shanghai, china

so i'm a little late on this one, too.

but i just want put down a couple thoughts about my visit to shanghai.

why visit shanghai?

well, the weekend i went was a long weekend for me.

it took place over lunar new year. so we had monday off of work.

and our school also gave us tuesday off (some schools got friday and monday off, some schools only got monday).

so i was allotted a fair amount of time to go.

of course, the most weighted reason to visit china was because of friends.

smith wilbanks and melissa mills, two alabamians i met at the capstone, were planning on studying abroad in china this semester.

before the semester started, they wanted to see some of china and it just so happens that they would be in shanghai (a 2 hour flight from seoul) over my long weekend.

but don't think i'm leaving out yurie akatsuka.

a japanese national, yurie studied at the university of alabama for a year and met smith, melissa and myself in tuscaloosa through various paths.

personally, yurie and i spent a fair amount of time together in the tri club.

of course, after a year in bama, she returned to japan to finish school, where she is now.

so it fell together very well:

a 4 day weekend.

3 friends from home.

additionally, yurie's personal itinerary made going very easy as well.

being in japan with more time off than me, yurie could do whatever and meet smith and melissa in china whenver.

so yurie came to korea to meet some korean friends she met in tuscaloosa.

and also to meet and hang out with me.

(after our shanghai excursion, yurie would return to seoul for an overnight layover, leading to another night of hanging out.)

as fate would have it, we also booked the same flight from seoul to shanghai.

we get to shanghai, meet smith and melissa, and the walking began.

i say 'walking' because none of us are apparently very decisive and we are all very okay with anything to do.

so we spent a fair amount of our time walking.

but we saw a pretty good bit of the city.

amongst the things we saw:

a karaoke/noraebang with a rat to welcome us (the girls would have none of it, though i recommend we buy it a beer; i'm sure it would have been to cool to hang).

the gate of the zoo and the precipice of pandas;

the world's highest observatory;

a lot of other cool buildings;

a couple of cool jade buddhas engulfed by scores of people;

a sweet-as-hell maglev train;

a metro system with a hell of a lot of character.

some of these and more have photographic support which can be seen on facebook (i don't like uploading twice).

would i recommend china?

yes.

go if you have the chance.

but don't expect too much.

i feel like shanghai was very well kempt because it's one of the world's largest metro areas and a former playground for the west.

of course, i only hypothesize that china funnels resources here.

i have no evidence of this.

in short, china is a pretty cool place to see.

would i go back to china?

maybe.

with serious peer-pressure.

maybe not even serious persuasion; i fold like a lawn chair under peer-pressure.

the flight to shanghai was short and decently cheap (approx. $250).

however, the single entry tourist visa was approx. $135.

yes. i said $135. for a single-entry tourist. even for only 4 days.

if i go back to china, i won't go back to shanghai.

i'd rather see another place, of course.

i doubt shanghai is worth repeating at this point.

plus, i have other unseen asian destinations.

just a couple of quick thoughts about my first trip out of korea.

many thanks to smith wilbanks, melissa mills and yurie akatsuka for one hell of a weekend.

lots of love,

jo

yeah, i know, i'm an asshole.

this post has been a long time coming.

in accordance with one of my 2010 resolutions, here is a post what it is like at bandi kindergarten in suwon.

i want to share with you a sliver of what it was like to work at my school with the infamous tammy teacher.

of course, tammy is now long gone, but i'm dying to post some of this info.

when i first arrived, tammy had already been teaching at bandi for 8-ish months.

i had the 'opportunity' to work with her for 4-ish months.

i don't remember if i've mentioned any of this before and i'm going to be lazy and not search.

but tammy was a 52-ish year old, south african, former drama teacher.

granted, she was apparently a fairly effective teacher; she had a number of years of experience teaching.

but i'm not sure if this made up for her overly motherly feelings towards some of the kids.

and it certainly did not make up for her sheer general and cultural ignorance.

as well as her self-centrism

and her B.O.

