So we've been here for a month now

Our one month aniversary of being here has come and I feel slightly morose as I think of all of the things that I haven't figured out yet. We're finally settled in to the point that we can get to work, do laundry, enjoy three types of authentic Korean cusine and it's taken us an entire month to get that far.

I think what bothers me the most is the fact that there are so many things that we cannot do by ourselves. For instance, Betty gave us curtains that match our apartment. Muchly appreciated! The problem surfaces when we try to hang these curtains. At the normal store that we visit there are no curtain rods big enough. So we must now find another store that sells curtain rods. Where? I don't know. Now assuming that we do find a curtain rod long enough, a new problem surfaces. All of the walls in our apartment are made out of concrete. We now require a concrete drill. Where do we get a concrete drill - we're still trying to find a curtain rod!!!!!

It's funny because we were so sure that after buying a phrase book we would be ready for anything. The security they lend makes any traveller feel self assured trudging along new paths. Until you try to use it. The thing that you must remeber about phrase books is that it allows you to communicate your ideas in broken and badly accented Korean, but does not allow for the reverse to occur. You can ask as many questions as you want - but you will NEVER understand the answer to your question. Therefore the phrase "Do you sell curtain rods" although it appears as though it is a useful tool accomplishes less than one might have hoped.

Charades, however, has become an art form.

I know what you are asking. You work with Koreans, surely some of them could help you. True. There is one woman, Betty, who has been assigned to helping us. The church that we have found also has memebers that are very pleased to answer questions and the like.

The problem is that we do not wish to kill these individuals with questions. Any given day there are at least 5 questions we need answered. Betty is an extremely busy woman. A simple question such as "where can we buy ant traps" (ants are very comon in Korea) becomes a fantastic ordeal where she must stop what she is working on, rush out of the building and deliver ant traps to us as if our happiness rested soley on this purchase.

It seems as though, in Korea, it is not enough to simply direct questioners to the questioned location. Therefore they have not truely helped us unless they have inconvienced themselves and gone and personally gotten what we require. Due to this unusal 'mother hen' atmosphere, we refrain from asking more than one question a day so as not to give any new found friends heart attacks.

This environment however, maintains our ignorance as we still do not know where to get ant traps and will need to ask for her help again when we run out. Frustratingly circular.

Word of warning

Just so you're aware, if you're ever in Korea and you order food and get it delivered, DO NOT THROW OUT YOUR DISHES!!!

The styrofoam ones are okay, and the cutlery consists of wooden chopsticks, so those can go too, but make sure you do not toss the plastic dishes. I thought they were a bit thick to be disposable, but everything here is wasteful like that, so I only hesitated for a second before throwing out my bowl. I was a little surprised, therefore, when the delivery guy showed up at the school (yeah. I was at work at the time) looking for the bowl. I had to get another teacher to explain what had happened and offered to pay for it, but he was new so he went rooting through the garbage can to look for it, and he must have either found it, or been told by his boss that it wasn't that big a deal, cause he never came back looking for it.

Anyway, so that's stupid westerner moment #1. I'm sure there will be more.

No wait, that was number 2. Number one was when I tried to tip the cab driver, only to find out later that here in Korea tipping is almost considered an insult. The idea behind this is that a tip implies that the receiver is so poor, they *must* need the extra money on top of what they're making in salary. The practical and benefitial upshot of this, of course, is that it's really easy to calculate who pays what in a restaurant. No cents, all even numbers, tax included in the menu list price, and no tip to consider. Awesome.

no wonder I couldn't figure it out

So I saw a sign today explaining the way cab fares work here. It's no wonder I was having trouble figuring out the system.

First 2km - 1500won
Every 176m thereafter - 100won
Every 43 seconds of waiting time (under 15km/h) - 100won


WHO THE CRAP chooses numbers that are that random? 176 metres? I'm not actually complaining, cause it's still really cheap to take a taxi - WAY cheaper than in Canada, but STILL!

Our trip to Seoul...

