Jinju

Jinju has been a welcoming city in my experience here.  An attractive small city divided by the Nam River, it plays host to the Lantern Festival and my excuse to visit.

The Jinju Namgang Yudeun runs for two weeks, and has lots of activities to do for a festival that one would assume is centralized around just watching the lanterns float down the river.  There are tons of festival games, some rides, a market area, arts and crafts, traditional performances, contemporary performances, delicious food, riverside cafes. And of course the lanterns.

The lanterns are not merely the small floating paper lanterns as depicted in so many movies, though.  The lanterns in Jinju are elaborately constructed statues depicting scenes from folklore and popular media that are larger than life and light up the night.

And eldritch horrors from the deep

 I wound up at the festival two weekends in a row, and both were fantastic, if different, experiences.

The first weekend I was regrettably traveling solo.  I got to the festival in the daytime, and proceeded to go around taking photos of the statues, and really just trying to experience what a Korean festival was like.  I was having a good time somehow, and then managed in short measure to run into somebody I knew in a city I didn't.  Apparently someone from my training group was stationed out there, and I managed to not be so alone after all! I have the best luck.

So we wound up in a small group running around the festival,  playing with all the statues, trying all the foods, and we wound up inside the castle. Jinju has a castle (called a castle, more of a fortress. Called a fortress, more of a bunch of ruins) and it gets included in the festivities as well.  The lanterns extended all throughout the castle, and there were stages in the midst of it.   We happened upon a traditional dance performance that was real interesting, with a bearded historical figure and a....tiger with a rifle. We dubbed him Gun Tiger. It seemed fitting.  We were actually pulled into the dance at one point and it was a whole lot of fun.

 After a bit more cavorting into the evening, my friends decided to turn in, but seeing as how my plan for Korea is not to waste money on hotel rooms, I ended up staying out all night and trying to entertain myself.  There was a K-Drama section to the festival which was temporarily entertaining, and I was drinking and checking out the festival games, when I was approached by two foreign girls.  They cornered me and demanded to know the location of the best drinking sites in the city.  Because I tend to just osmose this information, I got us there and we quickly found a neat little bar with other friendly foreigners to waste the night away with.

Once we were kicked out of the bar (for closing reasons, not being rowdy) we decided we should stay out for the rest of the night.  A such, we grabbed some soju and....ran back to the festival, of course.   Ended up spending a night drinking with a t-rex lantern and then taking the first bus back in the morning.  All in all, a good time with friendly strangers. Traditional Korean experience so far.

The second festival day that I was around I actually went meeting up with friends, so a pretty good time from the get go. Before meeting up with them I ran into a survey taker, who claimed that every foreigner he spoke to was a teacher and I explained to him that we're all either teachers or military with a handful of engineers. Cause, well, it's true!

Meeting up with my friends was basically a repeat of the previous time.  A bit more time at the k-drama festival,   and these friends stayed out a lot later, but I still was avoiding a hotel room.  After ditching my friends in their hotel, I was wandering in the direction of the watering holes when I was beckoned over to a table by a Korean man with a plate of crab and a bottle of soju.  It's like he was speaking my language!

I sat down with the man and found out he absolutely did not speak my language.  Fortunately, two of his friends quickly showed up and we all got to drinking and half-communicating.  Turns out they were all bus drivers in the city, and one of them was a former nationals boxer.  Definitely some interesting drinking companions.  After a good chunk of the night passed, we parted ways and exchanged number in case any of use were ever around again.

I was tired at this point, and went to go sleep in the woods.  Because apparently I'm a hobo.  I found a nice bench and nestled in, and took an hour or so nap.  The night got too cold and I headed to a mart for some food to heat up.  I was eating some ramen outside when another traveler motioned me over for some conversation.   He was from Mongolia, and a few other Mongolians showed up.  We shared a bunch of drinks, some Budweisers and sojus, and I wound up staggering off in a movie-like stupor after the sun came up.  Found a nice cozy patch of concrete in the entrance nook of a public transit building and was woken up by a nice young usher who was opening the building in the morning after a rather comfortable nap.  I had accomplished a night of blackout korea, and luckily I don't own anything worth stealing so I made it out just fine.

Just this past Monday I wound up in Jinju again.  Funny story, everything in Jinju is closed on a Monday.  Regardless, myself and a fellow traveler I know wandered about through the castle area and a chunk of the city nearby and had a rather nice time.  The castle is a completely different experience in the daytime without the lanterns, so it was definitely worth heading back for the day trip.  We actually went and saw the monuments and shrines within and I'd recommend anyone make a stop there while in Korea.  The river is beautiful without the festival clogging the landscape, and the fortress itself is well maintained as well.

The city has other things to offer, such as a large theater, some fossils, a prehistory museum, and food worth trying, so definitely a good place to spend some time.

 

Amongst the less seen sights, we did happen to see a rather...passionate woman loving nature, though.  And by that I mean we were strolling through the castle when a woman walked toward a tree, greeted it, and began to hold it close while kissing it ever so tenderly.

Korea, am I right?

   

Fond of Korea, Take One

It's ridiculous to think that it's been three months already.  I think I understand how people end up staying her for so long. By the time you reach the age where you're out of college and into the real world, a year is absolutely no time. That's sort of frightening.

I intended to do this post a week ago, but you don't own me. To compensate I've downloaded the blogger android app, and luckily my phone has a keyboard so luckily my thumbs will only become a little mutilated from updating under these cramped circumstances. It's fine, they needed the workout.

I thought I'd make a quick update cataloguing some favorite moments of mine that I haven't mentioned yet. So in no particular order, here goes :

-The Running of the Ajashi
Ajashi are the old men in Korea. In a recent trip to Busan, I was walking in the underground path next to the subway when a group of something like 60 old people (mostly ajashi, a few ajuma ladies) burst out of the subway in a continuous wave just running and laughing and surrounding me in their migratory patterns before running off down the path. Was really strange for the dual reasons of it being a herd of old people, and also that they were laughing. Everyone always seems angry in public here, so it was really nice.

Porno trading cards-
Just every discussion relating to the prostitute cards and turning them into a CCG.  Everyone's all for it but we're all too lazy. Comes up a LOT though

Halloween-
I went to four parties dressed up as a Buffalo Soldier (camo jacket, airsoft rifle, buffalo hat).  The look on peoples' faces when they got the joke was worth how overheated it made me.

Mexican Birthdays-
Wound up at a friend's party who invited a bunch of her students. Was awkward at first, but it ended up being a rather enjoyable experience, like a family party, except not my family because I don't see them ever. Also there was a puppy there and everybody loved it.

The Simpsons-
My kids spazzed on me one day when I tried to convince them that the Simpsons are people. They argued that they couldn't be people because they're yellow, and I thanked my ability to not say dated racist things at my children. Don't give me that look there has never been a more perfect setup!

Fancy dog-
I was at a clothing store that had the greatest dog ever. It was fuzzy and happy with the softest fur. Me and everyone I was with wouldn't stop playing with him.  The owner guy came up to us and in English said 'You like? It's the expensive model.'  Was laughing so damn hard. Random English witticisms from a Korean street clothing venor? Yes please.

