From Jeju back to the States in T-Minus 2 months! 

Warning: thoughts are all over the place through this post... My mind struggles synthesizing 2 months worth of life...

She is running

A hundred miles an hour

In the wrong direction

She is trying

But the canyons ever widening

In the depths of her cold heart

So she sets out on another misadventure just to find

She’s another two years older and she’s three more steps behind

~Casting Crowns

I listened to this song on the van ride to school a few days back, and I must say, the last line in the first verse really had me thinking. By the time that I head out from my tenure in South Korea, I will have aged by at least two years... that is a fact. What is not for certain though, is what I will have gained during that time (other than length of my hair!). 

Short "Apple-top" Hair for a class skit - I am suppose to be a student!

(Ok... so it isn't our real hair... it is for dramatic effect - WIGS) !!!!

Thinking back over the last 8 months, I think that my learning experiences can most easily be categorized into three compartments: Professional life, Personal life, and Spiritual life...

Professional Life:

My friendships and relationships with the Korean Staff members is already starting to deteriorate, and I think a lot of it has to do with the language barrier. I thought that it would be so easy to pick up on the Korean language moving to a country where everyone is speaking it - but I was wrong! Close to 70% of my waking hours are spent on campus, where the school-wide rule is “English Only”. So as far as being immersed within the language - well, it is the absolute opposite! I am more often reminding students to not speak Korean than I am asking how to say a familiar English phrase in translation. I am also to experience the cultural differences that I was working to dismiss during my first few months here... People getting fired with no warning for using informal language - Changes being made simply because someone higher up in the hierarchy thinks their outside perspective is more accurate than those experiencing the changes being made - Requisition lists being altered without consideration of those submitting requests. It has become more difficult to deal with the lack of my many American comforts that I often took for granted as the days go by.

On a more positive note - we had an All-Staff party, where our foreign faculty and the Korean business staff came together for food and fun. No work - all play! There was a talent show, and many people came prepared to try and earn the grand prize of 300,000 won! We all had a blast watching creative performances and eyebrow raising moves come to life on the stage. 

As for in the classroom... I was observed this past week - first time I have had someone in my classroom all year. I was worried that the students would act strange since they are not used to having additional adults in the room, but they behaved beautifully - asking the same humorous and thought-provoking questions that would arise during any other typical Presentation and Performance class. The conference on the observation went well - really, more of just a dialogue between myself and the Dean of Academics. I am extremely excited to take on the role as Presentation and Performance / Public Speaking teacher next year... This class in incredibly fun and watching the students grow in their confidence and comfort is truly satisfying. Plus: I have WAY too much fun creating examples of what is expected in different activities! (see the lipsync video that Emily and I made below for a laugh! haha!) Check out our class website to look at some of our student's classwork! www.jejupresentations.weebly.com!

Service Leading is slowing down for the remainder of the year, with only 2 Service Leading Friday’s left for our students to participate in. This past week, I got out the application for teachers interested in serving as “Destination Leaders”... in other words - the organizer and point of contact for our students international service trips that they will be going on in the spring of 2013. It is pretty exciting that we have such a head start as compared to this past year, when I had not even been selected as the Service Leading Coordinator until October, and trip leaders were not selected until mid-November. I have a feeling that the whole experience this time around will be much smoother, less stressful, and easier to reflect and reminisce on! Serving in this position has opened my eyes to a lot of the inner-workings of KIS and the leadership team. Now that I have a comfortable understanding of what is expected of me in this position, I hope to be able to bring the program to the next level this upcoming year.

These pictures were taken at a Nursing home just a few kilometers down the street from our school. We were asked to come with a song or two prepared, but when we arrived, they just wanted our children to sing on the Karaoke machine! OOOOO Koreans and their Norre Bongs !

Adventure day just passed, and an adventure it was indeed! It was raining pretty hard outside, and the bus driver pulled into the harbor parking lot to drop us off. Would not have been a big deal except for the fact that the parking lot was far from anything else and was full of dump trucks and cargo crates! So, our adventure quickly turned into an afternoon completing a scavenger hunt of activities, watching a movie that many students had read the book for - Hunger Games, and eatting lunch at Emart. Upon arrival back to the school, advisors opted to skip the “presentation of learning” and work to bond more with our students through some fun competitions - human pyramids and dances! Overall, everything pulled together for a successful afternoon of fellowship. (check out our little class website for more fun pictures! www.ourkisfamily.weebly.com) 

Personal Life:

Since I last wrote, I purchased a car... Korando (Korean brand) and choose to drive to school on occasion. It is an oldie - stick shift and deisel (cheaper than gas in Korea) but still WAY expensive, at a little over 2000 won a liter ($2.00 a liter). I hope to use my new means of transportation to become a little more adventurous on the island rather than limiting my weekends to walking along the shopping streets and visiting coffee shops! 


One place I ventured out to recently was a Chicken Galbi shop - here are the before and after pictures. 

So yummy, So spicy!

Another place I went one Sunday, with Joe and Leigh Anne from Houston, was to the Cherry Blossom Festival. I wish we had these beautiful bushes in the southern part of the US! Breath-taking...

I am thinking about the possibility of purchasing a house over here in Jeju for a few reasons. Reason #1: I miss my dogs - but in order for me to bring them over here, I would need a place with a yard - and as of right now, there are only 3 houses on Jeju for rent (no exaggeration!). So - in order to get a yard, it looks like I would have to buy. Great lengths for something so little, you say? Well, Reason #2: Jeju also happens to be HUGE in tourism, as there are probably more buses and taxis for tourists than cars and scooters for locals. So, this could be a neat opportunity for an investment!

As of this week, I officially purchased my ticket to come back to the States this summer! I thought that I could go a full year without seeing the fam, but I think that if I push my way through the summer, the first semester next year might be a bit miserable. So, I will be making my way back to Florida July 2-31, where I will get to hang with mom and dad,  see my brother and Riley, and relax on the beautiful East Coast beaches :) Hoping to make my way up to Tallahassee to visit a few college friends, making pit-stops to meet some new Babies that have come into this world since I relocated! Then, I will be off to Houston for my last week, checking in on the church family, the dogs, and the house. My excitement and anxiousness about moving back to Houston with the possibility to bring a boarding school continues to be a pick-me-up on my tough days... 

Spiritual Life:

Lacking tremendously. I have been unusually unmotivated to locate an English church over here, and have not been in the word much. Please pray that I get right when it comes to getting to know HIM. This weekend, I went to a service with Leigh Anne and Joe (who I met up with in Houston before we all relocated over here)... I pray that this will be the start to continual time in the word and surrounding myself with people of like minds and hearts.


Counting down the days until I see you!
xoxo from Jeju,


~Sara