35. The Ice Man
Hello,
So I've just come in and what a night! We went shopping for a bit and I got a dress and earrings and then we set off with Vicky, Caroline's student,to find the ice bar. We eventually got there and paid 15000won to get in. We were given huge coats and snow boats and a free drink. Now I should've known by the word ICE that it was going to be cold but I didn't quite grasp the concept. The drinks however really warmed me up and we jumped around.
Now Caroline pointed out a big statue of a man, and we realised that there was a tube coming out of.. well you can guess that bit. It being Caz and her birthday I got presuaded to do a shot with her. I had to bend in a crude manner and suck to get a large shot of Absolut vodka. It was disgusting and many photos were taken. It was however really funny to watch Caz do the same. We left because Vicky was slowly freezing to death and we walked along the streets. There was a big band playing the offspring and I took a timeout to stand and sing in the crowd. We then found Club street which wasn't as amazing as it sounds before settling down in a bar on the econd floor. I had Sex on the Beach and the girls had a beer. I tried on my new shoes and tottered around in them. We talked about nothing before getting bored and leaving.
Vicky then led the way and we all went to a Karoke bar. It was really amazing and I was surprised at the amount of metal songs on there that you could sing. Vicky reay came out of her shell and proper went for it. We had such a fun time but eventually it was 10.30 and we needed to get home.
I caught a tube but the lines got mixed up so I'm home really late now.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: birthday, drinks, funny, ice man, penis, seouls, sub zero, vodka
34. STOP EATING PIZZA!
Hi,
So last night when I left you I got talkikng with my host family. They asked me about m day so I told them about the folk village. Suddenly everyone disapeared and returned with huge books, photo albums. Apparently mother and fathers first date was at the folk village. They met in 1991 and where married in 1995. He proposed on her birthday and sent 100 red roses, it was really cute. Father takes alot of photos and many where of mother. After this album the wedding photos came out. They had three cermonies, one was more western with a big white dress and a suit. They got married at Lotte World which is like Disneyland, in the castle and the photos are adorable, she looks like a princess. The next was traditional in Korea and was done at the folk village, she was done up in Geisha-est makeup and clothes and hidden for the entire cermony. The last was a resgistars office where a suit and plain white dress were worn. The pictures are amazing and she looks so beautiful, it was breathtaking.
Next we had the honeymoon pictures where I saw a picture of father in a speedo, disturbing isn't even close to the word I have in mind. They went to Jujedo island which is really picture perfect, think Hawii style. Then we just had general photos and towards the end she pointed to her stomach and plainly said , 'baby'. Next we had the birth pictures, it was a little gross, not type the pictures we'd show in the UK if you get me and then really cute baby photos, brother is so adorable, I think I'm going to adopt an Korean child.
A few days after the birth, mother and father went to Japan for a holiday whilst brother was handed over to his aunty. I thought this was really shocking, and she just kinda popped him out an then went on vaccation, crazy.
Anywho, today was Carolines birthday so I got up and showered and stuff before munching my food eally quick and going to uni. On the way up I bought a chocolate cake and gave it to my father to hide in the office. I met Caz in the lecture and she thanked me. In her hands she had a package so I welcomed her and sat down. I asked where Helena was only to find out that she wasn't in. This confused me as Helena had the presents, so how did Caz have presents already? I looked over confused and realised that the presents were different to the ones that we'd bought, now I was trying to text Helena to try and find out what was going on.
Helena came in late and gave Caz her presents which confused Caz as she realised the things in front of her were not from us. She said that Mahinda had given them and we told her that we knew nothing about it. Nonetheless, Caz opened her stuff and was so excited. She read the card first and was questioning our mesages about loosing our souls to one of the presents. She rifled through them trying to see which one was the special one and squealed when she saw her braclet. I was so happy that she liked it, it was so hard to make (see post no. 32). Caz also loved her book which I then teased her about due to the fact she's bee trying to buy it for days only for Helena and myself to distract her.
