this and that.....

oh.....let me see....what have i been up to lately? i've been keepin' myself busy....i bought a new ukulele, whom i have given the name, rosie. i have been practicing my chords and strumming and plan to get my first full song down this week.this past week i've been on a coupla bike adventures w/ smilja....cruised to a temple in the daytime and through back alleys & over the han river at night. while wandering in the wee hours, we stumbled upon the local hip-hop/skater scene & drank free beer and danced all night at some guys birthday party. good times. i only have pics of the temple though...a couple of weeks ago i hosted my first couch surfer here in south korea. couch surfing is awesome, so if you don't know about it, check it out (www.couchsurfing.com). my guest, jaume, was this great guy from spain who has traveled all over the world and is now living and studying in kyoto, japan. he was just in seoul for a couple of days to renew his visa, so we had some fun exploring new parts of the city together. anyway, here's jaume...awesome guy.
and just the other day i met up w/ another couch surfer who's living and teaching in seoul...funny enough, it turns out that this guy and i have led very similar lives up to this point; working on environment and political campaigns for the same organizations, working in haiti and traveling through costa rica. some strange coincidences. anyway, we checked out these cool tombs, built between 1494 and 1544 for 2 kings and a queen, which happen to be right in my part of town. they are situated right in this awesome park full of trees and flowers...i can't believe i didn't know this was there......and i'm still enjoying my job. my kids are feeling more and more like my own as the weeks go by. so i've been blessed w/ the duty of planning and teaching art at my school & this week i had a lot of fun. i decided to make dinosaur eggs w/ all the kids. we mixed up our own clay out of dirt, sand, flour, salt and water & sculpted our eggs around little plastic dinosaurs. they loved it. what kid doesn't like those 2 things, dinoaurs & playing w/ mud? i also lucked out w/ my after-school class; i get to teach CHESS once a week for an hour! i'm still pretty new to the game, but i'm no doubt improving my game each week by teaching and playing w/ the kids (i have 4 students in chess). this week it was super nice outside, so we played outside on the terrace. what a rough life, eh? here's a recent shot of me & my crazy kids....and today has been everything that a sunday should be. it was a gorgeous and slow morning...a bright, warm and sunny day, i walked around the neighborhood in search of ingredients for something to make for the vegetarian potluck picnic this afternoon. i decided to go w/ 2 dishes; one that i make all the time (veggie pancakes), and one as an experiment (vegan chocolate mousse w/ sliced fruit). the picnic was in a peaceful park right beside a couple of buddha statues from the 10th & 11th century. there was a good spread of yummy food & my two dishes went over well. thanks to jonna, there was also hula-hooping!after the picnic, jonna, ben (her squeeze, as she calls him) and i headed out to the garden to plant some tomatoes. when we got there, the lady who manages the place was happy to see us as usual. we showed her that we had bought some tomato seedlings to plant and then she showed us that she had some for sale, which were already blooming. she gave us a few of them for free, plus about 6 other plants (3 of which i think are eggplant, and the others i have no idea). sweet lady. so once again, the sun went down soon after we got there and we were gardening at night. i added some fresh scraps to the compost bin & noticed that it's pretty ripe & juicy in there. i'm gonna go on a mission to find some worms next.sooo.....that was one long, jumbled & rambly update. i've gotta go back to work tomorrow, but then i get tuesday off for children's day. i'm thinking CINCO DE MAYO. :) aloha all. missing you.

gardening at night

my friend, jonna, and i have a plot in a community garden, which is just a few stops away by metro. it's amazing how much green space just appears out of nowhere here in this massive city. i mean, out where our garden is, it feels rural. there are some 500 plots around ours.
so we went out there after school the other day, just as the sun was setting, to set up a compost bin*, plant a few more seedlings and give the plants a nice drink of cool water. (*we had been storing our kitchen scraps in bags in our freezers, which were full to the brim. so we set up a bin by the garden to throw our scraps and cover w/ dirt. hopefully we'll find some red wriggler worms to throw into the party and speed things up a bit.) in our garden, the edamame had started to climb and our leafy greens were just going off. the woman who manages the garden came over while we were working to tell us (in her 99-miles-per-minute korean) that our greens were ready to eat. so before we left, in the dark, we picked a variety of every leafy plant in the garden. it wasn't until i got them home, under some lighting, that i saw just how healthy and gorgeous these greens were. vibrant shades of green and purple. mmmmmmmmmmmm......... nothing better than eating something that you put in the ground and nursed to maturity.