Drinking with a t-rex-
The temporary friends I made in Jinju and I going to the lantern festival at 4am to drink soju on a bench next to a giant glowing t-rex sculpture. Livin the dream.

The One Who Watches -
Wandering lost through Seoul after our taxi mishap, we ran into the most unsettling statue in a children's park that in our unsteady state (see: lost and drunk) we were convinced would follow us.

A week later in Jinju we came across a quite similar looking statue with the same unpeering gaze of dread.

Mr Park's -
There's this guy who runs a bar/cafe out of a shipping container in a parking lot near the main shopping center here. He is a delight, always smiling, and makes excellent drinks. Every visit here is great.

Let it go -
Me: correct! How did you know the answer?
Student: Women's intuition
Me:...fair enough

Nice try-
Student: Teacher I hate you because you are ugly!
Me: Well so are you.
Student: (laughing) Teacher I hate you because you are handsome!
Me: No it doesn't work that way

Guest speaker-
-discussing Jeju-
Me: Do you have to fly there? Can you drive there?
Friend: no it's way out there. Can you drive to Hawaii?
Me: yeah you can.
Friend: Bullshit!
Me: No, you can! Drive onto a ferry, the ferry goes to Hawaii, drive to Hawaii!
Friend: That doesn't count!
Cab Driver: You can't drive to Hawaii
Me: Dammit! (All laughing)

Dumb and proud-
Me: (student) what is the answer?
Student: (climbs onto desk and scream sings) I DON'T KNOW, TEACHER!
(I got asked about the kid cheering 'I don't know' later by the next class' teacher. Whoops)

The Best Chris-
-at bar for the third time-
Owner: you're the third Chris I've met. You are the most kind and gentle one. The best Chris.
Me: Well, thank you!

-a month later, after escorting a drunk friend out of the bar-
Owner: still the best Chris!
Me: yessssss
(And I get free drinks all the time here now too yes!)

A harsh truth-
Student: Teacher I want get rid of buffalo picture
Me: Why? I like the buffalo picture.
Student: It is ugly. You are ugly too.
Me: Well that's not very nice.
Student: No, but it is true.

A friendly dad-
-walking through Jinju castle-
-there is a man waving to me-
-I wave back-
Man: Hello
Me: Hello?
Man: -shaking my hand- Have a good time.
Me: Uhh...thanks?
-man smiles and pats his son on the head while walking away-

First rule-
-new students examining posters in room-
-student sees the 'no knife classroom' poster and covers the 'no'
Student: Teacher, now it's 'Knife Classroom!'
Me: oh heck yes, I will teach that class.

Waygook wayfail-
-at KFC-
Me: (struggling to read hangul) Su ma to cho ee su she tuh chuseyo?
Cashier: (in plain English) One smart choice set? For here or to go?
Me: oh uh....here please.
And then I noticed the menu right next to the one I had been reading in plain English text.

That's just a handful of stuff I remember at 3am. More to come!

Published with Blogger-droid v2.0.9

Chuseok Weekend

So, one of the advantages to my birthday (aside from sharing it with Confucius) is that staying in Korea means I get a nice vacation within a few days of it.  This year, Chuseok fell the weekend after my birthday, which meant I got a nice sexy long weekend to travel around a bit.

Chuseok is the one weekend of the year that pretty much everyone gets off, as opposed to the quite actually zero time off you get the rest of the year, or the occasional assigned vacation time you don't get to really plan for at your hagwon.  The one week that we all, altogether, get time off.

So of course I wasted it by going up to Seoul.

The bus ride up was long and boring and I was seated next to an old man who kept falling asleep on me.  To add to this, the friend I was staying with lived in Incheon, so I need to take an additional two hour subway ride to get to the Incheon area of Seoul, which is quite confusing itself.  Partially because I'm colorblind (the route maps are color coded of course!) and partially because there is a difference between Line 1 to Incheon and Incheon Line 1.  Of course I flubbed all over that, and wound up on the wrong part of Seoul, which caused me to be even later to my destination.  Luckily it was still early enough in the evening to go out, so after dropping off my luggage, we headed to Gangnam.

We wound up going to a hip hop nightclub that I'm still not entirely sure wasn't a gay club.  There were a whole bunch of guys grooving on each other, and some random Korean guy tried to get me to go up to the bathroom with him.  It was a pretty cool place despite the ridiculous cover charge, and there was a huge jampacked dance floor that served as evidence that Koreans don't know how to dance. Or at the very least, that every single one of them dances like a white person. Kind of grooving in place, nodding their head, shuffling slightly.  It's in direct contrast to the enormous popularity of dance teams in the country.  It's almost as if the teams need to channel energy from the rest of the population, leaving them void of the ability to pick up a beat. It turns them all into shuffling, arhythmic zombies, longing to belong to a world of music and festivities that they don't understand.

The club was densely packed, loud, and overpriced, and two stories as well.  Because too many places that are two stories end up separating the floors, this place counteracted that by having the staircases incorporated into the dance floor. In a club. With people drinking everywhere on the floor.  So needless to say, the tiled floor, which crawled up and around the staircases, were covered in spilled spirits, with bottles and broken glass littering the ground in all directions.  Each step would force you to slide across the floor, yet somehow we were drunkenly hopping around the whole place and from what I could tell not a single person died. It was truly a Chuseok miracle.

We did some mart drinking with some friendly strangers right outside the club until the subways started up again. I had to explain to one of them that there are no strip clubs, and no opening one up wouldn't be lucrative. There are girl bars. There are anma massage parlours. There are norejujangs. They don't need strip clubs because there are hookers everywhere, and a club with women you can't pay to sleep with would, unfortunately, crash and burn in the country.

When the subways reopened, I got to try dak galbi for the first time, which is essentially delicious stir fry in a spicy sauce. It's delicious and I want it forever.  We got the galbi in an area of Incheon that had just recently been built...or was in the process of being built.....or was in the process of being demolished.  As with most Korean construction, it's difficult to tell.  Point being, the place was a hazard, lawless wasteland. With delicious food.

I showered and took an our nap, and headed back out into the world to meet up with some of my friends from the states who were also in Seoul for the weekend. One of my friends had a visiting brother, so ideally that was going to lend itself to some touristy sightseeing, which is something I almost never do.  And it did!

We went to the Gyeongbak Palace which was definitely a good choice.  There were performances and festivities going on, and the whole palace was open to the public for the holiday.  We spent a good chunk of time there watching the dances and exploring the castle grounds.  At one point we were treated to a scene where we rounded the corner and some child had his pants down weeing in the castle grounds with his father's assistance, from which we quickly retreated.

We wound up in Itaewon for dinner, at a fantastic British pub with delicious burgers that I don't quite remember the name of, but it was definitely worth the price of admission.  Afterwards we needed to get ourselves to Incheon, which was becoming a problem with the swiftly approaching close of the subway lines, worsened by my friends getting cornered by another traveler when we stopped by their hostel.  So, we manage to get the last train out, with the intention of hopefully making it in time to connect to the Incheon Line 1, or at least from there it'd be affordable to get a taxi.

Neither of these things happened.

We were on the correct train when we got on.  I checked multiples of multiples of times.  You want to be certian when it's the last train.  There was an announcement at one point, which, due to the fact that none of use knew Korean (a fatal error) we assumed was simply the 'last train' announcement.