Break time came and we bunked off to the computer room to update our friends and family on Korean life. Helena pretended to go back to lecture but snuck off to the western bar with the cake. We all met at 12 and got interiewed by the Keele Uni students who are also making a film. We all walked to the western bar and ordered Pizzas, they were lovely and had wedges on top. About halfway through Caz said she was full and Helena and I tried to keep her from eating anymore as we still had the cake. Unfortunately Caz forced it down, I was slightly worried as the cake needed to be eaten ASAP. We grabbed the plates and told Caz to watch out stuff as we sorted the cake out, however being nosy as ever she came to clear stuff away, making me shove her down the ramp. I think it was worth the pushing however and she was excited to see the cake. We all struggled to eat apiece and decieded it would go to a good home in the international office to be munched on.
I'll update later but,
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: back in time post, birthday, korea, living, madu, paris baggette, party, seoul, students, tired, tried, wales
32. Never Make Jewellry
Hi,
So I couldn't update it properly on Wednesday back I'm writing this blog in the future now. After the protest me and Helena broke off and decieded to sort things out for Carolines Birthday. Our first task was to tryand convincve her not to go to the bookstore as one ofour plans was to buy the book that she was after. This took great skill and sneakiness and we managed to convince her to do some university work. We got the tube to the bookshop and picked up the book, God is Dead which has short stories in. We got it wrapped and went over to the artbox to pikc up wrapping paper and a few bits and bobs. Next we got a coffee and a tube over to Myeoung Dong and trailed around looking for this really cute store where my earrings are from. Apparently when shopping for my birthday Caroline really liked the idea of making a braclet so we figured this would be an aweome gift. We picked up a dragonfly, and some herat charms and the braclet. It was a DIY section and we figured it wouldn't be so hard to put the thing together. How very wrong we were. A combination of fake nails and chubby fingers did not help us trying to prise open a link, slip the charm on and plyers it back together. We had five charms and it was getting late. It took us about 40 minutes in all and there was much swearing and laughing in hysterics at the situation. The worse part was when we thought we'd finish only to notice that we'd put a charm on backwards. It was at that point that we were thinking a plyers and making Caroline make it herself. However we pervialed and the completed thing looks lovely.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: back in time post, birthday, caroline, cute, future, Jewellery
24. Part 2
Ding, ding, ding, BANG BANG BANG, BOOOOOSSSSHHHHH
That's what woke me up at 2.30Am, a guy going round with a bell, chanting and scraping against a wooden thingy. My three hours sleep was bizarre mainly due to the fact we were in a temple, on the floor. Everyone was getting up when I awoke and I put my stuff away into the locker. I put on my soaking trainers and we went to pee in the hole in the ground, it was an experience. I followed Helena and Lucy and we went to the main temple and started our prayers. My knees got weaker as we done Mantras and full prayer about 20+ times before being ushered out into the courtyard. We were arranged into pairs and one by one went up to slam this huge piece of wood into a massive bell with a Priest. It was really quite loud and meant to call the monks and nuns to prayer. I tried to bang it as loud as I could but the piece of wood took me with it and my attempt was quite feeble. I walked with the others up to main temple and we done mantras and prayers again. I felt really faint as this was about 5am and we hadn't eaten or drunk and had to keep getting up and down. This was for an hour or so, we were lucky as we had a nun in front of us that we just copied the entire time.
After morning prayers we got back to the hall and was greeted by the most awesome monk ever who had this tinkle in his eye. He taught us this really fun meditation and spoke in such a way that we didn't need a translator. We were shown some Buddhist self defence using the international guy as 'a bad man'. We also done some crazy exercises that made everyone laugh, like swinging our arms, doing some sort of JudoBallet combination, it was just too funny. I wish we'd filmed it. Afterwards he let us 'meditate' by lying on the floor and closing our eyes. We done this for an hour and had free time afterwards.
The big dong rung for Breakfast and we all hurried to find.. Babimbap. I had some rice and was told it was bad to waste any which was really annoying as it had these horrible beans in it. I also had some water and tea. Caroline has the same and afterwards we washed our plates out the back and said thank you for the meals.
As the night had been rainy, we couldn't do mountain walking as it was slippery so we got to make our own prayer beads. We had to count 108 out and a big bead. We threaded everything on and then laughed as everyone struggled doing the knots. I'm just Glad scoobies were in fashion when I went to school otherwise I would've never understand the ending pattern and how to finish off the excess wire and thread. I laughed at took pictures of the International guy as revenge and we talked about anime and manga, it was nice and relaxing.
