An official update

Let's see...the last time that I wrote was on Tuesday. This makes it roughly a week since I last gave an update.

Addendum: I was pretty tired when I wrote this and I forgot to spell check. I couldn't stand leaving it the way it was.

Wednesday: Fairly uneventful. I did something in the day, but it was so inconsequential that I really don't remember what I did. Thursday was the same way. Thursday echoed this same feeling. On boring days, I usually go out and just walk around for a bit, looking for something funny or worthy of a picture. I have some pictures that I need to save for another entry since this one will have enough updates. Skipping ahead to Friday...

Friday: I was a little tired of sitting at Ada's with nothing much to do. It's been somewhat boring when there aren't people to do things with. I mentioned this to Ada hoping that she would have energy to go out and see a movie, or to a later dinner or something like that. She mentioned that a co-worker of hers was celebrating her birthday on Friday night and I would be welcome to join Ada at the restaurant. I was pretty stoked because it was an opportunity to meet more people and eat at a new place. Ada and I, collectively, combine to make an excellently late pair. We were supposed to be at the restaurant by 9:45PM since it was about 30 minutes away. She checked her phone at 10:00PM as we walked out of her apartment...making us a solid 40 minutes late.

As we entered the Czech-themed restaurant (I wish there were a better synonym), I realized how awkward this dinner would be: I wasn't hungry, I was the only non-teacher, I was the only male and I was the youngest. The table was comprised of this combination (moving left): Me, Canadian English teacher, English school owner and teacher (her children were around five years old), English teacher from Minnesota, English teacher from Korea, birthday-girl (English school teacher), some woman that I didn't chat with, another woman that I didn't talk to, the birthday-girl's mother and finally Ada. A little overwhelming for me.

The coolest thing about this dinner was when they brought the birthday drink. I hadn't seen anything like this before, although that doesn't necessarily mean that it is uncommon back home. Anyways, the manager stacked the drinks and poured them down in a fountain-like fashion. Then he lit it on fire! It was so cool! We stayed at dinner before deciding to go a night club.

I will freely admit that I had never been to a dance club. I really didn't know what to expect. I was actually surprised to have fun. They played songs that I knew! I was so surprised to be having a good time that it quickly became 4AM before Ada or I really understood it was so late. We grabbed a cab back home.

About a week and a half ago, Ada informed me that she had a friend coming to Korea sooner than she initially thought. Somewhere in email correspondence, Ada thought her friend was coming in late March when the friend actually arrived mid-February. Ada politely asked me, at the time, if it would be okay for her friend to move in on Saturday or Sunday (February 24th or 25th) and for me to find someplace else. I naturally agreed and passively asked a couple people if I could stay with them for a couple days. I felt uncomfortable moving into the dorms because Ewha had several emails that stated I needed to alert the university if I would be coming early by February 10th or so. The exact date is lost to me right now.

Saturday afternoon was the sad day that I left Ada's and moved into a temporary dorm. I asked Ewha mid-week if Saturday afternoon was an acceptable time to move, which they told me there was still space. The subway trip from Sindaebang to Ewha University is about ten stops or so, equaling roughly 20 minutes. I spent my late morning packing all my things into a combination of my suitcase, computer bag and backpack until I roughly had a working system. It also meant that I needed a lot of space on the subway and bus. I felt really bad because the club left my clothes with a smoky aroma, which caused me to ask Ada if I could use some of her perfume to overpower the smoke, all combined with the sweat of dragging all my stuff around Seoul. Nobody on the subway seemed too compelled to move away from me, but I smelled it the whole trip to Ewha.

My first roommate was French, as I mentioned before. He had plans to go out with some of the international students and kindly invited me to come with them to dinner. I agreed, eager to meet some new people. If I remember correctly everyone that was there, there were: 3 Americans (myself included), 2 Germans, 3 French and 1 Dutch woman. At dinner, the numbers fluctuated as some more people joined and then some left. After we were done at around midnight, half decided to go home and half decided to dance at a club. It was fairly early, so I thought it would be fun to attend another club. On the way there, we ran into the Dutch group (4) and they came with us. The first place was pretty boring, so of the original 10 that came to the club, 5 of us left and 5 stayed. I left with the Dutch group, being the only one who didn't understand Dutch.

We went to another club, spent about a half-hour there and then left with a feeling of boredom. As we were walking in the general direction of Ewha, we saw a karaoke bar. Naturally, I was pretty stoked to impress these Europeans with the sonorous voice of American musical talent. I thought the hhighlight of the night was hearing one of the guys trying to rap to "Stan" by Eminem...he knew the song, but was consistently 3 words behind.

I got back to my room around 3:30AM. I showered and sailed off to a blissful night of sleep for my first dreams at Ewha. Or so I thought at the time. My roommate arrived back around 6AM (he stayed with the second group), which woke me up. The Ewha doors are really advanced with automatic locks and voices...no, I am not crazy. When I hit the unlock button, the door tells me something in Korean. When I shut the door, it says something in Korean. When I enter the combination to unlock the door, since we don't use keys, it says something in Korean. I know -- really neat. The speakers on the door also carry messages to those inside...as I learned at 7AM when I heard they were going to be cleaning the dorms that day. The first one must have been around 7AM, followed 10 minutes later by the same message. Didn't sleep through either of those. My next estimate is that at 8AM the cleaners were on the third floor (my room was 302) since I could hear them yelling in the halls. At around 8:30AM, a woman opened my door to clean the room and noticed that my roommate and I were still asleep. I collapsed until 11 when I just couldn't stand wasting anymore time trying to sleep. My damn roommate didn't wake up at any of that and even made a point to stress how well he slept.

