omg...B!O!R!E!D!: read on...

i added more pics to my photo album. some of my favorite snacks that i've eaten here. check 'em out and if they have them in america, you too can find out why i actually took pics of this. (plus i was bored.) oh and there's a blurry sticker pic picture of me & jane. =P

dang i was so freakin' bored all day. i was gonna go get my cell phone, but aunt decided that i wasn't. so then i ended up just staying at home all day since my cousin was reading a book and didn't seem like she wanted to go out. i ended up not eating lunch cuz i was kinda mad about it. maybe i'm being immature about it, but i was pretty annoyed when later on, my aunt changed her mind and said that i probably needed one (she earlier said that i can use hers on an occasional basis...hmph!). anyways, i think today was the most boringest day here.

god's park joon broke up with han go eun. 2 ugly people broke up. how sad.

tomorrow i'm meeting up with my dad's oldest brother and my cousins on my dad's side. i'll be getting a great lunch, but i'll have to face another day of "you need to lose some weight". wonderful. :)

i guess this has been a kinda depressing day for me. van exel, no cell, no lunch, bored outta my mind.

aite, enough of this depressing talk. imma eat some nal shin gamja ("skinny potato"). (^.^)v

Squirted 7:13 AM by E-J Yi

wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh~!

van exel's gone...=*****(

for jamison???

he BETTA be good...

*sniff sniff*

Squirted 9:58 PM by E-J Yi

sticker pics, anyone?: i love taking sticker pics! they're so much fun...=) ok, i'll explain more later...

i just got back from dinner, drinks, and sticker pics with jane. we ate galbi gui (soft galbi), dwen jjang ji geh, and all this banchan (side dishes) for dinner. yum! and cheap~! i never realized how much me & jane have in common. she loves meat just like me. she eats meat regularly. even tho she's very skinny, she eats very well. *envy* jk. she hates dressing up; only likes jeans. just like me! haha. and other things, too...i just can't list them all. jane and i go a way back. we both took lessons from the same flute teacher and we have some of the same friends. jane is also very pretty and very nice. anyways, it's her first time in korea and she's been here for a year. there are many things she likes & dislikes about korea which is understandable, of course. she doesn't like the korean girls here. too loud and too whiney. i TOTALLY agree. anyways, we went to drink coffee (i drank peach juice) at a cafe. ugh, too many smokers. *cough cough* then afterwards, we went to take sticker pics. she NEVER took sticker pics here in korea!! we took the ones that make ur skin look perfect. haha. you can draw all these flowers, stars, or whatever and put messages on it. so much fun! (my cousin might come home soon so i can't take a pic of it. i will soon tho.) anyways, i learned alot from jane about living here so i'm very grateful for her. :) she'll be leaving in september which sux. =(

right now i'm watching a show called "man to man". it's basically a health talk show hosted by 2 comedians, but the topics are very serious. right now they're talking about the dangers of smoking. smoking which is a staple in a korean man's diet. they showed a video where they had smoke from a cigarette being pumped into a cage full of lab mice. at first, they were desperately looking for holes in the cage for fresh air. a few days later, the mice were desperately trying to smoke the cigarette! so shocking! it looked like they were eating the cigarette b/c they wanted it to bad. see how bad smoking is!!

me & jane were talking about how nice the cars were around apkujung. i saw on the news that about 90% of koreans own a korean-made car. but in apkujung, almost every car is a foreign car. bmw, benz, range rover, porshe, audi...it's amazing b/c foreign cars are about 2x more expensive the price of the same car in the US. and on the way home, i see a dodge viper which is even hard to see in the US. crazy rich people here.

as for some korean drama news: i watched "yoo joh sook nyun"; the new drama with kim hee sun & go su. it's aite i guess. supposed to be pretty comical. kim hee sun is still very pretty, but she seems kinda old. i dunno. maybe go su wasn't the right person cast. some parts are lol funny, but it's just kinda unbelievable. (which of course, is like MOST korean dramas.) a drama i HIGHLY recommend is "ap jib yuja" (woman in the front house). that's freakin' hilarious. it's a comedy about 3 married couples in which all the husbands cheat on the wives. that sounds terrible, but it's really funny and it's not all rosy for the husbands: they get their just desserts which is great. hyori's making her debut in a couple of days and i saw some entertainment show where they interviewed her about her new song, "10 minutes" (meaning: she can get a guy in 10 minutes). dang, she is so freakin' sexy. she's like britney spears, madonna, and j.lo mixed together. she's almost too sexy for koreans. hahaha.

