No.(5) Traffic-a Pedestrian Sign

After driving a car, I got to hate walking even a stone's throw away. Nevertheless, I usually took the public transportation such as the subway in Korea when I had meeting downtown because the parking permit was expensive and the parking lots were not enough. Most of all, the traffic congestion prevented me from driving. Lots of people prefer to walk or use the public transportation because of the same reason as I have.

In San Diego, the other hand, I have rare chance to walk. It might be because the public transportation is not developed enough and its safety is not ensured, either. Therefore, I do not even think of using the public transportation. Even so, it does not mean I never walk. As my son's elementary school was just opposite across road, I occasionally walk to school with my son. Just there, I detected a different thing from ours;a pedestrian traffic light.

First of all, Korea's traffic signals are regularly changed . They are not affected by the number of waiting cars on the lane. They just keep the time distributed to each lane. Now and then, in case of the extreme traffic congestion, a policeman directing traffic timely either hold the signal or release to ease the traffice jam. However, the traffic signals change in general at regular intervals except for being operated by an officer if and only if a road is too blocked.

Consequently, pedestrian signals also get changed regularly irrespective of the number of a foot passenger by the roadside. So, we do not push any buttons -we do not have buttons-to change signal, but just wait the sign to change its color. In one traffic light pole, two separated lamps are placed;red and green, respectively. In Red(standing person on it), pedestrian should stop and wait until it changes to Green(walking person). The Green light blinks four-five seconds after pedestrians start to go over the road. It implies that there is no enough time to across, so no more try.

Then, How about America? I mean San Diego.
Since the traffic system is controlled by on-line sensor fixed on the top of the traffic lights for drivers, a stand by interval is very different depending on different traffic conditions.

I saw a pedestrian button during backpack trip to Europe in 1999 and heard many times that people in the United States should push something to across road, but it was sure that this system was unknown to me. Even a long time has passed since arrived, I just stood by the road, waiting the light to change because I always forgot to push the button. Pushing button was unfamiliar. One day, I was standing for about 10 minutes, waiting the sign to change. 15minutes...I felt nervous, but I thought the America's sign was a little bit slow to change.

Besides, the pedestrian sign here is a little bit strange to me, who have seen for a long time the colors of traffic lights are Red or Green. Here, the colors and shapes of traffic sign vary. All states have different signs. In La Jolla, my neighborhood, just a walking person, no green color, is go-sign to pedestrians. Then, a walking person is switched into a blinking palm shape of the hand, which is corresponding with the blinking green light in Korea;it warns people that it is too late to cross. A stop sign is the red-still palm light.

The interval between go and warning(blinking) is, however, very short here. I think Go-sign keeps at least 4 seconds before blinking, but go-sign is turned to a blinking palm shape in one second. At first, I hesitated to cross the road in a blinking sign. A blinking has been regarded as a little bit late to cross in Korea.

Anyway, in sum up, we have different traffic signs, and it is because we have different traffic conditions, road capacities ,and road plans.

The first embarrassing experience in the United States.

I stayed three nights at the Hotel when I first arrived at the United States because move-in day was three days after our arrival. For three days, we were held up in the hotel just watching TV at all times. My children slept throughout the daytime, and then woke up at 2am, kicked up a row whimpering for hunger, hopping on the bed. Jumping around the room for about 4-5hours, they went back to sleep at 9 am.

On the second night, we heard the guest below our room knock the ceiling, three or four times with very hard smash. It must be because they did not want to be disturbed from our roaring at 3am. "A police!" I threatened my kids to calm down. I was scared that we could be kicked out the Hotel. It took three days to recover from the jet lag.

Moving in the apartment, I thought the first thing I did was to get used to reading a map. But, I was not good at the map stuff. Looking into the map, I was alawys confused with a direction in making turn, right turn? no left turn. I had to do two or three things at the same time: driving, reading a map, and silencing my children. Now I am able to go anywhere without map, yet the map was the only guide to show me the way at the first time.

