So about Korea...

Dear Reader,

You probably are more interested in what Korea is actually like rather than hearing about my schedule! So I'll add some interesting tidbits here.

The first thing my mom asked was, Is it clean? Well, yes and no. It's probably not as across-the-board clean as America is. When we were at SBC in Gwangju for orientation, it was great. Each room had its own bathroom. The shower was a little weird, because it's not separate. You just turn on the water and shower in the bathroom, and the water drains into the floor. I got to really like this setup though, and wish it was more common in America! Our dorms at the camp are a different story. We're at the Namdo Provincial College. The classroom buildings are more modern, but our dorms, not so much. The rooms are OK - they're set up for four people. The kids are four to a room, but thankfully we have our own room. So I have four beds, four desk, four wardrobes, etc. But the bathrooms...they just are not clean. I'm not sure why. Do they just not have janitorial staff in the summer? I won't describe them, but use your imagination. There is a Toilet, and a Washroom with sinks and showers. It's weird - you have to go in the Washroom to wash your hands after you use the Toilet. But the showers are OK, there's hot water and everything.

Koreans seem very environmentally conscious. There are recycling bins everywhere. They're concious of not wasting food. Before the trip, aunt Peggy and my mom and Nicholas and I were wondering about their agriculture. We read that Korean is 80% mountainous, with 47 million people. Where do they grow food? Well, Jeollanamdo Province is their "rural" area and food is grown EVERYWHERE. Every bit of space has crops on it. Like outside my window. It's really neat how they use the land here. Not sure about the rest of the country, but here it's everywhere.

The food - ah, the food. First we get our utensils - metal chopsticks (again, reusing metal instead of disposable wood) and a spoon. We never have a beverage or napkins with our meal, but maybe that's just at camp. First on the plate is white rice, followed by Kimchi (spicy pickled cabbage). For breakfast, usually fish, seaweed, soup. They've been putting out cereal though - an interesting combination of corn flakes and cocoa puffs. The other Americans are eating the Korean breakfast, but for me it's too early in the morning to face it and I've been eating cereal :-) Lunch may have fish, pork or tofu in a sauce that you eat with the rice, lots of vegetable dishes, sometimes an omelet thing or dumplings or potatoes or corn, and soup. Sometimes they come up with strange things that I think they consider American - some kind of hotdog and sauce dish. Fruit, usually watermelon, is served for dessert. Dinner is much the same. At camp, we have a little convenience store in the cafeteria where you can get a Coffee Shake (my favorite), or other soda, ice cream and packaged snacks. It's fun to pick snacks because the description is all in Korean. It's a guessing game!

Like I mentioned earlier, Korea is mountainous. But it's not Colorado mountains. I think they're older, soft, lower mountains. Kind of like foothills. They're very beautiful! And the vegetation on the mountains just looks so...Asian. Not sure how to describe it. Very green and lush. Not exactly tropical though.

That's all for this edition of What is Korea Like?