i saw a magazine stand on my way home filled with american magazines meaning that they're all in english. but dang, they're about $8 each. >.< it even had SLAM, but it was the last issue i read before i came to korea. man, i think i'll be tempted to buy the next issue...

ok, that's it for now. why isn't xanga working! i can't sneak around and read about people's lives. aite, i think i update too much...(^.^)v

Squirted 9:02 AM by E-J Yi

independence day: today's korea's independence day. no work. yay.

yesterday i had dinner with all my cousins: jin ook oppa, ji yun unnie, and dong hye unnie. dong hye unnie took a couple of digital pics so check out my photo album. i think i lost a lil bit of weight. maybe not. >.<

we ate at hanwoori. just like my Church name. so i took a pic of that with my camera. i can't wait to get my pics developed. :)

tonight i'm meeting up with jane. haven't seen her in a long time. my mom says she looks like a talent (tv star). i'll take a pic to make sure. hehe.

i did a 500-piece puzzle yesterday. a "Christmas Traffic Jam" by jane wooster scott. i love her paintings. they're so cute. puzzles are so expensive here. i wanted to buy this hello kitty 1000-piece one...$30!!! so i had to settle for the 500-piece one for about $6. my cousin, ji yun, and my aunt (her mom) love puzzles, too. (see how similar we are?) now that i'm finished (took me about 5 hrs), i'm going to let them borrow. puzzles galore~! ok, that was super gay.

glad that we don't have a power outtage like ny. that would totally suck. can't do jack without electricity. makes u realize how much u depend on it.

ok, i really gotta go to the bathroom. no, not #2. just #1. i've been going to the bathroom ALOT here in korea. unless you go to a nice cafe or restaurant in korea, they're most likely not going to have a nice restroom. but when they do, i get all excited. makes u appreciate nice, clean restrooms.

ok, i'm really gonna go now...

[edit] i managed to sneak and use my cousin's digital camera while she's out. i took some pics of my room and other stuff. check it out in my photo album. dang, i gotta get me a digital camera!!

Squirted 9:02 PM by E-J Yi

i think i'm turning japanese: ahhh...i remember sam & jimmy singing that song...hehe~

my guy cousin, jin ook, bought me some of my favorite japanese snacks from japan. :D so yummy~! i was so happy to see him. he's super nice & funny. i usually don't like people touching my head (like petting it), but i don't mind when he does. (ok, that sounded super STUPID.) anyways, i'm eating dinner w/him and his older sister, ji yun (who is my absolute fav cousin) at HANURI. it's a really good korean restaurant here. hehe. i gotta eat at the place where it shares the same name as our Church!

both of those cousins have lived in japan for more than 5+ years and when they tell me what it's like, the more i want to go. in japan, taxi drivers DON'T speed. it's amazing. my cousin said she was going crazy b/c she asked him to go faster, but he wouldn't pass the speed limit. it happened to her every single time. and when it's a yellow light, instead of some cars trying to go through the light...nope! japanese drivers always stop on yellow. it's quite amazing. she said that there's so many good foods to eat. the cakes, the candy, the sushi...omg, i'm hungry just thinking about it! well, if i save up enough money i want to go either there or singapore. my cousin went there too and she said it was the best country (besides japan) that she's been to. so freakin' clean. friendly natives...especially towards asians who speak english! no crime so you can walk around the city at midnight and u don't fear for your lives. man i really hope that i can go sometime...

yesterday i got my first present. :) one of my students gave me kimbap with galbi in the middle. it's basically rice with galbi wrapped up in seaweed all in the shape of a triangle. i was so surprised! and it was very yummy. i was pretty tired yesterday from teaching, but after i got that, my tiredness went all away~!