Probably, about three times, I strayed for about 20-30 minutes around the somewhere where I'd never been to find the way back to my house. When I got lost, in particular, at twilight, my fear became double because at night the street was so pitch-dark with a very few street lamps. The night view of this country is really different from that of ours. The street was so dim in that there are extremely fewer lighting than us. The road signs are typically small that I could not see exactly from the running car. In Seoul, when I was off the right direction, I could ask a pedestrian the right way during waiting for traffic signal. Also, I could call my friends to get the direction.

However, in the United States, people are usually sitting in a car rather than walking on the street. There is no one on the street that I can ask something. And I had no friends to let me on the right way. Do you know that? A thousands and hundreds people are living here, but I have no one who can help me in emergency. Fear! No, That was more than the fear. Two questions rose in my mind. Why I was here? To learn something? Then, for what?

Tears ran down my cheek. I pulled over to watch the road sign, got out of car, and looked around to decide which way I had to take. Unfamiliar with the language, the road, people, and so on everything. I knew I could definitely arrive at my destination in an hour or later, but the thing that made me depressed was that I came to knowledge again that I was an alien. Not somebody, but an alien got lost. It was different.

Somebody told me time is the medicine. I take the wrong way even now but I am not scared any longer. I am getting used to the road systems and people. Still, the language problem is not solved yet.^^

No. (4) Driving test

I got a drive license in a year 2000, and immediately started driving a car in Korea. But, I took again a driving test in the Unites States. To register my vehicle, I went to the DMV(Department of Moto Vehicles) along with the auto insurance evidence in Jan. 2006. Since it was 3pm, not that late, I also applied for the written test. To tell you the truth, I was a bit tired, and wanted to return home letting the test wait. However, because DMV is always thronged with people, I would definitely waste more than time I spent right now waiting for my turn if I come to DMV again next time for the written test. It was without doubt the time waste. The written test are usually provided by 5pm, so I was able to take a test at once. There were a few steps: they searched my information first and snap my photo. In San Diego, the Korean-written-questionary sheet was available. A DMV worker gave me a pencil and two pieces of sheet for a test:a question and an answer paper, respectively. All of the problems are multiple choices and you can fill a blank with a pencil. It was very simple and familiar to us.

On the left side of the application windows, there were a few desks that were partitioned with screens at both sides. She told me to go to one of empty desks and get started my test when I was ready. Two or three applicants were working on their tests. It was not more difficult than I thought. But, a few of problems cofused me. Struggling with them for about 10 more minutes, I looked up at the clock which was placed on the wall over my head. Nobody told me that time' up. There seemed to be no time limit. Going it over roughly, I turned it in to the worker sitting at the application desk. She pulled her drawer and took out something there. That was the answer sheet punched holes on the right answers. She put her answer sheet on mine and began to grade how many answers I missed. I was lucky enough to get eligible for the standard. The pass an exam at the first try was attributed to the lovely Korean sheet. ^^

The DMV promptly issued me a temporary license, a paper featuring my both personal and automobile information. A practical road test was scheduled two weeks later. With a temporary drive license, I could drive my own car, preparing for the road test. The result? Of course, I went it through! Drive with caution and show him/her that you do your best to follow the traffic rules. Then, you will pass with ease as long as something unusual will not take place. Before the test started, the inspector threw me many questions and directions about car stuff;turn on the right or left light, push your foot break, honk a horn, function defrost, and so on. Most of all, three hand signals-a proceeding driver signals to the back driver with his/her left hand outside a window:right turn, left turn, and stop- were brought up without exceptions.

"You made it". When I heard it from the inspector, it was like I gained the whole world. I was really proud of my self. I felt as if I had accomplished something valuable. I really wanted to show off this to my family. With a view to bragging it, I called my husband in Korea. Hey! Get excited.

Submitting the paper that the inspector marked "pass" to the window, I was told that my driver licence would be mailed in two weeks. By that time, I could use the interim driver license which was issued just after passing practical road test.

