40th Andong Mask Dance Festival

Today we had gone on a trip with the university to Andong. There is now held the traditional mask dance festival of South Korea.

The university therefore has organised an event for International students to go along there.

It was really a great event - we have watch one performance (one hour) which told a story of a married couple or what could be understood by it. As they spoken in Korean. Even though I could not understand on what exactly had been spoken from the actions the characters did and the type of dance they perform it could be understood.

It was not only one story, but many different kind of stories been told in the one hour of program. It was a great experience to see traditional dances from South Korea. In the end also a Thailand group had perform in the show.

If you are planning on travelling Korea in October time - I recommend to visit Andong for the Mask Dance Festival which is held right in the city centre behind the train station.

You may shall do some research before coming as there might be some cultural performance - such as a Korean weeding. We could not watch it as we already needed to leave - this is a disadvantage to come with a tour. Therefore come by yourself rather then on a tour.

We watched a few performance outside the main theatre, a few high school girls given a performance. It was easy to understand as no sounds had been used just acting and music. I could get the point on what they wanted to show us - but on other time it was hard to understand on what they had been showing with their hands. It might be just a Korean thing and not common for myself.

The day was really amazing and I was glad that I managed to sign up just in time to go to this event. As it was quickly booked out as only 40 places been available.

Hurra!!

The first day of university and everything had been put ready, paper, pen and the campus map. Today would be a busy schedule due to having 5 modules in just a day. Back in the home university, you would be happy just to have maximum 3 modules or 3 lesson.

I guess please do not complain of not having free time between lesson. Come here and you will honour that our university back at home is generous with timetabling. As I only had time for breakfast at 8am and the next meal I could go for is dinner at 8pm. There had been not much time of getting some lunch in Korean style.

I had nearly all of my chosen modules today, Logistics, Persuasive Speech, Macroeconomics, Russian II and Korean I . The last module is Strategy but it would be next week Monday.

The professor are very friendly here so far, as long you are friendly to them. All of the modules are get taught in English, excluding Russian and Korean. Which is very handy, as there is no chance of speaking English as no one will understand it. You need to use one of the following language and try to explain in a different way on what you like to say. The Russian class has a Teaching Assistant student, but she only can translate into Korean not English.  Somehow you can get around and the professor will know on what you like to say and improve your words.

Each of the module there would be an exam, either weekly or mid term wise. Even for attendance you get a percentage, failing to attend without notice results into minus a point.  All professors like to give the students an A+ (equal to 90% for UK system), but then the student shall attend all classes, do the homework and ask question to the professor and may visit them in office hours if question occur.

So far I enjoy the introduction into the module, and I really can not drop any of them actually if there would be no exams and the day would just be 6 hours longer a day I may would chosen one more.  There is a good selection of module, and you will go to class with students from Korea and international students.

Daegus' Festival

I had an amazing day as the start of IAAF Games here in Daegu. I had woken up very early at 630am just to get a good spot to view the marathon. My new roommate had joined me for the games, so I did not been totally alone there.  It had been a great experience to watch the runners straight in front of you, and having Japanese supporters behind you who made all the time noise when Japan and other nations passed by. The local camera man also had pointed on me before the run has started, so I might had been shown across world TV or only Daegu we don’t know.

The run finish good in time with a full team win of Kenya, but our bet been Ethiopia and Japan second.  Ethiopia was doing very well in the beginning, but they fallen behind later on.  We only stayed until the Chinese fellow has arrived as we needed to go back to our dorm to move to another dorm.

After I managed to move all my things from A to B and from Floor 5 to Floor 5, I had been greeted by a resident also from Beijing who does his full degree at KNU and we meet one more person from Malaysia. He was free, so we decided to go with his buddy for some lunch and visit later on down town.  I guess it was a good idea to visit down town, as so many activities recently take place there.

In the memorial park near City Hall was a Family Festival sponsored by Equality Gender and Family Ministry and stands been holding by local schools.  We had some great fun with some off those students, such as from Daegu Girls’ High School where we have played with fire, an elementary school where we have tried to solve a puzzle and some middle school children to help them to change the school policy by voting yes or no. Even though they did not speak fluent English, we managed on somehow to solve the language barrier between three nations.  I repeat again, but it is important to know Korean language to communicate freely and understanding on what they like to tell, especially on the third highlight of the day.

As the event has closed down, it already been 5pm we decided to head back to city centre and seen a group just standing and looking at something that’s going to happen. I just quickly asked a guy on what is going on and he said it is a flash mob. So I said why not shall be a cool idea, and then suddenly we started to dance to Korean K-Pop. I was not sure in the end if it actually was a flash mob or a professional dance group just having fun in city centre.  At least it was fun to dance along the song that I already had posted in “94 days before”.

It is always fun to explore Korean culture day by day, just join in when you are by any chance here don't be afraid it is just an amazing experience to be part of something.