Jujubes and chestnuts

No classes today as the kids are outside doing a dress rehearsal for their sports day on Wednesday. With today being a write off, Wednesday all planned for and Friday being part of a long weekend this week should fly by. My co teacher and I went outside to putter around and the Principal soon took us off on a tour of the garden. He started out the tour doing his best old man taekwondo kicks against a Chestnut tree and quickly made it clear I was to take over. After a nice workout chestnuts started hailing down on us. He handed me my share of the grub and we then headed off to the jujube trees at the back of the yard. Most of the jujube on the tree weren't even close to being ripe but the principal waded into the spider infested trees and picked us off some to sample. This was my first time trying them off the tree and I recommend them to anybody. Here are some pictures I took the other day of the school yard.


The principal doing some gardening in his suit.


The little pond where most of school trees are.


Required Admiral Lee statue.


The principal used his trusty, rusty chainsaw and made a whole bunch of totems himself.


One of the many spiders in the garden.

Eve and Leoni's BBQ

Over the Chuseok weekend Eve and Leoni had a bunch of us over for a barbecue. It was a laid back affair with wine, meat and bananas wrapped in bacon. Thanks to chefs Raymond and Leoni I got to find a nice patch on the deck to sit back and relax.


Eve and Raymond enjoying the last of the summer like weather.


The Korean corner of the deck.


The English side.


Don and sir Eddie.


It has been confirmed that anything wrapped in bacon works, the best dish of the night wwere the bananas wrapped in bacon with lemon juice sprinkled on top. Sounds terrible but they were very, very tasty.


Homemade South African sausages.

Exaggerated weekend

After a week straight of stress I am happy to announce that I am back on holiday. Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) falls on a Sunday this year and luckily for me I have the next six days off. Chuseok is a massive Exodus of people from Seoul. It's the best time of year in Seoul because unless you are a genuine Seoulite, everyone returns to their hometowns. If you watch local news it's all about the amount of time people spend in cars trying to leave the city. A simple two hour trip to the suburbs leaps into tales of absurdity of four to five hour long trips. I NEVER leave the city at this time and love the silence Seoul gives off. The big plans for the extended weekend are a couple of parties. On Saturday Teddy is having a "widow" party for us foreigners whose Korean friends have obligations and on Sunday Eve and Leonie are having a nice afternoon barbecue at their place. Without sounding cheesy, you do miss the family thing at these times but we make up for it by our "Seoul family" being able to get together removed from the normal weekend fun.

Chuseok (thanksgiving) Comes Early

I just got back to the apartment and have to apologize for making some loud noises. The first was the huge sigh of relief I just let out, expelling a week's worth of stress which was quickly followed by the glorious sound of an ice cold beer cracking open in celebration. My Visa issues have been solved (read postponed) for at least three months with another three weeks being able to be tacked onto that if my criminal check isn't here by then.

I have been sworn to a bit of secrecy as to how we got by the strict new immigration laws but I can say Korean bureaucracy works much better than any others I have seen. (I'm glaring straight at you Mrs. Brandon PD.) We kind of went through a backdoor to get approved and I am happy it has all worked out (for now). To celebrate good times here are some pictures from the last three weeks I've finally pulled off the old camera.

Food pictures from the amazing new French restaurant Saejin and I found. It is a classy joint with the best roof top patio I have been to in Seoul.





Stephen's visit to Seoul:





Fall in Korea means red peppers drying out on the side of the road.




A drunken walk off where it was proved that models deserve the money they are paid.

The Hail Mary Pass

Went to the Canadian Embassy this morning to see what could be done there and as I expected they passed along all of the same news. They did have a printout that says we should ask for a criminal check through the local police and gave all the information needed to do this. At the bottom of the list was a lone asterisks pointing out that each police station has different criteria. Turns out Brandon is one of these "special" places. As I sit here I have just over 24 hours left on my Visa and my co teachers were going to head into immigration this afternoon to plead my case but a random phone call after lunch delayed this.

Turns out on Saturday my co teacher went on the Blue House's web page (this is the President's homepage) and put in a query to see if there was anyway they could find a solution. They promptly (for a bureaucracy) phoned this afternoon and got more information on it and they will check things out. Fingers crossed they can find better news to solving this hugely annoying process. I have asked Saejin to book me a ticket home so that at least I have something to show them tomorrow when they tell me to get lost.

Bonjour

Some good news, I just had and unexpected phone call from Frederic. We met Frederic when he was passing through Seoul on his two month long vacation. He was supposed to be here for just five days but somehow he stayed for three weeks. I was also on vacation at this time so we got to hang out lots during the day trying to find the best patios in Seoul for Frederic to have a coffee and smokes at. From here he went on to Thailand before heading back to start teaching in Paris this past week. It was a good surprise and I am glad he called because of all the crappy news I have been having. Here are some pictures of Frederic's time in Korea.

