I can fit inside this box!!

Lynzi, one of my best friends, and her mom, Jan, sent me a HUGE box of Christmas presents today!!! I could literally sit inside the box, it's so huge!! I love you guys!!!! Thank you for thinking of me!


I couldn't resist, I had to open it to see what was inside!!! Wooo hoo!!!

Oh, and these, of course, which didn't make it into the picture above because they went directly to my desk, were cut open, and eaten!! hahha! I love these things, and they are NO WHERE TO BE FOUND in Korea!


When I went downstairs to get the box, I opened the door to the teachers room, and stood with my mouth open at the sheer size of this box! My Vice Principal said, "You are receiving parcels almost everyday and they are growing in size!" hahah Thanks to all of you who have sent me things to enjoy for Christmas! I feel unbelievably blessed on my 1st Christmas away from home. :) You have made this season so special and memorable! Thank you a million times over for your unbelievable amount of love for me! My cup runeth over!

Last day of school!

Yesterday was the last official day of school before Winter Break! :) So, the kids all left at 10:15am, and the teachers boarded a bus and headed north a couple hours into a town I can't remember the name of! Sorry, the names here are really long and confusing!

Anyhow, we stopped the bus and walked up a giant hill to lunch, which was Sashimi (raw fish)!

When we got the restaurant, I spotted these 2 dogs outside, and had to say hello! The one in the cage in the background was going crazy and barking and growling at us...

So Lee, (our resident Buddhist teacher) walked over to it and told it to "slow it's temper and settle down." Buddhist believe they can communicate with animals. Sure enough, it did!


So then she asked it to sit down, and wala.... It did that too! She's like the Korean dog whisperer!


When we walked into the restaurant, the teachers immediately taped this banner to the wall above our table! I have no idea what it means, but I can tell you one thing... Koreans have a banner for EVERYTHING, literally everything...

... and toasted (with alcohol) to a great school year! As a side note: The male teachers and administrators get drunk at every teacher outing we have... so drunk infact, that some of them weren't even able to climb the mountain we climbed after lunch and slept on the bus!

Me and Stella!

Then, my sadest moment of the day came, my camera battery died! I was especially sad, because I would have loved to have taken pictures of the HUGE mountain that we climbed! Only 11 people were able to make it to the top, and I was one of them!! BIG thanks to Aaron and his awesome workout training that I've been doing for the past couple weeks! I've been getting stronger and stronger everyday!

FYI: This was the 1st mountain I've climbed to the very top of, in my life! For all you Arizonan's, Camelback Mtn is 1280 feet. This mountain was 1631 feet, that's approximately 29 more flights of stairs!!

Then, when we got to the very top of the mountain, I couldn't look down! It was terrifying and I felt like I was floating... so I sat down and latched myself around a tree! Then, once I got up the courage to stand up, the 11 of us started the treck down. Within minutes, we were faced with one of the scariest things I've ever encountered... a really long (approzimately 150 ft), and narrow (approximately 3 1/2 feet wide) wooden bridge, hanging about 100 stories in the air, that we had to WALK ACROSS!!! The bridge connected the 2 mountains, and it was the only way to get down the mountain! I started panicking and told Stella I couldn't do it! She said, close your eyes, and we'll get across! So, all 11 of us, scared to death, lined up single filed, grabbed each others shoulders and walked across! The bridge was wooden, so it swayed as we walked, which made all of us scream, even the guys!! I drew this picture, in the paint program on my computer, so you could get an idea of what it was like! :)


After 2 1/2 hours, we made it back down the mountain, safe and sound! Whew! We jumped on the bus with all the rest of the staff, and headed for dinner! :)

After dinner, we got back onto the bus and were told, by the bus driver, that the bus was actually a special bus - a Karaoke bus! YES, A KARAEOKE BUS! Within minutes, the bus lights were turned off, and the Karaoke lights were shinning in blue, red, yellow, white, and green! The party had officially started as far as I was concerned! For the next 2 hours, on our way back to town, each teacher got up and sang a song in the isle of the bus while we all clapped and cheered! It was awesome!

Stella and I sang a Korean song together! I think we were the big hit of the night! :)