A Blonde in Korea

  • Archive
  • RSS
  • Ask me anything

smykboyfriendsays replied to your post: Voiceless Update

is it a dry cough, or are you coughing up phlem? is it rattling in your lungs when you breathe? I got that a few weeks ago after I got sick and it lasted for about a month until i took some antibiotics. can you get those w/o a prescription?

I’m coughing up phlem sometimes, and I was coughing up more this weekend, now it’s not very much.

My cough is only dry and bad at night when I try and sleep.  I’ve been sleeping sitting  up, which is not comfortable…at all.

I also tend to cough when I speak above a whisper.

    • #smykboyfriendsays
  • 1 day ago
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Voiceless Update

Korea, sometimes you confuse me.

I can buy birth control over the counter, no problem.

I find that awesome.

So, why can’t I buy cough syrup without a prescription?  

I really, really don’t want to go sit in a packed hospital for an hour just to get a prescription for cough syrup.

I really don’t.

My voice is almost normal, but my cough is bad now that I’m out of cough syrup.

I guess honey water and cough drops are it for me. 

    • #korea
    • #sick
    • #medicine
  • 1 day ago
  • 1
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Lost My Mind in Seoul...: Arguing about adoption

spicyenoughforyou:

lostmymindinseoul:

(Before I write about this argument I had with my friend, I want to say that know that I’m very privileged. I’m white, I’m not disabled, I was adopted domestically in the US when I was three days old. My bio mom interviewed prospective adoptive parents and chose mine, I had an open adoption, I…

I don’t like when people become ‘experts’ on subjects they can’t fully understand because they haven’t experienced them. It’s one thing to do ‘research’ about adoption and another to have been adopted. I can’t talk about the subject with any authority because I’m my parent’s biological child (the nose proves it, mom and dad. Thanks.), but had I been adopted, they’d have loved me just the same. 

I think so because of the bonds I have with people who don’t share my blood. I have friends that are as close to me as my actual sister. I would step in front of a moving vehicle for my friends. I love them because they’re the family I chose. Compassion comes in many forms but it’s demonstrated best in humanity, I think, when one takes in someone who isn’t their flesh and blood. It’s saying ‘you may not be the same blood, but I will love and protect you as if you were.’ 

And that’s pretty powerful, if you ask me. 

LMMIS, I’m sorry you had to argue your case to someone who doesn’t seem like they were even listening, really. 

Wow, I try and respect people’s culture, but I expect the people I interact with to do the same.  LMMIS, you should do the same.  I’m sorry you had to defend yourself and your personal history and culture to someone who didn’t really want to listen.

Personally, I’m not adopted, but my aunt is.  She’s just as much my aunt as the ones I’m biologically related to and her children are as much my cousins as any of the others.

The only problem she ever had growing up was when she was a teenager.  Her personality is almost a complete opposite of my dad’s (tho they’re still close), so my grandparents had no idea  how to deal with her, but they still loved her.

Really, I don’t think I even knew she was adopted until my mom told me when I was about 10 and my aunt was having her first child.

True, their are some bad adoption cases out there, there always have been, but their are also lots of bad biological cases too.

Source: lostmymindinseoul

    • #adoption
  • 1 day ago > lostmymindinseoul
  • 9
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Adventures of the Office 막내: But I'm still a kid?

ambhyuk:

Chatting with a friend from the first college I went to [transferred to another after my sophomore year].

Two of our friends are getting married soon.

Um what.

I’m still not convinced I’m an adult most days, then I hear about all these people my age getting married.

Like, I’m reaching that age…

It’s funny, when I was seventeen and eighteen I didn’t think it strange for someone in their early twenties to be married and settled down.  I even thought that might be me.

I’ve been to five weddings in the past two years, all for people ages 21-24, and they’re all happily married, but I just can’t see myself doing it.

Now, I just can’t picture settling down now.  I’ve just (7months ago) started a real job and I’m planning to start my masters in about seven more months.  Once that’s done…who knows?

I’m only 23 (and a half…) and I’ve barely started living.  I haven’t really figured myself out yet, so I know I’m not ready to get married or start having children yet.  

