My classes are great, my first period class; Understanding Art; is taught by Dr. Sandra Bird with her assistant Dr. Miwon Choe. In this class we are learning how to analyze works of art more thoroughly and in a more unbiased manner. The best part about this class is that every Thursday we take a field trip to a museum! This past Thursday, I went to the National Folk Museum of Korea. It was an amazing experience to see objects that were created by humans so many centuries ago.
My second class is called Technical English Presentation Skills and Job Preparation. Sounds pretty boring right? Surprisingly it is not! My professor is Mr. Mark McShea from the U.K. He is very entertaining with his sense of humor along with the awesome British accent! It is not an easy class for me since I am pretty backwards and shy, but the way he has it organized makes it not so intimidating.
Just a funny side note; I wish I could have snapped a picture of Mr. McShea's face when he heard me speak for the first time, it was absolutely priceless. His facial expression said; "Sweet mother of mercy, what am I going to do with this!". Then just like everyone else and their brother, he had to ask where I was from, and his only advice to me: Just be yourself. Phew!! That's all I know how to do anyway!
My evening class is Topics in Korean Art and Society. This is also a very interesting class that explores the foundations of Korean cultural elements. It is taught by Dr. Seungho Moon. He is originally from South Korea, but he now teaches at Oklahoma State University. He has an interesting perspective because of his background and I really enjoy his class.
On Wednesday; my free day, I began by meeting Miwon in the art education room here at Hanyang! We met with some faculty and art students that are interested in participating in the exchange program. Most of them were art ed. students and one was an art therapy major. We met with them to encourage them to come to WKU. Even though I did not understand half of what was said at this meeting, I was excited to meet these girls that are pursuing the same degree as I am, 6,000 miles from where I normally am!
After this meeting, my friend Seokyung Park and I went on a small adventure in Seoul. Seokyung was an exchange student at WKU for the 2013-2014 school year.
Our fun little adventure started out on a rough note however.. My lack of grace has left me with a nice little battle scar on my left knee =( Whilst strolling down Hanyang Mountain, discussing the differences in American and Korean ways of life with Seokyung, my right foot magically slipped out from underneath me! (As my dear mother always says; I could trip on air.) Then it was girl down. I am used to this kind of thing so I didn't think much of it or looking at my knee to see the damage. I just brushed it off and jumped right back up! Seokyung was quite concerned though, especially when she saw the blood running down my leg! Thank goodness there was a pharmacy at the bottom of the hill that took excellent care of me! They gave me what I needed so that our adventure could resume..
Disclaimer: The next photo is the inspiration for today's post's title.. Proceed with caution!
The first thing we did was find a restaurant with Korean barbeque. I told Seokyung that I had been wanting to try it since I had arrived in Korea. She took me to one of her favorite restaurants. At this particular place, there is a charcoal grill built into the table, and you cook the barbeque yourself!
After we ate all we could, we traveled by subway to MyeongDong to do some shopping! The things here were very cheap! Most of the clothes were not made to fit gals like me, Korean women as a collective, are very small. They just don't need to make clothes much bigger than an American size 4! I did find a few things though, and we had just as much fun looking at the stuff, as well as the sights along the street. After we'd had enough of shopping, we decided it was time for a sweet treat! We went to a little restaurant to get some bing soo. What is bing soo you ask?? It is a little bowl of heaven, that's what it is! Here's a picture to better describe what I cannot put into words...
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Something Seokyung told me to make me feel better about my knee is that there is a Korean saying that if something bad happens at the beginning of your journey, that the rest of your journey will be good from then on. I hope this is true about my trip to Korea, hopefully nothing worse than that will happen to me!
An inspiring message I came across on my walk back to the dorm yesterday...
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