We were wrong.

The announcement was telling us that we would be traveling on the alternate route for the final train. Which took us... in the opposite direction that we needed to go from our destination.  The second we realized this, we hopped off and tried to flag down a taxi, which we did, and gave him directions to take us to the arts centre.  Or we tried to, anyways. The first cab we called over simply shook his head and drove off the second we said where we wanted to go.  After a bit of hiking, we managed to get a second cab, and climbed inside before telling him our destination so that he couldn't back out.  The cabbie spoke absolutely no English (which seems weird for being in Seoul)...which isn't a problem when you just want to go to a neighborhood or you know the name of your destination.  But we only knew the name of it in English.  There is the Arts Centre stop, and then also the Arts Gallery stop.  Our cab driver took us to the Arts Gallery stop, which unfortunately got us even further away from our destination than we were when getting onto the subway.  Also, it cost us 40,000 wan( ~$35SUSD)  After calling a friend to figure out where we were, and him laughing at us, we realized that we were, as it were, royally fucked.

Not wanting to pay for the cab all the way back, we decided to try trekking back toward Bupyeong station and take a cab from there to save some money.  We stopped a local and asked him how far away our destination was (after he kept trying to tell us the buses and subways were 'broken' because he didn't know 'closed', despite two buses driving by as we spoke to him) and he told us it was a three hour walk.

So, laughing, we headed off in our direction.

After we got over the initial irritation of the night, the walk wasa actually pretty fun.  We saw a whooooole lot of Seoul that I'm sure most foreigners never do.  We were quite actually at the edge of the city from the start of the walk, which is saying a lot being in a city that takes three hours to cross.

We wandered throught a few different districts; business districts, red light districts (where an angry Korean drunk got waaaay up in my face), terrifying children's playgrounds, rice fields.  Eventually we did make it to Bupyeong station, after a long trek of drinking at marts and wandering around a bit to do some sightseeing.  Bupyeong area turned out to be a pretty good destination for the night, as well.  It was the first place I've been in Korea that had, quite actually, no foreigners in it.  It was quite strange to see. The country is just filthy with westerners, Seoul especially, and not seeing a single other whiteface was a neat experience.   The district itself was alive well into the night, and we got some food and drinks in the area amongst friendly strangers. It's a pretty lively area, standard shopping district full of clothing stores and restaurants, but it's well put together.  We got some dak galbi again at my insistence, and then parted ways as the subway opened up.

The next day, my friend and I went to the International Business District.  From what we had heard, the International Business District was an area in Incheon that was lavishly built up with the intention of opening it to foreign businesses who needed a place to host conventions, or house their employees for long term projects.  Unfortunately, it had, allegedly failed miserably, and is currently in its renovation stages for its grand reopening in 2014.  As such, it's supposed to be entirely abandoned, almost a post apocalyptic city area.

Considering we went during Chuseok, apparently everybody wanted to see it, because the place was packed.  Not to say it wasn't impressive.  There is gorgeous architecture there, a beautiful modern canal, statues and sculpture everywhere, and well maintained gardens in every direction.  The place is pristine and awesome.  It was definitely worth the trip out to the area, and I'd highly recommend anyone in Seoul to venture out that way.

We stopped in a few buildings that were mostly empty. Not a whole lot of people live out there yet, so there aren't a lot of  businesses around.  As such, we did get to experience the abandoned city aspect of it.  Pretty much just walking 15 minutes in any direction will take you to an area that nobody is really going to, and in our case it was completed with a bunch of destroyed statues that were present in the otherwise empty parks.

After this adventure, I decided to head back to Geoje.  I had to travel by way of Busan, so I needed to get back early enough to purchase a ticket (this has become a reoccuring problem in my stay thus far).

I did not make it.

I took the KTX, which everybody compares to the shinkansen in Japan.  They shouldn't.  The KTX is garbage.  It's filthy and cramped, with stale air, and you really don't end up saving that much time on the trip for the extra money you're paying to use it.

The KTX dropped me off at Busan station, which was out of tickets, as it normally is, which is why we generally use Seobu/Sasang station (also because it's nicer).  Seobu was also out of tickets.  So I went to the night bus window. Which was also sold out.  There was a cab driver offering to ferry myself and three other passengers to Geoje for 30,000 a piece, but it's the same price to get a hotel room, so I did neither of those things.  Instead I found myself on the last train to the Pukyong University area to spend some time amongst the Busan nightlife crowd.

I wandered about, barhopping, marthopping, and talking to random strangers.  I won a bottle opener ring from a street game, and talked with some locals and generally had a good night of it, until I was exhausted from all of the not-sleep I got over the holiday so far.  Considering I was sticking to my not-spending-money-on-hotels policy, I had to find somewhere to sleep for cheap.

Because I've done my tutelage under the craftiest of vagrants, I found a 7th floor yoga studio that kept the mats outside its door.  I settled in and set the alarm for 7am on my phone, and took me a quick nap before the buses started up again.

After some good, quick rest, I ate some McDonald's breakfast, and headed home to sleep in an actual bed and get some actual sleep.

All in all, it was a pretty good Chuseok.

Oppan Gangnam Style

So, I guess I've avoided it for long enough.

There's this song called Gangnam Style. Maybe you've heard of it by now.

As of my writing this, the video has almost 665 million views worldwide since its release three-ish months ago, and I probably even got that number wrong. I'm sure it's at least three times that amount.  And from what I understand it's not slowing and may even be continuing to pick up momentum.

I'm sure everybody else can attest to its presence in the USA.  As I've been in Korea since roughly the beginning of its popularity, I'm not capable of doing so.  I remember seeing gifs of it on Tumblr as it started its onset to being the unholy result of Psy selling his soul to the Macarena, but it wasn't playing in bars, or football games, or encouraging drunks to horsey dance madly into oncoming traffic like I'm hearing secondhandedly is happening now.

Here in Korea, I can assure you that it's even worse. I've checked times. You can't go more than 12 hours without hearing the song, and that's provided you get eight hours of sleep in your own house.  It plays at least twice anytime I'm out at a bar, my students want me to play it in class, people have it as their ringtones, companies that Psy has done advertisements for blast the song or their own variant of the song constantly during their opening hours.

I've seen dollar stores that have replaced their entire signage with the cartoon image of Psy. You can purchase Psy's image on socks and tshirts on the street. Norebangs have his image plastered on them. If you talk to a Korean person for the first time, especially if you meet them in a bar, and double especially if they don't actually speak English, they are going to ask you if you know Gangnam Style, and then you will somehow end up doing the Gangnam dance with them and in all probability the music will start playing.  If you talk to anybody about Gangnam style, at some point you will hear the music, as if it is being summoned.  The song has become an abyssal fiend capable of infiltrating any part of existence where it is mentioned.

It is, quite actually, inescapable.

Take a second and let's think about why.

I want you to reflect for a second.  Think about everything you know about Korea.  Historical, customs, stereotypes, racism, all of it.

Alright. Get rid of the word 'kimchi'. Now take out the stuff that is the Korean War.  Take away North Korea. No Samsung or LG. Take out everything that is an overlap with your Chinese/Japanese/your collective Asian stereotypes (you monster).

