The first week in Korea

Being here has been a big handful of new experiences and so much already learned- even though it

has been just a little over 2 weeks, I feel like I have been here for at least a couple of months.
Backtracking to our arrival, I arrived in Korea with Jeremy and Steve (two other people who applied to the Chungnam program like I did) after a long flight from Dulles. The first flight was about 5 hours to San Francisco and then an hour layover before getting on the second flight....for 12 1/2 hours! (The picture is the view as we landed in San Fran)

It was a long trip but the

amazing service of Asiana Airlines a

nd personal T.V.s really

made the time FLY by- pun intended haha. The flight attendants started off the flight with warm towels, followed by (in no particular order) 2 full meals, snacks galore, drinks (alcohol for free), and slippers for the ride. I was amazed every time they came to deliver something- it seemed like the complementary services were never ending. I watched about 3 movies, one in Korean and two in English. With those, some bejeweled on my TV, and a nap, we arrived in Incheon- right outside of Seoul, Korea. When we arrived, I felt very loopy it since it was about 4 or 5 AM, eastern time. We tried to stay up so we could adjust to the time change and ended up going to bed around 9 after dinner and some exploring. Dinner was in a small restaurant by our hotel. We had to take our shoes

off (which is what you do in just about everywhere in Korea) and sit on the ground at small tables. There weren't any pictures on the menu so we just pointed and agreed that it was what we wanted. Little did we know that ordering in this fashion is how we would be doing our ordering almost everywhere we go. As of right now, we look for restaurants that have pictures so it is easy for both us and the wait staff but if they do not have it, we just pick one from the menu and hope it tastes good. The food we had that night was some sort of meat.. I think pork, in a sauce with vegetables which was pretty tasty for our first meal.
In Korea, when they serve food, they do not just give the main course. They also give multiple small side dishes, always including kimchi an

d rice, that you can eat during dinner and sometimes can put on your main dish. I like the concept a lot and it makes for more variety during dinner. For those of you who don't know what kimchi is, look it up- I'm pretty sure it's the national dish of Korea.

We spent the night in a "guest house" which is practically a small suite wih a very firm bed, a kitchenette, dresser, and bathroom. Even though the bed was tough, I slept soundly because we were all exhausted.
Day 2- We woke up in the morning and ate breakfast at a mini-mart on the corner before the taxi driver picked us up. Side note, there are mini-marts (like 7-11) on almost every corner. They had this in Japan as well. They serve the same things as they do in America except they also have meals like ramen or individually wrapped hamburgers. Back from side note, the taxi driver

picked us up and took us to our schools, which were about 3 hours away from Seoul, with traffic. We sat in the taxi talking most of the time among ourselves and tried to talk to they taxi driver but he did not speak much English at all. He pointed at some cities we passed and told us the names which was helpful in a tourist stance.

The first school we came to was Hyopo Elementary where we dropped off Jeremy. I was next and we drove about 20 minutes down the road until we arrived at Janggi Elementary. No one was there to greet us so the taxi driver knocked on one of the windows and a tiny Korean woman ran out. She introduced herself as the taxi driver drove away. Mrs. Chloe, my co-teacher (she told me her Korean name but I still have no clue what it is) showed me around the school, introduced me to some students, teachers, and admin, before introducin

g me to the principal. We entered into the principal's office and we both bowed while we waited for him to finish brushing his teeth. He tried speaking to me in Korean and Mrs. Chloe explained to him that I did not speak any at all, except for hello and thank you which I learned from the flight attendants. His office is definitely bigger than my apartment and he could probably live in it if he needed (more on my apartment in a second). He had his own sink, cup dryer, conference room seating (made up of big orange chairs), and I think he even had his own bathroom. I didn't really hear much about him until later in the week- from what I gather, he is very competitive and a sore loser. I, for one, think he is nice but I have not spoken a word to him yet besides 'hello' and 'thank you' in Korean of course.

