Welcome to Ilsan - New Home/New Blog Name

Well I am back in Korea after a lovely long holiday back in New Zealand and I have officially moved from Suwon to Ilsan.  This means that I have to update my blog name from 'kiwigirl in Suwon' to 'kiwigirl in Ilsan', I am not going to update the address as I think that would be too confusing.

I moved a few weeks ago now and have just been settling into my new apartment and getting used to a new school.  While I am still with the same company, each branch has it's own way of doing things so there is always a learning curve. 

So far Ilsan is Ok, it seems more suburban than Suwon however and there are loads of bikes around on the footpaths. The city seems to be trying to encourage their use by making them available for hire all round the city. It's just annoying because they are on the sidewalk so you risk getting run over every day.  I would not mind so much if they were on the roads.

I'm trying to keep an open mind about Ilsan but so far I miss Suwon, I'm sure things will get better once I learn my way around and meet some people.

I've been a bit slack for a long while on the blogging front.  I will try and post a bit more over the coming weeks as I get out and explore Ilsan.

Korea in the News #6

Hmmmm should I be worried about coming back to Korea - my family is getting a bit anxious as I fly back in the second week of April.

North Korea declares war on South Korea

The last few Weekends - Itaewon and Insa-dong

I have not really had a chance to post much recently, I'm still trying to sort out all the details for when I go home and my upcoming move when I get back to Korea in April. That being said I have been meaning to do a blog post from last weekend and now that this weekend is almost over I figured I would just combine them and make one post.

Itaewon

Last weekend was actually Seollal (Hangul: 설날) - or Korean New Year. This means we had the Monday off after the weekend for a nice long weekend.  I didn't do much but I did go to Seoul on Monday to meet a friend for lunch in Itaewon. She was a bit late so I ended up going to 'What the Book?' English bookstore to wait for her. I got a book and a magazine, I pretty much never leave there empty handed.

I was meeting a Korean friend that I met while doing a camp, she was my co-teacher and we got along really well.  We decided that we should meet up and enjoy some delicious food - she likes western food more than Korean food so we are on the same page.

We went to Suji's, it's a place I've heard was good but also that it is super busy, especially on the weekends.  The only time I've been going to go there with friends a while back it was way to long of a wait for a table so we went elsewhere. On Monday there was only a short wait, some of the places were not open due to the holiday so it was good that Suji's was.

It was really nice, everything came quickly and it was simple but well prepared and tasty.  I had a cheeseburger that came with wedges and a coleslaw - the coleslaw was a bit more heavy on the sauce than I ideally like but that would probably be my only complaint if I had to make one.

 

I would definitely recommend Suji's if you are looking for some nice basic western (American) food, however it is busy so if you don't like waiting in line you might like to have a backup plan.

 

 

 

How to get there:

You can use either Itaewon Station or Noksapyeong as a landmark for this restaurant, but it is closer to Noksapyeong Station. If you are coming from Itaewon Station you have to walk all the way down the main street  - past McDonald's, past Santorini Greek Restaurant and when the road turns left around the corner Suji's is on your left just round the corner a bit., if you follow the sidewalk you should find it no problem. The picture above is what the outside looks lik -  once you get inside, the restaurant is up the stairs.

 

I also took the opportunity while in Itaewon to visit the Foreign Food Mart, I have spoken about this one in previous posts. It's all the way down the other side of Itaewon from Suji's but I had not been for a while and wanted to grab some stuff to take to work with me as I will be leaving soon. My friend had never been before so she was interested in seeing what they had, she lived in America for a while and was happy to find a few treats of things she enjoyed over there.

 

                                                                               I got a few things, Salt and Vinegar crisps, a Cadbury chocolate bar and two packets of Tim Tams to take to work - I also got some banana/chocolate sweets from Holland that looked interesting. These are my goodies from the trip - a good haul I think.

                                                                               It was sooooo cold after that that we had to go to a cafe to warm up, we went to Jubilee Cafe which is just outside exit 3 of Itaewon Station on the corner.  I've mentioned this one before in a previous post about Itaewon as it is a pretty nice place. It's a chocolate cafe and they do several kinds of hot chocolate (among other things), last time I just had a classic one but I was a bit more adventurous this time and had a blueberry flavoured one.  It was nice, very sweet though.

 

 

Insa-dong

 

This weekend I went to Insa-dong. Insa-dong is a neighborhood in Seoul where there is a real mix of the traditional and the modern. It's well know for sightseeing, antiques and art gallerys.

