It's Here

The swine flu has hit us. I may be about a month late...but we are finally feeling the effects of swine flu at school. I've heard through the grape vine that the choice to cancel kindergarten classes was made last night after 3 students allegedly went home with swine flu yesterday. One co-worker who was lucky enough to still be in the office at the time received word and posted the news on facebook. A phone tree of calls ensued after one person read it. This was the only "official" word of the situation I ever received. My boss never address all of us to tell us what is actually going on. We've got a great system of communication around here.

This is not really all that shocking. Most people I know at other schools have either had a similar situations of being stuck in their office while there are no students in the school. Others have been told to stay home for half pay and emailing homework responsibilities. The swine has taken Korea by storm!

My Misadventures in Baking

Megan is babysitting our old co-worker Chris' oven while he is in Canada chilling between Korea gigs. How do you babysit an oven you ask? Well, here ovens are a free standing unit more like an over sized microwave that you keep on your counter. We've had some interesting encounters trying to make the homemade baked goods we have so desperately been craving.

We've had some pretty hilarious evening sitting on her floor mixing ingredients in salad bowls based on one measuring cup and a cereal spoon. Megan's mom's banana bread was a great success, along with most cookie attempts. Sadly, the brownies from scratch were a serious fail.

The most recent struggle I encountered was with butter. I bought some supplies for cookies and banana bread and went to Megan's only to discover that I forgot butter once I had arrived. I went down her street to pick up the butter along with more flour and some extra walnuts if possible. I was searching so hard for walnuts to no avail, that I didn't pay attention to the butter and ended up with spreadable corn based margarine. Megan convinced me that I did not want to bake with that so I went back and got a huge block of "butter". When I started to cut the butter to soften it it broke apart like I was cutting up a block of wax. Deciding this "butter" would most definitely ruin the taste of my chocolate chip cookies, I made one last trip to the full on grocery store and would settle for no less then genuine Land O'Lakes butter. I was finally successful. Only had the energy and drive to do the cookies, but they are delicious.

I want to attempt my mother's unique banana bread recipe, but it calls for beating egg whites until they are stiff. Without an electronic mixer I find this task a bit daunting. There is a possibility I will try to use a blender. Update later.

ENT

I wouldn't normally go to the doctor for a little cold, but with the ever present concern for swine flu I stopped by the doctor on my way home from work after spending the whole day feeling progressively worse with muscle aches, chills and a small cough. There is an ENT office just across the street. I have never been to an ENT, so I don't know if this place is Korea weird or just ENT weird, but it was weird.

After waiting about forty minutes, I was called back into the office, which is actually one big room. I sat and watched as a family of three small children took turns having crap sucked out of their noses. The sights and sounds were just like a dentist's office. I finally got called up to sit in the dentist chair, and through broken English communication determined I probably don't have swine flu and just need to rest and drink a lot of fluids. He then prescribed some pills, none of which is an antibiotic, some kind of cream to put up my nose twice a day (not doing that) and said I should wear a cotton mask out around people. He stuck some stuff up my nose and sucked it back out again. Then I was moved on to sit at a humidifier for two minutes and then some other station where I stuck two prongs up my nose that glowed red. I have no idea what that was all about. The doctor's visit cost $3,200 won (less then $3). I walked across the street to the pharmacy and got everything I needed for $5,600 won within 5 mins. My meds consist of individual bags of 4 1/2 (yes one is broken in half) pills to be taken 3 times a day. 24 hours later I'm feeling much better.