Korea Summer

I apologize for not updating this blog in several weeks. My life the last few weeks has been a whirlwind. This itself is only a short update as I do not have much time right now. I have had so many adventures, divine appointments, and plain old good times, though, so I hope I do get a chance in the next two weeks to fill in details.

With tears, I finished teaching at KEPAD July 24th. The following week I taught English to deaf students at Korea Nazarene University. Although it was quite a challenge, the experience teaching English to deaf students was invaluable and gave me new confidence in my English teaching abilities and joy in teaching. I returned to Ilsan for just a few days before leaving again this time to interpret at the United Methodist World Deaf Missions Conference. Wow. What an amazing opportunity. I met deaf people, pastors, and missionaries from Guam, China, Singapore, Japan, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Kenya, Uganda, and the US. What a priviledge to attend. I have invitations to work with the Deaf in most of those countries as a result and am excited about partnering in the work of God with the deaf around the world through prayer at least. In between KNU and the Deaf Missions conference, I’ve had lots of adventures (some of which include explosives, North Korea, and coming very close to instant death) and good conversations with the good friends I’ve made here. I will be very sad to leave in the next few days. And very busy saying goodbye to everyone. Oh dear.

What joy comes with the thought that many of them I will see again in eternity. What sadness with the thought that some of them, at this point, I might never see again. At this point.

I’ve uploaded some photos on facebook!

I am writing all of these posts and Choi has gone to bed early but left the tv on. I felt like I was not seeking God’s blessing, but I didn’t really heed that. I flipped channels arbitrarily and found Hillsong TV, which was alright. Then I “accidentally” changed the channel and it was a documentary in Korean Sign about the first Deaf Korean priest. Then is was a brief commercial of sorts about one of my heroes- Eric Liddell. Praise God. He knows what kind of encouragement we need.

This weekend I went “camping” with the deaf students and faculty including Choi. First we went to Namyangju Studios, famous film studios in South Korea. Namyangju is not very big despite the many movies that are made there. They do have a traditional Korean town set and a DMZ set.We had some kind of school tour. I didn’t understand most of it. I had to wear high heels and walk around on a 2 square foot board for the sound room. I was the North Korean in the scene we shot from some famous North Korea/South Korea film. I couldn’t keep a straight face nor could Hyunho, as hard as he tried, who I had to face. Military outfits are hot in 86 degree sun and 70% humidity.

From Namyangju studios, we went a little further up the road to the “campground”. It was more like a youth hostel right next to a river in the midst of mountains. We went swimming in the river. Actually, I take that back. I went swimming as did Mr. Ahn and Hyunho. The other students splashed around in the water and tried to fish with nets. Everyone was surprised at how aquaphiliac I am. Then they played soccer barefoot on the artificial turf field. Soon Bum broke his foot.

Then the eating began. First we had pork bbq kind of like sam gyeop sal. One takes the bbqed pork strips and dips them in samjang (reddish-brown sauce), puts it in a lettuce or sesame leaf with some rice, garlic, and onion if one wants, and then eats it all rolled up. Delicious. After eating a ton of that, we had watermelon and then Choi and Tae In made Korean onion and green onion pancakes. I tasted some because Choi wanted me to. Then the male faculty made me eat Korean ramen that they made.  I think they wanted to make sure I ate everything Korean and wanted to test my spicey food handling abilities but I can take more spice than they can. I was beyond stuffed but I didn’t want to finish with that taste so I had a bit more pancake. Hyunho, who I was talking with most of the time made fun of me for eating so much. It really wasn’t my fault. He thought it was funny. By now the bus driver was cooking steak tips which he made me taste. It was delicious but I felt like I was going to explode. They were about to start cooking up the fish they caught. I made a quick escape to bed.

Saturday morning I woke at 7 AM before the students were awake. Choi hates this place. She thinks the blankets smell, people were talking and singing into wee hours of the morning, there are bugs, she didn’t sleep well, there is no hot water in the morning. Oh well. I went for a walk up the river. It appears that “camping” in Korea means youth hostel type accommodations. We are in the midst of mountains and drove past mountains and rivers the hour here. Korea is one of the most mountainous countries in the world according to something I read.

