Update

I’m sorry it’s been awhile since I’ve written. My time has been filled with lots of practice, fun outings, promises (this is what Korean’s call a meeting or dinner date with a friend), and a doctor visit.

Last week I hurt my neck. It stemmed from an old shoulder injury. I’m going to therapy here. I have to decide if I’m going to continue because it is expensive. Please pray for healing and that it wouldn’t interfere with rehearsal.

Our rehearsal schedule changes daily. We are working on the songs, choreography, and blocking the scenes. My greatest challenge is singing harmony instead of joining the melody when we start to move around. I’m working on keeping my alto notes when I’m near a soprano or when a baritone is my partner and I have to hold my note with him singing in my ear.

Two weeks ago we went to see a dance musical called “Sachoom”, which means “ If You Fall in Love You Dance”. The show was very comical. The dance and acting style was very cheesy compared to America’s, but a lot of fun. There was audience participation involved and everyone danced together at the end. Last weekend we were given free tickets to a Korean version of the Shakespeare play The Tempest. I didn’t understand everything because of the language, but I enjoyed watching the traditional song, dance, and listening to the traditional Korean drum and harp. Some of their facial expressions were priceless. ^*^

In Korea they hold “promises” very highly. I have enjoyed meeting one on one with some of the girls in the cast and getting to know them better. One day we got dinner and sat at the Han River. It is so beautiful. Seoul is a big busy city and it’s nice to relax and look at the calm water.

There are definitely moments where I really miss home, but I am savoring my time here. I’m so thankful for this opportunity to be immersed in another culture while doing what I love. ☺ Love and miss you all. Xoxo

A little bit of fun

Last week was a break from our intense schedule. While we waited for the new script, we just had diction from 2-6. It was great to relax in the morning and be able to cook breakfast and excersice on the roof before going to class. I enjoyed teaching diction a couple days. I was able to use some of the games and activities I learned/made up last summer and everyone had FUN learning English. :) I also learned several Korean games this week. They have similar games to ours, but all of them end with physical pain if you loose. lol Its actually alot of fun.

We've been here for 5 weeks and haven't explored our area, so we decided to go out this weekend. We walked around Hong Dae and listened to several bands. My favorite was a group called Soundbox. There was a singer, beat boxer, and several people who played the drums and took turns tapping...AMAZING! Close to our house is a place called Can More that is my new favorite hang out. They sell pasta and Korean ice cream and have swings and rocking chairs. Its very bright and fun. For 5 girls we split two bowls that were filled with several scoops of ice cream, shaved ice, syrup, fruit, sweet red bean, post-type cereal, and cream. YUM! They need open this style of store in the US. :) Between the amazing ice cream and delicious Korean pastries, I better watch out. lol

After church, we went out to eat then went to one of our cast member's show. It was in an art gallery. We were able to see traditional Korean dance, Jung-ga a traditional formal song, as well as contemporary dance/hip-hop and song. The traditional movement was captivating and the hip-hop was high-energy and really entertaining.

The rest of the casting has been given out. I have one other small part where my friend Sarah and I will be ballerinas. I say like 2 words. :) Should be fun. Then in the Jospeph scene I am a slave. I can't wait to get started. I'm enjoying how laid back it is right now, but know that its not going to last very long. As soon as the script is completely finalized, we will have to get going quickly.

Changes

We received the first draft of the translated new script, but a lot of changes will need to be made. The casting still hasn’t been completely set, they are still trying to write a couple more songs and make many changes to the script. So, we are doing the best we can and are focusing on helping them with diction right now. I will be in the ensemble and also will be playing one of Potipher’s wife’s rich friends in the Joseph scene (which means I will have a few lines and have to sing a couple measures by myself! Yikes!!!). We started learning one number. The dance isn’t hard, but let me tell you, it is really hard to sing while running around the stage. I need to build up some stamina. I’m having a blast and despite the language barrier, am making a lot of great friends.
God is continuously stretching my faith and teaching me new things here. We were asked to come sing at 7am(which means traveling at 6am) on Saturday for the elders of their church at a meeting. We met them and sang “Give Thanks” in English. Then they asked us to sing it at church on Sunday. The cast decided that it would be cute to have the American’s sing part of it solo in Korean. So with one nights notice and no practice before, we sang it in front of the church and it was telecasted to all their different churches. I was so nervous….my first solo, first time singing in a microphone, in KOREAN. I feel like I understand a little now of how they must feel learning an entire musical in a foreign language. I had fun, however, I didn’t turn on the microphone so when it was my turn to sing a solo and nothing came out, my good friend Sarah quickly held hers up for me. I don’t know what I would do without her. She is my human piano, snack buddy, and encourager. ☺ I was so thankful she was by my side and thankful that God helped me remember the words and not chicken out.
Last night we went out for dinner and met some musicians on the walk home. They were so excited to meet some Americans and a couple of them are planning on coming to New York in the fall to study music. We stayed and watched them play outside in the Square. Many people gathered, storeowners brought out drinks and food for them, and everyone celebrated Korea’s independence day together. At 11:30 at night when it was over they invited us to go out with them, but we were exhausted from the long week and went home. We are going to focus on diction and work on solo’s this week, while we wait for the new script. Please pray for inspiration for the songs and content of the musical. I’m excited to get started, but am trying to be patient and helpful.

xoxo,
Bora Jin, 보라 진
My Korean name, which means violet true.

The World Conference and the official start of The Covenant Journey

The past four days we have been at “The World Remnant Conference”. Our cast performed "One Day More" and "Remant Power" for the opening ceremony for over 10,000 people. During the other days we listened to various messages and attended a big culture festival the last night. I was amazed at the talent, advanced technology, and enthusiasm from everyone. The performance the last night was in a huge stadium and it was suppose to rain, and although it rained everywhere else, God kept the rain away just in our area ☺. It was incredible to hear that many people praising God in so many languages. I also loved their theme song that they sang at the top of their lungs and praised God with their whole body (there was even a hip role in it lol) It went until 10:45 at night. We got home at 12 and had to leave at 8:30 this morning for our first day of rehearsal. We started reading through the script. It’s brand new and the first time they've written one in English. We focused on diction with the script for the first 3 hours, and then worked on diction with 3 of the songs for the rest of our day. One person from the academy is now a manager and another our interpreter….so no one is going home. ☺ Now the Covenant Journey truly begins.

"One Day of Vacation"

Today we went to our normal church service, lunch, and then the youth service. The second service was in Korean with sign language and Japanese translation. We had to put on head phones for the English translation. Then a friend from the cast took us American girls on a tour of Seoul. We went to Jamsildong, Chongnamdong, Apgujong, and a couple other places I can't remember the names. We saw the Olympic Arena, the Manhattan of Seoul with all the fancy shops, the presidents house, old castles, and beautiful scenery. I love all the modern archetecure and cool sculptures. We hiked up to the Namsan Tower. (This outing was not planned and we weren't exactly equiped. None the less, in a dress, and Jasmine in her 4 inch platform shoes) we went up to the top and enjoyed the beautiful view of the city. Our friend took us to some of his favorite spots in Seoul and treated us to a meal of all new foods....the best being the spicy snail soup. :) It was a fun-filled, spontaneous, beautiful Sunday in Seoul.

Audition

Today was great! I conquered my fear of singing by myself. I had fun doing the dances. I was only a little bummed that the director was cutting everyone off during the plays, when we had worked sooooo hard on it. Oh well....what we did show was good. We will find out more details of casting later. We have a "vacation" for 4 days until we start rehersals. But, then they told us that the church asked us to perform at the opening ceramonies of their big summer conference. We stayed after and put something together that we will perform on Monday, and plan to attend the conference every day of our "vacation". Once we finally finished( we were starving) we celebrated the end of the academy and my roommate Jasmine's 21st Bday, by going out to dinner. Its now 1am and I have to get up at 7 for church. :) Night

Week 2

There is a lot of pressure this week. We are all trying to get ready for the audition on Saturday that will solidify/give our parts. We will perform the dances we have learned, a scene, and a section from Le Mis and one song from Covenant Journey. I'm learning a song entilted "Who am I" for my solo and am singing the character of Eponine in the song "One Day More". Its scary for me to hear my own voice but everyone is so supportive and helpful. For the play I'm doing a scene from "Fat Pig" with one of the Korean actors. We can't fully understand each other verbally, so we have to be creative in the way we communicate about our ideas and the direction of the scene. With only one week to learn everything for the audition we are all working really hard. A couple of people are going to get cut. I can't imagine anyone leaving. We have become such a family.

First Week of Training

I can't believe we just finished our first week of the academy. It has been a blast. Each morning I ride the sparkling clean, air-conditioned subway to the rehersal space, where I'm greeted with a warm, excited, hello (Step)(a)(nee)!!! I can't wait to get there and see all of my chingudel ( friends). We've been working on memorizing different plays, songs, and have learned 3 dances. One of my favorite moments of the week was when we split into two groups and sang Grasslands from the Lion King accapella. Today ( Saturday) was a short day, ending at 6 and we went out to dinner together. I ordered samgyetang, soup with an entire chicken, rice, and ginseng. However, my Korean friends also ordered Bosintang, a soup made out of primarily dog meat. Believe it or not, I actually liked Bosintang better. I loved the flavor, although the texture of the meat was a little rubbery. It is suppose to be good for your health. :)

The Start of Something New

On Sunday we went to Seoul Emmanuel Church. It was amazing to see around 10,000 people worshipping God in Korean, English, and sign language. Yesterday, we started our first official day of training. Our music class was really challenging. We do the vocal excerises on Korean vowels and the music is really diffifult for me. I wish I new how to site read. I'm excited to grow in this area. We had a dance class and conditioning class. The dance class is very basic and will challenge my patience, but really great for me to go back to the basics and work on technique. The teacher is beautiful and is very jazzy, which I love :). For conditioning we had 10exercises that we did for 1 minute each with a partner, 2 times. Acting class was fun. We did cold readings in English. This was very difficult for the Korean's diction and a good challenge for me to get out of my comfort zone. I love the feeling of adrenaline when your nervous. We had training from 1-10 and then met for worship and a short message until 11:30. Didn't get home until 12:30. What a different schedule than America! The day went by fast though. We have a lot of breaks and we get an hour for dinner. There was one group that went out to eat and the rest of us brought our lunches. The Korean's all brough rice and side dishes to share. They eat sooooooo fast. Throughout the day when I would eat a snack they would just grab a bite without asking. I thought one girl was really comfortable with me at first, but after the 4th person did it, I decided it must be part of their culture :). I woke up at again at 5 am ( jet lag!!!!), with really sore muscles, a count of 13 mosquito bites, and ready for a new adventure in Seoul!

The city that only sleeps in the morning

We are slowly adjusting to the time change. I woke up at 3, 4, 5, and finally got up at 6am. We tried to walk around at 10am and hardly anything was open and it was so queit. People stay out really late and sleep in late here. Today we experienced heavy monsoon rains and long stop and go traffic. Each family is only allowed one car and the streets and freeways are crowded. We went to get water and pizza for the cast at Costco( yes the American Costco except that everything is marked up). In the parking lot we saw two ladies trying to push a car and ran over thinking something bad was happening. They just park the cars in neutral and if you need to leave you just move the cars in your way. lol We must have looked pretty funny trying to "help". We met the cast and choreographer today. They are friendly, energetic, and passionate. We did a jazz class and learned a combination. The choreographer doesn't know alot of English so the class conducted in Korean. Its neat to learn to count and pick up words here and there in Korean. I've always said dance is a universal language and have taught it to many different cultures, but I'm enjoying being on the other side and gaining a new perspective. :)

Arrival in Seoul

We left LAX at 12:20am Wed Morning and arrived at 5:00 am Thursday in Seoul! Our first day was long! By 10am we had moved into our house, had 2 breakfasts, gone grocery shopping, exchanged money, and were ready for bed....but we pushed on and explored the city. We are living right in the heart of Hongdae. It is the center for entertaiment and there are alot of young people around. We were stopped and asked to chicken fight for some promotion, and of course we did it so we could get the free ice cream. :) There are alot of American chains, but everything has its own Korean flavor. I'm excited to try all of the different foods. For our second breakfast we ate ddeok kalbi and ddeok bok gi. My pronuciation is pretty terrible right now, but my uncle blessed me with Rossetta Stone for my birthday so I'm going to be a pro soon. :) The Korean woman who's house we are staying at has a daughter who will be attending school in Tucson in the fall. I just love how small this world is. We sat and talked about Tucson and Jasmine( my friend from NYC who is in the show) was really able to communicate in Korean. She lived with me for 3 months in NYC and would always watch Korean dramas. I guess I should have paid a little more attention. lol Well...off to study the language. Annyong! (Bye!)

The Covenant Journey

I auditioned for the musical The Covenant Journey in the spring and will be going to Seoul, South Korea this summer to learn the show. It is a Korean company who has produced an original play about a young girl who learns how to face the hardships in her life through the story of Joseph. I was praying for an opportunity for musical theater training and was ecstatic when I got accepted for the ensemble. The first month I am in Korea I will be training in singing, acting, and dance classes. Once we learn the show, we will come back to perform in NYC, Phili, and D.C. You can go to www.thecovenantjourney.com for more information. I'm excited to join this adventure with the Covenant Journey!

Waking up in the city that never sleeps

Moving to NYC was a childhood dream fulfilled. I've enjoyed exploring all the different parts of the city, seeing Broadway shows, dancing with some of my role models, and meeting amazing people. Some highlights have been dancing with Sue Samuel's Jazz Roots Company, being a part of the dance parade down Broadway with Amy Marshall's modern company, dancing and singing in the original play Dear Mr. Rosan. I received the opportunity to choreograph for the play Mannequin’s Ball, for a benefit concert for Harlem's music programs, and the group dance for Project Dance, which will be perfromed in Houston, Atlanta, NYC, Sydney, Toronto, and the Philippines this year. Project Dance and Morning Star New York(my church) have become my family and helped make NYC home. :)