Getting ready for Seoul!

On friday I go to Seoul, and I really don't feel like posting until I get back rally. Maybe Seoul will help me shake the rain cloud over my head. 

Until next Wednesday,

    Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Gearing up while Gearing down

Today was a myriad of tiny successes and failures all wrapped up into one. 

The main failure came from class today when we continued going over more fun grammar, that I still haven't completely grasped. Oh well though, the space parthenon wasn't built in a day I guess.

After Korean class, I called the DMZ tour people and got my tour all booked up for Saturday in Seoul. I don't really know how much it's going to cost, because doing a whole shpiel about the DMZ is going to be great. The best part about booking the tour was that the guy on the phone spoke Korean, and I was able to actually do something in Korean. 

My midterm for culture class was shortly after, and of course I spaced on a couple of easy things. That's kind of what I do. Anyways, the test went ok and I grabbed a quick dinner before going back to my room for studying and whatnot. 

Now it's bedtime, though, so until next time, 

     Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

P.S. I realize this is pretty much the shortest post ever but I've been feeling really under the weather lately and, today especially, have found it hard to find anything worth writing about. 

Sunday is Korean for relaxation?

As the title suggests, today I devoted mainly to the fine art of keeping my sanity. While some studying was involved, I mainly reveled in the fact I had nothing really pertinent to do all day. For one glorious day, I allowed myself just to be tired, to just watch my favorite tv shows, and just laugh and laugh and laugh. It was nice.

Besides the self help time I had, I also went to mass. It was ok. I would probably get much more out of it if I were really of the church going persuasion. I know what you're thinking, I haven't tried, or given it a fair shot, but that can't be farther from the truth. Maybe that's the whole gist of it I really can't get. Maybe it's one of those things in life you shouldn't have to try for. Anyways, I guess I will keep going to church, and maybe things will go from there. I think it might be nice to have something to believe in. All I can do is keep trying, even if it's the wrong way to go about it.

So yeah, besides the whole church thing, I haven't really done much of anything. For dinner, me, Kayla and Phillip all went to the Meat Buffet place I found before and it was pretty good. It's always a good time to cook your own dinner with friends around I think. 

Well, I think I might try and sleep some more. I find I'm much more pleasant to be around and can have way more fun if I just get some sleep. Sound advice for any international adventurer I think.

For Now

       Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Saturday (Wow look at what I did)

I got way more and also way less done than I thought I would today.

I basically just did homework and read the book my professor gave me until it was time to go to my seminar. At the seminar, everything went pretty well. I was able to understand the basic concepts behind everything the guys were saying, even though I couldn't understand what they were actually saying. 

After the seminar, we all went to lunch (everyone in the lab + Dr. Chang's wife). It was hilariously like my family's meals. We all sat at the table, and basically watched the tv the whole time. All the younger people finished before the older people, and were waiting on them with an air of impatience. It was a fun meal, though, because it just cements, to me, how working relationships in academia can be a lot like family here in Korea. 

Lunch came and went, and then it was time for a little baseball. Our baseball time consisted of all the lab guys and Dr. Chang outside on a strip of land littered with trees, and bordered on all sides by buildings with lots of windows. It was pretty much everything I had nightmares/great dreams about when I was little. Don't think the day passed without windows almost being damaged either. Thanks to yours truly, several upon several windows were put in danger with just a bat and ball. 

I was tired of living out every shortcoming of my baseball career in a span of an hour so I left for the dorm. However, I couldn't really study, so I decided to try and get some exercise. My exercise of choice? Table Tennis. Luckily, and for no reason at all really, some of the guys from the table tennis club were in the room, and we played for a good four hours. 

Since then I've basically just been getting my homework done, got unsweaty, and getting all my stuff straightened out in my room (not). 

Even though it's not even 10 yet, I feel like I need to try and catch up on the sleep I don't normally get, so that's what I'm going to do. 

For Now, 

      Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Start of a new weekend, and a busy week

This weekend is one of both relaxation and studying.

Today's class was pretty good. We went over some tough grammatical concepts but I ended up getting it at the end, so all in all it was a good day. 

I didn't go to the lab today, because I wanted to at least have a good chunk of that book Dr. Chang gave me read before I see him again. It's a good thing I did because I have gotten some of it read and it's really interesting. It's all about microwave assisted organic synthesis. 

Instead of going to the lab, I went with Kayla to downtown Daegu. As usual, I didn't get anything, and basically it was fun just walking around. I'm getting pretty used to the whole downtown area, but then again, the downtown I'm talking about is only the mainstream downtown. We got off on a different side of the block today and I didn't even realize where we were until we made a giant circle. One day I just want to walk all around the daegu area, just to see it. It's really a nice city I think. 

That's basically all I did today. I really wanted to go to Pusan this weekend, but I have two tests in my english classes next week and lots of Korean I need to study. It looks like tomorrow will be devoted to academia. Hooray. 

For Now

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond 

Two days in a row! I'm on a roll!

I would just like to remark, first off, how happy I am that I convinced myself to get on here and blog again (and for the 2nd day in a row!). I like the whole journal thing, just putting out a good effort takes like an hour and it's always at the end of my day and....(see complaints section for the rest of this paragraph).

Anyways, class was pretty good. Considering I woke up as the most tired person in the world today, I got through. We have learned lots of stuff, and I'm pretty sure (if I can remember what the words actually sound like) I can have a pretty good conversation. 

         I can say things like: 

  

                  I'm sorry but I can't come to class today, due to the unbearable stomach pains I'm having right now. 

                 However, if you go to the beach later, I would love to go with you. 

                 No, I don't have my homework. I was too busy watching American sports at 3 in the morning.

                  The streets sure are crowded today. Let's take the subway instead, it's way faster anyways. 

So yeah, my Korean is coming along swimmingly I think. Those above sentences are really all you need anyways, right? 

   After class, we had lunch and I headed out to the lab. The lab always makes me walk away with a new feeling every day. Today, it was a mixture of frustration and amazement. Frustration because I can't really talk to the guys in the lab well enough to ask questions about why stuff is happening, and also because the reaction seems to not be working so well. Amazement, though, because with just a few words, my professor has given me a little hope and made me want to come back, yet again, tomorrow, and test my skill at chemistry. 

  

     When my professor told me at first he wanted to be a real father figure in my life, it was a little off putting. I got past that point, though, when I learned in culture class that in Korea, when you develop a good relationship with a teacher they really become like another parent. It's the whole Confucian thing again I think. 

       Now, though, it seems like (and as I imagine a father would often do) he can just come into the lab, say five words, and give me hope again. As ridiculous as it sounds, he has the best one line sayings ever (even better than David Caruso [<---The 'lead man' on CSI Miami who always gets to say the cool lines, like, "You don't spend a thousand dollars on clothes.... that you're never going to wear." see also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sarYH0z948]). Take for example, today. 

           

        He came in and I told him what was going on. He looked at my reaction stuff, looked at me, and said, "Chemistry is like making bread. Sometimes you follow the recipe and it tastes great. Sometimes, though, you follow the recipe and it comes out burnt on one side or doesn't taste good. We'll succeed, just give it time."

