Rakhi: No doubt everyone’s heard about the ongoing events across the border. Has Kim Jong Il apologized for the atomic weapons testing? Hasn’t he? Will there be more testing? Will America impose more pressure on North Korea? Who knows? Although some of our friends here (foreigners and Koreans) are concerned, I’m not too worried about it. I think the DPRK is simply trying to demonstrate its nuclear capabilities in order to frighten the US. Having said that, I did get a fright a few days after the nuclear testing; about 10 minutes before the end of one of my classes a really loud siren and announcement went off around my school. I had no idea what the announcement was as it was all in Korean but from the look on the grade 3 kids faces it seemed pretty shocking. My co-teacher explained that it was just a practice drill in the event of a nuclear bomb. Apparently, these drills are regular across the country but it had never been tested it in my school as it hadn’t seemed necessary- until now.

Last weekend we went to The Kimchi Museum. Korean’s really are crazy about this stuff, it’s eaten with breakfast, lunch and dinner; no meal is complete without it! Kimchi is a traditional Korean dish of fermented chilli peppers and vegetables, usually based on Chinese cabbage. Joel’s mum hated it when she came over. It is an acquired taste and I have to admit that I didn’t particularly like it (NEVER utter these words to Korean’s, they will be very offended - kimchi is their pride and joy!) when I first arrived. Now however, I have developed a taste for it and whilst I can’t imagine eating it for breakfast, it’s great with Korean lunches and dinners. The Kimchi Museum is basically a shrine to kimchi. It charts the history of the pickle (which has been around since ‘prehistoric’ times apparently!), shows how it’s made and stored and tells about regional and seasonal differences. The museum also details the health benefits of eating kimchi which is supposedly one of the world's "five healthiest foods." It’s rich in vitamins, aids digestion, keeps you slim, controls cholesterol and may even prevent cancer. No wonder it’s regarded as a super food; modern medicine should be scrapped and the whole world put on a compulsory kimchi diet! Joel’s favourite part of the museum was the ‘tasting room’ which was made up of 4 different types of kimchi. He really believed it was comparable to Willy Wonka’s tasting room so gave it more attention and praise than it deserved. He was gobbling up the kimchi like it was flavour changing bubblegum!

The temperature has really dropped here in the last few days. Although the sun’s still shining everyday, it’s started to get bitterly cold and windy. Only two weeks ago I was wandering around in shorts and T-shirts but over the last couple of days I’ve been covered head to toe and wearing my coat. Because of the limited weight allowance on the way over here, Joel and I bought so few warm clothes with us therefore the onset of winter has been a good excuse to go shopping! The weekend before last, we discovered a shop called ‘Kosney’s’ in Myeogdong which is amazing for staple items and funky, unique clothes. It’s a cross between Urban Outfitters and Topshop only better and cheaper! Joel found a brand new Adidas tracksuit top for less than ₤20 and I bought two jumpers and two pairs of trousers for ₤30! Bargains! I better be careful though or I’ll need a small fleet to ship all the belongings I’m gathering back home!

This weekend, Joel and I are going to a Korean wedding! One of the teacher’s from my school is getting married and we’ve been invited! Hani, the teacher who is getting married told me today that Joel are the only non-Korean’s out of 500 guests who have been invited. It’s quite an honour really; I’m very excited. In general, giving gifts in Korea is not as formal as other countries. For example, over chuseok it is acceptable and common place to pass on a gift that was bought for you. For weddings, people don’t give gifts but instead give the bride and groom cash. This is the same for birthdays and funerals. Although gift-giving is informal, there is etiquette to observe when doing it. For Hani's wedding, I was thinking that it would be okay to put the cash in with a nice card but apparently this is rude. Thankfully, my co-teacher has printed out the correct wedding envelope in which the money should be placed in. It has 'congratulations' written in Chinese characters on the front and my name in Korean on the back. Thank goodness she checked with me or I might have lost some face!

