Happy Songpyeon Day!

Ah, Thanksgiving - the most American of all holidays. Dysfunctional families gather from all corners of the country to spend one long weekend arguing, over-eating, and watching sports until they slip into a quiet food coma, only to arise at an absurd hour the next morning so they can trample and claw their way through the mall to get some "DOORBUSTER" sales that are inexplicably offered only one day a year.

Okay, so that might not be everyone's experience (and I'm happy to say not mine, besides the over-eating and football), but it's the tradition, right? And what is Thanksgiving if not a day steeped in tradition? The turkey and pumpkin pie, the Macy's parade, the Indians helping the Pilgrims survive the harsh winter, and the Pilgrims stealing their land and spreading smallpox in return. It reminds me of a Spanish class I had in middle school where a fellow student asked, "Mrs. Serrano, how do they celebrate Thanksgiving in Mexico?" He was utterly baffled to learn there is no Thanksgiving in Mexico.

How could this be? Aren't the Mexicans thankful for...stuff? Don't they love parades and stuffing their faces? Don't they love suicidal holiday shopping?! What could be more universal than a day to stop and celebrate the good things in life (while eating no less!)?

Of course, what our young, ignorant friend did not realize (and still may not) is that people all over the world DO celebrate thanksgiving, just not with a capital T. No, that distinction is reserved only for the unique overindulgence which takes place in the U.S. (and also some strange perversion of it in Canada). What most Americans have forgotten is that behind all the terrifying giant balloons and the mythical buckled hats, Thanksgiving is in essence a harvest festival. For hundreds of years, agrarian societies around the world have held celebrations where families gather to give thanks for their crops and to feast on the newly harvested food. So, in light of my upcoming world travels, and to give this wandering blog a point, here is a quick lesson about Chuseok - the Korean Thanksgiving:

Chuseok (추석) is a big deal in Korea. Well, that's my understanding anyway, since I haven't been there yet! The holiday falls on the 15th day of the 8th month of the lunar calendar (which I don't understand at all), so it's actually on a different day every year. This year Chuseok was October 3, but much like Americans, Koreans usually like to make the holiday a three-day affair, from Oct. 2-4. Honestly there are a few more cross-cultural similarities, namely family and food. Everyone loves some holiday travel, right? For Chuseok, the whole country makes a mass exodus back to their hometowns to visit family and honor their ancestors. And what better way to honor them than with gluttony?  Alright, well I can't say for sure if Koreans have as much a reputation for holiday binging as Americans, but they sure do make a good spread.

I don't know what most of that food is, but it looks delicious from here. Actually, the major food of Chuseok is called songpyeon, which are those colorful little cakes you saw earlier. Songpyeon on Chuseok is like turkey on Thanksgiving - it's not Chuseok without it. It's made of rice that's kneaded into perfect little pockets and then filled with things like sesame seeds, red beans, or chesnuts, before steaming them over a layer of pine needles. Yum, can't wait to try it!

This hearty feast you see is part of a Chuseok tradition called Charye. On Chuseok morning, families gather together to hold a memorial service to thank and honor their ancestors with all the delicious freshly harvested food. After the service, everyone chows down. But don't settle in for a nap, yet, because after the meal it's time to head to the graveyard and actually visit those folks that came before us. Plus a little weed-pulling and headstone-buffing to work off that breakfast. Traditionally, the rest of the holiday is filled with games and dances and music to celebrate the harvest. I'm not sure how widely practiced these activities are among your average Korean these days, but there are plenty of places for tourists to see a traditional Chuseok festival. I imagine that most Koreans, like most Americans, are just happy for some time to relax and visit family.

So now you can go ahead, slather gravy over everything, sink your teeth into that drumstick, and feel a little more worldly as you do. This time next year, I'll probably be explaining what a turkey is to Korean rugrats.

Happy Thankgiving!

It's a Great Day at Dunkin!

I don't know how many times a day I've had to say those words in the last 5 months, but never once was it the truth. Until today...

