Tonight I am off to do one of my favourite things in Korea; go to the public bath. I love the place and feel like a million bucks once I leave there. Then out with Dave again to visit a Korean fella that paid for all our drinks while we were at another place last Sunday. He is the owner of a local place called Dogobi, which means Frog in Korean. We want to repay him for his generosity and of course, we want to hang out with each other too. That is why that picture that I got from my Dad today is so apt to describe my best friend, Dave Anjema!!!!!!
It is hard to describe other than the fact that you walk around completely butt arse naked and then go into either the sauna, steam room, hot bath, cold bath or other baths with different concoctions of things to make your skin healthier.
My usual routine is to go from the sauna to the cold bath and keep going back and forth for about an hour. In the sauna and steamroom there is an hourglass that times how long you are in there. Each flip of it when it empties is 5 minutes. So I usually go in for one flip of the hourglass and then in the cold bath for about 10 minutes. Wait for my body to cool down adequately and then back in the sauna again and again and again and again and again..........
Where was I ? Oh yeh, at the sauna. Anyway, the places are immaculately clean. They are constantly cleaned by the staff there and and I have watched them scrub the mirrors and floors and even one time powerwashed one of the baths. They are very popular places here in Korea and a steadfast part of Korean culture. Most of the fathers take their sons to the public bath occassionally on the weekends or for other special occassions.
Here is a nice picture of my Mum when her and Dad went to see the play "Spamalot" in Toronto last weekend. It was Dad's 68th birthday and he got the tickets as a present from our Jackie, my sister.
They both said it was great and they would actually go and see it again! Mum looks great and I must say so does Dad! Retirement suits them so well. They look healthier now than they did 10 years ago. I guess the Huff 'n' Puff gym is helping them out too. What a great name eh for a fitness center for older people.... hehe.
This one is a great one of Mum and Dad and our Jackie and Nuri, Kate and Jamie. The kids are growing up so quickly! Our Kate starts at the University of Toronto in September and Jamie starts grade 12 too. When I left Canada in September 2004, Jamie was really short and now look at him. He is the same size as both our Jackie and his sister. He was always so paranoid about being short and used to actually cry about it sometimes. I told him to give his head a shake and that he was only 14 at the time.... for Christ's sakes!!!!!!
I put the cover of this book "Enders Game" on here as it is one of the novels that the wisdom level kids are reading at Avalon. I was originally going to teach it, but then they decided that they had me doing enough classes.
I actually started reading it and was enjoying it. I have read about the first 10 chapters and aim on carrying on reading it. It is a science-fiction novel, which usually don't interest me in the least, but this one is fun and caught my attention right away.
I also read another novel called "Hoot," which was also really good and I taught that one to two classes during the intensive period. We also downloaded the movie and showed it to the kids. They really enjoyed that and we bought them pizza and pop too, which they also loved. Cost both Wayne and I about 25 bucks each, but it was well worth it.
A funny picture that I got from who else, but my Dad again. It is a really funny take on the whole hide your face thing. Maybe they could use the footware to identify each other or maybe there is a marker on the Burka somewhere? Either way, pretty messed up in today's society to be that archaic!!!
Ended up meeting Dave at Dublin tonight and not going to that Dogobi place that I mentioned. We ended up meeting another fella we know at Dublin. An American fellas Travis who is a really cool fella and you can have a great conversation with him. We also met another fella, Steve who hails from Australia, but whose mother is from Kirkby, Liverpool. I guess she left there when she was 9 or 10 after having been sent to Wales during the Blitz!!!
His mother is a Scouser and her maiden name was O'Brien! She ended up moving to Birmingham before she left to go to Korea and his dad is a Geordie. He loves Newcastle Football Club and we had a good gab about English football. He is a great fella to have a conversation with. It ended up being a great night. I got home at about 2am, not bad considering I never went out until 11.30pm.
Dave has joined a gym that has a public bath attached to it and is only about 80 bucks a month for both the fitness club and the public bath. I have decided to join it as my membership is up today at my gym. It is only about 20 minutes from where I live and will make me get up a little earlier to get there and I can have a sauna everyday, which I miss like crazy.
I am going to meet Dave there tomorrow about 10.30am. I am looking forward to having a sauna everyday after I finish working out. The gym is in Bundang, Dong (that is the word that means neighbourhood in Korean.)
Friday is my easiest day of the week, so I am looking forward to just teaching 2 classes tomorrow. The new semester starts on September 11th. We shall see what my schedule is like then!!!!!!
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