Cheonggyecheon Stream

Well hello and welcome to my new and improved blog!  Its really not that new and improved, but my friend did tell me an easier way to put up photos!  Sorry that it has been a long time since the last posting, but I have been very sick and work was very hectic this week.  I have about four posting that I'll hopefully be putting up this week.

  So back in September (ya a really long time ago now), my friend, Lauren, and I went on a weekend excursion to the Cheonggyecheon Stream.  I was really excited to go, because at this point I was getting a bit overwhelmed with the city life and just needed to be around something a bit more natural.  The stream itself isn't all that natural.  In fact, the Cheonggyecheon stream is man-made with some natural things residing in in.  The nice thing about the stream is that it is actually below the city street, so you can go to this nice natural (looking) place and not have to travel out of the city! 


On the way to the stream, we took a wrong way out of the subway and headed to another nice area of Seoul where we ran into these cool statues.

These statues are of a Korean family, but it looks like they have been compressed down to about 2 1/2 feet tall!  It kind of looks like one of those funhouse mirrors if you were a Korean 40 year old painted gray.


So we finally found our way and found the beginning of the stream.  It starts out with this odd looking structure (sorry it's sideways!):

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We then head on to the area where the water starts flowing into the stream:

The walk itself was very nice with some great cultural things to do.  I was able to sit in on a little drum circle thing.  And was able to watch some older women do some traditional dances:

There was even a clown there who was making balloon animals:

The walk goes on for quite a while and eventually goes into the Han River, the large river that runs through Seoul.  There was also some very nice art that was decorated on the sides of the river.  This one shows the precession of a parade with the Emperor and Empress:

Here is some of the art that the public can put up along the stream:

Overall the day was great!  It was sunny and a good walking temperature.  Here is one last picture of the stream as we headed further away from the main areas:

Chungdahm

   Sorry about the recent lack of updates but I have been busy and slightly lazy.  I wanted to write about the thing that I really base all my other things in life around, my job.  Chungdahm is what they call a hagwon here.  It is an afterschool academy that bases their curriculum on English learning, test taking and critical learning.  The classes at my school are interestingly based off of golf lingo.  The basic classes are EC3, EC4, Memory Mega, Giga and Tera, and Bridge.  The more advanced classes are Par, Birdie, Eagle, Albatross, Albatross+ and Masters.
   As a first-term teacher, I am teaching Memory Mega, Memory Giga and Par.  The classes are three hours long and very intense.  We expect a lot out of these kids, but the kids actually do really well with it.  My younger classes are learning about the story of Elian Gonzales and the Salem Witch Trials while my more advanced class is talking about the trends of population growth in the developing world.  Crazy stuff!
     It has been nice getting to know my kids.  My past jobs for the last two years have been very come and go.  I now get to see the same kids twice a week for 13 weeks straight.  Most of these kids have also been at Chungdahm for years and have a special attachment to the school.
   Pronouncing the kids Korean names can be a bit difficult as everything is pronounced differently here, so we let the kids choose English nicknames.  Many of the students are still in love with Harry Potter, so we do get a lot of Harrys in our classes.  I once saw a "Harry James Potter" on my class list.  There are also names that have gone out of style in America but seem to be really popular here.  I have already seen three Irenes and an Esther. 
   The job has been fun for the most part.  The hours are in the evening, so its nice to be able to enjoy the day and then head off to work for the night.  It'll be nice in the Winter when I go to work when the Sun goes down, so I'll be able to experience a little bit of sunshine.
   Hopefully I'll get out of my procrastination slump and blog some more.  Maybe I'll even put up some pictures!