So this past weekend was Chuseok - Korean thanksgiving - and as you know we decided to head up to Seoul to visit some friends from our TESL course in Peterborough, Brandon and Jess.

Let me start off by saying that the trip was a blast. We had loads of fun and saw some neat places. We didn't see a whole lot of Seoul, since we stayed almost exclusively in Itaewon, which is the international section of the city, where foreigners from various countries (they have an inexplicably large Nigerian population, for instance) seem to outnumber actual Koreans.

The fact that there is a lot of English (in addition to Russian, Nigerian, and a number of other languages) spoken in Itaewon, didn't necessarily have any impact on the accuracy of the local signage. We found our way to Itaewon without trouble, since the Seoul subway system is ridiculously helpful (all the announcements for stops are made in Korean, Chinese and English, which displays above the doorways in the three languages, and the maps all have English on them too), and then just had to walk up the street from our stop to find a phone to get Brandon and Jess to come and collect us.

As a side note, this is what the subway stop near their place looks like on the inside (for some reason):



Anyway, back to the story. They had to come get us because (helpfully) there are no street names in Korea, so directing through the narrow alleyways of inner city Seoul is as close to impossible as you can get. As we were trying to find a payphone, we happened to stop in front of a Lingerie shop. I looked up at the sign above the store, and, barely holding back laughter, had to get a picture to share with all of you:



This kicked off Saturday night. What a way to start. Anyway, from there, we went back to their apartment to drop our stuff off before dinner which was at an amazing Thai restaurant, which we will most certainly be visiting again. So delicious.

After dinner, we thought that since we were in the area, we would take Brandon up on his offer to show us "some of the filthiest bars in Seoul." How could we pass that up? So we went to The Loft first, which was a dirty, but surprisingly well-behaved, bar that claims to be a "German-style pub" despite the fact that the most german thing about it was that they serve Jagermeister. From there, we went to a disturbingly gross hip-hop type club called Polly's Kettle. For Peterborough folks, picture the Rooster, but dirtier, and with lesser-known music. The feature of this place was their specialty drink, called a Kettle. A kettle is basically Tang mixed with soju (Korean liquor made from fermented sweet potato - and tastes as good as it sounds), but served in the bottom two thirds of a 2-litre plastic pop bottle that's been cut with scissors. I thought it'd be hard to describe, so I got a picture:



As mentioned before, alcohol is cheap here, as long as it's not imported. Those monstrosities (which I shared with Becca) only cost 5000 won each.

The next place we went was a little western-style pub called Scrooges, and wasn't really anything specacular either way, but it was quieter so we could actually converse while sitting. They also served Molson Canadian, which in Canada I don't ever drink, but thought I would this once for the sake of the cliche. I found out that the Canadian they serve here in Korea is WAY better. It has to be, it says it's imported!



Seriously, it's as gross as it is back home.

The second last place we went that night (the very last was a noraebong - Korean karaoke, and I didn't bother to get pics of it) was the most incredible concept I've ever seen. Observe:




Yeah, that's right, the floor is covered in AMAZING white beach sand, and there's a raised wooden boardwalk running in between the sections. It's just the most unspeakably good bar-related idea since serving alcoholic beverages. The drinks were a bit pricy, but they were delicious fruity-type cocktails. Again for Peterborough folks, picture the Sapphire Room, only with that atmosphere. Same type of relaxed music, only a little quieter.

So that was Saturday. A good evening all around.

Sunday we went to an big Chuseok celebration at a Korean folk village in another part of Seoul. The school where Brandon and Jess work has about 40 Canadian teachers, and one of the other ones has a student who volunteers at this folk village, so that's how we came to know about this event in the first place.

The thing that is still taking some getting used to is the Buddhist symbol adorning all the temples around here. I got a shot of one on the way into the folk village, and I think you'll see what I mean.



For the record, the German swastika was a mirror image of that, and was rotated 45 degrees, but it's a testament to the lasting effect of WWII that you don't even register that (if you know it at all) until a couple seconds of astonishment pass by.

