GOLO or Gabby Adventure Time Now: January 2016

Oh hey there good lookin'~
Welcome back to my fantastic blog.

It's 2016! Let's have fun!

I'd like to start with a clarification about the title. If you are confused, I'm not talking about being a party pooper with a negative attitude. This is about surviving in the cold of cold temperatures (negative Celsius and occasional negative Fahrenheit).

Can you guess what the temperatures are like here in the coldest province of South Korea? At the beginning of January?

Well, it's not as cold as last year. But this whole week our warmest temperature remains below freezing, and at nights plummets an additional 10 degrees Celsius or about 0 Fahrenheit.

Last winter it was this cold from early December, and the main river froze over.

We also had a lot more snow...

Sorta miss my white hairy leg mountains from last year. They're now brown and hairy... as they will be until late April.

But this year I'm living by myself in a house, not a fancy warm apartment complex. While I was still busy teaching up until winter break, I thought that my 온돌 floor heating didn't work, so I worshipped my space heater (I at least trusted the water heater, thank the Bathing Gods)

Without further ado, here is a brief and certainly not all inclusive presentation of my way of life in this cold. Maybe my dear readers in similar conditions, like my friends in Finland can relate.

Habits from last month (living without heating)

eating warm food as fast as possible so it doesn't get cold and because it warms your tummy

eating more than 1 person's serving because you don't want the warm to stop

feeling really fat after that

getting out of bed is your worst part of the day

crawling into bed as soon as possible after work to procrastinate against life (but it's really just too cold to life)

dying on buses and in coffee shops that are regular temperature (because whether you like it or not, you are a creature of ice now, and you cannot survive in the real world. Also taking off all of your layers is difficult so hey please just keep it around freezing and that'll be good thanks)

changing right next to your space heater so your bare buns are actually kinda pleasantly warm while exposed to the frigid air

wearing your hood up or leaving your hat on inside

not having to brace yourself for the cold of outside... because it's just a few degrees colder than inside

watching your breath in the bathroom (the coldest place in the house)

After I came back to Hwacheon with the holidays over, I didn't (still don't) have to go in for work yet, so that meant lots of time at home. I experimented with the floor heating and discovered that it just took a while to be noticeably warm, but it sure does work. Thing changes everything (not really but here we go)

Habits from this month (with floor heating hallelujah)

THE COLD IS BEATEN! sorta

Never leave the floor. Even if your butt is burning. Don't. get. up.

Trying to go for runs outside... It's fine starting out in sunshine, but when you get to the shade, by the river, and the Siberian winds cut through... legs start spasming. I could feel each individual muscle taking turns twitching. And I lose all the items I collect in the running app, Zombies, Run!, because the zombies I'm supposed to be picking up my pace to flee from... cannot be avoided in a run with legs convulsing inward.

Since I can't quite accomplish my goals running outside with the Zombie Run app, I instead pretend to be productive and started to watch The Walking Dead. I am enjoying it immensely and marathoning the episodes like crazy (thanks to Amelia's Netflix... truly thank you) I have yet to watch an episode while eating and not feel immensely uncomfortable.

I've only just finished season 3 so don't you dare ruin this for me. Or else.

Finally: YOU GO TO THE ICE FISHING FESTIVALLLL~~~~~ 산천어축제

Last year, due to circumstances I won't elaborate on, I didn't fully experience the joys of our local festival. But this year was different. The county office put together a new free fishing event day for the native English language teachers, and I have my own place to host guests so, FULBRIGHTER FRIENDS GALORE all came!