Going crazy because of a test.

Monday

Today my teacher basically bursted out in pure enthousiasm.
She asked me what I did during the weekend and I told her that I talked with friends from the Netherlands.
When I told my teacher about a situation I’m currently in concerning 2 certain guys she just kept asking me questions.
She even sushed the class because you wanted to ask me more questions.
My teacher seriously loves gossip and drama plots so she was really excited about this.
My whole class was clapping and yelling stuff while I was telling the story.
Everyone was so interested.
When the teacher asked the class who had the most fun weekend every single one of my classmates agreed about the fact that it was me.

Today Ajusshi made the funniest comment I have ever heard from him.
Because he is lazy and never studies the teacher always makes him study in the classroom after school.
Today he was trying to talk his way out of it.
He even tried pulling sad faces and fake crying.
He told the teacher he would die if he had to study today.
Then his amazing acting began.
He pulled a sad face, made his voice sound extra dramatic and said:
Teacher.. I Have.. a mother, father, sister, brother.
I have.. a family.
It was like he was quoting some sad movie he saw before.
How can someone be so dramatic about having to study after school?
This guy is incredible.

Thursday
Today I had a test but I failed it miserably because I didn’t study this certain chapter.
Instead I spent my time talking to people online.
I’m not sure why I thought it was a good idea to not study for a day.
I have to study almost every day because otherwise I cannot keep up with the pace.
Today two of my Japanese classmates asked me to have lunch.
We went for lunch together and I ordered Kimchi Bokkeumbap.
I immediately regretted my choice because they had so many different delicious dishes.
Today I studied after school in our classroom with 2 of my Japanese classmates.

Friday
Today I had my test and therefore I stood up earlier than normally so I could buy food and coffee.
I normally don’t drink coffee but because I didn’t wanted to be tired I drank coffee.
When I received my test I thought: Is this it?
REALLY? I studied for 2 weeks for this?
Like 85% of the test was multiple choice and therefore really easy.
I think I did very well on this test and I definitely got over 80%
There were 20 minutes left but I was already done and still shaking from the coffee I drank.
After that I had a Korean oral exam.
I feared this exam for my life but since I prepared well the day before it went pretty smoothly.
After I finished a huge weight fell off my shoulders.
Everyone was so hyped and happy about finishing the test.
After that it was time to change dorms.
We had to change dorms because in our dorm they’re going to do some construction work.

Everyone was carrying their stuff down and the elevator was entirely packed.
But I liked how everyone was working hard in order to get everything to the other dorm fast.
I actually talked to quite some people today which before I didn’t really do.
After the dorm change I went with Nozomi and Ayaka to have some Korean BBQ.
I finally got to have my beer.
I really wanted to drink alcohol SO bad after I finished my test.

Sam Yuk Gu. QUICK! COME, GO.

Monday
Today was a really fun class.
We learned how to say verbs and certain words towards elders using the se yo on the end.
Which you can use for people that are higher than you but also as a way of asking something politely.
The teacher said we could ask our friends to do something using please.
Please sing, please dance ect.
Everyone chose Ajusshi.
Ajusshi had to dance, sing, kiss the classboard, get hit by the teacher, talk in enlish and a lot more.

I lost a game of ‘’Sam, Yuk, Gu’’ which is a game including numbers.
You have a row of people and you have to count until someone makes a mistake.
You can’t say any number with a 3, 6 or 9 in it.
You have to clap instead.
I lost this game so I had to sing.
I chose a Korean song and as you might have expected I chose a song I knew the lyrics to.
Even if I die I can’t live without you by 2AM.
It was quite the embarrassing experience but thanks to my Noraebang experiences I didn’t sound that bad.

Tuesday
Today we learned more about numbers and for some reason I do quite well at Korean numbers so I liked this class.
We had to do some math and tell the teacher the answers in Korean which was double as hard.
Not only do you have to do math but you also have to think about the numbers in Korean.

Ajusshi sang a song in Korean that my classmate Puong was practicing.
Actually, he is quite good at singing so I am surprised every time.
Last week he sang a song by Westlife in class and it was really not that bad.