Joel: It seems the big chill is now upon us. Only two weeks ago we were out in T-shirts and sunnies and now even a jumper isn't enough. On Monday, I pulled out my coat and now wear it every day. We've turned on the ondol (underfloor) heating at home and I know this is only the beginning. A few years ago it reached -50 on a freakish winter's day in Korea. I don't think I'm quite prepared for that, but it is getting pretty chilly here already.

I know I've been a bit slack with the blog but I needed a bit of a rest after the work I put into the play and I've been busy again most nights this week. The Arts Festival at my school last Thursday was a really interesting event. Most of the 30 classes (each with 40 kids) had prepared some kind of performance or display and the typically Korean result was a day of logistical chaos. We'd worked pretty hard on Bugsy Malone and I was really pleased that the kids involved really seemed to enjoy themselves, as did the audience of students, teachers and parents. There were plenty of traditional and modern dances and songs, as well as drumming, a magic show and a group of parents doing one of those dances where you represent the music with your hands, like in 'Napoleon Dynamite' - it made me laugh. The opening of the day was also pretty memorable. After an short speech by the principal and the introduction of some special guests, the first group of dancers took to the stage. I've long known that although many Koreans enjoy western pop music, they don't always understand the lyrics so I wasn't completely surprised that, when the music kicked in, the first lyric was "I - LIKE - BIG - BUTTS AND I CANNOT LIE!!!" I must have been the only person there who understood. I put my head in my hands. Suberb.

There were no problems with the Bugsy performance. I felt like John Welshman (a drama teacher of mine) as I gave them some final notes before they went on (enjoy it! etc.). For the first time there was water in the guns and shaving foam on the plates and the result was a lot of mess and a lot of smiling faces. I've since been told by a Korean teacher that no-one had seen anything like it - which was kind of my idea. Korean school plays are usually fairy stories, in fact, one class did cinderella as part of the festival. So, on the whole I'd say it was a great success, and I hope maybe I can get some extra time off at Xmas as a result. I'm just happy now to have my lunchtimes and free periods back. I'll put some photos of the day up.

I've been informed that I'm required to compete in an inter-school sports competion. It's not a request, it's a requirement. I'd be well up for it if it was football (I honestly almost wrote 'soccer' then. That's the effect of teaching Americanised English every day!) or even basketball, which is quite big here. Trouble is, it's volleyball and running. I'm not bad at running now I've got myself in decent knick, but I've never played volleyball in my life. I get the feeling great things are expected for two reasons. One - I'm young. It's an all male event and all but one of the other teachers are over forty. I'm not saying they must therefore be rubbish, I'm sure my dad would be superb, but I've seen the size of some of their waistlines. The second reason is that my friend Ryan had to compete in this thing a while back and he's now a bit of a celebrity in the area. This is partly because he played a lot of Volleyball in Canada and starred as his school won the area title and partly because most Korean folk mispronouce his name as Lyon, so very quickly a local myth grew about this incredible Volleyball player from Canada who they call "The Lion". I might have to ask him for some tips.

Apparently, the computer system in the room next to mine at school has broken down so, luckily for me, it's been turned into a table-tennis room. I've been itching to play since I found out and last period today the Home Ec. teacher (whose idea it was) came in and asked me if I'd like to play. Would I! She became my doubles partner in a game against an older male member of the maintenence staff and a young lad who kind of works as an assistant to the principal, one of the few ways military service can be avoided. There's nothing like literally beating someone at their own game so I was chuffed we came from 1-0 down to a storming 3 sets to 1 victory. They all used the eastern-style serve and could chop the ball with incredible spin. I suppose we just had the better luck. Either that, or they were thrown by my deceptively slow serve and straight-as-arrows shots. I hope no face was lost.

If the weather's nice on Saturday we're going to go hiking in the hills of Bukansan and on Sunday we have a wedding to attend. Should be a fun weekend.

