The People of Hwacheon

Hey everyone!
Happy October!

 Ah yeah.

You know you love October.

I cannot believe it's already October. It seems like I just got back to Korea yesterday. This is also slightly freaking me out because I have a list of goals and things I thought I would do during my second year in Korea and OVER A MONTH HAS PASSED and I'm no where near any of my goals and at this rate I won't even get to half of them and this time last year I was so much more on top of things and and and-
Ok. Stop it, Gabby. 그만. 진짜. 이 사람들이 다 무관심하게 될거야~  ...
I apologize. I've been trying to control my anxiety but as you can see, I feel incredibly inept these days. At least I'm blogging again...

In an attempt to avoid panic attacks and being negative in general, I would like to dedicate this blog post to something wonderful and awesome and also something I have not written much about at all, yet makes up a huge part of my life in Korea: Koreans! The people of Korea!
More specifically:
The People of Hwacheon!
I bet you never saw that coming... It's not like there are blog titles...

Here are a few recent stories involving complete strangers that still made me smile. My first few weeks in Hwacheon were very busy with trying to settle in at my new place, and as stressful as that was to be on my own, trying to figure everything out, I also encountered more and more people than ever before!


First up I have the Barbecuers.

Here they are. All three of them. Obviously Korean...

Not.

After my second day biking into town, malnourished from fear of my gross kitchen, exhuasted after cleaning, biking into town twice for more supplies, and just finishing a mini tour I offered for the new ETAs, I was finally biking back home and then came upon them. The Barbecuers. They were a group of about a dozen or more middle aged Koreans with two big grills set up on the path under a bridge. It sorta-not-really looked like this:

Koreans love BBQ so I had no luck with Google search this time...

The grills and their parked cars took up the whole path, so I couldn't just politely bow as I passed or even walk my bike around. I got off my bike and prepared for an inevitable crescendo of "excuse me"s and zig-zagging that I would have to do to get by all of them.
To my surprise no one even began to move out of my way. Instead I was beckoned to the grill, given a paper cup full of beer, and welcomed like I was expected.
My stomach wouldn't let me say no to this free meal, and I really could use a drink.

Or three.

As watermelon and fresh grilled meat were forced very unwillingly into my hands (this is sarcasm my dears) I chatted with everyone. Yes, Gabby Walti the awkward social encounter queen and speaker of English actually chit-chatted for almost an hour in Korean with drunk strangers. It was fantastic.

The Barbecuers of course wanted to know what I was up to, surprised I could be on my way home through a road leading out of town. I said I was just starting my second year teaching at Hwacheon Elementary and one couple immediately perked up and asked about their son, a fifth grader at my school. The moment they said his name my heart swelled. Of course their son is the sweetest ball of sunshine who always beamed and earnestly asked how I was doing every time I saw him last year. Instantly making my day better. He's one of the students Amelea and I call our dumpling students. They are so small and round with baby fat, makes us want to squeeze them. The couple, being drunk immediately decided to call their son and we talked super briefly on his mom's phone.

"Hello, Gabby Teacher!"

me, basically

"Hello, Min Gyoon! How are you?"

"I am fantastic! How are you?"

"I am very happy. How is your summer?"

"Summer is... fun! Very happy."

"Good! I like your parents. Your parents are very nice."
silence... hmm was that too difficult? Better let him off the hook... 
"See you Monday!"
"Okay teacher! See you later."
The end.
His parents proceeded to bemoan their small house because they always wanted to host for the English teachers home-stays. They invited me to visit and have dinner but their sweet son must've misunderstood because he proudly told the other teachers at school on my first day back that I'd be living with him this year... Not happening.. sorry Min Gyoon...
The other Barbecuers were mostly old, quite intoxicated, men 아저씨들, save Min Gyoon's mom and two other wives (oh the ladies all had had quite a few drinks too.. they just aren't old men). I awkwardly tried to leave several times only to be fed more/given more to drink. Some of them 아저씨s introduced themselves to me and insisted they were from other countries like the Philippines and Japan (they seemed 100% old Korean men to me) which the others thought was hilarious and I just laughed at their drunkeness, completely missing the joke. One old man tried to flirt saying I should be on TV not in Hwacheon, that I was the most beautiful woman, and other nonsense. I took one look at his easy-going yet surely still offended wife and said men should always say their wives are the most beautiful. Then I can be the second most beautiful.
Score Gabby. The 아저씨s laughed and jabbed at the poor man with BBQ tongs as his wife shook my hand and refilled my cup with more beer.

