Friday 7 September 2018

New Home, New Town

My partner Saif and I were posted in a small town called Daeso-myun, under the administrative district of Eumseong-gun. The town was relatively small as compared to Seoul, where lots of factories located here and it seemed like the locals also did some agricultural activities such as vegetable farming and growing their rice. It was a bit similar like Tanjung Malim town. 

As for the accommodation, we were lucky to be given a two-room apartment for our three months stay in South Korea. The house was not that big and not too small. Perhaps around 800+ square feet. More than enough for me. The owner provided two beds, a refrigerator, and a washing machine. While the other appliances such as rice cooker, iron, and kitchen utensils had been prepared by our mentor in prior. 

Our mentor, Min was very helpful. He brought us around the town, showing the bus station, supermarket and even brought us to the phone shop to purchase a sim card. He also brought us shopping for some household items and groceries.

At night we went to the Halal restaurant located in the town. Approximately about 10 minutes of walking. The restaurant's owner was an Uzbekistan, so the food sold are traditional Uzbek meals. I had my roasted chicken for my dinner at the shop. A week without being able to eat any chicken had finally paid-off.

Our apartment

With our mentor, Min.

The kitchen area, next to the main door.

Our living room

My room

Washroom

My housemate's room

Washing machine

Our dinner for tonight.

Small town

Small lane heading up to our house



Breakfast at the 7 eleven while enjoying the serenity of a small town


HM

Local Adjustment Program: Day 05 - Welcoming Luncheon

Today marks the final day of our local adjustment training. We reached APCEIU early after checking out from the hotel. The ceremony which assembled all the participants, mentors and principals from respective schools, was officiated by the director of APCEIU, followed by the speech of the representatives from each country. Our country represented by Miss Aini, the officer from the Ministry of Education, Malaysia had given an exceptional speech. I did feel little touched realising that it was the last day that all of us would be together before everybody headed to the different part of South Korea. 

After the speeches, all participants from four countries performed their cultural dances. The participants from Thailand with their beautiful costume had performed the coconut shell dance. The Indonesian teachers had performed a dance from West Papua. The Mongolian teachers had performed their traditional dance and played their traditional musical instrument. And Malaysia with our extravagant traditional dance numbers consisting of overture dances, joget, kolatam and sumazau. We even ended our performance with joget lambak by which we also invited the audience to dance on the stage.

The luncheon ceremony ended at 2.00 pm. We bid farewell to each other and headed straight to our respective places with our own mentor. It was quite sad to be parted from other friends and knowing that Miss Aini will leave all of us in South Korea for three months was quite overwhelming.  














HM


Thursday 6 September 2018

Local Adjustment Training: Day 04

Our training today started with the slot creating effective lessons for foreign students and sharing good cases delivered by a lecturer from Yonsei University, one of the established public university in South Korea. She had given some tips regarding how to interact with the students and keeping the lesson as simple yet as engaging as possible. 

After having our lunch - surprisingly we had authentic Indian food for today's menu - we were taught some basic Korean and how to read hangeul characters. It looked easy but the more you learn it the more confused you would be. Hopefully, I would master the language in coming 3 months. 

At around 2.30 pm, we headed back to Lotte Hotel for the GCED conference. This time we would be able to attend a plenary session where I had decided to listen to a talk on forging educational theatre in teaching GCED. It was very interesting and new for me. I would probably study more on this in the mere future. 

At 6.00 pm we had our dinner at a restaurant near the hotel. Luckily we had the vegetarian pizza for the dinner and it was quite delicious. We had our rest for two hours before starting the dance practice at the gym. 




With our beloved Chef de Mission - Miss Aini

With the lecturer from Yonsei University

Authentic Indian food for lunch

Basic Korean class

Pronouncing it right

Tracey & Parthiban working on Hangeul

Mastering the pronunciation through the air controlling technique

Slotting in for a short dance rehearsal

Parallel session - theatre in teaching GCED

With teachers from Indonesia - Pak Hadi and Pak Rizki

Theatre exercise

Vegetarian pizza - pickle, cheese and some leaves


Dance practice at the gym

HM

Wednesday 5 September 2018

Local Adjustment Training: Day 03

Day 3 of the training.

Our Malaysian delegation decided to don tradition the traditional 'Bunga Tabur' songket garments in hope of promoting the Malaysian cultural heritage. This morning we were brought to an international GCED conference held at Lotte Hotel Seoul. (GCED stands for Global Citizenship Education). This annual conference was jointly organised by APCEIU, Korean Ministry of Education and Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 

The conference started with the opening address by the Korean Minister of Education and a congratulatory address by Ban Ki-moon, the former General Secretary of the United Nations. The conference was then continued with the parallel session and forum where they invited a speaker from Germany. One of the issues highlighted in this conference was the unification of two Koreas - North Korea and South Korea. 

Personally, I think that inviting a speaker from Germany in discussing the matter was a brilliant move since the Germans did experience the separation and unification of their nation. Being in South Korea amidst the unification process between these two nations did gave some sentimental value that I will forever cherished in my mind. And hopefully, the dream of unifying the Korean peninsula one day will become a reality. 
Heading to the venue


International participant

Centre stage

Wefie











Performance - teaching GCED through theatre 

Proudly wearing the nation's treasure of Songket in the middle of Seoul metropolitan