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Travel Bucket List 2012: Booking a role on Hawaii Five-O (Part II)

Filed under CHALLENGES, Hawaii by Christine Ka'aloa on February 17, 2012 at 1:54 pm {27 comments}

: My casting profile and the script for my episode, Kupale

Monday: The big Five-0 audition.

At Hawaii Five-0 studios in downtown Honolulu, I play my lines to the casting director in a bare room. It’s one scene. I’m an assistant to two bosses (a dead one and a murder suspect) and I’m being questioned by the Five-O team. The casting director has me perform it several times, adding different direction.

Now I have two thoughts burdening my mind:

- Will I get the Hawaii Five-0 part?
- What’s my decision about the Korea job?

My favorite two-letter phrase silences all tensions and neurotic chattering.

… Fuck it.

Tuesday: The result

My agent messages me. She is god! Good news, the director cast me. Now I need to wait and see if I clear network approval. Network could still say No.

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Travel Bucket List 2012: Booking a role on Hawaii Five-O (Part I)

Filed under CHALLENGES, Hawaii by Christine Ka'aloa on February 15, 2012 at 3:00 am {18 comments}

: Watch me on Hawaii Five-O! Air date is Monday, February 20th (episode is ‘Kupale’).

Okay, some of you asked to see the competition…

Still wondering what some of those alternate plans for 2012 were, twerking with that university job in Korea? Here’s my hinted confession to one of those alternate things…

Travelers all make “bucket lists”, but we don’t always know if we’ll accomplish the things on our list. They’re goals and some of them may seem like shooting for the moon. To see a ping pong sex show in Thailand, stay at an ashram in India, hike Macchu Picchu, see Cappadocia, go diving in Bora Bora,… For me it’s gone as far as moving to Korea , learning to go solo in my travels or even traveling continuously for an extended time.

Well last year, somewhere traveling between India to Korea, nailing a role to act on the TV show, Hawaii Five-O fell into my travel bucket list.

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Art of Hobo-ing: How do you budget for long-term travel?

Filed under Asia, CHALLENGES by Christine Ka'aloa on February 13, 2012 at 1:10 am {12 comments}

: A local-local Cambodian bus: Sometimes, you want to use the money you’ve saved to splurge and take a tourist bus instead!

Some of you have been curious how I budgeted for my several months on the road. Others, want to know how much to sock away for India and Southeast Asia. I’ll apologize in advance for any errors, because I rushed to get this post out. I don’t know if I’ll split this up into two parts yet. But for the moment, let’s start with the general topic of budgeting and hobo-ing.

Here’s how I worked it:

When I started out on my trip, the idea that I’d be traveling long-term didn’t occur to me. I thought I’d be on the road for a much shorter period. So, I got a crash course in budgeting when I was on the road… and I freaked out. Originally, I socked away $9,000 for traveling. I thought I’d just do things the cheapest way I can. Bad idea. I was a short-term traveler, striking out on long-term trip for the first time. The budget mentality between the two are drastically different.

Fortunately, I didn’t bleed my bank dry. I actually came back with a good savings (vs. debt). But still, budgeting a long-term trip felt like a stressful ordeal. (more…)

Luxury at Seoul’s Dragon Hill Spa… hip or hype?

Filed under * Korea tips & stays, Accommodations by Christine Ka'aloa on February 10, 2012 at 9:15 am {11 comments}

: Why does my face look like it’s going to explode? You don’t really want to know, but keep reading to find out …

One of the things I occasionally enjoy are the jjimjilbangs and bathhouses. It’s not that I enjoy being naked in front of others, but I do love the pampering of a good soak and scrub, whilst relaxing with the Asian bathing community. In fact, being naked in a bathhouse is actually more comfortable than wearing a bikini on a beach! Seeing bodies of all shapes, sags and sizes, parade around non-chalantly and matter-of-fact, I get to feeling less judgmental in general, about a pinch of fat here, cellulite there…

On my return to Seoul, there was one “luxury” jjimjilbang I’d heard hype about. Dragon Hill Spa has been raved about by CNN.com, The New York Times and bloggers being one of the deluxe spas in Seoul, where celebrities frequent and TV broadcasts like Yoo Jae Suk‘s show, Happy Together (I think), occasionally film. It was a spot I’d been dying to try. (more…)

Surviving a university job interview in Korea

Filed under Daegu, GRRR Inspirations by Christine Ka'aloa on February 6, 2012 at 1:46 am {23 comments}

: Working at a Korean university?

A few of weeks ago, when I tweeted I was undergoing a job interview in Korea, I got a response from Dave of The Longest Way Home about doing a post on ‘Surviving a job interview in Korea’.

At first, I laughed at the idea and then later, I thought…well, why not?

“K******** University wants you to contact them ASAP about a job position. Please call them; they are a very good university.”

That was the message I got from Eun-Hyung, my Korean co-teacher, last April in India. It was a university job I had applied for long before I left Korea. The position started March 1st and it was for a full-time lecturer in the Media Arts department, teaching Video and Animation. At (more…)

Written by Christine Ka'aloa Festivals

Photo Essay: Hwacheon, Trout fishing and Winter Carnivals in Korea

When Korea wants to throw a winter festival, it goes all out!

Take the Hwacheon Winter Trout Festival in January. Initially, I thought the festival was purely about the spectacle of fishing for sancheoneo (or wild trout) through a hole in the ice or even fishing by hand: it was an event I’d only related with Eskimos and igloos. But when I got there, what I got was a surprising peek into how Koreans enjoy good old-fashioned winter fun.

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