Hot little Potatoes!

Wednesday, 15 December 2004
Hi guys,
Sorry its been a while since my last email.
I’ve been busy at work, and came down with yet another rotten cold over the weekend – I must be breaking records!!
Anyway, other than that have a lovely little story to tell you. I was walking back from work last night, and it’s now freezing at night, so I popped into the little shop on the corner for some milk. The lady in there is just so adorable – she’s always smiling at me and trying to give little extras like a bunch of grapes here or a lollipop there. She was laughing and pointing at my nose, which when I looked in the mirror behind the counter was bright red from the cold and the fact that I’m sick! She gave me my change, and then pointed at her electric heater and mimed something. I stood over it to warm up, but she just laughed again, picked up these lumps of mud from the top of the heater, wrapped them in newspaper and handed them to me. They were so warm and toasty!!! They kept my hands beautifully warm the rest of the way home, and it wasn’t until I had taken off my coat and settled down that I looked at them closely and realised they were actually sweet potatoes!! She must have been slow-cooking them on top of her electric heater! I cracked one open, and there it is, perfectly cooked like a little baked potato, and I’ve got myself a lovely hot tea.
Isn’t that sweet? Continue reading

Medieval Torture…

Sunday 21st November 2004
Note – there was clearly an email missing between this one and the last one, but sadly I can’t find it. Suffice to say the gist of it was mostly about how I was feeling a bit miserable and down for no apparent reason. Also it appears that Cal was being a bit of a prick, which may have also made me feel rubbish.
Hello,
Big huge thanks to all of you for all your lovely messages!!
It’s hard to feel sorry for yourself when there’s twenty people telling you you’re fabulous!!!
Anyway I got a rotten cold right after my last email, so no wonder I was feeling all ratty and emotional. Am feeling much better now and have more cultural news to report!
I told my friend Sarah all about Cal and she was really nice about it. She called me up on Friday at work just after my last class, told me to get straight in a cab and come to her house, cos she’d booked me a massage at the sauna and she’d made me mac and cheese for dinner!
We went over to the sauna (me, Sarah, and Canadian girl, Beth) and all had massages. I have to say I’ve never really been a huge fan of massages, but I think I’ve figured out how they work now. Continue reading

The one with the toilet…

Thursday, 4 November 2004
So, I had another good weekend, lots of fun and games.
On Friday we had a Halloween party at the school for the kids, all dressed up in silly clothes and paraded around the block etc. I was in charge of the apple bobbing, but apples here are expensive so we bobbed for tangerines (and let me tell you after the 50th child has bitten into the same tangerine, the whole game starts to look a lot less appealing!).
Anyway, then at about 7.30, I was just about to go home when they told me we were all going out for a staff dinner so I only had 20 mins to run home and change.
We had a nice dinner, and Julie the director got absolutely smashed – she tanned about 8 bottles of beer in less than an hour, plus numerous shots of soju (sort of like Korean saki), and then dragged us all off to the Nori Bang. Continue reading