Greetings from Korea!

You guys.

I know, I know. I have been TERRIBLE at updating. As in, totally not doing it at all.

For all of you readers out there that are not Facebook friends with me or my mother (sup mom?!), I made it to Korea safe and sound almost three weeks ago! Let's go into some details:

The Flights
...were all fine and actually quite pleasant. I barely slept on the long flight over but they had some pretty good movies and I had my iPad with books. I was in the window seat and we had the middle seat open so it was quite an enjoyable experience.

The Landing Fiasco
My bag got lost!!! This happened in Norway, too, so I was prepped for it by putting a majority of what I needed in my carry-on. The bag that they lost was the one with all of my extras, including my shoes. It was a pretty annoying situation for four days, but I eventually got my bag. The hardest part was that I didn't have a cell phone number to be contacted at until the day of. What actually happened to the bag is INSANE as is the follow-up:

The actual tag on the bag (yes, the giant fucking sticker) FELL OFF in transit from St. Louis to Chicago. Because of that, they needed me to describe a unique item that was easy to find as an identifier.

My mom got me a mini-calendar of Bichon Frise puppies in my Christmas stocking this year. She thought that it could remind me of my pup when I'm in Korea. I left it on the mantel for two months and totally forgot about it. She must have asked me five times while I was in St. Louis if I wanted to bring it. I didn't feel like I NEEDED to (none of the puppies in that calendar could be as cute as my fluffy boy anyway) but I said I would to make her happy.

Well, a few days before I left, she took the calendar and put it on top of my suitcase herself and said that she wanted to make sure I remembered to take it. As I was packing, I put it in the front pocket as a last-minute item.

Guess what my unique easy-to-find identifier was?!?!

Moral of this story: LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER.

The First Night
I also found my driver and he was very mad at me for taking a long time with my bag. By the time we were in the car on the way to Suwon, it was late, I was tired, and I was upset about my bag being lost. Just when I was falling asleep in the back, he asked me if I liked K-Pop. I just kind of said 'yeah yeah' exhausted, but politely. Not two seconds later, he started BLASTING some K-pop band at a volume level that I can only compare to a 16-year-old the first time they get their license. WELCOME TO KOREA!!!

After I got to my apartment and my boss came with two other new coworkers, we took my things up and then went out for dinner. After dinner, we all went to HomePlus (I'm seriously going to have to do an entire fucking post on HomePlus because it is so so so amazing!!!) and I got shoes to wear to school since I only had my Ugg boots. All of my other shoes were in the lost bag. Then I went home and got a solid 4 hours of sleep.

That jet lag lasted a pretty long time. I think by the end of the first week, I had gotten maybe 14 hours in four nights. I finished the first week off by a night drinking with coworkers and that forced sleep did it for me. Lesson: always drink to mitigate jet lag.

The School
I will do many many future posts on my school but here are my impressions after two full weeks of teaching:

• My coworkers are amazing and I could not be luckier
• My kindergarteners (Korean 5-year-olds, American 4-year-olds) are half cute, half annoying as fuck. Two of them are super smart and love school and the other two can't make it through a day without having a temper tantrum and crying fit so bad that they have to go to the Korean teacher. And I'm not going to coddle a screaming child. Get your shit together and get the fuck over it. Can you guess which two are cute and which two are annoying?
• Lower elementary (1st and 2nd grade) is terrible. They are just terrible. I teach several classes and they are all annoying as can be.
• Upper elementary (3rd through 5th grade) is awesome. Further evidence of my third grade girls being the best people in the world to come in a future post.
• While the hours are hard and the rules can be strict, I'm pretty happy with my school. I get paid very well and there are a lot of bullshit parts that I don't have to do that I know other teachers have to do at their schools.
• Also, these kids are fucking geniuses. One of my four-year-olds can READ. What the fuck? Can American four-year-olds even form sentences??

The Apartment

...will be fully covered in a subsequent post, hopefully involving an apartment tour video. The basics are that it is bigger than most but it is not ultra modern and chic like some. I wasn't too happy with it at first but now that it's becoming my own, I'm liking it more and more. And the location is amazeballs.

The Neighborhood

Just assume that every section of this post from here on out will have future posts going into more detail. I'm just trying to get my bases covered so that I can move on with my life and this blog and not feel like I have this post hanging over my head. Anyway, the location of my apartment and school is awesome! It feels very neighborhood-y and there are tons of businesses but not HUGE CITY-ish like other areas that I've seen. If I had to describe it in Minneapolis terms, I basically live in the Uptown of Suwon. And if you're not in Minneapolis, reevaluate your life choices.

The Nightlife

Oh where to start. Soju is cheaper than water. It's definitely a capital T that rhymes with P that stands for Pool. Also, I knew it was trouble when I walked in. And there is a HIGH possibility that I could be lying on the cold hard ground (OK, you can do a lot with calling an alcoholic beverage 'trouble'). In summary, it is fun and I will update more.

The Shopping

KOREAN COSMETICS. THIS LAND IS MY PERSONAL MECCA. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. YES, THIS SECTION DESERVES ALL CAPS BECAUSE IT IS ALL THAT AMAZING!!! HOMEPLUS IS THE GREATEST THING TO COME OUT OF THE LAST 500 YEARS OF INDUSTRY!

The Sights

Because I work a lot, I haven't done TOO much sight-seeing yet but I'm working on that. I went to the Suwon Fortress and that was awesome. There are so so SO many things to see and do in Korea and I just want to do it all. As my friend Sara and I keep saying, there hasn't been a single thing that I HAVEN'T wanted to do yet!

Bottom line: I'm very, VERY happy that I came here and that I'm doing this. 

Even though there are times when I wish that corporal punishment was allowed, I feel like this is definitely the best thing for me to be doing right now. Teaching is SUCH a big challenge and it's made even more of a struggle living in a new place. That's what is so awesome about this: I get to have accomplishments every day! It started with simple things like successfully being able to order a coffee at Starbucks and just today, I got through my first 40 minute class with all four of my kindies without any tears. HOW YOU LIKE ME NOW!?

I PROMISE to be better about posting and to upload pictures!

Thanks for reading this ridiculously long summary!