We all got dressed up in traditional Korean outfits called hanboks, and then after standing around being stared at by the Koreans, we all were ushered under a tent-like covering and were taught how to make Songpyeon (Korean steamed rice cakes), which turned out to, in my opinion, not be very good, but were entertaining to make. They're kind of like perogies where the shell is a rice dough-y stuff and the filling is either sesame seeds or sweet red bean stuff. The peculiar part of this was all the Korean jockeying for position to get the best shot of us. I think I had my picture taken more over the course of that 45 minutes than I ever have before.

Anyway, here are some shots of us in the hanboks. The Korean-looking girl is Angela, the one whose student set us up with the info. She's from Winnipeg. The other couple is Brandon and Jess.




After that was over, we went and ate dinner at another awesome restaurant (I don't remember the name -- it was a bistro-type place) and then went to Angela's apartment and played a cutthroat game of Monopoly until 12:30am. We called the game short and just counted our assets (I came in second) since we'd been out at the noraebong until 5:30am the previous night, and we were all pretty tired.

Monday we hopped on the bus back to Cheongju.

The next time we take an intercity bus, I'll have to be sure to get a picture, because they're absolutely astounding. They seriously make taking the Greyhound look like travelling on a livestock freight truck. The seats are leather, and they're huge. They look like they've been taken out of the highest-class section of a REALLY nice airline, and they recline to a ridiculous degree and have an insane amount of legroom. They're also impeccably on time, which is nice. I'll have to get a picture.

Anyway, that was our long weekend. Now it's back to the grindstone, but for a shorter week, which is nice. This coming weekend there's a KOTESOL (a professional organization for ESL teachers in Korea) conference in Daejon (a city of about 1.5 million around 30 minutes from Cheongju) on Saturday that we're going to. Should prove to be interesting.

Anyway, more later.

One more question, should I be putting fewer pictures on these things? The posts seem really long, and if anyone's having trouble with loading the pictures or anything, or would just like me to talk less, just let me know.

Okay, I'm actually done now. Bye.

More pictures and other useless information

So I rearranged the blog itself so that the pictures won't get cut off by the menu on the right, cause now the menu's on the left. Nifty, huh?

This week has absolutely flown by. I can't believe that it's already our second Friday. So weird. School's going better now. Becca's parents' suggested an absolutely BRILLIANT technique for getting tiny people to shut the crap up while we're trying to teach, and it's worked perfectly so far. So a big thanks to them!

We still have yet to explore the "western bars" area of the city. This town's got 3 or 4 major universities in it, and the university district surrounding one of the bigger ones is apparently the place where all the foreign teachers go to hang out. We've been meaning to get there at some point, and it looks like next weekend will be decent for it, so we'll let you know how that goes. I think that there's this weird understanding between foreigners here. When you pass another white person on the street, it's not exactly an open-armed welcome, but just a nod and a simple "hey, howsit goin?" like they're someone you just kinda see all the time at school or something, even if you've never seen them before. I wonder what it's like to be at the social spots. I guess we'll find out soon enough.

Tomorrow evening we go to Seoul. I'm excited, both to see some familiar faces (the folks we're visiting are a couple that were in our TESL course, and I'm pretty sure that I had a class with the girl at Trent a couple years ago), and to see the city. They've been there since July, so they're going to show us around a bit. Also, on Sunday there's a celebration for foreigners for Chusok where they get us all traditional Korean outfits and there are some sort of festivities planned. Not really sure what they are yet, but hopefully it'll be awesome, cause we're going.

