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I found myself oddly comfortable here in Suncheon after coming back from the ETA conference in Gyeongju. I was expecting to be more unhappy I guess. As my bus pulled into Suncheon, after hours of travel, I tested myself: Does this feel like coming home? Like when I'm coming off the freeway and driving up Buchanan into Albany, passing the old middle school/newer elementary school and onto San Pablo Avenue? Of course it didn't feel like that, I didn't feel that traveler's relief of coming back to a familiar place. Maybe not because Suncheon wasn't familiar, or I wasn't relieved to be done traveling, but it wasn't enough to counteract the sadness of leaving my friends. But when I got back to the apartment and saw my host family, (and gave them the musical monk doll that I'd bought at a temple in Gyeongju) I did feel relaxed. Maybe a little like I'd come back a different, more comfortable person. It was the longest amount of time I'd left my host family for (Friday-Monday), so maybe that made it a little different for me than for other ETAs. I did get like three teachers tell me that I looked healthy or more beautiful since I came back, which is nicer than the common, "Your face looks red today," that I get from my host mother.

But I did find myself missing my ETA friends almost immediately (maybe even before I left). Being alone is lonely but okay. Being around people you love reminds you of how much you need them.

Yesterday was the teachers' athletic competition. We were all assigned to teams and different sports. The class periods were actually each shortened by 5 minutes to provide time for this; around 4 pm all the teachers left the school and gathered in the playing field area. Some of the students watched us from the classroom windows. I think they were supposed to be 'self-studying.' I was assigned to basketball, and two games I was unfamiliar with: a Korean game of tossing bamboo sticks into a basket and a game that I think was expressedly invented for the competition, which involved rolling a soccer ball into a target-shaped area on the ground, and trying to get it into the highest point area.

Basketball was actually just shooting baskets, and I got 1 out of 3 (of course I did better when I was just practicing.) With the stick-throwing game I did pretty good on my second round; it sort of reminded me of darts, which I used to play a lot--some of the same tactics, but similar to darts it also takes some time to get the hang of the right way to throw, and some of the sticks were different lengths, and thus different weights, which made it more challenging.

The really tasty roast pig that we ate was one of my favorite parts, though second to listening to the vice principal yell, "Chachachachacha!" everytime he attempted something, like rolling the soccer ball or playing a traditional Korean dice game that sort of reminded me of cribbage. I also enjoyed watching the teachers interact in a casual, social way, like competitively teasing each other, or yelling things like, "Aja!" with their fists in the air, or in English, "Nice shot!" or "C'mon c'mon c'mon!" There was also a raffle, and I won a package of tissue boxes, which was appropriate since I've been sneezing like crazy for the past three weeks or so.

So over all this week has been a pretty relaxing one. I'm heading to Jeonju for a pansori festival (a type of Korean music) either tonight or tomorrow morning. Next week is midterms, so I'll be spending most of the week at school but not teaching--so doing some grading and lesson planning.

Listening: to a cool mix cd that my sister Azelyn put into a care package that my mom mailed off weeks and weeks ago that finally came (lemondrops, smarties, a few issues of my The Believer subscription, and a nice purse that my mom actually made, among other things).

Writing: nothing for a long long time, but I've been challenged by a friend here, Matthias, and we're both required to give the other a story by this Sunday evening. I haven't written, or at least completed, anything new in awhile, so I'm a bit nervous, but it's good motivation.