perfecting the art of being a tourist.

let me just say that this may well be my favorite picture taken in south korea so far. 

1. it makes me laugh every time i see it 

2. its not too often that a pose like this can maneuvered at historical sites

3. this will be the cover to my book/really long list of reasons ima nut

(some background: photo taken in the heart of seoul. the us embassy is to the right, theatre playing korean "annie" to the left, below is fake green turf, giant korean palace straight ahead and giant statue of Yi Sun Shin, korean warrior who conquered japan in 1500s is right behind that image of poise in the brown.)

anyways....

i went to seoul this weekend with my ladies and spent all day sunday doing touristy things. which is a real nice break from trying to be a fancy korean in goseong. 

it was full of:

epic jump shots!

really low ceilings. 

some wildlife.

oh, 

and the only intercity buddhist temple in seoul!!!

there was apparently some sort of holiday or festival going on in the city (note the giant collection of flowers), but of course we had no idea what it was. things like this happen a lot. especially in sokcho (my big sister city). parties or parades will be going on and i get really confused but quickly very excited because it means extra street food. 

miss jordyn 

delicious pancake bites with red bean goop. SOOO tasty. and five fo only a dollah!!

just to add to the day of touristy adventure, jamie and i wore matching outfits. we are so cute.

prognosis: mini disasters left and right (losing my metro card twice and having to buy new ones, stepping in an ogre size wad of gum, ridiculously cold weather with speedy mcgee winds, trying to convert inches to centimeters to women's shoes to men's shoes with koreans and calculators, 3 day old stale waffles strong enough to crack molars, and oh yeah,  fake jimjibangs) were not enough to dampen a weekend of delicious food and good company. 

screw clubbing, screw going out on the town. it's friday night and all i want is a sandwich.

ma and pops i love yah, but sandwiches are the number one thing i miss from home. like desperately. you may think that i googled these photos just for this post. but no. i have been collecting them over time. aka: add this to the laundry list of new crazy kylieisms. (1. dancing in elevators 2. talking to myself  3. color coordinating my clothes dryer 4. collecting photos of sammies.) 

my only defense is that sometimes if you look at a pictures long enough and and focus hard enough, you can kinda, maybe sometimes taste the mayonnaise, feel the crunch of the toasted sourdough, detect the juice of a ripe tomato, and the favor of some sharp cheddar and provolone. my drool alone could water all the potted plants from here to china. 

my weak attempt at defending my crazy is futile, the last nail in my coffin. kylie is a freak. (AND I'm talking about my self in the third person!! help meeeeee)

the hokey pokey is SO overrated.

my kids requested the "hamster dance" every day during class and of course i couldn't say no, so we watched it every day for a week. i started to think that it wasn't the most professional thing for me to do so i decided to make dancing hamsters educational. now my kiddies know the lyrics to party rock. not quite true to most pedagogies, but most definitely culturally relevant.

party rock!
party rocking in the house tonight.
everybody just have a good time.
and we gonna make you lose your mind.
everybody just have a good, good, good, good time.
whooaaahh ohhh ahhhhhhh.
everyday im shuffling.

kylie "budding adrenaline junkie" kingsbury

 holy moly. bungee jumping is fantastic. let's just start the story by saying that immediately afterwards i was considering buying another ticket and doing it again right away. i enjoyed it that much. here's the play-by-play:

(travelled about 8 hrs to get to the WORLD FAMOUS, okay, not world famous, but definitely korean famous bungee jumping land. fun fact: with a 62m drop, it's the biggest bungee jump in korea. this i was not particularly interested in. what excited me more was that it only cost 30,000 won ($30). let me just tell you. being a budding adrenaline junkie and a cheap ass is not easy or common. but anyways, my friend susan and i both really wanted to try it out so we convinced a group of friends to come along.)