Just for the sake of clarity, Chusok is the Korean version of thanksgiving -- the harvest moon festival to be precise. It's a huge three-day affair, with the day before and the day after the actual day of Chusok being holidays too. We got majorly ripped off this year (THANKS ALOT, MOON!!) cause Chusok falls on a Sunday, which means that Saturday's a holiday (fat lot of good that does) and we get Monday off. I know it's still a long weekend, but if it fell on a Tuesday, we'd get Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday off - paid. That would've been sweet. As it is, though, there are pleasant surprises to this. We got presents from the school. We each got socks, 100,000 won (which we were genuinely surprised and ridiculously excited about, since that'll pay for our trip to Seoul this weekend) and a gift box, which is the focus of the first picture of this post... Observe:



Yeah. It's 8 cans of tuna (4 regular and 4 hot pepper tuna) and 4 cans of Korean spam. Canned luncheon meat to be exact. MMMMMMMM!!!!!!

Anyway, I've got a couple more pics of weird Korean food-related products. The first is an example of the only sized can of pop you can get here. Taller but much more narrow than its Canadian cousin:



The next is a baffling display of wasted educational opportunity. In a land so obsessed with teaching their children English, you'd think that any chance to teach kids any English would be welcome. Apparently not:



Can anyone else think of any reason at all to have crocodiles forming a letter "B"? Or a squirrel in the shape of a "V"? It'd be so EASY to have foxes make an "F", but NO, they've gotta be making an "N". So. Weird.

This next one is one of my favourite things that we've seen so far. It's a placemat from a restaurant downtown where there was a dinner for ESL teachers, and it's got some of the most bafflingly hilarious mis-uses of English I've ever seen. I asked to take the placemat home, and assuming it survives the year, I intend to frame it once we get back to Canada. I might frame it here, come to think of it, if I find a place to do it.



Below the price list is written "All vegetables and fruits we use in our dishes are fresh and environment friendly products." Awesome. Try to pick out all the errors on the rest of the menu. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

That's all for now, except for the pics of our apartment to follow, but there are a few things that I hope to get pictures of in our neighbourhood, like the incredible Korean parking habits, the abundance of neon, and the pick-up trucks full of fruit that have loudspeakers on the top blaring out their contents while meandering through the narrow streets with all the subtlety of Kareem Abdul Jabbar at a KKK rally. They're really annoying.

Anyway, here are the pics of our apartment to close out this (really long -- sorry) post. More to come after the weekend, when we'll have pics of Seoul to share.

Our kitchen. This is what you enter as soon as you walk in the door. Every other room branches off from it.


Our bathroom. Korean bathrooms don't have separate showers, they just have tile everywhere and a drain in the middle of the room. At least this one has a western-style toilet. The big green thing in the corner's the washing machine.


Our spare room. We've got a bed in there in case anyone wants to come visit, and a wardrobe cause there are no closets in the entire apartment.


And finally, our bed/living room. Two pictures, one from the door, the other from the bed. Decent size, really, and we decided to keep the bed in there cause that's where they installed the air conditioner, and we figured that a spare room might come in handy.

So we're testing our photo capability....

Okay, so the pictures we're posting here were taken on our second day in Korea. Michael, the teacher that we replaced, took us up to Sandangsanseong, which is a mountain fortress about 4km north of the city. A very cool place, with a good hike up around the wall, which I believe goes 1.5 km around the central part of the enclosure.

The way it's set up is that there's a valley in the middle with a little cluster of shops/restaurants, etc (which we didn't go to see this time -- we will soon though) and a wall that runs along the ridgeline surrounding the valley. It makes for some nice views, and a merciful breeze if the day is a bit warm, which it was.

I've got a bunch of other pictures (like of our apartment and some interesting examples of Konglish) but this is the guinea pig post, trying to see if this new image hosting service works.

Here goes...

This is a view of part of Cheongju from somewhere along the wall of the fortress:


This one's Becca and I at roughly the same spot along the wall. Michael's taking the picture.


More pictures to come, as well as an update featuring some more of the random oddities involved in this whole "living in Korea" thing.

Until next time...

Well, the red lights are long, and I could use a calculator...

Hey hey.

Well that's one week (and a day -- weekend really flew by quick) done.

Another random sighting to add to the "only in Korea" list: apparently instead of having squeegee kids at stoplights here, there are guys selling calculators.

