Jinbo's First Tourist...ME!

Considering that Ben comes to Daegu all the time, or we go other places around Korea on the weekends, I thought it was time to check out his "hood". 

He lives in a town called Jinbo, but he doesn't even teach here. He takes a bus to an even smaller village. At his school he has 40 or so kids. This is hard for me to imagine, because I have over 40 kids in just 2 of my classes! He knows all of his kid's names. Not just their English names either, he is learning all of their Korean names as well. 

I am jealous of many things about Ben's set up with school, but I can say that I am not jealous with his lovely little town. I grew up in a tiny town, where everyone knows your business, so when it came to deciding where to teach in Korea, I requested a metropolitan area. Ben also did, but his paperwork was later and first come first serve! 

So, I was put in Daegu, where I requested and Ben was put in Jinbo (he also had originally requested Daegu). Jinbo is a thirty minute bus ride past Andong. If you count the bus time it takes me to get to the express bus terminal, it's almost a 4 hour journey to get there! There are 4 foreigners, who all live in the same building and I met all of them! 

On Saturday, we took the bus to Andong. We met up with the other foreigners and went to pizza hut before going to the movies. I was nervous going to pizza hut in another country (because of the disaster in England), but I had been showing a commercial from Pizza Hut in the 80's and I really had been craving it! So we tried it! OMG! It was exactly what I needed! I'm pretty sure it was much better than Pizza Hut in the States! Salad bar was interesting to say the least! It was quite expensive, but when I reflect on it, it was one of those times with was worth it!

After pizza hut we went and watched the new "Hobbit" movie. I hadn't been to a movie yet in Korea! This was my first one, and also our first "real" date...ahahah! To be honest, I just wanted to look at New Zealand for a couple of hours! 

That evening after the movie, we went back to Jinbo and had a potluck with the rest of the foreigners in Ben's town and their Korean friend, HoJin. We made tacos, and I also had brought humus that I ordered online. It was kind of a miracle we could make the tacos. The ground beef was the most expensive I have seen in my life! We went to a butcher in Jinbo and I'm sure they gave us the leanest they had, since communication was minimal. It was 13,000 won for 1 pound, which is about $13. Needless to say, us foreigners don't eat a lot of ground beef, and when we do, we treasure it!

After dinner we played games. It was fun to meet new people and they were pretty cool! 

This is Ben's apartment building. Its really probably the tallest building in town and it is at the top of a hill that overlooks the town. His apartment is much nicer than mine... He has an awesome kitchen and a bedroom, like a separate room for his bed....That's unheard of in Daegu! :)

One of his local eateries. It was so small town. The colors of this place were a light blue/aqua and pink with clouds. It was really special, but the food was good...

The view from Ben's rooftop. I'm sure during different times of the year, it is quite beautiful. I'm also envisioning it very beautiful with fresh snow everywhere! :)