Eb In South Korea: Another day, another Mayor

Holy moley! I've been BUSY and it's been hard to update this thing which is a shame because we've done some SUPER COOL STUFF. In a lot of ways I've dreaded writing about April 12th and 13th because they were a little more fact-filled and dry and I've been chomping at the bit to get to the good stuff.

April 12th:

This morning started off with a "Strawberry Poppin'" donut from Dunkin' Donuts (insert "on and popping" joke). It was an okay donut. Apparently the "poppin" part of the donut was Pop Rocks. My donut sizzled in my mouth, ladies and gentleman.

On to more important things.

Following my breakfast, we met the Mayor of Hong Seong. Hong Seong is 1,000 years old and known for their mud, shrimp preserving process, famous military generals and artists. The city has plans to relocate its provincial office in the near future and that should encourage growth and development.

Following our meeting, we toured the house that the mayor lived in a long (think centuries) time ago.

A picture in front of City Hall

And then we went to Hong Ju Middle School to meet the students.

Hong Ju has aproximately 600 students. The educational system is very different here. For instance, in America we have kindergarten and grades one through twelve. In Korea, they also have kindergarten but the beginning of each new school level (elementary, middle and high school) is referred to as grade one. So, if you were in grade two of high school you'd be in tenth grade.

Another difference is the use of the word public and private schools. In Korea, private schools are owned by individuals and public schools are run by the government. Middle school education is mandatory in Korea, so it's free. High school, however, is not and regardless of whether you attend public or private school you pay a tuition.

Many (most?) middle schools are single sex. Hong Ju is an all boys school. High School is co-ed but the classes are not.

We wemet the principal of Hong Ju Middle School and, among other things, we learned that 20 hours a year of volunteer service are mandatory per student.

And then we got to meet the students. Long story short, boys the world over are exactly the same. Smelly, loud and rambunctious. They were surprised to have American visitors so that didn't have many questions planned but they were flirtatious with me and asked

Following pictures and a brief meeting with the Vice Principal of Hong Ju High School, we had a formal lunch with the Mayor of Hong Seong.

After lunch we went to a strawberry farm and got to pick strawberries!!! We were given a container with instructions to pinch the leaves to remove the strawberries from the vine and told that we could eat as many strawberries as we wanted during our adventure!

It's hard to make out but here's the outside of the large strawberry tents

Strawberries everywhere!!!!!!!

Me with my container of strawberries

Bag'em up! I'm ready to go

We made a quick trip to a bank to exchange some dollars for won and then we headed over to a new village development which will be restored using traditional architecture. This was followed by a quick trip to a children's library under construction.