Another day in the ROK!

Today's Korean class was extremely overwhelming. We learned both of their number systems. One is a native Korean number system used for counting objects, the other is of Chinese origin and is used for getting the price and telling page numbers. Both have other uses, but those are the only ones we have learned so far. There are also 6 different "quantifiers" or "counters" that you attach to the number when counting something, depending on what the object is. There are separate counters for: objects, people, animals, bottles, bowls, and cups/glasses. Also, there is one for years (ie: telling how old you are). So if you want to say I want one bottle of juice, you would not just say one, but you would say one+counter for bottle. It is pretty confusing and going to take a bit of practice to get used to the counters and when to use each counting system. An example: if you want to say "Those 2 loaves of bread cost $5.00 total" you would have to use both of the number systems: first the native Korean to say "2" and then the Chinese to say the price "5". Interesting, right? Another thing interesting about the numbers, the native Korean system does not have a number for zero. I've always been told that once a society gets the concept of "zero", then they have made big progress towards becoming "advanced". I find it interesting that native Korean numbers never had this concept. Maybe because it's only used to count things and because it probably already existed in the Chinese number system.

After class I decided not to attend the optional workshops and took the whole afternoon off! It was pretty amazing. I vegged out, took a brief nap (construction work nearby prevented me from getting a good one), made flash cards, watched TV and youtube, etc. We were supposed to have drumming (samulnori) tonight, but it was canceled due to the tremendous amount of rain we've gotten today. It has been raining steadily all day long, with some periods of extremely heavy rain. We must've gotten at least 3 inches today. Hopefully they will reschedule. I've been told we are in the monsoon season now, which should last about 2 months. Oh joy! ^_^

Tonight was a little frustrating. This weekend we have to help with Academic Olympics for Camp F. The topic is about the culture of a different country/region. My partner and I decided to do it about Japanese holidays! We worked really hard and did our research to find interesting facts about their big holidays. Well, today we were told that we could not do it about Japan because when they said different countries/regions, they really meant AMERICA. And they are worried about the Japanese/Korea bad vibes relationship. We had actually talked about this and decided we should go ahead and do it about Japan because 1/3 of the students in my class on Tuesday had been to Japan and additionally, my partner had lived in Japan for a year and his dormitory was filled with primarily Korean students. We thought these facts were pretty obvious signs that the J/K relationship wasn't as touchy of a subject for the younger generation. Apparently the "boss" does not agree. So, we had to redo our whole presentation about American holidays. This really wasn't hard to do, but I am just irked out of principle. The whole theme of Camp F is "Passport to the World", but I really think they are only focusing on America. I am not here to be a cultural imperialist, but whatever, I do what the boss says I guess.

Finally, to end on a more positive note, I forgot to mention the Foreign Service Officer's (FSO) insight about the American beef ban here in America. When asked what he thought about the short term future relationship between the US and ROK (Rep of Korea), especially since the beef bans are going on, he had some interesting things to say. Mainly, that the ban is not about America. It's about the recent shift in the controlling political party here in Korea, and the lack of respect going on between the 2 parties. The party that has been in charge for about the past 10 years recently lost the election and the other party has taken over. Since the "losing" party didn't win, they said they would not partake in making decisions. The new controlling party then decided to act on its own. (Sorry if this is not 100% correct!) It sounds like they accepted the FTA (free trade agreement) with the US without getting approval from Congress. This is why the people are upset. It seems like the media put the idea into people's heads that all American beef has mad cow disease. It seems that the media likes to put irrational ideas into the general public's heads quite often -- this will be frustrating to me this year, but I will learn to deal with it. Anyway, the point is that they are mad at the government for not going through the proper chains to make the decision (ie: asking the Congress) not about actual American beef; the beef is just the scapegoat, I guess! Too bad for American farmers right now. I'm sure this will all blow over relatively soon, though.

That's it for now. Tomorrow regular language classes start up again (all 4 hours!) and then we'll have lots of studying to do this weekend for our Korean quiz on Monday.

Have a good day everyone! Especially Mom & Dad -- Happy Anniversary!!! :-D