After beads we had more free time before having traditional temple tea and an 'about me' section. The tea was lovely and I tried to drink the 20 cups but only managed about 10 altogether. They brought round the sticky gooey pasta and I warned everyone about it. People tried it only for them to tell me I was right in my description.
A short monk then came over about 10Am ish and we went on a tour of the temple grounds and the museum. Somethings were really interesting but I think generally everyone was really tired and didn't pay much attention. I was shocked to learn that the temple is open to the public to prayer, just like a church. It was weird because I just assumed that only Monks and Nuns could go there. Many Koreans stopped to talk to us and ask us questions. I told a story about the Chinese zodiac to the International guys and they told me one about a turtle in return. They also helped me in the gift shop as I wanted something for year of the Horse, having a friend being able to read Korean comes in handy when you need to buy things.
Next I toured the museum in the temples and was amazed at how old everything was, all made in roughly 1760 or something, crazy. We got to do screen printing of Buddhist texts and pictures too which is a lovely memento to have. The lady doing mine was evil though and made sure it came our perfect. I'm glad in a way by my hands are still covered in ink!
We then heard the dong for lunch which was the same thing as breakfast but with added noodles. I tried a rice thing wrapped in tofu, it was quite yummy but strange along with pineapple which made my mouth sore due to a reaction to the fruit.
Luckily after dinner we had more free time and were able to change into our wet, but normal clothes which was a relief! I was dead happy to be our of our prison ware. Helena told me that her roommate in Sweden was sent to a temple as punishment for bad grades once, I think I can see why it's a fitting punishment!
We gave our gifts and collected our things before saying goodbye. The others visited the tombs but I wasn't interested and just slept on the bus until we got to Dongguk. I'm at the flat now, and am very tired typing this. It's nice to be home and I had such a great experience at the temple, we have so many things for the DVD, mainly bloopers though!
I've been thinking alot about my course in life and I'm debating restarting the year but am still unsure. It feels like I should be doing something more creative at University.
I'd like to say thank you for my birthday messages, it was very nice of everyone!
Anyway, Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: bath spa university, birthday, bu, Buddha, merthyr tydfil, teapot, temple stay, tire seoul, tired
23. Part 1
Goodness me!
Well after I left you, sleep deprived from the night before we wandered around in the tipping rain and had many coffees. We bought some snacks from the shop because we didn't know what the food would be like in the temple. We walked down to the university temple and borded a bus, heading straight to the back. I got out my hat and my video camera and Caroline sung happy birthday to me, it was amazing. We waited for the Keele students to finish their lectures and come on the bus along with the 2 international guys and Mahinda. We were soon on our way but had to stop numberous times due to the fact that the windscreen wipers were broken and the rain was making it impossible to drive.
So we arrived and got out stuff out the bus and trekked up these stairs. We passed these big scary gaurdians on the way in, they were huge and watch over the temple. We then went over to the main hall and took off our shoes, which were sopping anyway. Next we went inside and got our name badges for the visit. All the girls were ushered into a cuboard type thing and we were given the most baggiest, unflattering temple uniform ever. It was orange and about a size 18 which flogged us all. We came out, embrassed at our new uniforms and sat on the mats in front of the alter. Next the men went in and got green temple clothes and sat besides us. The next hour was us being shown how to prayer. You stand, hands together, bow, on your knees, head to the floor, hands up, then down, bring into yourself before standing up again. It was tiring and we were told we had to do it 108 times, it was crazy! We got some information about the temple but were unable to look around due to the weather. Instead our mats were placed in a square and mini tables brought out and cups where we had to make lotus flowers with a wish inside. It was really flidderly and Caroline made fun of mine until karma attacked her and it went wrong. A temple lady helped me with mine and then gave me hers as well, a birthday present she said. We then got to place our lotus flowers to the buddha who would rid the world of destress for us and grant our wishes. I think he was having a day off though because neither of mine came true.
However, all of a sudden the room went quiet and everyone started to sing happy birthday and Lucy brought out a chocolate cake. I was really really excited and blew out my candles. I made the first cut but made my international guy do the rest of the cutting. Caroline reckons he fancies me as he lingers round me and asks millions of questions, along with photos to match.
