new school year update

This week the students have midterms so I have a lot of free time at school.  I like it.  I try to do something productive while I am here.  I usually study Korean, and this week I started editing my photos from my trip to Japan in February. 

Tomorrow I'll go to Taiwan till May 6th.  About 2 weeks ago I found out I would have May 1st-6th off, so I decided I should go some place.  If I was in the US and had 6 days off I probably wouldn't go anywhere.  But while I'm in Korea it's so easy to travel to another country I want to travel every opportunity I have. 

The school year is going fine so far.  And since we are using the same books as last year lesson planning is much easier because I am mostly able to use the lesson plans from last year.

This is supposed to be my last year in Korea and it's really making me feel pressured.  I mostly feel pressure to improve my Korean as much as possible.  I have been here four years and I am really disappointed in my speaking ability.  I'm also feeling pressure to learn CAD better and make a good portfolio.  I have made a lot of designs with CAD, but I'm not confident that I am making good ones.

Japan trip 2015

In February I went to Japan from the 14th till the 24th.  I spent the whole time in the Kansai area.  I traveled around a lot.  I went to Osaka, Kyoto, Horyu-ji in Nara Prefecture, Ise Jingu in Mie Prefecture, Hiei-zan in Shiga Prefecture, Koya-san in Wakayama Prefecture, and a few other places.  It was a really good trip.

At Meoto-iwa, where it was very windy:

Ginkaku-ji in Kyoto was much better than I expected:

Someplace on Hiei-zan:

Koya-san:

キン肉マン in Osaka:

School year is over

Yesterday was the last day of classes.  I still had to come to school today, but I didn't have to do any work.  Tomorrow I will go to school then go to the hospital for my medical check, which I need every year for my visa.  Saturday I will go to Japan. 

Back from the US

I was in the US Jan 20th - 30th.  I got back to Korea Sunday morning around 5:00 am and was home by about 8:30am.  I flew from Chicago to Hong Kong, spent a few hours at the airport, then flew to Seoul.  Whole thing was about 24 hours of travel, not including the time going to and from the airports.  I didn't sleep well during any of that time, so when I got home Sunday morning I spent most of the day sleeping. 

My trip wasn't very good.  I never really got over my jet lag and I didn't have much time to just relax.  I was too busy meeting friends, shopping and doing some other things I wanted to do while I was there. 

I brought two 50 lb suit cases full of things I don't need back to the US, but looking at my apartment it still seems pretty full. 

Today I'm at school and don't have much to do here.  Tomorrow classes start.  We will have 2 weeks of classes then more vacation time before the 2015 school year starts. 

Going to japan again

I have a lot of vacation time this winter, so I decided to go to Japan again.  I'll be there for about 10 days next month.  I'll be flying to Osaka, but I haven't really planned what I'll do yet.  I'm just going because I like Japan and it's easy for me to go there since I live in Korea.  Once I'm back in the US it's a $1000+ plane ticket and a 14 hour flight.  From Seoul it's about 2 hours and I'm paying about $250.

Visiting the US

I'll be visiting the US this month from the 20th to the 30th.  I plan to eat a lot of food and buy some stuff.  I'll also bring back a bunch of things I don't need here.  I have way too much stuff here. 

2015 plans

I think this is my last year in Korea.  I like to decide a year in advance so I will have time to do the things I wanted to do before I go.  I didn't want to just suddenly decide that I'll be leaving in a couple months. 

So my plans for this year are to keep learning CAD, keep studying Korean, and to save more money.  I was doing those things during 2014, but with this being my last year I want to try to turn up the intensity a bit.