Amanda Takes Off...

(Warning: this is a photo-heavy post!)

This was by far one of my weirdest days in Korea. I got to work and my boss said we were going to a convention at COEX. It was a tourist convention with people from all over the country (방방곡곡) pushing their own provinces, yet we had a booth there for some reason. To make a very long story short this is some of what happened.

1) I was wearing a Merry Christmas shirt (with Mickey Mouse on it) and a microphone/loudspeaker thing all day.
2) KBS taped me doing a "museum tour" with some of our students. (I really, really should make a category called "Movie Star Me.")
3) I made a necklace using some tea and sesame seeds and dried grass.
4) I learned how to make straw rope with a very old man who spoke to me in Korean the whole time.
5) I got to make a Buddhist style ink print.
6) I watched a traditional farmers' dance complete with a fake cow walking past. A fake cow complete with cloth genitalia that the cow-people shook as they walked. I noticed it at the same time the Korean man next to me did. We both started laughing. He looked at me and I looked at him and I realized that I was covering my mouth. When the heck did I start doing that (Korean women cover their mouths when they laugh)?
7) I saw several wooden replicas of the turtle ship. I hadn't known what it looked like before. I got this photo of a guy dressed in traditional Korean soldier fashion. I held my camera and smiled, he nodded and smiled back. He'd been getting it all day, I'm sure.

Meanwhile, class was interesting. I got off work early and had I gone home, I would've rested for ten minutes before getting back on a subway again. It also would have added at least 40 mins to my subway time, so I just got to class 40 minutes early instead. I was shocked when Crybaby Gold Medal Girl got there five minutes later. One of my homework assignments was to ask a classmate some questions about their activities, so I asked her. She grinned and answered my questions, then checked my homework for me. Hee hee. Yes, a 13 year old was checking my homework for me!

She wanted to start doing the next section's homework. I said, "아니, 아니..." At the beginning of the book she found some handwriting practice pages I haven't finished, so she did those instead. Tired Guy walked in and said, "Oh, homework?" to Crybaby. I said, "I have homework. She's doing it."

"오애?" (See, told you that was the most popular word in Korean.)

She also read the next story for me on my iPod. No, I'm not done with the first one, but why not have the second one ready? She wanted to read story four, but people were coming in (you can hear the door clanging on the recording) and I said maybe tomorrow. Since it still wasn't class time, I took some photos to practice Korean with. For example, I figured this picture could be used to talk about directional words and prepositions, colors, and numbers. "Two red head guards are between four blue head guards."

Crybaby took my camera and went crazy taking photos. Unfortunately most of them are of people covering their faces. I wasn't though!

Before class I asked Cocky if we were playing soccer. He said, "Amanda! You, Kwanjangnim, OK?" He made me understand that he wanted me to ask tell Master we were playing soccer.

Master got to class and I said, "Master, are we playing soccer tonight? Soccer? Soccer? Playing?" I tried to look as excited as possible about it.

He reflected my look and said, "No" in the more formal, polite way.

My face fell and I said, "Sorry, [Cocky]."

Master said, "왜?" and Cocky said, "No, no! All Amanda!" and mock glared at me. Master changed his mind and said we'd play soccer for an hour. I thumb's upped Cocky and he put on his "you told on me face" and fake pouted.

Maaster needed to get our thumb prints ready for the digital scanner. Yesterday he'd kept talking about his handphone. I had thought he was saying that every time someone checked in or out, he'd get a message on his handphone, but I thought I must be misunderstanding. Nope, I wasn't. Every time we check in or out, he gets a message.

(I had taken off my glasses and was rubbing my eyes while we was talking. I heard Brave's Brother say something about it and I leaned over and whispered, "고양이예요." I am a cat. I rubbed my eyes and he said, "You are a cat!")

I said, "Master, this is taekwondo, not prison." He laughed. He seems very proud that he is the first taekwondo studio in Korea to implement this thumb print check-in system. He says he's not worried about the older students, but the younger ones he worries about. I suppose it does add a level of security to know who's coming to class early, etc, but people can still just leave the building without checking out, so I'm not sure exactly how helpful it is...

We all got passwords and we all got registered ("Amanda, you first." "Why?" "Good Korean practice, you first.") and then we all checked in. This took some time, so I was told to work on my poomse while I was waiting. (At the end of class, Master said that the older ones, myself included of course, don't need to thumb in or out. OK...)

I did the forms 1-8 facing the normal direction. Then I turned around 180 degrees and did them 8-1. I turned 90 degrees and did them 1-8, then 180 degrees and 8-1. That brought us to break time, and as they did before class, they played their version of The Lottery tonight.

That's Crybaby kicking. Grin's Brother is the lamb.

Cocky's taking a shot. I like this photo primarily because of the image in the mirror. See his shadow?

Meanwhile, Coverboy was hamming it up. He scrapped the image from Cyworld and asked me to put this one up, too.

What was I doing during the break?

That's Late Boy (Cheater) on the left and Tired Guy next to me, helping me with my vocabulary words. Yes, my hair is in that horrible growing-out stage.

Soccer was fun, although I managed to score against my own team three times. I think they all wanted to string me up, even though we weren't keeping score. When Master and I were on the bench, I found out more about the test. It's for Gwangmyeong studios only. He clarified "studios" because I kept using "people." There will be two or three judges for each section of the test. And yes I am egotistical shocked excited enough that I took a photo of my name on the board. See that lone name down there at the bottom? Under "1단"? That's me.

Brave playing soccer. I love this photo, even though it's blurry.

On the subway ride home, a very old man introduced himself to me, gripped my hands, and told me a story about an American soldier friend during the Korean war. It was fascinating.