bridging cultures day 1

WoO! I’m finally back at the hotel. Today was a somewhat tiring day but I’ve learned quite a bit and I’m finally not so socially isolated anymore. Well, I woke up in a sweat because the heated bed was literally baking me, got ready, and left by 8 to Café Come On. Mr. Swift provided up with delicious strawberries but I didn’t want to seem like a pig so I refrained from eating a whole lot. We then headed to Yoo’s Family house and listened to this old guy’s lecture on Korea’s culture. The gist I got from it was that Koreans strive to be one with nature (circle, triangle, and square/ houses in between river and mountain to draw good energy), the history of the floor heating system (kitchen), and a story about a gentleman and his four wives. It was a little boring, some parts were redundant, and he was hard to understand. After the lecture, some high school students majoring in English came to read us some ancient poems and we were filmed! The show is going to air on EBS on 3/5/2010 so I’ll try to tune in on that and see my movie-star self lmao! Then, we made are own lunch. I owned in the veggie chopping and we had legit bulgogi and kimchi puncheon(sp?). We then went to some park/mountain thing and met some elementary school kids who were our tour guides when we were hiking. My guide was named Chelsea her English was REALLY, and I mean legit American-y good. I really miss her. She was so entertaining and educational. Thankfully, I got her contact information. She even said she wanted to give me a tour of a palace if I was going to stay there longer. We then went to Dongdaemun and looked around. I got my first taste of street food and I figured out I do not like street chicken, I do like to buy fuzzy socks, and it’s hard to find my shoesize (the biggest I can find is a little too tight for me).

Just got back from dinner and it was rather fun! The restaurant was set in the middle of a maze in Insadong but it was delicious~ I bought some postcards to mail as well. I’m so excited! I wanna mail em!

Also, we got a lot of questions answered by our resident coordinator and just had ridiculous conversations about random things. I basically love all the people in the program right now! I don't know, but we all just get along so easily. And we've only been hanging out for a day! Anyways, one of the delayed students arrived today and she seems nice. Gotta go borrow the guy’s internet (can't get it in my room for some reason) so I can post this! WWL!