First week of teaching went well. Apparently this week will be a fair bit tougher, since we've been told that the kids view the first week as a kind of observation period to size up new teachers and week two is "test the boundaries" week. Should be fun. It's a good thing I like yelling at small children.

What else.....

Oh yeah, we were going to visit some friends of ours from our TESL course next weekend. They live in Seoul and moved there in July, so they'd be able to show us around a bit. These plans may be in jeopardy due to an interesting Korean holiday called Chusok. It's basically Korean Thanksgiving, and it's a three day holiday (which this year falls on a Sunday, meaning that we only actually get Monday off work - stupid everything) where everyone in Korea has to go to the house of the oldest male relative on their Father's side, and almost all of them drive. This is a lot of traffic. Apparently, they're estimating that there will be 21 million cars on the road for the weekend.

And you lot thought cottage country traffic was bad on May 24.

Anyway, due to this, the normally 90 minute journey to Seoul from Cheongju is estimated to take just over 5 hours, and while inter-city buses in Korea have their own lanes on the expressways, I'm not sure if we'll risk it, or if we'll just stay here in town and hide. More on that as it develops.

An exciting developement on the money-saving front. It's come to my attention that the basic monthly charge for a phone line is only 5200 won. Add to that the fact that our internet (through some interesting wheelings and dealings on the part of the internet company and the teacher we're replacing -- we just took over his account and get all the "long-term customer" bonuses and discounts) is only 22,000 won/month, and our heating bill is almost guarenteed to be under 70-80,000/month, we're in great shape to have all our monthly expenses (excluding food) come to under 100,000 won/month. Most other things seem to be fairly comperable in price (except alcohol - more on that later) so it's nice to see that the whole "cheap Korean living" thing turns out to be true for something, anyway.

So a quick note about the alcohol. Seems you can get alcohol anywhere. Convenience stores, gas stations, department stores, you name it. Most of this alcohol seems to be whisky, and most of the whisky seems to be scotch. It's a bit cheaper than in Canada, which strikes me as weird. A Johnnie Walker black label gift set seems like it should cost more than 30,000 won. The most amazing thing that we've seen in the alcohol department is the soju, which is a kind of Korean version of Sake. It's awful, for the record. However, there's something to be said for getting a value for you dollar. So without further ado, I present the price for a 3.6 LITRE (plastic) bottle of soju (30% alcohol by volume):

4,000 won.


yeah.
(for those of you who are currently looking puzzled and slightly anticlimactic, use the currency converter link in the link section. For those of you who have, but still look slightly confused/let down, go to the LCBO and check out the price for the cheapest vodka you can find.)

Speaking of the links, I've updated them. So there. Some useful, some not, feel free to check them out. Or not. Up to you, really. I mean, what am I going to do about it if you don't. How am I even going to know? I'm not. Don't worry. I'm not watching you or anything.

Stop scratching yourself.

I'm not watching, I promise.




It's evidently far too late for me to be doing this. I'm going to bed.

Man to Man, Joy Mart and other odd names for convenience stores...

Hi again.

Well in the last 18-24 hours this apartment has become infinitely more liveable.

We now have a fridge (read: freedom from oppresive ubiquitous Korean restaurants and their terrifying obsession with pickled cabbage), a microwave, air conditioning (read: freedom from having to take ice cold showers three times a day to keep relatively cool), a phone (ability to be connected to the outside world while still in our apartment -- imagine that) and the internet (read: freedom from reliance upon the *interesting* sensory strain/overload that seems to be Korean internet cafes).

So a lot has changed around here, and it's making us feel a million times better. Having the internet set up is a *huge* psychological boost. It's amazing what the knowledge that you're connected to everyone you're not going to see for quite some time can do for your general mood.

Also, for those who are interested, we've got a phone number and an address. The phone number's for our apartment, but the mailing adress is for the school, because our whole building (maybe 6-8 apartments) has only one mailbox, and it's small, and on the outside of the building with no front, let alone lock. So everything that gets sent to us will be safe and secure at the school that we work for. According to our predecessor, it's a beautiful system.

