Day 3 in Korea

Well where do I start? This has been a whirlwind couple of days and I wouldn't know where to begin to describe all of the things that I have seen, smelled, heard, tasted or what but I, the intrepid hero of the blog, will try.

I arrived at Incheon International Airport on August 25th, which is the 24th for anyone on the other side of the international dateline, and immediately had my temperature taken by the friendly airport staff-- looking for Pig Flu. The flight over had been nice and thankfully direct from Seattle to Korea. I watched some movies and tried memorizing some more Korean words but found it more interesting talking to the nice Filipino man next to me. Once through customs I need to withdraw money and as per my instructions from the school, make a phone call to the school letting them know I had arrived and then take a bus to a meeting place where I would then be taken to a motel where I would be in "quarantine"-- more about that later. I was able to find an ATM at the airport then take a bus (for $7) from Incheon to northern Seoul to the designated location, meeting several friendly English speaking denizens of this place along the way. At the stop I met "Jimmy," who talks as much as I don't, and we went to the motel and as soon as we walked into the room he told me to take off my shoes and put on house slippers because that's just how they roll in Korea. There are also separate sandals for the bathroom in case you were wondering. He left and told me he would be back at 8:30am to take me to the doctor for a medical exam-- but not without telling me not to eat the expensive corn flavored sodas in the mini-fridge.

Sleep was not what it usually is seeing as I had been up for over 24 hours at that point and I woke up at 4:30am Korean time which was probably 1 in the afternoon in Seattle. I then watched TV on my 27" LCD screen in the room (FYI that is pretty humongous) and hacked someone's unsecured network for my laptop since the computer in the room is not working properly. Once Jimmy arrived we went to the hospital where they drew enough blood to make Dracula sleepy, 2 cups of urine (one covered the other open), chest x-rays-- not sure why, blood pressure, height, weight, and looked in my mouth and asked me if I had diseases. Best medical exam ever! Actually, aside from the blood I'm not sure what was up with half of that. I guess I get my pig flu results back later. I hope I don't have it!

Speaking of the infamous pig flu that is why I am "quarantined." I use parenthesis because I can pretty much do what I like during my free time and I have visited the school several times in the last two days. Its basically a feel good thing for parents to think that we aren't coming in contact with their kids because I might be infected, maybe from the plane? Definitely not from the very densely populated metropolis of North Bend... So the last two days I have spent, instead of a thorough 3 day training at the head office, at a coffee shop next to the school with the director and sometimes teachers from the school, becoming overwhelmed with the strange new job that I am to undertake. I have about 8 different kinds of classes I am teaching and about 30 plus different classes in the week. We'll see if I can make it a week and remember it all. One day at a time? I know its al-anon's thing but I might need some serious drinks tonight or soon to relax. Its been one of the most intensive things I've had to do since my initial lifeguard training back in high school.

Last night me and my neighbor, Katie, who is also new, spent three hours wandering the streets of Seoul and not really getting that much wiser on how to navigate this place except to place all your faith in the metro.

Today I skipped breakfast and for lunch found some gimbop, Korean veggie sushi from what I can tell, and some deep fried squid legs-- delicious both! I've also had some Korean style chicken fried pork covered in cheese, had amazing kimchee and some pickled radish/turnip thing and on the plane had some bibimbap which I would recommend hands down. It came with a tube of hot sauce, which made the author extremely glad he chose Korea. I should also say that food is CHEAP!

Other things of note are the girls here are always wearing mini-skirts and high heels and on TV on two different stations I have seen broadcasts of former tournaments of the computer/video games of Starcraft, Warcraft 3, and Mortal Kombat-- all with live commentary from "sports" casters. I don't know if all of the readers of this blog will know what those are but lets just say that gaming in a big deal here and the superstars of these tournaments are professionals and make their living off playing these games. Holy cow.

That's too much to read or write for that matter in one sitting so I'll get back to chilling in my love motel.

Hasta luego

1 Day Left in the USA

Hello and welcome to my blog.

I guess we can call it a travel blog or maybe not since I am moving and won't be constantly "traveling." As you probably know I am moving to Seoul, South Korea and this will be the official source for all your inquiries on how Korea is going. This is a pretty big move for me even though I have lived and traveled abroad before just never for this long and never to any East Asian country. So lets do the list; I've been to Canada, Mexico, France, Argentina and Chile-- but not in that order. While I will be living in South Korea, I will probably hit up Japan, and am open to economical suggestions while I am in the so called Orient.

I will be teaching conversational English at a private academy, called a hagwon, through YBM in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul. Seoul is a city of over 10 million people (23 million in the Seoul metro area) and will officially be the most populated city to which I have ever even been.

More details to come once I am settled in Seoul and I hope that you either find this blog interesting enough to check out maybe once a week. I will try and update more often that that however. For fans of my last blog while I was studying in Chile, I hope this one is much better and more entertaining.

Contact info:
Email: sidebyrnes@gmail.com
Skype: sidebyrnes@gmail.com
MSN: escabeches@hotmail.com

Please write, comment, and or send me care packages filled with lengua tacos.

Sincerely,
Danny