Human Landmine Detectors

* I decided that instead of doing a day by day I would just do more of a weekly post. At the beginning, everything here was new and exciting. But now as I become settled into my routine there are some days that are completely uninteresting and unworthy of a blog entry. So instead, I may post a daily, or maybe a weekly report, depending on how exciting or slow my week was.
* Things are nice at home now. I've got a cute, cuddly rabbit waiting for me at home and I have the internet. If you know bud the cat then you can imagine bud as a tiny rabbit and that would be Pokey Tokey. (He stands up on his hind legs, just like a little Rorey Calhoun)
* Today I went to a teacher conference at one of the universities here, there are 10 different universities in the city of Seoul. It was really interesting hearing some of the speakers talk about students motivation, and engaging students in writing. Also interesting was the rock version of the wedding song played on an electric violin. During the closing of the conference a woman came out with an electric violin and played not only the wedding march, but the song from the godfather as well. What that had to do with educating second language learners I will never know.
* Last night I woke up to the sound of rain, and this afternoon it turned to snow. Big, puffy, flakes of snow blowing all over the place as Bonyun and I tried to find the conference. The snow is not sticking, it doesn't last long on the ground. I do fear the day when the snow does start to pile up, I am not ready to start living in a winter climate.
* This week I joined a belly dancing class. Its 3 times a week for a month and the class is taught in English, although she has very limited English and it is often impossible for me to understand. She seems like a genuinely sweet woman, although she did accost me when I first met her. Without warning she lifted up my shirt and tucked it in to my bra in the front and back. I was horrified and one of the other students, a girl from New York, said "It's ok, she does that to everyone," which some how still didn't make me feel better about revealing that much of my body to strangers.
* Mike taught me that in all other Confucius societies asides from Korea, the men walk in front of the women. A woman always walks behind her man, and the Korean society started out that way too but this changed in the 1950's. Apparently, landmines from the Korean war are to blame for this change. That's right, in the 1950's women became landmine detectors. If a woman was killed that was sad but at least the breadwinner was still alive and well. A woman would not be able to get a new father to her children if anything happened to him, but a man could always get another landmine detector.