I'm finally set up in my apartment! Updates are rare right now, as are pictures, because I don't have internet access in my place yet. Hopefully it should be set up this week, my co-teacher (who is awesome) is going to call the internet company for me tomorrow and get it set up, plus I will have internet access at school.
I start work tomorrow! I'm super nervous, but I think it'll be great. I'm the first native English speaking teacher they've had at my school, so they're happy to have me! Just hope I don't let them down! :)
I'm at Lauren's apartment right now, she and Katharine lucked out and are living in the same apartment building, which is also pretty close to my school...how'd this work out?!? Haha, oh well, at least we'll have more areas to explore now. Plus I'll probably just end up crashing on Lauren's couch most nights anyway. That's right, where Katharine and I got studio apartments, Lauren got a loft and has a living room! It's super cute. We all have really great views though, which is awesome.
We're about to venture out to Home Plus and get some other little things we need for our places, like lamps, food, etc. Hopefully we'll be able to figure out how to get back to my apartment! They're nice enough to agree to go back with me so I won't end up lost and stranded somewhere. Even if they didn't agree, I'd probably make them come anyway!
I've set up a Picasa account, it's under AmanbaNicole (I think...or maybe search by my email, amandanf@hotmail.com) and has some of the pictures I've taken so far. Like I said, I have a few more but haven't been able to post them online yet...they'll be here soon!
More later!
:)
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Cheonan City
So, Friday was our first full day here, and we had an open period from 12 until about 5. Lauren and I ran into Anthony and Violet at breakfast (friends of mine from Lubbock times), and they told us they were using that time to go into town to the mall because Violet's hair straightener wasn't working. Neither was either one of ours (my hair was a mess!).
We caught a cab into town, me, Lauren and Crystal (she's super cool, and Australian!) in one cab, Anthony & Violet in the second. The cab only cost like 2,000 won, which is like $2-awesome! Turned out the mall wasn't actually a mall but a department store, The Galleria. But it was huuuuge, like 5 floors. Plus they had hair dryers and straighteners, so all was well with the world. In addition to the fact that there was a MAC counter, as I said before, which filled my heart with butterflies and I was able to get some more powder, hooray!
Then we went to lunch at this little dumpling place, which was...interesting. I finally tried kimchi. It was...spicy. And not delicious. But hopefully I'll be able to force myself to try it enough times so that I'll begin to like it, like little kids. I also had some dumpling soup. The broth was really good at least! It was like egg drop soup, but with these strange dumplings in it. I wasn't a fan of the dumplings, but everyone else loved them so, go figure, it was just me.
Getting back to the campus was ridiculous, we tried 3 different times to catch a cab back and each time the driver would look at the address we were trying to get to and say "No, no," and kick us out of the cab. It was so frustrating because we had no way of knowing why they wouldn't take us back! Finally we got on the bus for a few blocks, then got out and climbed a mountain. Seriously, it's so hilly here, I really do appreciate flat Lubbock after that trek. If I had been in a proper jacket and sneakers or something, it probably wouldn't have been so bad. Oh well, we made it!
Then we had opening ceremony that night, which basically was just like, here's all the rules. Then we had our welcome dinner! Thankfully, I brought PowerBars!!! It's just going to take some time for me to adjust to all the strange foods...
I almost cried (tears of joy!) Sunday morning though because for breakfast there was PEANUT BUTTER! And APPLES! I had a peanut butter & jelly sandwich and apples, it was glorious!
After breakfast, we went on a field trip to a Korean Folk Village, which is actually an amusement park kind of place, but the buildings were actually from a Korean Folk Village so it was legit. This was where my Second Meal I Actually Enjoyed was had-plain rice and pork skewers! Um, I could probably have eaten like 5 more skewers, they were delicious.
More about the village next time!
We caught a cab into town, me, Lauren and Crystal (she's super cool, and Australian!) in one cab, Anthony & Violet in the second. The cab only cost like 2,000 won, which is like $2-awesome! Turned out the mall wasn't actually a mall but a department store, The Galleria. But it was huuuuge, like 5 floors. Plus they had hair dryers and straighteners, so all was well with the world. In addition to the fact that there was a MAC counter, as I said before, which filled my heart with butterflies and I was able to get some more powder, hooray!
Then we went to lunch at this little dumpling place, which was...interesting. I finally tried kimchi. It was...spicy. And not delicious. But hopefully I'll be able to force myself to try it enough times so that I'll begin to like it, like little kids. I also had some dumpling soup. The broth was really good at least! It was like egg drop soup, but with these strange dumplings in it. I wasn't a fan of the dumplings, but everyone else loved them so, go figure, it was just me.
