29 January 2014

Veinticinco Meters

So it has been awhile since I have written.  It’s because I have been a little busy traveling.  A couple weeks ago I booked a plane ticket and then a few short days later I flew down to the Philippines.  The Philippines is a country that does have a mix of influence from different countries some of which include: Portugal, Spain, and United States.  The main language of the Philippines is called Tagalog and it does have the influence of the different countries.  So for example the numbers are the same as in Spanish and also some of the colors are the same.  Besides that Tagalog is its own language with different dialects for the different area of the Philippines.  I particular was around the Cebuano dialect because I went to Cebu Island.  Even though I didn't know any Tagalog before going to the Philippines I was still able to communicate and get around just fine.  That is because English is the second official language of the Philippines. 

Heading down to the Philippines I had a couple of things in mind to do.  First thing was to find a warmer place for vacation, which wasn’t that hard to get out of the daily freezing temperatures in Korea.  Another reason for the Philippines was for the scuba diving.  I flew into Cebu City and then headed to a small town to the south west of Cebu City.  This town is called Moalboal.  It is a small town where people mainly go to scuba dive.  I ended up staying in the small town for seven nights and tried to scuba dive as much as possible.  I ended up not diving that much because the weather was bad the whole time I was down there.  There were about three days in a row where the dive shop I was at nobody was out diving.  In Moalboal it is possible to do shore dives but with the strong current and waves the visibility wasn’t good so that is why not much diving.  The dives that I did do were considered wall dives where we either swam out or jumped off the boat and went down to depth and followed this huge wall with coral and life on it.  With the overcast skies it was usually dark down at depth but I was able to see some neat things.  Some of the smaller things were: Pygmy seahorses (the two I saw were smaller than my own thumb), anemone fish, banner fish, porcelain crab, nudibranch, stone fish, scorpion fish, sea fans, eels, and various other coral fish.  A bigger thing that I did see was a bait ball.  I did see it a couple times and it is a big school of sardines that swim together for protection.  One time watching them there was some bigger fish trying to eat and the sardines would all swim as one avoiding the big fish.  It was this big huge shifting cloud that stretched for some time.  That was neat to see but I think the neatest thing was this: 

I have seen turtles before and this was the third one while in the Philippines but I think this one was the neatest.  This particular turtle was sleeping and didn’t even know we were around.  Plus the turtle is resting its head right next to some anemone and so the anemone fish were swimming around looking scared.  It was a good size turtle but simply the circumstances we found it in, sleeping was real neat.
 One of the days I did take a day trip over to Oslob (a smaller town on the south eastern side of Cebu) in order to go snorkeling.  I snorkeled in order to get close to these creatures:



Whale sharks have been hanging around Oslob for some time now.  There were about four different ones and were pretty big.  Also the same day of the whale sharks I did visit a waterfall:


The water fall is known as Kawasan Falls.  It is a three layered waterfall system but I just saw two of them.  It is about a ten minute walk back to the first fall through a jungle type atmosphere with lots of green trees.

After spending a little over a week relaxing and hanging out by the ocean it was time to fly back to Korea.  The last couple of days there hasn't been any work.  School starts back again on Monday for everyone.  Tomorrow there is a group of us who will be going snowboarding and skiing.  I will write later. Here are some more pictures from the Philippines.    

Typical dive boat 




Eel


Porcelain crab


Lion fish 




They feed by sucking in water like a vacuum and releasing out gills. 


    

08 January 2014

Holidays Korean Style

Holiday season has come and gone with the New Year.  In Korea there is a big difference in the way both Christmas and the New Year is celebrated compared to United States.  In Korea these holidays aren’t as big and don’t have as big of a meaning as in Western culture.  Christmas in Korea is actually more of a holiday for people who are dating.  Simply it is used as a day to have a date and hang out together.  Then the very next day it is back to normal with nothing that special happening.  Since Christmas was Wednesday this past year, everyone worked on Tuesday, had Wednesday off and then right back to work on Thursday.  Plus there wasn’t that much commercialisation of the holiday around the small town I live.  I was up in Seoul in early December and there was a little bit more commercialisation at that time, but still nothing compared to back in the states.  They do have Christmas music that is both in English and in Korean.  The beat and sound of the music is pretty close to the same even if it is in Korean.  That music did start playing in a few of the cafes around Thanksgiving time, but it wasn’t just Christmas music the whole entire time.  The soundtrack playing did have both Christmas songs and then the typical Korean pop.  One of my co-workers on the day before Christmas talked about Christmas with me and he simply said: “It’s a Western holiday and not celebrated in Korea."  That quote does sum it up for how Christmas does ‘work’ in Korea. 

The January 1st New Year in Korea isn’t as big either as the one back in the states.  I do clarify the January 1st New Year because Korea traditionally did follow the lunar calendar.  The lunar new year is still yet to come but I imagine it will be bigger than the January 1st New Year.  Here again it simply is a day off and right back to work on the 2nd.  That night out on the town it was busier with the younger generation home enjoying the day off.  I have heard from some Koreans that for the New Year they will watch the sunset on the West coast the night of the 31st and then drive to the East coast to watch the sunrise the 1st of January.  Since I am on the West coast it was busier at the beach that day even with the temperature in freezing numbers.   Plus Korea is a smaller country so it is easily manageable to drive from one coast to the other before the sun rises again.


Currently it is ‘Winter Camp’ at school this week.  Essentially it is classes for the students during their winter vacation and not actual camping.  Since it is winter vacation they don’t want to be here and so very few students and motivation is pretty much nonexistent.  A couple of them are here because they are forced to be here by parents.  I have been busy planning the camp and finishing up the semester the last couple of weeks. School does resume back around February 3rd but then it is only back for one week.  Graduation happens and then a few other little things but after that I am pretty sure a ‘spring break’ happens.  Kind of crazy to have a ‘break’ after only one week back but that is how the school system works here.  This weekend I am pretty sure I will be snowboarding which is about a three hour bus ride away.  I have been also gathering some more pictures of food for a later post.  The other day I did eat some "Sundae" (google 'sundae Korean food' if curious but fair warning. . .  not for queasy readers) with some Korean friends and it was good.  We were in a 'hole in the wall' sort of place in the middle of the open air market in town.  Will write later.