          How do you argue with that? You basically have no choice but to have hope. The motivational speech had everything you could have asked for: dramatic pause at the beginning, parallel story you can relate to (I really enjoy bread, by the way), and a pick-me-up line thrown in at the end.

      I came back to the room because it was time for none other than table tennis! Unfortunately for me, when I got there, I found out my club was once again not meeting due to midterm tests. It was all pretty good, though, because I basically got to kill two birds with one stone (and that's like 4 birds altogether, as long as two in the hand really are worth two in the bush) because I got to play with some professor type guys (on a university campus in Korea, you pretty much have to assume they're professors if they're old guys) ad I got to practice my new playing style. It's way more fun for me, so I am willing to put time into it. 

Afterwards, I came back to my room and had to come to terms with a terrible realization. It can be summed up in 7 short words:     Eating plus not working out equals fat.

     Yep, so, being as I am in a good mood it didn't bother me that much to figure it out. I am definitely going to make more of an effort to both eat less and work out more, because that's the formula to get rid of the fatness.  

Homework done, 

Table tennis played, 

I could be wrong, 

but I think I've had a good day.

For Now,

     Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Dongwhasa video!

Somehow I got motivated and posted today...yay!

Today I'm pretty sure I had a good time. 

Class went ok. I had enough coffee and whatnot so I was able to be in a good mood. Tomorrow is thursday so only one more day until friday! The class is good and all, but once again, for the millionth time, it's four hours. 

After class I had lunch with Kayla and Philip, and we strategized about travel and about how to better inform the people coming here in the future. More on that soon. 

Afterwards I went to the lab, ran an NMR on my product, and found out that I didn't actually get any product, which is kind of amazing I think. I redid the reaction... only to get the same exact looking (and wrong color) solution. There is a graduate student who wants to do everything for me, so I guess this work is what it is. I really don't know how to feel about it. 

I also went and booked the train for Seoul next weekend. I'm really excited about that trip. I emailed a travel agent about a full DMZ tour for us on that saturday. 

During the lab, I took my vitamin, because I forgot to earlier this morning, but by the time I got around to taking it I had been without food for a couple of hours. I totally forgot, at least subconsciously, why they tell you to have them with food. Not to be overly dramatic or anything, but I thought something really bad was going to come of the whole vitamin ordeal. I thought maybe that was it, because of my extremely altered existence for about half an hour. 

On that note, may I suggest that future students on any semester trip have daily vitamins, because sometimes nutrition is difficult to get. 

Well after that, basically I have just been trying to get stuff done. I'm pretty confident that I will have the next video ready tomorrow morning. Sorry again for putting the Table Tennis video up, it was just a fun thing. 

For Now

 Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Table Tennis Tournament Stuff

Yea yea I know it's not a big deal, and that no one probably cares, but it's a popular Korean sport, so here is my experience.

I have GOT to start blogging daily again.

I know it's been a while (5 days? :(  ) but I am going to do my best to start blogging daily again. 

Saturday

Saturday was pretty fun. Basically, the plan was to visit Daegu and do a little perusing of the local wares. We did really well in that regard. There were plenty of clothing stores to be found, and we walked pretty much the whole downtown. It was really a great Saturday afternoon. It wasn't too hot, or too cool, it was just perfect for a nice day of relaxation. 

We went into the traditional market for a little traditional shopping, but basically found the exact same stuff over and over again. I found some tailors, but didn't get anything. At the start of this trip, I thought getting new clothes would be a cool thing. I came to my senses, though, and thankfully so, because where would I even put a suit? 

          The market was pretty neat, because there were vendors everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. There was only room to go through one at a time, and there were still scooters going through, which gave the shopping an interesting air of danger, as if you knew while looking at a shirt you had the chance of being brutally ran down by a scooter. Well, maybe that's a little dramatic, but seriously the scooters go everywhere. I will get a picture of them being crazy. 

          One of the neater things about the market was that there was a vast network of indoor vendors as well, which specialized in textiles and traditional clothing. This part of the market was where the tailors were, and they actually had some pretty nice material. I would be pretty afraid of getting a suit tailored I think, because they would probably make it in the Korean style: very tight and shiny. 

          We came back from downtown and had dinner with the english teachers and watched celebrity apprentice. It was a really good time. The english teachers here are so nice, and are definitely interesting. They are good friends to have, and anyone coming to Daegu will be able to utilize them in staving off homesickness.

Sunday 

On Sunday I had an incredibly fun trip (which is also the subject of my next video blog, hopefully up soon). I met with my teacher and a couple of Japanese exchange students in Daegu and we went on a one day temple stay. 

           I woke up early so I could be awake for the travels, and attempted to get the Japanese guys and go to meet our teacher. They didn't answer their door, though, so I had to go it alone for that part. I didn't know where we were meeting (at first), but my teacher had given me the name of the place, so when I got on the appropriate bus I gave the information to the bus driver. He agreed to tell me when we got there, so I floated off into a daydream.

           An hour and a half later, when I come to from my day dreams, the bus drier is telling me to get off because I've arrived. Turns out the place I was meeting my teacher was a park I was really familiar with, I just didn't know what the official name of it was. I could have been there easily half an hour before, by taking the subway and whatnot, but instead, I had to rely on the bus and was a half hour late. 

          I met my everyone, and we were off. Turns out my knocking really did wake up the Japanese guys, and they freaked out when they realized they overslept. They, however, knew the official name for the park, and therefore were able to get there before me, even though they left way after me. 

          We got on this bus, called the Rapid Bus, but it should have actually been called the So-Crowded-It's-Probably-A-Safety-Hazard. This bus could probably have seated 40 people easy. Too bad 75 people were actually on board the whole way. Believe it or not, it made the trip much more interesting. What was usually a leisurely drive up a mountain road turned into an epic battle of diesel horsepower vs. gravity and physics. 

          We made it in good time (I think) and started making our way to the temple. I had a lot of fun walking to the temple itself. Hiking up a mountain is so neat, at least to me, and if you joy it as much as I do, Korea is a great place. The temple itself was smaller than I expected, but the stay itself was top notch. 

           At first, they welcomed us to the temple and we all introduced ourselves. All in all there must have been 25 people there, kids included. As soon as the clock struck twelve, we headed down to the food building for lunch, which was delicious. The temple had a vegetarian diet, and the food was neat. It was all very traditional, even the kimchi (sour from age). Also, there was traditional Korean bread, called Duck. It was really good, but it was the thickest bread type food I have ever had. 

           Lunch was finished and we headed out to our first activity: the famed Korean tea ceremony. I always enjoy doing the ceremony, because I feel like it helps me remove myself from the world, and really helps appreciate the act of taking in nature's bounty. I didn't really mean for that to sound so spiritual, but I guess it kind of just did. Anyways, we went through it two times, and the lesson was focused mainly on the steps, not the movements and things like that. 