We were supposed to have a test but they postponed it to next Friday which I really don’t like.
I’ve been studying a lot and know I feel it has been for nothing.
I guess I will study some more.
Next Friday we also have to move out of our dorm and move to a different dorm because of construction.
So after we finish the test we must leave as soon as possible to prepare to move our stuff.
For some reason this is only for a day which means : I’m gonna pack all my stuff in my suitcase and I’ll be ready to go.

Wednesday
As usual we had revision of the last couple of chapters like we normally do on Wednesdays.
I don’t think anything funny really happened besides the fact that everyone was almost falling asleep on this day.
Probably because the weather was so hot the day before, many people couldn’t sleep.

I started going to the gym with my roommate today.
I can’t believe I am actually going to a gym now since normally I really dislike going there.
Exercising is definitely fun but I like it so much better when doing sports instead of just going to this area to lift weights and run on a treadmill.
 But hey.. It’s free so why the heck not.

Thursday
Today was the day that we learned about what to say when in a restaurant and it was also the day that I spilled my coke.
All over my desk and the floor.
Basically the rest of my classmates had to come rescue me.
Nok Hwa was holding my schoolbooks and Yen Sha was providing me with tissues.
(By the way their names look so weird if I try and write it down in English)
Then the teacher told Hwi Hao to get some tissues from the toilet and he went in the slowest pace possible.
Then he came back with a giant mop and tissue and he started cleaning it.
Everyone was like “Where the hell did he find that mop’’.
Then the teacher was like: “Thank you Cleaning Ajusshi!’’
And I had to laugh about that for 5 minutes even during class because everything about this situation was so funny.

Friday
Today we FINALLY learned how to use the word because in a sentence in Korean.
I’ve been waiting for this day because I always want to tell people WHY I do something and I was never able to do that.

Today Ajusshi got made fun of again since he still doesn’t understand a lot of Korean.
The teacher was teaching us the word for ‘’fast’’.
So suddenly she screamed SHAI HWI HAO COME HERE FAST NOW!
NOW COME FAST THIS WAY!
But ofcourse he didn’t understand a word she was saying so he was looking at us like : “WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO’’.
Then he stood up and slowly walked towards the teacher while she was screaming. WALK FASTER FASTER!
So he ended up walking through the whole room slowly not understanding what he was supposed to do.
Then the teacher said: “GO!”. So he went back to his chair but then the teacher screamed “OK FAST NOW COME HERE!” and then he ran towards the teacher.
I can’t believe this took 5 minutes for him to understand.

At a certain point in class we had to write our answers on the school board and everybody wrote their answers really small except for Ajusshi who used font size 72.

Study, My Charming Roommate and World Cup issues.

Monday
Today was a really fun day for class.
Even though we studied a hard subject.
We had to study about object or place positions like : in the box, in front of the box, behind the box and so on.
I think this is not easy and I definitely need more time to study.
Recently I have been worried about my studies more because every time I finish class I feel like I should have studied more the day before.
I end up doing more fun stuff than I actually study.

Today our teacher had the usual powerpoint where you have to answer the questions.
One question was : How is Hwi Hao (Ajusshi)?
So I said Fun and Loud and the whole class chuckled.
Ayaka said bad and bad!
The funny thing about this is that Ajusshi had NO idea what was going on so he kept looking at everyone confused and he was trying to ask Li Soo Rin what was happening.
The great thing was that Soo Rin never answered so everyone just kept laughing at the confused Ajusshi.

After that the teacher asked us questions about where in the room an object was or who was sitting next to us.
Then the teacher asked Ami:
What is behind you?
Ami looked behind here and said ‘’nothing’’.
But the teacher was like ‘’NO! There is definitely something.’’
So everyone started to look if there was something behind Ami that she could’ve missed.
Suddenly the teacher started to make horror movie sounds (the sound that usually plays when there is someone behind you).
It was so cool how Ami wasn’t even scared.
She just said: “There is no ghost..’’

Tuesday
I swear we are getting tests almost every single day now.
I never scored under 70% so far but still every time I finish a test I feel like I could’ve done better.
Most of the time they are stupid mistakes where I had the correct answer to begin with but then I changed it in the end and got it wrong.

We have a big test coming up next Friday.
It’s a test where we have to be able to write, read, understand and be able to say everything that is in chapter 1 – 13.
Which means half of the book.
At the end of the course we get a test for the remaining 15-30 chapters.
I have to study hard if I want to pass this course.