I went back to Janggi Elementary where I observed classes on Tuesday and Wednesday, meaning I introduced myself and then sat in the back of the classroom as the teachers taught in Korean. The highlight of the week was going to Daejeon. Daejeon is the next biggest city near my city Gongju. It takes about 30-40 minutes by car to get there, which in Korean is not far at all. I

took how close I was to everything for granted when I lived in America. I would dread having to drive 15 minutes to get to a friends house or the mall when here I travel a minimum 30 minutes to places I need to go sometimes. Back to Daejeon. Jeremy and I were driven by my co-teacher to apply for our Alien Registration Cards in Daejeon. We went and applied, which was a quick process, and then my co-teacher treated us and her daughter to dinner. One thing I wish I did was take pictures of the food we got for dinner. This night in Daejeon, we had an amazing feast. It seemed like the table was set for 10 people once they were done bringing out rice, 9 side dishes, 4 soups, and an after dinner rice soup and pumpkin/squash drink- and that was just for 2 people, my co-teacher and I shared one set of this and then Jeremy and my co-teacher's 60 lb. daughter shared the other set. It was a

ll very good and all vegetarian.

The last two days of the week, Thursday and Friday, I went to Uirang Elementary. This school is about a 20-25 minute bus ride away from my apartment. My co-teacher rode the bus with me to help find the school since neither of us knew. We got off the bus with help from some friendly women who rode it daily- they showed me what to look for to know when it was time to press the button for my stop. We arrived in Tesani (the town that the school is in) which is probably made up of 20 houses and farms. The smell of manure practically smacks you in the face as if a cow came up and pooped in your bag- trust me it's strong. And it smells like that everywhere. In Korean schools, or at least all of the ones I have been to, they leave the windows open all day. So, the smell of cow poo seeped into the hallways. I also noticed, the fear of bugs and wasps are non-existant. I think there are several wasps' nest in the windows of the classrooms.

When I got to Uirang, I had about 20 minutes before I started teaching my first class. Thank goodness I prepared earlier in the week! I taught

4 classes Thursday and 4 on Friday, finding out my best classes are definitely the kindergartners and the 6 graders. The rest of the classes have great kids but there are always one or two boys that are troublemakers who torment the entire class and make them all unruly.

Once school was out on Friday, we hopped on a bus to meet our friends RJ and Steve in RJ's city Chungju, about 3 1/2 hours away. It was a very bumpy ride but once we arrived, it was worth it. We hung out the first night and caught up on all of our first weeks at school while enjoying a traditional Korean meal called samgyeopsal. It is a ver yummy meal where the meat is cooked in front of you on a burner. After a couple of flips and the meat being completely done, you take it and place on a juicy lettuce leaf with leaks, garlic, and a semi-spicy sauce. The only problem I had with it was being able to fit the whole thing in your mouth- which is exactly what Koreans do, shovel it in their mouths all at once. I later l

earned to rip the leaves in half to make a smaller bite which helped tremendously.

The next day we went hiking in the mountains near RJ's school. We went into his school and met a bunch of his students before we started our trek.

We traveled down a long road before we even made it to the mountain where we got lunch before we started. The restaurant was another place that did not have pictures so we pointed at words and just hoped for the best. This is one of the only times the pointing method didn't work well. The waitress brought out a tofu stew and so

me bibimbap (mixed rice with vegetables). It was alright but not what we were expecting and came to the conclusion as we were leaving that the restaurant was vegetarian (which all of the boys were expecting to have some hearty meat before climbing).

We hiked for a little but were exhausted from the walk to and from the restaurant so we finished hiking a little early. (This is the view from behind RJ's school) We caught a bus back to Chungju which was about 45 minutes back into town. Just with our luck,right as we arrived, it started to pour. We ran home and changed before heading out to dinner. Dinner was the same thing from the first night- because it was that delicious. Afterwards, we went out that night to a sort of techno club, it was a lot of fun (but a little bit of a weird concept) and we stayed out very late dancing. In Korea, I don't think the bars ever close, if they do, I doubt it's before 6 AM.

Lunch on Sunday was Korean pizza- similar to American pizza, just always with onions and it is practically nuked- they don't have many ovens here so the pizza went through a conveyer belt stove- exactly like when Quizno's toasts your sub. I had sweet potato and the boys had pepperoni and bulgolgi (a sort of Korean beef). After lunch we packed up our stuff and headed home to Gongju to prepare for another week of school that would start the next day.