Nothing exciting ever happens on a Monday...

I was thinking to myself this morning after I talked to my parents on skype, nothing exciting ever happens on a Monday. They were encouraging me to continue writing my blog regularly, and I said I had to wait until something was worth writing about, right?
Well, my Monday got a surge of excitement after I left work today. Right now in Songdo it feels like fall is right around the corner. The air is nice and cool, and all the humidity is gone. As I was walking home tonight the breeze felt wonderful, but all of a sudden I hear people yelling (in Korean of course) and I turn around and a giant white umbrella, the heavy-duty type you put in the middle of patio tables, is heading straight for me blowing sporadically about by the wind. Haha so I'm on this narrow sidewalk with the busy street on my right and buildings on my left and I have that fight or flight question in my head. My first instinct is to dodge left and right, but the wind is bouncing the umbrella too much so there's no telling where it's going to be next. Then I start trying to outrun it, but it seems to sense that those are my intentions and takes a giant leap forward. I see this woman gesturing frantically from an open doorway up ahead, so I sprint toward her and she grabs me and pulls me inside just as the umbrella slams past me on the pavement. Saved by the GS Supermarket Lady! By the way, looked back out after the umbrella and it had blown into the street and caused a fender-bender. Needless to say prior to the umbrella excitement I had been so tired, but the whole experience definitely got my adrenalin pumping. And I was laughing really hard as all of these Koreans were shouting at me and watching me dodging and trying to outrun an umbrella.
Since I was in GS Supermarket anyway, I decided to pick up a few things, toilet paper being one of them. In Korea, you can't just buy a roll of 4 or 6 like in the US. Oh no, the smallest it comes in is a pack of 24 if your lucky, but normally 30 is the smallest. Basically buying toilet paper is a trip to the store in itself, because you can't carry anything else. It's so weird!!

It doesn't look so large in the is picture, but trust me, it is. It also has pink teddy bears all over it. Weirdly cute toilet paper.

On another note, as a teacher you get tons of free food. I don't know if it's because I teach kids 15 yrs old and younger, but I am constantly being handed food. Sometimes I wrap it in a napkin and say I'm saving it for later (and toss it), but sometimes I try it out. Today I was given a Korean brand potato chip, which was so good. It was a lot thicker than a regular chip, and very crunchy. I was also handed a fish shaped cheeto textured cracker/chip, I tried it, and it was delicious! Not fish flavored luckily. I say that because I've learned you have to ask if something is fish flavored, because they love that flavor here. I bought these crackers last week in the store:

Thinking they were going to be like the cheese whale crackers we buy back home, I was pretty excited with my purchase. Got home, popped a few in my mouth and realized they were fish flavored!! When you're not expecting it, it is a shockingly awful taste. Not that it's great to begin with. So ye be warned.

In saying that, they have tons of great food here. This past weekend I had a Wang Mandu (wang=king), which was so so good! I've had the smaller version before, which I actually posted pictures of on here, but this time it was just one giant bread dumpling, which the bread on the outside tasted like a chicken and dumpling, amazing. On the inside is a mixture of beef, onions, peppers, and some spices. And you dip it in soy sauce if you want. So here's a picture of where it's made:

And here's a closer view of the mandu itself:

Huge right? And then the center:

Completely delicious and so cheap: 1,000 won -which is less than a dollar! Not exactly good for you, but once in a while is fine. A whole meal in itself too. Ok that's it for now, a bit of a random post but you know, just a day in the life of a teacher in Korea!