The Menno Melange

Some random things:

From L to R: Familiar candy…where do I know this from…?; Funny car seat covers, are there really rabbits in the car?; The second sweater I knit for Will

Anyeong Haseyo (안녕하세요)!

Well, it’s only February, but there sure are signs of spring coming. Every day has been sunny and clear, and it’s starting to warm up a bit. I forgot to mention some things in my last email, so I’ll just add those now:

Seollal (Lunar New Year) Tradition
One tradition we have been hearing about during this important holiday, is that children will bow to their elders (parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents) and each person they bow to will give them money. So, those who have many relatives are VERY lucky indeed.

Interesting shoes
On our way home from Soeul, when we were on the subway, we saw the most peculiar shoes I’ve ever seen. This man has shoes that looked like normal running shoes on his feet, but under each shoe were 2 springs, and then a flat shoe surface that connected the springs to the shoes. So, like pogo shoes. It’s sounds crazy, but they were real. And, he was an older man, so it’s not some fad that’s coming out, I don’t think. We thought they must be orthopedic shoes, perhaps. Maybe he had lost the spring in his step.

Namdaemun Gate
As a point of news, an important historical site called “Namdaemun” was burnt down recently by an arsonist. This is quite a big deal in Korea, as it was the oldest wooden structure in Korea, built to keep tigers out. Wow, how long ago were there tigers in the wild? This gate was the pride of Korea, and some compared this tragedy to 9/11. I think that’s a wee bit of an over-exaggeration, but this gives an indication of how important this gate was.

Special Lecture at church
Will and I were asked to speak over 2 Sunday School hours about our testimonies, our vision, cultural differences, etc. This was a good opportunity for church members who are not in our cell group to get to know us better. After our second special lecture, a church member asked us how we resolve conflicts between us. It probably didn’t help our case much when I would reach for the mic while Will was speaking, and he’d yank it away from me, then I’d do the same to him. Everyone laughed at our silly behavior, and probably felt they had a good sense of how we handle conflict at home.

Knitting Club
I had my first knitting club meeting, and in preparation I made banana bread and set up a display of all the knitted things I made and brought to Korea. When everyone had arrived, I realized I didn’t need to prepare food to serve, because everyone brought something; fruit, a traditional sticky rice dish, puffy rice cakes, etc. I had 4 out of the 5 that expressed interest, and there are still some more who want to come, apparently. I thought I would be teaching them how to knit, but they all knew how, they just didn’t know how to make things. They looked through the knitted goods, and picked something they wanted to make, and they just spent the time practicing knitting, as most of them hadn’t knitted in a while. Meanwhile, Will entertained one of the ladies’ babies, and I taught each of them how to knit the things they wanted to make (ie. prayer shawls, toques and scarves). So, even though at first I felt useless cause they all knew how to knit already, I realized I can still help them make things, and just provide a way for them to gather and socialize, and some motivation to start and ultimately finish a knitting project. It also provides a place for them to bring their children so they can play together, or Will and I can entertain the kids, so the moms can actually have time to knit, when they wouldn’t at home.

One knitting club member couldn’t make it to the first meeting, so Will and I went to her place one morning, so I could teach her (or rather, remind her) how to knit. Her two daughters wanted to learn, too, so I tried teaching them, but alas, it’s much harder for smaller fingers. I knit a little blanket for one of the girls’ pet hampster, and the ungrateful thing just chewed on it. We later found it sleeping under the blanket, or at least half the blanket, which made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

V-School Interviews
It’s that time of year again, when we prepare for V-School after a nice long holiday. We went to the first meeting, where we met our 5 new students, 2 of which for After School, the other 3 for Day School. We first sat through 45 minutes of not knowing what was being said, then we began our interview process. To our surprise and joy, 2 of our new teenage students are NOT shy, and quite comfortable with their English. They lived for one year in Scranton, PA (we asked them if they had heard of “The Office”, but they hadn’t), which would explain their confidence. We are looking forward to getting to know these boys better. I also have two boys who want to learn guitar, so it looks like I’ll be starting a guitar class soon.

Hockey Game
Will’s team finally had an actual game with a team from Seoul, so I went along, bundled up enough that I’d be plenty warm in Antartica….and I was still cold. It was quite funny. Will was borrowing someone’s jersey, which was #20, and there was another #20 on his team. So I’m watching the game, paying particular attention to where #20 was, but everytime I saw #20 go off the ice, suddenly #20 was ON the ice again! I thought I was going crazy, until later Will told me why.

Farewell to the Nham’s/Moving
Last Sunday we had a farewell prayer for the Nham family, who left for the States on a 1-year sabbatical. Just like at home, we gathered around them, placing our hands on their shoulders, and prayed for their safe journey. Will and I are moving into their place this week, so we have been busily packing all our things, including V-School books and supplies. I didn’t know HOW much stuff we have, and I don’t know how we fit it in this apartment!

By the way, here are some nice views of Chuncheon city, where we live:

Also, here’s an adorable baby from our cell group:

Anyeong Haseyo (안녕하세요)!

Wow, sometimes there’s a long lull between noteworthy events, and other times there’s just a week. So, here I am again, in hopes that the next check-in will be shorter having already shared these stories.

Cooking Fiasco
So, I’ve gotten a little more comfortable with cooking here, and have attempted twice to make my mom’s chili. The first time I tried, we used hot pepper powder that we bought in Korea, thinking it would be about the same. WRONG. It was SUPER hot, and very hard to eat. The second time I attempted chili, I used the Chipotle Chili powder my mom sent, thinking THAT would be just like the chili powder I was used to, and WRONG. That was SUPER hot, too. We were both surprised by how hot it was, me unpleasantly, but Will pleasantly, and said “It’s Chipotle! What did you expect??” Apparently I don’t know what Chipotle means. At least Will loved the chili as it was.