So, without further ado, our phone number (assuming that you're dialing from Canada, and including every button you have to push):

011-82-43-292-2959

(011 is the International Direct Dial prefix for Canada, 82 is Korea's country code and the rest is our area code and phone number).

Our address is:

Ryan and/or Rebecca Paulsen
Jongro M School
360-181, 1594 Yongamdong
Sangdang-gu, Cheongju,
Republic of Korea

So that's that. Oh yeah, and if anyone does want to call, you're absolutely more than welcome, but just to clarify, we're 13 hour ahead of Estern Standard Time. You do the math. We're generally on our way to work between2:30 and 3 in the afternoon, and the latest we get finished is around 10-ish.

So that's what's been goin' on 'round these parts. I've probably got more, but I'll leave that until I'm more awake, cause right now I can't really think of anything else.

Oh yeah, and as for the title of this post, does anyone else think that "Man to Man" is a weird name for a convenience store? I sure do.

peace out.

Our first staff night out and general oddities

Last night Ryan and I went out for our first staff social ever. It was difficult in that only three people understood English well enough that they could have any sort of conversation with us. Despite the language barrier we learned how to eat several dishes that resembled entrails and other substances that should never be eaten. That said, most of it was at least edible and none of the dishes contained any real entrails.

Korea is renowned for its drinking culture. Initially upon learning this Ryan and I were a little hesitant as it is socially inappropriate for you to refuse alcohol if you are male. All my fears have been laid to rest due to last night. Although there is a large drinking culture, Ryan is twice the size of all of the Koreans we have met so far. They were shocked that he could consume two beers and two shots of Soju (similar taste to vodka but only half the alcohol). It's very comforting to know that Ryan can drink our employers under the table without trying. This is important because in Korean culture you are not allowed to refuse an alcoholic drink from your boss or superior.

Other odd things that we have noticed in Korea so far - we recieved a catologue for a regular store in the area. It was all in Korean and sold clothes and furniture. There are several models in the catologue but there aren't any Korean models. They are all white. In fact, all of the ad models that we have seen have been white and emaciated - more so than in Canada. There is obviously this preoccupation with being extremely thin and with white being the most beautiful skin colour. Very odd.

oops ran out of time - more oddities later!

And we're now in charge of tiny people....weird.

Hi again.

First off, thanks to everyone for commenting. It's really awesome to see that people are actually reading our little rantings, and care enough to comment, etc. So thanks!

Anyway, moving on.

What haven't we said yet...oh yeah, TEACHING.

So the plan originally was that we would get a solid week of classroom observation before we started teaching. The Korean office of immigration saw to it that that was a non-option. Stupid visa delays.

What actually ended up happening is that we flew into Seoul (as you know) Saturday morning, and we were informed that the teacher Rebecca was replacing was teaching until Tuesday, so she would have 2 days of observation at the main branch of the school, and on Monday I would be going to the other branch (where I'll end up teaching on Tuesdays and Thursdays) to observe classes for one night, and then I'd start teaching on my own on Tuesday.

That plan also didn't happen. What *DID* happen was that we both showed up to the main branch on Monday to find out that Becca was still going to be observing for a couple days, but that there was nobody to cover the other classes, so I would be teaching right away. So I had exactly 45 minutes to look at the textbooks for a grade 3 class, two grade 5 classes and a grade 6 class and figure out what/how I was going to teach all of them.

No stress though, seriously.

*sigh*

anyway, the classes went well for the most part. Kids, it turns out, are kids wherever they are. Some are gold, some are....well......somewhat less desireable than gold. Let's leave it at that.

Since then it's already gotten a bit easier. I think I'm getting the hang of this. I have a couple classes that I actively look forward to, which is really nice, and totally makes up for the classes containing the second type of kid.