       

         When we sat down for the tea ceremony I was pretty surprised. I have heard that temples usually have their stay participants do actual work while there, but the one we were at only wanted us to have fun and see the lighter side of traditional korean life, which was also fine by me. 

          After the tea ceremony, we all relaxed for a few minutes, while the next activity was prepared: Lotus flower lantern craft time. In honor of Buddha's approaching birthday, we were taught how to make beautiful little lotus flower lanterns. It was so simple, and the product was so pretty, I was so surprised. 

         

       At this time of year (Buddha's birthday), Korea is infiltrated by the likes of hundreds upon thousands of paper lanterns. They are in the monasteries and the temples and even in the schools and the big cities. It's not the biggest holiday in Korea, but it is definitely big enough. One of the neatest thing I learned on Sunday was that every lantern in the temple was made by the monks themselves. Every lantern probably took half an hour to make, at least, and there must have been nearly a hundred. While it may not seem like a lot, the monks had supplies to last for at least three times that many lanterns. 

     When we had all created our lanterns, we headed to the food place again for dinner. Dinner consisted of another very traditional meal. It consisted of flattened and ripped apart rice cakes along with green onions, potatoes, and...something else that was delicious as well. The making of the rice cake parts was a lot of fun, because I basically made it just like pizzas are thrown. The whole scene was pretty comical, because all the nationalities of the people participating in the stay (including, but not limited to, chinese, vietnamese, thai, russian, japanese, korean, and american) were flattening the dough in a very stereotypical way. 

Dinner was delicious, but when it was over, we had one last activity. We played a very traditional game, called Yoot-Nori. It's basically a very old version of sorry. The rules are very similar, and instead of dice, you use 4 sticks, one side flat and one side round. Spaces moved are determined by how many sticks are turned flat side up. 

      The game was so much fun. I could see immediately why it was a traditional game. They split up the group into two factions, and it wasn't long before we were all cheering for our side.

We had to leave when the game finished, though, and made it back to the school easily. I, in turn, made it safely to sleep not soon afterwards, mainly because I needed to make up for the sleep I had lost the previous week. 

Monday

Monday was not nearly as fun as Sunday, but it was ok. Class was relatively good, and I got all my homework done. I even got to write a whole page in Korean, which is great practice. The pages always get ripped to shreds by my teacher's pen, but it helps me learn a lot. 

 

The only bad thing about Monday was that I sat in the lab waiting for my professor for a total of 4 hours without him being there. At first I was kind of annoyed, but was definitely humbled when he showed up.

      Turns out, he had a car wreck this weekend and has had to be at the hospital for an hour a day for rehab. Here I was thinking he just didn't care, when he had actually been involved in an accident which wasn't his fault. Basically, the moral of the day was to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, a valuable lesson I have definitely been getting away from while I've been here. 

      The lab stuff was the last thing I did on Monday, though.

Tuesday(Today)

Today has been a pretty good day too. Class was ok (still FOUR hours) but all in all I'm getting it. After class, I had a delicious lunch and went to the travel agent. Why the travel agent? Turns out that next weekend we have a five day weekend. I wanted to go to Jeju island, which is THE place to go in warm weather. It's off the southern coast of Korea, has a nice beach or two, and is very traditional. 

      I said wanted because when I learned the price of the plane ticket to the island, I had to rethink the price. Basically, it was a lot. I think everyone in Korea will be going somewhere nice (the entire country has the 5 day weekend) so all the prices are inflated. I decided then that maybe it would be fun to go to another country for the holiday, like China, or Thailand or Australia, Fiji, anywhere really. The answer, price-wise, for all of those, was no, no, no, NO, and no. ALL the prices of air travel are inflated that weekend. Instead, we have decided to spend the five days in Seoul, take the nicest DMZ tour we can find, and do everything we possibly can. 

       

With the travel plans settled, I headed off to table tennis, but for the second time in a row, the club isn't there. Last time it was because there was a tournament they didn't tell me about, but this time it was because this week is mid term week for everyone. Can't blame them for studying. 

After leaving there, I came back to the room and did my homework. So ends my day.

For Now and Hopefully Only Until Tomorrow

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

randomness video

This is all the stuff I had no other place for!

What do you know?! I have time...

So this is a momentous occasion for this week. I have time!! I can't believe it, honestly. I haven't really had any time to really even sleep or eat, but this weekend will be good for me. 

Honestly, I don't even remember which day it was I had to stop blogging on because of my lack of time. I believe it was Monday, since today is Thursday. 

So Monday was good. I got my research project and started my first reaction. So far, it has been slow going. I'm unfamiliar with the subtleties of what I'm doing, and the lab is unfamiliar, which is a little stressful. The good news is that I'm getting to work with a good group of graduate students who know exactly what they're doing, and also what I should be doing. I'm learning a lot in this lab, because the procedures are so different than what we do at home. Maybe it's just that it's a lab in a foreign country, or maybe it's just the system my professor likes. Who knows? 

        It's also kind of weird, too, in that my professor, at least, from what he's told me, really sees himself as a kind of father for me along with being a professor. This also might be a common thing, but I'm not sure. I guess mentors are also kind of like father figures too, and we have them in America, but I've never had someone come out and say that they want to be like a dad to me. It's kind of nice, even though I'm not used to that kind of thing. I really have no inkling as to why the father figure thing is important here. It could be just the whole Confucian society thing coming out, but I'm not sure. Either way, Professor Chang is a nice man. 

         Like I said before, the lab work is slow going, and that, in itself is kind of frustrating for me. I am very determined when my mind is set to doing something, and since I have class so much and other obligatory commitments, my hours are very strange, which cuts down on the time Professor Chang is in the lab with me. 

         This project is going to go very well, I think. 

Also, on Monday, my day was brightened so much by a PACKAGE I received from the states. I can't say enough how eternally grateful I am to Dr. Ratliff for sending me things. It makes life here so much easier. This package had tons of coffee and even a coffee maker! I fired it up almost immediately! I was getting ready to enjoy some true coffee, but started smelling burning plastic. I investigated the source of the smell, only to discover that my power converter was smoking at an alarming rate. I immediately unplugged everything and just stood there, half expecting my power converter to explode in a fiery torment of electrical rage. However, and thankfully so, my converter is fine. I had no cue as to why this happened, so I called the good people at Mr. Coffee. Turns out that American coffee makers don't work overseas, because they require the 10 amps which is offered by the American electric system and which Korea doesn't have. You can't fix the problem, because amps are intrinsic with the electricity and can't be converted. 

          In light of the sad news, though, I would really like to extend my full thanks to Dr. Ratliff. It was so nice of a gesture. I can't say that enough. Even though the coffee maker can't work, I will send it back to the states. I have also obtained a simple coffee maker which definitely will suffice. Again, and I can't say enough, thank you to Dr. Ratliff (By the way, the coffee is Fantastic.).

I didn't go to table tennis on Tuesday, but for good reason. I went to dinner at my professor's house, instead, along with all the other lab workers for Dr. Chang. The dinner itself was really good. Homemade Korean food is very very good. Way better than restaurant food, I think. We had a ton of food, and it was all so good. Afterwards, we had tea and orange slices and just talked for a while. Something really exciting about all of this, is that I actually understood about 10% of what was being said. That was a much better improvement compared to my previous abilities of about.....2%. 

