Gwangju, South Korea

We arrived in Seoul, South Korea and took a 4hr bus to Gwangju to meet up with Jono’s friends Kerri and Katie who are South Africans teaching English there. Luckily, they picked us up from the bus terminal because not many of the taxi drivers speak English and we had no idea where we were going. We stayed in Kerri’s little apartment for the week and pretty much just chilled and relaxed during the day while she was teaching at her school all day. It was nice to not have to do anything or be anywhere or wake up early for anything, like we had been doing since May! 

South Korea was a lot more affordable and cheaper to get around and eat. Taxis were super cheap to get from Kerri’s house to downtown in 20mins...about 5000won (~R35) We pretty much only went out at night because that’s when the others were free and met up with the English crowd and a bunch of South Africans too. 

One night we found a petting shop where you pay to pet the animals, which were highly dolled up and dyed all sorts of colours etc to try look cuter...we were a tad freaked out. We had some traditional Korean food, consisting of lots of rice, veggies and meat, with some “kimchi” – which is like femented cabbage kind of. 

I’m still not very good at eating with chopsticks, especially when I’m very hungry and can’t grip meat well enough to bite. We also tried some rice wine but that wasn’t too tasty for me either. This one restaurant had a hot plate in the middle of the table and a buffet of raw food, which you then cooked on your table yourself. It was divine and only 10 000won per person (~R70) for all you can eat. 

South Korea felt a bit like a mini-america, in that it had a lot of American clothes, brands, shops (Subway, Starbucks etc) styles and general influence than Japan had. I obviously cannot read Japanese or Korean, but just by looking at it, I noticed the Korean language had a lot more circles and rounder letters, if that makes sense. We also went club hopping and most of them played popular western songs, while one of them played Korean pop (K-pop for short) where Koreans blew whistles to the beat! Karoake booths are also very popular and we went into one for about 30mins, but the music videos were all hilariously made, like Korean soap-operas. 

On our last night, we went out for dinner and then took the night bus back to Seoul airport, arriving at about 6am. We then checked in, bought a bunch of snacks from the 7-eleven and then got on our 5hr flight to Thailand. 

Kyoto

So after the tournament ended, we all packed up our bags and went our separate ways, except a few of us who were all going to Kyoto since there was a street festival happening there. Our little travel group consisted of Finn, Tim, Darryn, Jono, Andrea (Columbian) and myself – and we all didn’t have accommodation in Kyoto booked or any idea of where to initially go in Kyoto. We safely got ourselves there on the trains and then booked our luggage into lockers at the train station and set out with small backpacks, in high hopes of finding cheap accommodation or a park with nice, soft grass. Jono even made a Japanese sign saying, “We have nowhere to sleep. Will pay to sleep on your floor.” 

Instead, we found a park with not much grass and mosquitoes, as all the hostels and hotels were fully booked or either really expensive since many tourists were in town. We chilled there for a bit, had a nap, played some poker and disc golf, and then decided to find some dinner. 

Since the festival was going on, there were many stalls everywhere and many people walking around, so it was quite a vibe. We decided to then not return to the park and rather sleep in the station. We got our beds made on the station floor and one hour later, the Japanese police told us we were not allowed to sleep here. Luckily, a friendly Japanese man who spoke English told us that we could go to the 24hr McDonalds and sleep on the couches there. 

But after 3hrs or so of trying to sleep and being woken up every 30mins by the McDonalds man, we finally met another English speaking Japanese guy who told us about a 24hr internet cafe where you can rent a computer booth and get food, showers etc. And that’s where we landed up staying for the majority of our time. 

I pretty much slept in a couch or in parks during the day, while at night we left to see the festival and meet up with friends since it was a lot cooler then. We tried to see the Imperial Palace but it was closed, so we slept in the Imperial Park, haha. On the 17^th we missioned back to Osaka airport and flew to Seoul airport, South Korea. 

Big in Japan

Japan is incredible! I had a great flight over, as I met up with some of the South Africans in Dubai and we flew over together. We got over the 7hr time difference pretty quickly since we arrived at the hotel at 8pm and hadn’t slept much in the last 24hrs. We took about 3hrs to navigate ourselves from the airport to our hotel using the Japanese metro and trains. The people were all very friendly, smiley and happy to help us, even if they could not speak English at all. The Japanese kids giggle and clap when you say hello to them, I think they think English is pretty cool!? We have a noodle bar across the road from our hotel, so that is where I had my first bowl of noodles with pork for 300yen (~R30) for dinner. The next day we planned a little trip to Nara, an ancient city just outside Osaka, with temples, shrines and ruins.

