I woke up today and guess what! No nausea! Guess it was just temporary tamiflu-onset side effects, which is fine because we only have two pills left to take - one tonight, and one tomorrow for my birthday!
I'm pretty stoked about birthday in quarantine! Rumors have it that South Korea changed the laws about swine flu quarantine a couple days ago due to it being too widespread in the country (contrary to what we had thought, we aren't at all the first case of it here), so we're pretty much definitely quarantine free in a few days :)
I finished my arrangement of the traditional Korean song "Arirang" Wednesday night after starting it maybe the night before? Anyways, last night I played it for everyone and it was well recieved and that's cool. I've uploaded a "quality" mp3 of it for those who want to hear: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=OI3FCW5A
I consider it my finest work compositionally, but it was also the easiest one to write. Maybe those are hand in hand?
no idea what to write next. I finished Xenocide yesterday and Children of the Mind today. By the time I'm back I'll have finished all of the books in the Ender universe, at this rate. The Brothers Karamazov will have to wait until I'm less captivated.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
another day another dollar
dryers are here, they're super fancy and can double as a washer for some reason.
there's a gigantic stockpile of soda and junkfood and a fridge for them too
stuff's going well overall i suppose.
I finally got in with the tae kwan do class and it was pretty alright. I couldn't do yoga due to a hand injury from a fall yesterday. It still hurts and is very annoying.
I've been doing a lot of reading and composing and whatnot, tonight i got a massage from someone and that was awesome, I'll have to start getting those daily.
I guess I'm going to teach a few people how to read music and start some basic music theory stuff, but I want to see if there's a piano or something in this old place that I can use.
That's about all! I'm up too late and need to sleep but the book I'm reading is too engrossing.
there's a gigantic stockpile of soda and junkfood and a fridge for them too
stuff's going well overall i suppose.
I finally got in with the tae kwan do class and it was pretty alright. I couldn't do yoga due to a hand injury from a fall yesterday. It still hurts and is very annoying.
I've been doing a lot of reading and composing and whatnot, tonight i got a massage from someone and that was awesome, I'll have to start getting those daily.
I guess I'm going to teach a few people how to read music and start some basic music theory stuff, but I want to see if there's a piano or something in this old place that I can use.
That's about all! I'm up too late and need to sleep but the book I'm reading is too engrossing.
Monday, July 27, 2009
summer camp
guess it really is summer camp here, we did archery today for a while and that was sweet. I hit an arrow through the farthest off target that I think nobody else except for the korean workers who obviously had practiced this quite a bit were hitting, so that was awesome.
There are worse things than being quarantined in an old summer camp!
We started our tamiflu regiments today and after five days when we're done with that, those who test negative for h1n1 are free to go and those who test positive are stuck here longer. I'm fairly certain I will not get it because i'm just that awesome, so it'll just be a few more days and then we'll see what exactly happens.
Yay :)
Sunday, July 26, 2009
super quarantine
So...
We're quarantined for another week. The three people supposedly infected are in the hospital.
They're bringing in two driers, getting us internet in our rooms (yay!), and we will be receiving at least half of the promised 500,000 won. Those were like my top three concerns really. We can still hike, it's now just like a summer camp.
If the elementary one happens, that's cool, but I'm having fun just hiking and composing music and hanging out all day. Also, if it gets canceled, they're taking us on a tour of Korea, so that might be pretty boss if it isn't rushed.
So all in all, things are well.
We went on a major major hike today. It was a repeat of the first hike, only it wasn't foggy today (The views were INCREDIBLE, the pictures I'll upload later don't do it justice). And we kept going. to this super high thing that had a rope to climb up the almost sheer cliff, but also a path around to get up. I unfortunately had to take the path around. =( Still, we were close to the highest you can get in Wando. Tomorrow Sam is going to keep going up and it is theoretically possible to make it the very very highest peak of the mountain in the middle. I may or may not join, depends on how sore my legs are. On the way back we lost Shannon, but she eventually found her way back on her own, thank goodness. I sorta stepped into a spiky bush and got a few large cuts/scrapes on my leg, but nothing serious. Cool looking though. :P
That's about all there is to say!