        Also, Dr. Chang's house wasn't a "house" as we would call it in the states at all, instead, it resembled more of a penthouse type of thing. His apartment/penthouse thing was located on the ninth floor of an apartment building which was in a group of about twenty apartment buildings. Pretty much the overwhelming majority of Koreans live in these apartment buildings, and are actually pretty eco-friendly I think. Anyways, when I heard that most Koreans live in apartments I imagined American style apartments, where it's nice, but not a house. Dr. Chang's apartment was most definitely just like a really nice one story house. I was thoroughly impressed. 

        

Yesterday, Wednesday, I thought was going to be SO busy, but it turned out to not be so bad.  Lots of lab work, and class. Can't forget that I also went to Hayang, and also ate more chinese food. I got my coffee maker thing from Wayne on Wednesday, too, and that's exciting. 

As far as class goes, things are progressing very quickly, and while I feel I am catching WAY more of the material, spelling still isn't so much fun because one mistake ruins the whole question. However, I really am learning a whole lot, which is exciting, because I'm starting to be able to talk to someone without them giving me that look like "huh?" 

Today has also been pretty decent, mainly because class is now over and I have had a little time to relax and just get stuff done. Nothing really of much excitement has happened, though, just a good, relaxing time. 

I am going to go and get some movie making done. 

For Now, 

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

The end of a nice weekend

I realize it's been close to four days since I blogged last... the fact of the matter is, that when you're exhausted, blogging really only exacerbates the whole shpiel. I feel I'm justified in just posting now.

As the title say, it's been a pretty good weekend. 

Thursday was highlighted by ping pong but that's not all. I had a delicious lunch at Mie's after playing a fun Korean game to learn numbers in a park on campus. There wasn't much more to the day besides those two activities. There lies the problem of not blogging for a few days, though, as now it doesn't seem like much happened, but I'm sure some stuff did happen. 

On friday I had a really good time. The midterm turned out to be really easy, so that was a relief. All I have to do is hope that I didn't actually bomb it when I get my grade back tomorrow. 

       Either way, I was so incredibly surprised that the midterm seemed so easy, I was on autopilot for the rest of the day. Almost immediately afterwards, me, Phillip, and an English teacher, Adam, all went with Kayla to drop her off at the train station. We had lunch and got her to her train, then made a day of downtown Daegu. We found a place that served delicious drinks and had those as we walked around. I bought a hat from Le Coq Sportif, and a long sleeve shirt from Who.A.U. (basically a cheap abercrombie). I actually amazed myself because I haven't bought clothes for myself in like a year or two, and before that, I think it was a couple of years also. 

       We had dinner at this delicious little hole-in-the-wall restaurant later on. I'm pretty sure the owner was in there eating with us, and was one of the best sources of entertainment for our meal. Every few minutes he would look over to us and slur a Korean sentence which was supposed to be something along the lines of, "You guys ok?" or, "You guys need something? Water? More food? Is it good?" Like I said, though, this was heavily slurred so even Adam, who knows more Korean than either me or Phillip, had a hard time understanding exactly what he was getting at. 

      That's one of the best parts about being here in Korea. Pretty much every restaurant is going to be delicious. There isn't really any size requirement for the foodshops. I have been in places with literally two tables, and they have been awesome. It's sort of like that at home, too, but not to the extent it is here. I can Always look forward to eating out here, and never have to worry if it will be good. 

We made it home about 9 o clock I think, and I got all of my stuff together before passing out, all ready to get up at 5 the next day for the table tennis tournament. 

I ended up getting up on time, and made it out to Gumi with the table tennis club. Those guys are a lot of fun to hang out with. I could just imagine what being around them would be like if I could understand anything they said. I understand context and can basically 'dub' conversations in my head (in other words, I can guess what they're talking about), which makes them equally hilarious. Sometimes when I'm bored, I like to dub conversations all around me with much more hilarious context. It's really fun, because it makes me at least look like I can follow, even if I have NO idea what's going on, with the added bonus of giving me a real laugh to go along with everyone else's, because even though I didn't get the intended humor, I've fabricated my own equally/greater fun.

           So anyways, me and my friends all arrive at the tournament, and I'm so excited/nervous i can't really even comprehend anything. Thinking back, I didn't feel all that nervous, but I'm pretty sure I was performing my best impersonation of an Egyptian, because I was definitely in denial. The tournament started, and I was so nervous, I couldn't do anything. I'm not used to getting so nervous, and have only ever gotten that way before once. In baseball, we call the loss of performance "pressing," and pressing usually translates to a lack of performance. I want to go ahead and use lack of performance because it sounds so much nicer to write down than does complete and utter chokefest. Hindsight 20/20 I played the best I could, especially being so nervous. 

            I have deliberately left out any real concrete record of how I played because I'm not proud of it. Table tennis' rules are very similar to that of regular tennis. Matches are divided into sets, and sets are determined by the player who wins the most games out of 3, 5 or 7. The format of this tournament was at first to separate all 64 players into pools of 4. From those pools, the top two go on to the real bracket of the tournament. 

           I elected to play first, and it was against a tall heavy set Korean guy. I won the first game, and was up in the second game 6 to 3. However, what I failed to notice at that point was that my self-destruct button had gotten pushed somehow, and I lost handily in three straight games. 

Match 1 over. 

I was still pretty nervous, and on top of that I was a little worried because I had lost, so after keeping score for the next game, I played a thin Korean guy. I was beat without much real challenge to him 3 games to 1.

Match 2 over. 

At this point I knew I had no chance of making the tournament, so the nervousness was pretty well replaced by disappointment. However, disappointment is really no help to a player whose game is based on precise movement and quick reaction time. I was beaten again, this time 3-0. 

Match 3 over. Singles hopes over.

My singles bid was hushed before it even started, but I was told I would get a chance to help the B team (the kind of JV team, which, after how I played in singles, I don't blame them at all for placing me in) in the team matches. Unfortunately, the team competition didn't start for a good 4 or 5 hours after my singles matches were done, so I was merely a spectator at that time. 

       When it came time for the team matches, I was actually able to be a source of positive outcome, though, as I won my singles match and helped win the doubles match, to propel our team to a 3-2 victory. I was so excited. 

       Since we won, we went on to play another team, but I lost again, less handily this time, in my singles match 3-1. Since I lost, my team lost 3-1, and that was the least fun part of the whole deal.

Doubles Over, tournament over.

On the way home, we stopped at a meat buffet. This restaurant was remarkably similar to the place we went to in Jinhae, except this one was nicer. I ate meat until I thought for sure my body ran completely on cholesterol. It was so good. Needless to say, when we rolled into the room at around 11, I was ready for bed. 

Today, Sunday, was good too. 

I went to church with my professor, to the Church of Blooming Love. Sweet name, I know. I think it was a Presbyterian church, but I'm not really sure, especially since the service wasn't like anything I was used to back at home for Easter. 