(at the bottom, i was thinking, oh gosh, that platform doesn't look very high. i wish it was taller. more exciting that way. elevator to the top, i start double taking. )

(at this point i was wishing i had peed before coming up. there's something about heights that tests my bladder control. ah. ah. ah. )

(once i got to the edge, i was stoked. and a little upset that i couldn't get a couple step head start and leap into the air. swan dive style. but no, i had to stand right on the edge. first try jumping, i tried to get good liftoff and the korean man grabbed my harness. "no! no! hands up" apparently this approach wasn't okay. but i must say, that moment where i was mentally and half physically jumping, but was then pulled back, the moment when i started to think i was going to fall 62m instead of jumping 62m was so so so much more terrifying than the jump itself.)

  

( all the other ladies i went with had to be pushed off the platform. i take full pride in jumping all by myself. i was talking to another english teacher today at work and told him about my bungee jumping glory. he said that he most definitely would have to be pushed off too. and that jumping would go against all human instinct and is totally abnormal. apparently i am some sort of mutant. )

(I'm real glad i never wanted to be an olympic diver. i have terrible form.)

(slightly more graceful)

( when i was just hanging at the bottom waiting for the rowboat to come and get me, i was so pumped i started wiggling around trying to swing around getting my moneys worth, yah know? well the man got a bit upset and said i needed to calm down if i ever wanted to get off. i contemplated making a scene and avoiding the boat, but the blood rushing to my head called trump.)

(these were the guys that were running the place. slightly terrifying that boys who were younger than i am had my life in their hands, but whatcanyahdo? secret love for the kid in the hat. he was such a hamball. he told be in his best english that he was an olympic athlete and a comedian. precious right? and most certainly a lie.)

(i asked him to take our picture and this is what he gave me. 100% what chandler would be doing if he worked at an amusement park. seducing the ladies with his goofball charm. )

(kinda like when he sneaks into my bed and takes pictures of himself)

(the group. iowa, iowa, idaho, alaska, michigan, canada, and texas)  

my life never quits being embarrassing.

so today, i splurged and bought a doughnut on my way to the grocery store. it was delicious. not as good as the banbury cross chocolate cake ones you can get in utah, but pretty damn close. interesting huh? okay, okay, it's boring i agree. but it will all make sense soon. chillax.

living in korea and especially in the boonies means that there aren't a lot of whities. (whitey = foreigner. i know that this is not politically correct, but i've become attached to the term and use it frequently. and i mostly only get weird looks when i call korean americans or black people whiteys. which also happens more often than you would think). annnyways. in korea there are not very many whities. so naturally koreans look at me thinking, "what the hale is this whitey girl doing out in freakin goseong, south korea? and why is she talking to herself and dancing in the elevators?" it happens all the time. I'm standing at the bus stop and 95% of people in passing cars take a long glance at me as they pass. some even wave. every other person that i pass on the street makes eye contact.  kids point and give me the nicest compliments in korean. (i cannot understand korean). i notice ajumas staring at me on the bus. when i first got here i used to think people would look at me because my clothes were a hot mess, or i had freaky reverse blonde roots, or i spilled kimchi juice on myself. but nope, it's just cause of my freaky eyes and pasty skin.

so today I'm walking down the street (a maybe 5 minute walk) from the bus stop to the grocery store and people are looking at me left and right. okay, normal. they always look at me like I'm a weirdie. but people are looking at me longer than usual. and focusing on my face. dah HALE? what is going on? i start to give them weird looks back. a creepy smile with eyebrows raised. this does not deter them. i think everybody else is being so weird until i walk up to the e-mart glass doors and see my reflection. chocolate frosting. on my face.

for once, koreans looked past my cultural and biological differences to stare at my real, normally embarrassing self. and it felt good. :)

K-POP baby!!!!

k-pop = korean pop music. and it's pretty addictive/delicious. here are some of my favorites so far.



GD & TOP "KNOCK OUT"
i love everything about this. their attitude, the beat. their style! and people really dress and act like this in seoul. ahhh!!! i swear this almost has a reggaeton/latin flavor. which makes me like it even more. side note: if i looked as good as top with cotton candy purple hair, i'd straight up leave my boring brown hairs in the dust.





