Pushy Christians, board games and Ena!

Pushy Christians: I think the language barrier here has both benefits and pitfalls when talking with people on the streets. On one hand, I can always just say I don't understand and walk away. On the other, explaining that I really don't have one minute and I would appreciate walking on my own instead of walking with two people that-don't-speak-English-continuing-to-read-their-Korean-pamphlets-to-me is difficult.

With that said, let me go into my story. I asked Youna on Saturday if she would be free on Monday for a late lunch or dinner. She let me know that there was a group going to get dinner and then something else afterwards and that we should join them. Will come back to the night later. On my trip to the subway, I walked past two middle-aged women that said "hello" to me in Korean. I've found four general classifications of strangers that talk to me in Korea: 1) Christians, 2) people that want to hire me to teach English privately, 3) children who say "hello" in English and then run away, 4) old people that call me beautiful. I really didn't get this classification until today, so when these two women greeted me, I just thought they were in category 4. I returned the greeting and they both stopped and asked me something. Most the time, the second thing I say is that I don't understand Korean.

Most people smile and continue talking, but don't go too much past two additional sentences. These women, combined, had about a paragraph of talking to me in Korean immediately following my statement. So I smiled and repeated that I only understand a little (I said "chogum" four times to stress that I only speak a little little little little Korean). I said thank you and goodbye. One of the women grabbed my hand and held up one finger, which I took to mean for me to wait one minute. The other woman started calling someone on her cell phone. I waited, mostly relieved they were calling someone who spoke English so I could explain that I needed to go because I was meeting a friend -- and that I was busy every moment from this conversation until I leave Korea. The man on the phone possessed limited English, but we came to a concensus that the women would write down the Church's phone number and I may consider giving some momentary thought to contemplate possibly contacting the Church in the future, should I have the time. I said goodbye to him and then I thanked the women again and said goodbye.

I was walking one way and saw these women walking the other way. So I was a little surprised that they started walking the same way as me. They kept talking and I understood one of the women asking me where I was going. I responded that I was going to Sindaebang station, causing both women to burst into giant smiles and they again grabbed my hand. They excitedly held up one finger, communicating that I only needed to spare them one minute for them to tell me the great things about their Church. We walked a couple blocks together while they continued asking me questions in Korean. Five minutes later, they led me up to their Church (remembering that Korean buildings often have many businesses in the same structure, the Church had the second and third floors of this ten story-tall building). The man I spoke with on the phone, the one that spoke English, came out of his office to greet me. I again told him that I needed to go, that I knew where the Church was, that I had phone numbers to reach the Church, that I had a personal cell phone number from one of the women and I may possibly consider considering contact in the near future if my schedule somehow permits me to consider it.

He offered me black coffee -- "sure," I thought, "it isn't poisonous where this group was a cult trying to kidnap me or anything..."I graciously took it and thanked them. He wrote down his personal cell phone number on a pamphlet and told me I could call him anytime. Nice people, a little pushy, but I was safely on my way to the subway. I don't think I've ever been happier not to have a working cell phone because I was asked four times if I had one -- once by each woman and then twice by this guy.

As far as I could tell from these Church members, the biggest defining factor was that God should be considered the mother of all and not the father. Fair enough -- God probably doesn't have genitals that makes him a male or female...not Earth shattering as there can't be a reasonable rebuttal and I would be surprised if people tried to make a case for a gendered deity. I think that is the only thing with this Church...the only thing they really talked to me about even after I told them several times that I was Christian (but said it with Korean pronunciation).

I need to learn how to say I am a devout Mormon in Korean with the hopes nobody will ask me questions.

Before I move on with my day, I need to quickly mention that I ran into the man at the bus stop today. He came over to say hello and asked if I had any free time. I informed him that I was on my way to meet a new friend at Gangnam station and was running late, so I had to catch the next bus. He asked me, "are you marry this girl?" The next 30 seconds of dialog involved me saying that I was not going to marry her and she is a friend of mine...yeah, that question really caught me off guard...

Back to Monday. We all planned to meet outside Ewha's main gate at 5PM, but I was interested to see what Youna did for her job. Therefore, I asked her on Saturday if I could meet her at 4PM and she could show me around her work. She told me that was fine and that she worked in the biggest building on campus...so the directions to find her were a little vague. At least, that's what I thought before I arrived at campus and quickly saw which building was hers.

She was done with work early, so I didn't get to see too much at all. I was pretty sad. Nonetheless, 5PM came quickly and there were six of us at the front gate of Ewha. I met a new fellow exchange student here -- his name is Peter and he is from Wisconsin. When we got to the restaurant, we were also joined by two more people, one being a woman from Japan that understood English if I spoke slowly. Her and I didn't talk too much because I demand that people operate at my speed!

Following dinner, we were looking for something to do. Something that Youna mentioned was a board-game cafe. How cool is that?! We stayed for two hours or so, but things really slowed down because Clue doesn't hold energy levels too high. I had a good time despite Clue going slow.

Tuesday was the day that JiBin's friend Ena and I roughly set up to meet. I waited until the last minute to call her directly because I felt I could get lucky and catch her on Skype. Not the case. So I had to call her and make sure she was free to meet me in the afternoon. Ena and I had bad luck meeting on Saturday, so my existance without a cell-phone depended on successfully meeting her today -- as in, if it didn't work out, I would collapse and buy a damned pre-paid cell phone (which probably wouldn't have a comparable virtual pet).

But we did meet up! It was grand! Ena is awesome and just great to spend time with...pretty much every person I've met here has been astounding! Ena and I grabbed lunch and then I wanted to check out a bookstore nearby that I saw on the subway map. No luck on William James and the books were really expensive. To give you an idea about how desperate I've been to find a resonable novel, I went into a Korean bookstore today and considered buying a student's copy of "Gone with the Wind." In this case, a student's copy means that it was written for middle schoolers with bland language and giant font.

Ena had to leave at 5PM to get to an English lesson about a half-hour away. As we strolled back toward the subway, she showed me this dialog she needed to learn. I burst into laughter as the first line read something like "I hooked up with Michael this weekend." The situation was two women at a salon. In all my Korean studies, I have yet to come across an equivalent conversation.

Picture time!!!!


This is just inside Ewha's main gate. On the right there is this ramp and just outside the picture on the far right is a second ramp, creating a valley in the middle. I asked Youna what this was there for -- but I don't think I got an answer. Her work is to the left of this picture and the building is a good nine stories or so taller than the one in this picture.








One of the games we played was to put these branches into the tree and then dump monkeys at the top. You roll dice to figure out which color branch you take and then whoever has the least amount of monkeys wins. I suggested this game -- nobody was as enthusiastic as me to be playing. Youna is on the right and my new Dutch friend, Marc, is on the left.








This was the menu that had the list of games. I believe the stars represent the difficulty of learning the game. They also printed the estimated time of completion, but their estimates seemed really off. Monopoly was an hour and a half and Life was an hour. They didn't have Risk, sadly...









This was a sign at the movie theater on Sunday. Jenny used her cell phone to take it and then she emailed it to me today. Just look at that sign and try not to be happy...











I've seen about three of these places and I vowed to never go inside. I am very happy believing this is a bar where you sit down and order ice. I refuse to have this belief crushed with reality.