The apartment's slowly looking more and more like a home now. We spent a solid afternoon scrubbing it, and Becca had a couple hours off while I was still teaching at the second school, so she got a lot of unpacking done (cause she's awesome) so now it's a lot more liveable. We thought we were going to have to pay for an air conditioner, but we found out that the school is actually going to cover that (!) so hopefully that will get installed on Friday too. If all goes well, it'll be a *lot* more like home by early next week, what with the introduction of a phone, the internet, cable, and an air conditioner. So awesome.

The food still sucks. Will update as the situation progresses.

That last bit actually has one exception already. They have this meat here (I can't remember the name right now -- I'll let you know later) that's the same cut as bacon, and looks like bacon, only it's huge. Picture a strip of bacon three times as thick and about twice as long. The restaurant where we ate this wonderful(ly fatty) stuff was set up so that you sat on the floor at a table with a rotisserie/grill in the middle, and the owner comes by and puts two trays of red hot coals in the middle, then puts skewers of this meat on the rotisserie to cook. In the meantime, the lid for the rotisserie is a grill where you can heat up the side dishes, then when everything's done, you wrap it in a leaf of lettuce and chow down. It was actually surprisingly tasty.

As a parting note (cause there's a staff dinner in 20 minutes welcoming us to the school and saying goodbye to Michael, the Kiwi teacher that we're replacing), Korean internet cafes are interesting places. This one has about 50 computers, all with 19" flat screens and the computers are all awesome, with about 90% of them being used to play come form of online game. To my right, as I type this, is a Korean guy, probably about my age (maybe a little older), playing some sort of online multiplayer 1st person shooter game. To my left is a Korean woman who, to my surprise, is actually about 40, playing what looks like a Korean PC version of Mariokart. The air is thick with smoke and the horrible cacophonous symphony of bullets flying, spells being cast and ear-bleedingly terrible Korean techno music accompanying any number of inane arcade-style online games. Truly something to behold.

I have to go now.

More updates to come, keep the comments rolling!!

Apartment and the first day

I assumed that the first day would be the easy one due to excitment etc. To be honest - it was terrifying! The person who picked us up from the airport was wonderful and drove us to our apartment...... our extremely empty, surprisingly spacious yet sweltering apartment. We're looking into getting air-conditioning as we take several cold showers a day! The apartment itself is situated in a poorer area and although clean, it has no closet space or fridge yet. Moreover you cannot drink the water that comes into an appartment here as it has not been treated. In Korean apartments there are no sinks or showers in the bathroom. The entire bathroom is tiled and it is a giant showering area. The one thing that reminds me of home is the ugly wallpaper that could easily be found in any Canadian student housing.

The first day we decided to go for a walk and buy some of the things we had not brought that we would need such as food, towels, shampoo etc. Interestingly though, even determining what was a shop was difficult and finding the ones we required was impossible. There were store-like fronts with nothing inside with open doors, nauseating smells emerging from what we assumed were restaurants, and places that looked as though they sold food-like items but we could not read the packaging to determine what it was that we would be purchasing. We finally concluded our search by finding a corner store that sold coke! Best coke ever. Armed with that along with a bottle of water and another bottle of what we presumed was dishsoap we decided to call it a day and ended our frustrating shopping experience victoriously.....

Fortunately Michael, the individual who picked us up from the airport came by soon afterwards and began to show us around. It's amazing how simply understanding where grocery and department stores are located can make you feel more secure. Something about being able to attain basic necessities and not starve to death I suppose!

We still cannot work the phones but hope to rectify that today to call our parents.

Today is our first day of observation before we begin teaching so I suppose I should go and prepare.

well, here we are!

So we're officially residents of Korea.

We arrived at the Incheon airport, after a 13.5 hour flight, at 2:30am local time, Saturday, August 3rd. It's now 8:40pm, and we're both exhausted, so a more thorough update will follow once we're more rested and we've got the webernet set up at our apartment, which will hopefully have sheets delivered to it by the time we get back in a few minutes!

Bye for now.