Second Week in Full Swing

The week kicked off with a test to see how much we’d retained from the previous week. Thankfully, it went well… I’ve officially moved up from the Foundation Group to the Beginner level. Yes, I am now a Beginner! This level is divided into four sublevels before progressing to Elementary. To reach Advanced, it takes about 61 weeks of study 🤪

This past week was quite intense… packed with new vocabulary, tricky conjugations, and extra layers of grammar. We had a new teacher and just like our previous one, he brought a lot of energy into the classroom. He raced through the material while still managing to fire questions at us in Korean, which, of course, we had to answer in Korean too. Every now and then, my ears would perk up in panic when I realized it was my turn. I ended up jotting down loads of notes. Now it’s time to try and review, practise, and hopefully remember them all.




In the four afternoon classes, we had a female teacher who approached the almost same material in a completely different way… very playfull, communicative and definitely interactive.





Also this week, I had signed up for the Friday afternoon excursion😃

So, Friday afternoon, a large group of us went for a picnic at Banpo Hangang Park on the Han River side. And, what fantastic weather we had. Perfect weather for the picnic and cycling along the river.









Of course, we wanted to end our Friday in a unique way. A group of us took the subway to the north side of the Han to Hongdae district in search of a Karaoke room (노래방). After strolling through Hongdae for a while we found a nice one. We ended up spending two hours in there instead of 1 hour and singing our throats hoarse. We ‘rounded off’ the day after our quick dinner with beer and soju in a pub where we struck up a conversation with some young Koreans and they were curious about our experiences in Korea.














Saturday turned out to be a bit of a slow day, at least in terms of studying. It was already getting late before I really got started, and to be honest, not much learning happened. So instead, I decided to go for a walk around the neighbourhood.

I stumbled upon a nice little supermarket not too far from my hotel. I picked up some food, since I don’t always feel like eating out. Luckily, with a microwave and kettle in my room, I can prepare a few simple meals myself.

In the afternoon, the weather took a turn. It started raining, so I ended up staying close to home. The weather here really is all over the place… Friday was beautiful, sunny and over 22 degrees Celsius. But last night, the temperature dropped sharply and it even snowed!

This morning, I headed out around brunch time, partly so housekeeping could tidy my room🤗 I picked up a few things for lunch and dinner and of course I coudn’t resist stopping by a coffee shop for a fresh latte. Instant coffee in my room just doesn’t cut it.

The rest of the day has been all about studying. We’ve covered quite a lot this past week, and there’s still so much grammar and vocabulary to review. It’s almost 10 PM and I haven’t managed to go through everything yet. Thankfully, tomorrow’s test isn’t crucial for moving up to the next level… still, I’d like to do well.

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