Sunday, May 17, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
A Moment in "Damn I wish I had my camera"
Today had been an ordinary day in school except for one thing. During the third period class, the color guard from the local air force base came and gave a nice little performance. It was a nice combination of a traditional marching band, and some traditional Korean drumming. The marching band did some maneuvers on the dirt football field in front of the school. After that some guys with Korean traditional drums (삼일노래)* played some drums and spun their hats around. That was followed by some guys with guns marching and throwing their guns around.
It all would have been a pretty awesome video to post on the Internet, but I didn't have my video camera with me.
This situation was much like the situation on Saturday when I recorded my first win in international Korean Kendo competition, and had brought my camera, but never took it out of the case.
*probably not spelled right
It all would have been a pretty awesome video to post on the Internet, but I didn't have my video camera with me.
This situation was much like the situation on Saturday when I recorded my first win in international Korean Kendo competition, and had brought my camera, but never took it out of the case.
*probably not spelled right
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Dieting
A little about myself first.
I became interested in Korean things when I was twelve. I joined a Taekwondo school and trained for the next thirteen years. My first experience in Korea was at a Taekwondo tournament in Jincheon county, in Choong Choong Do. I spent a week there and won second place in a plastic board breaking competition. After that I spent about a month in Seoul training at a high school for kids who wanted to become pro Taekwondo competitors. There I met a guy who was teaching English at the school, and that got me interested in Teaching English here.
I went home, graduated from college, waited a year, and then enrolled in a free Tesol course at a University in Jinju. I wanted to continue Taekwondo, but it was rather difficult. The Tesol course offered an "experience Korea" program where the members of the Tesol course could take other subjects at the university. One of the programs was a special Taekwondo program for the members of the Tesol course. I trained with them for a while but I faced a bit of a moral dilemma. I both wanted more and less Taekwondo. By that time, I had trained Taekwondo for well over ten years and was kind of sick of it, but I also thought that I should try an train with top players to improve my skills. I wasn't training with top players in the Tesol course, these were just people who were trying it out.
The inertia lead me to try something different, Kumdo (Kendo). Kumdo turned out to be a good challenge for me. I had to humble myself. I had never done anything like it before and was delighted at the frustration.
The three month Tesol course turned into a fifteen month part time job, with the illusion that I was making good money. Eventually, it ended, and I returned home to pick up Taekwondo at my old school for a few months. There, I tested for my fourth degree black belt officially making me a master in rank. It turned out that working in box factory and teaching Taekwondo in the evenings was no way to earn a living and so I took a full time job teaching at a middle school in Jinju.
While in America I also lightly continued some Kendo training. I'm only mentioning this because I learned a lot of things in those few months and had a great time with the Battle Creek Kendo Club. That is a great organization I highly recommend that place.
Anyway, back at the middle school, my first day there was a bit disappointing. Public school contracts don't say anything about teaching night classes, so I was disappointed to learn that the school I worked for reallllllly wanted me to teach a night class twice a week. I did the work and was paid for it, but I had to sacrifice two nights a week from six thirty until nine thirty to teach classes that the students didn't really pay attention to. The bus ride from my house to the school takes about twenty minutes, so on those days when I had those extra classes, I showed up at school at Eight in the morning and left at nine at night.
Interest in Taekwondo training fell by the wayside, and so did Kumdo. Luckily, a guy at my school was on the Korean national Kumdo team. He learned that I did Kumdo, and he talked to my old Kumdo master. Around December of that year I got a text message from the old Kumdo master asking me to go back to his school. So I did.
I have been doing that seventeen months now. Unfortunately I have been gaining weight also. I have been finding fat in new places all over my body for a while. Luckily, I ran into the guy who was in charge of the Taekwondo program at the University. Last week I joined his school. One draw back of the school is that all of the students are either middle schoolars or elementary schoolars. I don't think that I will loose any weight from just exercise so I am going to try a diet.
