Molly's Maiden Voyage

Sooo,
Jon went to see Star Trek this week with two of the other teachers. Later on, I saw it with him as well because he really liked it. Although I'm not a Star Trek fan (and neither were my parents despite naming me Anika Borg), but I thought I would watch it and spend some time with my Boy. I don't even know how this happened, but after the movie, we decided to reenact a little Star Trek of our own with our dear Molly Pocket.

We're hoping Molly's ready to make the voyage across
the Pacific in a couple months.

Teacher's Day

Yesterday was Teacher's Day in Korea. Last Tuesday was also Children's Day and it was nice that we got the day off. But, we were sad that we didn't get Teacher's Day off as well. The repeated question I have asked my students is, "Why do you get off of school for Children's Day, but teacher's have to go to school and teach on Teacher's Day?" My students usually didn't know how to respond or they said, "Because you adult, I child and you to work." So because I am an adult, I am not allowed to stop working, I guess. But, at least on Teacher's Day, students bring you gifts (or are supposed to). Jon's Teacher's Day started off with parent teacher conferences and got a 100,000 won gift certificate to Hyundai Department Store. Hyundai is a huge expensive department store (obviously) that is a ten minute walk from us. They have all the major name brands as well as all the high prices you would expect. But, also have a foreign food mart and electronic section, so we'll see what Jon chooses to spend his won on.

When I got to school, all the teachers were given cupcakes from a student. These cupcakes entertained me the most that any cupcake ever has! Each cupcake had bright blue frosting with tiny flowers on top and flowers stamped into the frosting as well. But the best part was that on top of this blue frosting, there was a white head and face with either short or long brown hair! Under this head there was a sign that said the teacher's name-how exciting! We thought they were very cute! There was one cupcake we needed to make a little more accurate, though. One of our teacher's buzzes his head and so has very little hair. We decided while he was out of the room, to take off the puffy brown frosting and make it look more realistic, he got a kick out of our prank.

Throughout the day, Jonathon accumulated several gifts including a box of Mister Donut donuts (he was sooooo excited), handkerchiefs (less excited...), tea, a handful of suckers, and boxful of colorful Korean rice cakes. Whereas, I received a jar of honey. But, this is no regular jar of honey, as you can tell by my picture of it. It was a timely gift, since just that week I finished our bottle of honey making some spicy, sticky, and sweet chicken! So, I guess the Lord even provides these little things through children on Teacher's Day! After the work day our boss took us out for Korean BBQ. I hadn't had BBQ for over a month and so it was nice to have some good Korean food.

Below are some pics from Teacher's Day as well as some pics of my classroom.

Mr. Jonathon

"Ms. Annika"


Big eyes, big smile!

My honey; notice its size in proportion with my hand.

Mr. Gary McDermott and his bald cupcake.


My 2nd graders whisper reading and completing
a comprehension worksheet.

My main decorated wall. My students have to regularly read
what it means to be a good friend and what are good choices. Every
day at the start of class, I also have my students put their "hand guns"
in their holsters. I try to diminish the fake shooting in my classroom.... :)

A Taste From Italia.

A couple of months ago, I had a huge craving for my Nona's Oyster Cracker's. I'm sure many of you have had oyster crackers covered in dill and garlic, but I am sure that none of you can cook like my Italian Nona could! Nona would make the best gingersnap cookies and other grandma-like treats. As a child, I remembered when Nona would visit, these treats being brought into our house bag after bag. And if Nona couldn't drive to our house eight hours away, she would send big boxes of coffee cans filled with goodies. My mom said, "No junk food!" and put them in the freezer to be portioned over time to Anders and I (or at least this is how my Sweet Tooth saw it). Oh goodness, they were all so good!

So, being in Korea, I have really missed good Italian home cooking along with certain treats. I have tried my best here, but some supplies are not available or very expensive. So, when I got my craving for Nona's Oyster Crackers, my mom lovingly surprised me with a box of oyster crackers, lemon pepper, a copy of Nona's handwritten recipe, Velveeta and shells, some devotionals, deodorant, poppy seeds, and a Pug puppet (most of you should know why these are all important to me). All I needed to get was dill weed! I thought it would be easy to find, at least in Itaewon (the foreigner heaven). But, alas, there was no dill weed. Finally, I asked around the teachers and one has it shipped from Canada and she gave me her last couple of teaspoons. These little things are like gold to us teachers! So, I ran home with my treasure and mixed everything together and started my baking. That is, baking in a toaster. It took about five times to bake it all, but I have the final product and it is great! Thank you Nona and Mama for the recipe and ingredients, you have given me a taste of home and it's wonderful!

Protection From the Elements

Many of you know, I am a big fan of being in decent shape or at least exercising regularly. Well, since I have been in Korea, this has been much more difficult. First of all, I don't have a nice community center like the one in New Brighton. Second of all, there are no open fields and trails and third of all, the air is horrible here. My asthma was already a frustrating thing in the States, but here, it was multiplied. I am just so thankful that I have the medications and machines here to help me deal with flare-ups. Because of the bad pollution, I haven't exercised as much as I like to, but I have been walking quite a bit. My preference is to jog and so I have been going crazy. Finally, I just decided I would put away my feelings of superiority and don the "Asian mask". Anders especially kept telling me to cover up my face, so here, are you satisfied?

Tangent to Childhood: (Besides I love you), two phrases that were said/shouted/yelled/lovingly said, stick in my mind from when I was a child. These two phrases were "Anika, use tools the way they were designed to be used," and "Anika, don't run (in the house, up the stairs, down the stairs, on the dock, in church, etc, etc)!" I liked and still like to get places quick, even if I'm just walking. And despite the multiple warnings from my dad about tools, I still find myself using a rock or shears to pound things open (oops). But, my dad's voice will always come back to haunt me either during the act or after I have broken the object or injured myself. Thanks dad! So, needless to say, I was (possibly) a dangerous, wild child.

Now, returning from my tangent....
Tonight was also Costco Night! We went with Betsy, another coworker and started off eating at the food court. The food court has some of the best food and we all get really excited about it. Tonight, we had American style pizza, American style hotdogs, and Bulgogi bake. Bulgogi bake is basically Korean bulgogi seasoned beef with cheese inside a bread stick; it's pretty wonderful. After filling up, we wandered and found the normal necessities of cereal, oatmeal, chicken and some other things, nothing too exciting. But, I remembered a long lost picture from our first visit to Costco!