OH, at the health check I was composing and my favorite nurse and the overseeing doctor dude both ended up listening to my piece and they both said they liked it, haha.
ALSo I finished Speaker for the Dead the other day and I loved it, one of my favorite books ever.
ALSO ALSO TWO MORE CONFIRMED CASES OF THE SWINE
Poor You-san, she's so nice. =(
We're quarantined for another week. The three people supposedly infected are in the hospital.
They're bringing in two driers, getting us internet in our rooms (yay!), and we will be receiving at least half of the promised 500,000 won. Those were like my top three concerns really. We can still hike, it's now just like a summer camp.
If the elementary one happens, that's cool, but I'm having fun just hiking and composing music and hanging out all day. Also, if it gets canceled, they're taking us on a tour of Korea, so that might be pretty boss if it isn't rushed.
So all in all, things are well.
We went on a major major hike today. It was a repeat of the first hike, only it wasn't foggy today (The views were INCREDIBLE, the pictures I'll upload later don't do it justice). And we kept going. to this super high thing that had a rope to climb up the almost sheer cliff, but also a path around to get up. I unfortunately had to take the path around. =( Still, we were close to the highest you can get in Wando. Tomorrow Sam is going to keep going up and it is theoretically possible to make it the very very highest peak of the mountain in the middle. I may or may not join, depends on how sore my legs are. On the way back we lost Shannon, but she eventually found her way back on her own, thank goodness. I sorta stepped into a spiky bush and got a few large cuts/scrapes on my leg, but nothing serious. Cool looking though. :P
That's about all there is to say!
OH, at the health check I was composing and my favorite nurse and the overseeing doctor dude both ended up listening to my piece and they both said they liked it, haha.
ALSo I finished Speaker for the Dead the other day and I loved it, one of my favorite books ever.
ALSO ALSO TWO MORE CONFIRMED CASES OF THE SWINE
Poor You-san, she's so nice. =(
Saturday, July 25, 2009
swine flu
Well three of us have confirmed cases among us of swine flu. Well, it is being said it's confirmed but there' quite a bit of doubt. Probably the phases of denial or whatever.
So we're sorta quarantined for longer and the middle school camp is practically canceled. There goes teaching Around the World, which is cool cause I didn't really have my heart in that subject?
So we're sorta quarantined for longer and the middle school camp is practically canceled. There goes teaching Around the World, which is cool cause I didn't really have my heart in that subject?
Friday, July 24, 2009
Thursday, July 23, 2009
rainy day games
Yesterday it was kinda rainy and shitty weather, but got better towards the end - I was too engrossed in Speaker for the Dead to go outside. Great book though. By night time I was so full of pent up energy, it was crazy. Haven't really seen myself like that before. Played lots of card games and stuff.
Today it is even rainier and windier, and so the chance of me getting out and doing a hike to use up all my extra energy is very low. Still, I am determined to find something to do. I will move and I will use up my copious amounts of energy. !
yesterday we decided our teaching subjects. For the first camp, the middle school camp, I will be teaching Around the World, which is basically just geography. Then I teach Foods and Restaurants for the elementary school camp. Should be exciting. :D
Today it is even rainier and windier, and so the chance of me getting out and doing a hike to use up all my extra energy is very low. Still, I am determined to find something to do. I will move and I will use up my copious amounts of energy. !
yesterday we decided our teaching subjects. For the first camp, the middle school camp, I will be teaching Around the World, which is basically just geography. Then I teach Foods and Restaurants for the elementary school camp. Should be exciting. :D
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
average day
today we had the usual breakfast (i'm tired of it, but from tomorrow on it'll be Korean only so I will probably grow to miss the weird hot dogs).
