went to hahoe traditional village sunday. they do a really neat mask dance which is, apparently, funny--if you speak korean.

there are houses in the village that were built by the aristocracy in the 1500s.

people still live here.

there's a humongous tree in the center of town--you reach it by walking down an anonymous, narrow alley--where villagers have prayed for the last six hundred years.

mountaintop badminton

forbes at the badminton courts. he showed me these courts on top of the mountain ridge south of my neighborhood--old people hike the trails and exercise at stations along the way. we play badminton some mornings.

haeinsa

on sunday i took a trip to haeinsa, about an hour west of daegu, with friends jon, forbes and katie

it's a unesco world heritage site--this man is looking through the slats at the tripitaka koreana

also known as the buddhist library, it's the oldest collection of buddhist texts in the world, all carved into wood

fall and suseong lake

soccer sunday

football team asia (well, ten and a half of us)

dad was standing behind the goal for two of mine

this one was disallowed on a dubious call

this one stood

halftime

chungdahm institute

well, the owner of my school bought a franchise of cdi, a well-known and serious academy that started in seoul and is expanding to other cities. classes last three hours and are highly structured, so i don't have the flexibility to really freestyle lessons anymore. this means that i don't know my students nearly as well, but i'm feeling less the pressure to come up with the grist of their english educations. the change bought me a fun week of training in seoul, too. swaton is still alive, on the third floor, now, of the same building. jason stayed there, tristan made the move with me.

family in seoul

lisa at the bus stop

farrukh posing like a korean

cousin gracie

and her little brother riley at the playground