Day 44: Rockin' Out In Church

Brad, Andrea and I slept in sooo late today! We woke up at 11:30am feeling refreshed and recharged - after yesterday's busy day we really needed the long sleep! I had to quickly dash back to Shihung City, so I showered, packed up, and said my goodbyes to my friends. I was meeting up with Steven and his family and didn't want to be late.

I got home just before 2pm, and about 15 minutes later there was a knock on my door - time to go! Steven's nephew plays drums in a church band every Sunday and so I had been invited to come along to church to see him perform. Yes, you heard right, Scott Erdman went to church voluntarily!!! :-) It was a cute little Presbyterian church just up the road and actually reminded me a lot of my own church back in Thunder Bay. It was really quiet in there and there were maybe only about 20 people or less at this Sunday afternoon service.

Eric, Steven's nephew was up at the front along with the other band members. The service started shortly after and the first hour consisted mainly of the band performing songs while everyone sang along.
Luckily for me the songs are all in Korean so I had a valid excuse for not singing along! But I have to say that I was impressed with the music. Besides having Eric on drums, there was also a guitar-player, someone on piano, a mixer, and 2 backup singers along with the Minister on main vocals. The music was lively and entertaining and dare I say I was...having fun...*big shock*! :-) Wow, who knew things could be so rockin' at church?

After the music stopped, the Minister had noticed that I was there (no surprise there, a foreign stranger is NOT gonna just blend in in a crowd of only 20 Koreans!) and started speaking to me...of course I had no idea what he was saying. Steven translated for me, saying that he was welcoming me to the church, and to Korea, and that he wanted me to say hello to everyone. So, I stood up in front of the church, gave my best "annyong haseyo" (means hello) and was rewarded with...applause....from the rest of the church!?? Too funny! The second hour was all talk and blah blah blah from the bible, none of which, obviously, I understood, so that part was pretty boring. All in all it wasn't that bad I guess.

After church we were all invited over to Steven's sister's house for food and conversation. They live nearby and we spent pretty much the rest of the day there eating and chatting and listening to music (the kids brought out Westlife for me to listen to...haha...I should have guessed!) We talked, us adults, about a variety of things, from NoKo-SoKo politics to the unbelievable size of Canada to how they respect my near vegetarian diet. Good times.

They even invited me to spend some holiday time with them this summer. That could be a lot of fun, but at the same time spending that much time with pretty much non-English speakers could get a little lonely after a while. I mean they always make efforts to speak to me, but during 'conversations' 90% of the time I just sit there and daydream, having no idea what they're talking about. It's a bit isolating, but I've gotten used to that here in Korea. It's like you're there but you're not. I'm not criticizing it or anything, it's nobody's fault. Hell their English vocabulary is a million times larger than my Korean one! It just feels a bit sometimes like you're....a ghost...a silent observer of things. I've gotten used to it, but again, I don't know if I could handle that for a whole week or something while on vacation with them. An evening is usually enough for me! I guess we'll see...