So you know the other day when I was all like "I think we should educate ourselves! and the Internet has so many free resources so let's do it!" Well I recently learned that universities feel the same way, and wanted in on it. This website is full of free. FREE online courses accessible anywhere in the world with internet to anyone who knows the language its taught in. Major universities from all over America and several other countries have contributed courses to this massive endeavor. I can't even express to you how happy I am about this not only for myself, but for the whole world. People shouldn't have to pay for knowledge!!! Eric and I are taking the class on listening to world music. Follow the link, sign up and join us! Its free, and invariably awesome.
We haven't started (it starts tomorrow!) but the fact that Eric works 80 hours a week and still wants to make time for this is so amazing to me. No matter how busy we are we must continue to keep our brains active to grow and become better people worthy of this existence we so often cling so tightly to. I wish you all the best, and for anyone who is not a student (only students are exempt from this request) I really hope you look around that website and find a class that interests you that you can take to stimulate your beautiful mind!
xoxo Claire
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Thursday, July 19, 2012
I made Kimbop
Like a BOSS
What follows is my story of making kimbop with illustrations by NIKON Coolpix S600.
For those who don't know, kimbop is a roll with seaweed on the outside, rice on the inside, and various other things filling the center. This story is that of my first attempt at making it with no instructions.
My Ingredients:
My Utensils:
Here is what my first roll looked like before I rolled it.
The following picture is after several attempts to "roll" it together and make it stick. There was too much rice and stuffing and no way for the seaweed to stick to itself. So this is after I "rolled" it, but before I cut it using the knife in the picture.
Here you can see that something went terribly awry. That is not how it should look.
Here is a picture of my second roll. You can see it is much smaller. I used less rice and applied oil with my handy brush to the inside of the seaweed to make it stick together. As you can see to the left hand side of the picture I switched to a larger more dangerous knife in hopes of scaring the kimbop into perfect little pieces.
This one still did not cut well. I was beginning to get depressed.
Here is a picture of my third roll. This was a very well rolled kimbop, tightly packed and gushing contents out each end. You can see to the right that I was beginning to get chili paste everywhere. As a side note, my camera now has a chili paste scent.
I thought that I was a total failure at cutting these things, or that maybe I had the wrong seaweed, rice, knife etc. But I'm a risk taker so I cut it anyway. Below is the result and a picture of what it should look like. Since I succeeded here I stopped taking pictures, because my hands were covered in chili paste and rice.
I continued to make several more rolls, and eat what fell apart. Total win.
What follows is my story of making kimbop with illustrations by NIKON Coolpix S600.
For those who don't know, kimbop is a roll with seaweed on the outside, rice on the inside, and various other things filling the center. This story is that of my first attempt at making it with no instructions.
My Ingredients:
Peppers, and mushrooms
mixed sprouts
chili paste, ground black pepper, and diced onions
Rice, seaweed sheets, hemp seed, grapeseed oil
My Utensils:
Rice spatula, oil brush, cutting board and the initial knife I tried to use
My rolling device
Here is what my first roll looked like before I rolled it.
The following picture is after several attempts to "roll" it together and make it stick. There was too much rice and stuffing and no way for the seaweed to stick to itself. So this is after I "rolled" it, but before I cut it using the knife in the picture.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Hysteria on the streets
So last Sunday I went to visit Dory, as is becoming common here in Korea. I had a bit of a fiasco getting there, but that is perhaps a different story. We went to an Army base near Daegu and watched a movie, then played some games in their game room. That is also a different story. The real story happens after we went back to her place...
The Incendiary Incident
We were chillin' watching some Parks and Recreation, eating spaghetti, really doing nothing important, when all of a sudden out of nowhere we saw a stir in the corner of the room. The stir turned into a commotion and flight! We were startled, but remained unflinching in the face of such a plight! We studied the situation from our positions and started a debate. She was under the belief that it was a cockroach. I however totally disagreed.
To give you a better understanding I will describe to you the creature which we had come up against. It was long and black, approximately two inches in length and half that in width. From a distance, which we cautiously kept, of about 10 feet we could see lengthy antenna fidgeting anxiously. We had seen it fly and watched it as it meandered across the ceiling to settle in a position above the window.
So you can understand Dory's apartment. There are two beds, against two side walls, flanking a window. We sat upon one watching and eating, and the creature had appeared from the other. Its current position was above the window between, and we rotated off the bed and began discussing strategy near the kitchen opposite the creature-ridden-window.
We decided that I would catch it and then we would flush it down the toilet. It was still undetermined what this creature was, but I thought it maybe a cricket. I'd never seen a cricket that big, but I'd also never seen a cockroach that big, so I thought it was as good a guess as any. I got a coffee mug and piece of cardboard. Dory set to preparing the toilet for the imminent bug invasion, i.e. making sure it had enough water to flush and various other things we didn't want to go wrong.
