Rafting and Randomness

I've been meeting a lot more people lately and one guy invited me to go rafting last weekend. I didn't really know what to expect, like I ever really do. I've been kayaking and floated down on river on an intertube, but never rafting. The river we went down wasn't that crazy, if it had rained more the rapids would have been bigger. Because of this we kept getting stuck on rocks. At one point we had to have another boat come and rescue us. We had to get out of the boat we were in to get unstuck and then get back in the original boat. When we weren't getting caught on rocks the rapids were extremely fun, but it did make for an interesting trip. Some parts of the river were calm so we had to paddle more, but it gave us a chance to enjoy the beautiful scenery. The rocks surrounding us were made from volcanoes and different than others I've seen here. There were many little waterfalls as well. It's always great to get out of the crazy city and relax in the calm of nature. I didn't bring my camera for this trip, otherwise I would have many more photos to show. One guy brought a waterproof camera where I got a few shots from. You can see that the gear we had to wear was rather attractive, especially the helmets. Somewhere along the way we stopped and flipped the boats over to make water slides. Never seen this done before either, but it was awesome. Also, since there were almost 40 of us we had to take a few different rafts, so whenever we would get close to another one there would be a water fight. Afterwards we had a huge bbq feast and drinks were involved of course. I can't explain how much people love to drink here. My parents are worried that I'm drinking too much, but I'm not nearly as bad as most people. It did make for a very fun bus ride home though.

Now for the randomness. There are so many things that I notice around here that I think are interesting or funny in some way so I thought I would share them with you. First, some of the things the students do or say. I need to start taking notes on this because right now I only have one example, but these kids crack me up sometimes. I had this class write a sentence with the word 'enjoy' in it. This kid Jason writes 'mom enjoy dad'. Maybe it's not that funny, but I thought so and laughter always makes a day much better. Second, is that I feel like a true alien or a famous person here. I just can't believe the way people stare at you. It doesn't matter where I go, what I'm doing, what I'm wearing I get stared at by everyone. It makes me feel uncomfortable, but they do it to all foreigners. Guess they're not used to people looking different. This one little boy was standing on some stairs and was staring so hard that he fell over as I walked by. I used to stare back or try to get people to smile, but now I'm thinking of some way to get them to stop. Maybe I should start making funny crazy faces at them.

The last random thing I noticed is how contradictory they are here. Koreans are extremely healthy. There are outdoor gyms, you see lots of people walking and riding bikes, even the old people are out there moving around. But then they drink and smoke a ton. I see guys all the time near the river that pull their bikes over to have a cigarette. Another example is that they are so adamant about the recycling, which is again a wonderful thing. But they don't believe in re-using things. There is constant furniture and other things that people leave by the dumpsters. The people, at least in my area, are so rich that if they want anything they will go buy it brand new. I know many people buy things brand new everywhere, but I'm talking about throwing away nice things that are like new just because they want a new one or they've used it once. It's a great way for us foreigners to get some good stuff for our apartments though. One more thing is that in general people are nice and friendly, but when dealing with relationships (friends, business) it's "what can you do for me". It makes it hard to trust people here because it feels like they might be using you in some way. Don't get me wrong, Korea is a pretty great place. It's definitely a different culture and I can't judge, no place is perfect. I just think it should be called the land of contradiction.