Trick or Treat

The Holloween is just around corner. My son wanted to get dressed like Jedi, one of the characters of Star Wars, and also to be armed with Jedi's sword. Last Monday, after picking him up from the afterschool day care, we went to the Party City, where there is everything for party from A to Z, to buy his costume because we had a flier from Party City advertising discount of coustumes. Every October seems to be a special-promotive month for Holloween. From the main gate of Party City to every corner, there are Holloween stuff, Holloween stuff, and....again Holloween. Holloween filled everywhere of the shop. Interesting! Holloween must be the biggest event to them, especially to the children.

Jedi is really neat, nice looking guy on the movie, but my son with Jedi's looked shabby. The color of coustume, light ivory-white, did not become him very well and even made my son's face look more deep-black. Mischoice. Down to the right side, a big bromide paper was hanging on the wall to show the sample of all costume for toddler, girl, boy, and the teen. Most of them copied the movie/animation's characters. My son finally chose one of characters from the Chronicles of Narnia as his coustume after having some try. A kind clerk gave us a direction of where the sword was though I did not ask her. Owing to her, my balance shrinked a little more.

As for my daugher, I had no idea before coming to the shop. While looking around, a thinking poped into my head. Fairy like a tinkerbell. Because she really has loved being a princess or a fairy, this would not dissapoint her. Yes, she really liked it. She really did.

Well, we will go though this Holloween for the first time. So I do not know how many children are going to visit us. On Holloween day, children in the disguise of wizards or monsters knock on your house and shout it. "Trick or treat". It means....give us treat-candies or chocolates. Otherwise, we will do mischief-trick- to you. A very childish threat.

No.(3) Laundry

I heard that some newly-constructed apartments are fully equipped with furniture and electronic goods, but built-in home furniture and electronic products are somewhat new to most of Koreans.

Most of Korean couples generally start their marriage with every requisite stuff getting ready;a bride side bears the expense of household supplies. But, It could be different because every marriage differs from depending on each family's financial situation or custom.

Today, I wan to mention laundry to be done differently. Since the 90% of all Korean households possess their own washing machines when they get married, Korean housewives do laundry at home. There are laundry shops for the singles or the young in some areas but those are not the way we are used to. Laundry is something that we commonly do at home. Washing, rinsing, and spinning, we hang the wet clothes on a clotheslines in the porch(veranda) when the sun goes up. The sun completely makes dry our clothes. We do not need to make sure a drying machine is involved on the wedding check-list. The natural resource, the sun, is our drying machine. It was true until I got married. Nowadays, things have changed. It is reported that the rate of selling luxury (drum) washing machines has been gradually increasing. This product has the function of drying as well as washing. At any rate, the drying machine was popularized in recent.

But, as you know, here, there are something different. First, many apartment have a common laundry room(shop) for their inhabitants' convenience. A washing costs for $1.50 and a drying for $0.20, respectively(I am not sure). Don't get me wrong. Most of the ordinary families in the United States have good washing/drying machines at home.

Anyway, we do not lose our patience with two or third- time-using laundry shop. It seems pretty tolerable. But more than four times, It was nothing but chores. Too troublesome: get ready for coins in advance, carry a clothes basket, and endure unsanitary condition of laundry room. I am so wondering who are using this laundry shop other than either us like temporary residents or students.

Secondly, I've nerve ever seen people hanging clothes at their veranda. Wait, I am not sure whether CA has the rule limiting hanging clothes to dry outside home. But when you hang your shirts and pants at the porch or veranda, you must get a call from the leasing office in a few minutes. A neighbour probably gives notice to the office. People consider the surrounding and environment first.

Then, what are you going to do? You should use a drying machine, though the sun is hot over our head. At first, I dried my stuff using theses machines-luckily, my apartment with two beds has washing/drying machines at home. In the beginning, it was really nice and convenient. I thought I could be happy without the sun. However, I found that something wrong happened to our clothes. They got shorter and smaller. Have our children outgrown their clothes? No! The clothes shrank little by little because of heat of drying machine. Ever since I got to know our clothes got smaller, I do not use a drying machine, except for underwear drying. Instead, by using many hangers, I hang the wet clothes on the shower-curtain bar for two days, and then put them inside a dry machine to get rid of dust and dirt from clothes for 5 minutes. Drying machine takes off dust and dirt from clothes, I think. Now, laundry ends. No, not yet. They are waiting to be put away to the closet ahead of you.