I grabbed a chair and set it below the window. Armed with my coffee mug and cardboard I went for it. The problem came when the wall where it was hiding was not flat. I am quite inexperienced with cockroaches and therefore was not expecting such a speedy rebuttal from the thing. I thought I could knock it into the cup and that my reflexes were fast enough to trap it. However I was wrong! With wings and the an immediate disagreement to being caught the thing was out of its hiding spot, down the wall, onto the bed, behind the pillow and out of sight.
Worried, I looked to the bathroom. Dory was out of sight, and I hesitantly suggested that maybe she should stay in there a bit. I moved the pillow, but of course it wasn't there. I couldn't see it anywhere, so I knew I needed to enlist Dory's help. We moved the bed, and poked. We found it and scared it to a small bookcase under the window. It stayed and we decided that the two of us were smarter that one of it. We each blocked a side, with her acting as an aggressor to send it my direction. Still armed with my cup and cardboard we slid the bookcase away from the wall. Our plan worked and it made its way my direction. It wasn't the most graceful. There was knocking and possibly shouting, but I shortly got it in the cup and slipped the cardboard beneath.
We realized this thing, which was definitely a cockroach, was fast, really fast and probably not pleased with being trapped. We assumed it wouldn't willingly go down a toilet either so we thought of a new plan. We would take it outside. Perhaps we would walk far enough to release it alive. With hearts pounding and adrenaline racing we left the apartment in a hurry. Dory, in a not-Korea-appropriate shirt (spaghetti straps), and with no money thought it best to buy some cockroach spray. I have a tendency to carry my money down my pants on my hip in not a pocket. As I was holding the cup-cardboard contraption in both hands with the terror of this thing inside I was unwilling to let go to get my money so Dory mustered the courage to make a silly little scene on the corner outside the Thumbs Up.
After attaining the bug spray we decided to walk further. We crossed the road, and Dory spotted the perfect opportunity. Two men were standing on the corner. They weren't trying to cross the street and I have no idea what they were doing, perhaps just talking. So she decided to enlist their help. She pointed at me, held up the spray and made the cut throat motion. They were perplexed. So I approached, I shook the cup and made a look like "yeah there's something in there". So after more motioning and telling them they needed to kill it we handed them the spray, set the cup down and backed up.
They had caught on, and one lifted the edge of the cup and released little spurts of raid into the cup. He then let the cup down and let the cockroach sit in it. I admit I think this is a bit awful, but sometimes things happen in life that aren't right on every level. As Deepak Chopra had been explaining to me early that day, there is no objective reality because our perception is subjective. So stood there staring at the cup trying to calm down. We laughed and the silliness of it. We both knew that cockroaches are hard to kill and we were a bit skeptical that that had done it. We wanted to wait longer, but he lifted the cup with confidence only a minute or two later. Then he retrieved a lighter. He looked at us, he shook the can. He lit the lighter. He sprayed.
The cardboard and cockroach blazed. We reeled and screeched with disbelief, fright, and the oddity of it all. We stood dumbfounded and watched the sidewalk burn. A minute or two later, and it was over. The finality of it's death sat upon us as great as any finality could. It was gone.
El Fin
The Incendiary Incident
We were chillin' watching some Parks and Recreation, eating spaghetti, really doing nothing important, when all of a sudden out of nowhere we saw a stir in the corner of the room. The stir turned into a commotion and flight! We were startled, but remained unflinching in the face of such a plight! We studied the situation from our positions and started a debate. She was under the belief that it was a cockroach. I however totally disagreed.
To give you a better understanding I will describe to you the creature which we had come up against. It was long and black, approximately two inches in length and half that in width. From a distance, which we cautiously kept, of about 10 feet we could see lengthy antenna fidgeting anxiously. We had seen it fly and watched it as it meandered across the ceiling to settle in a position above the window.
So you can understand Dory's apartment. There are two beds, against two side walls, flanking a window. We sat upon one watching and eating, and the creature had appeared from the other. Its current position was above the window between, and we rotated off the bed and began discussing strategy near the kitchen opposite the creature-ridden-window.
We decided that I would catch it and then we would flush it down the toilet. It was still undetermined what this creature was, but I thought it maybe a cricket. I'd never seen a cricket that big, but I'd also never seen a cockroach that big, so I thought it was as good a guess as any. I got a coffee mug and piece of cardboard. Dory set to preparing the toilet for the imminent bug invasion, i.e. making sure it had enough water to flush and various other things we didn't want to go wrong.