Okay, actually today was still a crappy day at Dunkin', because it's a crappy place to work, because all fast-food places are crappy places to work. But today was a slightly better day at Dunkin' than all the rest,  because today was my last day! My last day ever putting on a headset and trying to decipher mumbled drive-thru orders. My last day spilling hot coffee all over my hands. My last day holding my tongue for ridiculously picky and demanding customers. Unfortunately it's also my last day covertly stealing donuts. But they did let me keep my uniform!  Maybe I'll be able to use it to sneak into a Korean Dunkin' Donuts and snatch some free breakfast. Like some delicious sesame tofu rings or glutinous rice sticks. YUM!

South Korea, what?

 
I know I've been name-dropping this South Korea place a lot lately, but only a few pertinent details here and there. So just to make sure everyone's on the same page, here's what's really going down:

"Why South Korea?" you might ask. Well, for starter's Shawn has a friend from college who is currently on his third year teaching in Korea, so we had some initial insider low-down. Shawn had actually mulled over this scenario at different times in the past, but none of those times happened to be the right one. Then one day in July, Shawn said something to the effect of "Why don't we try teaching in Korea?" and I said "Sure" and the rest is history. Actually, as we've found in our research and application process, Korea is a great place for English teachers. You don't need any type of teaching experience. All you need is to speak English and have a Bachelor's in any field ... well, those are the minimum requirements anyway, but more on that later.

So we turned to the answer for every question - the Internet - and we came across a great place called Footprints Recruiting. The good people at Footprints specialize in helping hopeless wanderers make their dreams come true; we told them we wanted to go to Korea, and they filled us in on a little thing called EPIK (English Program in Korea). EPIK is essentially the government program that's in charge of all English teaching in Korean public schools, and because the Korean government has promised to have an English teacher in every public school, they make it very enticing for us native speakers:

• We get paid a minimum of 1.9 million Korean Won (about $1700) per month. Shawn and I are both in the process of complete a TEFL course, which will bump our pay up to 2.1 million KRW ($1900) a month. Plus this is all tax-free income.
• Our housing is FREE and furnished.
• Our airfare is FREE (reimbursed in our first month pay).
• We are guaranteed 25-30 work hours a week, NO WEEKENDS, and ample overtime pay if our work exceeds this for some reason.
• 18 paid vacation days + Korean national holidays.
• We have complete medical coverage under Korean national health insurance, half of which is paid for by our employer.
• If we complete our contracts, we get a nice severance pay, or a resigning bonus if we decide to stay and teach for another year. 

Needless to say, Shawn and I were sold. So we got the wheels rolling on an application process that proved to be far more involved than I expected. Surprise - if you want get a government job in a foreign country you have to provide a lot of paperwork and documentation! Luckily we were on top of our game, and several background checks, notarizations, reference letters and transcripts later we were first in line for the EPIK interviews in October. Which we aced, of course.

Now here we sit, a whole 4 months later, waiting for our official contracts to arrive, while we slowly start to pack things up and get the heck out of Phoenix. We're hitting the open road late on December 3rd, and taking our sweet time to meander eastward. First Louisiana (where we'll take a month-long hiatus) then across the Gulf and up the east coast to Virginia, where we'll settle for a little while before we trot 'round the globe in February. Of course, it won't all be peaches and cream and vagabonding for two months. There's still plenty of paperwork to slog through, and as we've found, hardly anything goes right the first time, so we're making sure we've got plenty of leeway for mistakes and redos.

So there you have the epilogue (or maybe I should say epiblog - ha HA!) to the SoKo story. It's going to be an epic.

Blog 2.0: Reboot

So I've definitely realized one thing: I'm not great at blogging. I can't continuously share all the random thoughts I have and interesting things I do every day, because then I have to actually interpret them into words and coherently communicate them. And if you can say one thing about my thoughts, it's that they're rarely coherent. And honestly, how interesting are the things I do every day?

So what brings me back to this forgotten wasteland of bloggery? And why bother redecorating? Well, what do you know, I've gone and decided to do something interesting again! At least interesting enough that I figure one or two people (Mom and Dad) will want to be filled in. And to answer the second question - I was bored.

So if you know me at all, this can only mean one thing - I'm leaving town! Leaving the country to be more specific. I'm headed to the Mystic East, and the best part is Shawn's coming with me! We both got jobs teaching in English in South Korea. In public schools, as government employees, no less. Yes, it sounds like the delirious ramblings of an opium addict, but it's all true.

So stay tuned for the exciting build-up to our February departure and then onward for a year of insanity!