Do you actually have anything left?  If you do, congratulations, most people I've attempted this exercise on go 'woah, I see your point, I know NOTHING about South Korea.'

I'm not going to lie, I was the same way before I came here.  What did I know about the country?  I knew the 'Gee Gee Baby' song from Girls' Generation.  I knew what Hanboks were from Koreans I spoke to when I was in Japan, and I knew a bit about the food because we had a Korean restaurant on my university campus.

But this is S.Korea's big foray into the world market.  Everybody here loves their country, but they're fully aware that it doesn't really exist in the world's collective consciousness. People go to Japan for vacation, Laos, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Phillippines, Singapore...somehow a lot of people overlook South Korea.  Maybe it's the threat of North Korea? Maybe they just generally don't think about it.  I'll admit in my shame that I never really paid attention to the South of Korea myself before I wound up here.

And that's a shame, because now the country is reduced to forming its media identity around an earworm song that gained international fame, that the original artist doesn't even like that much.

Don't be nervous. Close your eyes.

One of the events I for some reason neglected to mention for some reason (probably trauma related) was my doctor's visit shortly after arrival.  Luckily, it's now happened twice, thanks to my branch not registering me as an employee until after my results expired.  Which is fantastic, because I love the doctor. [/sarcasm]

The locations were quite different, but the experiences were the same.  The first visit was in Seoul, and, being the country's capital, the entire building down to the aglets on the nurses was pristine, glistening, and impressive.  It was the type of hospital medical practitioners could be proud of, and it shone with cleanliness.

The one in Geoje looked like the psych ward from a horror movie.

Oh yes. I feel healthier just being here.

Both hospitals shared the same procedures, though.  Differently between them, the Seoul hospital had us don sterilized ninja gis, and the Geoje branch took my measurements while I was wearing a loose dress shirt, so I'm sure they're a bit innacurate. The primarily similar method that you are exposed to is that you are sent to stations with one or two nurses (wo)manning each, and you're shuffled back and forth across them all depending on which station is available, and you will be confused for other foreigners because we all look the same.

The other shared factor is that you're kidding yourself if you think they have English staff.  They know enough English to do their jobs, but not to address your concerns.  At the first visit, I had to get an electrokardiogram. I've never had an EKG, so I just wanted to know what to expect.  The nurse told me to close my eyes, and not to be nervous, so I did as I was asked.  But while lying down with my eyes closed, I tried asking if I would feel a stinging, or an electric pulse, or anything. Her response was 'close your eyes, don't be nervous.' I tried insisting 'no, no I'm not nervous, I just want to kno-' which was interrupted with 'don't be nervous'.  At this point I was starting to get nervous, considering the nurse wouldn't answer my questions, and was holding me down on the table while she smeared jelly all over my exposed chest and told me 'not to be nervous' and 'close your eyes' over and over again.  Eventually we made it through foreplay and the EKG, but she never did address my concerns.

The Seoul hospital had a dental section which used a small camera and monitor (and the only Korean on staff who could speak fluent English) to show you how disgusting your teeth were.  I left feeling as though my mouth were trying to kill me from the inside out, despite getting a decent bill of health.

This site also had the 'head doctors' on staff, whose job it was to pull you in, ask you questions that you had previously answered on your forms, and sign off on you giving what sounded like similar answers.  Keep in mind that the only English speaking staff were in the dental ward, and understand that the two interviews we were forced through were probably the most unpleasant of the experiences in the process.

The urine test was also trying at both branches.  To admit a personal fact to the internet, I have a shy bladder  in the first place, and although it tends to go away with the introduction of alcohol in my system, the hospital didn't seem to approve of this method. Something about 'skewing the results'.  It was a non-issue in the Seoul test, although it took some careful hand eye coordination to be able to fill the test tube they gave us for the task.  At the Geoje hospital, however, I hadn't really drank any fluids for the day, and having a room full of people cheer you in does no help in this particular task.

The Geoje hospital more than made up for it with the best blood draw I've ever gotten. I quite actually felt nothing as the nurse pierced my skin with the needle, and I feel I'd have a much better relationship with them if this replaced my earliest memory of getting a shot where I had three nurses holding me down while I screamed.

In the end, I received an A+ to my health (as far as I know) both times and happily survived both incidents.  Which is good to know, because medical expenses are far cheaper in Korea than they are in the states, so any optional dentistry, optometry, or more complicated procedures are easily done an a quarter or less of the budget, so once the money starts flowing in more steadily, I foresee corrective health operation rooms as my second home.

Gonna come back home healthy as two horses stapled together.

HEY LOOK PICTURES

BAM THERE YA GO

http://s1296.photobucket.com/albums/ag3/KoreanRoshi/

Buncha pics from Korea.  Unorganized and without annotation.

I'll get to that later, but it's 4:30 in the morning here.

Edit 10/24:  Much, much later, the gallery buttons are updated! One button for the Japanese Gallery, one button for the Korean gallery!

Also adjusted some layout stuff and got rid of dead links as far as I know, lemme know if I missed something!

Further Observations

Geoje City

Geoje as a city is nice.  The main part near where I live is called 'Gohyeon'.  The bars are good, the food is decent.  They keep the place relatively clean (depending on the time of day) and it's pretty accessible to foreigners.  We have the Sea Spa which is a really nice jimjilbang, a movie theater, a few arcades, and a whole lot of clothing stores and barbecue places.  Can't complain.

Okpo

Okpo is... a neighborhood? Another city? I don't really know how Korea works, and less how the island works. But it's on the island.  It's also almost all foreigners.  Sometimes it seems there are more foreigners than Koreans there.  There's an Irish bar with huge beers, and they have the better McDonald's.

Busan

I've been to Busan three times since arriving, twice on purpose, once by accident. I'll tell that story later.  Busan is a nice city, in parts.  The area immediately near Sasang station seems kind of seedy, but there are some good restaurants.  My first time going there I went with a coworker to meet some friends.  I had just purchased a cell phone roughly an hour beforehand (prepaid) and ran around screaming 'WHERE IS A FREE WIFI SIGNAL WHERE IS A FREE WIFI SIGNAL WHERE IS oh there it is' trying to get access to my gmail and contact info for people, because writing things down is for old people.

Busan the first time was pretty good.  We went to a mall that was pretty nice and had a wax museum in it, got some Mexican food at Fuzzy Navel that was pretty decent, and wound up at the beach in Hongdae.  The beach had a videogame tournament taking place which is... well, welcome to Korea.  Wound up back in Geoje shortly after that for a going away party (which are pretty much a daily occurrence in Korea. Somebody is always going away and they never seem upset about it. . .)

Busan the second time was for a friend's birthday, and also was a pretty good time as far as I can remember.  Did some mart drinking, got a hotel room, went to Wolfgang's which has excellent fish fry, and then drank, and then kept drinking, and then drank a whole lot more, and then went to Rock n Roll Club and played beer pong and the rest of the night is pretty fuzzy, but I've been assured that I enjoyed myself, and videos from the night certainly back that argument up.  The morning after I stayed in Busan nursing a hangover, did some shopping (managed to find some Converse only a size too small that have stretched nicely to fit my gigantic American feet), and ate some pretty decent gyuudon at a restaurant next to Sasang station.

