The past week or Why I haven't published in a while

Friday Feb. 26

    Friday morning the entire SLP school, excepting myself and Judy (my Korean partner teacher) went to the preschool graduation ceremony.  Judy and I stayed at the school to prepare our classrooms for the first week of class.  This was both a good and bad thing as we had more time to prepare but no time to understand how the ceremonies go.  All of the teachers and secretaries went to a nice restaurant for lunch where they had a chocolate fountain and a self serve coffee machine that ground its own beans.  

     In the afternoon Laurence and Ulandi, English speaking teachers, arrived from South Africa.  I helped them learn about the buses and how to get to and from the hotel and school.  They were to stay in the hotel only until Sunday when they moved into their apartment that had been recently vacated by the departing English speaking teaching couple.

     I took them to a restaurant near our hotel for supper.

Saturday Feb. 27

     OK, I admit I was lazy and tired and I only left the hotel for supper eating some snacks for brunch.  I slept A LOT.  Not from jet lag, more from having worked for 10 to 12 hours with much stress each day.

Sunday Feb. 28

a view from the 8th floor

     I did not find a church that spoke English and I could not understand the schedule on the door of the place I am pretty sure was a church, so I didn't go to church.  In the afternoon I explored a shopping outlet that was nothing like an outlet mall.  The cheapest purse after the 50% discount was $200 US dollars.  I then went to the area where my school is and did some browsing and ate lunch/supper.  It started to snow and I took some photos of the town in snow.  More sleeping.

The building I work in.  My school is on the 8th floor.

Monday Feb. 29

    On Monday after school I went with the teacher whose apartment I was going to get to learn how to unlock the door, what the trash schedule was, where the apartment was located, how to use the heat, washing machine etc.  She told me about grocery stores, and many other tidbits that would come in useful.

Tuesday March 1

    Tuesday was a South Korean National Holiday.  I didn't get it off.  I took a taxi to school because I needed to take my suitcases with me (the first time I took a Korean taxi).  When I got to the building, the elevator wasn't running because everyone was to be off for the holiday so I had to wait for one of the school administrators to come to get my things up to the school.  The administrators were flummoxed by my having brought my things, but they had not told me what else I could do. 

     Stacy, one of the administrators took me to my apartment at 2 pm.  There was much cleaning to do and a trip to E Mart for bedding and other necessities.  (Korean beds are about as comfortable as sleeping on a non-carpeted floor!  It was OK for a few days at the hotel (even then my leg and arm went numb from sleeping on my side), but that won't work for an entire year so a mattress pad was necessary as well as some comfortable pillows and a proper sheet!  That was my first visit to E Mart.

     I was up until about 1 am cleaning and organizing my apartment.  No, the apartment is not large, you might even call it minuscule, but  that makes organization all the more imperative.

Wednesday March 2

     My first day of school was hectic and stressful.  So many things that people popped their heads in and said, "Didn't you __________?!"  when I said that no one had told me they acted like well I should have just gotten that information by osmosis.

     In one of my afternoon classes I handed out flash cards.  They were not important at all, just a way to get the 12 children to do something.  We had to give out books, take role, and try to teach on the first day in only 40 minutes.  Well, in all of the chaos (that class is notorious for being poorly behaved) I missed giving a card to one girl.  It just so happened her mother was watching the class on CCTV and couldn't understand why I would slight her child.  I heard about it from several of the Korean teacher afterward.  I wish I could apologize directly to the mother but she doesn't speak English or she would have realized it wasn't a big deal anyway!  Korean mothers are VERY overbearing!

     When the day was finally over I got to go home.  I bought some baskets I needed and some food on my way home.  When I got to the apartment I couldn't get in!!!!!  It was terrible.  I tried several times.  Finally I went to the convenience store next door and borrowed the cell phone from one of the clerks to call my school, but it was after 8 pm so no one answered.  I went back to my building and tried my door again with no result.  Thankfully a neighbor was exiting his apartment.  I asked him to help me and he tried the door then called my landlady.  She said to wait 10 minutes and try again if I couldn't get in to call her.  He gave me her number.  I tried unsuccessfully in 10 minutes and again 15 minutes after that so I returned to the convenience store.  The clerk called the landlady for me and she

came in about a half an hour.  (All of this was me speaking English and everyone else speaking Korean.  Don't tell me God can't translate!!!)  She took another 10~15 minutes to get the door open.  The door works with a key pad and apparently the batteries needed to be changed!

     I finally got into my apartment by about 10 pm.  Over 12 hours later than I left it.

Thursday March 3

     I bought a SIM card for my cell phone.

     It was another "first" day of school because it was the first day of the term for the Tuesday/Thursday students.  I got to go home "early" (after my last class) because of the night before.  After buying a SIM card I went to sleep.

Friday March 4

     Finally, the end of the week.  More junk at school, but I didn't stay past 7:15 pm because the other new teachers and I decided to come in over the weekend instead.

And that catches you up to this weekend!