Archive for the ‘ Comedy and truth ’ Category
Oh, how we love talking about our experiences with local Koreans. Whether they are holding our hands walking around a lake, cleaning our apartments or trying to shoot us with their guns, it’s fair to say most of our encounters have been friendly and pleasant. Then, there is this. Thank you to my colleague and friend Vanessa for [ READ MORE ]
Mud Fest article due within the next 28 hours (hopefully) but this is a mint of a quote from the weekend. As we relaxed by the beach kicking a waterlogged football between us, a Korean lady over the PA system came out with this: “Pedro from Puerto Rico is looking for his six friends. He is [ READ MORE ]
I was just talking to an old friend on Skype (for the first time since moving here), and he asked me a bunch of personal experience questions. Naturally, the food, children and people dominated my answers, not to mention many of the foreigners I have met, but when he asked me for the “funniest moment”, [ READ MORE ]
I thought it was only in Legally Blonde, that dreadful movie starring Reese Witherspoon, that dogs dressed in clothes appropriate for a child or adult. I have seen small dogs in ridiculous rain coats or knitted sweaters during the winter months at home, but these tend to isolated incidents at best, and are normally a [ READ MORE ]
When travelling with a motley group of international tourists there can be rare but wonderful moments when one person in particular says or does something that exemplifies their national stereotype to a tee. Fortunately for my co-writer and I, there was such an occurrence this weekend. It was on a bus in the middle of the [ READ MORE ]
Stu’s article below had me thinking of previous encounters with children at school. You get the usual “Andrew teacher loves……(insert whatever name you want)” or “Andrew teacher kiss……..(again, any name they can come up with)” and other related scenarios seven year old kids can think of. Sometimes they’ll even inform the rest of the world that [ READ MORE ]
…says a boy no older than nine years old in my final class this afternoon. How does one answer this question other than to say: “How can you possibly know that word?” “Celine teacher told me,” Sam said with a characteristic sly grin. If the boy had been three years older I might have said something to [ READ MORE ]
After the old woman cleaning my apartment, the man who held my hand around the reservoir, and the children shouting in the park, I figured Stu and I had exhausted the topic of writing briefly about encounters with local Koreans here in Gwangju. That was until a young boy, no older than ten and with absolutely [ READ MORE ]
After reading Andrew’s incredibly thoughtful post about not paying his heating bill I was inspired to come up with some examples of things you would never do at home, but would (or could) do in Korea. I would encourage readers who have been to, or currently live in Korea to share some of their own [ READ MORE ]
OK, so this is probably not exclusive to Korea, but it was funny nevertheless and I felt it warranted a small entry on the website. I was teaching my seven-year-old class today about goods they can purchase in a supermarket or convenience store. Before long, it was clear they knew what is for sale in any [ READ MORE ]