         Being in church was really nice though. I couldn't really understand what the preacher was saying, but I was able to figure out what he was saying by the words I could pick out, and the reading. Instead of reading the same scriptures about jesus rising again, this time we read a different part of the same book. It was kind of refreshing. I really wish I had the ability to understand the pastor guy, though, maybe I could have appreciated the sermon much more. 

     Something really funny actually happened in the church too. It was one of those moments where you're just kind of frozen, unable to really do much of anything, because you're just so shocked. As we were leaving the big hall, my professor and his wife left got up very quickly, but I was still getting my stuff together. When I looked up, the person next in the line to leave was this tiny old lady with white hair who beckoned me to go in front of her. I thought it was really nice, especially since there were 345235 people behind her. After saying thank you, I took my spot in front of her. The line was barely moving, though, so I was just kind of standing there in front of the old woman waiting on the line to move. I soon discovered the peril of standing in front of old ladies, though. For a good five minutes, while the line was barely moving, I stood there, with an old lady's hands sitting on my butt. No kidding. While she was a nice old lady and all, I don't think she was nice enough for that kind of friendship. 

         I wanted to say something, but realized I couldn't say anything she would understand. When I realized I knew nothing she would understand, I wanted to move, but there were a couple of problems with that theory:

     1. What if this was just one of the little perks old ladies get when they get older (in Korean culture, older women basically run amok, as a sort of amends for them having a rough life up to that point)? If this was true, I would be committing a really rude cultural offense, and thought it would be best to wait the couple of minutes, however uncomfortable they may be.

     2. What if she couldn't stand otherwise? For all I knew she could have been jogging before church, or cleaning her house, or some other very healthy and normal task which requires the use of normal walking skills, but I couldn't remember seeing her standing on her own. I hadn't remembered actually seeing her before this episode, so there was no telling if she needed help remaining upright or not, and I certainly had no desire to be the cause of a broken hip, much less a Korean broken hip. I resolved by this thought process I should wait out the two or three minutes, no matter how uncomfortable they may be. 

       

So I stood there. For what seemed like forever. Finally, the line started to move and I was freed.

               Besides the self entitlement old ladies think they have while in churches, I find going to church is really kind of nice here. The people are super kind, and lunch is even served for free. Sure, you might have to stand around with a couple of old hands on your butt, but boy was that food good. 

After church, my professor brought me home, and I caught up on some reading and had dinner at my favorite chinese restaurant here. Phillip went with me, as did Rita, a student I met last summer (although I didn't remember straightaway until she told me). The dinner was really good, and to my surprise, Rita's english had improved dramatically. 

Basically that's the end of my weekend. Long post, but it was worth it I think. 

For Now,

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Number of days till the midterm: still 2

So today I have had lots of time to study and get my head round some of the more difficult things. It's not overly incredibly hard, the system is just much different than that of english, it's hard to get the instinctive grasp of what I'm doing. 

I also found out today that my grade will be sent via a numerical grade. I am willing to take the GPA hit though. I'm not worried about it, because I'm fully aware of how I'm already here and I can only do so much. Learning a language isn't as simple as rote studying I think. I will persevere no matter what. 

Class was better today. I learned more I think today, but the grammar is difficult, as is the vocabulary. I don't know why those words aren't sticking better. 

I didn't have class today, since the drop thing with the philosophy class has gone through, at least as far as I know. So in that time I studied and also took the time to have some fun as well. Me and Kayla had a couple of Korean friends over, and enjoyed some great andong jjimdak. Jjimdak is a delicious dish consisting of chicken, glass noodles, and lots of veggies. It's incredibly delicious. 

      Also, I learned that there is a right and wrong way to use chopsticks as well. Apparently, as told to me by Hee-sung, my Korean friend, it's impolite to use chopsticks the right way. I don't really know how to explain the right way to use chopsticks, but I will try and do some research on the subject.  

Afterwards we had S.A.P.P. and we held a one hour class, seeing as how we have midterm on Friday. It went really well, with questions being answered well, I think. 

The rest of the night has been devoted to curling and studying, but not in that order. 

With much more studying to do, and maybe a video to post, I sign off. 

For Now

Aron Huckaba

Number of days till the midterm: 2

As the title suggests, time till the midterm is dwindling quickly. I thought I was ready, but this test is over 14 chapters. It's going to be murder on me. 

Today has been ok. I just got in before midnight due to table tennis, but it seems like, as usual, my information, or lack thereof didn't prepare me for this week. I thought we would be training all week long, but apparently that's very wrong, since we actually won't be practicing any extra at all. It's so very weird to me. Korea's nickname should be changed to the Land of the Information You were Given so you Thought it was Correct, but it Turned Out to be Incorrect. The proposed name IS a little longer, but I'm pretty sure it works too. 

Class today was ok, it was just a whole lot of new stuff again. The upper grammar and all of the quantifier words and all the honorific verb endings are so confusing. I'm usually pretty good at not confusing information, but not this stuff. I don't really understand why, it just happens that way. It's so interesting to me that learning a new language can be SO difficult. This is easily the most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. When I was little, I could be told a word and another word and another word, and just absorb them. Now, I can absorb as long as someone repeats the word about...1000 times. I can honestly only learn like 3 or 4 words a day. How weird is that? 

So, I read a synopsis about the Murray State tuition increases whole shpiel, and (I'm not going to talk about this long, for obvious reasons) I'm not very happy paying the extra money. I don't feel it's kosher to say much more than that, I'm just cheap I guess. 

Back to the class, I have ben thinking about my grade all week, and it's dreadful in every meaning of the word. I literally get a feeling of dread when I think about the transcript that's going to be sent there. No matter how I study, I haven't passed a quiz yet. They are 10% of the grade. the midterm on friday is 30%, and homework is 10%. I have also not passed many homeworks. I wonder what kind of hit my GPA would take if I got a C in a twelve hour class? Actually, I'm going to calculate that now. I would have a 3.59 if that happened. boo. I will just have to hope I can study enough.

After class, I went to literature. The class is ok, but I don't particularly enjoy it right now. 

Table tennis was also ok, but i find that i just can't get into it very well anymore. I'm not sure why. One of the guys in the club told me I would be sleeping in his room on Friday, to make sure I got to everything ok. It's going to be fun I think. 

It's too bad that it's so late. I wanted to write, but I'm just too tired. 

For now

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Training Week's Eve

My attitude today can best be described as that of a child on christmas eve, well, maybe on the eve of halloween or easter. 

Tomorrow, I start training in earnest, every day until Saturday, for the big tournament in Gumi. I'm getting my game face on early. It's important to me, especially since I performed so poorly at the tournament held by the club before. 

I attempted to wake up early, but it wasn't happening, so I woke up at a decent time, and was off to class. Today we had a large review session of the last three lessons. It was definitely needed, that's for sure. It seems like we have just been blazing through our current book, and it's certainly difficult to keep up some times. 

    A good thing I'm able to take out of the whole deal, is, though, that I'm able to find out exactly what I need to study, each and every night. 