2NE1 (pronounced 21) "I AM THE BEST"
these girls are so badass. nega che cah la gah = i am the best.  this song plays all over the place, from clubs to the family mart across the street from me. favorite part? 2:26. i need me that hairstyle. :) could you imagine the horns in purple!!!!??? ohmgeee. and every korean girl i know LOVES this song. i have seen multiple renditions of the dance moves during lunch break by the 6th grade girls. i also credit k-pop for making all my kids say "ohmygod." in that ridiculous voice, heard at 0:39.


does korea have the best music videos or what? i'd say hells yes.

lil baby discovery.

apparently this is my "dance" face. also, new dance move in the works? I'm dubbing it the stein. frankenstein that is. 

when left by myself too long....

 i am turning OCD. i was doing laundry and subconsciously had the urge to organize by color. each piece had to be in their. exact. spot. i have a cousin named jade, who used to be obsessed with the cabinets in our grandma's kitchen. it's a giant kitchen with a ton of brown cabinets. at least 14. and that's only on the west wall. anyways, it would drive her crazy if one was left open. they all had to be closed. at all times. i thought she was just being dramatic and so one night when we were sleeping in the front room that is connected to the kitchen, after we had all gone to sleep, i woke up and quietly went and opened all the cabinets in the kitchen. every. single. one. and i was so proud. "heh heh" laughing while creeping back to my bed on the couch. this was totally gonna freak her out!! so i went back to sleep and woke up again about an hour or two later and groggily looked over at the kitchen to admire my handiwork, AND JADE HAD ALREADY CLOSED THEM!!! i was flabbergasted. and upset that i didn't get to see her face when she saw the kitchen disaster. so now on her 21st burfday, i'd like to apologize for making fun of her peculiarities because i have now developed some of my own.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY!!!

oh and whoda thunk that a rainy, freezy cold day would be such a kaleidoscope of ROYGBIV?

(minus the v, but come on! i and v are so stinkin close. :)....)

oh seoraksan, my favorite korean love.

you would think that i would need a its-not-you-its-me-kind of, i-just-need-some-time-to-think-break with seoraksan after getting caught in a giant rainstorm two hours into my hike? but don't worry sugar-baby. i still got chore back.

KKB + SNP = BFFAEAE  (best friends forevah and evah and evah)

                                                                 cable car to the heavens

(may all sentient being free of suffering and cause of suffering. om ah hung) 

it's something real nice when religion can be so closely connected and intertwined with nature. they've got a good thing going, buddhism and seoraksan. it's so beautifully done, like i've never seen before.

old foggie heaven

ahhh, if nothing else, trips to seoul are always popping up with weird oddities of places i could stay for hours. prime example: was walking in seoul last weekend and passed by a park. and holy moly i was excited. you literally never see parks here. in all of korea. notta one. well except for the national parks, but I'm talking about municipal parks. julia davis, ann morrison, sugarhouse, etc. so i see this park and i freak. we bee line it to the trees and i see this giant group of men all wearing grays and blacks. i initially think they are all homeless. maybe there are fire pits and they're warming their hands? or a soup line? I'm mean, what could they all be doing just standing around in a park? we creeped a bit closer and discovered an old man korean checker playing ring!!!  i most definitely took this opportunity to creep some photos and romance some old cuties with my pre-primer korean into showing me the ropes. 

i was continually thinking about my own grandpas when at the park. definitely on the same page as bill with the khakis and tennies. and old hanyak sensibilities from mark. 

i would just like to mention that all of these were taken from the hip, without them even knowing i was taking a picture! these are genuine "oh, what a ridiculous/hilarious foreigner girl. she's trying to make jokes/ i guess i'll take some pity on her" smiles and laughs. 

what a HIP grandpa!!! not only working the pose, but check out the style. THREE different stripes. and ALL vertical! makin moves baby baby!!

it may look like "korean checkers" is just a giant mess of junior mints, and it essentially is. when asked if they could explain the game, one old guy said that foreigner brains couldn't ever master the game. apparently it's too complicated for us waygooks. 

fall lovin.

little bugger.

monkey:
my favorite little heart breaker/mess maker.
even when he tries to dong shim me (see video above), he still has a lil sweet spot in my heart.