At ten we had our activity for the day, which was singing a Korean song. Finally being a music major is paying off, I was sight-reading the music and singing along but very few people could so we had to spend a ton of time learning it by rote. I volunteered to sing it up front later and that was okay I guess. She had us drum out a rythm for about 30000000000 minutes and it was annoying because everyone rushes in a group, a phenomenon that I abhor. Then, she ran out of things to do and asked if anyone wanted to sing a song up front, any song. Nobody volunteered at first so I did "Reflection" from Mulan and got a lot of laughs, it was fun.
Lunch was good, we had the Korean summer dish of a little (whole) chicken stuffed with rice in chicken broth and stuff. Also a little like fried fish dish that didn't taste like fish at all, looked and tasted like flat tofu. It was smothered in this great sauce and sesame seeds and stuff and I got Yu-san's, Ian's, and Eric's after I went back and saw that none were left. Had a great conversation too about stuff.
Then we met with our camp groups and talked about a skit, ours is going to be okay and possibly but it is top secret!
There was a group hike scheduled at 3 and the leaders (Yu-san, Ian, and Ethan) had planned to take us up to the gazebo we went to yesterday, so Sam and I let them stay back and led the group back up there. Took 20 minutes, while it took an hour and a half the round about way we did yesterday >< Then we walked all over the place, and as usual most of the group left and Sam and I with some others just kept on trekking. Checked out this sick arboretum and got a dirnk from the vending machine - MILKIS "New feeling of soda beverage". It's a Korean Calpis knockoff but it is just as good if not better. The rest of the hike was sick, and as usual we made it back in like a half hour despite being gone for way longer. Dinner was good.
We had some karaoke and I sang "I wanna hold your hand" but left after all the other songs I would've sung were by other people and I wanted to leave. It was mainly missouri kids and I feel like they're overall quite a different culture than psu ones, surprise surprise, so it was weird. Plus, karaoke in groups over like 10 or 15 is just too much for me :P
Guess I'll read some more Speaker for the Dead and drift to sleep. Woo.
I really love it here in Wando, it is so peaceful and serene. Most of the places we walk to would be so great to just hang out to. I think I'm going to keep hiking often when I get home.
At ten we had our activity for the day, which was singing a Korean song. Finally being a music major is paying off, I was sight-reading the music and singing along but very few people could so we had to spend a ton of time learning it by rote. I volunteered to sing it up front later and that was okay I guess. She had us drum out a rythm for about 30000000000 minutes and it was annoying because everyone rushes in a group, a phenomenon that I abhor. Then, she ran out of things to do and asked if anyone wanted to sing a song up front, any song. Nobody volunteered at first so I did "Reflection" from Mulan and got a lot of laughs, it was fun.
Lunch was good, we had the Korean summer dish of a little (whole) chicken stuffed with rice in chicken broth and stuff. Also a little like fried fish dish that didn't taste like fish at all, looked and tasted like flat tofu. It was smothered in this great sauce and sesame seeds and stuff and I got Yu-san's, Ian's, and Eric's after I went back and saw that none were left. Had a great conversation too about stuff.
Then we met with our camp groups and talked about a skit, ours is going to be okay and possibly but it is top secret!
There was a group hike scheduled at 3 and the leaders (Yu-san, Ian, and Ethan) had planned to take us up to the gazebo we went to yesterday, so Sam and I let them stay back and led the group back up there. Took 20 minutes, while it took an hour and a half the round about way we did yesterday >< Then we walked all over the place, and as usual most of the group left and Sam and I with some others just kept on trekking. Checked out this sick arboretum and got a dirnk from the vending machine - MILKIS "New feeling of soda beverage". It's a Korean Calpis knockoff but it is just as good if not better. The rest of the hike was sick, and as usual we made it back in like a half hour despite being gone for way longer. Dinner was good.
We had some karaoke and I sang "I wanna hold your hand" but left after all the other songs I would've sung were by other people and I wanted to leave. It was mainly missouri kids and I feel like they're overall quite a different culture than psu ones, surprise surprise, so it was weird. Plus, karaoke in groups over like 10 or 15 is just too much for me :P
Guess I'll read some more Speaker for the Dead and drift to sleep. Woo.
