Day 2

Due to extremely poor planning, and a lack of willpower to keep my eyes open, I went to bed at 7:30 pm last night, which of course meant that I woke up at 2:30 am on Sunday. This not being an ideal time to wake up, I attempted to go back to bed, but the bane of my existence – a bug – tormented me by buzzing in my ear so that I had no choice but to wake up properly. Thanks to the heroic efforts of Sasha and Sean, I am still connected to the internet, albeit barely. I can access text, and Google chat, but not much else – my dreams of watching the latest Supernatural episode are finished.

To my delight, my mother was online, as it would be only 1:30 pm her time, back in dear old Canada. I am missing Canada quite a lot, but I keep telling myself that I will get over it, because really this is just culture shock. The fact that everything is written in Korean, and people only speak Korean, doesn’t help much. I hope I get my foreigner registration card soon, because I’d like to have a cellphone and bank account. Also, the knowledge that I can go to the hospital without paying exorbitant fees is a comforting one, not that I plan on breaking my leg anytime soon.

With my shoddy internet connection, I whiled away the hours surfing the web and writing my various fanfictions and novels. I wish that I had brought my booklet of DVDs with me in the initial move, because I was hard pressed for something with which to occupy my time. Reading and writing are both fun, but sometimes it’s good to just turn on a movie or television show and while away the hours. Ah well – mother has promised me regular care packages, so hopefully my DVDs will arrive soon!

Around 7 am I decided to go back to sleep – I have my first day of classes tomorrow, so it’s probably a good plan to not wake up at 2 am again. My attempts were successful, and I re-awoke at 10 am to the sound of banging on a door. Not mine, as it turns out, but I got up feeling refreshed and ready for a new day! After twiddling around until noon, Sasha came a calling, and we were off to the airbase!

Today was Air Power day at the Oson American air base, which means that they opened up the base to non-military personnel, as well as brought out a dozen of their planes and helicopters for people to see up close. We took a taxi to AK mall, then hopped the subway three stops over to the town that the base is located in. One of Sasha’s students had told her about a back way into the base, so we grabbed another cab and went in the back way, which was still pretty busy, so probably wasn’t as top secret as we’d hoped.

The air base was very cool – they lined the runway with various types of planes and jets and assorted bombing machines. At the far end was a “missile battery”, and you could sit in a machine gun turret and make the rotating gun barrel thing fire. There were also aerial demonstrations – the planes went by so frequently overhead that we had to yell most of the time to be heard. Planes are loud. The earth literally shakes when a jet flies overhead, even if it’s so high up that you can barely see it.

There was also the food tents area, with everything from bratwurst to Korean short ribs. Apparently “Western” food is very difficult to come by in Korea, because Sasha was beside herself when she saw that they were selling bratwurst. Things that are difficult to find in Korea include hamburger and hotdog buns, celery, dill pickles, and sausages. I’m sure I’ll learn about more soon enough. Sean assured me that in about four months, I’ll be craving Western food as much as they do.

After the air base, we trekked back to “Main Gate”, which is the area around the main gate of the air base. This area is very westernized, because it is where the soldiers go when they’re off duty. There is English on every sign, international cuisine, bootleg DVD stalls, etc. We went into a bar that had a “juicy”, which is a woman employed by the bar who hangs out with a guy, in return for which he buys her expensive drinks. Juicies are not prostitutes, however – they are companions, although I suspect that the line can often get blurred.

At the bar I met Jenna, Jade, and Lynn. Jenna is the fourth and final foreign teacher at our school, and Jade and Lynn work at the Avalon school by the base. I’m a bit fuzzy on how Jade and Lynn know everyone – possibly they were trained with Sasha? – but all the foreigner teachers seem to know each other in some way or another. They complimented me on my sunburn, which I had not realized that I had, until I went to the bathroom. Incidentally, Koreans have a habit of keeping toilet paper outside the bathroom, so you have to guestimate how much you need, and bring it in with you. I will be carrying a wad of tissues around as emergency backup toilet paper from now on, as per Sasha’s suggestion.

We wandered around the Main Gate shopping district for a while, and then went into a Thai place for dinner. It was delicious, but much spicier than I’m used to. I got the lowest level of spice, and my mouth still burned. Then a little bit more shopping – bought all three High School Musicals, bootlegged, for 5000 won – which is like $5. I was assured that they’re good quality, although I haven’t yet had a chance to test them out.

Took the subway back home, and arrived back in the apartment around 9 pm. Sasha advised that I stay up until midnight, or else I’m going to be exhausted tomorrow. I’ll try to make 11 pm, but I doubt I’ll be able to do much later. I would have if my computer was working, but my background image disappeared when I turned the laptop on, and now I can’t connect to the internet.

After about half an hour the internet worked out, although I still can’t have a background image for some reason. Computers continue to baffle and elude me. Bah. I attempted to watch my bootlegged High School Musical DVD, which went well enough, but I fell asleep around 10 pm... so I didn’t quite make the 11 pm deadline!

First Meetings

South Korea. Land of the rising calm. It is certainly calm, at least at 5:00 AM in the morning. My plane ride was long and arduous, although not nearly as bad as I thought it might be. The plane took off from Pierson at 1:30 AM – a blessing in disguise, since I was properly exhausted by the time I got onto the plane. Falling asleep was not so easy, though – like all my airplane adventures, it was less a solid, 8 hour chunk of uninterrupted sleep, and more 5 hours of tossing and turning while the kindly gentlemen to either side of me made annoyed noises and huddled away from my constantly shifting limbs.