After breakfast (which I could barily eat), we went to the house of Dasan, a Korean erudite of the 1800s who wrote 500 books on government, medicine, and Chinese characters and thought besides poetry while under internal exile. He also invented a machine that lifted heavy stones and discovered an ancient Korean site that is a UNESCO World Cultural site to this day. Wow. Mr. Ahn did a good job of explaining everything that was in just Korean.

Then we drove (and slept) the hour back. I still haven’t gotten over last night’s food.

Dave is an answer to many prayers and I pray many more.

In the beginning, I expected to hang out with Dave quite a bit. He spoke English and he is my age. He helped me negotiate higher wages and lobbied for the higher wages on my behalf. In the last few weeks, however, he was acting kind of awkward. I found out through Choi that he thought I had rejected his friendship because the two times he invited me somewhere, I had already made other plans. The Tuesday I was back from Jeju, I did my best to patch things up by asking him when we were going to hang out. We tentatively made plans for Saturday and he told me he’d text me when he was free during weekdays and invite me over to play badminton. Wednesday he invited me over to play “table soccer” (= foosball) and I helped him and his colleague assemble it instead, much to his surprise.  But he still bounced between being great and being awkward- he gave me directions via text and phone to get home late Wednesday night, I stopped by his office Friday when the Seoul School for the Deaf visited, he made me coffee and we finalized plans for Saturday, he waited for me to eat dinner Friday when I came late and everyone had left. I think it was that friendship was defined on my terms? Maybe the fact that he broke up and then made up with his girlfriend was a factor? In any case, even Choi felt he was awkward.

Saturday night it ended up just being Stan, his Korean- American best friend, Dave, and me. Stan is a typical American fraternity kid and he’s done lots of things Jesus doesn’t approve of. So has Dave. (So have I). Stan made me feel a little uncomfortable though, because in that way he was more “American” than I but he assumed otherwise. After dinner, we were supposed to go out clubbing with a bunch of Dave’s friends, but Dave had food poisoning. He was sick. At first he didn’t admit it, but then he finally told us he needed to go home. I was dismayed that he didn’t just cancel his plans with me in the first place. He wanted me to go out with Stan and meet up with Stan’s American friends who were celebrating the 4th by drinking a lot, but I felt there was too much potential awkwardness, so I just went home with him. And I’m so glad I did. During the bus ride, I got to share my parents’ testimonies and my family and homeschooling experience. He was struck by it all, especially by my parents’ openness about their pre-Christ life and their dedication to their children in homeschooling them.

To make up for Saturday, we went out for Mexican food on Wednesday night. I was a little nervous about it because Stan told me Dave thinks I’m beautiful and I was afraid he might have broken up with his girlfriend because of me (I didn’t know they were back together yet). God is good. Dave invited his brother who has just graduated from Rutgers to come with us. That in itself relieved my fear a bit. But moreover, we had so much fun. Alex and Dave are a blast. Both are really great guys and I’m genuinely glad to have Dave as a friend. He is very humble and continually turns the conversation away from himself to praise others like his brother. We started talking about Koreans and how obsessed they are with beauty and how they dress and look. Alex and Dave are disgusted with it and with Korean materialism and superficiality in general (sidenote- the Korean Nazarene students were all surprised that I am thin since I’m American. I told Dave that and he said when he heard there was an American intern he assumed I was a fat, 40 year old. That’s our American rep, guys). In so many words (that made it not awkward) Dave told me that I am beautiful, and not just because I am American, but he knows I feel strange to always be in the spotlight and just appreciated for my physical qualities, he respects me for it and he tries his best to avoid putting me in those situations. I am grateful for that. He’s really a gentleman; that’s just one example.

