Thursday, July 16, 2009
...Whatever That Means
After several months of practicing as a three piece, bothering everyone we know and putting up random advertisements online, our band "...Whatever That Means" has a lead guitar player. We've only been practicing with him, Alex, for two weeks, but we have out first show this weekend in a smaller city outside Seoul called DaeJeon (대전). We practiced a lot this week to get ready for the show and are pretty excited about it. Hopefully, all will go well, and we'll get offered some more shows in the near future.
Monday, July 6, 2009
2 Years and Running
I know my posts on here have been sparse at best. There are two main reasons for that. First, we are really busy. I work full time at the elementary school (of course, full time means 6 hours a day...sometimes 5), teach one on one lessons to businessmen in the mornings before school and do some private tutoring at night as well. Plus, we've been having band practice twice a week (we're hoping to have our first show soon!). The second reason, life here has become so normal to me that I don't feel the need to update nearly as much as when I first got here. That said, I have decided to do a better job in the future. Now onto the next thing.....
This Saturday, July 11th at 11:45pm Korea time (10:45am EST) will mark two years since my plane first landed in Korea. Trash and I will be celebrating the anniversary at the Boryeong Mud Festival again. It's amazing how much life has changed since then. I'm working at my third school, live in my third apartment, speak a little Korean, play in a local punk rock band, have been to Vietnam and Cambodia.....oh yeah, and I got married too! Amazing how much can change in two years. I never would've guessed things would be like this two years ago. I'm very happy with all these changes. It's been an amazing run, and it's not over yet!
Trash and I came back here three months ago planning to stay for about a year and a half to two years more. That remains the plan. We're doing our best to save money to ensure a good move home with as little stress as possible....especially since there will be SO much stress that just can't be avoided.
Anyway, that's where we stand for now. Life is good and we're very happy :)
This Saturday, July 11th at 11:45pm Korea time (10:45am EST) will mark two years since my plane first landed in Korea. Trash and I will be celebrating the anniversary at the Boryeong Mud Festival again. It's amazing how much life has changed since then. I'm working at my third school, live in my third apartment, speak a little Korean, play in a local punk rock band, have been to Vietnam and Cambodia.....oh yeah, and I got married too! Amazing how much can change in two years. I never would've guessed things would be like this two years ago. I'm very happy with all these changes. It's been an amazing run, and it's not over yet!
Trash and I came back here three months ago planning to stay for about a year and a half to two years more. That remains the plan. We're doing our best to save money to ensure a good move home with as little stress as possible....especially since there will be SO much stress that just can't be avoided.
Anyway, that's where we stand for now. Life is good and we're very happy :)
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
The New Ride
Goodbye old, crappy, falling apart scooter. Hello new, awesome scooter!
*click to zoom in
*click to zoom in
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
The Important Part
I know a lot of people are waiting for an album of wedding photos. We haven't gotten around to that yet. Besides, the most important part of that day came later at night....get your mind out of the gutter! I'm talking about the punk show we had after our wedding. We had the usual wedding ceremony and reception and then headed straight to club spot for the 8 hour punk rock show we organized to celebrate the big day.
Ric, my friends Honggu and Shawn and I threw together a band to play at the show. Below are 3 videos that consist of our whole set. Enjoy (And don't be too critical. We only had one week to learn everything).
Ric, my friends Honggu and Shawn and I threw together a band to play at the show. Below are 3 videos that consist of our whole set. Enjoy (And don't be too critical. We only had one week to learn everything).
Sunday, April 12, 2009
2 Months of Silence
While I've been too busy to keep my blog updated, life has been anything but slow. As I'm sure everyone knows, I'm married. I spent two weeks in Vietnam and Cambodia (that's right, a Holiday in Cambodia) with my beautiful wife and two weeks back on the East Coast of the USA visiting family and friends.
We've been back in Korea now for almost two weeks. Life here is good as usual. I promise to spend the time to upload honeymoon photos and stories very soon. Until then, you'll just have to wait :)
We've been back in Korea now for almost two weeks. Life here is good as usual. I promise to spend the time to upload honeymoon photos and stories very soon. Until then, you'll just have to wait :)
Friday, February 6, 2009
Life is Good
I spent Tuesday night at home folding wedding invitations with my fiancee....while watching The Terminator!! Nothing says "wedding prep." like a cyborg traveling back in time to kill the mother of its unborn enemy. I'm marrying the coolest chick in the world!
