A Fun Filled Weekend in Gwangju!

Hey Friends,

First off, I want to congratulate my sister Kim and her new Hubby Lorenzo who got married this past weekend! I’m so happy for them and super sad I missed the occasion. So, in order to keep the sadness away over the weekend I kept myself super busy.

On Friday night I went to a 'Guitar Bar' which is in my neighbourhood and only a short walk away. It was fantastic! They have a folk/cover band there that plays both Korean and English music. They were amazing and the bar was full of fun loving Koreans. It was such a good night for me and my appreciation for Korean grew stronger. For those who know me well know that I love live music and so I hadn't really heard any since I arrived and this is just what I needed. We ended up meeting up with tonnes of great foreigners and had some hilarious interactions with some really drunk Koreans. I ended up closing the bar with a few other stragglers and when there was only four of us left one of the band members played a few more songs while sitting at the table with us.

I've found this wicked group that a Korean girl named Han Na has started. It's called the Warm Hands Project and her mission is to bring Koreans and Foreigners together. The idea of it is that the Koreans can practice there English and the Foreigners can get help deciphering the culture all the while doing fun things like dinners and art classes.

As part of the Warm Hands Project Saturday afternoon I went to a leather working class. It was super cool! It ended up being a small group of 5 girls and we had a ball. We each got to pick what we wanted to make and then had to decide on designs and colours. I picked to do a wallet. It was all very overwhelming for a few of us because of all the decisions and the amount of people in the little workshop. Plus, I don't want to generalize but from my personal experience when Koreans do things they do them fast. I sometimes have a hard time picking my socks in the morning so picking designs and colours out takes me some time :) :) So, basically you have metal stamps/stencils that you use a hammer to embed the designs into your leather. Once that’s complete you use cotton gloves to brush your paint on and you can combine colours if you’re daring! We all had moments of frustration and feelings of failure however, all of our projects turned out well and we laughed a lot while doing them.

After our workshop we met up with the rest of the group to go out for dinner and drinks, it was delicious!

On Sunday morning I woke up early to call Quebec City to wish my sister and my new brother in-law all the best. It was so nice to talk to them and hear that all was going really well and that everybody was having a great night.

On Sunday afternoon I met up with some friends to go ice skating. HA! It was pretty wild and reckless. The skating rink was packed with people flaying themselves all over the rink. People were kamikaze, but somehow nobody seemed to be getting hurt (except the one guy I saw do a face plant into the open rink door...yikes!). You were not allowed to skate in the middle of the rink as it was dedicated to young figure skaters and speed skaters who were training. I have no idea how any of those athletes managed to stay focused with the small space and the chaos happening around them but I guess they are use to it.

So, now I'm back at school for another chaotic week of teaching English to young children! All I have to say is thank god they are cute!