Thank you Bubbie and Grandfather!

The boys got their birthday presents right on time!  I tried shooting a video right as they were opening them, but the battery ran out. : - (  So, I shot a video later in the evening and had them thank Bubbie and Grandfather for the gifts.  Oliver loved the crayons and Ronan loved the Pokemon card the best, but the gifts as a whole were a big hit.  I've included a drawing Oliver drew tonight of him and Tashi.  Thank you!

Rain, rain go....oh forget it

Heavy rains have resulted in massive mudslides and floods all over Seoul.  It has essentially rained non-stop (with only one or two days of sunshine) since mid-June.  It would be an understatement to say I am sick of the rain.  Now, it's turned deadly.  People have died from the floods and mudslides, including the wife of the CEO of a major dept store here in Seoul.  We're lucky that we have power still since a lot of people don't.  The sidewalks in front of our place have collapsed in spots and the roads are blocked so we can't go anywhere.  I'm afraid to ride the subway with roads caving in and mountains melting into the roads.  I posted a Chosun Ilbo video of a major mudslide/flood from a mountain in southern Seoul.  Right below, I'm posting a link to a video of our neighborhood subway station as well as other videos, and some photos others have taken of the floods.

Bongcheon Station (5 minutes from our home)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpcY62K8SY8

Sadang Station (5 minutes from our home):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OddF2YtbTxE

Downtown:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydjLV4ckOaw

Shaky video of the inside of subway and Daechi neighborhood in southern Seoul:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpkjceYGnrE

The above and directly below photo is from the Chosun Ilbo's coverage of the floods.  The above is a still of the video in the post below and the shot below is a before and after of Gangnam subway station.

 The shot directly above is of the stairs leading to the National Korean Traditional Music Center (National Gugak Center).  The buildings are in danger of being engulfed by a massive mudslide.  The Center is built on the side of a mountain.  Below, the shot is of the stair corridor leading to the outside Star Theater.  It's become a rushing waterfall.  The entire grounds are completely flooded.  I'm worried about the archives and museum collections in the building to the right.

Below, a larger perspective shot of the Gugakwon--shots of the Gugakwon courtesy of Karam Kim and Jeong-in Lee.

Above (photo: Minjoung Kim), a shot of the Yangjae station area--the road is completely gone and the rain is not stopping. It literally sounds like we're standing beneath the falls at Fall Creek Falls park.  Just relentless.  Below (photo: Mirin Kim), one of my favorite Indie Gugak teams has had their studio flooded.  Their not the only ones, however--tales of flooded studios and broadcasting stations abound.

One of my students, Do Misol, took this photo near Kwanghwamun station in downtown Seoul.  I'm hoping this rain ends soon.  The boys are scheduled to have a pool party tomorrow for their birthday, but I'm thinking it'll just be an inside affair.  Geez...endless rain...

Seoul Floods

Debut?

Okay, so I've joined an amateur pungnyu group.  Pungnyu is chamber music that was big with aristocrats during the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910).  It essentially is court music, but there are also regional variations as communities in the country side also had their pungnyu styles and performers.    My haegeum teacher teaches at this Korean music institute and she asked them if I could become a member of their club.  They consented and so I joined. I performed for the first time with them yesterday and it was, well, interesting.  It could have gone way better, but at least we did it.  These were pieces I know very well, but with rhythms and tunings not matching up on stage all did not go as planned.  That's the risk you take, I suppose.  But, having played in amateur orchestras since I was in my early 20s, I know that amateur groups can be good.  With some more work and individual practice, I'm hoping the next performance will be way better.   Still, it just feels good to play with other people.  There's nothing like it.  I've always prefered playing with others compared with playing alone--there's always a good energy.  Most of these people are not, and have never been, musicians, so the energy is a bit different.  But, if we keep playing together it can only improve.

Above and below, the small cafe and stage are ready for the performance.  The directors of the institute were running around lighting candles and burning incense to enhance the mood for the performance.  In this little space, there are performances every Friday.  On most Friday's the performers are professionals or people who rent out the space for their solo performances and/or events.  The Friday performance series is called "Pungnyu in the City [doshi pungnyu]."  Last night was amateur night, a regular part of the series. Here is a link to one of the pieces we played last night (or, a demonstration of how it should be played):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fKOALGNRyY
We played it way too slow so that the end result was both hard to play and hard to listen to.  It should have a march-like feel to it and it just bombed.  Oh well.  I, for one, am not sure who should set the tempo, but the directors blamed the daegeum (large transverse bamboo flute) team (whew--at least the haegeum team wasn't blamed, but the daegeum team was not happy with that).

The geomun'go teacher got us all prepped and ready.  She's a master with makeup and hair.  She even got my short wavy hair back into a little ponytail with the help of lots of hair gel.  She kept saying, "Wow, you're hair is like doll's hair."  She, and others, insisted I have the little bun appendage attached to my head.  They said, "We have a brown one so it should work."  Um, guys....um, it totally looks wierd. Brown and reddish-blonde are, afterall, completely different. But they were like, "No, it looks fine. It really blends in." Um, ok. I wanted to take it off, but they insisted I keep it on since they said it looked better than my little pony nub.

