Catch up

Since my last post was all about Taiwan, here's some other stuff.

Couple of weeks ago we bought Korean Monopoly. They use world cities as opposed to areas of a city. Mayfair is Seoul, and Old Kent Road is Tripoli. Mild fun, despite not knowing what the cards said.
Next day, we went to a theme park. Korean theme parks are identical to theme parks anywhere else, though this one did have a sex education centre. Seoul Land is at the opposite end of the Blue subway line to us, ie, South of Seoul. Since we live close to the second to last stop at the north of the city, we easily found a seat, and spent the 70 or 80 minute ride in relative peace. We saw all it had to offer, and while it was a bit dated, it fulfilled all that was expected of a theme park, with two rollercoasters, a pirate ship (advertised as "Korea's largest Viking with the largest seating capacity among all Viking facilities in Korea", which is just brilliant), a log flume, spookyhouse, various spinny things and assorted sideshows and attractions. We left well and truly exhausted and a little nauseated, a feeling exacerbated by the fact we had to stand up all the way back. Or at least I did.
Last weekend was Chuseok, which is like harvest festival or thanksgiving or whatever. On Friday all the kids came to school wearing traditional Korean Hanboks, which made the place look like the wardrobe department at a school production of Aladdin, or an early nineties shellsuit shop. I can't decide which. Anyway, all the teachers had to wear one too. We borrowed teachers' husbands' stuff. Again, you'll find evidence on facebook... Here are some kids armwrestling, "chicken-fighting," and er, a bit of millinary.
The bottom two are the enigma that is Jasmine and Eric, both from my 'homeroom' class (I teach them twice a day and give them tests and that). Eric is cultivating quite a remarkable five o'clock shadow for a 6 year old, and rightly so, he's incredibly proud of it. He keeps stroking it and smiling to himself. I've had to grow my beard back to put him in his place.

OK That'll do for now. Tomorrow the kindergarten kids have a field trip which means I don't start until 3pm, hence my posting at 2am in the morning.