I really love it here in Wando, it is so peaceful and serene. Most of the places we walk to would be so great to just hang out to. I think I'm going to keep hiking often when I get home.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Super Hike
Today we got our lesson plans and stuff, then a long lecture about Korean culture/history that I mostly slept through. After that all we went off on a hike that I guess is actually the plan for tomjorrow? But Sam and I basically went real fast/ran ahead of the pack and made it to our goal, this observation gazebo thing that nobody else got to see. The views were amazing, but I can't upload photos at the moment due to the lack of my own laptop and possibly laziness. Thank goodness the fog is mostly gone so that we actually could see the amazing view. It was super awesome, haven't gotten such a good and rewarding workout in a long time. Hiking is the bomb.
I'm excited to teach and stuff but this laptop situation really bugs me.
Outside supplies finally came today, I got some chocolate and it tastes like eating hot cocoa, it's pretty boss. I didn't manage to get the Aloe drink I requested for some reason though? Now everyone's up on the roof drinking the copious amounts of alcohol that was brought I guess. I'm happily getting absorbed into a book, however...
I got to talk to So-ryoung on the phone today and hopefully we'll meet up in Seoul on one of our last days here, should be cool. :)
I'm excited to teach and stuff but this laptop situation really bugs me.
Outside supplies finally came today, I got some chocolate and it tastes like eating hot cocoa, it's pretty boss. I didn't manage to get the Aloe drink I requested for some reason though? Now everyone's up on the roof drinking the copious amounts of alcohol that was brought I guess. I'm happily getting absorbed into a book, however...
I got to talk to So-ryoung on the phone today and hopefully we'll meet up in Seoul on one of our last days here, should be cool. :)
Monday, July 20, 2009
stupid
guess there was a storm last night, my laptop was plugged in and now is dead. great. Hopefully that isn't a sign of things to come.
Picture Time
Here's the Seoul airport. I think they send spaceships from this spot.
on the bus to Wando!
The Bus!
Here we are at the first rest stop, our helper Yu-sun with the Statue of Liberty shirt
I had some dinner and it was bad, but Sam (left) and Eric (right) enjoyed theirs.
The view of the ocean from our place. Fog city.
The great swimming pool in the front, but the point was the pretty jawesome view out there.
The camp, our rooms are behind the scaffolding
The back of the building, looks great huh? With all the fog and the fact that this building seems abandoned in the middle of construction and junk in the back and the fact that we're basically quarantined it feels like a horror movie. Fun though.
Sam is really happy about the stuff in the back.
more stuff
Kyler in his bed cool huh
there's me!
archery range at the camp? cool huh
Here we go on the hike up to the kinda mediocre temple.
rice and stuff
the temple!
the temple dog
some dude with the dog
me! at the temple over fog
Our building, the great castle in the clouds
lunch! not enough meat in the soup but good overall. I actually am liking the kimchi here a lot, which is a surprise cause I really disliked it most of the time in America. It's like it's not jarred here or something!
H1N1 inspection, guess this is going to be a regular thing
She got a stern talking to for some reason...
Looks like I passed! but my temperature was a little high I guess? Hmmmm I feel fine though. Basically we're quarantined for a week and are getting our health checked daily or something? Woooo so much fun.After the inspection I went to my room, composed for a bit, and fell asleep until someone woke me up for a meeting we had at 3. That took a while but afterwards Eric mentioned that he found an offshoot trail on the way to the temple you can get to by crossing over the stream. This turned into a huge adventure.
Forest was cool
The group, although people slowly started turning back.
foggy fog fog. Was a test shot I guess but that just shows how foggy it was even just above the ground.
woodz
the group some more
crazy mushrooms, wish I had a better picture but there's that orange netting mesh they've grown and the mushroom is on top? I don't understand really.
Great view, except the fog ruins it :P Wonder what it actually looks like. Kyler loved that stick he's got there. This is pretty much the end of the trail we went to, but we found out it could keep going, but too bad we couldn't keep going.... dinner was too soon.
Me! and my water bottleSam just chillin
oh yeah! 
