Go Go Gadget Sports

All right, my thoughts about my school's Sports Day is long overdue and will be my most epic post yet. Our school had this event roughly 3 weeks ago. When I heard about our Sports Day, I was intrigued of what would take place. The teachers were supposed to participate with our own team, but we ended up not participating (to my disappointment). This was a great time to see my students show their cheerful side since they study almost non-stop. Many of them have school plus academy from 8:30 am to 10 pm every day, so this day was definitely well-deserved! We started out by playing the familiar sports, basketball and soccer. Basketball was stopped after 10 minutes when students started chucking shots from NBA 3 point range and half court. The soccer mini-tournament went much better and students showed some nice skills. Everything else revolved around the track and field. Some of the events were somewhat bizarre at first, but it was very entertaining to watch! It was a great time overall and the students showed great competitive spirit. I'd like to thank all of the teachers for providing me with these images. For next semester, I'm hoping I get to participate in the 2nd Sports Day!

 Students warming up before all the events

 Look at how intense the students look in this race!

 For this relay, all of the students bend down for the lightest student to walk on their backs. This event is called the "bridge relay". The students in the back will then run towards the front to advance the bridge.

This event gets pretty crazy once the students are fully in motion. It reminded me of one of those kung fu movies where the main character prances over the people's shoulders to run away from the enemy. This inspired me to watch a martial arts movie afterward...

I was amazed by how the coordination of the students. None of them wiped out, and it looked liked they all had fun.

 I was tempted to grab a pair of scuba flippers and start running on the track.

 Some students doing the 110 meter hoop roll with their wands.

 This was the first of a four part obstacle relay. The students had to run to this spot, then pop the balloon before they could continue running. It was kind of funny seeing the students get frustrated when they couldn't pop their balloons on their first attempt. 

 For the second obstacle, the students had to break through this net. The student wearing orange did a dead sprint into the net. He successfully went through with little resistance, but suffered a few rope burns...

The third obstacle is similar to the potato sack race.

For the last obstacle, the students were jumping over "hurdles". The mats behind the hurdles used to reduce injury are not very soft, but I guess that's better than plunging face first into the sand!

A competition is not the same without the classic tug-of-war.

Our principal being a bit camera shy. Here I was talking to one of my co-teachers and him about activities that are done in American middle schools.

  One of the pictures my co-teachers took of me with the 7th grade students.

The final event was the 400 meter relay.

The 8th grade "Bee Team" celebrating their victory! All of the other 8th graders looked so disappointed...

The winning teams coming up to claim their prizes.

Crouching Eel, Hidden Chicken....

Preparing eel for the grill. The crazy part was seeing our server literally take out the swimming eel from the tank, wrapping it up in foil, and simmer them alive. Despite seeing part of my dinner roasting to death, the eel was pretty good after it was grilled.

Can anyone guess why my friends look ready to reach out and grab someone with their "claws"? That's because this entree happens to be chicken feet! While the taste itself was not bad, I'm not sure if this is something I'd be drooling over for dinner....

Pre-Summer Hiking

Since the hot & humid summer is about to arrive in full force, I decided to go on one more hike. Daegu becomes especially humid since the city is surrounded by mountains, trapping the warm air. Mount Apsan wraps around half of the city, so we were treated to some great overhead views.

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The starting point of our hike. We were deciding which trails to take to the summit.

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Interesting Dining Decor

 The entrance to a restaurant I went to with our faculty English club. The song "All We Need is Love" would be appropriate here.

 I like the glass walkway with the pebbles and rocks.

 This was the booth we ended up sitting in. If you're wondering why there is just a backpack with no one else sitting here, I was the first person to be finished with the restroom.

Street Art

Here is some paint spray art from Busan. The artists were working on this for the entire day and here are the best ones.

Dessert is Served...

Some cake that the students made for their home skills class. These were the first three cakes we had to try and six more were brought in later on. It was kind of cute how the female students came up to me and said, "Teacher, you should try my cake. It's very delicious!" I told them that all of their cakes were delicious, which was the truth!  

Artsy Music & Dance Invite

One of my friends sent me these pictures of our attendance at a creative arts performance. This happened back in late April, but I figured it was worth posting. The principal at my school was very kind to invite five other native English teachers and myself. His son and daughter had a part in the performance and both of them performed quite well.

Best Ramen ever!

We found a ramen shop where you can get a meal and sides for about $5. The sides are pretty good if you like fried tofu, cucumber salad w/ pineapple dressing, and dried squid. Fresh ramen is a huge difference from the instant kind I was used to eating. The creamy beef broth was amazing. I won't ever look at ramen the same again!

Jumping in Haeundae

 Here's a nice candid beach shot.

After the sixth try, our jumping photo was a success!

Steady Hands in the Sand

One of the main attractions in Busan is their beaches. Many Koreans recommended visiting Haeundae Beach, which is supposed to be one of the famous beaches in Korea. Since its Memorial Weekend in Korea, I figured this would be a good time to visit this beach. I was pleasantly surprised since there happened to be a Sand Sculpture Festival going on here. All of the sculptures were awesome and incredibly detailed. I wanted to take pictures of all of them, but there is only so much that I can do with a cell phone camera. Still took some decent pictures regardless. I'll never look at a sand castle the same way again!

As you can see, these sculptures are have a great amount detail.

I think this is the Sword in the Stone, but I'm not completely sure.

One of my friend's pictures showing someone working on this sculpture earlier in the day.

A tale with a familiar theme for this sculpture.

 Who could forget the signature grin of this cat?

 I'm late, I'm late

 Off with his head!

 Follow the yellow brick road....

He came with them to fulfill his wish of courage.