One of the Americans that I met on Saturday had only been in Korea for a day. He was eager to go out and explore, but was apprehensive about going out on his own (perfectly understandable). I informed him that I was going out on Sunday to look for a new phone and he was welcome to come, not necessarily to buy a phone, but just to see new parts of the city. I told him I was going to Yongsan, located near the electronics market. I met him for breakfast (although it was well past noon) and we met up with the Dutch group. They wanted to come as well. I had a pretty good day at Yongsan, mostly quantified by finding my game, and that overshadowed the absence of my phone ringing Sunday night. I also liked the feeling that at that moment, to my American friend, it appeared that I knew everything...

On Sunday night, my PEACE buddy Youna emailed me back just to say hello and explain her recent schedule. She mentioned that she had to pick up a new student from the airport who moved in on Sunday -- an American from Minnesota. Since I hadn't found my phone yet, I was going to go back to Dongdaemun and buy something cheap just so I could start making calls. I invited her to join me on the trip. Her name is Rebecca and she is also really cool. It was nice spending the day with her. I finally found a phone that would work at a reasonable price (about $20). Rebecca already had a phone she bought on Sunday with Youna, but Rebecca needed to establish an account before her prepaid service could start. It was amazing, but it somehow took us over an hour of waiting until she had her phone working. I couldn't believe how long it took. The whole experience was so overwhelming that both Rebecca and I were fairly fatigued. I didn't get a chance to set my phone up because I didn't feel like waiting for another hour to get it working while Rebecca just waited. We went back to Ewha while she was looking forward to a nap. We stopped to eat Kim Bab on the way home (that is how it supposed to be spelled...Kim Bab and not Kimbop...one of the benefits I've received from reading). I led her back and took off to get my phone working.

The little SK store I stopped at that handled phone accounts took care of me in 15 minutes. My phone is finally up and working!!!

I got back to my dorm and checked my email, called people to give them my phone number, and started on this update. Midway into my third paragraph, one of the Dutch guys (Marc) came by to see if I wanted to go out and do something. I was interested since the phone success energized me. He told me that he moved out of his temporary dorm and into his permanent one due to the I-House office's concern over how busy it will be on the 27th (the official move in day). Marc suggested that I should move out as a courtesy as well as the chance to avoid the cluster of others moving at the same time. I agreed so I went to get my pin number for my new place (directly below the temporary room). Pictures of my room at the end of this post.

I was in a movie mood. I originally expected that we would put a DVD on the big-screen TV, but the Dutch guys were more interested in seeing something at the theater. At dinner with Rebecca, I asked her if she would be interested in watching a movie following her nap. She said she would likely be up for it. Marc and Ralf (the other Dutch guy) asked the Dutch girls over MSN if they wanted to see "Across the Universe." I didn't know anything about it. I asked Rebecca if she was interested in joining us, which she was, so we gathered to go see the movie.

I throughly enjoyed it. The art style was nice, complimenting the music and juxtaposition of the stories, but I felt the main character's segment was lacking. I was much more interested in seeing other characters grow as opposed to Jude (protagonist).

Rebecca brought some snow with her to Korea! For the first time since I've been here, suffering through days well below freezing, it finally snowed! It trickled down most of the day to create a nice veil over the ground. After the movie, I was childishly delighted to make snow angels and engage in an international snow fight...nobody else shared my enthusiasm and I had to fight to get one (only one) to make a snow angel with me. For the record, mine was more beautiful.

We all said goodnight and I walked into my new dorm room. I literally just removed my sweatshirt when there was a knock at my door. I opened it to find my old French roommate asking me if I wanted to go out and play in the snow! How cool is that?! So I naturally agreed to join him and two other students to go outside and play. I stopped by one of the Dutch girl's room to ask if she wanted to join us...her initial reaction was mild, at best. I felt it appropriate to start a speech about the window of youth leaving and this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I stand by this conviction. How many Westerners can say they played in the snows of Korea? Exactly. In the process of my speech, which was quite passionate but succinct, one girl exited her room to tell me to be quiet. I felt really bad because I didn't realize how well my voice was traveling.

Once outside, the French guy (Jeremy, probably not spelled that way) started attacking us with snowballs...it took me 15 minutes to realize that he was the only one that brought gloves. The rest of us outside tried to mount an offense against him, but had trouble keeping pace due to our numb hands. Jeremy spent most his time throwing snowballs at this German girl, so while they were off fighting, I built a snowman with an American student named Nuh (pronounced new, but I am clueless how to spell it).

I came inside and finished my journal entry. Now, at 4:30AM, I am ready to go back to sleep. The Korean language class is Monday - Friday at 8:30AM...my hours will need to change really quick...



This is Brian the morning that he left for Thailand. I gave him two options: I could use the picture I took while he was sleeping or this one where he is brushing his teeth. Just in case some don't get my sense of humor, I didn't tell him about the sleeping one.










Here is Ada and Jasmine.














This is my dorm bed. I would estimate that the room is about 18 feet across and 14 feet wide. There is quite a bit of space here, which I am unsure is reflected in my estimations. I usually take my height as the standard and then I lay down across the room.










We have a balcony! How cool is that?! After this picture was uploaded, I realized it would have been better to step outside and take a picture of the walkway below, or the graduate dorms...but I am pretty tired right now. As long as you realize I have a balcony, I am happy.










Self-explanatory. Our hands were too cold to do much else and Jeremy kept attacking, causing us to continually use the base as a snowball.












I had to end with this picture. This door is seriously like one of the coolest things ever. On the bottom right is the box that talks to me. There is also a button I push that automatically locks the door. I can set it so when I close the door, it just locks. I never have to worry about keys because I know the number, so I can always open it. The light on the ceiling turns on when I enter! So I never have to come into a darkened room.