The rest of the group.... So because dinner was so soon and I kinda wanted to run back we (Aly, Shannon, Danika, Kyler, Sam, and I were the only people left at this point) ended up doing just that and got back within a half hour, even though the hike was maybe an hour and half to get to that point.
Drenched with sweat, also sunburn from the morning hike @_@ too lazy to turn it unsideways sorry
Huge ass moth that was near the cafeteria, thanks dude for the hand for size purposes.
Dinner! tonkatsu with gravy and fries and stuff, yum yum yum?
Oh yeah this is my room, and...
bathroom! the whole floor is tile and you just sort of shower next to the sink. it's weird.Um that's all my photos for now except a few blurry ones that sucked horribly. All in all I've had fun so far, looking forward to tomorrow. Hopefully my bug repellent will work better in the future as I got a few bites today :O the sunburn really sucks and I hope I can get sunscreen from people from now on, that damn fog made it seem like the sun doesn't matter. I see it's showing up on my arms now too, argh.
well
I'm pretty exhausted even though it's only 9:40pm, might go to bed soon and read or something.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
In Korea
Well the plane ride was long but good. Finished Ender's Shadow on the flight and it is was awesome. Took me a while to figure out that there wer actually some movies that I wanted to see that they had, "Valkyrie", "Push", and "Monsters vs Aliens", but I only had 2 hours left of the flight. I went with "Push" and it was badddddd. oh well. :3
then we got to take a horribly long bus ride all the way down to Wando for quarantine/orientation. We're in like an isolated castle like old summer camp place that's under construction and run down, I've got pics but I'm currently lazy and got lunch in a few - we just got internet.
Went on a hike up to a kinda lame little temple that was grueling in the heat and humidity. Breakfast was decent eggs and hot dogs (lol) and toast and shit. Awww yeah.
I guess I'll post more later when I've got some free time but I'm here and alive. Hurray!
also I'm composing a song for the first time in a while for some reason pretty neat huh
then we got to take a horribly long bus ride all the way down to Wando for quarantine/orientation. We're in like an isolated castle like old summer camp place that's under construction and run down, I've got pics but I'm currently lazy and got lunch in a few - we just got internet.
Went on a hike up to a kinda lame little temple that was grueling in the heat and humidity. Breakfast was decent eggs and hot dogs (lol) and toast and shit. Awww yeah.
I guess I'll post more later when I've got some free time but I'm here and alive. Hurray!
also I'm composing a song for the first time in a while for some reason pretty neat huh
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Camp locations have been decided!
I'll be in.... WANDO
I don't know much about Wando except that it is an island and none of the other camps are on islands, so that could potentially be awesome or shitty, as it's also the farthest one away from the major city of the province. Hopefully internet should be okay and everything should be fine.
Other than that, everything else is pretty much ready but I'm very concerned about my checked luggage being over 50 pounds. What a stupid limitation.
I don't know much about Wando except that it is an island and none of the other camps are on islands, so that could potentially be awesome or shitty, as it's also the farthest one away from the major city of the province. Hopefully internet should be okay and everything should be fine.
Other than that, everything else is pretty much ready but I'm very concerned about my checked luggage being over 50 pounds. What a stupid limitation.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Hello!
This is my blog. I'll be updating it more when I actually get to Korea, maybe even with pictures and MAYBE, maybe videos. We'll see.
I'm just about done preparing for Korea, I need to get my hair cut, print some stuff out, buy and wrap some gifts for colleauges and whatnot, and then pack! So I'm pretty set. Coming up with gift ideas is tough as I'm not a gift giver by nature but I'm hoping I can find a made in oregon store that exists and that'll be easy to figure out from there. If anyone has any specific ideas you can comment!
I'm just about done preparing for Korea, I need to get my hair cut, print some stuff out, buy and wrap some gifts for colleauges and whatnot, and then pack! So I'm pretty set. Coming up with gift ideas is tough as I'm not a gift giver by nature but I'm hoping I can find a made in oregon store that exists and that'll be easy to figure out from there. If anyone has any specific ideas you can comment!
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