I’ll know when I’m ready, and until then, I’m going to enjoy my life and just live it.

I’m sure you feel the same way, Amber.

I’m pretty sure most of the other young people here in Korea feel the same way, as do a lot of other people in the world.  Unfortunately for me, I’m the only one of all my friends who feels this way.  

Of my four best friends from the US, three are married.  Two of them to each other.  The only one that isn’t married is my 19 year old sister.  Even my cousins, two of my best friends since we were still in diapers, though we aren’t as close now as we were as kids, are in serious, committed relationships.  One is married and she just helped her husband fight cancer (he won, finally, I’m so glad), and the other is seriously dating someone and they’re talking about the future after he graduates and gets commissioned.  

They’re all ready for settling down, but I’m not, and neither are a lot of other people, I just don’t know them very well.  lol

Eh, this was supposed to be just a short reply, and ended up being a real post.  I guess having no voice to talk is making me type a lot more than usual.

Source: ambhyuk

    • #age
    • #kid
    • #ambhyuk
  • 5 days ago > ambhyuk
  • 8
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet
As a longtime Sailor Moon fan, I had to reblog this. 
Hehe
View Separately

As a longtime Sailor Moon fan, I had to reblog this. 

Hehe

(via this-is-allec)

Source: jennifersargent

    • #HAHAHAHA
  • 6 days ago > jennifersargent
  • 6896
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Voiceless

So, I have laryngitis and started losing my voice yesterday.  It’s down to nothing but a faint whisper.

My boss knows this.

Her husband does too (another teacher here).

Yet, when they arrive, they say hello, I just wave, then he asks me if I’m okay.

From across the room.

-_-

Really?

I really don’t know how I’m supposed to teach when I can’t talk.  Oh well, I’ll do my best.

I just had to complain though.  Both Car and J thought I should take the day off to rest.  

At least tomorrow I don’t have to talk since it’s just speeches all day.  Tomorrows the speech contest we’ve spent the past month preparing for.

Also, due to my voice, Car is now convinced we can’t do the trip he planned for this weekend (he’s probably right), so my lovely three-day weekend will be spent at home.  

Why?!?!

Why did I have to get sick now?!?!

Ugh, hopefully I’ll be better by the time my sister comes next week.

I better be better.

    • #teaching
    • #korea
  • 6 days ago
  • 2
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Cross out what you’ve already read. Six is the average.

lifeandloveincanada:

lifelovekorea:

look-at-that-bowtie:

    1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen 
    2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
    3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
    4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
    5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
    6. The Bible - Council of Nicea
    7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte 
    8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
    9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
    10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens 
    11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
    12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy 
    13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
    14. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
    15. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien 
    16. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
    17. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
    18. The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
    19. Middlemarch - George Eliot
    20. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
    21. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
    22. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
    23. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
    24. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
    25. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
    26. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
    27. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
    28. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
    29. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
    30. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
    31. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
    32. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
    33. Emma - Jane Austen
    34. Persuasion - Jane Austen
    35. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
    36. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
    37. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
    38. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
    39. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
    40. Animal Farm - George Orwell
    41. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
    42. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
    43. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
    44. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
    45. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
    46. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
    47. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
    48. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
    49. Atonement - Ian McEwan
    50. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
    51. Dune - Frank Herbert
    52. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
    53. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
    54. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
    55. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
    56. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens 
    57. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
    58. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
    59. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
    60. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
    61. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
    62. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
    63. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold 
    64. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas  
    65. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
    66. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
    67. Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
    68. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie 
    69. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
    70. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
    71. Dracula - Bram Stoker 
    72. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
    73. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
    74. Ulysses - James Joyce 
    75. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
    76. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
    77. Germinal - Emile Zola
    78. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
    79. Possession - AS Byatt
    80. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
    81. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
    82. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
    83. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
    84. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
    85. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
    86. Charlotte’s Web - EB White
    87. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
    88. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
    89. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
    90. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
    91. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery 
    92. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks 
    93. Watership Down - Richard Adams 
    94. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole 
    95. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
    96. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
    97. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
    98. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
    99. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

read 9 of the list.. not bad if I say so myself

22! Some I tried to read, but couldn’t finish (Like The LOTR Series, and Tess od the Durbervilles). This list needs Ferinheight 451, and On The Road, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest, to name a few. It also needs more Shakespere, Hamlet is great, but why no King Lear? Or Julius Caesar? Why is there no Hemmingway on this list? 