Off the tree

English has frustrated me for a long time, even more in the United States. People generally believe that English is with ease coming to those who are living in English-speaking countries. So did I. However, My belief has proved wrong. We could, of course, benefit from the unlimited Human resources:neighbours, cashers, passersby, faculties, and so on. There is, however, the condition always tagging along;get as many chances as you can to talk to them. Those resources never talk to us first, except for greeting like hello or hi, and they are unluckily no interested in us. It is true.

It is not easy for me to speak to strangers, and that, with terrible English. My tough usually got twisted and I was almost black-out that I did not know what to say. My all senses were forcusing on only escaping from the very moment of embarrassment. Unidentified fear was in my mind. For instance, whenever I ordered to go at the fast food restaurant, I always prayed no more asking from cashers because I was not ready to hear and speak. Even the simple word like "say again, please" did not come out from my mouth. At home, I recalled the talk that I and casher had. No professional words. Srangely speaking, I was able to response without any trouble at home in practicing by myself. Why?

Yes, I found out that the fear I had was that I was truly afraid of being humiliated, which resulted from the lack of confidence. I bet the first thing I had to do was to implant self-confidence with English in my mind. After that, I'd thought over what was going to work.

The another thing that stunned me was "Off the tree", the title of this post. It was from one staff member of YMCA , wherer my son had spent most of summer for camps. At the pick-up time, I went there to pick up my son as usual. As my son' camp were on their way to YMCA from the beach, I just waited them, standing aside by staff in the background. There was a big tree on the center. Many campers climbed up the tree and one of staff wanted them to be away from tree by saying this "Off the tree". It was a kind of shock. That was totally different from those I've learned at school. I realized that people often say something in no accordance with textbooks. Then, what is that? Honestly speaking, I do not still know exactly.

So much for today, isn't it? When it comes to English, I have a lot to say. But, I' ll take my time to proceed. ^^
The book on the picture is the one that I've just started to read. I firmly believe that all of speaking and writing are from reading. Trust me. This book is for youth, still you can learn a lot.

My son's drawing

My son, Seungwoo, has been interested in making stroies with the second language, English. Above picture is his third work describing his usual morning life. As usual I wake up at 6:30 and fix breakfast while my two little monkeys fall asleep. They turn in bed around 10:00pm. Raising them out of sleep, dressing myself in ourdoors garments, getting breakfast ready, I get easily exhausted at 7:00am.

My son wants to talk about his common things in the morning; wake up, wash out, put on cloths, eat up, kiss us good bye, stride to school, meet his friends at school, and what he ganna do at recess.

The drawing is the moment when I am cooking and they are sleeping. That is somewhat different from our real things, though. It is disclose, but I have to do for the truth. Most of time our monkeys sleep in underpants only, unlike those in the drawing. They toss a lot in their sleep, even fall from the bed frequently. Children in above cut whose sleep habit look very tidy are weird to me. ^^

Manjoo-Treat from one of Japanese friends

I do not meet people at a fixed time, for I worry that those are highly getting involved in my life. I am not very socializing person, so I have a few close friends sharing part of private things. Indeed, meeting new people, I am always cautious and not easily trying to take a step forword. Nevertheless, the good news is that I am free from those relationships here because I am an alien. (Of course, once in a while, my alien status causes me to get in trouble.)

BTW, I am off the point right now. One of my Japanese friends treated me ManJoo, Japanese traditional sweet snack. As I had occasionally tasted them in my country, I knew what ManJoo was. Her husband was on business trip up to last Saturday and bought some of them in Japan as a souvenior.

That was the best ManJoo that I've ever had. Slightly moist, very tender, a wonderful flavor, and a little bit smaller than ours. Most of all, the mashed chestnut inside ManJoo was the peak of taste. We had some before dinner, yet they did not spoil our appetites. How delicious!