Today my roommate said there would be a guy coming over and asked me if I minded.
Of course I didn’t mind but I was kind of curious about this guy and about her ‘’relationship’’ with this guy.
I thought to myself : ‘’I wouldn’t even care if a whole group of Chinese guys would come in.
Which for some reason.. happened.
I swear at some point there were like 5 guys in our room.. and the guy that she mentioned was there fixing her Wifi.
I thought it was the funniest thing ever.
My roommate is obviously that kind of girl : a girl who uses her charm to get guys to fix her computer.
It was like she told him ‘’You can see our room and my roommate if one of you fixes my Wifi’’

Wednesday
On Wednesday we had one of the student teacher.
I now realize that I forgot to mention this earlier: For some reason we sometimes have student teachers who observe during our lessons.
I guess they thought training them with foreigners is better than to train them with kindergarten students.

I had to get used to her style of teaching since my other 2 teachers are always so energetic and they talk really really loud.
So this way I have to make less effort to understand because the words are almost being yelled at you.
Which I actually prefer.
But of course this teacher is just a student and I think it was her first time with an actual class and she did well regardless.

I planned to go bowling with Nozomi and her friends but somehow we weren’t able to meet.
I was a bit late (about 3 or 4 minutes) because I had to go to the bank to get money otherwise I couldn’t even go bowling.
Because I didn’t have any contact information I wasn’t able to reach her and I couldn’t find her anymore.
I was pretty frustrated because I couldn’t believe they would leave at 2 exactly.
But there was no point in waiting more because I already explored the area we were supposed to meet for like 20 minutes so eventually I gave up and went to Daegu Downtown instead.
Where I bought some really cheap but cute clothes.

I bought an orange shirt and some permanent name pens at Hottracks so I could design my own Netherlands shirt, which I could wear during the World Championships.

Friday
After class I quickly went  to the spot I always go to for Wifi and made a reservation in a hotel.
Why?
Because my country had to play their first match against Spain and I really wanted to see it.
The dorm has a curfew and you basically can’t do anything after midnight and wifi doesn’t really work in my room either.
So I went towards Daegu downtown again and checked in the hotel.
I went to this hotel every year so far since the rooms are really cheap for what you get.
The rooms are spacious, there is a giant TV, there is a computer and the beds are really comfortable.

I planned to go to a certain E-mart that was really near to my hotel because on the website of KTO (Korean Tourism Organisation) it said they had records and I really wanted to go to a different place than Hottracks in Daegu Downtown. The hottracks in Seoul have a bigger collection and I was able to find less known groups that I like there. But here in Daegu it’s really hard to find for example : the new N-Sonic album.
But when I finally got to E-mart and saw the record section that wasn’t even a meter big I was really disappointed.
I really have to find a CD-store, an old school one where I can maybe also find some No Brain (Korean Punk Band) CD’s.
I’ll have to research some more on this.

I went back to the Dongseongno area and ate some food at Burger King.
I wasn’t really in the mood for any Korean food but in the end I was kind of disappointed I went to Burger King again.
Maybe I should’ve just gotten pasta somewhere instead.
Then I went for Noraebang again.
I seriously love Noraebang and it’s a good way for me to improve on my Korean.
This way I can improve myself on my hangul reading and my pronunciation.
Because the words come so fast I really have to concentrate to be able to pronounce them correctly and at the right time.
I paid 10.000 won but suddenly when my time was almost over this women came in and asked for my passport.
I left my passport at my hotel and I was confused why she wanted it in the first place.
It’s just noraebang.
But then she said she wanted to know my age so I figured I would just show her my Health Insurance card and after that she quickly left.
I am 23 you guys, c’mon.
Why would a foreigner even come here alone when they’re under 20?

So then I went back to my hotel to rest a bit and to sleep because I wanted to wake up before 4 AM so I could see the match.
the Netherlands versus Spain.
So I was ready to watch, it was 4 AM.
I remember Spain making the first goal.. and then.. I fell asleep.
I can’t believe I fell asleep.
I woke up at 8 o’clock because of a horrendous stomach ache and I realized I missed the other 75 minutes of the match. Since Spain made the first goal I was already expecting we would’ve lost because I fell asleep with that image.
Then I went online to check the score and..
5-1 victory for the Netherlands.
WHAT HAPPENED while I was asleep? I had to watch the recap to see it for myself.
5 terrific goals from our side, the crowd going wild and the players freaking out.
I missed all that.
I still can’t believe I fell asleep.

