In May, I went to the ROKs western shore to check out the sea with a lot of teachers at my main school. It was a way to reward the teachers for all of their hard work disguised as a "training trip." But, you didn't hear that from me. It was an all-expenses paid overnight trip. They also gave us each 10,000won to buy snacks when we made a pit-stop. We left school on Friday afternoon around 3:15. The bus ride was pretty uneventful, as everyone used the time to sleep. I couldn't really sleep, so I read an e-book.

Our first stop was about an hour and a half in (the halfway point). We went to a rest stop that had lots of food stalls, carts selling big hats, sunscreen, sunglasses, sunbrellas, and everything else anti-sun that you can think of. Korean people typically tend to stay out of the sun as to not ruin their porcelain white skin. Either that or they're vampires. That would explain all of the blood sausage. 


When we got to the sea, we stopped to walk on a really futuristic looking stairway/bridge situation. I thought we were going to cross to the island on the other side, but we just walked to about the middle, took pictures, and turned around and got back on the bus. The smell by the water here reminded me of the beach...on a really bad day. It was really overpowering, and I was really happy when we got back on the bus. 

We rode to the cutest little pension where we'd be staying. I was rooming with my younger co-teacher, and two of the younger teachers. Our rooms name was Versailles, and it had two bedrooms (I shared a bed with my coteacher and it only made us closer), a nice kitchen, and a huge bathroom. After dropping off our things, we hopped back on the bus for dinner. As we were at the sea, the weekend's menu was sure to include nothing but fish, which I'm not a fan on. Allllll of the fish. There was raw fish, cooked fish, crabs, clams, wriggly live octopus (that's a stretch, considering it was chopped up, but it was still moving. I voluntarily ate some fried shrimp. It wasn't bad. 

One of the head teachers organized with the restaurant to cook up a good ol' fashioned pot of kimchi jjigae (a kimchi stew) for me. It was actually very delicious, considering it's not on the menu. It tasted like the owner just rolled her sleeves up and cooked it as though she were cooking for her family. I ate until I was stuffed, and drank quite a bit without catching a buzz. 

Our next destination was to a light festival that's name alludes me at the moment. It was beautiful. It reminded me so much of being home around Christmas. My dad would take us kids to see the houses with beautiful lights. We'd sometimes drive a good 45 minutes away to catch a Christmas light show. Even as a teenager, and as an adult, I looked forward to going with my dad and sister (after my brothers were out of the house) to see them. The night was fun, the temperature was great, and the lights were amazing.








We headed back to the pension, where many teachers stayed up playing Korean poker. But, since I couldn't sleep on the bus, I was beat. My co-teacher and I headed to Versailles, I took a shower, and we crashed for the night. It's good that I got a lot of rest, because the next day was action-packed. More on that later, though
As a college student, I constantly blamed busy class schedules and endless homework assignments for my lack of motivation when it comes to writing. There was a time when I loved writing. It didn't really matter whether I was writing about my feelings, my day, a poem, a short story, an essay...it really didn't matter. I just enjoyed the act of putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard. In college, I only wrote for the purpose of passing classes. Nothing more. I didn't feel like I was writing creatively enough for my liking. As a sophomore, I took an essay writing class. I wrote personal essays. It was reflective, liberating, and dare I say, creative. As a junior, I wrote papers about Shakespeare. They were analytical, concise, academic, and yet, they were fun to write. As a senior, I took a class about creativity, and what it means to be creative. My mind was opened to the idea that maybe college wasn't stifling my creativity, but allowing me to be creative in more mediums than I would have pushed myself in before. After that, I allowed myself to dabble in different forms of media to get my point across. I was dipping my toes into the vast possibilities that composing post-undergrad could afford me.

BUT. And there's always a but, isn't there? Since graduation, I've found myself more stagnant than ever before. I'm lazy. I wake up, I go to work, I go home and eat dinner and  go to bed. Now I have to ask myself. When did I fall out of love with writing? When did I extinguish the flame of inspiration inside of me? How much longer can I blame my university for robbing me of something that I willingly gave to them. Every time I sit down to write, I allow trivial things get in my way. I get distracted by Facebook (seriously, what is with my recent reclamation of all things Facebook?). So I'm making some promises to myself. I want to fall in love with writing again. I want to push myself to write everyday, and I a posting it here in order to hold myself accountable. Next time, I should make some promises to myself about exercising, but that's neither here nor there.

Anyway, listing things, let's go! I promise to:

1. Keep a journal on my desk at home.


my new journal. 


I will start keeping a journal, to write down a bit about my day, every day. I used to love writing the good ol' fashioned way (no not clay tablets). I'll reclaim my love of writing by sitting down with a journal to recount my days. This will also be helpful when I want to look back on my life and write that memoir. Or maybe, just to keep me from letting anything from this beautiful adventure called life slip by unnoticed.

I got this idea from something I saw on Facebook (oh, irony). But, a woman wrote about how a grade school teacher made her write in a journal at the end of class everyday, and at first she fudged around and wrote a bunch of nonsense, but after a couple of weeks she really started writing about her day, and her feelings, and it allowed her to think reflectively about not only her own actions, but the actions of those around her. She felt as though the act benefited her so much that she continued to do it everyday for the next 30 years. I'm inspired.

2. Sit down and work on posts for this blog three times a week.

I have more free time here in Korea than I know what to do with. Teaching here is relatively stress-free. As an unwed, 23-year old, all of my superiors here are pretty much convinced that I can't do anything more difficult than laundry. And even laundry would be a stretch for them This is a culture of coddling, and they are surprised any time I tell a story about traveling on public transportation without a native speaker. What does that mean for me? No work really gets delegated to me outside of preparing for my 19 classes a week, and a weekly English broadcast. I want to start using my free time for writing. It's a more honorable way to spend my time compared to the hours of web surfing I allow myself. 

3. Update this blog twice a week.

I made this blog to keep my family updated, but I haven't exactly been doing that. My family has to beg me for pictures, and I end up sending about 35 at one time to make up for it. Actually updating my blog allows me to be held accountable for those posts I was working on all week. And accountability is everything. How else would you know whether or not I've been actually keeping these promises?

4. Record more.

I have a great camera that my dad bought me. It's just what I wanted to capture my daily life here in Korea, as well as to work on a skill that I've always been interested in: video editing. The problem is, I can't edit video that I don't have. I wanted my time in Korea to be a time of skill building on top of experience building. I promise to record more, to give myself a reason to open up iMovie more often.

So there you have it. I hope by making these promises to myself, I can fall in love with creating again.