Above, I am all dressed and ready to go.  They have a whole storeroom full of hanbok, so the haegeum team all coordinated our outfits, as did the geomun'go and gayageum team.  We spent some time warming up before the show.

Above, the leader of our haegeum team (left) and one of our daegeum players.  He was a daegeum  player in college and also plays piri and danso.  He's very nice.

Jack and the kids arrived late, so I have no photos of the actual peformance.  But, it's just as well.  I need to work on my stage manners (this was the first time for me, afterall) as well as presentation. After the performance there was collective relief and regret.  It could have gone better, and the directors were not happy with the overall performance.  Me, too.  If nothing, a bad performance gets you determined to do better next time (well, except for one geomun'go guy whose playing is terrible but he blames the other instruments as to why he can't play in tune and time--I think he's hopeless).

 Above, me and my biggest fan and, below, with the lovely ladies of the haegeum team.  I really like them.

At this point, I was ready to go....can you tell?  It was a tiring, tiring day.

Girls' Nights

Whenever we get a chance, Dahin and I steal out for a girls' night.  I was able to get some tickets to a concert at Namsan Traditional Music Hall (to do some research--there's killing two birds with one stone for you), so decided to take Dahin.  We ate at Mr. Pizza before the concert.  Mr. Pizza has a salad buffet, but true to Korean style, they only provide one bowl for multiple people, even though you are paying for two salad buffets.  They provide new bowls for replenishing, but each time only give one bowl.  If you ask for a bowl for each person, they flat refuse.  I'm just not into that, but when in Rome...Also, true to Korean style, the potato pizza we ordered also had corn on it, What's with the canned corn on pizza?  Even "cheese pizza" comes with corn, something the boys have had to get used to in their "I only eat cheese pizza" world.

Then, I took my TA and my favorite pansori singer out for dinner and we decided to go to norae bang (karaoke room).  The girls asked if Dahin could join (we were in our neighborhood), so Jack put Dahin on the bus and we sang our hearts out together.  I think Dahin enjoyed being with the big girls, although that night I discovered she had come down with some sort of bug and and she faded as the evening got a little later.  We left early after eating some gelato with Eunji and Mina.

Dahin, Mina (fabulous pansori singer and Korean Music Dept. office manager), and my wonderful TA Eunji.

Rainy Days

It's certainly not the most exciting around here with all this heavy rain falling daily.  Tashi, for one, is bored and shows it.  Poor guy.  Luckily, we can play ball indoors, but we all yearn for sunny days and hanging outside. 

Above, Dahin sits way too close to the TV (and I'm in the midst of telling her to sit back), the clothes attempt to dry on the drying rack, and Tashi has claimed a pillow with Baby and Ball (and bone).  Below, Tashi  and his other baby hang out with Tashi's blankie and the boys as they trade Pokemon cards.

Photoshoot

One of the exciting experiences of the past month was doing a photoshoot for LEBEIGE fashions here in Korea. One day, I received a phone call from an advertising agency asking me to model for LEBEIGE Fashion's "Heart for Eye" campaign.  I thought it was either a joke or a scam so had her call my husband.  He verified they were for real and we started from there.  They sent us some of the magazines with their ads in it as well as info on the ad agency and LEBEIGE and I sent them measurements and recent photos.  Doing the photo shoot was part of a charity campaign sponored by LEBEIGE.  Instead of being paid to model for the shoot, the money  would go to a charity for blind children.  Programs benefitting from the donation include the Korean Art Association for the blind.  As a thank you gift, I received a terracotta sculpture created by a 13 year-old blind child.  It's an angel without arms.  The child was trying to make arms, but instead formed wings.  Part of it is the understanding that blind children have a hard time conceptualizing the contours of the human body in complete form, and also the message that, even though it began as a mistake, the final piece carried a great amount of meaning: even with imperfections, we can fly.  I love that sculpture and keep it on my piano in my office--they provided a marbel stand for the sculpture and a little placard.

It was the perfect chance to do something good. Plus, I got to be a model for an afternoon, got some great photos, and some outfits to boot! 

 Lee Kyung Min and her team did my makeup and hair.  Lee is a very famous makeup artist who not only does the makeup for top movie stars and models, she is also quite the celebrity herself.  It was so fun to get all made up.  They really transformed me into a total upgrade of myself.

 I loved this dress and wish I could have kept it.  : - (  Sue, the Lars ad company rep, took me shopping at LEBEIGE, but the clothes I wore for the shoot were part of the fall/winter collection and so not available at the moment.  Still, I got some really beautiful clothes to wear to work and concerts.

It was fun to see the photos on the monitor.  The whole team of photographers, makeup and hair artists, and representatives from the ad company and LEBEIGE were all very supportive.  Below, thank goodness for modern technology--my little eye wrinkles get photoshopped out.  I'm pretty sure they made my arm slimmer, too, because my arms look great in that dress.  : - )

 Above, posing with Lee after she did her photoshoot--she was one of the models that day, too.  Below, posing with Sue Kim, the Lars ad company rep who spent so much time getting us ready for this day and who took us shopping. Without those lights and the backdrop, etc. I look like a crazy lady with that big hair and layers of makeup.

 Above, with the photographer and, below, you can see some shots of the other models that day, including (on the right) the Direcctor of the National Ballet Theater.