Welfare Challenge

Today I am going to follow the $21 food budget set out by Welfare per person.

Check out the website Welfare Food Challenge

People who need help really do not get help. We have a problem in B.C and all of Canada. We should be helping out the people in our backyard rather than sending charity to seriously corrupt governments overseas.

Stop fueling war, fuel your people.

To start, last Sunday I bought a weeK's worth of food for myself and my DH worth $40 and I already prepared all my lunches for the week.

I'm not sure I'll be able to cut out coffee because I get coffee withdrawals and nasty migraines when I don't get coffee. I work at Starbucks, I am always highly overdosed on coffee. Since I am going to school everyday and work every weekend, I cannot try to cut it out yet. Weaning off is possible. I still have 10lbs of coffee beans from last year. I can try to use it up when I need to.
Sugar, which I don't usually add to my coffee but eat too much off, I will try to cut out.

I also generally eat 2 meals a day. But I have a secret stash of oatmeal if I get really hungry. I have tried to follow, but not exact, the power fast diet from darebee.com.

I will mark out what I eat and generally how much it costs.

Morning: Large Coffee ($2.20), waffle
Snack: Three Hashbrowns ($2.00)
Lunch: 2 egg omelette (no milk) with pizza sauce, pepperoni, and mozzarella cheese

Snack: Chestnut Praline Latte and Mini Snowman doughnut ($7.10)
Dinner: Apple and Oatmeal

Definitely went over my daily budget for sure. But I still have some left over for the week. 

$21 - $11.30 = $9.7 for the rest of the week and it's only the first day

Study for midtern

I am supposed to be studying for my midterm thats tomorrow but instead I am trying to finish Once upon a time on Netflix. I can't stop myself. It's so addictive and I can't wait until the next season is on Netflix.
I am probably going to have a super hard time getting off of Netflix again because Hemlock Grove just updated the latest season. I freacking love that show.

Sigh

Busy day

Today was definitely a busy day. I started my day a little bit late, the bus passed me saying it was full again (same thing happened yesterday). And by full translink means there is still standing for six - eight people. I would stand to get a ride 4 mins down the road. Seriously translink. The bus from my apartment is only comes every 15 - 30 minutes. So... Yeah you can really miss the bus. I walked to the station. I should have walked to the station anyways. Or at least woken up earlier.

So I arrived in Psychology Class late. I love psychology. That stuff is the bomb. Currently learning about cognitive and physical development of children. We are in the 'attachment' section of our book.
I also have a virtual baby. His name is Lan. Currently he is 8 months old :)
And I found that my baby is has a secure attachment to me.

The rest of school went well. I feel like I am actually learning stuff. My only issue is that I have already become disorganized and feel like I am about to fall behind in my studies and assignments. I can't afford to redo a class. I can barely afford my tuition this term. Faaak.

Well getting late, peace 🙋

What my day is like

Today was a busy day.
I almost woke up late for my mid-term this morning.
Luckily I made it on time and the teacher was late.

My classes class schedule is
Monday 8:30 - 3:50
Tuesday 9:00 - 5:20
Wednesday 8:30 - 3:50
Thursday 8:30 - 5:20
Friday 8:30 - 12

On Thursday and Friday we have practicum so Thursday is a really long day.

Sadly, I study until 10 pm everyday and still cannot get everything done.
I also work on Saturday and Sunday but its still not enough to cover the costs of study.

Sigh

Election Results

Federal Election 2015

Liberal wins 184 seats, first past the post
Conservative 101 seats, official opposition
NDP 42 seats


This may be my last political post unless something crazy happens.

Peace out Canadians.
We elected Bebe Trudeau. We have a lot of change in store.

I may decide to post my Facebook statuses of my ongoing rant.
Maybe

Election Day Canada

I'm not usually overtly political but

Dear Registered voters,
Don't Vote Harper

#stopharper

Check out vote together website to find the best political party to vote for in your riding.

And don't spoil your ballots.

Dear Unregistered Voters,
Get registered for next election.

Love, someone how is stuck between two bracets and gets royally [expletive].

P.s free universal healthcare is a lie
Income splitting is the worse thing to ever happen to a marriage.

Wow. Hello World!

As you can see... I am not really that good at keeping up with my blogs.
Again, I am going to try and promise to but I doubt that will happen.
Let's keep it up.

Yup, I still cook - less Korean food, but I crave it. I still cook rice for my DH. Lovely rice cooker keeps it warm for 5 days. Ah~
I still crochet. Though, not so much anymore too busy.
I hand sew (past tense) as a costumer's assistant for the BCRF.

