I started more intensively studying Korean about a year and a half ago and in the wake of my boredom from being stuck at home, I decided to make a little video about it. Honestly, I feel like this is more for me than anyone else, I don’t know how people manage to stay at their homes all day. Maybe it’s because my home is one room it makes me a little bit more antsy, but here we are. Korean is a hard language. English is a hard language. French. Spanish. It’s all hard man.
So, I basically started filming this way back in September and slowly over the course of months and months of piecing video footage together I gathered all of this. I know I never film, I’m aware, I don’t have excuses, but anyway. With COVID basically becoming the neverending story of last year and possibly into this year I made a little video about what I’ve been doing while somewhat stuck inside. Of course, Korea is in much better shape than the US, but still, things have definitely changed.
Sometimes I think in the midst of writing resolutions and starving ourselves for the newest fad diets at the start of the year, we forget about those little moments, what those bits and pieces look like when tethered together just tight enough. We spend our time moaning about how horrible the year was, how this year will most definitely, definitely (just you watch!) be better, then make silly promises to ourselves and others just to hold a semblance of accountability.
This wasn’t the immersive site-seeing type of trip like I had last year. It was more, let’s go shopping and wander through department stores until we forget how stressed work made us before this holiday, kind of trip. Anyway, I filmed (kind of), but as always, I was distracted by pretty things and didn’t film as much as I could have. I realized this kind of thing, though I’m not necessarily the best at it, is more so for me. I like having a visual diary of sorts.
Recently, in a kind of spur of the moment thing, I booked a trip with a friend to visit Kuala Lumpur and Penang. I’m trying to visit different countries in Asia and get a bit more out of my comfort zone (more than I already am anyway) for the time being, which means, more trips abroad (I’m thinking Taiwan and Hong Kong early next year).
This is the first time I’ve visited a country in Southeast Asia (more on that later), and while we did the whole shopping/spas/massages on certain days, I didn’t really find them camera worthy (I mean, a mall in America is pretty much the same as a mall anywhere else).
Okay, I think I have about five more days left on my Final Cut Pro Trial…and last but not least, here’s the rest of the (useable) footage I have from this past summer when I was volunteering in Busan. It was actually really fun editing this one. I had forgotten about some of the things I had done with and time spent with the friends I made while in PNU, as well as a not so happy reminder that I miss my best friend back home a lot more than I thought.
But, moving on… remember when I first got to Korea back at the end of June and was in Seoul for a little while, doing everything touristy and walking over twenty thousand steps a day? Yes, I said back in June. Basically, that first week was so hectic that I took all the footage, moved the files to my backup drive and never looked back. Yesterday I finally went through that footage, and let me tell you, it was pretty brutal. I don’t want to make too many excuses for myself, but those first few days was the first time that I had ever held a camera and I guess I didn’t realize how jerky walking with one could be if you pay no real mind to the fact that you’re even really holding anything.
Apologies that it took a couple more days than originally planned to get this uploaded; my only excuse right now is the fact that I’m back at work so I’m lacking a bit in extra time to finish these things. Either way, here you guys go – part 2 of my Kyoto trip.
As 2017 came to a ridiculously fast, but inevitable, and frankly highly anticipated end (not that 2017 was a particularly awful year, but I like the idea of a “new” start too), 2018 began with a strangely motivated Monica, who, whilst breaking out of her creative rut, edited, and enjoyed editing, her footage from Kyoto.
While I’m wallowing a bit in self-pity because I had an amazing holiday in Japan, I managed to pull myself up by my good ol’ bootstraps and edit this video for you (and also me, like a little souvenir memory of sorts). I would also like to point you to the fact that I just used the phrase “pull yourself up by your bootstraps,” which may just be the most southern thing I’ve ever done.
The end is near everyone! This past weekend was my last weekend in Busan. I leave bright and early on a cozy 7am flight to Jeju Island Saturday morning… so in a very stereotypical girls day fashion, Caleigh and I spent the day shopping, eating, walking, and doing face masks to close because we will be departing our separate ways (too) soon.
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