      Something interesting happened to me in class, today, as well. One of my classmates, and desk neighbor, Ning, gave me a book today. Ning is from Thailand, and is a buddhist. She's 36 and has a ten year old child. She is a marketing manager for a medical distribution company which is owned by koreans and has establishments in her home country, but I digress. Ning asked me in one of the early classes if I had a religion, because I took an interest in what she believed. When I told her I was undecided but open to any and all philosophies at this point, she told me she had a book for me. 

     Last week, Ning went back to Bangkok to take care of some things at her workplace. Evidently she also picked up the book for me, and now I have a book called Dharma Moments. It has an introduction written by the Dalai Lama himself, so how could I not give it an honest chance? I have been reading it, and the things in it are very interesting to me. 

     Yet another thing I never thought would happen to me here in Korea has already transpired, as I am truly able to explore my own set of beliefs by getting to know much better the ideologies of the eastern world. The most beautiful thing about it is that I wouldn't have gotten the chance if I hadn't come to Korea.

After class, I walked out of the building to grab lunch and realized that I was enveloped by a massive yellow cloud. It smelled really strangely, and reminded me of fog in many ways. I thought initially that it was yellow sand, and even bought myself a protective mask just for the sole purpose of not inhaling large amounts of it. Mr. Travers, my culture teacher and resource man in the international affairs office, explained to me that the crazy yellow monstrosity that was floating through campus aimlessly was actually just pollution (what a relief) which came as a result of farmers burning their fields in order to replant them. Something that was incredibly neat, though, was that the cloud rendered the sun, at this point close to its highest point in the sky, a brilliant red ball, which was neither bright nor dim. It was, however, aptly described as eerily fluorescently red.

I ended up obtaining some Jjimdak (a spicy chicken dish with glass noodles and rice), and then headed off to meet Dr. Chang. Unfortunately, I had class an hour later and couldn't start work today, but I at least found out what I would be doing. I'm going to be working with  porphyrin, and will be attempting to both institute some functionality into the compound, as well as attempting to give it ionophoric properties. I'm really excited to start work, and it will be sunday when I can finally get to the wonderful discipline that is chemistry research. 

Afterwards, we had culture class, which is always fun. We discussed Korean foodstuffs today, which included teas, food, alcohol, and table manners. It was really very fascinating, especially the tea ceremony. I think it would be so fun to take a tea set up into the mountains, brew up some boiling water, and perform the tea ceremony. 

After the last class of the day (learning anyways), I moved onto my first and last class of the day that I teach. I righted a lot of nonfactual information, mainly that Americans are difficult to make friends with, and definitely helped them understand family life in America much better. Only one of them decided not to complete their homework, and one student didn't show up again, so three out of four participants and 2 of 3 homeworks was pretty good I think. They seem interested in what I'm trying to teach them, at least, and, as I have said before, really seem to be nice people. They are so enthusiastic about developing themselves and helping me understand Korea. 

We ate dinner together, and I headed back to the dorm. I really meant to do the homework, but couldn't do it. I will definitely be a studyholic though whenever I can, especially since my midterm exam is this friday. Honestly, I am a little afraid, because everything I write in Korean is so grammatically wrong. In my homework I try and push the limits of what I can do, linguistically, but they are always, at best, completely wrong. I'm not discouraged at all, as I have a pretty good grasp on the things we have been explicitly taught so far. It's just a matter of studying, of speaking more often in Korean (outside of class), and of writing more often and learning through failure. I'm confident in myself.

For Now,

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Pom Sunday!

Today was actually pretty darn good, believe it or not. It was filled with tons of fun and excitement, as well as a nice dinner.

I started off my day by reading professor Chang's papers and making sure I understood them. They were only synthesis papers so they were pretty straightforward. I had a couple of cups of coffee and readied myself to attempt to go to church.

In case you weren't aware, today was palm sunday. Today is the day that Jesus entered Jerusalem (I think?) and there was much pomp and circumstance. Anyways, Kayla really wanted to go to mass today, for obvious reasons (the start of holy week), so we got mass times and I asked around until I found the bus that took us into jinlyang, the city closest to us. 

       We boarded the 840 bus and somehow made it into Jinlyang. That was the first step in the serious of steps that got us into the church, though. Unfortunately, the on.y thing I was sure of when we got off the bus was that we were in Jinlyang. I knew that the church was indeed in the city, but never having been there before, I had to revert to my question asking ability to find more info. 

       We climbed the hill to another church and I asked a friendly looking lady if the church I was standing at was in fact the catholic church (I knew the church was actually a presbyterian church, but I thought just asking if it was the catholic church would leave less room for error). It wasn't, and instead of giving us directions, the lady motioned over to a van, and yelled something at the driver. He nodded his head and motioned for us to get in. 

      Normally, I would be wary of this situation, and have some terrible fantastical exchange in my head that I was about 2 minutes away from being able to say, "and that was how I ended up a slave in North Korea...", however, I was pretty sure that we were being taken care of. 

I love it when I'm right. They took us straight on to the church, and didn't even ask us to give them any money. I love people here. 

Needless to say, I experienced my first catholic mass. In Korean. it was neat, I can say that much. I sat next to this sweet old lady who shared her hymn book with me. I was actually able to read along and sing the songs in time! Then, the reading of the gospel was done, and I attempted to follow along in my parallel Korean/English bible with what the guy was saying. 

     It might or might not sound ridiculous to say that something could make you feel like you're on the verge of aneurism, but I really felt like I had pushed the limit of my brain capacity. It was neat because I was able to understand stuff, but it was the toughest thing I've ever tried to do in Korean. It would be neat to get an audiobook and try that very same thing I think. 

Anyways, my first catholic mass passed (which, in all actuality, I probably wouldn't have really understood if it was in English anyways, so it being in Korean may have been ok). We left the church, and somehow made it back to the school. We also met a ton of nice people at the church. They were all saying hi to us and attempted to talk to us. I say attempted to talk because I would say something and their reply would prompt the: no-clue-what-you're-saying,-but-I-want-to-be-polite-about- it look. They got the hint, and tried to simplify it down. Didn't work. Older folks use much different words than we're taught. It's so funny. I never thought a language could be so different, but then again my native tongue has no concept of ingrained caste rules and am intrinsic honor system. Well, kinda, with please, and thank you, and all that stuff, but I think thee, thou, and thy would be the better example of what the closest thing we have is. 

Anyways, while I waited for my dinner date with my professor and his family to roll around, I read over his papers again. The time approached our meeting, so I headed down early. That was actually a good decision, because even though he was late, I was able to get some great picture opportunities.  I love taking pictures. And video. The video is much tougher to get good material for, though, so I have much less of that. I don't think any of the work I do in pictures and film is any good, though, so I guess that's a redundant statement. 

Spring here is so beautiful. Everything bursts into life with vivid colors, and the sound of bees humming the work week away fills the air around any flowering bush/tree. The air smells good, yellow sand or not, and the weather is really pleasant. It's as if Spring here is truly as it was meant to be. Or maybe Murray and the greater Paris area just needs more fruit bearing trees and flowers. 