All in all, I'd recommend Busan pretty highly.

Mart Drinking

Mart drinking isn't something that happens from my experience stateside, at least if you aren't homeless. Probably cause it's illegal in most places.  But hanging out at convenience stores and getting sloshed is surprisingly not uncommon here. And by not uncommon, I mean I seem to be doing it a lot, I see other people doing it a lot, and the Koreans here seem to be pretty fond of it.

Buying beer from the mart is halfway between buying it at an actual grocery and at a bar, so it's much more affordable.  They provide chairs and tables and they clean up after you even if you throw everything on the ground, and there are public bathrooms or conveniently parked trucks near most of the locations I've been to.  There's also wifi, and access to a microwave.

They tend to be a great place to meet strangers.  Not in a Craigslist sort of way, no, but definitely in a talking to other travelers/teachers/foreigners randomly way.  Everyone goes to relax outside of marts.  I had a good experience in Seoul at a mart at the intersection of a bunch of clubs, sitting and chatting with random foreigners and English speaking Koreans.  They're a crossroads for drunk, friendly people in the country.  Most of the time you'll never see these people again, but for a brief period of time you're all best friends.  Strangers will buy you drinks and ice cream and tell you their most intimate secrets.

Basically, mart drinking is the best.

Garbage

Korea is filthy.

That's really all I would need to say on the matter, but I guess I can add onto that.

Korea is absolutely disgusting.

There is constantly garbage littering the streets.  There are no public garbage cans, for the most part, and the best a conscientious individual can attempt is at least throwing your trash onto the bigger piles of refuse lining the streets, or in front of a mart so that one of the workers will clean it up.

To add onto this problem, there tends to be a rainy season (it was 'right when I arrived' until 'now it's cold'), and there are tons of band flyers and the aforementioned prostitute trading cards slung everywhere people might walk, so they tend to get pasted to the ground via rainwater and the uncaring tread of passersby.  Also, there is a more open sewage system in Korea, where the fetid waters are closer to street level directly under the sewer grates, and the smell can seep through harshly out of nowhere.  There's a spot near where I live where you'll be walking along, enjoying the smell of a bakery, when suddenly you hit a wall of odorous war crime.  Never a pleasant experience.

The silver lining to this, is that all these problems tend to happen later in the day.  Every morning, before Korea wakes up, but after it comes home from drinking (so, roughly 6-9am) a group of workers comes out and sweeps up the streets.  If you're the first one awake in the morning, and then you went back home around noontime and didn't leave again for the rest of the day, you'd have no idea the country got so filthy.

I've heard a few explanations for the lack of trash bins.  The first I was told was a fear of terrorists, which doesn't make any sense, considering the few places there are public receptacles are in the areas of highest transit which would cause the most damage.  The second, more logical reason is simply that they don't have the willing  manpower to collect the bins multiple times a day, so letting it get dumped all over all day and then cleaning it up once early in the morning is actually more efficient.

And it is, but guys, Japan is right next to you and they are pristine.  If you ever had to invite them over for dinner you would be so embarrassed.

Confucianism and its effects

Confucianism has twofold very visible effects.  First, is the age hierarchy.  Somebody older than you is automatically right. No matter what. Even if irrefutable evidence proves them wrong, you're still morally wrong for trying to prove that.  As mentioned briefly with the ajumas that will elbow you into the ocean and spit on your bloated, floating corpse, it comes into play at work as well.  Your boss is your boss, they're older than you, you will respect them.  I've had younger bosses before (only a year or two of difference, but still) that were pretty cool, and this is just not something I could see standing up here.

The other part is your position as an educator.  You get a lot of cred for being a teacher here. People assume you're wealthy, you get treated like a king, mothers are throwing their virgin daughters in your direction in hopes to wed them to such a successful individual...

Well at least people assume you have good money, but that could be because of the foreigner thing.  Huzzah stereotyping!

Let's Do the Time Warp

As I'd like to hurry things along before my memories of events fade from my old age,  I'm going to use this post as a way to briefly give some general impressions on Korea, and the next blog or two is going to skip the days pretty quickly.  I promise work isn't all that exciting, and that's most of what I do.  Elsewise,  this blog is going to be very scattered and disorganized as I try to recollect day-by-days or even weekly chronicles from over a month from now at this point.

Also yes I realize I haven't uploaded any pictures yet.  I don't have a home computer, so picture upload has been difficult.  I'll make my way to a PC Room one of these days and get all that taken care of.

The Apartment

The apartment they gave me is...nice.  It's roomier than I was expecting.  Individual bathroom, separate bathroom, kitchen area, separate laundry room.  There really isn't all that much room to spread out, though.  The main entryway, and the only legitimate room beside the bedroom is essentially all kitchen.  The lease does include a microwave (broken) and a refrigerator (tiny) as well as a washing machine (no dryer, had to buy a clothesrack) and a rice cooker which I'll never use because I'm fine with instant rice like a jerk.

The shower in the bathroom is a hole in the ground and a hose besides.  The shower nor the sink worked when I moved in, and I had to do some amateur plumbing to get them to acceptable levels.  Also, the kitchen sink had bean plants growing in the sink trap that I had to take care of. They sure as sugar went over the apartment before I moved in, I'll tell you.  Regardless, everything is in working order at present, even if it does take forever for the bathroom floor to dry after a shower.  Debating investing in those raised floor...racks? Whatever they are. Water drips through them onto the ground, dry off easily, yadda yadda.  I'd need two for the bathroom (one for the toilet, one for the sink) and multiple for the laundry room (where the air conditioner and washing machine drain onto the floor) and they're 16,000 a pop, so it's really not the top of the list.

I've been donated some furniture, and, with a bit of interior understanding, the place has gotten rather homey, but unfortunately the main area for hanging out is still my bed, which I would like to sleep on and not have people spill beer all over.  Fortunately my work still hasn't gotten me the bedframe I was promised, so it's not much better than sitting on the floor to be on the mattress anyways. Huzzah.

The apartment is also on the fourth floor with no elevator, which isn't a problem until you come home drunk and decide you want to move furniture in and out of the building.

Hey, no judging.

Workplace

After being there for a bit, the place I work is really nice... as a building. Everyone who works there is super friendly, it's always very clean and well stocked, they get any supplies I ask for them.  We don't have an (official) head instructor, so there isn't anyone spying on my classroom to make sure I'm not beating the kids or anything.  I mean, I'm not, but I COULD.

As for work itself, on that subject, 80 percent of the job is student management.  The material practically teaches itself, but getting the kids to sit still and look at it is a difficult task.  You have to balance getting the kids to enjoy class with getting work done, and too far in either direction makes some or all of the kids miserable who will then rat your ass out to the nearest Korean adult because how dare you just try to get through a lesson instead of letting your kids yell in Korean and hit each other and watch music videos on your computer.  Of course, when they complain, they never explain what they were doing wrong (let's face it, neither did we, eh?) so it comes off as you being a terrible teacher at a terrible institute, you risk the kid complaining to their parents and getting pulled out of the place, which loses your hogwan money, which gets you fired.  And we don't want that.  So make the kids happy.