This was at 10pm and we ate cake, coke and watermelon before packing away and getting out our mates for the floor. We made a bed type thing with prayer mats, sleeping bag and blanket nicked from home, it was really comfy. Girls were on the left and guys on the right with a very naff curtain seperating us both. We slept in our uniforms which was annoying as we brought nighties to stay in, thinking we'd need them. I got out my camera and turned on the Night vision, it was realy funny as Lucy grabbed Carolines foot making her jump. We slept by the buddha, figuring that it was the safetst place to be.
-Angharad
Labels: birthday, Buddha, lotus flower, men, rain, sleeping bag, storm, temple stay, watermelon, yongjoosa
22. Raindrops keep falling on my head
Hiya,
So I'm already 19 in Korean and still 18 in Britian. It's crazy, I'm so old. I got up and packed for the temple an had the quicket breakfast known to man before grabbing my cards and present and going. The tube annoyed me because I couldn't get a seat althought I had about 5 bags with me, so annoying. I got into a small arguement with a Korean girl too cause she nicked the seat I wanted, it sucked. However my mood was lifted when I got into uni and had cards and presents to open. I got some stickeres, face mask, nail varnish and the cutest earrings off the girls and new charms for my braclet off my parents along with some spending money! I'm really happy about it. We had our last ever lecture and graduation of Indian Buddhism so I have a nice folder with a diploma certificate, it's all good.
We said our thanks to Professor Bronkhurst and gave him a card, he signed our fans for us as a momento and hopefully we'll be seeing hin in Bath for a special lecture. We all popped over to the international office and dropped off our stuff before going to food. I just had soup as I'm not up to eating much at the moment. We had a chat with Mahinda and currently we're in the computer rooms waiting to leave.
My birthday is quite uneventful, I can't say what it's like because I'm bored and we celebrated yesterday. Overall I'm just waiting to go home now.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: 19, age, bath house, bath spa university, birthday, buddhism, cards, girl, mahinda, metro, seoul, soup, tired
35. The Ice Man
Hello,
So I've just come in and what a night! We went shopping for a bit and I got a dress and earrings and then we set off with Vicky, Caroline's student,to find the ice bar. We eventually got there and paid 15000won to get in. We were given huge coats and snow boats and a free drink. Now I should've known by the word ICE that it was going to be cold but I didn't quite grasp the concept. The drinks however really warmed me up and we jumped around.
Now Caroline pointed out a big statue of a man, and we realised that there was a tube coming out of.. well you can guess that bit. It being Caz and her birthday I got presuaded to do a shot with her. I had to bend in a crude manner and suck to get a large shot of Absolut vodka. It was disgusting and many photos were taken. It was however really funny to watch Caz do the same. We left because Vicky was slowly freezing to death and we walked along the streets. There was a big band playing the offspring and I took a timeout to stand and sing in the crowd. We then found Club street which wasn't as amazing as it sounds before settling down in a bar on the econd floor. I had Sex on the Beach and the girls had a beer. I tried on my new shoes and tottered around in them. We talked about nothing before getting bored and leaving.
Vicky then led the way and we all went to a Karoke bar. It was really amazing and I was surprised at the amount of metal songs on there that you could sing. Vicky reay came out of her shell and proper went for it. We had such a fun time but eventually it was 10.30 and we needed to get home.
I caught a tube but the lines got mixed up so I'm home really late now.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: birthday, drinks, funny, ice man, penis, seouls, sub zero, vodka
34. STOP EATING PIZZA!
Hi,
So last night when I left you I got talkikng with my host family. They asked me about m day so I told them about the folk village. Suddenly everyone disapeared and returned with huge books, photo albums. Apparently mother and fathers first date was at the folk village. They met in 1991 and where married in 1995. He proposed on her birthday and sent 100 red roses, it was really cute. Father takes alot of photos and many where of mother. After this album the wedding photos came out. They had three cermonies, one was more western with a big white dress and a suit. They got married at Lotte World which is like Disneyland, in the castle and the photos are adorable, she looks like a princess. The next was traditional in Korea and was done at the folk village, she was done up in Geisha-est makeup and clothes and hidden for the entire cermony. The last was a resgistars office where a suit and plain white dress were worn. The pictures are amazing and she looks so beautiful, it was breathtaking.
