Monday, 12.11

Rainy. Dreary. Chilly. Want to stay home in bed. But.

Must.

Go.

To.

Class.

Dinner: Cream of Corn soup (out of a pouch, they don’t do canned soup here) with house rice mixed in. I always have to doctor the slightly bland soup up a bit with butter, milk, salt, and depending on flavor, a little soy sauce. Like, cream of mushroom soup can take soy sauce, but I wouldn’t use it in the corn soup. #CookingTipsFromBettye

It was just a typical weekday – a.m. tutoring session, class, homework/study, k-drama, sleep.

Tuesday, 12.12

Not quite raining…but not quite NOT raining.

School, homework, lather, rinse, repeat.

Wednesday, 12.13

SURPRISE! A TEST! Ugh. It said REVIEW on the schedule not Review TEST. I think I did alright, though. There are two things I know I got wrong and I’m sure there’s a couple small spelling mistakes here and there, but I’m confident I at least PASSED. Last term my highest test score was a 76…and it was all downhill from there πŸ™ It would be nice to at least get higher than that, after all my hard work.

Thursday, 12.14

More rain. The worst part about walking to class in the rain (other than just having to walk to class in the rain) is that everything is wet and I can’t sit for five minutes at The Rest Stop (aka the pergola by the lake with benches) to rest my hips and my heart before I tackle The Hill. I try just standing there for a few minutes but that a) feels stupid with people walking by, and b) doesn’t really help. And typically I sit on a planter wall for five minutes outside the language building before I go inside for class, letting my heart rest AFTER the hill, and to try and stop sweating before I go into the classroom (which in the beginning is a SAUNA and by the end I’m cold). So rainy days mean just a straight run for me and it’s tough.

Anyway…after class I met with my language exchange partner, Hyungun (ν˜•κ·Ό). There’s not a WHOLE lot of “language exchanging” going on, because once I get past “how have you been,” “what did you do last weekend,” and “what are you doing this weekend,” I’m sort of out of full conversational sentences in Korean…then I have to go to an English/Korean hybrid….”racetrackμ—μ„œ 뭐 ν—Έμ–΄μš”?” (what did you do at the racetrack), and then gradually my Korean peters out altogether in the interest of just having normal conversation. But he’s fun and easy to talk to so I enjoy meeting with him even if I’m not doing much Korean practice. He speaks much better English than any of my non-American classmates, so…

Last week he told me about his mother’s tea shop, she sells a traditional tea called μŒν™”νƒ• (sanghwatong). It’s a medicinal tea. He said the taste was not his favorite…and I remember one time being with friends at a tea house – one of the girls got something that is maybe what his mother sells – and she did not like it At All. Ha ha poor her. The rest of us had delicious drinks and she was trying to get the medicine down. Anyway, last night he brought me some tea (like frozen concentrate packets) from his mother’s visit last weekend. Very sweet.

I know I’ve said it many times, but I have really met the kindest people here!

It’s late now, but I think tomorrow night after homework/studying, I’ll make myself a cup of tea to try it for myself.

Friday, 12.15

Ha ha. I always have to chuckle a bit on December 15, as it is the anniversary of my first wedding. 33 years ago today I did a really dumb thing. Ha ha. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in my entire life.” HEY DUMMY. YOU’RE 20 YEARS OLD. Your “entire life” has been five minutes long. I did not have a great frame of reference. OH WELL.

I’ve told that story here, right??

PS: Guess what? It’s raining.

Saturday, 12.16

NOT RAINING. But FREEZING. We actually had a little snow here overnight. There’s no grass around me so there’s not much for it to stick to, but…

So of course NOW is when I chose to do my Christmas shopping. I’m probably already too late, as even super speedy expensive 3-5 day shipping from US to Korea has been taking 10 days. Christmas is now in 9 days and I’m really just starting my shopping today. Oh well.

I was GOING to get up early this morning and get out but it’s so cold, and even worse, it sounded so windy!!! My body is so tired by the end of the week (THE HILL) that it’s hard to get me to go back out there and walk more. Tired Body + Wind Sounds = Bettye Doesn’t Leave Her Room.

Sunday, 12.17

Thinking about starting up again with my TikTok…I’m starting to record some “bettye tries korean stuff” videos…I THOUGHT this was going to be spicy (red background + angry bird = SPICY in my mind, but no no, it was sort of bland “fried chicken coating” flavored. Don’t really recommend. The name is Chicken Leg Nugget.

Well, I never made it out again today. I just don’t have the right clothes for being out for long periods of time. Hopefully the child mailed my “winter package” yesterday so I’ll have warmer coat/gloves/scarf soon. Yes, I could get a scarf and gloves here, but…you know how I am πŸ™‚ PARTICULAR. Interesting that the word “peculiar” is so similar to the word particular, ha ha. Anyway, I also hate spending money on something, when I know the BETTER thing will be here any day (week?) now. I have 2 LIGHT scarves here in the meantime, but my poor hands, out in teen temps (fahrenheit), I feel bad for them. And I’m going to HAVE to walk to school like this, but at least I’ll warm up a bit from walking…and after the hill, I’ll be sweating.

And good news, I’m going tomorrow after school to get my permanent Korean phone number and phone plan, YAY. Hopefully that will help with my “out in the world” connectivity…plus, then I can finally order online. Food! Stuff! Food! Gloves, if necessary!

Sorry for a not-very-exciting week. The rain and cold kept me mostly inside…so not very interesting pictures.

xoxo