Picking Persimmons...

We have a few persimmon trees on the school's property, and one of the 6th grade classes was chosen to picked these trees. I was asked to take pictures of them picking the persimmons.  These pictures were meant to go to a newspaper or maybe the DMOE newsletter, or maybe even both? I really don't always know what is being asked of me and why. I just do what I'm told after I figure out what they want me to do. 
The 6th grade class that was picked in actually my favorite class, so this was a treat to watch them do this. Also, I was curious how to pick persimmons anyways! They ended up getting a couple large boxes full of them!

Woonam School Festival...

Every year our school has a festival where each class performs something special and parents are invited to come and watch. It festival goes all day. Some teacher are very creative with the performance and others fall back on K-pop dances. Last year I remember many more dances, so I applaud the teachers for stepping up their game this year.

This year some of the classes went together and then let the kids decide what they participated in. This allowed for a really cool taekwando rountine/dance by some 4th grades. 6th grade also let the kids decide what they wanted to participate in. Some chose a dance, others a skit performance, and others singing.

I really love seeing the kids doing their talents. Some of the most shy speakers and lowest level students really light up on a stage. It just goes to show that everyone has different talents and abilities, but you can usually find something that you are naturally good at.

My co-teacher, Ms. Nam has a daughter in the 1st grade and her class did a traditional Korean dance and all of the students were wearing hanbok and traditional clothes. It was so cute and she was VERY professional and serious about her dance! CUTE! :)

There is a bit of a strange tradition for these school festivals... Outside of the schools, people set up tables to sell candy arrangements. Most are made out of tulle and fluffy stuff and have an arrangement of suckers in the middle. Parents buy these and after their kids perform they give them to them. The kids instantly rip off the fluffy stuff (and toss it aside) to find the important stuff- the candy! There were also personalized little banners that had kid's names and pictures of them on a form board #1 finger sign. Candy was also attached to these as well... This causes to them completely not pay attention to the classes actually performing because they are looking at their candy, inspecting their candy, sharing their candy, and eating their candy...

 

Another thing they they do on this day is hang up the student's artwork. I got a kick looking at the younger grades artwork knowing full well that the parents actually made them. Some of the stuff was better than the 5th and 6th graders and they are allowed to bring them from home... hmmm...

The best fire in the sky...Busan firework festival 2014!

One of the things that I looked forward to in my second year in Korea was doing the Busan Firework Festival...correctly. When I say correctly, I mean getting a great seat and able to see the fireworks...
Last year, we underestimated the amount of Koreans that go to this festival. (over 1 million) We got there shortly before the fireworks and quickly learned that we would NOT be seeing all the fireworks, as we would be standing to the side of them and fighting for viewspots with the savvy elderly Koreans! That being said, I extremely enjoyed last years fireworks, and was amazed beyond words...
This year we took a different approach. We were in the "know" this year. We got to Busan around 2:30 and we split our group of 14 up. Half of us went to the hostel to check in and take our stuff. The other half went directly to the beach to stake out a great spot. There they laid down our mats, and got their elbows out.
After checking into the hostel, the rest of us made our way to the beach. There we had 5 hours or so of hanging out. We played some cards and chatted. The time went fast because the weather was AMAZING- 75 degrees with a shining sun. We couldn't have asked for a better day.
The best part about getting there early is not having to compete for your spot as much. We had plenty of room for our group. We were about 20 feet from the start of the beach. The people that were behind us and closer to the road were having to hold much stronger for their spot. Not many people were gutsy enough to bring their mat way up to the front knowing that those people had been there a long time. Only the ajummas were brave enough, and that is because they don't care about anything/ anyone. One lady brought her 6 foot square mat and put it down in a 1 foot space...How you might ask? Well, she spread it evenly over 4 other people mats, taking their space. No one said anything....I would have like to see her pull that on us. Foreigners act a little different to rude people...no matter their age.
At 8:00, the fireworks started and they kept going for the next 45 minutes to 1 hour. This year we could hear the music much better and it was obvious the fireworks were timed with the music. They even had some English music. It was really great!
Again, after the fireworks, we hung around the area and ate, and didn't try to navigate the metro. The people who went last year were trying to express the madness to the new people, but it was just hard to convey the craziness!
I highly recommend going to this festival, but for your sake- do some research so that you survive the madness!

This person in front of me was face-timing with a girlfriend because she couldn't come. Cute!

Sports Day 2014...