Next we had the honeymoon pictures where I saw a picture of father in a speedo, disturbing isn't even close to the word I have in mind. They went to Jujedo island which is really picture perfect, think Hawii style. Then we just had general photos and towards the end she pointed to her stomach and plainly said , 'baby'. Next we had the birth pictures, it was a little gross, not type the pictures we'd show in the UK if you get me and then really cute baby photos, brother is so adorable, I think I'm going to adopt an Korean child.
A few days after the birth, mother and father went to Japan for a holiday whilst brother was handed over to his aunty. I thought this was really shocking, and she just kinda popped him out an then went on vaccation, crazy.
Anywho, today was Carolines birthday so I got up and showered and stuff before munching my food eally quick and going to uni. On the way up I bought a chocolate cake and gave it to my father to hide in the office. I met Caz in the lecture and she thanked me. In her hands she had a package so I welcomed her and sat down. I asked where Helena was only to find out that she wasn't in. This confused me as Helena had the presents, so how did Caz have presents already? I looked over confused and realised that the presents were different to the ones that we'd bought, now I was trying to text Helena to try and find out what was going on.
Helena came in late and gave Caz her presents which confused Caz as she realised the things in front of her were not from us. She said that Mahinda had given them and we told her that we knew nothing about it. Nonetheless, Caz opened her stuff and was so excited. She read the card first and was questioning our mesages about loosing our souls to one of the presents. She rifled through them trying to see which one was the special one and squealed when she saw her braclet. I was so happy that she liked it, it was so hard to make (see post no. 32). Caz also loved her book which I then teased her about due to the fact she's bee trying to buy it for days only for Helena and myself to distract her.
Break time came and we bunked off to the computer room to update our friends and family on Korean life. Helena pretended to go back to lecture but snuck off to the western bar with the cake. We all met at 12 and got interiewed by the Keele Uni students who are also making a film. We all walked to the western bar and ordered Pizzas, they were lovely and had wedges on top. About halfway through Caz said she was full and Helena and I tried to keep her from eating anymore as we still had the cake. Unfortunately Caz forced it down, I was slightly worried as the cake needed to be eaten ASAP. We grabbed the plates and told Caz to watch out stuff as we sorted the cake out, however being nosy as ever she came to clear stuff away, making me shove her down the ramp. I think it was worth the pushing however and she was excited to see the cake. We all struggled to eat apiece and decieded it would go to a good home in the international office to be munched on.
I'll update later but,
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: back in time post, birthday, korea, living, madu, paris baggette, party, seoul, students, tired, tried, wales
32. Never Make Jewellry
Hi,
So I couldn't update it properly on Wednesday back I'm writing this blog in the future now. After the protest me and Helena broke off and decieded to sort things out for Carolines Birthday. Our first task was to tryand convincve her not to go to the bookstore as one ofour plans was to buy the book that she was after. This took great skill and sneakiness and we managed to convince her to do some university work. We got the tube to the bookshop and picked up the book, God is Dead which has short stories in. We got it wrapped and went over to the artbox to pikc up wrapping paper and a few bits and bobs. Next we got a coffee and a tube over to Myeoung Dong and trailed around looking for this really cute store where my earrings are from. Apparently when shopping for my birthday Caroline really liked the idea of making a braclet so we figured this would be an aweome gift. We picked up a dragonfly, and some herat charms and the braclet. It was a DIY section and we figured it wouldn't be so hard to put the thing together. How very wrong we were. A combination of fake nails and chubby fingers did not help us trying to prise open a link, slip the charm on and plyers it back together. We had five charms and it was getting late. It took us about 40 minutes in all and there was much swearing and laughing in hysterics at the situation. The worse part was when we thought we'd finish only to notice that we'd put a charm on backwards. It was at that point that we were thinking a plyers and making Caroline make it herself. However we pervialed and the completed thing looks lovely.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: back in time post, birthday, caroline, cute, future, Jewellery
24. Part 2
Ding, ding, ding, BANG BANG BANG, BOOOOOSSSSHHHHH
That's what woke me up at 2.30Am, a guy going round with a bell, chanting and scraping against a wooden thingy. My three hours sleep was bizarre mainly due to the fact we were in a temple, on the floor. Everyone was getting up when I awoke and I put my stuff away into the locker. I put on my soaking trainers and we went to pee in the hole in the ground, it was an experience. I followed Helena and Lucy and we went to the main temple and started our prayers. My knees got weaker as we done Mantras and full prayer about 20+ times before being ushered out into the courtyard. We were arranged into pairs and one by one went up to slam this huge piece of wood into a massive bell with a Priest. It was really quite loud and meant to call the monks and nuns to prayer. I tried to bang it as loud as I could but the piece of wood took me with it and my attempt was quite feeble. I walked with the others up to main temple and we done mantras and prayers again. I felt really faint as this was about 5am and we hadn't eaten or drunk and had to keep getting up and down. This was for an hour or so, we were lucky as we had a nun in front of us that we just copied the entire time.