Getting back to the campus was ridiculous, we tried 3 different times to catch a cab back and each time the driver would look at the address we were trying to get to and say "No, no," and kick us out of the cab. It was so frustrating because we had no way of knowing why they wouldn't take us back! Finally we got on the bus for a few blocks, then got out and climbed a mountain. Seriously, it's so hilly here, I really do appreciate flat Lubbock after that trek. If I had been in a proper jacket and sneakers or something, it probably wouldn't have been so bad. Oh well, we made it!
Then we had opening ceremony that night, which basically was just like, here's all the rules. Then we had our welcome dinner! Thankfully, I brought PowerBars!!! It's just going to take some time for me to adjust to all the strange foods...
I almost cried (tears of joy!) Sunday morning though because for breakfast there was PEANUT BUTTER! And APPLES! I had a peanut butter & jelly sandwich and apples, it was glorious!
After breakfast, we went on a field trip to a Korean Folk Village, which is actually an amusement park kind of place, but the buildings were actually from a Korean Folk Village so it was legit. This was where my Second Meal I Actually Enjoyed was had-plain rice and pork skewers! Um, I could probably have eaten like 5 more skewers, they were delicious.
More about the village next time!
Friday, February 20, 2009
Annyong haseyo, Korea!
Well, Lauren and I made it to Korea!!! Our flight left Dallas at 6:50 Wednesday morning for San Francisco-the in flight movie was The Secret Life of Bees, which was good until I fell asleep. We landed there around 9:30 am, Cali time (11:30 our time) and waited until 12:30 for our connecting flight to Seoul. By the way if you ever have to go somewhere and Singapore Air is one of your flight options, I highly recommend them! The flight was about 12 hours, but it went by pretty quick, especially because we had snacks like every 45 minutes it seemed, plus lunch and dinner! I probably gained 5 pounds on the flight alone.
They also had tons of choices of things to watch and listen to (movies, tv shows, radio, playlists you could make) PLUS games to help you learn languages! Umm, I probably should have played the Korean ones, but The Devil Wears Prada was calling my name.
Anywho, we finally landed around 6 pm, Thursday night (we missed a whole day!). After customs and immigration it was a little after 7, then we found the EPIK people and got our info for the shuttle. Then we had a 2 and a freakin' half hour bus ride to the campus! I almost cried, all I wanted to do was go to sleep. By the time we got in (after the bus driver got lost) it was almost 11, I think, I wasn't even sure because I was so exhuasted. We got our room numbers, Lauren and I finally figured out how to unlock the door after about 15 minutes (they're all number pads and the key is a number) and I was finally able to talk to my parents and take some Nyquil.
Then I fell asleep while talking to Lauren because that was the first time I had ever taken Nyquil and it hit me pretty quick. It was kind of fun, actually, it felt like I had just taken a few shots or something.
Enough for now, tomorrow I'll write about our venture into town to the mall-which ended up being just one department store, but it was five floors so it was ok.
And OMG, it was the best day because I discovered they have MAC counters here so I won't have to switch make-up or anything! It's the little things...
I'm planning on creating a Flickr or Tumblr account or whichever one is just for pics so I can post those asap.
Until next time, annyong-hi kaseyo!
They also had tons of choices of things to watch and listen to (movies, tv shows, radio, playlists you could make) PLUS games to help you learn languages! Umm, I probably should have played the Korean ones, but The Devil Wears Prada was calling my name.
Anywho, we finally landed around 6 pm, Thursday night (we missed a whole day!). After customs and immigration it was a little after 7, then we found the EPIK people and got our info for the shuttle. Then we had a 2 and a freakin' half hour bus ride to the campus! I almost cried, all I wanted to do was go to sleep. By the time we got in (after the bus driver got lost) it was almost 11, I think, I wasn't even sure because I was so exhuasted. We got our room numbers, Lauren and I finally figured out how to unlock the door after about 15 minutes (they're all number pads and the key is a number) and I was finally able to talk to my parents and take some Nyquil.
Then I fell asleep while talking to Lauren because that was the first time I had ever taken Nyquil and it hit me pretty quick. It was kind of fun, actually, it felt like I had just taken a few shots or something.
Enough for now, tomorrow I'll write about our venture into town to the mall-which ended up being just one department store, but it was five floors so it was ok.
And OMG, it was the best day because I discovered they have MAC counters here so I won't have to switch make-up or anything! It's the little things...
I'm planning on creating a Flickr or Tumblr account or whichever one is just for pics so I can post those asap.
Until next time, annyong-hi kaseyo!
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