Just taught my first class

But I will not talk about that just yet. I will just write about my first day for now.

I have a lot to write about since this is my first post from Korea. I am writing on the office computer, and I cannot upload pictures right now so please be patient and wait for the next post for that. I have to wait until I am issued some type of residency card before I can get an internet hookup in my apartment, but by this time next week I should be posting pictures and skyping.

My trip over was long and mostly uneventful. The first leg, the flight from LA to my stopover in Beijing was quite nice. The plane was huge and undersold so I had an empty seat next to me. I was able to doze a good portion of the 12.5 hrs away. At the Beijing airport I had a small scare. The security officer checked my bag manually and carelessly sliced his finger open on my razor. There was a big hub-bub and milling about, but ultimately nothing came of it; they even let me keep the razor (the blade of which I disposed, of course) and the corkscrew that I didn't even know I packed.

The flight to Busan was short and sweet. I was seated in the midst of some type of China national sports team. Aparently there is something called the tre-X games going on in Busan, but I couldn't figure out exactly what it was.

I was pretty tired by then, it being 17 hrs since my 1:30 a.m. departure, but it was only noon in Korea and I had still almost a full day ahead of me. Driving around from the airport to the office of education to sort out some administrative things, and finally a 1.5 hr drive to my home for the next year: Hadong! The long drive was very scenic. The conversation with my driver, who is also one of my English co-teachers, was a bit stilted; we were both a little nervous probably, and his English is not very good. At one point, after a few moments of silence, the 48 year old married man turned to me and said, "You are very handsome." I did not quite know how to respond, so I just said thankyou and let the topic pass. I guess it is not so uncommon a thing in Korea; also since I've been here everyone is saying how handsome I am and things like, "they will really like you at the girl's school." I guess my modest height and tinted eyes are are considered an exotic delight over here. It is nice, but I will try to not let it go to my head.

Once we arrived in Hadong I had a brief visit to each of the two high schools (boys and girls - right next to each other) where I would be teaching. Then I visited my home for the next year. The location is pretty good. On the negative side it is over a main street and fairly close to a train tracks, but it seems the trains don't run at night, and the street quiets down not too late. Besides that, my only complaint is that there was no hot water my first day - we took care of that quickly. The positives are many. I will post some pictures later as well, but to briefly describe it, the apartment is the third (top) floor above a little restaurant. The middle floor is the local go club. Does it get any better? The apartment itself has a bedroom with ample closet space. The bed is queen size, and a very very firm mattress. There is a small living room with a tv and nothing else besides an ironing board. The kitchen is well equiped with two burner stove, full size fridge, microwave, toaster, water boiler. The bathroom has a washing machine in it. The bathroom is of standard Korean style (with western toilet) which bears extra description: there is no separation between shower area and sink/toilet. The whole room is tiled with a mildly conical floor and one drain in the middle. Hopefully this means that it will be easy to keep clean, I will have to nip in the bud any shower mildew.

Then I was treated to my first Korean supper. The food was delicious, but the downside was that we ate in a traditional restaurant which meant sitting on the floor in front of a one foot high table. I am no good at sitting crosslegged for prolonged periods, perhaps it is a flexibility I will acquire in the coming months. The food: very spicy and garlicy, we had an acorn paste that was kind of like tofu, kimchee (of course), spicy potatoes and zuchinni, and a tender beef with sesame seeds and a mildly sweet very light sauce. There was a plate of lettuce leaves, the idea being to load up a leaf with whatever you want and eating it as sort of a green burrito.

After a quick trip to the store for some basic neccesities the day was done. Likely due mostly to the fact that I hadn't had a full night's rest in over 40 hours, my first night in Korea I slept like a babe.

First post, and only one to be written in LA

I'll try to keep this site updated with my trials tribulations and adventures in the Eastern hemisphere over the next year. I am leaving tomorrow night, so by now I have either packed up, donated, shipped for storage (thanks mom and dad), or sold almost everything I own. The best part of that was the knick-knack auction at Ernie's home-brewed wine party, the worst was occasionally feeling that my possessions were a burden / saying goodbye to some of them.

That is all for now. Check back for updates once I make it across. If my blogging does not satisfy your curiosity, try to talk to me over Skype as colin.hinde928 hopefully the time difference does not prohibit this option.