After morning prayers we got back to the hall and was greeted by the most awesome monk ever who had this tinkle in his eye. He taught us this really fun meditation and spoke in such a way that we didn't need a translator. We were shown some Buddhist self defence using the international guy as 'a bad man'. We also done some crazy exercises that made everyone laugh, like swinging our arms, doing some sort of JudoBallet combination, it was just too funny. I wish we'd filmed it. Afterwards he let us 'meditate' by lying on the floor and closing our eyes. We done this for an hour and had free time afterwards.
The big dong rung for Breakfast and we all hurried to find.. Babimbap. I had some rice and was told it was bad to waste any which was really annoying as it had these horrible beans in it. I also had some water and tea. Caroline has the same and afterwards we washed our plates out the back and said thank you for the meals.
As the night had been rainy, we couldn't do mountain walking as it was slippery so we got to make our own prayer beads. We had to count 108 out and a big bead. We threaded everything on and then laughed as everyone struggled doing the knots. I'm just Glad scoobies were in fashion when I went to school otherwise I would've never understand the ending pattern and how to finish off the excess wire and thread. I laughed at took pictures of the International guy as revenge and we talked about anime and manga, it was nice and relaxing.
After beads we had more free time before having traditional temple tea and an 'about me' section. The tea was lovely and I tried to drink the 20 cups but only managed about 10 altogether. They brought round the sticky gooey pasta and I warned everyone about it. People tried it only for them to tell me I was right in my description.
A short monk then came over about 10Am ish and we went on a tour of the temple grounds and the museum. Somethings were really interesting but I think generally everyone was really tired and didn't pay much attention. I was shocked to learn that the temple is open to the public to prayer, just like a church. It was weird because I just assumed that only Monks and Nuns could go there. Many Koreans stopped to talk to us and ask us questions. I told a story about the Chinese zodiac to the International guys and they told me one about a turtle in return. They also helped me in the gift shop as I wanted something for year of the Horse, having a friend being able to read Korean comes in handy when you need to buy things.
Next I toured the museum in the temples and was amazed at how old everything was, all made in roughly 1760 or something, crazy. We got to do screen printing of Buddhist texts and pictures too which is a lovely memento to have. The lady doing mine was evil though and made sure it came our perfect. I'm glad in a way by my hands are still covered in ink!
We then heard the dong for lunch which was the same thing as breakfast but with added noodles. I tried a rice thing wrapped in tofu, it was quite yummy but strange along with pineapple which made my mouth sore due to a reaction to the fruit.
Luckily after dinner we had more free time and were able to change into our wet, but normal clothes which was a relief! I was dead happy to be our of our prison ware. Helena told me that her roommate in Sweden was sent to a temple as punishment for bad grades once, I think I can see why it's a fitting punishment!
We gave our gifts and collected our things before saying goodbye. The others visited the tombs but I wasn't interested and just slept on the bus until we got to Dongguk. I'm at the flat now, and am very tired typing this. It's nice to be home and I had such a great experience at the temple, we have so many things for the DVD, mainly bloopers though!
I've been thinking alot about my course in life and I'm debating restarting the year but am still unsure. It feels like I should be doing something more creative at University.
I'd like to say thank you for my birthday messages, it was very nice of everyone!
Anyway, Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: bath spa university, birthday, bu, Buddha, merthyr tydfil, teapot, temple stay, tire seoul, tired
23. Part 1
Goodness me!