I have to say this about Korean Air, though. Despite the cramped seats and lack of leg room, they know how to travel in style. Moist towelettes were provided on two separate occasions, drinks served throughout the flight... and the entertainment! First of all, the waitresses themselves were absolutely fascinating to watch, because they all had their hair drawn back in completely identical, not a strand out of place, twist buns with oddly stiff ribbons. But better were the little television screens at each person’s seat – that way, I could watch anything I wanted, and even skip through the parts I found boring. My movies of choice included Toy Story 3, Karate Kid, Prince of Persia, and Iron Man 2. Unfortunately my complimentary headset arrived broken, but I cleverly brought along a spare set.

Blankets and pillows were provided, which eased travel significantly. Even slippers, although I didn’t wear them. It must be a Korean thing. I suspect that I will find out more as my year here progresses. The food on the plane was... different, even for airplane food. Perhaps that’s because it was not just airplane food, but Korean airplane food. Here’s the thing about Korean food – I assumed it would be like Japanese, or Chinese, because they’re so close geographically. But this may not be the case, from what I witnessed. A weird ravioli and beef concoction, which to be honest, did not taste very Korean. The breakfast, though, was fascinating – green-tea flavoured rice porridge with these thinly sliced orange things that may have been pickled at some point.

Having thus survived the plane flight, I disembarked and immediately ran into trouble in the form of not having filled out my school’s address on my arrivals card. No matter – one quick hold-up-everyone-else-in-line-while-I-rummage-through-my-bag-for-the-relevant-information later, and I was through! Baggage check was surprisingly easy – my bags came out almost instantly, although I looked so perplexed trying to handle two roller suitcases that a nice Korean woman suggested I get a cart. A cart! Bah! Carts are for the weak!

Luckily I found my driver immediately upon exiting the Customs area. I was a bit confused, because I had been under the impression that visiting ESL teachers to Korea were required to undergo some sort of medical check-up, which possibly involved peeing in a paper cup. So I got myself all worked up over it, only to discover that there was no such thing. Or maybe I just didn’t look very dangerous? Considering that I was wearing baggy sweatpants and my brother’s oversized sweater, I probably looked fairly harmless.

My driver was sweet – told me I was pretty, helped me carry my bags to his minivan parked nearby. As a slow walker, especially an exhausted one, I was hard-pressed to keep up with my rapidly-paced driver, but I managed well enough. The ride to Pyeongtaek city from Incheon (the airport/city) is about an hour and a half, although my driver claimed that it was two hours. At five in the morning, Korea is very serene – and continued to be, although my trip did not end up being very calming.

The driving part was wonderful – smooth roads, lovely curves and brightly lit roadways. Then we got to Pyeongtaek, and my driver had no idea where the school was. We ended up sitting at a curb for ten minutes while he talked on the phone in Korean, and then we found the school, except no one was there to meet me. Apparently “CK”, the head teacher, thought that I was arriving at 5 pm, not 5 am, which does explain the absence of a teacher, but wasn’t terribly inspiring.

Together with two other Korean teachers, CK got me to my apartment, although he was confused by which floor I was on. He had to wake up Sean, my neighbour and another teacher at the school, who showed them where I was going to be living. Apparently the guy who lived in the apartment before me – Sasha, same name as Sean’s girlfriend, another teacher – was a “psycho”, which kind of shows. There’s a pink light installed over the kitchen, apparently to mimic the “pink light” district of Pyeongtaek, which is equivalent to the red light district of Amsterdam. Not to mention the poster of scantily clad women gracing the wall.

My apartment is small – smaller than I had expected, although to be honest I’m not sure what I was expecting. It’s a single room, with a balcony-ish type area that leads over to the bathroom. I will have to keep my room clean if I want to have guests over. Which is great for me, because I love cleaning ever so much. There is a TV, but Sean and Sasha aren’t sure whether or not it works, so I’ll have to wait and see. The internet didn’t work for the longest while, but now I’m hijacking Sasha’s internet, which I will continue to do until someone sorts out my internet.

After a short nap – too short – I got up and took a shower... and then went promptly back to sleep. I also did some unpacking, so now I’m about halfway through my second bag. Sean woke me around 2 pm, and we went out for lunch at a Korean BBQ place, which was very nice. It’s cool, because there’s an actual grill in the middle of the table – outlawed in North America, because they’re worried that customers might burn themselves. Which is the same thinking that goes for those open crepe grills in France, I expect.

Sean and Sasha dished on the school, how the kids are, what lessons are like, how different Korea is from home, etc. Sean has been here for almost two years, and Sasha is – I believe – 6 months into her contract, so they’ve been around. They started dating a few months ago, and are a very cute couple – Sean calls her “babe”, and they bicker unceasingly. Reminds me of a certain couple that I know back home.

We then went to the supermarket to stock up on supplies. Actually, we were nominally there to buy food, but I only got a few foodstuffs – the majority of time was spent getting cleaning supplies, toilet paper, etc. And a bath mat! It is green and says “Full House”, which puzzles me to no end, although it does have a picture of a house on it, so I suppose it makes some sense.

Then back to the apartment to put things away! Sean and I bonded over books, while Sasha attempted to hook me up to the internet. She ended up connecting me to her wireless, but the landline in my room does not work, so I’ll have to hijack her internet until someone can set mine up for me. I asked about a bank account, phone, health plan, etc., and I can’t get any of that until I have my Resident Alien Card, which will take about a month to process.

After all this, they departed for their own room, leaving me to my own devices. I am currently lying on my bed, which I have covered with sheets of questionable cleanliness. Tomorrow I may have to invest some time into cleaning, as the apartment is in a sorry state – the last tenant, as I stated, was “psycho”, so things aren’t quite up to snuff. But Sasha and Sean assure me that I’ll get used to things soon enough. I think that this will be expedited if I learn Korean, so I’ll have to get on that! Seoul is only 45 minutes away by train, so I’ll definitely be going there every couple of weekends.