Holiday Catch-up

Ok, so I've been on holidays and as such, have been very lazy with the blogging. I didn't really do much over the holidays of interest. I had grand plans to go to Mongolia and buy a motorbike to ride around, but that fell through, so I was left sitting in Korea in the hot summer heat... Of course this just meant I spent many days going to beaches... but more of that later.

Damyang Teachers Camp

So my last week of school and first week of holidays, I was at a camp teaching Korean English teachers how to teach English. Rather ironic considering they have had 4 years of Uni to learn how to do this and I have had none... but anyway.
The camp was a lot of fun and I got to meet a heap of great people. During the camp, we went for a trip to the ancient capital of the Shilla Dynasty in Korea, Gyongju. This place was really interested and I learned a lot about the history of Korea.

Unfortunately our supervisor for this camp thought it would be a great idea for us to get up and "enjoy to watch the beautiful sunrise". Bearing in mind it's the middle of summer and the sun rises at about 5am... and he wanted to watch it from the top of a mountain! This meant we had to get up at stupid-o-clock to get on a bus and drive up a mountain. Once there we got to see some beautiful white fog! Later that day, we were told this is the foggiest place in Korea... would have been nice to know that BEFORE we got up that morning.

Anyway, we got to see some cool things like the inside of a burial dirt mound, and an amazing temple and restaurant that was more like a museum than the museum we visited!
All in all, a great trip.

Elementary Camp

While I was at Damyang, I was informed I was required to teach at an Elementary school camp... starting the day I finished at Damyang!

I was just a little pissed to say the least. I had been asking for 2.5 months prior to going to Damyang if I had any camps and no one could give me a definite answer. Then with a whole two days notice, I was told I was, in fact, expected to teach and that I had to come up with my own lesson plans in that time. Not that I knew how many kids I would be teaching, how long the lessons would be, what level the kids were or how many lessons I was suppose to teach...

Anyway, the day before I was to start this camp, my Waygook co-teacher, Linda, asked if it would be ok for her to teach the lessons if I played with the kids for the outside activities?

GREAT!

This meant I was paid to go to the beach and play with cute little kids for 3 days. Talk about a life-saver. In the end, I had a great time swimming and playing games.

Beach Camp
So I decided to have another beach camp. If you've been following my bloggs, you will notice in my last one, I hosted a camp which was a bit of a wash-out. Well, this time only two people came along, Virginia and JP.

We headed over to the beach and spent a relaxing afternoon sitting under the trees and having a few cold ales.

For the first time since I've been here, there was actually surf worth talking about at the beach. Unfortunately there was a bit of a stiff, breeze and I didn't really feel like going in the water. Instead, we spent a couple of hours putting a tarp around a pagoda to turn it into our own private little shelter... and boy did we need it!

The wind picked up and the rain started to roll in. In the evening, a police car pulled up and made an announcement. People ran over to the car and as soon as the police stopped talking, everyone ran for their tents and within half an hour, about 100 campers had packed up and disappeared. It was about this time that we were wondering just how bad this storm was likely to get.

As it turned out, there was a typhoon out near Japan somewhere and we were copping the winds from it. Much worse than the last camp, but at the same time, our tarp walled shelter stood up to it remarkably well. With JP only having to make one minor repair in the night, we kept relatively dry and warm.

I was actually having quite a bit of fun this time. Mind you, this stormy weather when we go camping is getting a bit beyond a joke!

Motorbike ride.

Over the break, I did quite a bit of riding. As it's the middle of summer, and I refuse to ride my bike without proper protection, this means I spent a good many hours of this summer dressed in padded jacket, long padded pants and boots. A little hot to say the least, but not too bad when I'm actually moving.

I decided to take my tent and spend a couple of days working my way over to Yeosu, along the coast. Now going straight there along the highway takes about 2.5 hours (or it did on the return journey) but following the coast, the roads are so twisty and there is so much to explore, that it is quite easy to spend a couple of days.

Along these roads, I often found little side tracks that looked interesting, so I would go and explore them. Turning down one such track, I realized I couldn't actually keep going in the direction I wanted, so I decided to make my way back to the main road. In doing so, I ended up going down smaller and smaller tracks, until I was on a two wheel dirt farm track. It had rained not more than half an hour before I got to this track and by the looks of it, the rain had been fairly heavy here. This meant that the nice little dirt track had turned into a bit of a boggy, mud-pit.

I have ridden on bitumen highways, gravel roads, sandy creek beds and dirt tracks, but there is nothing I hate more than riding through mud! At one point, after being sprayed numerously with nice dirty brown mud, I decided the second track looked a bit dryer and though it might be better riding over there. Unfortunately I didn't put too much thought into the decision to change tracks and so, half way through a mud puddle, after turning my handlebars, I found the front end of my bike sliding out from under me.

Thankfully I'd slowed down to a moderate 50 or 60km's / hour by this stage, so the fall wasn't so bad. The bike went over and I went with it, only sliding for a meter or so before it landed on my leg.

Remember me talking about that hot jacket and pants and boots I was wearing? Well, this is exactly why I was wearing them! I landed on one knee and the bike landed on the back of that same knee. I would say if I wasn't wearing the padding (with excellent knee pads I might add) I most likely would not have got up to walk away. As it was, I got no more than a bit of a bruise.
I was also very impressed with the bike. Hardly a mark on it. The guards on it really are well thought out and put in the right place.

But now for the hard part... picking up a bike that weighs almost 3 times as much as I do.

To be honest, I was surprised at how easy it was. Not long ago, I'd watched a video on the internet to see how it was done, but wasn't game to put my bike on it's side just to try it. So here was my chance. Turns out, after the initial bit of effort, it comes up quite quickly and easily.
But wouldn't you believe it, not half an hour later I dropped the bike again. This time on the other side. Got to keep things even I guess.

This time it was just a gumby drop though. I'd spotted my firs snake in Korea crossing the road (I almost ran over it), and I wanted to take a photo. In my rush to jump off the bike quickly, I didn't put the stand down properly, so over she went. Thankfully, I was still holding the handle bars and was able to stop it falling hard. Of course, by the time I picked it up again, the snake had gone.


And that was basically my life for the last month or so. Nothing major or exciting... just the usual random events that happen in this country of everlasting entertainment and fun.

Till next time.
:)

(PS Photo's to come)