After the best part of 21 hours, about 12 hours in the sky, 3 in the waiting room at Amsterdam International Airport, and hour at Seoul International Airport and a 5 hour bus journey down to Daegu (which actually pissed on KLM for seat comfort and leg room) i'm pretty pooped....and hearing "let's go meet your boss" when i'm met by Liz (who works at the school and has a Korean name but I can't remember it yet, so we call her Liz) so it's another half hour in the car....after all that i'm just hoping I don't get the sack for smelling as bad as I did.
It's all good though, my manager is called Jun and he's a dude! The headmaster of my department of the school, Dave, is also there to say hello and i'm very pleased that they tell me we are all off to my new flat. It's about 1730 by the time we get into the flat, which is a stones throw away from the school....anxious isn't the word I would use to describe how I felt about the place I was going to be living for the next year and to my surprise it's not a studio...thank the gods, i'm way to large and clumsy to live in a studio, I get a bedroom, a separate living room and a hallway/kitchen. I even get partial views of the rice paddies, who needs seaviews! Beat that Brighton!! photos and videos to follow when it's looking nice(ish) I get the impression i'm pretty lucky, although we now have to go out and buy stuff for my new digs....bedding and food really is the order of the evening...oh and slippers. NO shoes allowed almost anywhere here except for when you're outside. Slippers needed for work...ok i'll go with it.
They have E-Mart here...(hmmm ring any bells). 5 floors of of hell really after the day i've had, but you can buy everything here...Everyone is super friendly and there's a nod here and a bow there and I immediately feel the culture shock and i'm thinking "oh god how am I going to survive here? I can't read or understand a thing?!!" I'm assured that everything will be ok by Dave as he grins every time a Korean sales assistant comes and asks me a question and I give her that quintessential English look of "huh? ...Right let's go get some slippers....this i'm sure in England might take a minute or two but big Chubb Western feet meant that my choice was fairly limited and took a matter of seconds....there was only one pair that fit.
I pick up just about half the shop including the two key things in South Korean food society...chopsticks and a spoon. These are now my culinary weapons of choice. If you're good to them then they're good to you....because they don't use anything else when you go out to eat in a Korean restaurant.
We get back to the flat and unload the stuff and i'm wobbly on my feet with lack of sleep and an empty Chubb stomach that'd been grumbling for a good long while. Dave takes me to a little pasta joint just round the corner and I get a lay of the land...."Pasta??!!" I hear you say...well yes, it was his choice and he was paying so I didn't object. Plus there's some talk of a Korean banquet in my honour on Thursday...well I never! But I had already dipped into some Korean fast food at a stop on my way down to Daegu. Couldn't tell you what it was, but it was hot and spicy and tasted pretty good. So a little familiar pasta went down well. It's at this point that i'm told "oh by the way you can't eat anything tomorrow until after your medical exam which is at about 1400.....BALLS!...Blood tests and a ball tickle here I come...lovely.
My apartment is in an area that has a load of bars, restaurants and I discover that there is a University here so it can get pretty lively. I can't wait to get into Daegu centre and do some exploring, but it's probably not going to be until the weekend, where I can hopefully get my internet router sorted and finish buying stuff for the flat to make it my home for the next year.
It's up tomorrow and into school for 0830 and i'm told it's all guns blazing and i'll actually be teaching in a classroom to actual small people in a couple of days....what?!..ease me in gently? Nope sink or swim time.....welcome to South Korea.
ps. Anyeong haseyo means hello in Korean...the one word I know...
pps...damn forgot clothes hangers!
It's all good though, my manager is called Jun and he's a dude! The headmaster of my department of the school, Dave, is also there to say hello and i'm very pleased that they tell me we are all off to my new flat. It's about 1730 by the time we get into the flat, which is a stones throw away from the school....anxious isn't the word I would use to describe how I felt about the place I was going to be living for the next year and to my surprise it's not a studio...thank the gods, i'm way to large and clumsy to live in a studio, I get a bedroom, a separate living room and a hallway/kitchen. I even get partial views of the rice paddies, who needs seaviews! Beat that Brighton!! photos and videos to follow when it's looking nice(ish) I get the impression i'm pretty lucky, although we now have to go out and buy stuff for my new digs....bedding and food really is the order of the evening...oh and slippers. NO shoes allowed almost anywhere here except for when you're outside. Slippers needed for work...ok i'll go with it.
They have E-Mart here...(hmmm ring any bells). 5 floors of of hell really after the day i've had, but you can buy everything here...Everyone is super friendly and there's a nod here and a bow there and I immediately feel the culture shock and i'm thinking "oh god how am I going to survive here? I can't read or understand a thing?!!" I'm assured that everything will be ok by Dave as he grins every time a Korean sales assistant comes and asks me a question and I give her that quintessential English look of "huh? ...Right let's go get some slippers....this i'm sure in England might take a minute or two but big Chubb Western feet meant that my choice was fairly limited and took a matter of seconds....there was only one pair that fit.
I pick up just about half the shop including the two key things in South Korean food society...chopsticks and a spoon. These are now my culinary weapons of choice. If you're good to them then they're good to you....because they don't use anything else when you go out to eat in a Korean restaurant.
We get back to the flat and unload the stuff and i'm wobbly on my feet with lack of sleep and an empty Chubb stomach that'd been grumbling for a good long while. Dave takes me to a little pasta joint just round the corner and I get a lay of the land...."Pasta??!!" I hear you say...well yes, it was his choice and he was paying so I didn't object. Plus there's some talk of a Korean banquet in my honour on Thursday...well I never! But I had already dipped into some Korean fast food at a stop on my way down to Daegu. Couldn't tell you what it was, but it was hot and spicy and tasted pretty good. So a little familiar pasta went down well. It's at this point that i'm told "oh by the way you can't eat anything tomorrow until after your medical exam which is at about 1400.....BALLS!...Blood tests and a ball tickle here I come...lovely.
My apartment is in an area that has a load of bars, restaurants and I discover that there is a University here so it can get pretty lively. I can't wait to get into Daegu centre and do some exploring, but it's probably not going to be until the weekend, where I can hopefully get my internet router sorted and finish buying stuff for the flat to make it my home for the next year.
It's up tomorrow and into school for 0830 and i'm told it's all guns blazing and i'll actually be teaching in a classroom to actual small people in a couple of days....what?!..ease me in gently? Nope sink or swim time.....welcome to South Korea.
ps. Anyeong haseyo means hello in Korean...the one word I know...
pps...damn forgot clothes hangers!
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