Day 118 -- Cheongju Craft Festival and Meeting Konyang University Students

A few days ago, I got a call from Bora. Bora is an English professor at Konyang University, down the street from my apartment, and her nephew is one of my students at the Internet high school. She came to visit me at the school festival last week and was shocked to see me wearing jeans, sneakers, a ratty Penn State sweatshirt, and a baseball hat. She was so surprised to see me singing and dancing along to KPop songs with the students that she commented about me looking like a college student.

Well, duh. I only graduated in May.

After noticing that I do not, in fact, look, feel, or act like a member of the "professional" adult world, she told me that I should meet some of her students. SCORE. She called a few days later to ask if I'd be free on Saturday (i.e. Halloween) because her students wanted to take me to an exhibition. Regrettably, I had to tell her I already had plans. She said she'd call back another time.

Ten minutes later, she called again and we were set for Sunday at 1pm. Since I was in Gwangju for Halloween, I got about 2 hours of sleep from the time I left the bars/nightclubs and then had to wake up in order to start the 4 hour journey back to Nonsan for this meeting. Not even complaining though.

I wasn't sure what to expect because all she said was that I would go to an exhibition and I would like her students because they're "cute and smart". Now, since this is Korea, I didn't know if this meant I'd be meeting some nice girls, or if I was being set up with a boy because blind dates in Korea are called "meetings".

I met Bora across from my apartment after she ran to the grocery for some snacks(?). She was with a female student.

Okay, so I guess we're just going to the university to talk and hang out.

Then we got to Konyang and there were two male students waiting in the parking lot.

Okay, so it's a double date where we'll talk and hang out.

Then we got into a car and started driving away, picking up two more girls along the way.

Okay, now WTF is going on?

After two hours of driving, we finally arrived... somewhere I didn't recognize. It turns out we were in Cheongju, east of Nonsan on the other side of Daejeon, for a craft festival. Well, as long as everything makes sense, right?

In all honesty, though, I ended up having a great time. Things were awkward at first, with the students being way too shy to use English with me and my Korean being painfully limited. I bonded with two girls, Yae Ji and Chi Su, as we wandered around the exhibits.

Yae Ji was super cute--my first impression of her was that I thought she looked so Western: relaxed-fit jeans with sneakers, a sweatshirt, and puffy vest. Compared to the other girls, who wore designer-style suits, she seemed the most laid back. As we walked around, she kept linking her arm with mine. Adorable.

Chi Su was the most talkative. She was thrilled, it seemed, to discover I'm just like any other girl, despite being foreign. That is, when she commented on how cute a particular guy was and I agreed by pointing out another cute one, she almost died of shock. We spent the rest of the day picking out hot guys from the crowd and fawning over the artists showing little kids how to make wheel-thrown pottery.

Next to that booth was a tent offering edible house-building kits. In other words, the Korean almost-right equivalent of a gingerbread house. Never mind the fact that it was the day after Halloween, or that instead of gingerbread and candy it included saltine crackers and Ritz, it was great constructing a hideous monstrosity of carbohydrates and sugar. I'd say that was the turning point, when we went from slightly-awkward-and-unsure to this-is-weird-but-mutually-enjoyed.

At the end of the night, the others had opened up a bit, too. At dinner, one of the boys admitted he had a lot more fun than he thought he would and that we should do this type of get-together again another weekend.



I really should text Yae Ji or Chi Su to maintain contact, because this kind of interaction is EXACTLY what I've been craving out here in Nonsan. I haven't had that much fun since Chuncheon and I know the reason why: I need friends my age here in Nonsan. This may very well be a huge milestone and an emotional turning point in my grant year, if I play my cards right.