Thursday, January 29, 2009
설날 - Lunar New Year
That's right folks, in Korea it's called either "Lunar New Year" or "Asian New Year." Don't call it "Chinese New Year." People will get mad. It's not just theirs ;)
This was my first time as part of an Asian family during Lunar New Year. That made it slightly more enjoyable and A LOT more stressful. I spent all afternoon Saturday with Trash at Lotte Department Store. We had several important family engagements this weekend so my Mother-in-Law decided I needed to look my best. Since "looking my best" usually means an old sweater, jeans without holes and my windproof fleece, Trash's mom decided to buy me a suit and nice coat. This was a painful process. I don't wear clothes like this. Trash was getting pretty annoyed, but eventually we found a suit and coat that I liked.
I found the suit by accident. I needed to wear a suit jacket to fit on an ugly coat (that I didn't buy) so the salesman gave me a random jacket. I hated the coat, but liked that jacket so we bought it with the matching pants and a fitted shirt. Then we went downstairs, and I finally found a nice coat I liked. I saw it from across the store and loved it right away. Remember those black winter coats the SS wore during WWII? It looked like that but without the cool silver letters and eagle. We bought it.
We got home and were able to rest for a little bit but then had to get ready to go out. Pastor Robert's American Visa was finally approved, and he and Jenny only had 4 days left in Korea. To celebrate his time here, the entire church met at a nice restaurant. I wore half of my new suit, the top half...with ripped jeans and old sneakers on the bottom half. What can I say? Old habits die hard. We spent several hours having dinner followed by coffee. It was a nice way to say goodbye.
Sunday, I had to wear the whole suit. I met Trash and her mom at their church to be introduced to the pastor who is going to officiate our wedding. He was surprisingly nice and accommodating. I've had a hard time with Korean pastors. I don't usually find them to be very humble, but that's a whole nother story. Anyway, we were worried about what the pastor would say about our wedding. Koreans are very traditional, and we want to pick our favorite Korean traditions and American traditions and just throw them all together for our wedding. The pastor said that it was fine and to just do it however we want. Very nice and very surprising.
After we met him, we walked around outside the church. Trash's mom had her arm hooked on mine, was smiling and proudly introducing me to everyone saying, "우리 사위! (This is my son-in-law!)" Afterwards, she told me to stop calling her 장모님 (Mother-in-Law) and call her 엄마 (Mom). This isn't as common in Korea as you may think and really showed that she's completely accepted me into their family.
Monday was the big day. I had to cancel my snowboarding trip to spend the day, the actual New Year's Day, with Trash, her immediate family and some of her extended family. Part of the suit got its final ride for the weekend. Just the jacket though. Jeans, a Johnny Cash t-shirt, zipup hoodie and my new, expensive black suit jacket. I looked like me again! The worst part of meeting the family happened right away. Trash and her mom introduced me, and then, Trash and I had to bow to the older members of the family. I mean, the deep bow. The one where we hold our hands/arms in front of our faces parallel to the ground and bow until we're pretty much flat on the floor (Here's a side note for my Christian readers. No, this isn't any kind of Eastern Religion thing. Their whole family is Christian. It's just a sign of respect. Think of it as Asia's version of a really firm hand shake, calling someone "Sir" and paying for dinner all rolled into one.). So we bowed, ate lunch, which was FANTASTIC, and then just hung out for a few hours. It was pretty painless, and her family really liked me.
My favorite part of Monday came after we left the family. I told Trash that since she made me skip snowboarding, she finally had to keep an old promise and watch an episode of Lost with me. We watched the first episode and immediately watched two more. As of today, she's seen the first 8 episodes. She's hooked. That may not seem like a big deal, but it makes me happy :)
Tuesday was a simple day. I woke up at 4:30am and went snowboarding at High1, the best resort in Korea, with my buddy Joe. It was a pretty good day, and I'm definitely getting better at snowboarding.
