We are embarking on a great adventure, one of learning and teaching. We will embrace our new surroundings and grow in a new culture.

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Hello

Hello everyone,

We are doing great. We're enjoying the weather and we hope spring arrives soon. We have been to the beach and enjoyed the sun. It was a beautiful day but a little cold. Everything is going well and we are going to play in the touch rugby tournament this week. It should be a lot of fun.

The big news is that we will probably be buying a car in the next month. The car will probably be smaller than my old FESTIVA. It will be funny to see us get out of the car. We'll send you some photos when we get the car. For the next month, we will be riding our new bikes. We bought ourselves some speedbikes. They are cool and we hope to travel around all the island on them. We will post pics in the future.

We are trying to stay in shape and enjoy the beautiful weather. Everyone tells us that spring is here. We hope that in the following weeks this comes true. Talk to you soon.

Later

Christian and Karina

Remember that you can leave us replies by hitting the comment button under each post! We hope to hear from you.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Celebrating at the Fire Festival






Hi everyone!

Well it's Valentine's Day here and I just wanted to say have a wonderful day! It's pretty funny how the kids just say "Teacher, chocolate!!!" the moment you walk in! This whole holiday is celebrated the same as at home. And I must say I was truly spoiled when Christian came home this morning with the largest bouquet of flowers I've ever seen. It had roses, and snap dragons and these lily-type flowers! So we had a nice breakfast of crepes and head off to school in a balmy 8 degrees Celsius!

Christian and I have been hit by a bit of a cold, and I have lost my voice! My kids think it's hilarious that I sound like a man!!! Anyways, Christian is actually teaching my adult class now since my voice has been ravaged by the last 6 classes! So its been a lot of worksheets and games today! Anyways, we are both doing really well, minus the health bit, but we have already gone to the doctors and we are on some med. It's funny here how we can go to the medical clinic, each have a check-up, get meds and still pay less than $40! Its a pretty good deal!

But we just had a most unique weekend. On Saturday we went to a Fire Festival. It was to celebrate the new moon and to banish bad omens for the coming harvest. So what they did was actually light an entire small mountain on fire! There were crazy fireworks, a lazer show and it was all coordinated with random music (Braveheart theme song, traditional Korean music, then some dance music to spice it up!) And this went on for the entire night! It was pretty impressive to see this gigantic fire just blazing in front of you...from 50 feet away you could feel the heat! I was in heaven! Though the billowing clouds of smoke were a little nasty, it was all really spectacular. There were tents set up all around and it felt like a mini-market. You could buy your fruit and veg here or a pair of pants, and there were also tents set up like restaurants where people were eating all sorts of traditional foods and drinking soju, makali, and beer! Needless to say we had a great time!

Our entire adventure in South Korea has been amazing and we are both looking forward to what the future may hold!

We send you all our love,
Karina and Christian

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Last weekend

Hello everyone,

Hope everything is going well. We are having fun and enjoying the beautiful areas on the island. Last weekend, we went to the Halla mountain runoff river. It was really beautiful. Joe, it reminds me a lot of the Sooke Potholes. This is the best place to have a swim during the summer since the beaches can be crowded and very hot. This is our Kiwi friend playing with ice. They don't get a lot of it in New Zealand.

We walked down this river. It was very slipery. We will come swimming in these holes during the summer to refresh ourselves.

This is the biggest pool we saw. It is a beautiful place because of all the vegetation around the river. We liked it alot.

Sunday, we took it easy. It was not very nice out and we stayed in and watched movies. We are coming down with a little cold and we want to make sure we are ok to teach. Hope it's not too cold in Canada. We can't wait for the spring to come. It has been snowing a little today but it has all melted away. I hope to talk to you all soon.

One last note, I can't wait to se Canada at the Olympics. I hope I can see them on TV.

Best of luck,

Christian and Karina

Thursday, February 02, 2006

Pics from Udo and Jeju City

Hello everyone,
We are doing very well and had a great long weekend. We have two vacations during the year and this one was really fun. We will have a few more long weekends but not one of 5 days like the one that just past. It was really fun.

On Friday, we went to Jeju City to explore the biggest city on the ilsand. We had to pick up our alien registration cards form Korean immigration. We visited the city and did a little shopping. It was alot of fun. We took the bus there in the morning and walked around all day. It was fun.






In Jeju City, we walked up this hill on the edge of town. It was really cool. There were all these Koreans walking around and doing there exercise. I got a few reps in and enjoyed the sites. We had supper and I found some shoes although shopping is difficult at times since nothing fits me. That night we took the bus home and relaxed.



On Saturday, we went to play Rugby with all the expats. I also got to play cricket again. It was fun. That night, we all got together to eat and have a few drinks. It is always funny to have a bunch of us together. Everyone is nice and we enjoyed each others compagny late into the night.




On Sunday, we drove of to Udo island with a New Zealander couple. It is a beautiful island with a population of 1750. It is really small and we were able to bike around the whole island. We had a few of our friends join us that night and enjoyed our hotel room right in front of the coral beach.














Udo island is the one of the few islands to have three different types of beaches on it. The closest beach was at the door step of our hotel. It is a coral beach. The coral is really soft and white.







This is the other beach on the other side of island that has black sand. I will put other pics on the other site that show more of the beach. We biked past the other beach put we were going so fast we did not take any pics.


On Monday, we biked around the island and it took us around 2 hours. There is a hugh lighthouse on the east coast of the island that is on the tallest point of the island. We will take some picks of it when we go again.



The island was amazing. The best part is that after returning our bikes on the last night we saw a pod of dolphins playing in front of our hotel. They were swimming around for around 30 minutes up and down the coast. It was amazing to see them in the wild. We were told that it is a good omen to see them. We were all delighted to see them. That night, we relaxed and enjoyed the heated hotel room and TV. At home, we try to conserve on heating costs so it was nice to have the heat on full blast.

On Tuesday, we had a late breakfast and made our way home. We took the ferry home and drove back to Seogwipo. It was a gray day and so we drove on the back roads home and enjoyed the countryside.

It was a great week-end. We even went for a swim on the coral beach. We had a great time and enjoyed our long weekend.

Talk to you soon. This weekend we are going to take it easy but will do a little more exploring. The island has a lot to offer.

Bye

Christian and Karina