No. (2) Lighting-illumination

Lighting is so important that we could not bear staying in darkness even for a second. We usually feel scared in a dead dark limited room. Human beings are thoroughly dependent on lighting. Had it not been for lighting, we must have been in a dread of the night.

Let's begin with what the lighting fixtures look like in Korea. All houses equip with the electronic lightings hanging from the ceiling. If you move out and in the new house, you do not need to purchase lighting stuff because those are permanently fixed pieces of equipment at every room in houses. Niether did you plug in. Just switch on, we can light on. Only in case of auxiliary lighting, you need to plug in and turn it on.

The contrary, in the United States, bulit-in lighting are only in the kitchen, corridors, and the bath room. The bed and living room just have the wall outlets(concent in Konglish). There are no lightings at all in the rooms. The good thing is that you could place the lamps anywhere you want inside room since those lights are not fixed on the wall. Whereas Korea houses have 1-1 switchs to all the lighting, each room has only one switch near the door to turn on the main light in the United States. At first, I did not know there was a switch for lighting, so I always staggered along the wall groping for the light in a dark room.

I am living at an apartment in San Diego, CA. Moreover, since this apartment is the first dwelling for me here, I think I could be wrong.

No. (1) Placards & Banners

Every country has a different social environment according to its unique custom and history, so we can not dare to judge which one is more advanced. However, there are surly good examples that our country follows:a legal restriction on the advertisement.

The regulation on the placards/banners in the public is very stringent in San Diego. I did not notice it first, but I happened to figure out that no placards/banners were not seen anywhere. Even in the University(UCSD), I could not seek for any kinds of placards. From that moment, I carefully observed how they put up posters in the public.

I came to know the forms of placards/banners are somewhat different before long. A placards in Korea is a big rectangle clothing, being hung in two poles. It has various colors and pattens;moreover, these placards are spreded all over the cities. We have many traders who are engaged with making and selling placards to people. We can not think of the advertisement without placards. Plenty of placards are speaded all over our cities. It becomes worse in the season of election. We can easily take a look at placards scattering and hanging everywhere. Even fliers about loaning or seeking for the roommates were attached on the electric poles or benches at the parks. Some local governments hire some street cleaners who are only in charge of taking off those illegal fliers, yet we have still a long way to go.

But then, in San Diego, I've never seen any big placards who were used so much for advertising in Korea. The placards they think of are just bulletin boards or posters. They are not big enough to keep the traffic signs off on the street. Even the case of advertisements such as leasing/selling houses, an automobile on sale, and etc., any placards were not hanging on the street. Instead of seeing placards, at the corner of streets, I witnessed lots of boys- rarely middle aged gentlemen- holding bill boards looking like the surfing board. It was really weird to me.

In some areas, the house owners who want to sell his property can place a short pole with triangle-shaped flag on its top in front yard;on the other hand, some residents should buy permit to place the banner from theri competent administrative offices.

They have obscure reasons to get the city clean and tidy;it is not accomplished by itself. The idea is that the administrative office are applying the very strict criteria for the protection of their communities, and people
observe and abide by the rules.

I know we also have the rule that regulates an outdoor billboard, but our government more relaxed the limitation of outside board than this country's. I do not mean to blame our government for loosening the restriction, but extreme removal of ban is also not good for our environment. I am just thinking that we should consider the nature and future first in order not to spoil our cities' landscapes.

My children

In early 1997, I got married for love after 6-7months seeing with my husband. On the same year, I deliverd the first bady, Seungwoo, who is right now 10 years old. Having a baby was so horrible thing to me that I made up my mind that I never have another baby in my life. However, time often takes away our bad memory. I forgot how terrible giving the birth to child was. Foolish! Five years after having the first child, I had the second baby after all. It was a Pretty girl, Seungjoo. They are so different from each other. It could be mainly because of opposite gender.

My son is more sensitive and responsive to me. He gets easily hurt. On the other hand, Joo has quick wits so she knows that how she should behavior when mom gets angry.
Aside from their different personailites, their tastes, hobbies, concerns are all unlike.


To sum up, I could not even think of the world without them. For me, they are worth my life. I pray and wish their health and happy life.