I'm so glad the Barbecuers stopped me. It might have just been the beer, but I couldn't stop smiling as I biked back home.



Next I have the Americans.

Again obviously from Hwacheon, right?

During Chuseok, the Korean equivalent of America's Thanksgiving, many family members travel from near and far to be with their parents or grandparents in whatever small town they live in. I ran into one very particular family in Hwacheon during the holiday weekend this year.
The Americans and I met first while ordering popcorn before seeing a movie. I was shocked when a young woman approached, speaking perfect natural Engligh, and offered to help read the menu since it was all in Korean and help me order.
Wait! I don't know if I mentioned this before, but last winter Hwacheon got our very own movie theater! It's just one room, so there's only a half a dozen showings or less a day, but it's also less than 5 dollars a ticket and the happening place to be!

I went to the movies with my friend Emily (my first friend to visit me in Hwacheon! 사랑해~) but it was the last showing of the night for the small town theater so it ended pretty late. The little town bus we took to get to my new place doesn't go that late, so we were planning to just split a cab. Expensive but doable.
Before we left the theater we ran into the Americans again. There was this woman with an adorable baby and perfect English, her sister, who also had fantastic Engish, and their mom. They were surprised we could watch a Korean movie and that we laughed while watching it. (It's a really great movie! If you can ever track it down with subtitles do it. Called "Veteran" or 베테랑)

Basically a hilarious cop film with a really horrendous villain. I have never cussed out loud at the movies before, but this villain made me curse him repeatedly.

We gave the standard "English teacher, studying Korea, love Korea" spiel, so they could understand how we were in the theater, but before I could ask about their perfect English (a rarity in Hwacheon) they asked where I live. The moment I mentioned the district they insisted they could give us a ride since they are staying somewhere nearby. It was a tight squeeze, but all of us fit in the car and finally learned that the super cute baby and mom live in Baltimore, with their husband who is a professor at Johns Hopkins. The baby's only seven months old and his American name is Albert, after Albert Einstein because they hope he will be smart like him (how adorable is that?) They just flew back to Korea a month ago for the holidays and so the baby could meet all the family. The whole time we talked the little boy had huge eyes, and we all deducted he was recognizing English again after a while of only Korean. Everyone was so kind and fun and I wish they lived in Hwacheon all year.

And thus we met more awesome people and didn't have to pay for a taxi.

I have one more funny story about biking home and the Hwacheon folk I encountered, but I'm afraid of making this post too long and I know my Wifi is going to disappear any second. I'll try and write again soon.
For now, I'll end this post titled "The People of Hwacheon" with the uncontested most amazing and important person to me in Hwacheon. She was Leanndra's host mom last year, and is now the new middle school ETA, Susan's host mom: 김복순 <3
She is the social queen of town and knows everyone. I call her older sister, Unni, because she likes to feel young. She has also helped me more times than I can count. I could write forever, but I'll just share photos from our latest adventure, hiking Yonghwa-san 용화산 last weekend. I'm so so grateful for this amazing woman!
언니, 지금 읽고있으면 고맙습니다! 언니는 저에게 너무 중요한 사람입니다. 사랑해요!

 Emily, Susan, Unni, and me. 

And the beauty of Hwacheon ;)

Happy belated Chuseok!
- Gabby Teacher