We had a “lunch box” to eat, which is like a plate with dividers and has little servings of different meals inside them – mine had rice, chicken, pasta, salad and soup. You also get served jugs of water or green tea throughout your meal and always get topped up if you finish your glass. We walked through this really cool forest, garden type area with lots of stairs and lanterns on the side leading to the temples. There were deer everywhere and always very keen on trying to get food from you. They’re considered to be quite sacred in their culture, as they apparently protect the temples and have been around for a long time (according to Lonely Planet Guidebook). The temples are just like in the films and really fascinating, with written prayers everywhere and lots of water fountains to drink from. I paid 500yen (~R50) to go into one of the biggest temples - to see a huuuuge statue of a Buddha. You could light incense and buy some wooden planks to write prayers on them and leave them at the base of the Buddha if you wanted. It randomly started pouring with rain on our walk home, so we had to take shelter under a roof and then continue our way in drizzle. I also got bitten by a leach for the first time and freaked everyone out a bit. Our hotel had both South African teams in them and I stayed in a room with 7 people, 1 shower, 1 toilet, 1 table, 1 fridge and 1 stove. We named ourselves “the family” since we had an older couple who pretty much sorted our meals for the first two days and greeted us with rooibos tea first thing in the morning, while the rest of us just smiled and were grateful. 

My bed, along with two others, was a futon on the floor – which was actually suuuuuper comfortable. The humidity and crazy hot temperatures are not felt in the rooms or trains etc since Japan is pretty jacked up with aircon. We also had slippers at the entrance since in Japanese culture, you’re meant to take off your shoes at the door and then put on the slippers for the house.

Saturday was our scheduled practise day at the fields, which took us an hour to get to, with 2trains and 1bus, and 430yen later. The fields were in amazing condition, with perfect grass and astro to play on. The opening ceremony was a bit later and we blew our vuvuzelas as we watched drums being played and Japanese women dance for us. 

We got some pretty cool tournament bags which had a free Frisbee in each and a cool Japanese fan thing. Sunday we got up quite early to go support the South African open team (men’s team) in their first game against Singapore, which they won 17-10. We played our first game against Holland and lost 17-7. That’s pretty much how the rest of the week went, getting up really early and only returning home at dinner time, while either playing our own games, supporting the open team or watching amazing games between countries like USA, Canada, Japan etc. We either had one or two games a day and would have to warm-up and play in really hot and humid conditions, often leaving us completely drenched in sweat before we even started playing. I got burnt quite a lot since the sweat would just rub off the suncream during our game, and so I landed up with a red forehead and nose, and a sock tan on my legs.  Trying to buy packed lunch for ourselves for the field proved to be quite expensive...R16 for 5slices of bread, R30 for 4bananas, R13 for one large apple...And I thought Europe was expensive! Most evenings we spent just eating dinner and falling asleep at around 10 or 11pm before we had to be awake again around 6am the next morning. One evening we had team drinks at a bar and another evening we had the Frisbee party which was very sweaty, but a lot of fun since we could finally all wind down and have fun. There was an official “trading jerseys” evening where you could go and trade your extra kit with other countries. I traded my SA shorts and 2shirts for a Swiss and Canadian shirt, with Singapore shorts = very happy! Over the course of the tournament, we played USA, Hong Kong, France, Philippines, Japan, Russia, Finland, China and Columbia. Some were actually quite close but the speed and fitness of most of these teams was insane. I managed to score a goal for our team in the Japan and China game, as well as assist two goals in the Finland and Columbia game. I also got voted MVP female for our China game, in which I then won Baijiu, a Chinese liquor which was 56% alcoholic...I took one sip and thought I was going blind! On the finals day, our team won the Spirit award for having the best spirit throughout the tournament, when different teams rated us at the end of each game. 

Was pretty epic to stand up there and get awarded this after losing every game, yet still being positive and fighting hard, and walking away with an AMAZING WORLDS MEDAL to conclude our worlds experience! :) 

Pescasseroli

8am Saturday morning is the time that Isaac and I started our transfer from Milan to Pescasseroli, in the Abruzzo national park, just outside Rome. We took two trains and two buses and finally arrived at 6pm in the evening, to a cool, fresh breeze and wonderful mountains surrounding us. The evening was spent settling in, meeting and preparing for the following day. 

This camp was different to all my other ACLE camps that Ive done because this was a summer camp and not a city one. In Summer camps the children live, breathe and eat with you in the hotel, so you have camp from 8am-11pm and you start on a Sunday and end on a Saturday. We had activities like mountain biking, horse riding, swimming, tennis and Frisbee (ofcourse). We had siestas and shower times, with evening activities being soccer matches on tv for the eurocup, bracelet making, bingo, talent show, Mr & Miss Pescasseroli, bbq and disco night. My favourite was definitely the cross-dressing Mr & Miss night, where the boys actually looked like legit girls! 

In the meantime, I changed my flight to leave from Rome instead of Milan to Japan because I was now alot closer to the Rome airport. We taught the kids the lyrics to “waka waka” and dance moves to a mash of songs like ai se eu te pego, cotton eyed joe, waka waka and the macarena. Our final show was on Saturday when the parents came to watch and then take their kids home after. We went into town that night with the new tutors and I left the following morning with a host family. It was so sad to leave Pescasseroli and the lovely weather....because when I arrived in Rome, it was 40degrees! I stayed in the ACLE Rome flat and did my washing finally, walked around a bit, bought lots of fruit and chocolate. Also went into the centre of Rome to watch the soccer game on some big tvs with the rest of the Roman population, and also met up with Jono. I sat on the floor in a supermarket chowing some free wifi and now I sit on the floor in Dubai airport doing it again, before I leave for my flight to Japan! Woohooo!!!