Linguistics and Thailand

It has been a very long time since my last post on this blog--about one year actually. But, thankfully the title still seems pretty relevant to my life so, I think it's okay to keep adding to it (the blog, that is, not the title). That said, and with my current experience in mind, I'm not sure that I can call myself a "linguist" quite yet. There are so many real and well-studied linguists around me on a daily basis right now that I hesitate a lot at using the term for myself. I do think I fit Merriam-Webster's definition however--"a person who studies linguistics", so let's just go with it.

Now that I have successfully (in my mind) justified the use of the title of this blog, I can start the post for real.

I am currently studying at Payap University, working toward an MA in Applied Linguistics. There are quite a few people at Payap who have been in and around the field of linguistics for a long time. Payap is also located in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Chiang Mai is home Lanna, or Northern Thai, but it also has pockets of speakers of many other languages. Most people speak Standard Thai as well (the language of Bangkok). Basically, this is a really cool place to study linguistics. Not to mention that when compared to attending a North American university, it is just a lot cheaper to study over here.

So, with that in mind, I came to Thailand to study linguistics and, with God's help, to seek out the next part of His plan. He has already shown me so much in my time here and I can't wait to see what He does next. There is so much I want to say but this will have to do for now.

A post seems incomplete without a few pictures to go along with it, but those will come soon too I hope!

Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.  Psalm 37:4

Learning and Searching

I say learning and searching because, right now, those do seem to be the main activities in my life: I am continuing to learn so very much about this quite unique culture and language into which I dove back in September, 2012; but at the same time, I continue to search for what will come next. God has given me an unquenchable desire to pursue the field of linguistics, in my current study of Korean and in whichever capacity He will eventually lead me to down the road, but I know that He is taking me somewhere outside of Korea, and so, I am searching for His will and discovering so much along the way. Patience is difficult. I want to know. I don't want to feel like I am wandering and unsure of every step that I take.

In the chaos of my fallen humanness, it helps immensely to focus on one of God's beautiful promises from Psalm 37:4 -  "Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart."
We know that to be true, for those of us who have experienced moments (or maybe longer periods of time) in which we can see clearly the pearl that is the Gospel of Christ. How can this be? Because when we truly find our delight in the Lord, our desires become one with His! So to that end, we have to pray with all our hearts, as long as it takes, for that Pearl to be fully visible to our souls. All the worrying about what I will do next seems rather trivial when God gives me grace enough to see the Pearl of the Gospel clearly. When I can see that, just being alive is a grand and glorious thing.

So, that is the meat of what God has been teaching me lately. I thought it was more important than all this other stuff that I'm about to write so I put it at the top.


I'll start off this next bit with pictures of some of my favorite people :)

On April 18th, I had the privilege of accompanying the wonderful students of Sangsu Elementary School to The 63 Building on Yeoido, the island on the Han River in Central Seoul (-do meaning "island" in Korean). We all piled onto a couple of buses--yes, two buses for the entire school--and traveled an hour and a half south until we could see the newly blooming cherry blossoms of the famous island. This is the same island that I visited back in September with Josh and Laura when we attended a Sunday service at the largest church in the world, Yeoido Full Gospel Church.

In the picture above, Gayoung is posing for me while waiting to go up the elevator to the top floor!

The 63 Building is located on the east side of the island while Yeoido is on the north side. You can see all the locations I am talking about in the map below where I have marked them.

View The 63 Building Trip in a larger map

In the photo above, you can see me and some students reflected in one of the rather unique pieces of art on display at the top of the 63 Building in an art gallery called "63 스카이아트" or "63 Skyart." The Korea Tourism Agency says the following about the building: "The 63 City in Yeouido stands 264 meters above sea level and is considered one of Seoul’s most well known landmarks. The 60th floor ‘Sky Deck’ of the 63 City Building has been newly remodeled into the ‘Sky Art Museum’, offering a place for art exhibitions, magic shows, and various cultural experiences. Visitors will also be able to enjoy the beautiful scenery of the Hangang River through the observatory’s large windows." 