The curriculum itself is...dull.  There is no meat to it, and it's all premade for you.  You teach method. Not speaking method, not listening method, not reading or writing methods. Answer finding method. 9 times out of 10, the kids won't even listen to the question you're asking them.  They will listen for some words that they can find in the textbook and regurgitate the answer they find without even sort of understanding what it means.  You throw them a curveball and ask them a question they need to think about and they cannot answer it, at least not without a lot of leading intonation and help from teacher.  It's depressing, at least for me, because you realize nobody is there to learn a language, they're there to pass tests.  And they do that very well, because the method they know works more often than not.  But for someone like myself with a great interest in languages (despite how good I may or may not be at acquiring them), it's sad to see so many kids just not care about learning the lingua franca.

Which brings me to my next point.

Speaking English in Korea

From what I can tell, there's virtually no reason to learn Korean.  And I've made some attempts, trust me.  I've learned Hangul, going so far as to even study the exception rules, and I've picked up simple phrases (Thank you, please, left, right, how much, etc), and am trying to get at least some basic knowledge of the language as I progress (although let's grant that my first month here was trying to get adjusted to the country and meet people, so I haven't set too much time aside for language study).  With what I know, I can go into a restaurant, order food, pay for it, and thank the person while saying the food was delicious.  The majority of the expats I've met here can't even do that.  Reason being, there is no reason to.  Speaking English is a status symbol here.  If they can speak English to you, they will speak English to you.  You can order something in flawless Korean, and if you look foreign, they will reply to you in English. And you can answer them in Korean, and they'll respond in English again. I've seen it happen.  It's happened to me, in my less than stellar but still comprehendable Korean speaking attempts.

People on the street will randomly talk to you in English. I've had kids stop me on city blocks to practice English with me, just to prove that they can.  I don't mind it, it's great that they're trying.  But it really does seem like a novelty thing that people do.

Not that that's not a thing that happens in the states, I've seen people at restaurants embarrass themselves by attempting to speak Mexican to the waitstaff (and finding out they're Polish or something, oh ho ho).  But it's such a weird thing to have people multiple times a day wander up and say 'Hello, how are you, nice to meet you, you enjoy Korea?, thank you very much, goodbye' for no reason other than to prove that they can. And  where I live there is no shortage of foreigners (some neighborhoods we outnumber the Koreans), so you'd think they'd have gotten over the novelty by now.

Foot Traffic (and traffic in general)

This is a big thing with me.  I hated how people walked in Japan, seemingly randomly, slowly, and stopping for no reason.  They had the luxury of it being explained with the walking patterns differing all over Japan (let's pretend it's island to island) so it's a whole bunch of people from different walking styles all intermingling. I can excuse that, but it still gets irritating.

Korea is quite possibly worse, but in different ways.  People will just shove you to the side.  I shouldn't say people, ajumas will shove you out of the way. Ajumas are crazy old ladies that dominate everything in their Confucian power grasp.  They will stare you down for simply existing as a non-Korean, push you out of the way (even if you weren't in the way), spit on the ground immediately next to you, and do anything they damned well please because nobody would dare tell them to stop.  They will ride their bicycles straight at you and expect you to move, even, and seemingly especially if there is a wide gap to either side of you that is completely clear of any obstacles.  They just want to see you move.

There's also the matter of cell phones.  Cell phones in Korea just...are.  Everybody has one. And they're all using them. Constantly. It's just part of being.  It's not even considered rude to be on a cell phone. Clerks at stores will be on cell phones. People have them out at special ceremonies.  Cab drivers will be playing on them while they taxi you to your destination.  And everyone has them glued to their faces while they're walking around, causing them to just sporadically charge in arbitrary directions as they get distracted watching their latest kdramas.

Other than that though, for the people that are paying attention, at the very least they will walk at a good speed on the right side of the path and it's easy to navigate them.  Although there is a weird tendency to stop at the traffic lights for... forever.  Traffic is unidirectional in Korea.  The light on each four sides of the traffic light will go green, one side at a time.  Which makes crossing on foot take even longer than that, especially if there is a separate timer for the green arrow and the regular green light.  At a crosswalk, Koreans will wait forever until the green man says go.  If there is no crosswalk, nothing can stop the Korean pedestrian.  They will charge into oncoming traffic face-to-cellphone and dare the world to hit them. Which may actually be a dare, because by law anybody hospitalized by a motor vehicle is the lucky beneficiary of all of the driver's money until their hospital bills are paid off.  Which gives you a nice two week vacation as you recover in the hospital.  And judging by the way people drive here, they'd be all to eager to run you down regardless.  So maybe the crosswalks are just an ingenious way to prevent people from playing chicken with traffic.

Food

Dak galbi, barbecue, HOF chicken, street mandu, jjahjangmyon, kimchi... kimchi.  Kimchi. I hated kimchi before I came here. I hated kimchi for my first few weeks.  I'm...starting to come around.  At the very least, it does taste different depending on where you get it from.  Different restaurants will make their own kimchi, and the spicier ones are better from my experience.  Kimchi as a cooking ingredient works better than kimchi by itself, though.  I think it's the addition of heat. Something about cold fermented cabbage is just...unappetizing.  But it's allegedly one of the healthiest things you can put in your body so you eat it regardless, and you keep trying it until you like it.

Street mandu is probably my favorite thing here.  Steamed mandu is the best, little dumplings either fried or steamed or a third thing that are stuffed with meat and vegetables, or kimchi, or what have you.  Some will be sold from carts, some will have tents set up for you to eat at, generally it's great. Beware the vendors that just sort of microwave it.  It tends to be much less appetizing then.

Street food is the best no matter where you are in the world.  Street mandu is great, and even better is just street meat. It doesn't matter what kind of meat. It's meat on a stick. Eat it.

HOF's are just chicken and beer places. They're open late, and they have chicken and beer. They also cost buttloads of money. You're paying about 16,000 for a basket of chicken and chips, but at least the beer is cheap.  It's no worse than three drink minimum bars with 25 cent wings back in the states, but with the beer being the discounted item, it just feels wrong for some reason.

Barbecue is meat. Meat you cook yourself unless you seem to American, in which case they'll cook it for you.  But it's always good.  I've found a place called Dino Meat Barbecue that is all you can eat for 16,000 and I don't know why I don't eat there every day.

Dak Galbi is essentially stir fry that they do at the table in front of you.  You pick the ingredients, and some poor undergrad stays up til the wee hours of the morning to serve your drunk ass the food. Worth it.

Jjahjangmyeon is one of the more popular Chinese dishes in Korea.  It's noodles or rice with black bean sauce, mixed vegetables, and generally some type of meat.  Pretty good stuff, but I'm starting to miss American cuisine.

Jimjilbaeng

Like the onsen I went to in Japan, except you can go in with tattoos here, hey~!  Also the one near my house has a tub with water jets on it. So relaxing~

Naked time is fun time.

Welcome to Geoje

My first night, right after arriving in the city, I wandered around a bit. I was in downtown Gohyeon area, which to this day is where I spend most of my time, so I figured it was important to get at least somewhat accustomed to the area.  I tried to keep a stable direction in my head and come across landmarks here and there, which is hard to do when you're brand new and you pass a CU Mart every 12 feet.  There are mountains and water in every direction, so you can't really use those to judge where you are for the most part either.