 

A friend of one of my friends will be leaving Korea soon and wanted to get some souvenirs - of course where is the best place for this? Insa-dong. I decided to tag along as I have a trip home at the end of the month and figured I could do with a few pressies to take with me.

 

Above and below are some pictures I took of Insa-dong, the souvenir shops, street food and hole in the wall vendors make up the majority of what you can find on the main road of Insa-dong.

 

 

Insa-dong is always so crowded, it's a real tourist destination. There is always lots going on, sometimes there will be music or performances (like the in the photos below).

 

 

There are also heaps of street vendors selling jewelry, wooden crafts and other various items. This one sells ice cream in the long tubes (pictured) which seems really popular, even in the middle of winter.

 

 

It was really really cold on Saturday, I find that the best places to shop are the big centers that have lots of different sellers all together in one store. You can find all the things you need in these and it's warmer than walking from one store to the next. I got a few of my things from this one and I have purchased stuff from here before too. They have decent items at a reasonable price.

 

 

I manged to get a few final souvenirs so all in all it was a good day out in Insa-dong.



Korea in the News #5

Korea was again in the news, this article highlights one of the problems that as foreigners we see here in South Korea constantly.  The attitude towards animals is really low, I think a lot of it comes from the fact that they are just not educated on how to interact with animals.  There are not many wild ones left and pets are expensive so many people don't have them.  It means that they just don't know how to deal with animals and the emotional connection is lacking. 

Burning dog sparks public outcry in S. Korea

One of my good friends (a lovely, educated woman who is a mother and principle of a private school) was telling me how she was once (a long time ago) given some baby rabbits from a boyfriend and she put them in her handbag to carry around.  They of course died and she was very sad - I could not believe that someone could be so silly.  Of course they died, they are fragile creatures  - who in their right mind would put them in their handbag?  But the thing is, as I came to realise, she did not know that  - she had never had an animal before, had no experience with animals and had no idea what to do or how to look after them. What I and many of us would see as basic common sense just did not apply sadly.

The New Year - 2013

So this is a little late, being as it's over halfway through the first month of the New Year but hey, better late than never.

So Happy New Year to everyone, I hope you are sticking to your New Year resolutions.

I have not posted much lately as I've been pretty busy and with the holiday period everything always gets behind.  I did a couple of English Camps in other cities, one over Christmas and then one this past week gone.  I don't think I will be doing that again for a while, I always come home sick.  It is a good way to make some money however as they usually pay pretty well and you stay there for a week with room and board so you don't spend any money in that time.  I'm going home for a friends wedding in March and will be staying for about a month and a half so some extra money was needed.

When I come back in April it looks like I will no longer be in Suwon, this presents difficulties in that I named my blog - 'kiwigirl in Suwon' and made that the url as well.  I, of course, was not thinking long term at the time of creation. So it might become a bit confusing but we will see how it turns out.

I won't be doing the Music Mondays for a while, I might start again after I get back in April but everything is going to be pretty hectic so I will just post when I can.

Music Monday #25

This week's Music Monday is a Korean Ska band called Copy Machine.  They are the other band that I did not get to see the other night at the gig I went to. I did stay for one of their songs and it sounded pretty good so I would have liked to have seen their whole set. Unfortunately I had to get a bus home so was unable to stay any longer.

They have a great lively ska sound and judging from the one song that I did see I think they would be a pretty entertaining show.

Copy Machine - Okie Dokie

ESL Teaching Tips #3 - The Magic Hat

This is not so much a teaching tip as a teaching resource and it is one of my absolute favorites. It's called the 'The Hat' and it's a software programme that randomly selects names out of a virtual hat - no muss, no fuss.

Every month my students have to do a presentation where they talk for a minute or two about one of the subjects we have studied.  In some classes I have all the kids wanting to be first and in others I have none of them wanting to.  Even doing a rhyme choosing poem sometimes does not really work out well, 'The Hat' programme will solve all these issues.  You can type the names into it as you go or you can do it before hand and then just load the list from a saved file, you can also pick pairs of names so if you have a class that does not like to pair up this will also work great. 

I like it because the kids can't argue with it or blame anyone, if they say it's not fair I just point at the computer and say - 'the computer picked it, not me' and this pretty much stops any arguments.  As an added bonus it's also a bit of fun, the kids like trying to guess whose name will come out each time the hat draws a name. I keep it on my flash drive -  it's just a small programme, and that way I have it with me which ever class I am in. It's got to the point where the kids ask for it now, it's nice to have a positive start to something most of them don't like to do.

The programme is called 'The Hat' and is from Harmony Hollow Software.  You can find it here and best of all it's free.