On another note!
I have moved back to Canada as of March 2013 to Beautiful Vancouver. I have been living here for 2-ish years,
I have worked for Starbucks for 2 years now. Which I absolutely love to work at! I used to work full time but now I am only working on the Weekends.
Hey if you have any questions about Starbucks drinks and food items in B.C I can help you out.
I like to make "secret menu" style drinks.

I started volunteering for a private school because I wanted to apply for Early Childhood Education. I applied one college, but they didn't accept me.
I may go into details later.
Instead, my friend got my into another College. I had applied early for the January intake the moment I found out that the first college didn't want me. (Three years teaching in Korea to Kindy/Pre-k doesn't really cut it I guess). I started finishing all the paperwork and basically handed it in the next day. They were interested. My greatest friend put in a good work for me to the Head of the department and I got an interview a couple weeks later. I also felt it odd that the registrar accepted my with an English mark of 78% (1% less than minimum 80%). The head said that she accepted me and was glad to have me in the intake for September! OMG, Apply for January 2016 intake and got accepted to the September 2015 intake!

I was super happy about this. For sure.
But back to the English mark, a couple days later I was informed after I have my January application cancelled and my September intake accepted, that I was not able to register for classes (which already had the registration pass). So, unfortunately, I had to take the LET and get at least a 3 of 5. Got a three. Yay

So TL;DR, I got into college.

Peace, I have two mid-terms I need to study for.

Wow, it's been a long time!

Hey, to anyone that reads my blog.... it's been a loooong time since I have updated or made any post.
Nothing much on this end. Korea still feels like home (I've been here 3 years).
I have been getting healthy and exercising a lot more. Never thought I could pull it off. I started to run about 3 years ago, off and on, but never liked. In fact, I hated running. Then, when we moved from Konkuk Uni area (Gwangjin-gu) to 10 mins walk down from Itaewon Station (Yongsan-gu), I was closer to everything. Including an English speaking gym, at Noksapyeong Station, with personal trainers and group fitness. AW-SOME by the way.

I started fully exercising in May 2011. I started with Zumba on a Tuesday (unfortunately, my zumba instructor went back to Hawaii with her husband recently and I no longer have zumba.) and the went to the foreigner's gym on a Wednesday.  (I remember this because Zumba was on Tue/Thurs and Condition/GX was on Mon and Wednesdays. Both were awesome and I started to lose some fat and see a lot of changes in my body.

Come around August 2011, I started to watch what I eat and try to cut out junk food. I did very good until Halloween came around.

Crochet

I tried crocheting a squid but it looks rather more like a jellyfish cross with an octopus.
I decided to not make a squid because the tentacles looked not squidish. Hmmm
I should try again... someday

Kimchi jeon 김치전

I decieded to make some korean kimchi pancake.
I used several sources to find a good recipe, but i for got the sites. I remember the recipe, it was for about 3 people.

120 ml flour 밀가루
100 - 120 ml kimchi juice 김치
200g kimchi (drain, cut with scissors or chop it into smallish chunks) 김치
1 egg 계란
Half a green onion 파 (optional)
15ml oil 기름

<u>method </u>
Mix together and then pour some into heated pan with oil. Spread thinly and cook for 1 - 2 minutes until reddish brown and flip. Make a few more and enjoy Enjoy 맛있게 먹어요!

New phone and new job

I got a new phone because my lollipop was rather outdated. I decided to get a smartphone just until the new iphone comes out, but i will wait for about a year.

I have new job now and its tons of fun, i am enjoying it so far ^^

From left to right: Cloy (pronounced Chloe), Amy, Jian and Brian ^^

This is the classroom where my desk is and where I eat lunch

Left: Sarah, Ryan

the baby class: Daniel, Joshua and Arthur is hiding his face

After school class: this is Eddy and Ally. The bricks decided to fall on

him the moment I took a picture. haha

Miso

Miso is a korean performance of music and dance at the theatre that is down the road from the canadian embassy.

It is basically only for foreigners, the whole theatre was filled mostly with japanese ^^

It was very beautiful and the bad guy hugged me in the photo! Thats why bad guys rock. ㅋㅋㅋ

I recommend going of you want to do something in korea. I'll look for a map just in case.

When in Rome do as the Romans!

