"MT" stands for "Members Training," which is a
Konglish term used to describe an overnight outing for a club or a group of students in the same academic department, usually as an initiation, though in our case it was to mark the end of the semester. We stayed in a rented pension about an hour east of Seoul. The official purpose of any MT sounds very wholesome: to build community and encourage camaraderie. But in reality it's pretty much just an exuse for 24 hours of partying, singing, talking, and drinking games.
Though I don't think professors are typically invited, my Evening B class invited me to join them. It was great fun. I came with a later group, so we missed out on the wake-boarding and swimming.
But I came in time for the food...
...and the many party games led by our energetic class clown, Julie, who presided as Master of Ceremonies.
Yes, she really wore a mic' even though there were only about 10 of us!
Most of the games involved winners and losers, with the losers having to choose between drinking or doing something embarrassing.
We talked until the wee hours of the morning about everything from language teaching and regional dialects (no surprise), to Korean politics and history. I learned a lot about 5.18 (or "
오일팔") and regional prejudice in Korea, and I heard a lot of strong opinions about current president
Lee Myung-bak's policies towards education, economy, and N. Korea.
The next morning, after sleeping in rather late, we headed out to visit one of the local attractions near Ungilsan:
Namyangju Studios.
Namyangju Studios, which is the largest film studio in Asia (according to its website), is home to several reconstructed traditional village sets, which made for some fun photos.
[coming soon -- blogger's photo uploader just pooped out on me.]
It is also the site where much of
JSA, one of Korea's highest-grossing films, was shot and edited. JSA stands for
Joint Security Area, which is the official name for a particular area within the the DMZ between North and South Korea. (It is the location where the
pruning of a poplar tree almost sparked World War III in 1976.)
All in all, it was a fun and memorable weekend.
If one stick lands face up, it is called do (도), meaning "pig," and this results in a player moving a token one space. 2 sticks is called gae, which means "dog" and allows a player to move two spaces. 3 is geol (걸), or "cow," and 4 is yut (윷), or sheep, resulting in 3- and 4-space moves, respectively. If all 4 sticks land flat-side down, this is called mo (모), or "horse," and a player's token is moved 5 spaces.