and her far-from-perfect english.

tammy may have been a good teacher, but she was an awful co-worker.

i think.

i'm not really sure how bad they get because this is my first real job.

kim was a hell of a lot cooler than tammy.

i deviate.

ladies and gentlemen of the jury, i would like to present to you two pieces of evidence.

exhibit A is a note tammy left our boss, lisa.

her errors are not highlighted; please take a moment to locate them yourself.

i am no william strunk, jr. or e.b. white, but i think her mistakes are quite evident.

exhibit A:

ladies and gentlemen, i would like to present to you exhibit B.

this piece of evidence is a simple tally started by a fellow teacher at bandi, kim.

kim had worked with tammy for 11 months.

kim started this tally 4 weeks before tammy was due to leave.

note the short span of time and the incredible tallies some of the qualifications receive.

bear in mind that kim was not with tammy at all times, so this is a tally of only kim's experience.

though kim was tuned into tammy and could easily spot vintage tammy mannerisms and acting, there very well could have been many a time a tally was missed.

exhibit B (1) and B (2):

(you might have to copy the images and view them in a program in order to better read everything.)

no further questions, your honor.

jo

seoul international marathon training update #5

bad news.

and worse news.

okay. the bad news first.

well, i haven't been training consistently in the last 3 weeks.

not so great considering the looming full marathon coming up in about 5 weeks.

yikes, dude. ok. well, hit me with the worse news.

well, remember when i mentioned that full marathon?

i have a half-marathon next week.

this should make for a very interesting, if not at least slightly painful, situation.

i guess we will only see what happens.

you live and you learn.

(insert another arbitrary conventional wisdom here).

unfortunately, any last minute tune-ups will be quite limited as well, due to a lunar new year's trip to shanghai to meet some friends.

details to come in the next post, probably post-voyage.

on the upside, for only $30, in the race packet (which was sent in the mail to me, rather than me having to pick it up (how sweet is that!)) i received a running tank-top, running shorts and running pants.

of course, along with the largest bib number i've seen in my life.

quite a diminuitive feeling.

anyway. it's past my bedtime.

and i felt the blogging itch since i haven't scratched in a couple weeks.

solid update about my school coming soon ^^

lots of love,

jo

world without strangers

in light of my two most recent posts, i've had a mind to amend my list of new year's resolutions.

it goes a little something like this....

2) tell more about actual life and living in korea

3) tell more about my school and teaching kindergarten kids

most of my posts have been about my training for my first marathon.

and i'd like to continue blogging about that.

endurance sports have become me.

triathlons, marathon running, whatever fix is next.

but i'd like to let you, the reader, in on more of what it is like not to live in the u.s.a.

what it is like not to live in the west.

what it is like to live, literally, on the other side of the globe, where it's day to your night.

i'd like to be your eyes into a foreign kindergarten, taught by a 22 year old punk, who in fact doesn't like kids.

i'd like to illustrate how it is a young alien teaches to young children.

i'll have to expand each resolution later.

i just want to use this blog to lay down a preface and offer an hors d'oeuvre.

working backwards, in respect to resolution #3, please refer to my post before this one (the photos).

that's the appetizer for that one.

as for #2, i'd like to send you over to a blog upon which i stumbled whilst googling 'bob dylan korea 2010' (i heard he's coming sometime this year and was vaguely interested).

and i can tell you know, i feel as though my view will be skewed because i'm half korean and i have serious motivation to be here (see new year's resolution #1).

but, to borrow the words of a great news medium, i want to be fair and balanced.

so, i want to offer you the opposing point of view.

please refer to this guy.

take a peek.

think what you will.

if you want to know what i think about a particular topic, please ask me.

i'll probably also cover a lot of topics he does, just to offer my own point of view.

this guy is more like the app. combo for resolution #2

here's to the start of the new year.

lots of love,

jo

dressed to kill

me, circa christmas 2009

lots of love (especially to the bandi kids.....(>.<))

jo