Eberland!!!

I went to a Korean theme park, Everland, this past weekend. I was a little bit disappointed because although it may live up to its name as the best theme park in Korea, there were not too many rides. On their website they claim that they ranked in the top 5 theme parks in the world. I'm not sure who that ranking was from....maybe a Korean guy who had never been to another theme park....or maybe that was the ranking for Best Fishheads in a Theme Park...who knows?!? Unfortunately it rained so they had to shut a lot of the park down but we had been on almost all the rides anyways....after about 2 hours. There were a couple of roller coasters and then some thrill rides like you would see at exhibitions and fairs back home. Apart from the rain, we all had a pretty fun day anyways. By the way, they don't have the 'V' sound in Korean language so they have to use a B ~ Eberland!

Who can resist that perennial favourite...BUMPER CARS!!!

It isn't often that I get the urge to take photos in the washroom but I thought Everland's father/son toilet combo was the perfect opportunity! Really, do you have to be doing that at the same time?:

"Please waste here." Don't mind if I do, thank you very much!:

Now some stories about the kids:

I have some new kids and they are all pretty good. One of my classes is full of big story tellers...it gets quite funny sometimes and I egg them on to see just how massive the stories can become....

For instance, we were talking about animals the other day and one of the little girls, Jane, said that she knew about monkeys because her grandfather had a pet monkey. I thought this was a little bit odd but I guess it was pretty believable. Then we moved on to eagles, which her grandpa had one of two. Okay? This is getting more odd. Then it was bears...guess what, her Grandpa has a pet bear too? I said.."Oh your grandpa must live in the country" but she said, "No, he live in Seoul." I can just imagine the tiny little Korean apartment of this old Korean man filled with a monkey, eagle and a bear!

While talking about eagles, Jack also chimed in with his own little story....it seems one day Jack found himself in the forest. Don't ask me how but little Jack had a tomato in his hand. He continued to say "I threw the tomato up in the air as high as I could. I went to go see where the tomato had landed and I found it on the ground with a dead eagle." "Oh you killed an eagle?" "Yes teacher, but it was an accident." Jack had also seen many bears while walking in the forest with his grandfather. This is significant because of the fact that Korea has basically no wildlife. They ate basically anything with four legs, and during the time of the Korean war they were so desperate for food that they finished everything off that was still left at that time.

I love these stories. It's great to see the kids have imaginations. For a society that tries its best to stifle creativity and imagination, it is good to see that some kids can still just be kids.

Clark