Hull
Friends in Hull

Hull
College

While studying for my TESOL I had to travel three hours every day to and from Grimsby. We all had to evaluate one student each and mine was Xiu ru from Taipei who knew someone who had a room to let. Xiu ru, through her friend Lee Eun-Joo introduced me to Mr. Hoang Young-Ju. This was one of the best favours anyone has ever done for me as knowing Young-Ju definitely has changed my life.

Without knowing Young-Ju, who is a lecturer at the Pusan University of Foreign Studies (PUFS for our amusement) gave me a letter of reccomendation without which I may never have had the opportunity to teach in Korea - which I did for two years.

Koreans and in particular Buddhist Koreans (although Young-Ju isn't)have a phrase that means a bonding in this life and in other past lives between souls that gives these souls the ability to meet again and again. This is called 'in yeun' and our example of this follows.

While home in the UK in the summer of '98 I accompanied Tracy Warren and Alicia, her youngest daughter, her Mum, Jean and Jean's friend, Terry to Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. Chatsworth is about two hours away from both Grimsby and Hull. While walking up the decorative and slowly sloping waterfall with Tracy I noticed one Oriental looking chap with his family. When I looked closely I couldn't believe my eyes as it was Young Ju with his wife and son. We just couldn't believe that we'd picked the same spot for a day out.

Although we still keep in touch by E-mail when we both have the time Young-Ju and his family are braving the Korean economic crisis and are back in Pusan. I visited Young-Ju in the Autumn of '98 for a month and enjoyed their company before coming back to the UK and then on to ... well, who knows.

As I've said before in this section, meeting Hoang Young-Ju is one of the most fortunate experiences I've had especially for all the good company he keeps. While staying with Young-Ju in Hull I was fortunate to experience life living with Korean people in many instances. Here is a picture from the Lunar New Year's party at Peter Lee's house in 1996. Peter himself is far right, next to him is Aika from Japan then Young-Ju and Peter's wife Eun-Ju with Se-Ri. Then there's myself and two other young Koreans whose names unfortunately are lost within that mass I sometimes misapropriately call a memory.

One of the many benefits of living within a Korean community in the UK was that it helped me adjust more easily into living in Korea. Here at the New Years party is a group of us playing Yu-na-ri, a board game played with sticks instead of dice, very similar to Ludo.

I'm not sure what the occasion was, though I do think it was our house warming after moving into Freetown Court. We did have a few parties and I'm pretty sure that not all of them had a reason. Here's myself with an ever-lovely Chun-Yan behind me, on the right is Peter Lee with in front of him Son-Jae. Over my right shoulder is Aika with Young-Ju to her right but I'm afraid I don't remember the name of the guy at the back.
I know that at time of writing Young-Ju is in Pusan, Son-Jae and aso I think Peter are in Seoul and Aika is in her native Tokyo, but should anyone have any more info please write to mea at six_a_t_w@hotmail.com

Please send any comments or feedback to
six_a_t_w@hotmail.com

Site created 19th March 1999 currently being overhauled - Created using hey, HTML by Rob Price.

Click here to return to main home page. | Click here for the latest drivels.

***Hull***Friends in Hull

Hull
Friends in Hull