I couldn't have said it better myself, so I didn't!

At right, you can see the building rising above the ground with its gold-paneled exterior and some of the cherry blossoms at its base. I really would like to go back soon to enjoy the cherry blossoms, but I'm afraid they may not be as beautiful as they were!

Here is a great picture (I think!) of Hyeongju hugging Geunweon... it really captures Hyeongju's personality. Always smiling and always on top of someone haha. We are waiting in line to watch the 3D film, "Grand Canyon Adventure," narrated, apparently, by Robert Redford... all I can say is I didn't realize he could speak Korean so well.

A crab at the aquarium inside the 63 Building.

A super weird fish called a "lion fish" ... wish I had a better picture because he was a weirdo.













Directly after finishing our tour of the 63 building, we headed over to KBS studios where 2  students from each grade got to volunteer to be KBS news anchors!

Here are Seunghi and Yeongkwang (a good Christian name meaning "Glory" just as a side note!) on their first take of the KBS 7 O'clock News!

Here are Yubin and Ujin repping the Sangsu 1st graders on the 7 O'clock News as well!

In the video below is Seogin, the youngest of the 1st graders, trying out the blue screen at KBS...

Later on after we had finished our tour of KBS, we just hung out for a while outside the building and the vice principal took this picture for me with some 5th and 6th graders and I'm actually not sure who that is sitting next to me.

This is one of my favorite pictures and it definitely was not taken during our trip to the 63 building... but rather during our recent dental health education day on which all of the students and me got to enjoy the very unique experience of fluoride gel treatment. It was probably the most fun I had all day just watching the students experience this! I got asked by every single student, "Mr. Watson, are you doing it too????" I was the only teacher who got that privilege apparently.

Jinsu, the 2nd grade boy with the red "A" jacket is definitely the leader of his class and seeing this picture just says that to me in a new way.










Hong Seogin, the disappearing student from the video above has his mouth wiped before receiving his fluoride...

Above is a picture I took from the back of Uijeongbu Station looking towards the downtown area. This is the town where I spend most of my weekends and where my church is located.

After our 3rd-6th graders arrived back from a recent field trip to a nearby military base, they brought back with them a bunch of unopened bags of various snacks--one of which was a cheeto-like snack, except it was chocolate flavor and therefore had a very unique color and shape... Mr. Wu (우성제 쌤) insisted we take a picture. It was a weird snack but it did taste good!

^The latest Christmas card I have ever received... from Brad and Patty Gibson, next-door neighbors to my parents. It was sent back in December 2012 and, somehow, it made its way all the way to my mailbox on Tuesday of this week. Made my day!

And this last picture... well, I needed to make it nice a big because it was such a good dish. Our school faculty had the pleasure of dining at a very nice Chinese restaurant (충국집) in a town called Songchu (송추) between two mountains about 30 minutes away from our school this past Wednesday evening. Driving there made me feel like I was in Tennessee again because we had to go up and down a mountain with winding roads just like the ones around Wautauga Lake where my grandparents live. There was even a reservoir (저수지) there near Songchu that we passed on the way, a bit smaller than Wautauga. The food was wonderful and the view of the town from our dining room was very serene. The dish pictured above is called 마라도미 or Spicy Snapper (not the fish underneath, but the deep fried fish on top with hot sauce on it)  and it was by far my favorite dish of the evening.

That is all for this blog. There were so many things I wished to write about over the past months but the job search and Korean study have just kept me very busy and away from this blog. Today, thanks to Buddha's birth, I have a holiday and was able to share a bit of my experience here. Until next time.

... And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:7) ...

