Day 2- I will survive :)

So I am officially coming to an end of my 2nd full day in Korea and it is amazing at how easy things are to get the hang of.  To finish off where I left off in the last post, I moved into my NEW APARTMENT which is honestly super tiny yet a lovely little home, it’s really all you need for one person.  I walked into the bathroom and noticed a tiny shower head in the corner of the washroom and wondered how well that would turn out, I took a shower and found out that everything in there gets soaked (toilet, towel, toilet paper) so I am going to need to figure out how the heck I plan on taking a shower where no water gets on certain areas of the bathroom...hmm Challenge accepted! :P

I moved in and found the place to be decorated pretty nicely from the last teacher that lived here, along with little things here and there that she had left behind. After unpacking my things I found myself to feel a lot more at home and as if I belonged.  It really is amazing how seeing familiar belongings makes an individuals comfort level sky rocket.  Basically I love my little apartment, the bed is pretty hard but hey, I can work with that!  

One of the interesting aspects of my living here is the amount that electronics play a role in day-day activities, my door is literally a key code where I have to put in a password to get inside the building as well as my own personal living space...so many numbers to remember ahhhh! However with the amount I am going out and in I should be able to remember it in about a day! I will post some pictures afterwards. 

Lunch with the Foreign teachers here went lovely, they are super outgoing and kind, I notice that most foreign teachers here are really friendly due to the amount of people that come in and out of lovely Korea, they are on perma-nice mode (although I am sure there are some not so pleasant ones but I have yet to meet them).  The girls took me to an Italian restaurant which was actually delicious, I had no idea what to expect but the food was great AND they paid (so thoughtful and encouraging).  One super cool thing they do here is drizzle their pizza with honey...hmm I wonder if that would be good on the pizza at home, someone try it and let me know! :)

Anyways so after the dinner and debriefing about school and the kids I made a journey by myself to Seoul to meet a girl from church. I live in a city called Dongbaek and there is no subway system here so my journey to Seoul involves a 45 minute bus ride to start off.  The bus ride is air conditioned and much needed alone time so I actually look forward to the bus rides...until I came home later that night where it was so packed that I had to stand on a bus holding on for my life as the bus is going super fast down the highway like a crazy wild llama who is blind (meaning that its almost impossible not to touch someone awkwardly from all the crazy turns).  These busses do have seatbelts however, the people standing up have no hope...I was afraid for my life at least 15 minutes of the ride but after watching people sleep while standing I decided to accept the fact I was new and would need to own the experience.  I imagined myself to be surfing in Hawaii and it made all the difference to my 45 minute journey back home.  

Another interesting fact here is that babies and children do not sit in car seats, their parents hold onto them...which makes sense...sorta.  On my journey the bus drivers also text while driving which explains the crazy jerking motions, I may throw up on one of these trips so I have decided to bring a little bag with me! Haha  anyways, I finally arrived to my destination safely and met up with a bunch of amazing people and went out for dinner and ice cream which was super scrumptious! They have Earl Grey icecream here, who knew? It is really tasty!!!

Moving on, today I woke up and went to Church in Seoul so I did the same journey I did last night and it went well, I met up with a friend from Canada who is also here and went exploring.  It is crazy at how good it feels to see a familiar face!!! We went out to eat (a common act here) and then went to church together which was fun!  One of the coolest things happened today while walking to Church I heard someone yelling my name but I thought to myself, "there is no way the person is yelling for me, I KNOW no one other than the people I am with now who would be in Korea" so I kept walking and kept hearing my name and turned around to find a girl I knew in Toronto who was originally from Korea and she was headed to church too! It's amazing to me at how small a world we all live in and even though we are far away we are all really connected (profound, I know). 

After church we went out AGAIN to eat (don't worry folks, I only got a drink).  However, the set up of the food courts is pretty awesome.  You walk into the food court and there is a display of all the food they have with numbers beside them, you pick which food you want and then tell the cashier the number.  She then punches in your food and gives you a ticket.  All around the displays are the "restaurants" which have electronic displays that ding your number and you go to pick up your food when you see the number flash along the screen...it is pretty "new-age".  I am telling you, Korea is very high-tech!!!!

All in all today was a good day spent with people from church and I again went home alone which was super exciting because I was able to read some of the Korean signs AND I am picking up a few sayings already which is encouraging.  I cannot wait to be able to communicate with all these amazing people, everyone here is generally really nice and I have made the decision to enjoy myself!  Mind over Matter!!!

I start teaching tomorrow which is the new thing to worry about but the theme is NEW and therefore I am going to take it step by step and I know that I will eventually know what I am doing.  Well on that note it is time to skype with my family so I shall be off!

Wish me luck at my first day of school!!!