First, Happy Thanksgiving everyone! It is the official start of the holiday season. I'm sure most people back home are getting ready, at this time, to hit the stores for the Black Friday shopping day! I think back to last year, when I was working at Kohl's and had to be there for all the shoppers. I can't believe that was already a year ago! That thought makes me feel better about how fast time flies and how soon it will be when I get to come home and see all my fabulous family members and friends!
Thanksgiving in Korea started out as a normal day. I woke up dreading getting out of my bed, as usual. Turned on my electric heater and began my morning routine. I didn't even realize it was Thanksgiving until my parents texted me to tell me that it wasn't the same without me there. Mostly because Jenna helped prepared the Thanksgiving food and I'm pretty sure she put up a fight for tofu-turkey. Anyway, I had no plans for a big meal until I went to school and my two fellow American teachers suggested making a dinner from any food we could scrape up from our apartments. Well, let me tell you all that we made the most amazing meal I have had in very, very long time. We made chicken, garlic mashed potatoes, corn, cooked carrots, pomegranites, salad, bread rolls, and finished with warm brownies, cookies, ice cream and nutella to top it off. Four of the foreign teachers and myself sat around the food and talked, ate, and laughed for hours. It definitely wasn't home, with family and football, but it was my own Korean Thanksgiving.
Now for an update on the past month. I started November by getting the delightful pink eye infection. I went to 3 Korean doctors and all of them looked at me and went "Ohhh so very very bad!" I was taking a pile of antibiotics and putting 4 different eye drops in my eye. The infection lasted for 2 weeks and I was forced by my boss to take a week off work. If there is any job that you cannot afford to take time off of, it's this one. My monthly plan is all confused and I am barely making my deadlines which is not a good thing. I am neurotic (as you all know) about being timely and organized and this is just not ok! Luckily, I have been able to catch up with everything, but I've been spending 10-12 hours a day here for the last two weeks just to make up for my missed time. When I returned, I sarcastically thanked my students for giving me pink eye. They just looked at me confused and go "uh, you're welcome Teacher." Other than that, I am very excited because I have tickets to another K-Pop concert next weekend! This is the biggest concert of the year with about 8 different artists performing! I have suckered my roommate into coming and I'm getting her pumped up for it. I will definitely have pictures of the concert and perhaps me on the floor after fainting. We'll see :)
I need to address the world news that has come out of Korea this past week. As everyone already knows, the North and South are playing tag with their missles and gunfire. As an observer from inside the country, I have to say that I'm not too worried. Why? Because all the Korean teachers and Korean people that I know aren't worried. When they start freaking out, is when I'll start freaking out. Granted, this is the first physical attack since the Korean War, but I am not in harms way! I have contacted the U.S. Embassy and they are in the process of sending me information and an escape route if needed. Right now, we are all going about our lives as usual and keeping an eye on the crazies up North!
Well, back to class. Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday! Love and miss you all!
