I took Meagan to the Chinese Opera tonight!
I was actually given two free tickets by the Busan International Performing Arts Festival organizers, since I trained 12 adorable elementary aged Korean kids to welcome people to the show in English! The little girl who opened for this performance did AWESOME! As soon as she started speaking English, the audience erupted in ooh's and aaah's and clapping! I felt like a proud mom, cheering her on! She ran up to me after the show yelling, "Chelsey, teacher!!" I immediately gave her a big hug and told her how proud I was of her!
I knew the performance would be in Chinese, so I asked the festival origanizer's before I came, "How will I know what's going on?!" I was told, "There will be subtitles for you!" Well, there were... but they were only in Korean! FAIL! This was all we had to tell us what the heck was going on... a small summary.
We may not have understood what was happening, but we chalked it up to a cool cultural experience. Not many people can say they saw the Chinese Opera on a stage in Korea, right... and in the 5th row for heavens sake!
Here's the cast, after the performance, taking photos with the mayor of Busan and
the President of the festival.
I actually saw Monica there, too! Remember her?! My awesome co-teacher from last year! She was there with her husband... such a fun surprise!
Absolutely NO Korean festival is complete without a "foreigner interview." Literally, anytime I go to something like this, I get stopped and interviewed.
It's just one of the things you grin and bear when living in Korea.
I never thought that the first time I saw the Opera it would be in Chinese... but I never thought a lot of things would happen to me, and look at me now! haha! Cheers to a fun cultural experience with a fun friend!