Rakhi: My first Chuseok in Korea was great and having Joel’s parents over made it even more special. After having the first Friday of their arrival off to recuperate and acclimitise to Korean time, Ann and David embarked on the ‘Rakhi and Joel Tour of Seoul’ It was great to re-visit some of the places that Joel and I have already been to but it was even better to get out and explore more.

On the same day that we went on the Han River cruise, we stopped by Seonyudo Park which until that morning, neither Joel nor I even knew existed. Seonyudo Park was originally used as a sewage treatment plant but transformed into a park in 2004. It’s in the middle of the Han River and is connected to the Yanghwa area of Seoul by a visually striking bridge made of environmentally friendly wood. Within the park, there is a greenhouse, botanical gardens, a river history museum and art gallery and cafes. The park was a great discovery and made me realise just how many unknown and undiscovered areas there are in this ginormous city.

Also on our tour was Namdaemun which is Korean for "Large South Gate." It is a historic gate in the southern part of the old city of Seoul and is also the entrance to Namdaemun Market, one of the oldest and largest traditional outdoor markets in South Korea. The market was enormous and it seemed that the number of people there could equal the whole of the population of Manchester! It was very crowded and very overwhelming! At Namdaemun like so many market places in Korea, there were lots of vendors selling the popular snack ‘beondegi’ which are steamed or boiled silkworm pupae which are seasoned and eaten. The stench of these things is unbearable; I really don’t know how anyone can eat them, but each to their own.

Although Joel and I had no time to work out at the gym whilst Ann and David were here, we still got plenty of exercise walking around the city and up and down stairs. A particularly gruelling day out was spent on a walking tour of Inwangsan, a shamanist hillside village in Seoul. Our guide book has this tour down as ‘a short uphill walk,’ so we were all surprised to discover that it was actually ALL uphill! The village has Seoul’s most famous shamanist shrine, small Buddhist temples and if you scramble up some rocks like we did, you can see part of the Seoul fortress wall. It was very peaceful walking around the village and there were very few people there. Apart from some monks doing some maintenance, a Canadian guy and his mother and a few Koreans hiking up the hill, we were the only people around. There were lots of traditional Korean houses and brightly coloured temples but more fascinating were the hidden crevices which serve as shrines for shamanist deities. Just walking around, we stumbled on lots of them with remnants of past offerings such as rice cakes, fruit, water and also wax from candles lit during the various ceremonies. It’s hard to believe that such a spiritual, tranquil place exists in the middle of one of the most built up cities in the world.

Ingwangsan wasn’t the only quiet place over Chuseok; our area was quieter than usual, as people had travelled back to their home towns to be with relatives. Chuseok is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month and is the harvest season after the harsh toiling of farming in spring and summer. Korean people take this time to thank their ancestors for providing them with a good harvest of rice and fruit. On the morning of Chuseok, people offer cooked rice, soju and "songpyeon" (rice cakes), to their ancestors to thank them for their blessings of a good harvest. Another ritual is visiting ancestors' tombs to pay respects and repair any damage. The Chuseok holiday almost felt like Christmas what with seeing all the special gifts displayed in shops and everybody dressed in their finery. Although Joel’s gift of Spam was the definite winner of best ‘Chuseok Gift 2006,’ lots of the gifts in Home Plus could have been close contenders. Who wouldn’t appreciate an elaborately wrapped gift set of soap and toothpaste or beef or frozen fish (which cost over 100 quid by the way)?! Having the traditional Chuseok dinner bought over to our apartment was a wonderful surprise. We’ll certainly be returning the favour with Christmas dinner with plenty of sprouts and stuffing!

Also over Chuseok, we saw a celebration performance at the National Centre for Korean Traditional Performing Arts. There were various performances including a folk music recital, a farmer’s dance like the one we saw at the Folk museum the day before and the dance, ‘Ganggangsulae.’ It’s a dance where in the evening girls and women wear their favorite hanbok and dance under the bright Chuseok full moon in a large circle. Groups of girls form a circle and start moving clockwise and then counterclockwise around a solo singer who dances and sings in the center of the circle. It’s presumed that the dance originated during the Japanese invasion when women danced around fires in the evening to make the Japanese invaders believe there were plenty of soldiers in the area.