Saturday and Sunday.
To be honest I planned to do a lot on the weekend but in the end my stomach ache got so bad that I didn’t do any of those.
So instead I spent my time skyping and studying for my test as well.
Sorry.. I wish I could’ve done more interesting stuff on my weekend but in the end it didn’t go as I wanted it to go.
Too bad..

Korean food with Lianshi

On Sunday I didn’t really do anything special.
I just slept for a long while.
My roommate asked me to have lunch together so we went off campus.
Too bad on Sunday a lot of places seem to be closed.
We settled for Jindap.
It was so delicious.
I noticed that my roommate didn’t even touch the kimchi or the pickled radish.
I guess even if your Asian you still might not like certain things of a different Asian country’s cuisine.
Until now I like almost every Korean dish so far.
I’m not that crazy about Bimimbap though but it’s not like I can’t eat it.

By the way.
I look like an idiot because of my sunburns.
Because I wore a sleeveless top that goes all the way up to the neck but has open shoulders I now have these ridiculous marks on my back.
I’m still trying to figure out how I am going to tan the rest of my skin when the sunburn completely disappears.
Tanning easily is not always a plus.

After my roommate and me ate our lunch we went to this coffee place.
My roommate proposed the one that had Free wifi.
I ordered Kiwi juice and she ordered Lemon ice tea.
After we got out drinks we just sat down like a couple of social awkward losers though.
She researched Exo. I researched Block B.
My kiwi juice tasted amazing though, probably going to go back there soon.

When we got back outside my roommate explained to me that because she had Lemon ice tea she has to stay out of the sun. She immediately used her umbrella to hide from the sun.
She told me that because she drank something with a lot of vitamin C the sun would easily adapt to your skin and you will tan quicker and become darker skinned.
That’s quite funny because I heard that lemon has a bleaching effect on hair.
Of course not dramatically but for example: if you are blonde your hair will turn a bit lighter blond eventually.
At least.. that’s what I’ve heard.

By the way.
You guys must be like ‘’WHY DO YOU KEEP CALLING HER ROOMMATE, when she obviously has a name’’
Right.
Her Chinese name is easy to pronounce but hard to write.. I guess I will give my own little twist to it.
From now on I will refer to her as : Lianshi because that’s what her name sounds like to me when people pronounce it.
It’s actually written as Li Yuan Xi but hey my Chinese isn’t the best.

Like 3 hours later we ordered chicken together but it was WAY too much for us too finish.
We had more than half left and we couldn’t eat any more.
Wow. That was a waste of food and money.
Even though I couldn’t eat a lot it was still really good.

Duryu Saturday

On Saturday I figured I would explore Daegu some more.
I have been to quite a few Daegu tourist attractions but somehow I never went to Duryu Park before.
Duryu Park seemed like a good choice.
By the way, remember how that lady said they would disinfect our floor on Saturday at 9?
NOPE, never happened.
I was in my room until somewhat over 10 and no one ever showed up.
Anyway.
I headed off to Yeungnam University by bus.
Luckily I knew how to get there because of the Daegu Bank thing from last time.
I took the metro to Duryu and got off.
I could’ve sworn I’ve been to this station before though..  (2012 maybe?)
But I couldn’t remember for what.

(BY THE WAY)
RANT!
I don’t understand how our dorm cafeteria works!
It shouldn’t be open on Saturdays but sometimes it is and I NEVER know how that works.
So today I expected it to be open like last week but it wasn’t and I was craving Naengmyun so bad.
WHY. WHY do places and people never do what their signs says.
Maybe I just missed the overruling signs again.. I don’t know..

It came in quite handy that we studied places in Korean class because that helped me get to the right exit.
On my way to Duryu park I came across E-world, which is Daegu’s amusement park.
I always thought it was on top of some big mountain but that seemed like a big joke when I actually walked past there.
It’s a large hill at most and it can’t even be compared with a mountain.
I really want to go there some time but to be honest it’s quite expensive.
And it’s kind of weird to go to an amusement park by yourself.