I grabbed a chair and set it below the window. Armed with my coffee mug and cardboard I went for it. The problem came when the wall where it was hiding was not flat. I am quite inexperienced with cockroaches and therefore was not expecting such a speedy rebuttal from the thing. I thought I could knock it into the cup and that my reflexes were fast enough to trap it. However I was wrong! With wings and the an immediate disagreement to being caught the thing was out of its hiding spot, down the wall, onto the bed, behind the pillow and out of sight.
Worried, I looked to the bathroom. Dory was out of sight, and I hesitantly suggested that maybe she should stay in there a bit. I moved the pillow, but of course it wasn't there. I couldn't see it anywhere, so I knew I needed to enlist Dory's help. We moved the bed, and poked. We found it and scared it to a small bookcase under the window. It stayed and we decided that the two of us were smarter that one of it. We each blocked a side, with her acting as an aggressor to send it my direction. Still armed with my cup and cardboard we slid the bookcase away from the wall. Our plan worked and it made its way my direction. It wasn't the most graceful. There was knocking and possibly shouting, but I shortly got it in the cup and slipped the cardboard beneath.
We realized this thing, which was definitely a cockroach, was fast, really fast and probably not pleased with being trapped. We assumed it wouldn't willingly go down a toilet either so we thought of a new plan. We would take it outside. Perhaps we would walk far enough to release it alive. With hearts pounding and adrenaline racing we left the apartment in a hurry. Dory, in a not-Korea-appropriate shirt (spaghetti straps), and with no money thought it best to buy some cockroach spray. I have a tendency to carry my money down my pants on my hip in not a pocket. As I was holding the cup-cardboard contraption in both hands with the terror of this thing inside I was unwilling to let go to get my money so Dory mustered the courage to make a silly little scene on the corner outside the Thumbs Up.
After attaining the bug spray we decided to walk further. We crossed the road, and Dory spotted the perfect opportunity. Two men were standing on the corner. They weren't trying to cross the street and I have no idea what they were doing, perhaps just talking. So she decided to enlist their help. She pointed at me, held up the spray and made the cut throat motion. They were perplexed. So I approached, I shook the cup and made a look like "yeah there's something in there". So after more motioning and telling them they needed to kill it we handed them the spray, set the cup down and backed up.
They had caught on, and one lifted the edge of the cup and released little spurts of raid into the cup. He then let the cup down and let the cockroach sit in it. I admit I think this is a bit awful, but sometimes things happen in life that aren't right on every level. As Deepak Chopra had been explaining to me early that day, there is no objective reality because our perception is subjective. So stood there staring at the cup trying to calm down. We laughed and the silliness of it. We both knew that cockroaches are hard to kill and we were a bit skeptical that that had done it. We wanted to wait longer, but he lifted the cup with confidence only a minute or two later. Then he retrieved a lighter. He looked at us, he shook the can. He lit the lighter. He sprayed.
The cardboard and cockroach blazed. We reeled and screeched with disbelief, fright, and the oddity of it all. We stood dumbfounded and watched the sidewalk burn. A minute or two later, and it was over. The finality of it's death sat upon us as great as any finality could. It was gone.
El Fin
Friday, July 13, 2012
Laser Hair Removal
For my birthday I gave myself the gift of hair removal. I found a tiny review on Ulsan online (a website for local things) and I decided to try and find it. I was downtown the Friday before my birthday for a Dr's appt. So I went to check it out. I found the building, luckily just two buildings down the street from my doctor, and went up to the fourth floor. The website I had read about it from said it was on the fourth floor. I got out of the elevator and saw a sign "Momma, Pappa and baby" and I knew I was in the wrong spot. I walked up to the fifth floor. More "Momma, Pappa and baby" So I got sad, walked up to the sixth floor, the door from the stairwell looked suspicious, so I went down to the fourth floor. I kind of gave up. I got back in the elevator, and looked at the wall, where (all in Korean) was an advertisement for the spot I was trying to find. Thankfully this sign said 6F clearly on it and I took the elevator back to the 6th floor. When the elevator opened I walked into a luscious sparkly environment with a fake tree, sparkly purple chandelier and several purple couches. The staff didn't speak as much English as the website had led me to believe, and after a bit of tedious information exchange I spoke to the doctor. His English was better and we cleared some things up. I decided to make an appointment for the following Monday (my birthday!)