I ordered a book called "the instinct diet." I have never tried a diet before, so I am some what excited, I'm also somewhat embarrassed that I have let myself go to this point. Anyway I'm happy to be doing Taekwondo again. My skill is still okay, but seeing the reflection of myself and the way the otherwise baggy uniform is now somewhat form fitting is certainly a delicious piece of humble pie.
I became interested in Korean things when I was twelve. I joined a Taekwondo school and trained for the next thirteen years. My first experience in Korea was at a Taekwondo tournament in Jincheon county, in Choong Choong Do. I spent a week there and won second place in a plastic board breaking competition. After that I spent about a month in Seoul training at a high school for kids who wanted to become pro Taekwondo competitors. There I met a guy who was teaching English at the school, and that got me interested in Teaching English here.
I went home, graduated from college, waited a year, and then enrolled in a free Tesol course at a University in Jinju. I wanted to continue Taekwondo, but it was rather difficult. The Tesol course offered an "experience Korea" program where the members of the Tesol course could take other subjects at the university. One of the programs was a special Taekwondo program for the members of the Tesol course. I trained with them for a while but I faced a bit of a moral dilemma. I both wanted more and less Taekwondo. By that time, I had trained Taekwondo for well over ten years and was kind of sick of it, but I also thought that I should try an train with top players to improve my skills. I wasn't training with top players in the Tesol course, these were just people who were trying it out.
The inertia lead me to try something different, Kumdo (Kendo). Kumdo turned out to be a good challenge for me. I had to humble myself. I had never done anything like it before and was delighted at the frustration.
The three month Tesol course turned into a fifteen month part time job, with the illusion that I was making good money. Eventually, it ended, and I returned home to pick up Taekwondo at my old school for a few months. There, I tested for my fourth degree black belt officially making me a master in rank. It turned out that working in box factory and teaching Taekwondo in the evenings was no way to earn a living and so I took a full time job teaching at a middle school in Jinju.
While in America I also lightly continued some Kendo training. I'm only mentioning this because I learned a lot of things in those few months and had a great time with the Battle Creek Kendo Club. That is a great organization I highly recommend that place.
Anyway, back at the middle school, my first day there was a bit disappointing. Public school contracts don't say anything about teaching night classes, so I was disappointed to learn that the school I worked for reallllllly wanted me to teach a night class twice a week. I did the work and was paid for it, but I had to sacrifice two nights a week from six thirty until nine thirty to teach classes that the students didn't really pay attention to. The bus ride from my house to the school takes about twenty minutes, so on those days when I had those extra classes, I showed up at school at Eight in the morning and left at nine at night.
Interest in Taekwondo training fell by the wayside, and so did Kumdo. Luckily, a guy at my school was on the Korean national Kumdo team. He learned that I did Kumdo, and he talked to my old Kumdo master. Around December of that year I got a text message from the old Kumdo master asking me to go back to his school. So I did.
I have been doing that seventeen months now. Unfortunately I have been gaining weight also. I have been finding fat in new places all over my body for a while. Luckily, I ran into the guy who was in charge of the Taekwondo program at the University. Last week I joined his school. One draw back of the school is that all of the students are either middle schoolars or elementary schoolars. I don't think that I will loose any weight from just exercise so I am going to try a diet.
I ordered a book called "the instinct diet." I have never tried a diet before, so I am some what excited, I'm also somewhat embarrassed that I have let myself go to this point. Anyway I'm happy to be doing Taekwondo again. My skill is still okay, but seeing the reflection of myself and the way the otherwise baggy uniform is now somewhat form fitting is certainly a delicious piece of humble pie.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Saturday adventures
Saturday I competed in another Kumdo tournament. This one was much smaller and had no special performances. My team took second place out of five teams. Yay. I had two matches. In the first match I won 1-0. It was a tense fight that dragged on the full five minutes, both of us couldn't get an advantage, finally he made a mistake. Something happened to make him drop his gaurd and I went for it hitting him in the head. Then about thirty seconds later the match ended.