But this is where it gets awesome. After dinner (and he did a good job of finding a relatively authentic Mexican place if you don’t include the ketchup and onions they called salsa) he received a call from a friend and told us he had to leave to go meet up with this friend. His brother and I were a little put off and then we found out that it is a friend who recently has gone through a messy break up and who needs comfort and friendship, so he was really being a good friend. We asked Dave if his friend didn’t mind hanging out with all of us and Dave readily acquiesced- he just didn’t want to force us to hang out with a friend who doesn’t speak English. We met up with Dave’s friend and then went to a coffee shop to meet up with another friend. From there we were going to go to a bar, but those two friends decided to hang out together instead, so it was just Dave, Alex and I again. The three of us went to the bar anyway (and preceded to only speak English and pretend to be ignorant Americans who only order alcohol, no food= taboo, in Korea. They were so surprised they gave us two fried eggs for free. It was quite amusing). There, conversation turned to dying and subsequently, God. It turns out, Dave is afraid of dying to the point of insomnia. He used to believe in God and Christian beliefs, but then one day he decided not to since he couldn’t really prove God existed- it seemed more just a psychological, feel-good trick. Although he enjoys the lack of restrictions on his life, he has been afraid of dying ever since and lacks peace and joy. I shared my whole testimony with him about struggling with that very idea that God is just something people made up to feel good. I told him about how I came to the conclusion that all the “coincidences” in my life and in the world can either be explained as coincidence or as God, but both take faith. I told him how I wanted to believe in Jesus because I had so much more peace and joy when I did, so finally I just decided to believe in Him and indeed, my life was (and is) so much more peaceful, joyful, purposeful, and fulfilling. And if nothing else, in the end, if my belief in Jesus is in error, I’ve lost nothing by it (and I’ve gained a lot), but if I don’t believe in God, it might have dire consequences. Alex, very high on Dave’s respect list, who graduated with a degree in biomedical engineering, chimed in saying that all of his science professors believe in a higher being or in God to some extent because science simply cannot explain everything and thus Alex believes in a higher being and sees why I would. It was such a good conversation. Dave ended by saying that he really wants to believe in God again and he hopes I can convince him to. Dave, if only you knew how much I pray for that every day.

Thursday night the English Club went out for dinner. Dave again told me that he really wants me to convince him to believe in God. Amen.

God is so good.

Mrs. Rancourt had meetings starting at 6 AM this morning, so I woke to an empty room. She gave me her complimentary breakfast pass. Lotte Hotel continental breakfasts are like other expensive hotel complimentary breakfasts except one can choose from Western cuisine or Asian cuisine. I chose Western cuisine.

Mrs. Rancourt came back around 11 AM and needed to sleep for a few hours (she had stayed up all night doing inventory for her store) so I left to go shopping and walk around a bit before I had to meet up with Choi at Samsung School for the Deaf (no relation to the company). I was in the Jongno area again and I definitely will have to return. I pray about everything, so I have prayed that God would help me shop wisely (shopping here rather than shopping in the US is wise at the start, because everything here is very inexpensive). As I walked, I happened to start looking in this one store simply because it had t-shirts with English but not English. It turns out it also had really nice clothes for very cheap and a place to try them on (a rarity around here). Hopefully I made wise purchases.

Then I began my trip to Samsung School. On the map, the train station it was near would take awhile to get to, but another station was nearby and looked like walking distance from the school. The only catch was that I would have to figure out which direction to walk from the station. I arrived at the station, and monsoon weather started- torrential downpour. The Koreans were all waiting in the station but I would be late if I waited, so I just set out with my umbrella. I walked in the direction I thought I should but after 10 minutes, I stopped to make sure. The guy I asked told me I was going the wrong way and pointed me in another direction. I walked that way for awhile and stopped to ask a couple under an overhang. They discussed things for 10 minutes and called up some friends about bus routes, then told me whre to walk to catch a bus. I found the bus station, got on the bus, and after 10 minutes or so, realized it was going in the wrong direction or actually, I think it had two routes and skipped over my stop. I got off, called Choi, caught a cab that she translated directions to, and found out that indeed, I had walked in the right direction initially and could have arrived at the school 45 minutes earlier, probably. Oh well.