---
Monday I went back and was led to a room with silky robes where the attendant chose one and handed it to me. Since I was having my armpits done, I was confused why they gave me a robe that covered more than clothes did. I gave her a questioning look and she hooked me up with an elastic wasted skirt so I could wear it like a strapless dress. After I was changed I was promptly led to a room where I was laid down face up with my arms over my head. A woman shaved my right armpit, used some tape to remove the excess shaved hair from the armpit. She then slathered some sort of gel on my armpit. At this point a second woman came in the room and picked up a machine that looks like a grocery store scanner gun. I guess I can best described it as a laser gun. Now I must mention how extremely sensitive my armpits are. Like, panic attack hysteria when people or the occasional random object touch my armpits. So for me this was a pretty intense few minutes. While one lady was shaving my left armpit, and prepping it, the other was lasering my left armpit. I managed to keep still out of fear of flailing and being lasered other places, but it was not easy. The laser felt like a row of small needles being stabbed into the skin for an instant. The whole process probably took less time than it did for you to read this. It was over super fast, and there was almost no irritation or notice afterward. I wasn't allowed to shower for a day, but I had planned ahead so I wasn't concerned. It takes 5-8 sessions, spread a month apart each. My next appointment is in July and I'm super psyched about not having to shave my armpits again :-)
---
Its been three or more weeks and I've only shaved my armpits twice, and mostly because I thought to myself "wait... I haven't shaved in a while" so I checked and there was a bit of soft fuzzy hair. Not the usual bristly hair that chafes and irritates, so I'm super excited about the results I've already gotten. I will head back next week for my next appointment and possibly inquire about pricing for other places! Its so cheap and so awesome, how can I resist?
---
Monday I went back and was led to a room with silky robes where the attendant chose one and handed it to me. Since I was having my armpits done, I was confused why they gave me a robe that covered more than clothes did. I gave her a questioning look and she hooked me up with an elastic wasted skirt so I could wear it like a strapless dress. After I was changed I was promptly led to a room where I was laid down face up with my arms over my head. A woman shaved my right armpit, used some tape to remove the excess shaved hair from the armpit. She then slathered some sort of gel on my armpit. At this point a second woman came in the room and picked up a machine that looks like a grocery store scanner gun. I guess I can best described it as a laser gun. Now I must mention how extremely sensitive my armpits are. Like, panic attack hysteria when people or the occasional random object touch my armpits. So for me this was a pretty intense few minutes. While one lady was shaving my left armpit, and prepping it, the other was lasering my left armpit. I managed to keep still out of fear of flailing and being lasered other places, but it was not easy. The laser felt like a row of small needles being stabbed into the skin for an instant. The whole process probably took less time than it did for you to read this. It was over super fast, and there was almost no irritation or notice afterward. I wasn't allowed to shower for a day, but I had planned ahead so I wasn't concerned. It takes 5-8 sessions, spread a month apart each. My next appointment is in July and I'm super psyched about not having to shave my armpits again :-)
---
Its been three or more weeks and I've only shaved my armpits twice, and mostly because I thought to myself "wait... I haven't shaved in a while" so I checked and there was a bit of soft fuzzy hair. Not the usual bristly hair that chafes and irritates, so I'm super excited about the results I've already gotten. I will head back next week for my next appointment and possibly inquire about pricing for other places! Its so cheap and so awesome, how can I resist?
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
Elliot's excellent goodbye
A restaurant in Shinae
So as I mentioned in my last post my coworker and friend Elliot left Korea last Sunday. So we all met up Saturday evening for extraordinary fun! After my overtime Saturday I headed to Shinae to meet up with my language exchange friend. She was awesome and nice and I'm super excited about the whole situation. We chilled at Starbucks and talked for a while. Then she left and I stayed to meet the others.
A restaurant as viewed from the outside in Shinae
A stairwell in Shinae
After they had all arrived we headed to a wonderful Indian restaurant. The group was nine total. The food at the restaurant was amazing. I had chicken tikka masala and Eric ate some mushroom curry. We rounded the food portion of the evening off with a trip to Baskin Robbins.
Sophie and I discussing strategy
We had a brief interlude where we bought some adorable Korean cellphone charms and souvenirs. Then we went to a billiards room. We split into three teams and played shark for a while. It was a lot of fun, and it wasn't that competitive so it was low pressure and fun. I didn't sink a ball all night, but I don't mind.
The fifteen ball refused to go in. In an amazing move of strategy I tried to keep the fifteen ball on my team the whole game. Eric finally sank it and the game ended shortly afterward. It was a pretty entertaining game.
We finished the night off with a sticker photo booth experience. This is a truly Korean and hilarious experience. It is a photobooth where you can choose the background, dress up in costumes with hats, sunglasses, wigs or silly capes, and then decorate and alter the photos with designs and words after you finish taking the photos. You an email the files to yourself and then the pictures are made into stickers and cut up for you to stick every where.
A picture of the lovely Sophie with the various hats.
The girls' photo reel
And here is a select image from the boys' photo reel.
I decorated this one. Oh so excellent!
-Claire
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