I walked past a park and I figured HEY.. this must be Duryu park.
This is a park.. I’m in Duryu.. it should make sense right?
I really wish they did a better job on directions for it though.
When I was walking towards the ‘’park’’ I was not even sure if it was the actual park.
To this point I’m still not quite sure.
Why?
Well it’s probably because I had quite high expectations of this park since it’s probably the most well-known park in Daegu.
But.. it didn’t live up to my expectations.
The temple in Duryu Park is beautiful though.
It’s on a hill and that means the view Is just amazing.
Other than that.. Daegu University Campus is a better ‘’park’’ if you ask me.

Another thing that I DID like about Duryu Park is the option to be able to rent a bike.
The place was full with people riding bikes everywhere.
It kind of reminded me of my home country in a way.
People seemed to be having a lot of fun and children were trying so hard to ride their bikes as fast as they could.
I figured if I just walked In a circle I would be able to get back to the place I got off.
Boy was I wrong.
I spent my time walking back the long way with nothing but gas stations and tire shops.
Streets full of hairdressers and Telecommunication stores.

When I was FINALLY going in the right direction I came across a Homeplus.
I figured they might have a CD store in there.
Again, a disappointment.
BUT! I was able to find a Korea World championships shirt!
Of course I bought it.
I figured.. “Hey, If I am going to spend the whole summer in Korea.. might as well support the team.’’
Luckily Korea and the Netherlands are not in the same group! HAHA.
That would be terrible.
Now I think of it.. I have to figure out what time and when the matches for my country are.
When not supporting Korea, I will be supporting my own country of course.

When I came back from the park I only realized how sunburned I was until I got back to my dorm.
I think I have never been THAT sun burned before.
Duryu Park! YOU ARE NOT WORKING WITH ME HERE.

Anyway.. I was so tired that I went to sleep pretty soon after that.. IN COMPLETE PAIN.

Noraebang friday

Friday I had another day off so I decided to spend my Friday like a Saturday so I went to Daegu downtown again.
I wanted to walk to Gugi since I was out of ideas for new restaurants that might be good.
And.. I didn’t went inside primal so.. I got lost and didn’t end up finding it.
I decided to check out Lotte Young Plaza instead.
I like this place so much more than Debec.
Debec is such an old lady place to go compared to Lotte Young Plaza.
The style of the clothing and bags there fits my style much more and the price range seems to be a bit lower as well.
They even have an arcade and a movie theatre there.
I was kind of hoping to find a CD store in there as well.
But I ended up being left In complete disappointment instead.

I ate some KFC since they did have KFC in there and I spend an hour on wifi..
And then I figured.
Today Is the day I’m going to Noraebang alone.
My mood was getting worse by the minute anyway.
After going on facebook I just felt more sad so I went to the place I usually go with Jinjoo and Eunji for Noraebang.
At that point I didn’t even care about language barriers anymore.
I figured that if I put my finger up and say one I would be fine.
I said yes a couple of times and gave the guy 10.000 won.
The guy made sure I went into the right booth since “ten’’ could still be hard for foreigners.
In English.
But hey! Nice that he made the effort.
So I spend 10 minutes trying to remember how it went and I ended up changing settings which kind of messed up my first hour.

I chose so many Punk, Emo and Rock songs to sing.
I sang so loudly that I even managed to lose some of my voice within the first hour.
After that I sang many sad 2AM songs wholeheartedly since 2AM always seem to capture my feelings.
Then I picked out the few Korean songs that I know the lyrics to.
Old songs from SHINee and Beast.
Some old songs from the 90s from H.O.T and DEUX.
Some pop songs from *NSync, Gotye and Adele.

I sang/rapped a few Eminem songs and was able to do pretty well at Stan and Without me.
For some reason I was able to rap almost all the lyrics for Without Me leaving me completely surprised.

I ended up spending more than 2 hours by myself in Noraebang but I didn’t mind at all.
I can sing all the songs I like and nobody is there to see me sing like an idiot.
Which Is great.

