ribbon and let the contents drop into my hand..... Chanel Whitening Lotion! Yes that's right factor 50+ sunscreen wasn't enough but I actually got a present to make my skin even whiter. I had to laugh. It just goes to show the differences between cultures. Here in Korea having a tan means that you are poor as generally the farmers have tans as they spend more time outdoors. So each lunchtime as the kids play I desperatly try to expose as much skin as I can (decently) in a fruitless attempt to tan while my Korean co-workers walk under umbrellas and shelter in any shade they can find. Each to their own I guess.
                                            

RocKorea.

          Yet another memorable weekend passed in Korea.. this time at RocKorea Indie/Rock tribute band concert. Dee, Kyle, Vanessa, Michael, Nicole, Mark and I decided to spend last Saturday  partying until the early hours so we set off from English village in our summer clothes and 2 tents. After a very long and tiring journey (only at the other side of Seoul but a lot of transferring was required) we finally made it to the RocKorea site. After World DJ fest I am sorry to say I was very underwhelmed my the whole thing to begin with. The concert consisted of one small main stage surrounded by tents selling food and drinks. The whole concert was set on a construction site for an entire new city they are building from scratch (to be completed in 2016), which ensured plenty mud around and NO grass! We set about pitching our tent (which turned out to be HUGE.. it said it slept 6 people but in my estimation we could probably have fit closer to 10.)
         Anyway The Beatles tribute band began playing and I got in the spirit until Dee came back saying the only alcohol they sold was beer! As I don't like beer I was a little annoyed but decided that all I could do was smile. I finished my beer and went on one last attempt to locate something else and thankfully it worked. I secured a bottle of soju from a guy with a black plastic bag in the back of his food tent! Much happier now and with the music still going strong we danced and laughed and sat on rugs in front of the stage. We heard them all from AC/DC to The Rolling Stones and Led Zepplin.
          The final bad point though, entirely our fault, was the cold. Dee and I hadn't packed the warmest of clothes when we left in the midday heat but by 4am that night curled up in our tent with one very light and small blanket it proved to be a decision we regretted. The morning heat eventually arrived though and we thawed our bones out again.. before the long trek home.

         I'll have to admit that despite it's poor first impression RocKorea actually turned out to be surprisingly good.

Let the burning begin!

          Wow, what an amazing weekend. It couldn't have gone better really. Friday we had a field trip for the kids to a stunningly beautiful wild flower garden. Unfortunately (yet not surprisingly) the kids didn't have much interest in the flowers themselves or wandering around the garden but were instead happy to run around on the grass and blow bubbles. All the same I had a great day sitting in the sunshine and laughing with (and at) the kids. The field trip made the weekend seem to begin all the sooner as I didn't have to teach. Despite the morning being warm it was cloudy so I wasn't expecting much sun, however, later the sun broke out and by the end of the day I had slightly red shoulders.
          Then that night (Friday) we headed to Seoul for Teena's birthday! I felt very cool as she had reserved a VIP area in the club and we danced the night away with friends until we could catch the train home.
          After a few hours sleep on Saturday morning I relaxed and read until we decided to have a BBQ..yum. Delicious pork burgers, mackerel, salad, and shrimp kebabs. Good food and good company..perfect. Next morning (Sunday) I got up and decided to go for a walk before it got to hot. I walked for about an hour starting at 10.30am and wow I was wrong about it being cooler then. It seemed like the sun was out in full blast and when I got home I had a lovely pink pattern on my chest and arms and back from where my t-shirt ended. I changed into lighter and more summery clothes and covered myself in factor 45 sun cream.
         Later with the addition of a little more sun cream a group of us headed to the river (beside the English village) to relax in the sun. The water was lovely and before long we were all in swimming... hopping in and out of the water every few minutes. We left after about 2 hours and when I got home I realised my lovely pink burns had spread... as the night when on I got progressively redder until I got to the extent where I think my colour could make lobsters jealous. Thankfully despite my very rosy skin tone it's not painful (fingers crossed it will stay like this...and not peel)! If I am REALLY HOPING for the impossible I might even wish that it might turn to a tan (that way next time we all go swimming I might not be voted as the whitest person anyone had ever seen)! :)