Nic Trips

One of the things we had been talking about though all of November and December that the gang wanted to do was go skiing. Pretty much everyone in the group had gone once or twice, with Ashley being the "expert" snowboarder of the gang, and me being the "expert" skier. Eventually we found out about a two day, one night trip to a mountain resort far north called "High 1". We went through a program called Enjoy Korea and paid $212 to get two full days of lift tickets, an overnight stay at a resort located a 5 minute walk from the lifts, bus transportation to and from Busan, two days of ski and boot rentals, and two days of snow pants and coat rentals. As expensive as it seems, it was actually a GREAT deal and it was a TON of fun. Originally I had said that so long as I'm able to go skiing once in Korea that would be fine, but now that I have gone once, I'm dying to go again! Were already looking into doing another trip, but are unsure where we wi...

Christmas in Korea is a very different kind of experience. They don't celebrate it the way we do in the states. Although it is just as commercialized, it is in a different way. To them, Christmas is a couples' holiday. You usually get together with your significant other to get dinner or something on Christmas Eve and then go to do some kind of activity together on Christmas day. For our gang of 8 in Ulsan, we still wanted to treat it like a family holiday, so in between Skyping with all our families back home, we did all sorts of things together. First on the list was getting a "family" Christmas picture taken. I brought my camera and dragged everyone along to see the lights they had put up at Ulsan and got everyone to sit still long enough to take a nice photo... Top row, left to right: Andrew, Jaryt, Tuba, and Shane. Bottom row, left to right: Nicole(me), Lauren, Jarah, and Ashley. Also known as "Ulsan's Great Eight". =) C...

I did a special Christmas party class for my 5th and 6th graders. It was a lot of work, but I love my students and it turned out to be so much fun: 100% worth it! I took lots of videos throughout the 9 classes and compiled them into a little 4 minute music video. Merry Christmas! The first 10 minutes of class was a PowerPoint and lecture portion in which the students got to learn about how we celebrate Christmas in the USA (it's very different from how they celebrate and perceive the holiday). Then I explained the process of gift giving and the rules of Secret Santa. Throughout the rest of class (while listening to Christmas music of course), they were able to make Christmas cards for the student whose name they drew from the Secret Santa box (another student in the class). During the class, I would pull a few students at a time to the back of the room where they go to decorate their very own Christmas cookie. At the very end of class, everyone exchanged cards, took a c...