I Love Canada

Still no solution to the Visa issue and after checking out most of the options available to me it is more than likely I have to head home for a bit. The one way to get immigration here to see that a background check is in the mail is to apply for a vulnerable sector search. It takes one week and you have to apply through your local police station in Canada. I have had a few friends have their parents go into the local police station request it for them with finger prints and "aberacadabera" the report comes up.

I had my dad try this and the local lady doing this search loved her manual and said it was impossible. I would have to do it in person. I even tried calling her from here to explain the situation and her strict compliance to rules has me left without a check. Tomorrow I will head down to the embassy to see if they can do anything. I highly doubt it but my co teachers have heard that it has worked in the past. When and if that fails we have the last strategy that worked for a different friend and have my co teacher break down and cry at immigration in hopes we can get three or better four month extension.

Anyway I am done stressing about it and if worst comes to worst I get to spend the fall on the prairies. During this time I will start asking for documents to be sent (transcripts) to make a new Visa and will get a drivers license saying I live in Brandon and start the quick search then. Hopefully all can get done within a month I can get back to work. Who knows.

I Love Korea

Long winded one here. As my Visa deadline approaches, I need to vent. Sorry.

Three months ago, new contract discussions started. This left the perfect amount of time to get things sorted. Nothing happened that first month other than agreeing to let me leave early so that I'll be back in Canada before next September.

Two months ago, I brought up the contract again hoping with a strong amount of time to get things sorted. I wanted to get things moving before the scholastic lull of summer vacation. It was at this time I had the following conversation:

Supervisor: Cam teacher, Gyoungi-do official manual say we need a new medical check up for you to get Visa. (They check to see you can walk and talk and more importantly that you don't smoke pot or have any contagious diseases.)
Me: OK. Do I need anything else? I heard I may need a new criminal background check.
Supervisor: Really? The list says it's OK we did before.
Me: I've heard they changed the laws though and it takes (arms shoot out wide to show the word long) a long time to get this. Are you sure?
Supervisor: I will check it out. (Co-teacher opens the official manual from the department of education but this time looking at the English side. She shows me the list of required papers to get the new Visa and no mention of a criminal check.)
Me: I had a friend who tried to extend her Visa and she couldn't because she didn't have the criminal background check. (Hi Shelly.) Is this book right?
Supervisor: It's 2008 manual.
Me: (Hesitantly accepting another governmental document for the truth.) Ah, Ah, (relieved I don't have to do any extra leg work) OK. (Smile.)

Turns out I should of taken stalk of my life in Korea and asked the all important question, "Can you check it out to make sure?"

This month (OK, late August.) Living here for a long time I know Korean style is to do things last minute so I let our first week back to school slip by.

This week, one week before my Visa expires, I jokingly urged my supervisor that I seeeeriously needed to sign something soon and get to immigration. This got the contract in hand but I got the jitters. I fell back into questioning if I had all the paper work in order. Anytime I deal with immigration (here, travelling abroad or going back to Canada) I get nervous. Even when things are straight, cool, on the level, and 100 percent fine I feel like I will be spanked. This made me ask my co teacher if she would give immigration a call. She did and came out with a different list from the needs for a new visa and #2 on that list included a criminal background check.

CRAP.

Today, we made the trek to Mokdong to see what would happen. We slipped in the old criminal check that got a five minute look over, a walk back to the supervisor and second good look and...it turns out, NO VISA.

NO SURPRISE HERE. The man working our kiosk was helpful and said that we should come back the last day of my Visa to get a two week extension for the wrong paper work. Hopefully in that time I will get the right paper work. Supposedly it takes a lot less time to get and by going to the local police force in Canada and asking for a Vulnerable Sector Check, it will all work out. It now falls on air mail and my amazing father to try and get it. If it still hasn't arrived in the allotted two weeks I can get another week extension. When and if this fails I have to visit Japan. Woe is me. I love Korea (at the moment, read with seven scoops fulls of sarcasm.)

Female Authors

I recently loaded up the old bookshelf with some new books. In my anally rigid ways I quickly shelved these said books in alphabetical order by author. As I stood back to take in the fresh look of my collection i noticed I have a horrible habit of buying a lot of the same authors and they mostly tend to be authors born with a penis. I need a lot more of the opposite sex on my shelf to help balance out the gender scale. The great Margaret Atwood has a sprinkling of friends but she wants more, please recommend some good stuff I should be checking out.