Finally an update on our South Korea adventure

Here is a letter I wrote my family of our travels and all that has gone on since arriving in Gunsan, South Korea. We really love it here and have already had such a great time. Pictures to follow.

Dear Family

I know Liji e-mailed everyone to let you know that we made it here and that everything is going well. Mom wanted a lot more detailed letter so here it goes. I am mostly writing all this to have for my own journal keeping but figured it would be easier to get the journal and the letter writing over all at once. Our travels went really smoothly. It was really long but we are grateful that we didn’t have any holdups. We headed to the Salt Lake airport at about 7:30 Tuesday morning and when we arrived in Seoul, South Korea it was 11 pm Wednesday night in Korea, which is 8 am Wednesday in Utah. So it took us a full 24 hours to get to the capital here but we still weren’t to our final destination in Gunsan. The longest part of the trip was from Portland to Tokyo; it was a 10 hour flight. I was worried about getting sick on the flight because I get motion sickness really easily. I did really great the whole flight until just before landing in Tokyo. I got really sick and felt like throwing up but they said when landing that quarantine officials would be coming on the flight to check any who have been sick or been around other sick people to quarantine thing because of possible swine flu cases. I was so worried that I would have to go through this huge ordeal if I threw up so I tried as hard as I could to hold it in and was able to. Coming off the plane in Tokyo it was so humid. It was bad for me because I already felt sick and so the humidity just seemed to envelope me and I felt very claustrophobic. I made it to our connecting gate though and then took my shoes and socks off and pulled my pants up to my knees and sprawled out on the seats available. I had broken out in a sweat and did not feel well and didn’t know how I was going to board another plane in just a little while. Luckily I was able to fall asleep for a few minutes and when I woke up I felt much better and was able to do pretty well on the next flight.
A man the school hired met us at the airport in Seoul and he took us to a hotel for that night and said he would come get us the next morning at 7:40 to take us back to the airport where we would catch a bus to Gunsan. As we came out of the airport the first thing I noticed was how smoggy it was here. The air is so polluted you can smell it. It is pretty bad, especially in Seoul, the capital. We were very tired and went right to sleep when we arrived at our hotel. I was thinking that 7:40 would not be very long to sleep but at 4 am Liji and I were both wide awake and weren’t able to go back to sleep because for our bodies it was 1 in the afternoon not the middle of the night. So we just got ready then and watched some Korean TV while we waited to be picked up. The bus ride to Gunsan was about 3 and half hours.
Jennifer, the principle at the school we are working for, picked us up at the bus station in Gunsan around noon. First she took us to the school we’ll be working at to show us around a little bit. It is a very small school. There are just 4 small classrooms that fit about 12-15 students squished in. And then there are 2 teacher offices. Then she took us to our apartment that is about a 15 minute walk away. Our apartment is nicer than I thought it would be and we have most everything we need. Some things are different than I am used to but everything has been a lot easier adjustment than I was expecting. We have a great view of the city from our balcony. The shower is kind of funny because there is no stall it is just a hose that goes up from the sink and hangs on the wall. We had a couple hours to be at our apartment and so we unpacked everything. Jennifer picked us back up at three and took us back over to the school so that we could meet the students. We thought we would just be there for a little while, but we ended up being there until 9 pm, because she meant she wanted us to meet all of the classes. I have never seen Liji so dead tired. He could barely even talk by the last class. The kids thought he was shy but it was just because he was so tired.
There were 6 classes and we basically spent the entire time answering questions that the students had for us and we also asked them questions to get to know them. The school is VERY relaxed. I think what surprised me the most about everything here was how relaxed they are. I think that it must be part of their culture that time is not a big thing. The students seem to come and go from the classrooms. Whether they are arriving late or going to the restroom or leaving early. There are 20 minute breaks in between each of the classes and the students run around being crazy. It was pretty fun to watch. The boys were wrestling in the small foyer area that the school has and jumping up and down on the couches. The boys seem to playfully punch each other a lot even right during the lessons and the teachers don’t say anything. They also just talk over each other during classes. It may have just been because it was kind of an unusual day with us coming to meet them. The students were very excited to meet us. As we came in the school the first class all had their heads poked out of the classroom door giggling and waving. Each of the classes asked a lot of questions. It was a good way to practice their English. Some were not shy at all about the things they asked and some of the students were very shy to speak English. The 15 and 16 year old girls have crushes on Liji and were not shy about announcing to the whole class how tall and handsome he is. I was surprised by how quickly some of the kids latched on to Liji and I. The boys all wanted to arm wrestle Liji and even me. I beat an 11 year old, luckily. It was really close though, he was tough. They also wanted to play rock, paper scissors a lot. And one 10 year old boy just came and sat on Liji’s lap like it was completely normal. We have seen a lot of people; like mother daughter or just friends be touchy feely with each other. I think another part of their culture is just that they are very comfortable with being touchy feely. It seems as though we are going to get to know the students very well and I’m excited about that. They are all such fun and cute kids; very welcoming. The kids could not believe how big our families are. For them having 10 or 11 siblings is just unheard of. They most siblings that any of the students had was 2. The teachers have been very helpful with anything that we need. Jennifer gave both Liji and I our own cell phones. It is too expensive to make international calls on them but we have them to call people here. Jennifer is also always bring us food. They have these really good pastries here and she has already brought us bread from there 2 mornings.
So we heard that the food is spicy and that is definitely true. Everything is very spicy. Liji and I are lucky that we like spicy food and have gotten ourselves used to it by eating a lot of spicy food because the food is even very spicy for us. If it was any spicier I don’t think I could eat it. Liji can handle really spicy also and it is almost too spicy for him. There had also been a lot of sea food and I’m having a hard time adjusting to that. Even food that is not fish, tastes like fish. They serve a lot of seaweed type food. They do have a lot more American brands than I was expecting. There is a huge store practically across the street from our apartment building, where we can get pretty much anything we need.
It has been hard to do things ourselves because we can’t read Korean so we don’t know what anything is. We still can’t figure out the internet in our apartment because the setup screen is in Korean and we have no idea what is what. Our first morning here we had to take cold showers because Liji couldn’t figure out how to turn the hot water heater on because he couldn’t read anything. There is this intercom in our apartment and late last night someone just started speaking over it in Korean. We thought someone was at the door but no one was there. Then around 6 this morning someone started speaking over it again and then they did again at 8. It is kind of funny. It is a man’s voice and hopefully it is nothing important because we have no idea what they are saying.
Liji wants me to put that our handyman for the apartment is a retired mechanical engineer. He is here right now fixing our sink in the bathroom that was broken. Jennifer just came over also and helped me set up our internet. So I should be able to keep in contact now a lot better. I guess that is all for now. We start actually teaching on Monday and I’m really excited about it. I guess that is all I will write for now. We have been having a good time and this is going to be such a great experience. I really love it here. The people are so nice. We have the coast and the mountains close and a lot to do in the city. Let us know how everyone is doing at home. I hope that all is well.
We love you.
/Christina