What we have done so far

We have been busy little clay heads! What we have done:

Korean breakfast with Hoon on the first day-- SO much to eat and they even brought us more. There was seaweed soup and Kimchi (picked spiced things) and eggs and fried zucchini and seafood and hot water (no tea?) and seaweed... and... things I don't recognize.

ISCAEE was a blast-- the first day we walk into an exhibit with a bunch of important clay heads that Hoon (our professor) knows, and find all our art work hanging up! I got introduced to a great bunch of girls from the Seoul Women's University because Hoon knew the head professor. He had taken a class with her when she was a visiting professor at his school (Seoul National University of Technology) and he was her first male student. He said that at the retirement party for her he was the only male in the room. I said that she must have not wanted to teach another boy after him. He grinned, but I never know if he thinks I'm funny or not... The girls were all impressed with my work and asked if I was a professor! (plus Europeans look older anyway) but really it was because our work was in with the other professors (and a few students from the Swiss school that we met later). They showed me their work in the student section (a tent near the workshop/demonstration tents for all the Universities) and I LOVED IT! We exchanged emails-- these girls had made a business card with their picture, artwork and email, waaay more professional than me scribbling my name and email on scrap paper. I will email them the link to my blog and artwork. OH YEAH here is the link to my website with some of the artwork I have made: http://www2.gvsu.edu/~hipshean (the web page sucks, but I have never made one before)

We made lots of new friends, including some girls from the Swiss school, but two of them were origionally from France. I had introduced myself to them because I wanted to meet their professor... I LOVED his artwork, it was in the same building as ours and I walked right up and introduced myself and he talked to me for so long all about how he works and thinks about clay. He really enjoys working backwards-- finding a material that pleases him then thinks of a form that would be appropriate for such a material. I introduced him to Hoon and he said it was great that Hoon had such outgoing students; I blushed. Everyone we met had really great accents, and there artwork was great-- I think Dean really took a shine to the French girls. I floated between Dean and the girls then our girls and some Korean boys, then back to Dean and the girls. We hung out at the workshop area for a long time, also bought some really great wood fired cups, then came back and tried out the (naked!) sauna in the lower level of the condominium we are staying in (like a dorm room with a kitchen and quick mart near the lobby, special for the conference with tons of students staying here... we only have bed rolls, no actual beds though). We then met up again with Dean (the men's side was separate of course) and went to dinner. I forgot my dinner ticket and went back, then met some Japanese girls, and we found the dinner place together and met up with EVERYONE. We had to throw darts to get a "yes" or "no" to get into dinner, which was good and had a buffet-style so we could try everything. Always Kimchi, or pickeled cabbage and spices, at every food place we went so far.

I have been made fun of because at dinner I fell asleep propped up and then came home, laid down, and fell asleep last night at 8pm and woke up with everyone at 6:30am-- we have been getting up early because of the jet lag. We got up this morning and really have the hang of it-- the rice cake things we got yesterday were a good breakfast and we were off to the conference again. All the universities were doing their workshops and WOW WE MADE A LOT OF FRIENDS!! I have tons of business cards and pictures and we even ate LARVAE!! All of us tried silk worm larvae from a street vendor. Gross.
Other things:
Meghan had her palm read and he gave her long life.
Becky keeps describing everything as "that's so Asian" tee hee
Everyone loves Dean's shiny head and red beard.
I was randomly called beautiful.
I can haggle pretty well.
I bought a teapot and cup set! Only $20
I bought a frog incense burner! Only $4
I bought a Korean stlye shirt! Only $30... that wasn't haggle-able
Meghan got called a cow 2X because she has a nose ring.

Hoon found us again and got us our food tickets only AFTER we went and bought a ginormous lunch-- but it was soooo delicious!