Alternate Reality

Dear South Korea,

Thank you for making my trip here two weeks ago a simple thing. Really, maybe it was too easy to get into the country? Anyway, I look forward to our adventures together this next year.

SO, here I am sitting in my one room apartment, watching Eagle Eye on TV (apparently Saturdays are English movie day in Korea :) ), and about to attempt to explain how I feel about my first two weeks in Korea.

Well, the best way I can describe what I think could be called "culture shock" is that I feel like I'm watching my life from above. It's weird and it's been extremely overwhelming not knowing the language, not knowing how to read the signs. Initially I struggled because I didn't know how to do the basic things like turn on the light, make a phone call, flush a toilet, turn on my microwave or actually know what I was buying at the grocery store. But as I said that's all improving.

So, let me give you a quick run down on what I have been up to. First, dad and I got here on Monday morning at 5 a.m. and we checked into a hotel and slept all day and tried to sleep all night. The next day we got on a bus and drove about 3 1/2 hours south to Gunsan. This day was packed full of getting all the luggage into the apartment, meeting the teachers at the school, meeting some students, job shadowing, going over the manuel, yatta yatta yatta..but this day was a struggle because of the jet lag and question in my head, "WHAT IN THE WORLD ARE YOU DOING HERE?" Anyway, progressively, the days got better, I spent the first week job shadowing, talking to the manager of the school, unpacking, and sleeping as much as possible.
On Saturday, I met up with a girl my dad met at a church service here in Gunsan and myself, her, her roomate and her roomie's b/f had pancakes and then went to Wolmpyong Park about 3 blocks from my apt. I'm sure I'll go again and take some pics.

That Saturday morning my dad left and so began my first time living alone. The first night was a little hard, but when I'm laying down, I just think of how it's really no different than sleeping in the dorm at school..I am surrounded by other apartments. The only difference is that no one speaks English around me, but I'm confident that if a crisis were to happen I could communicate with my neighbors through hand gestures and pointing, I am 1/4 Italian after all ;)

Sunday I went to church at Haven Baptist, a church that is located right outside the US airforce base in Gunsan. It was nice and they were all so welcoming. And so began my first real week here as an English teacher. Monday was a good first day. My first class is at 10 a.m. I have 3 adult students who are probably in their 40's or 50's. They are a wonderful class and are passionate about learning English. Then I have a 5 hour break where I this week I either ran errands or just came back to the apt. Then at 4 I have a class of 7 wild elementary aged kids (they will really test my patience), at 4:30 I have another (but less wild) group of 4 elementary aged kids, at 5 a group of 4 teens, half hour break at 5:30, class of 2 30 year olds from 6 to 7, and then finish it off with a class of 4 15ish year olds from 7 to 8. Not too bad of hours. I am sure I will go into more detail about these classes in the future posts.

I feel like I could go on and on about the differences I see in culture, the interesting things I've noticed about the people, etc, but I'm going to try to keep this short and will hopefully cover some of those things later on. So, I just want to update you on the interesting food I've eaten and I want to tell you about Tuesday last week...interesting day.

ok..FOOD..well, ironically, the very first meal I ate in Korea was Italian. My dad and I had slept all day at the hotel and I was feeling overwhelmed and I just wanted something familiar. So, I had this DELICIOUS chicken carbonara. As for Korean food, we had this seafood pancake looking thing, something called samgyeopsal which we cooked the meat in front of us and then made sort of an lettuce wrap with your choice of sides, other good dishes I've consumed are things called jjamppong, ja jyang myeon, and other things I simply cannot pronounce. I will keep you updated though. The food is good. I'm not a fan of Kimchi, but apparently that's ok because there is some sort of Kimchi crisis going on here in Korea.

Tuesday was such an interesting day. First of all, on my walk to work, a solid 35 minute walk, I stepped in a heaping pile of gum which got in my sandel and on the bottom of my foot. So, the day started a little rough, but I decided to live on the wild side and walk on the other sidewalk..it was there that I discovered two things that I am sure will brighten my day everyday--puppy world and a hair salon with a cute little dog with pink highlighted ears outside it's doors. So, after seeing the puppies and petting the dog I've named Jacksie jr, I forgot about the mess the gum had caused. After class, my adult class invited me to go to lunch with them and their former teacher, so I did. We apparently went to a very famous Chinese place (Korean style) that served the best jjamppong around, however it's kind of spicy, and after just teaching my adult students different ways to say I like or dislike something, they knew I did not really like spicy food so they ordered me ja jyeon myeong..a Chinese noodle dish with a black bean sauce, which I think was one of my favorite foods so far. After that, they took us on a little drive to the Gunsan countryside where rice fields are plentiful and Cosmos flowers are all along the road. After making a stop to say hi to Mr. Che's son who runs a rice tractor business, we ended up pulling off on the side of the road to take some pictures. The road was a bit busy, but these students were set on taking pictures with their former teacher and the beautiful autumn flowers. Anyhow, we ended our adventure at a coffee shop at Eunpa Park. I had some Green tea ice cream which was just scrumptious.

So, what I thought was only lunch turned into quite an afternoon adventure. To end this eventful day, I was in the middle of teaching my 7 oclock class when all the lights in the building went off..my initial thought was, "North Korea! I knew this was going to happen," after a minute though, the lights were back on and I was relieved that maybe I overreacted ;)

Now, I know you probably did not make it to the end of this post, but in case you did, thanks for reading and I am going to try to post once a week or at times when I just feel like it is blog worthy. I hope everything back in the states is going well and hopefully next time I blog I will feel less like I am experiencing an alternate reality. Pictures of the apt to follow...