Dirty Dishes

So, I had been asking my colleagues all week long if they needed my help with the dishes...I think I was just missing all those good memories as an intern at the Jacques Lefèvre Institute where I got to do dishes every day with some really cool people!... but finally today, Friday, they actually needed my help. Ha! Mrs. Choi handed me an apron and some gloves, I rolled up my sleeves, and we began the job! Shortly after starting our cleaning, I must have just looked so 잘생기다 (chalsaenggida = good looking) in all of my colorful cleaning attire that Mrs. Choi had to take a picture. At right, you can observe the result. I had fun! haha.

The above picture was taken just today, the week following my winter break. All The pictures below are from my winter break (Dec. 29 - Jan 6)

 <<<<<Here I am sitting with, from left to right, Yerin (예린), Dayoung (다영), myself, Pastor Keith, and Mizan.

On New Years Eve, I had  a part in a staged music video/skit at my church in Uijeongbu and this picture was taken before our performance on Monday night. The song was "Healer" by Hillsong United. We had basically four separate stories during the song. Each story presented a character struggling with sin in a different way. I played an angry husband who hits his wife and pushes her down because she is reading the Bible when he comes home from work. In practice once, I actually hit my wife (지혜 - Jihye)... she wasn't hurt too bad I hope (ha!) but everyone was laughing at me after the fact so it was okay. It was a little bit awkward, when we first started practicing the skit, kneeling down at the end and asking a girl who I didn't even know to forgive me for being a horrible husband, but since that skit it has been really easy to talk to her and we have become good friends! We always greet each other as "husband" and "wife" ... 재밌어요 (it's fun!).

 At right, from left to right is, Dayoung, Li Ming, Yerin, and myself. The four of us went out for coffee at this really great Italian café after dinner at Pastor Keith's last Wednesday. (As you can see, I am still wearing my wonderful coat everywhere I go... I feel like a lion with an overgrown mane sometimes.)
Below is another angle of the same pic and then, on the right is a picture of the very tasty waffle with gelato on top that Dayoung treated us to :)

Li Ming, second from the left, is actually from Qiqihar, China (near Harbin) and speaks fluent English. She came to our church for the first time just a couple of weeks ago. Dayoung and Yerin have both been at our church for much longer than I have.

 Okay... look closely at the words on the advertisement in the above pic... "this love is brillianter than the jewel"... translations such as this one are, unfortunately, not at all uncommon in Korea. Josh Worthington and I were talking about it one day, and we really think it could be a lucrative job if you had enough connections---fixing all the bad English translations in Korea that is. Josh pointed out the above ad when we were visiting Bosan together last week. Josh came all the way up from Songtan to see me and we had quite the adventure traveling up and down Seoul Subway Line 1 on Saturday. First we went up to Bosan, home of Camp Casey, the largest US military base in the region. While there we enjoyed some good American style sandwiches and some Aloe juice (that stuff is GOOD by the way... we put it on our skin in the US, but here they drink it!) all while watching the Shawshank Redemption on the TV at the restaurant. We were probably the only Americans in town not associated with the US military which was a surprise to most store clerks!

 After Bosan, we headed all the way up to the end of Line 1... to Soyosan. I had been wondering for the longest time "what is up there in Soyosan?" because it's the farthest north one can go on the Seoul Subway and it just seemed like it had to be an interesting place... well... not so much. Haha, we didn't even get off the train because there was hardly any town to explore and what we saw didn't draw our attention much at all. The landscape was beautiful beyond the town, but it was way too cold to go hiking. Thus, we headed back to Uijeongbu for coffee and dinner with Li Ming and her roommate, Tsai Hong (also from the Harbin area). Both Li Ming and Tsai Hong are Chinese language teachers at a local university in Uijeongbu. I am quite sure that our evening was quite a bit more enjoyable spent the way it was than if we had stayed up north!

At right is again Li Ming at our coffee gathering earlier in the week... we took a LOT of pictures that night. That is one more of the many blessings that smartphones provide--the ability to easily take pictures and show others pictures you have taken, which is especially a blessing when there isn't a common language in which everyone is fluent!