Well after I left you, sleep deprived from the night before we wandered around in the tipping rain and had many coffees. We bought some snacks from the shop because we didn't know what the food would be like in the temple. We walked down to the university temple and borded a bus, heading straight to the back. I got out my hat and my video camera and Caroline sung happy birthday to me, it was amazing. We waited for the Keele students to finish their lectures and come on the bus along with the 2 international guys and Mahinda. We were soon on our way but had to stop numberous times due to the fact that the windscreen wipers were broken and the rain was making it impossible to drive.
So we arrived and got out stuff out the bus and trekked up these stairs. We passed these big scary gaurdians on the way in, they were huge and watch over the temple. We then went over to the main hall and took off our shoes, which were sopping anyway. Next we went inside and got our name badges for the visit. All the girls were ushered into a cuboard type thing and we were given the most baggiest, unflattering temple uniform ever. It was orange and about a size 18 which flogged us all. We came out, embrassed at our new uniforms and sat on the mats in front of the alter. Next the men went in and got green temple clothes and sat besides us. The next hour was us being shown how to prayer. You stand, hands together, bow, on your knees, head to the floor, hands up, then down, bring into yourself before standing up again. It was tiring and we were told we had to do it 108 times, it was crazy! We got some information about the temple but were unable to look around due to the weather. Instead our mats were placed in a square and mini tables brought out and cups where we had to make lotus flowers with a wish inside. It was really flidderly and Caroline made fun of mine until karma attacked her and it went wrong. A temple lady helped me with mine and then gave me hers as well, a birthday present she said. We then got to place our lotus flowers to the buddha who would rid the world of destress for us and grant our wishes. I think he was having a day off though because neither of mine came true.
However, all of a sudden the room went quiet and everyone started to sing happy birthday and Lucy brought out a chocolate cake. I was really really excited and blew out my candles. I made the first cut but made my international guy do the rest of the cutting. Caroline reckons he fancies me as he lingers round me and asks millions of questions, along with photos to match.
This was at 10pm and we ate cake, coke and watermelon before packing away and getting out our mates for the floor. We made a bed type thing with prayer mats, sleeping bag and blanket nicked from home, it was really comfy. Girls were on the left and guys on the right with a very naff curtain seperating us both. We slept in our uniforms which was annoying as we brought nighties to stay in, thinking we'd need them. I got out my camera and turned on the Night vision, it was realy funny as Lucy grabbed Carolines foot making her jump. We slept by the buddha, figuring that it was the safetst place to be.
-Angharad
Labels: birthday, Buddha, lotus flower, men, rain, sleeping bag, storm, temple stay, watermelon, yongjoosa
22. Raindrops keep falling on my head
Hiya,
So I'm already 19 in Korean and still 18 in Britian. It's crazy, I'm so old. I got up and packed for the temple an had the quicket breakfast known to man before grabbing my cards and present and going. The tube annoyed me because I couldn't get a seat althought I had about 5 bags with me, so annoying. I got into a small arguement with a Korean girl too cause she nicked the seat I wanted, it sucked. However my mood was lifted when I got into uni and had cards and presents to open. I got some stickeres, face mask, nail varnish and the cutest earrings off the girls and new charms for my braclet off my parents along with some spending money! I'm really happy about it. We had our last ever lecture and graduation of Indian Buddhism so I have a nice folder with a diploma certificate, it's all good.
We said our thanks to Professor Bronkhurst and gave him a card, he signed our fans for us as a momento and hopefully we'll be seeing hin in Bath for a special lecture. We all popped over to the international office and dropped off our stuff before going to food. I just had soup as I'm not up to eating much at the moment. We had a chat with Mahinda and currently we're in the computer rooms waiting to leave.
My birthday is quite uneventful, I can't say what it's like because I'm bored and we celebrated yesterday. Overall I'm just waiting to go home now.
Logging off for now,
Angharad
Labels: 19, age, bath house, bath spa university, birthday, buddhism, cards, girl, mahinda, metro, seoul, soup, tired
Designer : Cynna
Welcome to my blog. This is my blog to keep you all updated on what I'm doing in Korea. Hopefully you can follow me on my adventure, I'll be sure to upload lots of pictures and to tell you what I'm doing each day!!
Small, Welsh, 18 years young. Mrs Edwards to be! Studying in Bath Spa. Living in Merthyr Tydfil. <3