Knitting Club
Ever since we arrived here I have wanted to start a knitting club with people from JVC, with the idea of teaching knitting and donating knitted goods to the needy. I finally got around to making the poster, had it translated by a friend, and put it up last Sunday. Turns out a few people are interested but are afraid of the language barrier. I will just have to insist that it’s more showing than talking. I now have two students so far, who are confident in English, and we’ll start classes next week, probably. I can’t wait!

Adventure in Seoul over Lunar New Year
1) First night
We decided to go to Seoul for a few days, while we’re still on break from V-School. We first went to a restaurant in Seoul called “Crazy Hook”, and it reminded me of a restaurant you’d find at Disney World, or something. The theme was Captain Hook from Peter Pan, so there were life size manicans of hook, and ropes and hooks hanging from the ceiling, etc. We greatly miss the strict sense of “Smoking sections” in Canada, as it is not quite the same thing here. The only thing that makes a “Non-smoking section” here is there is no ash tray on the table. We were literally 2 rows away from smokers. Did that mean there was no smoke in our section? Nope, there was. We then met up with a group of our friends from Connexus and went to a Nore bang. For those of you who remember the song “Barbie Girl” by Aqua, you might be amused to imagine Will and I singing that as a duet. A guy from the group had been learning the dance moves from the popular Korean song “Tell Me”, so we were entertained to see a grown man doing girly dance moves.

From L to R: Will in front of TV screens; Some friends who got really into the song; Ana with her back up singers

2) Suwon City Tour
We gave ourselves 1 1/2 hours to get to Suwon, a city just outside of Soeul, and it ended up taking 2 hours! Anyway, we did the Suwon City bus tour, which takes you to different parts of the Suwon fortress that surrounds the city. Our first stop was to admire a wall built in the 1700’s, which is very well preserved, and a secret entrance. We climbed to the top of the wall, where there was a tower and beautiful big yellow flags. We found a 600 year old tree that s considered sacred, and people believed that if they wished for something while touching the tree, their wish would come true. They have special slips of paper that you can write your wish on and tie it around the tree. This area of the fortress is also where a popular heritage show was filmed, so we saw the costumes used in the show. We went to an archery area, where the king practiced his archery, I suppose. We each got to shoot 5 arrows for 1,000 won, towards these targets with big pig heads on them. Man, archery isn’t as easy as it was at camp. We also drove to the KBS TV station, where a myriad of movie/TVshow sets are kept. On one side is a fake Korean town, based in the 70’s we supposed, and a fake Japanese town on the other side. Over lunch, we laughed about some of the funny signs we had seen that day. For example, a sign that says “Caution, stairs”, when you can clearly see the stairs ahead. If you can see the sign, then you’ve already seen the stairs. The punctuation was humorous, too

From L to R: Will and our friends in front of our tour bus; Cool dragon fountain; Never ending doors at fortress; Heather and I with some actors from the heritage TV show; 600 year old wishing tree; Golden buddha in the distance; Will and Joel trying to knock each other off the board; Past and present in one shot; One of the fortress entrances; Taking aim at the archery field; Our targets; One of the secret entrances; Will and Ana in front of movie set; The gang in front of a set; Ana at a “Japanese restaurant”; Funny sign stating the obvious; Your guess is as good as mine as to what this sign means; Another obvious sign with funny punctuation

3) World Cup Qualifying Soccer Game: Korea vs. Turkmenistan
We met up with a large group of friends and gathered at the World Cup stadium in Seoul, and our bags were searched before we were allowed in. A friend of ours had their travel mug taken, for fear she would throw it into the field (??). A marching band in yellow attire came out in fine form, followed by the players. During the game, everytime the Koreans were anywhere near scoring a goal, or being scored on, EVERYONE stood up and cheered like crazy. It must have looked so funny to see all these people standing up and sitting down every few minutes. They cheered so loudly when even a goal wasn’t scored, I wondered how on earth they would cheer when a goal WAS scored. As Will assured me, there certainly was a difference in volume and craziness when Korea scored. As predicted, Korea won with flying colours, 4-0. Even though our friends mug was taken, people still managed to sneak in toilet paper, and the streams of white could be seen after each goal. It was quite the experience, but by the end we were pretty frozen.

From L to R: Will and Ana at the World Cup game; The whole gang at the game; The marching band on one side, the players on the other

Stolen Wallet
Why does a gutt feeling not linger long enough or feel stronger? For the first time EVER in Korea, I had a sneaking suspicion that I should feel for my wallet. I did so, and my wallet was in fact there. Feeling comfort at this, my gutt warning system turned off. Not 30 minutes later, on the jam-packed subway, so full I wouldn’t know who was touching me where, my wallet was indeed stolen! I didn’t think this kind of this would happen in Korea, and I have been assured that it is indeed unusual in Korea, by someone who has been here almost 6 years. Lucky me to be the exception! On the bright side, if anything “bright” can be thought of, I discovered it right away so we cancelled all cards before any damage could be done, I didn’t have a lot of cash in there, and my passport wasn’t in there. That’s the only ID I have now. The bummer is that I have to replace ALL other ID cards, some of which from overseas, which will no doubt be a hassle. Ironically, when I was in Uganda, I kept my hand on my bag wherever I went in the big city, knowing what I did about the clever theives there. Here, I never ONCE thought about doing that, and HERE is where it happened. Argh.

That’s all for now. If it weren’t for my passport, I wouldn’t be able to sign my name at the end, as I would no longer exist in the eyes of the Ontario government.