So yeah, that was the 4 day weekend. It was a bit more hectic than I anticipated, but rather enjoyable. Chinese New Year is fun....uh, I mean Asian New Year. Yeah, Asian New Year. That's what it's called ;-)
This was my first time as part of an Asian family during Lunar New Year. That made it slightly more enjoyable and A LOT more stressful. I spent all afternoon Saturday with Trash at Lotte Department Store. We had several important family engagements this weekend so my Mother-in-Law decided I needed to look my best. Since "looking my best" usually means an old sweater, jeans without holes and my windproof fleece, Trash's mom decided to buy me a suit and nice coat. This was a painful process. I don't wear clothes like this. Trash was getting pretty annoyed, but eventually we found a suit and coat that I liked.
I found the suit by accident. I needed to wear a suit jacket to fit on an ugly coat (that I didn't buy) so the salesman gave me a random jacket. I hated the coat, but liked that jacket so we bought it with the matching pants and a fitted shirt. Then we went downstairs, and I finally found a nice coat I liked. I saw it from across the store and loved it right away. Remember those black winter coats the SS wore during WWII? It looked like that but without the cool silver letters and eagle. We bought it.
We got home and were able to rest for a little bit but then had to get ready to go out. Pastor Robert's American Visa was finally approved, and he and Jenny only had 4 days left in Korea. To celebrate his time here, the entire church met at a nice restaurant. I wore half of my new suit, the top half...with ripped jeans and old sneakers on the bottom half. What can I say? Old habits die hard. We spent several hours having dinner followed by coffee. It was a nice way to say goodbye.
Sunday, I had to wear the whole suit. I met Trash and her mom at their church to be introduced to the pastor who is going to officiate our wedding. He was surprisingly nice and accommodating. I've had a hard time with Korean pastors. I don't usually find them to be very humble, but that's a whole nother story. Anyway, we were worried about what the pastor would say about our wedding. Koreans are very traditional, and we want to pick our favorite Korean traditions and American traditions and just throw them all together for our wedding. The pastor said that it was fine and to just do it however we want. Very nice and very surprising.
After we met him, we walked around outside the church. Trash's mom had her arm hooked on mine, was smiling and proudly introducing me to everyone saying, "우리 사위! (This is my son-in-law!)" Afterwards, she told me to stop calling her 장모님 (Mother-in-Law) and call her 엄마 (Mom). This isn't as common in Korea as you may think and really showed that she's completely accepted me into their family.
Monday was the big day. I had to cancel my snowboarding trip to spend the day, the actual New Year's Day, with Trash, her immediate family and some of her extended family. Part of the suit got its final ride for the weekend. Just the jacket though. Jeans, a Johnny Cash t-shirt, zipup hoodie and my new, expensive black suit jacket. I looked like me again! The worst part of meeting the family happened right away. Trash and her mom introduced me, and then, Trash and I had to bow to the older members of the family. I mean, the deep bow. The one where we hold our hands/arms in front of our faces parallel to the ground and bow until we're pretty much flat on the floor (Here's a side note for my Christian readers. No, this isn't any kind of Eastern Religion thing. Their whole family is Christian. It's just a sign of respect. Think of it as Asia's version of a really firm hand shake, calling someone "Sir" and paying for dinner all rolled into one.). So we bowed, ate lunch, which was FANTASTIC, and then just hung out for a few hours. It was pretty painless, and her family really liked me.
My favorite part of Monday came after we left the family. I told Trash that since she made me skip snowboarding, she finally had to keep an old promise and watch an episode of Lost with me. We watched the first episode and immediately watched two more. As of today, she's seen the first 8 episodes. She's hooked. That may not seem like a big deal, but it makes me happy :)
Tuesday was a simple day. I woke up at 4:30am and went snowboarding at High1, the best resort in Korea, with my buddy Joe. It was a pretty good day, and I'm definitely getting better at snowboarding.
So yeah, that was the 4 day weekend. It was a bit more hectic than I anticipated, but rather enjoyable. Chinese New Year is fun....uh, I mean Asian New Year. Yeah, Asian New Year. That's what it's called ;-)
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