My professor arrived shortly after everyone disappeared and I ran out of picture ideas, and we were off to dinner. Before he came to pick me up, I was thinking how I had broken a streak of eating a certain type of chinese food once a week since I had been here. Oh well, I thought. Not a big deal, it's just food after all. 

            Turns out we went to a different chinese restaurant, but ate the exact meal which I thought I was missing out on. I thought the irony was the most delicious part of the meal, just ahead of the cinnamon-ed sweet and sour pork. We had a really good conversation, and the food was delicious. Overall, it was a fantastic meal.

          Did I mention we had a conversation? I wish I could say it was in Korean. Unfortunately (and secretly, fortunately too), the whole family spoke english. Being a professor, Dr. Chang was able to do work in America, and allowed his children to go with him. Maybe his wife too, but they never said. It's common for Koreans to only take a child or two abroad and not the other parent, so there's no telling. 

       

Either way, I made a really good friend in the good Dr.'s son. He is basically just the Korean version of me, if you can believe it. Every time one of us would talk about a hobby or interest, the other shared it. It was as if, upon birth, I was rebirthed to a surrogate caucasian mother, put up for adoption, and then swept away to the states, never to know that I shared a twin over here. I really wish you could meet the guy, though. He's a good friend. He goes to school in Seoul, though, so we had to drop him off at the train station before I could go back to the dorm. 

His parents seemed unbothered by him leaving, but I found out their oldest son is studying in America (Indiana State) and they miss the older son a whole lot. Just in case that sentence sounded funny, I feel I should explain that in the Korean family, the strongest feelings parents have for their children are given to the eldest son, since he is the one who carries on the family census. The family census, in a related story, is basically the complete genealogy of the family, and usually goes back 3 or 4 generations. We don't have an equivalent in the States, or I would compare it. 

Something else cool, though, was that the Prof.'s son wanted to be just like his dad. I love to see that. I could tell that he loved Dr. Chang and wanted to make him proud. Every time Dr. Chang talked about his son, he got this Korean-man glow about him as he talked, and I could tell the pride he held for his son was incredible. The familial/filial love in the room was practically tangible. I really wish I could hang out more with complete Korean families. They seem incredibly nice to be a part of. 

They drove me back to the dorm, asking questions the whole way, and dropped me off. I really enjoyed the time I spent with them. They are so nice, and the Prof. is a really accessible guy. He even called me smart, which is pretty nice to hear from him. 

Tomorrow at 2 I'm going to get my project! Like I said before, it appears that it will be in synthesis, so I'm super excited about it. 

Oh yeah, and I got all of my homework done. 

For Now

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Weekend of fun and adventure, etc.

Weekends here are usually not so good, but thankfully this one turned out to be the opposite. it was pretty good (at least so far). 

Yesterday we had lunch at a chabu chabu place, which is basically Korean fondu. I made some pretty neat discoveries about food while I was at the restaurant. 

   Cooking things in a hot spicy soup pretty much makes everything delicious

   I really enjoy squid. Especially the head parts(I forgot the word for it, but isn't it something like a wintry clothing item)

   rice, eggs, and onion all cooked together on a hot iron bowl is possibly the closest thing to broccoli rice casserole. It's also just as good, incase anyone was wondering.

Anyways, all of the exchange students were there eating, and we had a good time. I sat at the table with Mr. Kang and someone else who works in the office with him. The guy was really nice and did his best to explain things and help when he could. I really had a fun time at our table. Mr. Kang is definitely a character and I'm very glad to have him on my side of the information.

    We had mondu there in the restaurant, as well, and I know what mond is, but it definitely warrants some introduction. Mondu is basically like a delicious egg roll, but instead of the fried exterior, imagine that it was a nicely colored (any color basically) and nice and soft. So soft in fact that it can be easily pierced with only the superpowers afforded by one/two chopsticks. Mondu, though, is much better than egg rolls, in that the emphasis is shifted away from the cabbage and other unnecessary ruffage present in the steretypical treat from china. The (other chinese treat, less known, however) deliciousness of the mondu comes from the fact that it has a fair amount of meat and spices which basically cause it to taste more like a meaty spring roll. Circular description or not, I hope you come across mondu at some point. Oh, and its cheap too.

We left the restaurant and ended up going to Kmart for groceries and a new clothes drying rack (I forgot how physics worked and accidentally broke the last one). Kmart was pretty neat, but it wasn't the same as our Kmart at home. I didn't expet to be, just figured it was a good point to make. It was however, just what I was hoping for. There was fresh produce, fresh fruit, fresh kimchi, meats, a fresh (and may I say, tantalizingly, torturingly, beautifully tempting to the nose, especially if the nose is attached to a face which is already hungry) bakery, and all kinds of foodstuffs imaginable. 

I didn't spend very much, when I think about how it can all space out. It's easily a week of breakfast, and healthy snacks (and some not so much healthy), so I'm happy about my gettings. Oh, and peppermint tea. I can't forget how I snagged peppermint tea, and pancake mix. Eli offered to let us cook at her place sometime, so I think the first thing I want is pancakes (I know, I know, a rash decision, but I thought it was a good prelude to next week's patty melt).

I forgot also that I went to the library too. I met a Korean librarian who speaks english really well, and she showed me how to access the chemistry journal. They are so gifted here with the amount of journals they get. Basically, they have all the ACS publications. It's amazing, really. Anyways, I am getting to read some really cool stuff, and I like it a lot. 

Let's move on to today, shall we?

Today was actually a lot of fun. It was meant to be a relaxing day that just kind of brought me back down a stress level or two, and it definitely reached its purpose. 

It started off by waking up at my own pace, at 9 o clock, and a big cup of coffee. To go with said cup of delicious coffee goodness was some bready breakfast item and a tangerine. I knew I was going to lunch at twelve, so I wanted to watch my girlish figure for breakfast. After my little breakfast, I read a journal article, genuinely learned something really interesting, and attempted to find another article, to no avail. 

At twelve, me and Kayla went to Isaacs toast. I think I have eaten there a whole lot, but only on the weekend, because basically nothing else on campus is open. It's so good though, and is the only western food I have here really, and it keeps my head up when it comes to missing the food from back home. 

      After my three hot ham and cheese with eggs (and a really delicious sweet sauce), it was time for a picture taking excursion. I posted pretty much all of the pictures (with the exceptions of identical pictures just with different filters) are on facebook now. I took some good ones I think, but I can never tell if they are actually any good or not. I took almost 170 pictures, though, and it was a great time. We basically meandered through and around the campus, finding neat places, and actually a bunch of places I had never ever seen before. 

       This campus continuously amazes me. There is everything you could want from a campus here. There is incredible facilities and equipment, beautiful aesthetics, plenty of teachers, helpful staff, research opportunities, and now, as I have just recently found out, an entire system of trails which go through woods and up and down hills, and end in a beautiful little park. I'm so excited that I found all the neat little spots today. 

