So my night last night was certainly an interesting one. The exams finish and I head out for the hike. There are 6 of us going. Mr. Pak, who is the Ethics teacher that has befriended me, Mr Ham who is the 3rd year of middle school English teacher and then 3 others that I haven’t really met yet. The female teachers all went home to look after the children while the males and I went out to play. Well when Korean say hike they mean hike. We drive for about 30 minutes till we finally find the entrance of the hike and start to go up and I mean UP. I’m thinking holy crap this is steep it should start leveling out soon. But I am wrong. So I start to wonder where are the switchbacks? (zig zag paths up steep terrain) but none are coming. As more and more profanity enters my brain and I start cursing the fact that this is my 4 hike in 3 days, I start to wonder if Koreans even know about switchbacks. Then as we get to slight crest I think thank goodness we have reached a resting point, only to see another mountain ahead of me. Once I realize there is more a worse feeling hits my stomach. The Koreans aren’t stopping. Not even for 5 seconds. They keep going. WHAT?!?!?! So it dawns on me why they don’t have switchbacks: Koreans are part mountain goat.
Now I’m not the most incredible hiker but I’m not bad, but I felt like the laziest, weakest thing in the world (at least I wasn’t the worse in the group). Sufficient to say with a 30 minute lunch we climbed over 600m of elevation in under 2 hours. The view was incredible and I’m glad I went but man, am I sore today.
Well, you’d think that that was enough adventure for one day but no, that would be too easy. We get back down and meet up with the other male teachers who had gone fishing. They start to prepare dinner. Ahhh just as it should be: the female sits on her ass while the men prepare food around her . Well the thing about Korean men is that they like to drink and the thing about dinner is that’s when you drink. So out comes an entire case of soju (tastes like a combination of homemade vodka and rubbing alcohol). Now Korean men are serious about their drinking (kinda like the Russians). There is a whole ritual into drinking and pouring soju. Well they start giving me some and well let’s just say thank goodness I’m not a lightweight. I keep telling them no but they insist they I say very little and they give me half a shot glass. Thank goodness I’m a women (hey it actually does come in handy sometimes) cause if I was male they would try and get me to drink even more.
Well the dinner is finished and Mr Ham, my vic-principle and I climb into my co-teacher’s car (don’t worry my co-teacher managed to drink basically nothing, I still don’t know how he managed it). Well it’s about a 30 minute drive and my vic-principle keep singing to me (he’s very drunk). He then start to ask me question (through the English teachers cause he doesn’t speak English). I tell him a little bit about Canada and when he hears that Canadians like beer he gets really happy. I’m thinking @#*# what have I done. Well we drive past my place and end up at a Noribang (karaoke bar). Oh great! My vice principle herds us into a booth, trusts a beer into my hand (thank goodness their beer is basically water) and start to sing. Well to make matters worse he then grabs my beer, puts it down, grabs my hand and pulls me up and start slow dancing with me. I thinking, crap what do I do now? OCWARD!!! He then precedes to dance with my to ever song while pushing his hand on my back to force me closer and not only squeezing my hand but digging his nails into my palm. Don’t ask me what that’s about. Finally they ask me to sing and I’m thinking yeah at least he won’t be touching me. Well someone else sings another song and of course he dances with me and then out of no where he just gets up and leaves. The other teachers look at me and tell me it’s time to leave. We go to the car (the vice principle still no where to be seen) and I grab my bag and book it out of there (my apartment was just down the street).
This morning everyone is back to normal so I have no idea what to make of last night. Today I will head to Wonju with Mr. Ham and his son to meet Annie (a friend of mine from Seattle who will be a new English teacher in the town next to mine). Who knows what will happen there.
Now I’m not the most incredible hiker but I’m not bad, but I felt like the laziest, weakest thing in the world (at least I wasn’t the worse in the group). Sufficient to say with a 30 minute lunch we climbed over 600m of elevation in under 2 hours. The view was incredible and I’m glad I went but man, am I sore today.
Well, you’d think that that was enough adventure for one day but no, that would be too easy. We get back down and meet up with the other male teachers who had gone fishing. They start to prepare dinner. Ahhh just as it should be: the female sits on her ass while the men prepare food around her . Well the thing about Korean men is that they like to drink and the thing about dinner is that’s when you drink. So out comes an entire case of soju (tastes like a combination of homemade vodka and rubbing alcohol). Now Korean men are serious about their drinking (kinda like the Russians). There is a whole ritual into drinking and pouring soju. Well they start giving me some and well let’s just say thank goodness I’m not a lightweight. I keep telling them no but they insist they I say very little and they give me half a shot glass. Thank goodness I’m a women (hey it actually does come in handy sometimes) cause if I was male they would try and get me to drink even more.
Well the dinner is finished and Mr Ham, my vic-principle and I climb into my co-teacher’s car (don’t worry my co-teacher managed to drink basically nothing, I still don’t know how he managed it). Well it’s about a 30 minute drive and my vic-principle keep singing to me (he’s very drunk). He then start to ask me question (through the English teachers cause he doesn’t speak English). I tell him a little bit about Canada and when he hears that Canadians like beer he gets really happy. I’m thinking @#*# what have I done. Well we drive past my place and end up at a Noribang (karaoke bar). Oh great! My vice principle herds us into a booth, trusts a beer into my hand (thank goodness their beer is basically water) and start to sing. Well to make matters worse he then grabs my beer, puts it down, grabs my hand and pulls me up and start slow dancing with me. I thinking, crap what do I do now? OCWARD!!! He then precedes to dance with my to ever song while pushing his hand on my back to force me closer and not only squeezing my hand but digging his nails into my palm. Don’t ask me what that’s about. Finally they ask me to sing and I’m thinking yeah at least he won’t be touching me. Well someone else sings another song and of course he dances with me and then out of no where he just gets up and leaves. The other teachers look at me and tell me it’s time to leave. We go to the car (the vice principle still no where to be seen) and I grab my bag and book it out of there (my apartment was just down the street).
This morning everyone is back to normal so I have no idea what to make of last night. Today I will head to Wonju with Mr. Ham and his son to meet Annie (a friend of mine from Seattle who will be a new English teacher in the town next to mine). Who knows what will happen there.
posted by Natalie | 6:42 PM
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