I’m putting far too much thought into this for a silly tumblr meme.

I’ve read 27 of them.  Several of the ones I haven’t read are on my kindle…I keep meaning to read them…

Source: fellowshipofthetwat

    • #books
    • #classics
  • 1 week ago > fellowshipofthetwat
  • 1402
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet
I’m not sure about the table flipping, but I believe what he says is true.

It doesn’t matter who you marry.  As long as you’re both adults and willing to spend your life together.
Pop-upView Separately

I’m not sure about the table flipping, but I believe what he says is true.

It doesn’t matter who you marry.  As long as you’re both adults and willing to spend your life together.

    • #marriage rights
    • #love
    • #leasticoulddo
  • 1 week ago
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Adventures of the Office 막내: Korea Love Pt. 1: Ahjummas [아줌마]

ambhyuk:

Bottom line: If the Korean military were made up of ahjumma, I don’t think any country would ever dream of messing with Korea again.

Hehe, Car and I agree with you.  

Ahjummas are amazing.  

Source: ambhyuk

    • #Korea
    • #observations
    • #ahjumma
    • #love
    • #Korea Love
  • 1 week ago > ambhyuk
  • 6
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet

Pieces of My Seoul: Let's take a moment to discuss Korea's mosquitoes

partyintherok:

lifeandloveincanada:

partyintherok:

piecesofmyseoul:

Huge. Nasty. Relentless.

I have ten mosquito bites on my hands ALONE (three of which are on one thumb). I have bites on my forearms, upper arms, neck, forehead, calves, thighs, ankles, feet, and even toes.

I don’t even WANT to count how many I have. It is getting ridiculous. There are six dead…

LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT KOREAN MOSQUITOES. THEY ARE THE NASTIEST MOST EVIL CREATURES IN THE WORLD. They can bite through multiple layers of fabric (at least, I would assume, seeing as sometimes in the middle of the day I find mosquito bites on my BUTT and I am definitely not walking around my workplace pants-less.) They can also bite through tights and stockings. If they’re flying around your room while you’re in bed, and all your arms and legs are under your covers, they will not be afraid to BITE YOUR FACE EVERYWHERE. Their bites are super-itchy and make big red/purple lumps on your skin. It is not rare for me to have at least twenty bites on my body at any given moment during the summer. If I’m in a room full of people, it is not unusual for me to get 3 or 4 bites while everyone else is untouched. There’s a particular type of blood mosquitoes love, and whatever it is, I must have it. They will be here until October. Don’t think that you’re safe if your windows have screens, because they can also get into your house through plumbing and pipes. 

My new apartment doesn’t have a screen, either, so I just use a fan, and haven’t gotten any mosquitoes in here yet. If you want to keep them away, there are lots of options. I bought mosquito repellent and anti-itch cream at the local 약국 and all pharmacies in Korea should have these. I also had an anti-mosquito thing I plugged into an outlet that was supposed to release some poison… but I don’t think it really worked. And if things get really bad, you can buy a mosquito net to put around your bed while you sleep. Yeah, that sounds really hardcore, but I almost had to buy one last year. Last year was rough for me and mosquitoes.

The good thing is they’re dumb and easy to kill. They usually just perch on the walls in plain sight, and you can smack them really easily. It’s always gross to see blood on whatever you use to kill them, though, because it is YOUR blood. I have a special mosquito-killing fan, which is the Mister Donut lion mascot, and it’s very cute. And there are year-old blood and insect juice marks on it, which is kind of disgusting.

I hate Korean mosquitoes more than anything, but haven’t had to deal with any yet this summer. Knock on wood.