I did eventually get oriented, and wandered around the area a bit before turning in, falling asleep with the tv on.

The next day we had our 'work orientation'.  I took a cab in (cabs cost about a dollar here, really), and figured my way into the building.  Our building is swank.  We have an aquarium in the waiting room, we have a waiting room. We have secretaries, cleaning staff, management staff. The building is sterile clean and freshly wallpapered, we have water coolers in multiple locations, showering units in the bathroom for...some...reason... and we've got our own private offices with computers, projectors, whiteboards, markers, pencils... the whole works. It's almost like I'm a real teacher!

At about 1 in the afternoon, we met up with the boss (who is a very nice lady who spoke less English than I thought she would, but still plenty more than is common) and went over hours, wages, reimbursements, living situations, etc.  We were then dismissed to do prep work. For the next.....six hours.  Which was, well, absurd. But it was something I was told I needed to get used to. As per the schedule, I'm at work 1pm until 10pm Monday through Friday, and at least three hours every day is prep work.  What it actually is, is 'deskwarming', which is a Korean job skill that requires you to procrastinate on the internet for a few hours until your class starts.  It take me roughly 15 minutes to prep for a class, I shortly found out, so if I were to do nothing but prep for the whole time they had set aside from me, I would have the entire semester done in a week.

As myself and the other new teacher didn't really have much to do,we were getting prepared to leave about an hour or two into finding our bearings in the branch when one of the Korean coteachers told us to stick around because we were getting free food.  Not wanting to burn through my meager funds, and wanting to sample some good Korean food as recommended by locals, I stuck around.  This backfired because we ended up getting Chinese food. Not that it wasn't fantastic! But, it wasn't Korean.  We got to chatting, and I found out the very uncommon fact that myself and the boss are the only people at work who drink, or at least enjoy doing so.  That... doesn't happen a lot in Korea. Everyone here drinks.  It's hard to walk down the street without seeing a drunk middle aged guy hanging off of his friend. Yes, I know it's eight in the morning, what is your point.

The other new teacher (I hate using names in a blog but it is starting to seem like I'm going to have to) ended up tagging along on the way home with me so that we could do prep work together (we didn't actually do any of the sort at work).  She needed my help, because she was given a class that she wasn't trained how to do, and I was given 5 days worth of teaching the same class over and over, so one of us got the short end of the stick. I'm talking about me, teaching the same thing everyday is tedious.  So I generously helped her out, and retired to Shaun of the Dead with Korean subtitles.

The next morning I woke up at 7am, still on my training regiment, and being affected by the whole 'I'm in a hotel room' thing, where my body doesn't sleep soundly because the surroundings are weird.  So I went to the fish market.  It only took a little wandering around, and it helped that I could follow my nose. Because the smell was awful. Offal, even.  I got there and there were live fish squirming, dead fish cooking, people chopping and gutting fish up all around, and the whole thing is situated right above a sewage drain.  The smell is quite atrocious, but it is a sight to experience for somebody who didn't grow up on the seaside.  Of course I had the unfortunate effects of managing to look at everything as a 'pet' instead of a 'food' for the same reason.

My first class was later that same day, and I went in thinking I was prepared. I mean, this is what they trained us for, right?  Wrong. They didn't train us. They didn't train us at all.

I was optimistic, happy, smiling, thinking about how much fun this would be.  And then my first kid showed up. She looked at me and went 'You my teacher?'  And I said 'Yep!' and she made a...a face. And swore in Korean, and left my classroom.

Well, things were off to a great start.

The whole class was like that. Just very...tense.  Nobody wanted to be there, they just wanted to sit and silently judge me.  See what I was made of.

It was my first day as a teacher, I wasn't made of much.

As we struggled to get through on the prep work I did and the little bit I was taught, the class progressively got a bit better.  We were laughing together by the end and not staring blankly at each other, which is enough progress to make over a three hour class period.

I left my first class feeling pretty drained.  It didn't really go how I had expected at all.  The kids at the private schools here seem to be fully aware that your employment is based on you keeping them happy. If they go home and complain to their parents, they get switched to a different school. This happens enough times, you lose your job.  So there's not really a way to punish the kids, or get them to pay attention other than just being stern and...hoping it works.  They get distracted, they refuse to do work, and 'sending them to the principle' just makes them come back mopey and even less willing to work. It's... frustrating.  At this point I hadn't really figured away around it, and it was just irritating.  I wasn't expecting such a small, four student class where none of the kids listened. It was like teaching in an inner city school back in the states, except with less change at being shot.

Although all the students have knives.  Granted, they're box cutters, but still, was a shock to see that all of them are more armed than I am.

The first week was essentially just that.  Getting to know the kids, getting to know the job, really...not doing a whole lot back home.  Mozying around with the girl from work, going into random places looking for food. I ended up getting japchaebap, which is horribly offensive from a western standpoint but I assure you it's delicious.

The only eventful things that happened during my first week were finding out that Dunkin' Donuts serves bubble tea, and getting into unintelligible arguments with the landlord at the motel I was stationed at.  He yelled at me about how I had dirty clothes in my room, and how I took the key with me when they needed to  clean, charged me for the maid doing my laundry, and then forced me to pay for an extra day (which I got reimbursed for), and all of this via shouting in Korean at me until I understood him.  I'll give this to the people, I haven't had anyone back down on me. Always push forward.  And really, it was the most honest exchange I've ever had in my life. He'd yell and point, and I'd hand him money until he went away.

Aaah, international relations.

I ducked out really early on my checkout day to try and avoid him, managed to successfully, and then set up camp in the apartment I'd be occupying for the next year or so.

It's nice.

Training Week

After settling into South Korea, getting my bearings, and then immediately losing them again because soju is ₩1500 (about $1.50) and ~2 liters of beer is ₩4000 (about 4 bucks). A bunch of us had the idea that training was going to be a breeze. 

After the first day of training we maintained this perspective.  First day's training mostly involved orientation. A bunch of us sitting in a room as one of the staff explained stuff about Chungdahm, how the classes work, reminded us to do our online training, etcetera.  Seemed like cake.  So we celebrated by gathering a bunch of trainees together and going to the Coex Mall for dinner and generally lazying about.

The mall was a pretty decent sight.  Well put together, nice fountains and rest areas, attached to a ritzy hotel. Good food to be had there as well.  A bunch of us were walking out of a random pharmacy when some foreigners dashed right at us.  Two attractive-esque (let's face it, quite skanky, actually) girls tackled us with questions about what there was to do here. In Seoul. The biggest city in the nation.  Apparently they had come from Jamaica (neither of them looked the part) with help from the Jamaican mafia in order to see an Eminem concert (yep) and now they were bored. Not from the area ourselves and only having had two days to explore the city, we had nothing.  Our response? "Drink".

Their response was that they didn't drink... but they had a whole bunch of alcohol. A laundry basket full of alcohol that some guy pushed on them despite their urgings that they don't get drunk.  And did we want it?  Because, if we could help them find their hotel, we could have it.