Every year there is a sports day in all of the schools in Korea. Last year, our school was meant to have one, but the ferry disaster happened only a few week prior, so our sports day was cancelled. Many other schools did the same thing.

Instead, they scheduled a smaller one in the fall. This meant that this was the first time I got to witness the sports day festivities. Well most of them- apparently on a normal sports day, it is bigger and the 1st graders do a performance of some kind. Every teacher gets to help in some way and for this day I was on the official paper to be the photographer! I wanted to take pictures anyways! :)

To start the event off all of the students stand on the field and listen to the Principal, and Vice Principal give a speech. Next they perform group stretches that are put to music and a recorded voice saying "hai, hu, hou, ho" in a four count rhythm. All of the stretches are lead to that rhythm. It's actually quite entertaining the stretches that they do. One reminded me of reaching starts and then rowing to get to them.

Once they are all warmed up for the event....they sit down. This is because there are around 1000 students on the field so they have to take their turn with their grades. Each grade gets to do a sprint, and a game. The fastest and best runner or each class also compete in a relay race. The younger kids do what I would consider a 50 meter race, and the older grades do a 100 meter race.

As the student would cross the finish line, each student was given a stamp on their hand with the place that they finished in their heat. I didn't understand why they would do this, but I later heard that each different place would get different things as a reward. So first place would get 5 notebooks and second would get 3 and so on. This provided motivation for the kids.

Oh! - I was also given this nifty white gloves to make me look "official". All teachers got them... I was excited about them because I was looking for white gloves just like this for my Halloween costume! SCORE!

Here are some fun pictures from the day!

For the relay races the school was split into 2 teams, blue and white, so that the kids had someone to cheer for even if their grade wasn't racing! This helped them pay attention a little more and cheer other on.

Sports day lasted until about noon when they had the closing ceremony and were sent on their way. As you can see the weather was beautiful and amazing and it really was a great day. I'm glad I finally got to witness the legendary "Sports Day"!

Cupcake Decorating...

  

Our friend Abbi had a birthday and invited us to go decorate cupcakes with her. This cupcake place, Kingscups Cake Studio, in downtown Daegu was across the street from our board game cafe was it was easy to find. I had never heard of it, but Abbi had been wanting to go.
None of us had been before, so it took awhile for us to understand the procedure. This is what we discovered...

#1. You get 4 cupcakes for 10,000. They are 4 different flavors. When we went there were- strawberry, almond, chocolate chip, and cappuccino. You place your order at the counter, but you don't pay until the end.

#2. With these 4 cupcake flavors, you get two piping bags of "whipped" icing. This was similar to whipped cream. You must get white (vanilla) as one of your flavors, and then you also can pick another flavor. There were about 8 different ones to choose from. We picked mint!

#3. Then you go to another counter that is full of add-ons. There are sugar letters/numbers, sprinkles, colored sugar, chocolate shavings, gel icing, and much more. You take what you want on a separate plate and begin your decorating. They are all individually priced!

#4. Decorate your cupcakes. Do what you want. Ben and I tried to use ALL of our whipped icing so to not waste any! This made my cupcakes very tall! ahah

#5. When you are finished, you take the cupcakes to the counter and the cashier adds up all of the add-ons that you used and then you pay for it all together at this time. Our cupcakes were still under 13,000 won and it was a lot of fun making them.

I will admit that some of the flavor combos were a little odd, but the frostings were not that strong, so it didn't make too much of a difference. The lady working was very kind, and as we were leaving we figured out that we had intimidated her quite a bit and so she called her friend who was better at English in case we had any issues. How cute! 

Busy at work...

The concentration needed to make cupcakes is insane! :) Maria and Ben definitely have that concentration down! I slightly wish that we could have gotten different piping tips, but in reality that would be insane and a ton of dishes and washing on the part of the owners! I understand why that doesn't happen. I guess I am just missing the ease of baking/cooking  in America. It is so much harder to do anything cooking-wise in Korea. I mean, my oven only fits 6 cupcakes at a time...

These are my two finished products. Nothing too fancy or over the top. Luckily, we were able to share and swap different icings to achieve different colors.

We started out having a contest for the best cupcake, but we never really finished that. We ended up just having fun and making what we wanted to make. Stefanie made a few cupcakes that were inspired by her hedgehog, Noname! I'll have to admit- they were pretty cool and creative. Personally, I wasn't as inspired with one frosting color....ahah! Stef won...

The cupcakes below are Abbi's- hence the "2" and "4" birthday candles! :) 

Happy Birthday Abbi!