Now we’re back to school and we don’t have another holiday until Christmas Day. We’ve been spoiled so far with at least one national holiday falling every month and of course having a whole week off for Chuseok. It’s going to be tough!

I’ll be posting some pictures off the last week and half on the Webshots sight soon- keep your eyes peeled. In the meantime, feast your eyes on this beauty…!

Joel: Luckily, my folks didn't bring the weather with them - quite the opposite - for the ten days they were here it was like mid-summer all over again. Temperatures were up to 27 degrees and I didn't see a single cloud until yesterday when Rakhi and I travelled with them to the airport through a haze of fog. Perfect timing! I'm pretty sure they enjoyed thier time here, although after over a week of exploring the fourth biggest city in the world they seemed pretty exhausted, as was I.

We managed to do so much. Rakhi and I enthusiastically took on the roles of tour guides and set out to ensure my mum and dad got to experience some of the best things we've discovered here, as well as some of the things we haven't got around seeing/doing yet. We returned to the tower and places like Insadong and Dongdaemun for the markets. We visited the palaces at Deoksugung and Changdeokgung (which was particularly impressive), the Jogyesa Buddhist temple and the Korean Folk Villiage in Suwon. We took a cruise down the river in gorgeous sunshine and my dad and I watched a particularly good but ultimately disappointing match at the World Cup Stadium (it finished 2-2). We had loads of great meals, the most noteworthy being at a tiny Morroccan place we discovered in Itaewon and a very generous gift from some of our neighbours:

The mother who approached us months ago about helping her son with his English sent both her sons round with a tray of traditional Korean Chuseok food for us - beef ribs, savoury pancakes, ricecakes and chestnuts. Chuseok is the traditional Korean thanksgiving - it's such a huge thing here and the reason we had four days of national holidays in a row. The gift was such a lovely gesture I was blown away. I had received two other Chuseok gifts but neither had been such an incredible surprise. The day before my parents came my principal asked me what fruit I liked. When I thoughtlessly replied I was quite partial to strawberries ( impossible to get in Korea) he asked if I liked Korean pears which are enormous things, about the size of melons. They might even be Korea's national fruit, I'm not sure. I said I did and on Sunday morning we received a big box containing twenty of these things - four of which have now been passed on to the Korean family who brought round the food, as a thank you. The other present I received is even more bizarre, it's beyond a joke. Think of the food item you would least want to receive as a present. Okay, what is it.? What's the first thing that comes into your head? Right, I bet I can top it. How would you feel about being presented with a gift box of Spam. Yes, Spam - that second-world-war favorite. It must have arrived here with the Americans in the fifties and set up shop because for some reason people love it here! It was given to me by my school for Chuseok. I think the other teachers get bonuses but not little old me. Still, as I sit back, chewing on my Spam fritters, I can smile to myself and remember the old adage - "only when all the Spam in the world has been eaten will people begin to realise - you can't eat money!" Ha!

Anyway, it was brilliant to have my parents here to stay. I said to them when they arrived that after putting up with me for so many years they had better make themselves at home. They asked if this meant they had to break everything and stain the floor with red wine and sick and I said no, it didn't. I think just being out with them on visits though meant I took an extra moment to take things in and see things I may have passed by otherwise. We definitely made the best possible use of the week and I will miss them now they're gone. I'm sure Rakhi will put some photos up soon.

Now I have to focus on this stupid play I've agreed to do. On return to school today I realised the arts festival is in ten days. I reckon I've got just about enought time if we can get all the sound recorded and finish the dances by the end of the week, which is still quite a tall order. I know it's only a fifteen minute kids play - I just don't want it to be rubbish.