After meeting all of the administrators, I was given a tour of Samsung School for the Deaf by the Vice Principal. It is a private school that was initially founded by a Catholic man in 1957. It no longer is Christian but does contain some portraits tof Jesus and Mary in reference to its past. The school has about 130 deaf students with a teacher per 4 students. It is largely funded by the government despite being private. It also has an orphanage for about 40 students. Students are primarily orally educated until 3rd grade when they are taught in sign language. One of the classes students are required to take is traditional Korean music. The music teacher is enthusiastic about her efforts. It seems well funded as she uses a giant touch screen computer screen (maybe 36 inch screen, if that’s a size). I question the point of music class as most students are profoundly deaf. They also have pottery, sewing, and wood working studios with beautiful works made by the students.

I met many of the students as I toured, and they were excited to meet an American, as always. Most of the students who came to my ASL class were girls, however. They learned quickly, asked many questions, and I’m glad I am going back next Monday.

Afterward, I was supposed to meet the Scottish Deaf guy I met the first week, Brian Duffy, but not for several hours. One of the girls in my class was to take me to the subway station. Since I had several hours to kill, we sat outside and chatted with the other students in the class. I forgot how different high school students and college students are- high school students are a lot more flirty with each other and less reserved with me. I thoroughly enjoyed hanging out with them.

Then two of the girls walked me to the train station. Sangdo is in south Seoul and in the midst of steep hills. We walked up one steep hill and then down to get to the station. The girls didn’t want to leave me alone at the station for some reason, so we chatted some more. Then I found out that Brian wasn’t able to make it. I felt bad for making the girls wait so long even if it was pleasant. I am grateful to them.

Instead of meeting Brian, I met up again with Choi and Suh Hoon. I was starving so we went to McDonalds where I had a bulgogi burger. They are much better than regular McDonald’s burgers.

I went to Mrs. Rancourt’s mother’s church again this morning. Mrs. Rancourt was ill and thus she did not come. I love Mrs. Cho, Mrs. Rancourt’s mother. She does not know much English, but she certainly does know Jesus and love Him and it overflows into love for others. She blesses me so much. I also was very blessed by the church service again. It is especially a blessing to watch the deaf worship leader worship. And who do you think came to the service this week? One of the students from Seoul School for the Deaf who I met on Friday! He is also from China and friends of the girl I met before (who was not at church when I was there). He is just about my age but is still in high school because he didn’t know Korean Sign Language when he came (or Korean, I assume). He is fluent in KSL now and learned some ASL while we chatted. It was nice for me to have someone who sympathized with my sign language confusion and learning. And again, it is really encouraging to me to see a young deaf person who loves Jesus and comes to church on his own, and  a Chinese deaf person at that. He said the Chinese deaf church is quite vibrant in China. Praise God!

After church, I went to Lotte Hotel to meet Mrs. Rancourt and go shopping with her. Lotte Hotel is one of the nicest in Korea. The toilet/bidet seat is heated. To be honest, it kind of disturbed me. Everything in the room was controlled by a touch screen pad next to the bed.

Anyway, I love Mrs. Rancourt, too. Not only is she encouraging and always seeking to know what God is doing and where He is going, she has incredible stories, and she is fun and entertaining. The list of people she meets with and how she met them and the places she goes and how she was invited there is ridiculous. Opera singers, CEOs of hotel chains, famous chefs, CEOs of other companies that are related or unrelated to her own business, one of the most famous lawyers in Korea (and hers, of course), I can’t remember them all. Anyway, she was lost one day and needed directions and this nice, 26 year old Korean guy led her where she needed to go. He is one of the designers of the Lotte mall. Well she thought he was really nice so in the past 3 weeks she’s called him up when she needed a body guard of sorts. He accompanied her to some prestigious art show and events like that. Since I speak English and her time in Korea is coming to an end, Mrs. Rancourt invited him to come shopping with us. Oh dear. Shopping with Mrs. Rancourt.