Li Ming also gave Josh and I a tour of her school on Saturday before we went to dinner. It was pretty cool to see where Korean college students study. She even let me borrow a book called "Evolutionary Illustration of Chinese Characters" when I said "I wish I had a copy of this!" haha... yes, I was being serious, and yes, it is currently what I read just before going to bed every night.

There are so many things I want to say here and it has been far too long since my last blog post, but I'll just have to save it for later.

Oh, well, I have to say this now, because I thought of it! Christmas in Korea! It was my first one this year! Actually, it was my first Christmas spent away from my family period. It wasn't bad at all, but I did have to work on Christmas Eve, which seemed unreal in my mind (thankfully there were no classes that day and we got to go out for lunch together (all of the faculty)... although the reason wasn't because of Christmas but because Mrs. Kim's contract was ending that day so I guess they thought it would be fun to celebrate ...? Anyway, I didn't work on Christmas. I woke up and for the first time didn't have a tree with presents underneath to run upstairs to... BUT, I did get to skype with my entire (almost) family as we all opened gifts  in our first annual gift exchange (organized by my wonderful sister, Elise Watson). They had previously mailed my gift so I got to open it with them all watching! (it was a nice new case for my macbook) Later that morning, I went to the Christmas worship at church. It was all in Korean, but many of the songs were just Korean translations from their original versions like Silent Night, Joy to the World, and Away in a Manger so I was able to fairly easily follow along. It is such a blessing to hear an old familiar tune sung in a new language.
After the service, Pastor Keith and I went to Outback for some Christmas steak.

New Years was spent with my church family as well. After the skit and other performances at church, a few of us guys went back to the Pastor's house to hang out/chat/watch TV until morning. Then, at 6:40 AM we went to see The Hobbit! Good memories were made :)

My overall impression since coming back to work after break is just how big God's hand has been working in my life even when I don't recognize it at the time. He has provided me with friendship when I need it and even when I don't know that I need it. I am so thankful for all of the people in my life here in Korea. That doesn't change the fact that I love and miss everyone back home!

jdwatson@anderson.edu

A Very Warm Blessing!

I just thought I would share one of the most recent blessings that God has provided in my life here in Korea...

You see, since I'm in the far north of the country, the winters are even colder than those I experienced during college in Anderson, Indiana. I came here with a pretty nice (fake) leather jacket that I thought was pretty warm when I first got it... but the past few weeks have shown me just how thin that jacket is! Ha! Do you know it even snowed for the first time here a couple weeks ago (already!) -- yep, about 3 inches in one day! So, I needed a new coat. Not a jacket, but a coat. One of my co-workers, Mrs. Choi, who works in the administration office, saw my sorry excuse for a winter coat and actually went out and bought me this big guy... who, aside from the rather long fur rim on his hood (which tends to blind me and get in my mouth) is the warmest coat that I have ever owned! I am so grateful to my friend and co-worker for this wonderful Christmas gift :)

The day of the first snow, looking out through the flagpoles at school....

One of the awesome school lunches that we get to have every day! The only thing I could probably do without is the kimchi...

This is a little gift I received from my school... it is a piece of artwork that doubles as a keychain and a pair of fingernail clippers!

 Above is the playground a few days after the first snow...

Below is the statue of 이순신 (Yi Sun Shin), a great Korean naval commander from the sixteenth century.

The setting sun over the playground... this is what Mr. Yi Sun Shin gets to look at every day

The English Zone

Here's a look at my classroom for those who are curious about what my working environment looks like! This will just be a quick post with some pictures. Hopefully I can add some captions or explanations to it later this week.

 Okay, I have to give a caption here... haha.
I just found these audiobooks on the shelf with all the other English reading materials in my classroom and had to take a photo... they just seem sooo out of place on that shelf. I asked my co-teacher where they came from and she didn't even know. She assumed they must have been the property of the previous NET (Native English Teacher) --- but she was from New Zealand! Anything is possible, but this still was very weird.

