Happy Belated Birthday Mom!

In honor of my Mom. :)

So for the past two nights I haven't actually officially slept. I had two papers due back to back, one about nonverbal communication and the other a summary about the three important factors of social policy development in Western nations from 1850-1950. If you know anything about the way I write papers my stupidity does not come off as a surprise but to those of you who think I am responsible...definitely not the case. I am someone who puts off papers until the day they are do and stay up all night to do them. What do I do in the time I am not writing the paper? Well, I have recently been hooked on One Piece and I caved in and bought the season pass for Heroes from iTunes. I totally have senioritis...

Nothing terribly exciting happened this past week. On Tuesday I went to Red Mango and a DVD bang, where we watched My Girlfriend is an Agent, a really funny and well done Korean movie, and 300. SPARTA!!!

On Wednesday I met my Language Exchange partner for the first time and she's totally awesome! We ate lunch at this cute little place that served delicious Japanese food and chatted about my lack of Korean skills, her trips studying abroad, and our mutual love for learning languages (even if I totally fail at it!). Yay for attempts at befriending native Koreans! I feel as if the program is not beneficial at all for the Koreans except that they get to meet foreigners. For the exchange students, however, we get to become friends with someone who knows perfect English, can show you around Seoul, pays for your food, and can even check your Korean homework! To me this seems very unequal so I will do my best to assist my partner by practicing possible interview questions in English and the like. Wednesday night I was surprisingly productive!

Thursday morning I totally ignored my alarm and woke up at 8:17 AM. I have class at 9:10 AM on Thursdays. After having an "oh, snap" moment I practically ran to the bus stop and was able to make it to class at 9:17 AM due to a good amount of traffic. Thursday evening I hung out with cool Filipino people! Three were half (but all Filipino at heart), one was actually from the Philippines, one was the guy who organized the gathering, and me. We ate at this cute bibimbap place, got cheap yet delicious waffles, and sung our hearts out in true Filipino style at noraebang.

Friday on my way to see a play I experienced what a sardine must feel like on the subway. I had to literally shove myself onto the car and was squished between two guys in suits. The play I saw with my friend was called Hotel Splendid, which was (now I'm going to quote myself) "a very emotional and moving play about four comfort women serving Japanese soldiers during World War II. I knew very little about the 200,000 women who were forced to have sex with the enemy every night as a part of their “patriotic duty” so I was glad to be able to watch a play like this which gave insight into a little bit of how life was like for these women, made even better because of the English subtitles! All the women were portrayed as strong and courageous human beings despite everything they had to go through. One women remained faithful to the memory of her dead husband while another somehow remained optimistic about life. What struck me the most was one subplot involving one of the women and a kamikaze pilot, which seemed to me like a real love story in true Romeo and Juliet fashion."

Saturday I went to my music class for the second time (out of a possible four times). Here's a little blurb about it: "Through the National Center for Korean Traditional Performing Arts I am taking a weekly music class specifically designed for foreigners. Taught in English by teachers who are truly masters of their art, I am able to learn how to play the instrument I thought was the most intriguing of the traditional Korean musical instruments, the gayageum, or the 12-stringed plucked zither. This class has already allowed me to experience more of Korea’s rich musical culture by learning how to properly pluck the gayageum in order to produce lovely melodies. Even when it is hard and I just can’t seem to play the instrument properly I appreciate all the more the knowledge and patience my teacher has in showing me the correct way to do it. I already know how to play some of Korea’s traditional songs and will be giving a final performance at the end of the semester to show off my newfound skills."

The whole week I had been planning on going to the R19 B-boy world championships but things just didn't work out, so I ended up going to a fireworks show which ended up being cancelled due to...swine flu. WHY?!?!? On the bright side, the area we went to reminded me of Chicago's Lakefront. A friend and I stayed there for a little bit before meeting her friend in Hongdae. We, of course, ended up going to a bar with delicious nachos.

Sunday was procrastination, mass, more procrastination, and finally working on the first paper.

On Monday DMC residents got free pizza and rice cakes in honor of the holiday coming up, Korea's own Chusok (Thanksgiving). After that I procrastinated some more and finally gave up to write the paper. That reminds me - I also turned in an application to be a part of IWU's Mortar Board, a new Senior Honor society yet I have not heard back from them. Hopefully that works out! Now should I apply for Research Honors or just enjoy my last semester on campus job hunting? Just in case you were wondering, my program has this "Cultural Reimbursement" program where I write a blurb and they give me money back for participating in things that enhance my knowledge of Korean culture. Yay CIEE!