사진 찍어줄래?*

* = want to take a picture?

My Korean class - a picture taken for the 조선일보 (Chosun Ilbo), one of Korea's largest newspapers.  I am not sure when/if coverage of Sogang's language school will be appearing, but I'll post if it does!

 

 

Ice sledding / 얼음 썰매 in 안성.  We went for our Level 6 소풍, translated as "picnic" but usually refers to any day trip or outing of some sort.  Despite it being cold (I am bare-handed here because I lost my gloves, whine whine), it was SOMUCHFUN.  I probably would have stayed out there all day if the teachers didn't make us come back to Seoul.

 

Nothing new or terribly informative to report except for another bit of foreigner hilarious: after a delicious dinner of 불고기 (bulgogi, a type of Korean BBQ) with JM's parents last Thursday, her dad ordered us some 육계장, a pleasantly spicy beef soup.  However, the waiter brought out not three bowls of 육계장, but two bowls of it and one bowl of a clear, mild-looking broth.  Placing it in front of me, he offered this explanation to JM's parents (without looking at or addressing me): "I figured the foreigner couldn't handle the spicy soup."  OHRLY.  How nice of the waiter to tell me what I would like.  I really couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.  But the secretly hilarious part is that I think that this sort of thing happens quite frequently and is actually viewed as an act of politeness on behalf of the restaurant.  Interesting, because in America, this is actually horrendously rude.

JM's mom let me eat her 육계장.  And when I ate all of it, she offered to order me more.  An offer that I declined, but TAKE THAT, WAITER.

Cold weather, 막걸리 (Korean rice wine), graduation in less than one month.  The lunar new year is this week and I'm going to be spending it with a real live Korean family!  More to come.