Happy Winter!
I haven't updated this blog recently, mainly because of FINALS! The past few weeks have been so busy and stressful. Here is a quick update of what's been going on:
On November 15th, my mom and aunty came to visit me again! This time, we went to see the lantern festival, and did lots of shopping!
I went to a tea house with Jarenn (a FISH scholar), where I had cinnamon tea with soy paste soup.  It was delicious! I  went to a 4-D movie theater at Times Square, the largest mall in Seoul.  We watched "Rise of the Guardians."  4D is where the seats move, objects punch you from the back and bottom of the seats, air blows at you from the headrest, and ropes lash out at your feet! What an experience!  It has also been snowing for at least one day of the week. I had my first snowfall since i was young and made my first snowman in my life!  Watching the snow color the ground white felt like I was in a movie.
Our school also held a "graduation" ceremony for the International students, putting together a presentation and slideshow of all our times together.  They handed out graduation certificates and fed us pizza.
For the past 2 weeks, I have been studying for my finals (I had 5), but now they are finally over! I have a week left in Korea and finally have a chance to relax and enjoy the city!
Yesterday, I went to watch the Cooking NANTA performance, which is ranked as the number one performance in Korea, and even made it to New York's Broadway!  Cooking NANTA is about a team of chefs that have to cook something by the end of the day.  It is a non-verbal show, so it welcomes people from all over the world to enjoy it.
Today, I went to the DMZ.  It was such an eye-opening experience.  We got a chance to enter the conference room that was located right on the boarder (half of the room was on South Korea's land, while the other half was in North Korea's land).  I also saw over to North Korea's villages, and mountains.  Regardless of constantly being watched my North Koreans, tt was a very peaceful place, seeing lots of untouched and open land on the North Korean side.  The tour also took us to see the 3rd infiltration tunnel, which was built by the North Koreans to make a surprise attack on the South.  The tunnel was 2 meters in diameter, but very amazing!  We also learned a lot about the history between the North and South.

Here is something interesting that I have learned about the grading scale at Ewha: Ewha has a rule where only 50-60% of the class can get  an "A" or "B," while the rest of the classes will receive a "C" or lower.  English-taught classes are more relaxed, where up to 70% of students may receive an "A" or "B," while the rest of the students receive a "C" or lower.  When I asked about why Ewha the number of "A" and "B" grades were limited, no one could give me a straight answer.  However, I found out that the percentage is higher for English-taught classes in order to encourage the Korean Students to take the English classes. Being International students, we are graded on our own scale, where we don't have to compete for the "A" or "B,' but are instead graded upon our personal performance.  Phew!

Another interesting thing that I found out is that the bookstore here won't buy back any used textbooks.  The International students have been trying to sell their textbooks to each other or online.  Most have been throwing them into the recycle bins.  What a waste! No one wants to carry those heavy books home.  There are student-run organizations that will purchase textbooks back from you, however, they will only buy them back at the beginning of the new semester, rather than at the end.  Therefore, if you want to get a cheap book, find out which organizations these are and when they will be selling them (usually the second week of school). =]