Tricksters

Hello everyone!
Another week past and closer to a new year beginning at Little America. This means we are all rushing to get books finished for new classes and/or figuring out our schedule for the next 6 months. Getting new students will be a bitter sweet change at work. While I will really miss my Texas class, I am so looking forward to switching up the routine and getting a new kindergarten class. Elementary classes are also changing. I think I am keeping some of my elementary students but the times/days/books are all changing and then I will get new students as well, which should be fun! Our students are on spring break from their elementary schools now, but do we get spring break? Nope, we have March 1st off to enjoy and get ready for the next term!

Next week is very exciting, because Ryan (the friend I stayed with in Thailand) is coming to visit for the weekend! It will be so much fun to show him around and also have someone to do all the touristy things I haven't done yet. Should be a weekend full of yummy food and photo ops! I have a schedule typed up of everything I want to do. I just wish I didn't have to be in work all day on Monday and Tuesday so we could explore more of the area, but alas I need to be with my kiddos. Ryan will have to fend for himself on those days! Keep your eyes out for that blog post.

Time to fill you in on this weekend! I finally (with the assistance of Shanna) went to get a haircut today! Very exciting, I know, but my hair was getting a bit out of control after not cutting it for 6 months now. The girls at the salon kept saying "Oh so much! Such long hair!" Yes I know. They had 2 girls blow drying and straightening, I felt like a science experiment. Walking out with my hair the straightest and lightest its been since I arrived, we made our way to the Trick Eye Museum in Hongdae. I've read a lot about this museum and seen pictures of friends here who have gone. As the last item on Shanna's to-do list, it was a must for this weekend!

The museum, for those of you who do not have previous experience, is basically a giant photo-op area aka Korean's dream museum. You can interact with the paintings and sculptures to take goofy pictures. Some paintings left you with a kind of "huh..." feeling (Eddie Izzard fans?) and others were fantastic, such as the giant panda having you for dinner...

That just gives you a little taste of the goodies this museum provides. When I wasn't sitting on a giant spoon I was robbing banks or getting peed on by little cupid sculptures. The photos are all 3D allowing you to inflate Mona Lisa with a bicycle pump or pants the "Scream" painting.

I don't know why these types of museums aren't in the states. While the condition of some of the paintings and sculptures were not exactly brand new after so much traffic through the exhibits, it was still a hilarious way to spend the afternoon. Shanna had the brilliant idea of trading cameras so we followed each other to each photo op and made goofy poses with the rest of the crowd making their way through the museum.

Tricky Tricky

Any flashbacks to Jasmine from Aladdin?

Yes please

This doesn't count as cheating on Lent does it?

Little America takes the kids to a trick idea for a field trip during the year sometime. I am not too sure about this decision as there were a copious amount of naked people and sexual innuendos via 3D wall stickers. Maybe the one they go to has more kid-friendly photo opportunities? I hope so, as I do not want my kindergarteners pretending to look down some guy's boxer shorts! I also can't imagine guiding a group of kindergarteners through this place and getting them to pose at every picture. We will cross that bridge when we get there...

We left at a perfect time as the line wrapped out the door to get into the museum. Next on our list was finding some Arabic food! I had done some research and found a place with apparently some excellent felafel sandwiches. I took a picture of the map on my phone (oh technology, how would we get by without you) and worked out what we thought was our general location. All things looked positive as we walked and the road looked similar to the one on my phone but when we turned to expect to see a sign saying "Jack's Bean"...nothing...lets try the next street?...nope, still nothing...hmm well after retracing our steps and checking further down side streets, we chalked it up as a loss and continued to an Indian road we had passed earlier to grab some curry.

Biggest Naan ever....

The turnover of restaurants and stores here is in enough to make you dizzy. I will walk to work one day and pass an eye-glasses shop one day and then it will be a pet shop the next day. It is not uncommon to see a place completely gutted in the morning and then set up as yet another phone shop in the afternoon. And of course when this new store opens, they have a GIANT "Grand Opening" party with balloons, animal suits, and clowns on stilts handing out flyers to everyone that walks by. One particular phone shop next to Little America first opened when I got here...and they still have balloons and animals suits out every day. Now I know time flies here but how long can they stretch the term "just opened"...?

Wow, long vent there. Anyways, we had our curry and then headed back home after a successful and tricky day!

Tired Garfield- exactly how we felt

Until next time!
Korean phrase of the post: 레스토랑은 어디 있죠?? (Reseuhtorangeung awdi eesjyo) Where is the restaurant??