arrived alive
I don't even know whether I want to keep a blog, but it seems like a good enough way to share my ideas as I try to figure out why I'm here. So here goes, i guess.
The trip was very long. Three flights, one from Ottawa to Chicago, then Chicago to San Fransisco, then San Fransisco to Seoul. After that we pretty much drove the length of the country by bus and were picked up by our employers at the southern most large city in Korea to drive even further south to Naju City. All in all, the trip took something like 32 hours of travel time, which didn't even include any long layovers. Our layover in San Fran was so short that we barely made the plane and they were calling our names on the loudspeakers and such. That's never happened to me before. I also ended up leaving my suit in the coat check of our first flight, and still no idea if I'll get that back. I'm not getting my hopes up, as I've never heard anything good about United Air and the agent at the counter laughed when I asked if she thought they'd find it. Sucks, since that suit is the nicest thing that I own.
We brought our cat on this trip, which seemed like it was gonna be a nightmare. She was good and even pretty quiet, except when she wanted to use her litter box. Leta was taking her in her bag to the bathroom and setting up a makeshift litter box out of a collapsable shoebox and some litter in a ziplock baggy. When we finally got to our apartment, the cat ran around sliding on the linoleum crashing into things. The first chance she got once we left her to her own devices, she searched through our suitcases and found an unopened bag of her treats. Somehow she managed to tear the entire bottom open and eat until I can only guess that she was full. Several hours later when some of the other english teachers here came by, she got all excited and threw up. That was a first for her.
We got to our apartment at around 1AM local time and the next morning we sat through a full day of classes at the academy. We met the other teachers, including some who are going to stop teaching once we start on Monday. Jetlag was kicking my butt, tho, and the whole experience was one delirious blur. It was overwhelming at first, but by the end I realized that it won't be all that difficult once I relearn what a 'past participal' and the other verb tenses mean. The work will be intense, but with only six 45 minute classes a day (max) and our apartment only a couple minutes away, at least it won't eat up all of our time.
We arrived on the weekend of a festival. I'm still not sure how often they have these festivals, or what this means besides that a bunch of people open food stands and apparently give out free stuff. Our employer told us, though, that the food from those vendors is dirty and will probably make us sick... so we didn't do much besides walk through thick crowds of people and say hi to every tenth person or so who managed to notice how tall I am. The festival goes on all weekend, tho, so hopefully tomorrow we'll find something more exciting to do there. Tomorrow, Leta and I and a few other english teachers are going up to the nearest big city, Gwangju, to some 'international center' where foreigners congregate from surrounding cities and there are activites of some kind planned. The 45 minute bus into the city will only cost something like 90 cents, so might as well.
I haven't encountered anything too strange yet since I've been here. The first morning I woke up and went out on the balcony and saw some dad slap his crying toddler across the face in broad daylight surrounded by people... the kind of thing that would have the childrens aid society knocking at your door in the middle of the night in N America.
Okay, just remembered two things that were surprisingly strange to me. First, people here have a 'Korean age' and an 'international age'. In Korean age, when people are born they are 1 years old. Then, at the lunar new year some time early on our calendar year, everyone gets one year older... so somebody born in December could by two years old within a couple months. Second, we were told that people here believe in 'fan death'. Fan death is apparently a danger that comes from being in a room with no open windows or doors, usually while sleeping, with a fan on. Some think that it destroys the air particles in the room eventually asphyxiating you. Others think that the fan doesn't spit out as much air as it sucks in with the same effect. Either way, one of those superstitions that doesnt seem to be phased by a complete lack of scientific evidence to support it.
I'm gonna give it another go at sleeping despite my jetlag, so that's all for now.