And this is where we trade in our real shoes every morning for slippers... I can't stand this part of the job because my feet get so cold in the slippers and there is no central heating. But, it keeps the floors semi-clean so, what are you gonna do?

My third and fourth grade sticker chart for the month of November... I have to make a new one in the morning!

Gyeongju - a memory within a memory

When I posted about my very special iron last time, I was really just choosing a simple topic to blog about because I wanted to give a quick update. Now, I still want to give a quick update because my days are getting shorter and shorter it seems... but I have nothing short of a million things to share!

I will start with what I didn't share in my previous blog.

Our AWESOME 3-day field trip to Gyeongju!

Above is Sangsu Elementary, grades 3-6, at Bulguksa Temple, the first stop on our voyage through the old capital of Korea--Gyeongju--when it was ruled by the Silla dynasty more than a thousand years ago. Hence my title for this post: for me, Gyeongju holds a grand memory of Korea's past in which I formed some of my own wonderful memories as well!

The above and following pics were taken at the site of what used to be a large palace complex during the Silla period... the pictures were taken in succession as you might notice. I was not expecting this to happen...

 Or this...

 Or this!

 Above and right, the kids are listening intently to our tour guide who stayed with us throughout the 3-day trip giving us tours and explanations of all the sites we visited. She worked for the youth hostel that we stayed at, so it was very convenient. Apparently there are many youth hostels in Gyeongju with similar programs because all elementary students--and I think even middle school students--get to take at least one trip to the city to see their country's heritage. You can see Mr. 우 (pronounced kind of like the "oo" in "food"), the 6th grade teacher, who I got to know pretty well during this trip.

OH! And, guess what? I was on TV!
There happened to be a talk show from the Busan area filming at one of the monuments that we visited and since I was the most out-of-place-looking person among their onlookers, they came up to me and immediately started asking me how I liked Korea. They asked me how old I was and when I told them, the two women asked if I would marry them LOL.

It was a comedy show of course for a local audience, but still... I was on TV in Korea! hahaha
I haven't received any calls for further interviews... yet.

Left is Bulguksa once again.

This is Miss. 김 (Kim--the Smith of Korean last names, only even more common). She is the 5th grade teacher and also the person who has helped me in adjusting to life in this country more than any other individual over the past month and a half! She also just graduated college and we are the same age--so we can be friends! If you're not the same age as someone in Korea, it is significantly more difficult to become close friends with him or her because of the way their social hierarchy works... but I find this to be different for foreigners like myself thankfully!

Above: The youth hostel where we stayed in Gyeongju. Some 3rd and 4th grade girls are still trying to wake up at 8 in the morning... 

Above and below are all from the Gyeongju National Museum (국립경주박물관)

There were about 3 million of these tombs just laying about all across the Gyeongju landscape and we probably visited 20 of them!  They are, at least on the outside, somewhat similar to some of the Indian mounds you can see in Ohio and other places in the States.




Here is one of the most famous ones below...

And this is the largest bell I have ever laid eyes on... sadly it has not been "ringable" since about 2005 if I remember correctly.... at the Gyeongju National Museum.

These two little girls, Seo Yoon and Min Kyeong, are best friends as you can see... they almost never let go of each other! No joke.
They are also two of my best students!

Mr. 우 taught me an interesting expression (while we were visiting this beautiful park full of burial mounds) that lots of Korean men like to quote when autumn comes around:

"Autumn is the season for men" ("가을은 남자의 계절")

It means that men are at their peak for finding a relationship during autumn or something to that effect... I quoted it to Miss. Kim and she got a kick out of it.

There is a really cool story that goes along with this little artificial stone stream, but it was lost in translation... for me at least.

We also visited the Pacific Ocean! (in Korean: 태평양 "tae pyeong yang") 
It was chilly and the waves were huge... therefore, a lot of fun!