Now kids, step back for a second here.  Think about what your parents taught you. The good kind of parents, not the ones that shouldn't have had kids.  They tell you not to accept candy from strangers.  And this is good advice, follow it. Follow it your whole life.  But as you get older, learn to use discretion.  I've accepted candy from strangers at the mall who were giving out free samples, friends' parents I'd just met,  other college students on campus.  Not a big deal.  But a couple of girls with shady stories, claiming to be in with the mafia, staying in a hotel they don't know the location of, offering to give you free booze if you followed them back to their hotel room?  That's one of the worst case scenarios that your parents were afraid of when that candy advice came up.

So naturally myself (and a friend from training) decided to be impromptu tour guides for these two strangers.

We had gotten a glimpse of the hotel they were staying at when we came off the subway (the Internation something or other), and trekked our way in the direction we thought it was in, the whole time listening to these girls tell stories about their trip (apparently they frequently get turned away from taxis), and stopping every few feet so they could harass a random local with questions worded loudly in English.  Obviously we were in the presence of noble ladies of a high caliber (see: firearms).  The hotel itself. was. gorgeous.  Everything was gold plated and immaculate, gleaming and clean, and smelled pleasant. There were fresh potpourris laid out on scattered tables, and the hotel staff was dressed properly.  There was even a lawyers' convention taking place in the main room (that the girls we were with attempted to sneak us into for... some...reason).  By all appearances, this posh inn was the top of the top, which indicated that we were either quite secure in our journey, or this was the place that rich tourists go to cover up murders, trade drugs, and perform kidnappings and extortions.

In a rather uneventful manner, we hurried the girls up to their room, and in return they thrust a green laundry basket filled to the top with expensive liquors and then thanked us and sent us on our way.  I-I mean we had sex with them! Just... just loads of it. It was fantastic. And then we rappelled out a window. Like in Die Hard or something.  But really, in the end, we had a laundry basket... full of liquor.

We made our way back to the group we had abandoned fully triumphant in our quest (after hurrying out of the hotel in case it had all been stolen/someone was trailing us afterwards), and our traveling companions were....disappointed that we weren't murdered, or drugged, or at least charged an absurd amount of cash for taking up the time of high class hookers, and then getting stained with an STD.  What good friends I'd made.  Understandably though, they just were upset that we were rewarded for our foolishness instead of being punished for being idiots, as we rightfully should have been. I'll just claim optimism about trusting our fellow man, and look down upon my friends for slandering the good name of two quite reputable women of their word. The nerve, really.

After our adventure, we went back to 1405 in our hotel, drank some of the booze, and readied ourself for training the next morning.

Training

The next day training started for real.

It was clear that none of us were prepared for it.

To explain the matters in short, there are roughly three days of actual training. Monday is orientation, Wednesday-Thursday are the brief training sessions, and Friday is testing. They're cramming what should amount to a week or two of preparation into three days of training broken down between two instructors over 4-6 hours a day.  We don't teach English, per se, we teach method.  What this means is that we teach the kids how to find the answers, not understand them, because that's how the Korean school system is designed.  Our school does make some efforts toward actual integration with vocab, and some grammar help, which is more than some of the schools do, but less than is needed.  They're trying to get us to memorize and understand the teaching method for two different types of classes, gauge us as teachers and fix our faults, or at least address them, and educate us on the class structure and material in preparation for our first day of class.  The first day of training went miserably, and all of us realized we'd need to buckle down and properly study the material to prepare for the second day of training.

So that night I went out drinking with some other trainees.  Just a handful of us barhopped for a bit, and a smaller handful of us wound up in a great bar I'd recommend called 'Self Bar' in Gangnam.  It's a little hole in the wall (ground really, it's downstairs) and it's called Self Bar because you just... you serve yourself.  There is a fridge with beer in it, and you grab beer and pay at the end of the night.  There's a bartender there to get you food and cocktails if you need them. It cost a bit less and was a good atmosphere.

Afterwards, because we didn't understand this whole 'training is tomorrow thing' apparently, we went to 'norebang', Korean karaoke.  It was a super cheap place right next door, and the owner was quite friendly. Unfortunately the microphone had a horrid echo effect we couldn't figure out how to turn off, but we solved that by exclusively singing 90's songs. Also, the English selection was exclusively 90's songs, so hey.  Afterwards we ran home drunk in an absolute downpour, stripped down, and waited for the next day to happen.

The next day happened.  Everyone did miserable in training again.  Slightly less miserable, but we still were confused with the takeaway. None of us were really quite sure what we were learning.  Study sessions were decided upon, and people got together and mock-taught each other until we thought we had it figured out.  For myself, at least, it didn't really click until the next day's classes. The next day was primarily fine tuning for people...although everybody in the program had reported of 'this one person in my class just... I don't think they're going to pass the training' which was a terrifying insecurity a whole lot of us had, because not passing training meant buying our own ticket home.  Also that whole 'disappointment' and 'not having a job' thing wouldn't help matters much.

Testing ended up not being so bad.  We had learned as much as we were going to, and had notes to rely on. My class structure is essentially 'wing-it' (even, and especially to where I am now) so I was quite relaxed, and was mostly thrown by other peoples' performances.  After everyone had done their tests, we were all seated in our rooms and told to wait for staff to come in with good or bad news.

I haven't been able to get an accurate count. I asked around and nobody was certain about anything.  I kept telling people I failed because that's just the kind of guy I am (hilarious) so I got a few apologetic 'I'm sorry's until I revealed 'I'm kidding'.  If anybody failed, officially, I didn't hear about it.  But from stories I'd heard of what went on in some classes, maybe not everybody was prepared enough to get a pass... but did anyways.  The branches are desperate for new blood, and to be honest the trial by fire of having your first class does better to prepare you than the training does.  

That said,  The training could do with some lengthening. The instructors were great and did their best with the time they had, no issues there.  But the training itself could use a full week, if not two weeks, to prepare the new teachers, although understandably putting trainees up in a hotel for two weeks would be...quite costly, so that's most likely the issue there. The other argument I'd make is that the program could do with a quick 'celebration gathering'.  Just...something.  Cheese and crackers. A pizza. Anything after the final testing. Something to just say goodbye and good luck to everyone you'd just spent a harrowing week with.  Instead we're ushered nervously out of the rooms, quickly gotten to sign a contract for our new jobs, hurried into cabs with Korean drivers who don't really speak much in the way of English, and tossed on a train or a bus to go on a lengthy ride across the country to a place we're unfamiliar with.  It's all a whole bunch of stress with no uplift, and it does a lot to make you feel more alone in a country you've barely arrived in.

Luckily I had company for my four-and-a-half hour bus ride to the opposite end of the country. A tall Canadian girl who made for good conversation and had a bubbly personality and may walk into this room at any moment, because I'm typing this at work and we work together (she is a doof, but in a good way).  When we made it in we were met at the station by our new boss, our secretary, and a few of our coteachers.  She went off to her new apartment, and I was crammed into a tiny (love?) motel for the next week. Free of charge, though!  Also, my new boss bought me hot meat buns from Dunkin' Donuts. Which were pretty great, honestly.

I marked my address and took a picture of the building with my now almost-useless US smartphone, and wandered around a few city blocks, taking in the sights of my new city before ultimately wandering back, too tired and unfamiliar to really do anything with the night, and fell asleep with the tv on.

The next day would be the first day of the rest of my...year.