When I finished I went to the bathroom only to find out they only have squat toilets.
Which I never really know how to use..
I mean.. you have to pull of your pants completely if you even want to use those, right?
Maybe I should do some research on this..
Anyway.
I returned the microphone and headed to the Disco ppang ppang area because I knew they had bathrooms.
On my way out I played a game of Punch ball again and beat the high score 2 times.
I always score up to 8200 and more which is a good score for a girl don’t you think?
The funny thing is that I’m even able to beat quite a few Korean guys with this game.

I headed back to my dorm right after and went to sleep almost instantly.

Busan

Wednesday I didn’t really do anything worth mentioning so I’m just going to skip to Thursday.
On Thursday we went to Busan with the class.
And I couldn’t believe my eyes when I looked outside the window that morning because the sky was pretty dark and really clouded.
Yet we were still going to Busan (To the beach ect) so I was really surprised.
Everyone from our class was in the bus except Li Soo Rin.
No Idea why.

Anyway one of the teachers started a long dialogue about our trip to Busan which was ALL in Korean.
So I understood half of the story.
Knowing time is essential for going on a trip if you have a planning you have to follow..
Yet telling the time in our book is more than a chapter away..
So I just depended on the paper I got which had all the times and locations on them.

The bus trip took about 2 hours to get to Busan so I ended up sleeping a lot of the time.
We went to the dragon temple first.
I’ve been here with Minji 2 years ago (2 times actually).
One time in the evening when the temple was already closed and one time during sunset which was really beautiful.
I remembered the route quite well and since I already saw a lot of the things there I made my way to the actual temple really quickly.

I was amazed about how everyone seemed to be much closer than in classes.
I took a lot of pictures with my classmates.
I took a picture with the Vietnamese guy I mentioned earlier.
And I even took a picture with my roommate.
I still have to ask everyone to send me their pictures.

After the dragon temple we went to Haeundae beach and it felt SO weird to me.
Normally I only go to Haeundae during festival season so now that the huge stage, sunny weather and loads of people were missing.. it felt different.
There were still enough people there because this weekend will be the Sand Sculpture festival and they were still getting everything ready for opening on Friday.
This way we were still able to see a few sand sculptures.

I went to the market together with my Japanese classmates.
It surprised me how we were still able to communicate using Korean, a bit of Japanese and a bit of English. We went to this place who sold a variety of stews and a lot of side dishes for 5000 won.
It seemed like a good deal so we went in.
Apparently it was a good deal because when we went in we ran into our teachers.
The teachers chose the exact same restaurant to have lunch.
I am not lying when I say our entire table was full of food!

For some reason I can handle spicy food so much better than I did 2 years ago.
My classmate Ami had a bit of trouble with the Kimchi Jjigae because it was quite spicy.
Maybe because it’s one of my favourite dishes I’m able to handle it well.

After that we explored the market some more and saw people preparing their seafood as fresh as they could: still living.
We returned to Haeundae bach to go to Apec house (BUT I SWEAR MY TEACHERS PRONOUNCE IT LIKE EPIC HOUSE)
I kind of expected a lot since I heard the view there was supposed to be pretty amazing.
While waiting we came across Ajusshi.
Ayaka told him that he was NAPPEUDA! (which means bad)
But he just repeated the word and nodded.
Ayaka turned to me and said : “He doesn’t understand.”
To which I agreed since.. it’s Ajusshi.
It’s what he does every single day.
So I spent a few minutes laughing because Ajusshi is so clueless.
If Ajusshi was on the Chinese Blue’s Clues (TV show), he would be a perfect Steve.

We walked the same road as I did in 2012 with my friends.
Good feelings of nostalgia came over me when we walked along the sea.
It was good since we were able to talk to our teacher some more and we could actually practice the Korean that we knew.
When we got to Apec house.. it seemed promising.
Until we got inside that is.
Because almost everything near the window is off limits, you are not even able to make photos of the beautiful view.
Which sucked.
We went through the whole thing pretty quickly and in the end we were even late.
We picked up the rest of the people at Haeundae and we continued our journey back towards our school.

When I got back to my dorm I seriously had SUCH a long conversation with my roommate about so many different subjects. I swear we talked for like 2 hours.
It turns out my roommate is better in English than I thought.

Even though the weather wasn’t that nice.. I still had a great time with my classmates.
I can’t wait till the next excursion.