the bus rides have been kinda draining. once i get on the bus, i immediately feel so sleepy, but i can't fall asleep b/c i'm afraid i'll miss my stop. >.< and since my feet hurt wearing nice shoes, i've decided to walk around the "new york" way. my OTHER cousin, susie, told me a long time ago, women in ny wore sneakers with their nice suits and just changed into their nice shoes when they got to the office. that's why alot of ny women carry huge shopping bags around. so yesterday, i wore my sneakers with my nice pants. haha. it didn't look too weird, i must say. but i did feel good about my feet. hehe.

friday's a national holiday in korea. independence day. so no teaching on that day. =) what to do...what to do.

man, julie sent me pics from the EM camping trip. looked like alot of fun. =( sad that i missed out.

i guess that's it for now. if anything new comes up...i'll let ya'll know~ (^.^)v

Squirted 7:33 PM by E-J Yi

hey guys!

i was so nervous about this morning that i couldn't fall asleep last night. =( i was supposed to wake up at 6am, but didn't fall asleep till around 2am. >.< (i had been laying in my bed since 10pm...)

well, i taught the business people this morning. i didn't know how long it was gonna take for me to find the place so i took a taxi and got there in less than 5 minutes. ugh. then i had to wait about 40 minutes in the hot office. no air conditioning (b/c i didn't know how to turn it on). i'm waiting in a room full of clothes. the company is called "sam shin creations". they're a fabric manufacturer and a fashion company. anyways, at first, there were 2 guys and 3 girls. the guys were 27 years old and the girls ranged from 22-25. they were pretty quiet at first, but they slowly opened up. one guy said that when i was talking, "it's like watching tv!" (b/c my pronounciation is good). haha. anyways, we played a couple of games and did some conversation drills. they were having some fun it seemed like so i think it was okay. when i asked them what we should do next time, they said that they wanted to do the same thing as they did today. whew~! :)

now it's time for me to get ready to go to YBM. :) ttyl~!

Squirted 10:57 PM by E-J Yi

another celeb sighting: not an "A list" star, but a random one...

if you saw the movie, "sex is zero", then you know who he is. (rosie...hehe) i saw the guy who was like majorly feminine in the movie. he was just walking around apkujung, but nobody hardly looked at him. sad. i told my cousin, ji yun, that i saw him and she said she's seen him on the bus before, too. he was wearing lots of makeup and a "michael jackson" mask. he was trying to cover up his face so he wouldn't get noticed and my cousin thought he was weird. he even powdered his face on the bus. weird.

tomorrow morning i'm teaching a bunch of college-aged students. my cousin, ji yun, was giving me all these ideas. simple things like flash cards are a great idea. they love games like hangman or scrabble. only if i brought my scrabble board! anyways, my plan is to have them do self-introductions. that should take awhile. then based on their level of speaking, i'm either gonna play a game with flash cards or have them role-play. for example, act like you're on a blind date (meeting/sohgehting) and have a conversation in english. my cousin and aunt thought it was a great idea since college students do that alot. :) i hope that all goes smoothly tomorrrow. i just gotta find the place first...haha.

some things that i have learned while living at my aunt's:

*if you mix oyster sauce & ketchup (more parts ketchup than oyster sauce), it will end up being like a steak sauce.

*if you want to curl your eyelashes, get a lighter, move the flame back and forth across the part where you curl your eyelashes a couple of times, wait a lil bit, and curl your lashes. it's like a lil curling iron for your eyelashes! makes the curls last longer. (although i don't use an eyelash curler...)

*instead of throwing away the eggshell(s) after you've cracked them, save them so you can massage the remaining gooey part (i think the whites) of the egg(s) into your face. after massaging for a while, let the egg whites dry for a bit until it hardens on your face (about 5 minutes). then wash it off. makes ur skin feel softer and it's a natural mask.

*to lose the fat off your arms (underneath biceps), act like you're throwing a ball real hard. alternate arms. supposed to make the skin tighter or something.

okay, that's the lesson for today, kids!

tomorrow's gonna be a long day. 8-9am class. come home. leave around 1:15 for YBM (my part-time job). come home around 8:30. whew.

see ya'll later. good morning~! (^.^)v

Squirted 6:33 AM by E-J Yi