Long time no post

This is my first post in a really really really long time.

If anyone reading this has something specific that they'd like me to post about, please leave me a message in the comments section.

In the meantime, I'll just post this picture that a friend sent to me. He thinks the person in the picture looks like me. What do you think?

Alphabet Soup

This weekend I visited Gong-gu (공주) for the first annual UKETA conference. I'm not even sure what UKETA means, but I am sure that it's something about Korean English Teachers' Association. It was sponsored by ETAK and at least I know what that one means... English Teachers Association in Korea.

It was a good conference with lots of different speakers from all over Asia. The keynote speaker was Richard Day from the university of Hawaii. His speech was short (just 45 minutes), but informative.

There was also a speech by Kwon O-ryang (권오량) who is very well-known in English education circles here in Korea. I was happy to hear him echo something I've been saying for a long time. Namely, that Korea is overly dependent on first-language (native) speakers of English.

Fire!

My cousin is a firefighter at a small airport in Canada (Regina).

This is a picture of a training fire he started the other day.

Fun, fun, fun!
Fire, fire, fire!

My First Book

After almost 10 years in Korea and countless editing and proofreading jobs, I've finally published a book with my name on it!

Now I just have to wait and see if anyone buys it.

The book is available at major bookstores in Korea, including Korea's largest, Kyobo Books (see more HERE in Korean).

The Best Word Attack is an English study guide and vocabulary book for Korean middle and high school students who are preparing for the state administered college entrance exam (College Scholastic Ability Test - CSAT).

One of the more interesting features of the book is the chapter that deals with low-frequency occurring words from the CSAT. I actually did data-mining on all the past CSAT tests and focused on the least-occurring words. Needless to say, these words are very obscure and are not well known to middle and high school students. As such, this chapter (and the book in general) provides students with a valuable resource for improving their scores on the CSAT.

And while I am sure that the book is far from perfect, I can say with confidence that it is better than most books out there.

While working on the book, I was utterly amazed at the poor quality of other such books on the market. Without exaggeration, I could find mistakes, errors, and/or typos on nearly every single page.

Together with my co-author and editor, I have worked very hard to make sure that the language used in the book is both natural and correct. And again, while I am sure the book is not perfect, I know that it represents a vast improvement over other such books available in Korea.

I hope, after seeing my book, that you too will agree.

Learn more about The Best Word Attack HERE (in Korean).

Happy reading...

It's a twister, it's a twister...

I survived my first earthquake today. 4.8 on the Richter scale. Although the quake was about 200kms from where I live, it did shake the place for 1 or 2 seconds.

There was one yesterday in the same place too, but it was only 2.0 (too small to be felt).

According to one site I found, a 5.0 earthquake has about the same force as the nuclear bomb that was detonated on Nagasaki (LINK)

In 2006, Korea had 49 earthquakes, the largest of which was 3.5 on the Richter scale.

Like George & Weezie...

If the title of this post doesn't make sense to you, CLICK HERE

In any case, Betty and I are happy to say that we are moving on up to a dee-luxe apartment in the sky.

After years of living in school-provided housing, we have finally decided to take the plunge and get our own place. We have signed a 2-year lease on a 1,300 sq. ft. (35 pyeong) 2 bedroom/2 bathroom apartment on the eighth floor of an 18-floor building.

Korea has a very interesting leasing system. When you lease a place you place a sum of money down for a period of time (usually two years). At the end of the lease, that whole sum of money is returned in full to you! Cool!

Now that we have lots of room, we hope that everyone will be able to come for a vist.

Here are some pics of our new place (we move in on Jan 28 if anyone would like to lend us a hand in moving ;-)

See more pics from our new place HERE

2006 Year-end Review

For everyone who would like a glimpse into what's been going on in our world in 2006, check out our 2006 year-end review:

www.walterforeman.com/2006

Some of the highlights include, James Brown's first (and now only) performance in Korea, the Rolling Stones live in Tokyo, Canada, the US, big screen TVs, PhDs, and more.

If you missed the 2005 edition of the year-end review, it can be viewed here:

www.walterforeman.com/2005

Happy holidays