I have questions. Namely: 

1. Are these mosquitoes in Seoul? Seriously? I grew up in the woods, and I’m used to blackflies and mosquitoes, and evil fucking deer flies that will bite giant chunks out of you, and annoying little no-see-ums, but once I moved to the city (and not even the big city, like 40, 000 people type city), there was rarely every any type of flies at all. Hardly enough to be a nuisance. We also don’t have any type of flies in Vancouver, I haven’t even seen any on the campus, and it’s surrounded by a giant national park full of woods. Seoul is a giant city that’s essentially a concrete jungle, shouldn’t there not be any mosquitoes hanging around? :/ 

I only ask because fucking mosquitoes LOVE my blood, and I will never go outside ever in summer in Korea if they’re going to be in the city. I moved out of tiny hick towns and the forest to get away from bugs, I don’t want to go to the city and deal with this shit. 

2. Is it really already summer in Korea? I thought Korea had that whole ~4 distinct seasons~ thing going for it. How is it already summer in mid-may?! Where is spring? This confusion could possibly stem from the fact that I’m from essentially the artic and we don’t have summer until like the middle of june (fun fact, it snowed on my birthday a couple of times.. and my birthday is at the end of may), even here in Vancouver, while it’s still nice out, it barely cracks 20 degrees, so I’d still consider it spring. Is Korea really that wondrous that summer is already a thing? 

… I am so ignorant about the world. I need to get the fuck out of dodge and go see things.

There are a lot of mosquitoes in Seoul because, I think, mosquitoes grow and thrive near water, and there are lots of rivers in Seoul. Also, the mountains.

As far as Korea’s four distinct seasons go… I feel like Fall usually lasts a week or two tops, which is a shame because Fall is so beautiful here. Spring is kind of weird this year. It was really, really hot for awhile, and today was freaky rain forest weather, and it looks like tomorrow will start gross hot weather again. But then in a few weeks we have the lovely monsoon season to look forward to, where your hair will be constantly frizzy, your face will be grimy and sweaty and all your makeup will melt off within seconds of stepping outside, and you will constantly be wet with sweat and rain water. Last year, parts of Gangnam and Myeondgong were underwater. Entire buses were submerged. And winter is long and miserable and sometimes it’s so cold outside I cry. 

But it’s not really that bad. If you’re coming from California or Florida, where it’s usually warm and there’s not as much humidity, it can be startling, or so say friends from both those places. But growing up in a place that has four distinct seasons as well, it’s the same here, just the summer is a little hotter and the winter is a lot colder. I think it seems worse here because you’ll spend a lot more time outside, waiting for buses and walking to wherever it is you want to go, whereas in America or Canada you would probably drive in your air-conditioned car everywhere.

I just want to address one thing: Humidity in Florida.

Florida is crazy humid.

I’ve lived there for most of my life there: 16 of my 23 years.

Trust me.

Sometimes it was so humid I practically had to swim to get from work to my car.

Source: piecesofmyseoul

  • 1 week ago > piecesofmyseoul
  • 6
  • Comments
  • Permalink
  • Share
    Tweet
← Newer • Older →
Page 1 of 19

About

Avatar This blog is about my time in South Korea as I navigate a foreign culture, a social life, and the world of dating.

Following

I Dig These Posts

  • Chat via ambhyuk
    Slice of our life.
    Boyfriend: What are you doing?
    Me: ...putting on deodorant.
    Boyfriend: That's weird that you have to do that.
    Me: It's better than me smelling bad.
    ... ...
    Chat via ambhyuk
  • Post via stereobone
    a word on Loki in The Avengers

    I couldn’t contain myself. spoilers under the cut. have at thee.

    [[MORE]]

    Let me preface by saying I absolutely...

    Post via stereobone
  • Chat via this-is-allec
    My dad just emailed me this huge list of puns oh my god
    I changed my iPod's name to Titanic. It's syncing now.
    When chemists die, they barium.
    Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.
    ... ...
    Chat via this-is-allec
  • Post via imnopicasso

    You know what I think a good test of the weight of a person’s opinion, in my opinion, is? Whether or not they are willing to come to the table and...

    Post via imnopicasso
See more →
  • RSS
  • Random
  • Archive
  • Ask me anything
  • Mobile

Effector Theme by Carlo Franco.

Powered by Tumblr