On November 11th, while Canada (and most of the western world) is celebrating Remembrance Day, Koreans head to the Homeplus' and Emart's in their thousands for the equally exciting Pepero Day. For those who are unfamiliar Pepero is a long narrow stick of chocolate covered cookie which, it was noted by young Koreans (and the Lotte corporation that manufactures them no doubt), that four pepero sticks standing upright make 1111, or 11/11. Thus the hallmark holiday or all hallmark holidays was born. In essence every student comes to school with boxes of these sticks and gives them to their friends and their teachers. It cracks me up to watch two kids exchange two of the EXACT same box and yet be overjoyed by it. Personally, I didn't have the desire or the finances to buy for every student, but I did buy for my 8 o'clock class, who are all middle school kids and my favourite group of students. I also enjoy playing up the stupidity of the event (imagine a company in the west trying to pull something like that with a Coca-Cola Day or a Dorito's Day) and so tried to celebrate many a Pepero Day miracle and tried not to be the grinch who stole Pepero Day when kids didn't do their homework. I did make off like the fabled Pepero Day bandit though and will have lots of chocolate for the week (at least).
I also managed to send home a million won this morning, which at present is only $860 Canadian dollars and while I know that includes a few fees (esp. on the North American end..... jeez) but that's still a brutal rate. Fortunately my favourite woman at the back at the bank. She's great and was always very helpful when I first started going in and has always been helpful with problems or even just routine transactions.
Anyway, tomorrow has Paul coming up for a visit, so should have more to blog about then.
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