well, I've added another vid, and for ease of use for you non-computer people, here's the link to all my videos (a grand total of 5, but there will be more, now that I've figured out how to compress the files to manageable sizes).

I've had an busy weekend so far, it started early on Saturday morning, I was in Hyehwa by 8am to do volunteer teaching, as part of a program run by Feminif here Seoul. Feminif are a feminist (duh!) publishing house here in Seoul, and they do lots of other awesome campaigns and programs.
The one i'm involved in is the IF Nolto program. Kids in Korea go to school every second Saturday. On the non-school Saturdays, kids from single-parent families stay at home alone while their parents work. The IF Nolto program is like a holiday program for these kids. They stay at the IF center all day, with English, Art, PE and culture programs. I'm helping out with the English classes, along with 3 other volunteers: Min and Ann who are bilingual Koreans, and Sue who is gyopo (person of Korean ethnic descent who have lived the majority of their lives outside Korea). So I'm the only whitie, which means I'm like a celebrity. anyway, yesterday was our first day. It was fun going back to being around kids, there'll all so cute. and LOUD! here's some pics from yesterday morning.




After Nolto, I rushed home, cooked a quick lunch (yummy scrambled tofu) and then rushed off to meet Erin at City Hall, for the Seoul Friendship Fair, part of the Hi Seoul! Festival. Korea is not particularly open to foreigners, not a surprise since its one of the most racially homogenous countries in the world. But once a year, Seoul does good with the Friendship Festival. Under hot sunny skies (eek, its not even summer yet and already its too hot), we wandered among all the international stalls, showcasing ethnic crafts and selling food from 0ver 30 counties. Yummy falafel from the Eygpt stall, and baklava from the Ukrainian stall. Then we sat in the sun on the grass at Seoul Plaza and watched performances from all over the world. It was a really lovely afternoon.







I am in love with Korean kids, who are so much cuter than Western kids. We spend a good while watching the kids playing the fountains. The wee kids in their raincoats were especially cute.







Then we rushed to Itaewon to meet people for dinner at the Mexican restaurant, where I ran into Amy from the Veggie Club. How random! a city of 12 million and you still run into people you know. then back to City Hall for the evening program of the Hi Seoul Festival. Great Korean ska band, trampoline acrobats, and crazy dancers in fluoro outfits. The best part was seeing the crowd having such a good time, all without alchohol. Kids, families, teens, and old people all dancing and singing and enjoying themselves in such an earnest and eager way. The highlight was the elderly Korean couple who had just come back from hiking, who spent the evening jiving away energetically, and being the centre of the party. Unfortunately, my camera battery ran out, hopefully Erin posts her pics up soon and I can steal one.

Then today it was BBQ time again, with Tyson, Tynessa, Tyson's two friends from Daegu, and Erin and I. after the BBQ we headed to City Hall again to watch the closing party of the festival. Lots of people, more fluro dancers, Vivaldi's Spring and Winter concertos, and a very strange hip-hop performance where people pretended to be in wheelchairs. Bless them, they were trying to be inclusive, and got it very wrong. Just when i'd thought I'd seen everything in Korea...






whew! photo overload! I can't be bothered loading anymore up, so here's a link to some more of Seoul at night-time: