Michelle Akemi Miura
| 아케미 미우라 | |
| |
| Name in Latin Alphabet: | Michelle Akemi Miura |
|---|---|
| Nationality: | Brazilian |
| Affiliation: | University of São Paulo, Department of Korean Studies |
목차
Introduction
여러분 안녕하세요!
About Me
I am Michelle from Brazil. I study at University of São Paulo and my major is Korean and Portuguese Studies, problably I will be graduated in the end of this year. First, my interting about Korea begun when a friend of mine showed me Korean dramas and I really love it. Then, I started to be interesting in Korean culture, literature and language, because of my great curiosity I decided to do my majoring in Korean Studies. One of my favorite writer is Yi Chong-Ju (이청준), his history also talk about Korean tradicional culture and the period post Korean War. It is very interting, everyone should read his histories. I am glad because my class will be the first one graduated in Korean Studies in Brazil, actually University of São Paulo is the only one that offer Korean Studies majoring in South America. Last year it had a conquest at my University and I won in first place. In the conquest I was suppose to write an essay about the romance-novel "The Vegetarian" ("채식주의자") wrote by Han Kang (한강). When I won this conquest I become really happy, because last year I tried twice to enroll in the scolarship exchange program at my University, but I fail twice and I was thinking about given up of my majoring in Korean when I won this conquest, I think it cheered me up to continue my graduation. I know that Koreaan skills are not very good, but I truly want to learn, so I think that 24th AKS Summer Program will help to improve my skills and I hope to make new friends and learn about their country culture.
My hometown
I live in the city of São Paulo that is the biggest and most populous city in Brazil. There you can find all kind of foods from the world, but everyone like pizza and japanese food, so there are many pizzeria and japanese restaurant. The crime rate is high, but in the streets you can find a lot of kind and lovely person. I really enjoy visiting museums and in São Paulo there are many good ones. The transportation are not enough for carry everyone for everywhere, but problably it will get better in the next 5 years, because we will must have more five subwway lines. One of my favorite places to go is Ibirapuera Park, there are good places for sports, you can borrow bicycle and also have museums nearby.
Habits
- to travel
- reading
- cooking
- fishing
- to watch movies
- to make new friends
Korean Culture & Folklore
The class of Korean Culture & Folklore was very interesting and was conducted by Professor Young-ha Jun. He was very funny and the content was well explained, even my skills to understand Korean speech was not that good, I was able to understood by the ppt presentation that was also in English and because he explained every picture very well. Then, in this class I learned about the Koreans manners in table, how they usually eat and differences with other cultures. One of the parts that I was interest by was about how kitchen utensils for eating change by centuries in Korea and how was divided the rooms in a house where men and women were separate.
KBS Suwon Center
The experience of visiting KBS in Suwon and see a TV studio was really amazing. We saw how a drama is shoot by visiting a scenario of a famous drama. It was unbelievable to saw how big they made everything looks like it is in real life. Firs we saw a scenario by inside from ‘Morning’ drama (아침 드라마), then we visit a scenario outside that was like a real city, it looks like real buildings, but most of them are made of soft materials, it really surprise me when a touch a wall that looks like made of rocks, but it is not. We also saw a blue studio, where it is possible to change the background, there we can be in front of the blue wall, be recorded and when we see us in TV we are in another scenario. I really like all the experiences.
Gyeongju trip
- Yongin Korean Folk Village
Before we got at Gyengju we went to Yongin Korean Folk Village and this was an amazing experience, because it was possible to see and imagine how as Korean life in the past. When you are in the village you have the impression of you have come back hundred of years ago. It was interesting to see in the village houses have objects to illustrate aspects and make us imagine how people used the objects in this houses. It also has presentations of Korean culture like traditional Korean wedding, Farmer’s Music and Dance and Equestrian Feast. I loved the Equestrian Feast, actually I love horses and the ones used in the presentations were so well trained, I was really impressed. And there were also the unbelievable performance of the jockeys on the horses, like hit a target with bow and arrow on the horse. After we saw the presentations we saw that were an amusement park in the village, so we spend some fun time there too. There we went to a horror house, it was really funny, because we are so scary to be scary that we start to laugh of which other face.
- Anapji
When we got at Gyeonju, first we had a great dinner and then we moved to Anapji. There was a beautiful yard used for royal families in the past. It was a really good place to sit down and see the sunset, there was a lake, surrounded by flowers and a palace that is beautiful in the sun light, but it unbelievable that it can be more beautiful after the sunset, because there were so many beautiful lights coming from the lake. It is a really good place to walk and take pictures.
- Cheonmachong Tomb & Daereungwon and Gyeonju National Museum
It was an interesting tour, where we saw historical places that carry important meanings for Korean history. First we saw Cheomseongdae, an astronomical observatory, made of rocks and it is one of the oldest observatory in the world with almost 10 meters high, that was constructed in Silla period. Then, we in Daereungwon area we watched a video that shows how must be Gyeonju in the Silla period and entered in Cheonmachong Tomb that is the one opened for visitations. It was an indescribable experience to entered in the tomb, because half of the tomb was conserved and we saw a lot of rocks that the tomb is made of. Finally, we visited the Gyeonju National Museum, where was possible to see the real pieces that was take from the tomb, like the crow and ornaments all made of gold. I really enjoy visiting museums and it was really good to see the real pieces of I learned about in history classes.
- Underwater Tomb of King Mumu and Pillar-shaped joint
After we visiting the Gyeonju National Museum, we have pizza time and then we went to sea for to see Pillar-shaped joint that was formed in the water next to the beach. Near where we went was plenty of this phenomenon made by nature, it is interesting for me because in Brazil does not have volcano so this kind of think it is not possible to see. It is really beautiful what nature can do. After that we went to other beach where we saw the rock were King Mumu ask for put his body ashes. So in front of of the King Mumu tomb we had some fun swimming in the water and taking pictures. The water was really great, it was a little cold, but it was so hot this day that it was really refreshing.
- Bulguksa & Seokgulam
In our last day in Gyeongju we went first to visit the Seokgulam Temple, where we need to climb some stairs to get where there is a huge statue of Budha in a grotto, it is 3.5 meters in height and sits on a 1.34 meter tall lotus pedestal. It was really touching for me. We learn from the teacher that Korean monks wear gray, shave the hair and are celibate. They shave the hair on detachment signal to the consumer good, because if they have hair they will need money to buy shampoo. It makes me think more about my life and there is an interesting place to visit. Then we visit the Bulguksa Temple, it is near Seokgulam Temple and actually these two temples are UNESCO World Heritage. Bulguksa Temple are sustained basically with not else than rocks and it is so beautiful construction that makes hard to believe that human hand made it. There were many pictures in the ceiling and sculpture so beautiful and was really touching when the teacher told about the fish sculpture: “even a fish can become a dragon with Buddhism practice”. There is also the historical Dabotap Pagoda and Seokgatap Pagoda side by side with different styles. After this visit our visit in Gyeonju finished, I really enjoy my time there and I would like to come back there if it possible.
Korean Language Class
I was placed in elementary Korean classes and in this level I had the marvelous Professor Song-hee Jun (전송희). In the beginning I felt little bad because my Korean skills should be good by this time, I have been studying Korean Language for 3 years, but I cannot speak at all. But then, I saw in these classes the opportunity for to learn more and try to improve my Korean skills. Actually for me it was a little challenge to speak and listening to classes in Korean because I get used with classes managed all in Portuguese in my University. So for me it was a little difficult to understand everything in the class, but I always had help off my colleagues, especially Dobrin Tsvetanov Bugov, who was my partner in most of the activities in class. We had many activities where we need to ask and answer question with our partner, like introduce ourselves, making a job interview, answered question about a report, etc. Because our teacher is always kind with us and with the help of my colleagues I was able to learn in the classes.
I still do not believe that I did two speech in one month, normally I spend one month or two to get prepared for one and in less than one month I did two. My speech was not very good and I was not well prepared, but I did and I tried to do the best I can, so I am happy. My first speech was a tree minute speech was about a Korean town in my city and the second was about Brazilians Arts in the XX century. I liked to talk about my country for my friends and then listened about theirs countries.
I think that for me and most of my classmate the grammar point was not new, but our teacher have always bring extra activities and information that make us training more the content and also compare other grammar, so it was really useful and good. For me it was really good to see again the indirect speech grammar, because before these classes I just saw it once and I did not have the chance for training. So in the game that our teacher made in class was a funny way to train grammar, in this game everybody took one piece of paper with an action and we need to do it for our classmates report in indirect speech what is the action and who is doing. It was really funny.
Finally, I wanted to have more Korean language class with Professor Song-hee Jun and my classmate, I wanted that to see everyone go to Brazil with me, but I know it is impossible, so I will keep in my memory the classes we had and continue study hard to one day come back to Korea and be able to have all my conversations in Korean.
Korean Meal Cooking Class
This class was really delicious!! First, our class was next of the Blue House, so before the class started we have the chance of take some pictures in front of the beautiful Blue House. The sun was so bright that I did not know if my pictures was really good, but then I saw it and it was very good ones. Then we went for the Korean Cooking Class, the teacher explained about some traditional Korean foods and taught us to make a kind of Korean pancake. It is really easy to make, just a little flue, broth, egg and some vegetables, then mix everything and put small pieces of the mixture with a spoon in a frying pan and cook. After teacher explained how to do it we needed to cook the pancake, so we were separated in small groups for to do it. Actually I wanted to do the mixture too, but we just used the teacher made mixture to cook in the frying pan, anyway it was really funny. The best part is that we were able to eat what we made and we have a great Korean meal with bulgogi and bibimbab. While we were eating the teacher explained how to do bulgogi, it did not look so difficult to be made, but I just do not remember all the ingredients I need for to do it. I think that I was very concentrate and happy with my food that I forget to listen... Cooking is one of my favorite hobbies so I loved this class. I wish we had more cooking classes.
Career Development in Korean Studies
This class gives us some ideas of some working areas in the field of Korean Studies. Professor Seong-Ho Jun started the class asking for some of us why we study Korean and give suggestion of which area will be more interesting for some people who answered his question. Then he explained something about how Korea had development in the past years and during the class he showed some books and chose some students for read some parts of the book or the ppt. I do not get so much information in this class because I was a little tired, but it was an interesting class for to think about our future in the field of Korean Studies.
| subject | relation | object |
|---|---|---|
| Michelle | sits next to me | Teresa Luftensteiner |
| Michelle | my roommate name | Agureeva Anastasia |
| Michelle | is a student of | University of São Paulo |