The second match was a bit different. The guy was about 6-4 and seemed to have done Kumdo for most of his life. He scored two points, ending the match around the 40th second. I believe he only moved his Jukdo only three times (Jukdo = Shinai-a bamboo practice sword) After their team swept our team, my opponent was kind enough to hand my ass back to me. Fun times (in South East Korea)
Sorry no video for this one.
The second match was a bit different. The guy was about 6-4 and seemed to have done Kumdo for most of his life. He scored two points, ending the match around the 40th second. I believe he only moved his Jukdo only three times (Jukdo = Shinai-a bamboo practice sword) After their team swept our team, my opponent was kind enough to hand my ass back to me. Fun times (in South East Korea)
Sorry no video for this one.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Happy Children's day
It is a Tuesday and I have the day off. This day off is due to the Korean holiday called Childrens' day. I celebrated this day by grillin up some steaks. I recently learned what a new york strip was in Korean, so I went down to the ole meat store and picked me up a pair of Korean New York strips. They tasted pretty good. Also on the grill were some Australian tenderloins. They didn't turn out so well because they cooked for too long.
Fun in Busan
Last Sunday I went to Busan. My GFF and I went to the new Shinsaegea department store at Centum City. This department store is huge so I took a little film of an outside park that is on the 8th floor of this place. I simply think that it is amazing that such a place would exist on the eighth floor of a building.
After that we went to Joongang dong and went to the American Apparel shop there. Not much to report. I bought a 10,000 won pair of socks, and a 30,000 won t-shirt for my gff. American apparel is pretty expensive, but I do like paying the higher prices to support the American made stuff. Also in Joongang dong there was a parade that had some Japanese people in it doing Japanese-y things. I didn't get a chance to film it because we were tired and wanted to go to Seomyun to get a book.
Later in Seomyun we stumbled upon a Uniqlo shop. Uniqlo is a Japanese company that makes clothes like American Apparel but at a mere fraction of the cost. I got a nice new shirt, and awesome pair of 10,000 won sweat pants. After that we had coffee and went to a Japanese style Ramen shop. I don't know the name of the ramen shop, but it is in Seomyun somewhat near by the Pascuchi coffee, and near by a street that has a whole bunch of fortune tellers. Anyway that place is really good, it is a lot cheaper than Ramen in Japan too. I don't much like Japanese Ramen, but the place's spicy Japanese Ramen is quite good. They even had the Japanese style ordering system where you put some money into a machine and a ticket comes out. You then give the ticket to a guy who takes the ticket to the cooks.
After that we went to Joongang dong and went to the American Apparel shop there. Not much to report. I bought a 10,000 won pair of socks, and a 30,000 won t-shirt for my gff. American apparel is pretty expensive, but I do like paying the higher prices to support the American made stuff. Also in Joongang dong there was a parade that had some Japanese people in it doing Japanese-y things. I didn't get a chance to film it because we were tired and wanted to go to Seomyun to get a book.
Later in Seomyun we stumbled upon a Uniqlo shop. Uniqlo is a Japanese company that makes clothes like American Apparel but at a mere fraction of the cost. I got a nice new shirt, and awesome pair of 10,000 won sweat pants. After that we had coffee and went to a Japanese style Ramen shop. I don't know the name of the ramen shop, but it is in Seomyun somewhat near by the Pascuchi coffee, and near by a street that has a whole bunch of fortune tellers. Anyway that place is really good, it is a lot cheaper than Ramen in Japan too. I don't much like Japanese Ramen, but the place's spicy Japanese Ramen is quite good. They even had the Japanese style ordering system where you put some money into a machine and a ticket comes out. You then give the ticket to a guy who takes the ticket to the cooks.
Friday, May 1, 2009
A Korean traditional Guitar performance.
The video quality on this isn't that great, (As if, the video quality on any of my videos is good any good) but this is a woman playing a Gaya Geum which is a Korean traditional stringed instrument. I took this video early last march and have been lazy about posting it.
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