After the fun picture taking adventure, it was time for seminar meeting with my (new) research group. I was so excited! I love research! So we all assembled (all 4 of us) and I got to listen to a couple of presentations about their contact making system and also about a project they will start working on, which will deal with chemo sensors. I actually had to give a presentation as well. I thought I did very well, because I was nervous, but the professor had good questions, and it seems like he liked what he saw. He also has an idea about what he would like me to do, I think, and it seems like it will involve supramolecular synthesis of fluorosensors which contain at least one crown ether moiety. That will only help advance my work at Murray, also, so it's doubly good.

After the seminar was over, he brought me into his office and handed me a couple of papers he co-authored. He told me to read them by tomorrow. When I asked why by tomorrow, a sunday, he said, my wife and son would like to meet you. I also want to discuss your direction, so please meet me here at my office on 5 so that we can have dinner, discuss your direction, and make good memories. It's going to be great I think. I am nervous about my korean, though. Let's hope I can stumble through enough to not be a bad guest ha ha. 

The culture here is so neat, and I'm going to have a chance to go to a real Korean household! I'm so excited! I hope it turns out to be a good experience. I honestly don't have any doubt about that, but I still need to hope, I think. 

Also, I finally figured out what is going on with ping pong this week. I will have training tuesday through friday and then on saturday, I will meet the team at 6AM (6!) at the bus stop and we will journey from there to Gumi. I will participate in both team and in single matches. I'm really excited and will work hard to not get so nervous this time. This week will be serious practice throughout. 

I'm truly happy that my classes are going smoothly and that I'm getting everything pretty easily, at least so far. We have midterms on friday, and the tournament is Saturday. It will turn out exactly the way it's supposed to, I think. 

Well, I could write more, but I don't think I could write much more about what I've done in the past two days.

For Now, 

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Day number two, but Day number one as wellf

I'm not sure exactly how many "Day 1's" I've had here in Korea. I devote myself to doing the better things with my day often, only to discover that my ability to try and create a new healthy habit is not as great as the ability of Korea to sap any and all time from the day.

So, I am once again going to make it a point to really study Korean. I did my homework tonight, and did way more than was required in the way of answers, so that is definitely a start. Sure it took my two and a half hours, but it was worth it. Let's hope for a good grade on that test tomorrow.

Class today was good. I was attentive and definitely learned a bunch. I am getting much better at reading and writing but the speaking and listening is coming slower. It's a common progression for someone who spends 20 hours a day in class and lots of time doing written homework I think. 

Today was the big "food festival" at the exco in Daegu. Turns out that it wasn't exactly a food festival. It was more like an expo for the major cities of Korea and then for international travel. It was neat, except that everything was really expensive there. I managed to get a sweet shirt, though, for the low, low, price of a complimentary mudpack. It made my face feel really funny though, like it was caked with mud (who knew, right?).

I got to hang out with a couple of teachers (the only native korean speakers who went with us ha ha) and they were really nice. The other international students spent time with us too, but in a coming and going manner. 

On the way back, I read some of my book which has the works of Poe in it. He was really a great writer. I'm really glad for the book exchange in the teacher's dorm. It has some really great books in it, that's for sure. 

After I managed to get back from the exco, I did homework and grabbed dinner. Just an average day for the alien Korean. 

Oh yeah, and I forgot to grab my camera for the exco, so no pictures:(

For Now

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond

Rabbit Rabbit

It's my second first of the month! I successfully said the fabled saying of good luck today, rabbit rabbit. It seems like it already worked today. More on that to come.

Once again I've skipped a day of blogging. How boring I am. In my defense I felt not at all like doing anything when I got in last night. I had a pretty rough time at table tennis. We had a tournament and I played..... not very well is a good term here. Basically it was terrible, but, as I will explain later, I think it was for the best. That was my only table tennis for the week. The club is going to party tomorrow and I'm not really up to go out tomorrow, especially since there is going to be a korean food fair in Daegu that the university is taking us to.

Anyways, class yesterday and today went pretty well I think. yesterday was really good, and I easily understood everything. Today, however, my listener was broken again. Simple verbs sounded like gibberish, but oh well, tomorrow will be better. I will start studying more I guess and just hope it all comes. It will, I think, after all, I've only been studying a month or so. 

Yesterday I found out exactly how my classes were going to transfer over to Murray. My language is all transferring, and I'm super excited for that. The literature and the culture and etiquette classes are also transferring, which is awesome. The philosophy class isn't transferring though, so that kind of sucks, but oh well. I will drop it and move on. It's a shame too, because I was really enjoying that class. Honestly, I'm just thankful to be getting 18 hours out of this semester. I'm pretty sure all but three of those hours is going to be pass/fail credit so it won't help my GPA any but it will be credit nonetheless. 

So now on to what I'm reallyreallyreally excited for. Last night, right before I went to bed, I got an email from Mr. Kang, the international affairs coordinator guy. He is incredibly nice, and I told him a couple of weeks ago how I wanted to get in touch with a professor in chemistry, namely organic chemistry. Well, he held true to his word about helping me, because today I left the Korean Language Program early in order to go and have lunch him Mr. Kang and the professor. 

    It turns out that Mr. Kang was a former student of the professor, his name is Seung-Hyun Chang. He is very intelligent, and a very nice man. Also, his research is incredible. 

             I don't know if you have ever heard of contacts which keep your eye hydrated, but they are coming up with a method currently to make a good contact which does just that. After they develop the process, a company they have a contract with will manufacture them. He is also very interested in the type of work I did under Dr. Revell. It's truly amazing that I found a chemist here who is doing such amazing work. 

     The big question, was, though, if he would offer me a spot in his lab to research and use his AMAZINGLY well funded facility. Near the end of the lunch he did indeed offer me a position, and I now have a desk in his lab. I'm ecstatic.

I also understand now, I think, why I lost so badly last night in table tennis. Aside from not being very good, I think it was a sign. I know many people don't believe in signs, but I believe the best signs are the ones you don't realize are signs until they've affected you. I think I was shown today where my time should be committed to. 

Hopefully I get some quality work and a unique experience form working in a foreign country, researching and producing a nice paper as well. Did I mention also that the chemistry department here is funded really well? They have an NMR on campus. I don't have to wait a week to see if my stuff worked! Oh the places I can go!

Oh yeah, I almost forgot that I met my buddy yesterday. I almost just walked out of the whole program thing at fifteen minutes past the start, a little discouraged that my buddy didn't show. However, he showed up in the door right as I was leaving, so we talked for a good half hour before I went to table tennis. His english name is Tim and he went to Murray State last year. He study economics and speaks pretty good english. 

So, with the newfound energy a real project gives me, I am off. It's hard for me to focus on anything non-chemistry related right now. 

Before I go, though, I just want to include a couple of things about the program here. 

For any students planning to come here in the Fall of '09: Please get a hold of me. 

For any students looking for a recommendation: I recommend this program. It's fun, and it's learning. The staff here is extremely helpful and they really do everything they can for you. 

Until Later

Aron Huckaba International Vagabond