Omigod, Tae Kwon Do has gotten a little out of hand. First of all, Grand Master has been in Ho Chi Minh City judging some competition for the past week. In his stead he's letting some young upstart triple black belt student teach our class. This guy's main purpose seems to be not so much to teach us Tae Kwon Do as to make total fools of us and laugh in our faces. For instance, among this guys talents is the ability to spring up and down from squatting position to full airborne extension over and over. So he'll do a couple of bounces and then watch us try to follow his lead. Believe me, my attempts involve a lot more toppling over than actual jumping, and I don't even think I'm the worst in the class. What else did we have to do today? Oh, there was the part where we had to squat with our hands behind our backs and try to "walk" forward in that position (have I mentioned before the seeming Korean obsession with squatting?). Then we had to hold one foot up and hop to the end of the gym and back. Whatever. This guy might be a hot shot in TKD, but I saw him walking around the back gate area yesterday and he was wearing pale denim tapered jeans. Loser.

Hm, I'm teaching a lesson on latitude and longitude tomorrow. Lesson planning has taken significantly longer than it probably should have due to the fact that it took me about a thirty minutes (and a VERY heated debate with my roommate) to figure out how the international date line works and another twenty minutes to explain it in writing using short. direct. sentences. But if anyone out there has any lingering confusion about time zones or the prime meridian, have I got the worksheet for you.

I have a new favorite Korean food. Here's how it works: first they dump a bunch of pork and onions and sauce into the grill. You let that cook for a while and then eat the pork (supposedly with ample amounts of kimchee but somehow mine never gets eaten...odd). But THEN, once all that's left is all the extra sauce they add rice, lettuce, kimchee and CHEESE. Honestly, I had no idea what a psychological attachment to cheese I had until I came here and suddenly was eating none of it. I swear I almost shrieked when the guy brought it out. But that would have been inappropriate. The name of the second half of the dish is "jeejuh (cheese) deng (deng) bap (rice)." Deng is not actually a food, but is the sound they make when they deposit the cheese on the grill by thwacking a metal spoon against the bowl. Actually, I think I'd prefer plain jeejuh bab...the deng kinda hurts my ears.

(the spell check on here wants me to change "omigod" to "homicide," which seems apt...)