I have spent the last couple of weekends at home in Jeonju. We have had several excursions planned, but the monsoon season is upon us, and last weekend we had a typhoon travel up the coast close to us, which dumped even heavier rains down upon our heads. This has made hiking and temple crawling too difficult to navigate. Instead, I have spent some amazingly fun times with my new friends here in Jeonju. Last weekend was slightly bittersweet because there was a going away dinner for a different one of our friends Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
So my last post was about how much teaching in Korea reminded me of being in college? Last weekend reminded me just how much the transient life can drain……You make incredibly fast, intense friendships, and then one of you moves on. It was the same in the theatre world. Beautiful. Amazing. And slightly sad.
This weekend, Kiran and I helped Bart and Kayla throw a Canada Day/4th of July party. There was soju punch, homemade pirogues, rooftop fireworks, and Waygooks from Canada, the US, Britain, South Africa and New Zealand. At one point we even kicked our poor Brit friend out just to reestablish our Independence.
We let him back in……
Kiran and I were also ordained the, “Most active and social newbies,” by everyone. I’ve heard this so many times over the last couple of weeks from several people. It seems we have already been to parts of Korea that people who have lived here for years have not…..(see Jindo). I had a fantastic time meeting some new people last night, and getting to know some others better. I was invited to climb Mt. Fuji by some of my male hiking friends; was informed I will be attending mud fest in a couple of weeks; was invited to a friend’s home for hookah; and also made friends with someone who shares my interest in Buddhism, studies with a female monk (how amazing is THAT!), and can introduce us.
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Today, we planned to go hiking to an old fortress an hour or so outside of Jeonju, but the rains had other plans. Instead, we rented a DVD bang and watched, “Black Swan.”
On the way from the DVD bang to dinner the skies let loose, and we were drenched. Umbrellas were rendered completely useless.
It was a beautiful day!
The next few weeks are going to be busy. A large group of us are heading to the DMZ next weekend. I am going to Mudfest in Pusan the weekend after that. Then Kiran and I are going to Thailand for summer break. We had planned to go to Mongolia initially, but time constraints made that a little impossible, and Thailand is so cheap……We will be doing an elephant trek, visiting a tiger temple, and seeing our friend and mentor, Nathan.
omg, you are busy! we need to plan to meet soon! pencil me in somewhere 🙂