The trip was very long. Three flights, one from Ottawa to Chicago, then Chicago to San Fransisco, then San Fransisco to Seoul. After that we pretty much drove the length of the country by bus and were picked up by our employers at the southern most large city in Korea to drive even further south to Naju City. All in all, the trip took something like 32 hours of travel time, which didn't even include any long layovers. Our layover in San Fran was so short that we barely made the plane and they were calling our names on the loudspeakers and such. That's never happened to me before. I also ended up leaving my suit in the coat check of our first flight, and still no idea if I'll get that back. I'm not getting my hopes up, as I've never heard anything good about United Air and the agent at the counter laughed when I asked if she thought they'd find it. Sucks, since that suit is the nicest thing that I own.
We brought our cat on this trip, which seemed like it was gonna be a nightmare. She was good and even pretty quiet, except when she wanted to use her litter box. Leta was taking her in her bag to the bathroom and setting up a makeshift litter box out of a collapsable shoebox and some litter in a ziplock baggy. When we finally got to our apartment, the cat ran around sliding on the linoleum crashing into things. The first chance she got once we left her to her own devices, she searched through our suitcases and found an unopened bag of her treats. Somehow she managed to tear the entire bottom open and eat until I can only guess that she was full. Several hours later when some of the other english teachers here came by, she got all excited and threw up. That was a first for her.
We got to our apartment at around 1AM local time and the next morning we sat through a full day of classes at the academy. We met the other teachers, including some who are going to stop teaching once we start on Monday. Jetlag was kicking my butt, tho, and the whole experience was one delirious blur. It was overwhelming at first, but by the end I realized that it won't be all that difficult once I relearn what a 'past participal' and the other verb tenses mean. The work will be intense, but with only six 45 minute classes a day (max) and our apartment only a couple minutes away, at least it won't eat up all of our time.
We arrived on the weekend of a festival. I'm still not sure how often they have these festivals, or what this means besides that a bunch of people open food stands and apparently give out free stuff. Our employer told us, though, that the food from those vendors is dirty and will probably make us sick... so we didn't do much besides walk through thick crowds of people and say hi to every tenth person or so who managed to notice how tall I am. The festival goes on all weekend, tho, so hopefully tomorrow we'll find something more exciting to do there. Tomorrow, Leta and I and a few other english teachers are going up to the nearest big city, Gwangju, to some 'international center' where foreigners congregate from surrounding cities and there are activites of some kind planned. The 45 minute bus into the city will only cost something like 90 cents, so might as well.
I haven't encountered anything too strange yet since I've been here. The first morning I woke up and went out on the balcony and saw some dad slap his crying toddler across the face in broad daylight surrounded by people... the kind of thing that would have the childrens aid society knocking at your door in the middle of the night in N America.
Okay, just remembered two things that were surprisingly strange to me. First, people here have a 'Korean age' and an 'international age'. In Korean age, when people are born they are 1 years old. Then, at the lunar new year some time early on our calendar year, everyone gets one year older... so somebody born in December could by two years old within a couple months. Second, we were told that people here believe in 'fan death'. Fan death is apparently a danger that comes from being in a room with no open windows or doors, usually while sleeping, with a fan on. Some think that it destroys the air particles in the room eventually asphyxiating you. Others think that the fan doesn't spit out as much air as it sucks in with the same effect. Either way, one of those superstitions that doesnt seem to be phased by a complete lack of scientific evidence to support it.
I'm gonna give it another go at sleeping despite my jetlag, so that's all for now.
posted by Pope Lithium at 2:14 PM
1 Comments:
"I realized that it won't be all that difficult once I relearn what a 'past participle' and the other verb tenses mean."
I smiled when I read that - as a result of my learning French, the structure and terminology of verb conjugation has been permanently imprinted on my brain :-) Past tense is especially tricky - you always have to be mindful of using the correct participe passé. On the other hand, English is a little less formalized. Moreover, since it's our mother tongue - i.e. it's instinctive and we don't have to think too much about our words - we tend not to actively think about the mechanics of the language itself.
So, ironically enough, when I do have to think about that kind of stuff, I tend to defer to my French background/experience. The concept & rules are the same, so I just translate & associate the jargon in my head.
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