Mrs. Rancourt likes to shop. Byong Gi and I do not. 5 hours with her in one of the shopping districts of Seoul. It was a good experience because she taught me how to shop in Seoul, but it was a lot like shopping with your mom. She wanted me to get things I don’t really like. It was kind of awkward at first with Byong Gi there, but we kind of bonded over the whole ordeal. I felt very sorry for him. I tried to strike up conversation, but his Enlish is very limited. We did manage to communicate a bit, however, jokingly suggest ridiculous things for each other, and laugh about Mrs. Rancourt. She bought us dinner (tteokboki- classic Korean street food, nangmyun- cold noodles, and fresh mandu- Mrs. Rancourt’s favorite and what I remember her by when she lived in Boston) and then icecream. We really were like her kids.

Then, after the 5 hours, she told us to go back to the hotel room (I was spending the night because I had to be in Seoul the next morning anyway) instead of following her around. So we did. I expected Byong Gi to leave, but apparently he wanted to wait for Mrs. Rancourt to return. So we tried to converse for 2 1/2 hours. It was a bit challenging and awkward, but somehow I managed. He just graduated from college because male Koreans have 2 years mandatory military service in the middle of their college education. He studied furniture design and he showed me pictures of his furniture along with his paintings, drawings, and superheros he has created. He is talented. We talked about Mrs. Rancourt- he, like me, is entertained by her stories, her friend-making abilities, and all of the crazy people she knows as a result. We also talked about Korean food that I like. Somehow through that I managed to agree to go out with him for dinner. Oh dear. That will be interesting. Hopefully his brother (who I talked to on the phone) will come. He speaks a little more English. And it will be less awkward. I hope.

Mrs. Rancourt finally came back at 11:30 PM, Byong Gi left and then Mrs. Rancourt and I tried on all of the clothes she had bought (a lot). She wants me to try some of the Korean fashion she likes. It didn’t look bad on me, but I don’t think it is my style. We munched on rice krispie type snacks made with some other kind of puffed grain and squid jerky and she told me more crazy stories.

Then I went to bed.

Choon Hee texted me and asked me to come to Jongno again to teach Mr. Kim American Sign Language. I was not able to come until later in the afternoon and shortly after I arrived Mr. Kim had a meeting with some deaf people he is counseling.

Instead of teaching ASL, Choon Hee made me grilled cheese sandwiches and coffee and we talked for 1 1/2 hours. It turns out she was on staff with YWAM for many years and works for them part time now. She was a missionary in China for 10 months when her mother fell ill and she returned to Korea to serve her mother for 10 years. After her mother passed away, she devoted herself to missions again, joined Mr. Kim’s performing group (she had been part of a drama evangelism team before and through it gotten a bit involved in the deaf community) and has traveled with them. She has traveled to the US twice for missions as well as other countries in Asia and the Asian Pacific. I told her about my story of why I came to Korea as well as my vision for serving God in Portland, ME and in my future. I told her about my experiences in Guyana, South America working with the deaf and my desire to return there and my previous intent to go there instead of Korea. She informed me that Korea being a relatively wealthy and developed nation, the Korean deaf Christians would probably have the capability and desire to serve the deaf in Guyana. She encouraged me to pray about coming back and leading a deaf missions trip to Guyana. I never considered that. Its cool how things we give up can be brought back in ways we never expected. She also gave me more details for the United Methodist Asian Deaf Missions conference I will be interpreting for. She said it draws several hundred people from Asia and the US and is quite the event. I am honored to interpret for it and excited about what God will do.

Today the Seoul School for the Deaf junior class came and toured our school. Since I had nothing better to do, I toured with them. I enjoyed chatting with them and getting to know them a bit. I know enough KSL now to have at least basic conversations with everyone and I generally understand the gist of what is going on. It was unexpected and fun.

I have more to write about for Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. I’ll try to write them in the next day or two, but no promises about tomorrow, so keep checking!