A scary wedding taking place and a fight scene in what looks like a horror film (our friends Magda, Nate, Liz and Sean). Group shot up above with everyone hanging out at a Halloween party at Sean's apartment. I love the Where's Waldo costume! And you can see Keith in the clouds in the background as "I'm in your dreams":)
Our friend Magda, dressed up as a scary dead bride.
Me dressed up as a witch at night and Keith as a "I'm in your dreams". :)
The Chinese booth with the food sculptures and hand-crafted goods (dolls, fans, masks, clothing)
The Japanese booth, with Japanese dolls and a mask.
My co-teacher, Mrs. Hyun, who was in charge of part of the language festival.
The many booths that represented the English countries that the EPIK teachers are from. It was insanely busy in the morning with so many families and kids visiting all the booths. However, during my break (right after lunch) everyone was inside the stadium for the dance, singing, etc. competitions so I had a chance to check out all the booths while it was less busy.
Magda dressed as a clown representing the US Halloween booth. So cute!
Keith hosting the kids' English contest at the cultural festival. He looks so handsome dressed up!
Me dressing up as a kangeroo for the Austrailian booth that I worked at. There were too many Americans and Canadians to work at our own countries so we were representing other ones hehe Keith worked at the South Africa booth :)
Keith and I had a fun weekend celebrating Halloween. Saturday we spent all day from 9am-5pm working at the HUGE language festival that took place about 10 minutes cab from our apartment. They had booths set up to represent all the English countries that all the EPIK teachers are from. This included America, Canada, Australia, South Africa and England. They also had booths for Halloween, English sports, some Korean booths, a Japanese booth, a Chinese booth, food and other activities. During the morning shift, I worked at the Australian booth giving kids passport stamps, giving out candy and helping the kids make boomerangs. Each kid was given a passport and if they visited all the different countries (booths) they got some special candy. There were kids everywhere!!!!!!!! It was insanely busy, which I was surprised because I had heard that not as many people would be coming because of the Swine Flu scare (many people have been getting it or getting sick so everyone is fearful of it and have been wearing masks). I actually had a bunch of teachers at my school tell me to be careful at the festival. Also, students were supposed to come as a class from my school but because of the Swine Flu they ended up not coming. I did see the Japanese teacher from my school there working at the Japan booth, and I saw a few of my students and one of my co-teachers, Mrs. Hyun. She is head of the English Dep. at my school and was in charge of part of the cultural festival. She also had asked me to be one of the four judges for the adult English competition.
So after lunch, my friend Magda and I judged the speeches, which were all related to Jeju Toursm. Some of them were very informational and presented like a speech, while others were more humorous and had dilalogue and presented like a play. This made it hard to decide who was the best, but it was fun seeing adults work so hard at presenting their English speeches and I also learned more about the island and what they are doing to improve tourism. They talked about how Jeju is so small that you are always bumping into people you know....which can be a good thing or a bad thing. You need to be careful how you represent yourself outside your job because everyone will find things out....it's like living in a small town. They also talked about how they would like to use the web to provide more tourism information on popular traveling websites, as well as improve sporting competitions on the island to attract more visitors. One man also informed us how he is going to improve being friendlier to movie stars or celebrities because sometimes they feel like they are not being treated nicely, when in reality, people on Jeju feel as though they do not know what to say and how to act towards them because they are so famous. It was an interesting day and ended with me being able to walk around and check out the other booths and talk to EPIK friends.
That night Keith and I went to our friend, Sean's apartment. He and some other EPIK teachers live very close to Mount Halla (kind of on the way up the mountain). It was cool to see other people's apartments. Their apartments were big as well and even had bathtubs! And their location is very pretty with a good view of Mount Halla and in a peaceful neighborhood. However, it is more difficult for them to get cabs or buses out of their area and there are not many businesses around so they have to travel a ways to go to bars, restaurants, and grocery stores. The night was fun though, with a bunch of people showing up and some people went downtown to the bars afterwards. In the pictures, you can see that I dressed up as a witch (since I already had the witch's hat from school), and Keith made a creative costume in the only hr. he had after the festival. He was "in your dreams". He had clouds around his head and a board that had a person in bed ...dreaming of him. It was pretty funny!
Although it was the upper 70's and very hot on Saturday for the language festival, today it got very cold....in the 50's and very windy with rain. This made my run in the morning difficult since I was in shorts and a long-sleeve shirt. I think I need to buy gloves and a running hat and get some more long running pants. I did buy a winter hat and scarf here and have one wind/water resistant warmer jacket with a hoodie from home, but I'm starting to think I need more winter clothes if it stays this cold. It is supposed to get back up to the upper 60's/ lower 70's later this week. Let's hope it does! It is interesting because sometimes windows and doors will be open in our school. I think the teachers do this on purpose in order to have fresh air and not breath in the dry air, which is bad for your health. So I see teachers wearing their coats and jackets in the office and when teaching. Today I am wearing my jacket. It seems weird to me to be wearing it inside, because then when I go outside it will seem even colder! Oh well, it keeps me warm when there's a breeze in our office.
What is the weather like in Chicago? I heard there was lots of rain but still not too cold. It was sweet of my parents to send me some fall leaves decorations...I missed them this year! I have them on my kitchen table and counters to make it seem like fall inside. Our apartment luckily is very warm! I wear shorts and a t-shirt usually, so I hope it stays that way. Plus we have the floor heater we can use when it does get a lot colder.
Bye for now!
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