On Monday, I went to school thinking I can just focus on the summer camp and try to figure out the exact number of students who signed up. Instead I was told by Ye Jin that one of the teacher's mother passed away. I left at 12:30pm to go home and change into something more appropriate. I am glad that brought 15 dress shirts and couple of black dress pants with me! I showed up to the funeral area around 2:30pm but I was lost for a good 50 minutes, so I didn't get to the actual place until 3:20pm. I learned that in Korean funerals, it is a custom to give money to the family who is grieving and that's exactly what I did. I gave 30,000 wons ($30). I am not sure if that's little or not. Later I found out that it was good enough considering that I don't even know the person who passed away. I personally avoid places such as hospitals (home of the needles), funeral places (depressing and I have no idea how to be instantly sad), and libraries (too many books and too quiet) but I still went because I felt that I should go. Sam was kind enough to drop me at home so I was able to save time.
I used the extra time to do laundry, clean up a bit and head over to Gwangalli beach area to meet up with Dylan Kim (a Korean friend I met) who was going to help me get a cellphone. I asked him about a Korean SIM card for my Canadian 3G iPhone but he said its not possible to do. He asked few of his connections as well and they said the same thing. I guess I will use my iPhone as an iPod and a camera instead. Later on Facebook I found out that his wife Cheryl has an extra phone and that she would help me with that matter on Saturday. Hopefully it's possible. I didn't want to have my trip to Gwangalli area be pointless so I got some chicken wings! Horray for finding a place that specializes in chicken. 90% of the restaurants specialize in pork or beef. Two meat I am allergic to. It's a rarity for me to find anything chicken related. However, I do like seafood but I am just a little picky about it because I refuse to eat octopus, squid, eel or any other fish that is not named salmon or tuna. Besides salmon and tuna, I do like shrimp, lobster, and crab. Here's a picture of the box I got my meal in. The actual food is not going to be placed here because it'll be on my Facebook album as usual.
I went home and ate the delicious wings while watching sports (Korean channel). I saw the highlights of the USA vs Japan - Women's FIFA World Cup finals. I was happy with the results naturally. Especially after my team lost (Brazil). I went to sleep shortly after that.
On Monday I went to school once more hoping to get my summer camp materials organized. This time I was successful but I also found out that only 7 students signed up and only 3 of them have paid so far. I have to re-do my 3 weeks of summer camp schedule because I created the schedule thinking I would have at least 20 students. I have less than half of that. I guess many of the students already had summer plans scheduled well before I showed up to the country because the summer camp sign up was before June 25th. It's probably a good thing that it's only 7 students because less classroom management and more focus on the actual activities.
I have never seen so many badminton birdies in one place before.
There were two bins with so many birdies for the students to use.
Around 1pm I was allowed to leave and I went exploring around PNU (Busan National University). Pusan was the city's old name and now it's called Busan. Everyone just calls it PNU for short. PNU area was quite interesting to say the least. Lots of people but at the same time no one was really shopping or going into the stores. I guess the shops are on the way to the campus. There were way too many cellphone booths. I took a picture of a place called, "MLB" which had baseball related clothing, naturally. Overpriced in my opinion considering it did not look authentic. All I did at PNU area was eat at Paris Baguette and get a screen protector for my iPhone. I needed it so badly because I had the same protector for the past 3 years.
After an hour and a half of roaming around I decided to head to Nampo-Dong area, which has been noted as a foreigners place to visit. The place was busy with many shoppers, so many booths of random junk but I didn't find anything to be cheap. I did however go into a leather shop and asked how much a leather jacket was. He told me 180,000 wons ($180) but I told him that the most I would ever pay was $60. The man immediately said he would sell it for $80. I knew it was fake right away but I just wanted to see how low he would actually sell it for. I said no to the $80. He asked me how much would I really buy it for. So I said $30. He said, no and told me how it was already reduced. However, he still reduced it even more to $70. I told him kamsamnida and said that I would come back another time (Nav don't laugh at me). The man gave me his card and told me to come back anytime. I was like "kamsamnida, kamsamnida" and walked out disappointed that the leather jacket was super fake and the store was a ghost town to begin with. If it was $20 I might have actually bought it! Well, I walked around for another hour or so just looking at random items. I saw ankle socks with angry birds on them and it was only $1 for a pair. I was thinking about it but I didn't like the design of it.
Anyways, I went back to Seomyeon station, took the bus and went back home. It started to rain as soon as I got on the bus. I guess the weather is unpredictable just like in Toronto. Hopefully it's good weather tomorrow as well because I might explore other regions of the city by myself tomorrow too. I haven't decided where yet but I do need a hair cut as well!
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