WEll, I'm not in Rome. I am in South Korea and here, they don't usually have ovens in their households.
So how does one go about making a cake that doesn't cost an arm and a leg??
***(as beautifully crafted cakes in local Bread shops range from 10,000won to who knows HOW much. and these beautiful and yummy cakes, although expensive are usually REALLY tiny. You'd have to buy two or three just to have a birthday party)


Well! I know! Use your rice cooker!! Wait, what? Yes, I am serious. Use your electric rice cooker to bake your cake! Its very simple.
I used this recipe here and it turned out wonderful and like this blogger, I didn't do the filling but I did do the butter cream icing on top but my icing turn more darker... it may be because I didn't use butter - I use margarine (Thats all I could find in short notice near my area at the furthest convenience store from my house/apt/one room-thingamajig) and I added a dash of Kahlua and vanilla syrup (like latte style syrup) because, well, the margarine style butter cream didn't taste as good as normal butter cream and I didn't have vanilla extract. (I originally wanted a whipped cream icing because its whiter and fluffier, but you can't find whipped cream r even 35% cream in the convenience stores here in Korea [outside of Itaewon].

But, for my cake I had to run it through the cook process 3 times, instead of 2 like the original recipe. It turned out perfectly the way I like it, nice and brown!! HA!

Anyways, Here are some nice pictures of my cake!

Hana Cooking School - kongbubang field trip

Today, instead of Korean Class, we had a field trip to a cooking school near Mia station.

We make 제육볶음 (jeyukbokkeum), 된장찌개(doenjangjjikae), and 주먹밥(jumeokbab).

It was very delicious.

These here are the 주먹밥. They are similar to Japanese Onigiri.

Me and my group decided to make ours look cute!

On the left is 된장찌개 (Soybean Paste Stew), it was awesome.

I really put the perfect amount of salt. Although I wish there was more 된장.

I felt it wasn't dark enough. But it was still awesome.

On the Right is my friend(Joanna)'s 제육볶음 (Spicy Stir-fried Pork). I took a picture

of her's because my other group members making the Pork was too far away. ㅎㅎ

But they all looked the same, so it didn't matter to me.

And I didn't have space on my Cellphone to take too many pictures.

I hope you all learn how to make Korean food! Its really delicious.

P.S Although we all had the same amount of gochujang for the bokkeum,

I felt that it wasn't spicy at all.

P.P.S If you want recipes for these things, check out

maanchi.com

# 11 and 12 of Touristy Things

Touristy Things to DO in Korea

Halloween Night

At the Seoul Drink n' Draw club

So much fun, I believe. I really enjoy going, although I went only twice. I will definitely try to keep going!

Oct 30

Baby Om!

I have been going to a Business Korean class for that past 4 months. Yay for blogging about it... NOT.

But one of the students at the class (he is a Yoga teacher at one of the universities in Seoul - forgot which one) just recently had a baby and today we get to go to his house and meet him! **heartheart**

The baby's name is Om.

Touristy Things to do before I leave Korea Forever

(This is just a copy from my facebook notes. I want to do it here too - hahaha)

(but I won't be leaving Korea too soon yet harharhar)

1. Meet and talk to 노홍철 from 무한도전.
2. Meet all the guys from the tv show 무한도전.
3. Half-master Korean language.
4. Take the topik(test of proficency in korean) and get good mark.
5. Visit another province in Korea (again)
6. Visit a Hanok village (traditional style Korean village)
7. Visit namsan tower. **done**
8. Go to a live 무한도전 concert.
9. Go to a live gag concert (kinda like korean version of snl)
10. Visit the old capital of city of the Joseon dynasty
11. Visit the re-vamped gwahwamun square.**done**
12. Take a picture with the statue of king sejong at gwanghwamun.**done**
13. Meet big bang ;) (or just go to their concert)
14. Visit Jimjjilbang **done** (several times done)
15. Be on a commercial in Korea
16. Go to jeju
17. Experience a temple stay
18. Pay off my credit card debt
19. Wear hanbok(Korean traditional clothes once more)
20. Purchase hanbok for myself

Will add more as I think of them...

Chuseok!!

It was fun, we went to my hubby's parents place and did the normal thankgiving "korean style" stuff.

We're off to the in-laws.

Mmmm, Yummy food!! ^-^

But right now, it's for the ancestors. So lets bow, so they can eat the yummy food first.

Me and Jang ik's cousin. I think her name is 다회 (Dahee...)

할머니, Jang-ik's uncle, and me ^^

And the end of a loooong day of eating and 3 hour car rides

from Namyangju to Incheon. ㅠㅡㅠ

Flooding before chuseok!

it had rained all morning and we found that our alley had slightly flooded. i made a joke about incheon having to worry about flooding and not us, and later found out on the internet that incheon area flooded pretty badly!

This is our area: At children's grand park station/konkuk university soccer field

These are the other areas:

^

kangnam area

^

Incheon area

^

Hongik University station

^

Also, hongik university station

^

Gwanghwamun subway

.

(these last images i got from my hubby that was on korean websites. None of these places are near my house)