go doosan!

koreans love baseball. i was invited to go to a game after work one day last week so, after a brief hesitation, i went. one of the korean teachers at my school is a HUGE fan of the local team, the Doosan Bears. she had enough hats, t-shirts & noise-makers for the whole office, so we fit right in at the game. there weren't a whole lot of fans in the stadium, the game itself wasn't all that great, and "our" team ended up losing 1-0...but it was a GREAT time. we had good seats, almost right in front of the MC stage...that's right...they have an MC, leading the fans in hilarious chants and cheers throughout the game. oh, and not to leave out the dancers...there were only 2 of them, but they were also entertaining, to say the least. all of this was made more enjoyable thanks to the beer guys...walking around w/ little mini-keg backbacks to keep our cups full. there weren't any hotdogs or peanuts, but plenty of dried squid jerky to appease any oral fixations. i will definely do this again. go doosan!

to market

i love the open air markets. on saturday i went to namdaemun market, more just to explore than to shop. this market takes you through an endless, winding maze of bargain clothing, hair accessories, housewares, tea shops & food. one could spend an entire day here and perhaps not find your way down each and every crowded, narrow alleyway. i was most intrigued by the food...all of the vibrant and fragrant varieties of kimchi and seafood. and although tempted by the piles of cheap & amusing t-shirts on sale, i managed to come out w/ only a balsa wood box of ginseng tea.

mt. namsan, seoul tower

this past weekend i ventured to mount namsan with friends to catch the view of seoul at night from seoul tower. there was a cable car that goes to the top, but 1) we're cheap skates and 2) we all concurred that we could use the exercise. not to mention, there was a gorgeous path along the mountain, which was tunneled by glowing cherry blossoms. at the top, we discovered that the admission fee to the tower was $7, and there was a 35 minute wait. we all opted out (did i say cheap skates?) and decided that the view from the base of the tower was good enough (and it was). the city looks amazing at night, and no doubt even more so on a clearer night. the fence surrounding the tower area is covered w/ padlocks. thousands of lovers visit the tower (kinda like the empire state building), link their two locks together, and then throw the keys over the edge. locking in their love "forever". gag. no, really, it's kind of adorable. why is it that i always find myself in the most romantic spots either by myself or with friends? :)

my new coffee grinder

man, it's not easy to find real coffee in this place. they sure do drink plenty of it because there is a coffee shop (starbucks, coffee bean, etc) on almost every corner..... but they obviously don't make coffee at home. the only kind of coffee you can find anywhere is either a really sweet and milky pre-made coffee in a can or a package of the instant mix, which consists of mostly powdered creamer & sugar. however, i found out you can get the big bags of starbucks-roasted coffee at costco, but i don't have a membership. one day, i came across a couple of these big bags of coffee at a foreign food market in itaewon, the gringo part of town. all they had was whole bean, so i said, what the heck. i planned to just take it to a nearby starbucks and have them grind the whole thing, but i never got around to doing that, plus i'm stubborn. so i started grinding it myself. i thought about buying an electric grinder, but at $40 and up, i'll pass. the apparatus in the picture, a nice wooden mortar & pestle, is actually an upgrade from what i initially used (a ceramic bowl & a glass jelly jar). drinking my coffee every morning takes some work, but now i appreciate its goodness all the more. who needs a gym membership, really? i need to work on using my left hand in this daily grinding and pounding task. if i don't, a difference might be visible in my arms after a whole year. ;)

cherry blossom bike tour extravaganza

never in my life have i seen so many cherry blossoms. GORGEOUS!!!!
....so this past weekend i went on a bus trip to historic gyeongju where we (myself & 4 other rockin' ladies) rented bikes, saw hella cherry blossoms, festivals, buddhas, tombs and temples, and "slept" at traditional bathhouses. was an exhausting, yet epic weekend. my ass still hurts, but i'm all smiles.