Don’t Rub My Buddha Belly

So my coworkers and I went out to dinner on Friday to celebrate the end of the semester and to say goodbye to one of the teachers and as we were paying, the proprietor and his friend wanted to shake my hand (only). They decided that my hand was cold and kept taking turns shaking it.

They then proceeded to give me some advice at length about how I needed to get some herbal medicine to fix my intestines so my hands would stop being cold. To emphasize the point, one of them rubbed my stomach. Really. Just put his hand on my and rubbed in a circle.

I sometimes feel like Korea is becoming Western so fast that in some ways it doesn’t really feel Korean anymore, but that felt 100 percent Korean. My sister arrived safely last weekend and on Tuesday we celebrated Korean Constitution Day by going to Kyungbokkung Palace in Seoul. This is us in front of the lake. It was a great day. We saw a reenactment of the changing of the guard and she got to see some traditional Korean architecture.

This is the backside of the changing of the guard with downtown Seoul in the background.

Yesterday, at the KOTESOL meeting, I was told by a Korean member that I was suitable for a “Korean gentleman”. The reason for this odd pronouncement? I was cleaning the tables before the other members arrived. So, apparently, the only qualification she thinks Korean men are looking for is a woman who cleans. Well, sign me up! Goodness knows all I’m looking for in a man is someone who wants a maid.

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The current pair of Elann socks I’m working on, the purple ones, are getting pretty close to done. I’ll post a pic of the completed pair next time.

I haven’t really had any knitting time this week. The regular session ended at school and the new one starts tomorrow, so I’ve had progress reports and lesson plans. I took a morning class last month and was presented with a four page (front and back!) progress report to complete for each student. To be honest, I don’t have eight pages to write about the students I’ve been teaching for the last six months, much less students I’ve taught for 4-5 weeks. So, I’ve been trying to improve my BS skills.

I keep getting more and more jealous of the people who got in on the Mystery Stole KAL. I don’t know how I didn’t hear about it, but I missed the sign up deadline by one day. Now that people are posting photos of their WIPs, I’m even more upset than I was. At least she’ll be posting the pattern when it’s all over. It would just be fun to be doing it with everyone else.

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