My first day was Wednesday. I went in at 1 and filled out
some paperwork. I spent the day shadowing Mark’s classes because I’m his
replacement so most of his classes will be mine. Later in the evening I began
shadowing other teacher’s classes just to see what other people do with their
students. This has been invaluable to me because I have no TESOL experience
outside of the mock lessons I taught when I got my certification. I start
teaching officially next Thursday so I’m pretty sure I’ll be totally
comfortable teaching on my own by then.
After work I went out to dinner with Justin, Mark, Rob &
Zak to a place they said they go to often. It was right around the corner from
our apartments and they were pointing out places to me (the super market, a
cheap place to get food to bring to school, etc) on the walk. When we got to
the restaurant they ordered grilled and fried chicken. Umm… yum. Korean
restaurants (and other Asian restaurants, I’m assuming) bring you lots of side
dishes for free to go with your meal. That night we had a raisin-y salad thing
(I’m new here, and would like for you to not judge me for what I name things),
peanuts, and radishes. Its kind of like having bread at your table in American
restaurants or chips in Mexican ones. There was also beer. Korean Kristen
drinks beer now because she has not yet found wine. Seriously, who am I?
I went to bed pretty quickly after getting back to the
apartment. There’s really nothing else to do because I have no form of
entertainment to keep me busy. I’ve been taking sleep aids to help myself sleep
through the night and I think that’s why I haven’t been jetlagged. Since I got
here, there’s been a huge 2L bottle of water next to the sink that I haven’t
touched because I didn’t really understand if it was there for me since I’m
only here temporarily. I also noticed the seal was broken so I wasn’t trying to
take my chances on getting sick on sketchy water. But the night that I got back
here after the restaurant I was ready to take my sleep aid and didn’t have
anything to take it with like I did the night before. I stared at the bottle of
water. I weighed my options. Do I try and sleep without the sleep aid and risk
waking up in the middle of the night wide awake? Or do I take my chances on the
water and get a full night’s sleep? I walked over to the water, opened it, said
“Yolo”, and took my sleep aid. I’m still alive.
I’ve been carrying around the huge bottle of water since
then and I feel ridiculous drinking from it lol. But I’m really not trying to
get dehydrated and I haven’t been able to make it to the super market yet to get
smaller ones. The cafés I’ve been going to haven’t had bottled water available,
only pitchers of water or water machines with cups nearby.
Yesterday I got up at 10, showered, got ready for the day
and headed to a place that Mark pointed out to me the night before. I have no
idea what its called and refer to it in my mind as the place with the orange
sign. Its really nice because its cheap and there’s an English menu. When I
went there yesterday I learned that just because an establishment has an English
menu, this does not mean they speak English lol. I ordered some food and there
was so much that I couldn’t finish it. I have a baby bird appetite so I think
I’m going to get myself into some interesting situations here. I ate all of the
gimbap (Korean sushi), but still had tons of Ramyun left. I really should have
focused on eating the soup because gimbap is so much easier to pack up and take
with you. However the restaurant only had chopsticks and spoons available so
soup was a challenge lol. I am not yet chopstick proficient so I go for the
western silverware when I get the option. I finally was able to communicate
with a woman at the restaurant that I wanted to take my Ramyun with me and
there was no issue. I remember in France getting really good at acting out what
I wanted. I think I did a great job of making an imaginary box with my hands
and pointing to the door but my charades do not translate in Korean. I
figured it out. Google Translate. Murdering it.
After eating my food I still had like 2 or 3 hours before I
had to go to work so I headed to the café I went to Wednesday called Pioré
because I knew they had an outlet I could plug my computer into. I waited there
until it was time to go to school. Yesterday was nice because I got to skype
with people back home and let them know I’m alive.
School went well. I think I’m definitely getting the hang of
what I’ll be expected to do but I’m happy to be following people around until
next Thursday to really get the idea.
After work I was going to go out with some people but then
when I walked outside and got smacked in the face by the cold I didn’t want to
be anywhere but my warm apartment. As soon as we all walked outside there was
this disgusting smell that also smacked me in the face and Rob said “By the
way, Seoul smells like s***”. Good to know lol.
Kate was nice enough to lend me a fork so I could eat my
left over Ramyun and she also gave me some chopsticks to practice with so I
don’t look like an idiot when I go out to a restaurant without silverware. I
ate my food, took my pill and went to bed.
I’ve been sleeping on top of the blanket that was on the bed
when I got here because there's no sheet on the bed so I’m not trying to catch
anything (germ-a-phobe). I’m also covering the pillow with my hoodie lol. I
sleep with my little travel blanket on top of me. I watch How the States Got
Their Shapes until I feel myself falling asleep. Then I unplug the computer
from the wall so that the converter doesn’t fry my charger. I wake up with my
slippers and computer on the bed and this morning I rolled over to find Kate’s
chopsticks that I forgot about when I was eating my soup last night lol.
My next priority is getting some groceries so I don’t have
to buy food everyday and getting my medical check so I can get my Alien card.
Once I have that, I can get a phone and bank account.
I’ll write another blog post when something interesting
happens lol.
