First (and perhaps only) post of 2011

Job searchin'!

Videos from Southeast Asia and Commentary on the States

First, some videos, memories and comments about Southeast Asia [Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam]:

This is from Escher Climbing Wall, Railay, Thailand:

This is from 1, 2, 3 Climbing Wall, Railay, Thailand. This climb was ~25-28 meters high. It was one of my favorites:

This is from Thaiwand Climbing Wall, Railay, Thailand. We went spelunking through a cave from Escher Wall, intentionally, to find the other side on Thaiwand Wall. When we got there, we had to abseil down about 15 meters. After I abseiled down, this was what the weather was like. When we entered the cave, it was sunny; when we left the cave, it was...:

This next video is from Ha Long Bay, Vietnam. There is a shop called Slopony on Cat Ba Island, Vietnam and they organize these amazing, awesome deep water soloing trips through Ha Long Bay. This is a view of the bay:

This next video is of our guide climbing. He is very, very good. Notice his bare feet. Unfortunately [or, fortunately considering my intermediate skill level], there are no videos of me climbing. I am no where near this good:

These last two videos are from Hanoi, Vietnam. This is from a cafe overlooking the main square in the Old Quarter. There was some kind of festival in the middle of the square and they had rotating performers. This caused a lot of motorbikes to stop and made the traffic pretty bad. Though, this kind of motorbike traffic is common. People kept telling me to, "Just walk through the traffic in Hanoi. Don't worry, they will stop or miss you." It really is true too, a bit unnerving as well:

This is me walking through traffic. Believe it or not, the traffic was actually sparse at this moment. Try to notice the motorbike taxis asking for business:

Those are all the videos worth posting from the trip.

Being that this is my blog and being that I use this to post my pictures, videos and general observations. I really want to post this one picture. It puts the deep water soloing into perspective:

That is about as high as I got on that climb. It is about 14 meters (46 feet) high.

Observations about Southeast Asia:

-Thailand was my favorite country, though it was probably the most expensive. A good meal cost about $5-7. But decent, survivable meals were anywhere from $3-5. Railay beach in Thailand was simply phenomenal. It was not as party-centric as some of the islands and offered you a lot of outdoorsy activities...or just a beach to lay on.

-Cambodia was really beautiful and I spent far too little time there. People who explored other areas than Angkor Wat said that the other areas were amazing.

-Laos was true to what people told me. After Cambodians begging you in Siam Reap, it felt like Laos people did not know I existed. You walk into a bungalow complex and no one comes to greet you. You stand aimlessly for 5, 10 minutes until the owner comes and negotiates a price with you. There was a curfew on Don Det at 11pm, everything turns off. Vang Vieng was nice and offers tons of alternative activities besides drinking and tubing. At least 50% of the people I met had pink eye at one time from tubing. I actually never went tubing.

-Vietnam was a surprise. I think I liked it more than I expected to. Cat Ba Island is gorgeous and offers a lot. Hanoi is a city that is on the rise and was safe to explore, at least during the day. Just ignore the motorbike taxis.

Second, being back in the United States of America:

Overall, it is weird being back. The welcome home sign was a pleasant and nice surprise.

I understand everything said and read.

I forgot to tip, though truthfully, the service did not warrant a tip. Unintended benefit.

Driving is like riding a bike; remembering how to use your lights, change the radio and move your car seat is not.

We eat a lot.

I had been accustomed to being of average weight in Korea. But, wow, I already feel small again.

There are a lot of things I have missed...family, friends, Dr. Pepper.....and a lot of things I have missed that I have not had yet...Chipotle, Dave's Cosmic Subs, some legit Mexican food.

Overall, it is a complete change in lifestyle. I have to remind myself to keep busy and find things to do.

Korea vs. Greece from Downtown Seoul

If you watch one video on this site ever, watch this one [especially if you are a soccer/football fan]:

Spring Was In The Air

As the title alludes to, it has been getting hot in Seoul recently. Also, I have been slightly [majorly] neglecting this during the Spring. My reason is that my camera broke back in April, thus there were no videos and thus there was nothing to write about!

Half out of curiosity to see how my new camera would work and half to show people back home a few random tidbits about Korea, I took two videos today after work: (((**The videos are a little wobbly, I apologize**)))

I.) The first is a typical subway experience:

II.) The second is me walking down the sidewalk, heading towards and through the special rock-climbing gear district in the Dongdaemun Market. Korea is amazing for their departmentalized areas; I have walked by different streets/areas where all the stores were focused on one thing....lights, porcelain bathroom items, rock-climbing gear, etc etc:

Off topic.

I arrived in Korea on Saturday, July 18th 2009...it is now June 8th, 2010. I only have about 6 more weeks of teaching left. I can't believe it....but what this all means is that I will have an opportunity to do some traveling around Asia before coming home. As of now, there are definite plans to be in Southeast Asia for a few weeks (Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand) and there is a chance I may even catch a flight to Bali for a few days. We will see...when I have a set itinerary, I will make sure to write it here.

That is about all for now. I hope you are having a good day, wherever you are.

Alan

Kindergarten Graduation

I do not know what you will think of the following video, however, I can assure you that this is in fact normal in Korea:

Kindergarten Graduation was sad. Luckily, I will still be teaching a majority of my students next week, only in the afternoon. I will see them for about 3 hours a week compared with the 20 hours that I had spent with them. This is probably for the best in the long term.

I was more sad because our head teacher was leaving and she had connected greatly with the students and their parents. She was/IS a great teacher and will be missed.

The drama performance went as well as we could have expected. Of course, it could have been better, but we are talking about kindergarten-ers here...

I have a new class on Wednesday. Monday is a holiday and Tuesday is a weird work day for me which will mostly be spent arranging my classroom and preparing to teach the next class. My next class will be new English speakers. I will be teaching them basic phonics (ABCs...sounds, basic words). They are 7-year olds. I will also be teaching phonics to the 6-year old class, or the 'babies.' Korean age is different, too...long story short, essentially subtract one year from what they say and you have their American age. If you want to read more about it...go here.

That is it for now. Work is about to get a little more stressful with a lot of change next week, so I am spending some of my weekend mentally preparing for it. Do a little work early in effort to save your sanity at a later time.

Alan =)