First Week In Korea

So I'm in Korea and things are pretty fantastic. Other than a long plane flight with 4 layovers (Det, Chi, LA, Tokyo), I have no real complaints. I found out when I got to my room that I don't have a single, but I'll just have to deal with it. I met my new Peace Buddy (person the University I'm staying at matches you up with) when I arrived. She's awesome! Her name is Sein (she tells people like Saddam HusSEIN, but really it's like Say EEn). Even though she's young (19), I don't get irritated by her hahaha. She speaks three languages and is a Freshman at Ewha. So she's not too familiar with things herself. Leads to a more enjoyable exploration in my opinion.

I didn't mention this to anyone before I left, but about a week before departure, I got an email notifying me that Korea just recently had a big swine flu outbreak, so all the orientation dates were slightly changed. Also, when I landed in the airport, they had a quarantine thing setup and a pre screening booth where guys were wearing masks. One of them checked behind my ear with some kind of light stick thing. It wasn't a big deal though, not much of a hassle. The reason I chose to have my buddy pick me up at the airport was because I figured it'd be more convenient than taking the bus. We ended up taking the bus....So I spent an extra 30 bucks for nothing in a way. But the whole bus ride I talked to Sein about quick histories of ourselves. So it helped a lot. After getting my stuff to my dorm, I went out for ice cream with some of the other Peace Buddies and International Students (from here on out i will refer to them as IS).

Most of the IS's right now are German and French. There's a pretty good deal of Chinese as well and some Japanese. There are a hand-full of Americans. Since almost all the Germans are blonde haired and blue eyed, everyone thinks I'm German at first. It's pretty interesting having a majority of Europeans around (there's also people from Belgium, Denmark, Holland, Finland, etc). I'm jealous of the fact that Europeans can, for the most part, speak multiple languages. The IS's I've been hanging out with the most are German. My roomate is Chinese. I have yet to really get a handle on how he is.

I went out Friday night to a bar and a club, although not on purpose. I was just about to enter my room for the night when I got overwhelmed by Germans to go out. So, needing to make sure I network and not be a shut-in, I went out drinking. It was pretty fun and I got to meet some new people. I was going to end it after the bar, but then I ended up getting stuck with a Frenchman and Phillipino who couldn't speak any Korean whatsoever and who needed to get to the club. I ended up helping them out and taking a taxi with them. It was pretty cool because I talked to the cab driver during the whole ride (like less than 10 min lol). I asked him if he liked being a cab driver and that led to talking about culture. Our conversation ranged from where I was from to American vs Korean cigarrettes and how guns are pretty easy to get in the US and how you don't have to worry about them in Korea. The coolest part about all this, was there was only like one sentence I didn't understand he said, so it made me feel pretty good. I had gone to the bank the day before and felt miserable because my brain relapsed and my Korean was terrible. I somehow managed to get my account taken care of. Anyways, I went to my first Korean club and it was...a club haha. Lots of people, hot, and grimy. Plus it was in Hongdae and I don't like Hongdae. Hongdae is one of the major clubbing districts in Seoul and it's filled primarily with Korean Americans. The sucky kind. The kind that in the US are spoiled punks and when their parents let them stay in Korea they act like they're hot stuff. Only they're not. So being in a place I didn't really like, I decided to do what I normally do in a situation I don't like; make the most of it. So all I did was dance lol. Went up to the main stage area by the DJ and just vibed out. No one could really dance, so I mainly just danced by myself and earned props from random people. And it made the Germans love me more haha. Only problem was it was way too freaking hot. So I left early (early in Korea when it comes to clubbing is 3am believe it or not). Most the time people stay out until 6am ish. Screw that. I don't like clubbing.

I recently have been getting contacted by my friends from 2 years ago who are in Korea. I met up with Heejung Nuna on Sunday. So she spread the word pretty darn quick about me being here. It was awesome seeing her again. She's living in a nice place working as a tutor and getting ready for either Med School or Graduate School next semester. We gave each other full updates on what's been going on in our lives the past two years. I guess I'm as famous in her family as she is in mine haha. She lives about 40 minutes from where I live, so I can't necessarily visit her whenever I want. I'm going to try though. Especially since I need to refrain from spending too much time with Sein. I realized that tonight actually. The buddy program has changed a bit (more strict), so I don't want to get her into any trouble. Plus it's way too easy to speak English with her. And that's the last thing I need to be doing; giving me an easy out and speaking English. I've been meeting people left and right though, so as long as I don't just go introvert, I won't have any problems making friends.

I plan on trying to join some of the student clubs here. That should make things more fun and help with the Korean. There's a hip hop dance club that I'm going to look into. I don't know if they'll want a bboy, but you never know. Also, there's a korean sword fighting club. I don't know the difference, so I'd like to see. I walked into the student union today and got heavily recruited for a bunch of random ones haha. Like one was a musical another was bird watching. I might actually go to the bird watching one. They made the best case haha. I'm still looking into bboy crew practice spots. It's been a little difficult because all the sites and forums are in Korean and my Korean isn't that great. This Saturday is the UK Bboy Championship Korean Eliminations (competition to see which crew from Korea will go to the UK to rep). It's free and I plan on going. Hopefully I'll make some contacts there. At the end of September is the R16 Korea World Championships. This isn't an elimination, but the final round of R16. So the best crews from around the world will be there. It's going to be sick! This one costs like 18 bucks a ticket though. Not bad at all.

Lastly, I took my Korean Placement test Friday afternoon. After the written part, I felt terrible and depressed. Right after was an interview, which made me even more anxious. But I think because I already felt like crap and didn't think it could get worse, I talked really freely and thus pretty well. I tried my best to charm the interviewer so as to make it less scary. So this time around I did the opposite of how I normally do (well on the interview, bad on the test). I ended up placing into Level 2, which is intermediate. I think the first week is review because we're learning stuff that I literally learned 2 years ago the last time I was here. If it doesn't pick up, then I might have to ask to be moved up. We'll see. The first week of classes is just like in the US; you don't really do much because people are still sorting things out. There's also a period to figure out which other classes you want to take. Because Korean is 9 freaking credits (I have class everyday from 8-11am. Yes, class starts at 8am every morning), I can only take up to 3 other classes. To make things more frustrating, a lot of classes I want to take, I can't because they're in the same time slot as my Korean class. The 2 I know for sure right now are: History of Modern Korea and Dance, Gender, and Sexuality. The two I have to pick between (or neither) is Ecotechnology and Textile Design Coordination. The Eco one is about using environmental friendly technology. The textile one is a fashion class haha. I was hoping it'd be about design your own things (like furniture, clothing etc.) but instead its designing the designs that go on those things (so like the designs on sofas, wallpaper, prints on certain clothes. Not actual clothes or furniture). It was quite humorous. When I walked in people thought I was lost because I def don't look the part of a fashion major. To add to the humor, I straight up asked if I could even do the class because I literally know NOTHING about fashion. And because the Korean academic school year starts in the beginning of the year (unlike ours where it starts in the fall), this was like class II (so more advanced). At first the teacher said she doubted it, but I was welcome to check it out. By the end of the 3 hour class, I had her wanting me to stay for the whole semester haha. Not only do I provide a man's eye, but apparently I understand the concepts really well without even knowing anything. The first day you start your first design called a 5 star. Which is essentially wallpaper or something for a couch or pillow. Those patterns that are just one thing but repeated in a way that makes it look complex. Anyways, I had no freaking clue what to draw, but the premise was pretty simple. I had to make a picture that could be easily symmetric and/or geometric. The key to my success is Dante. She said before you draw your design, think of what it would go on. So I thought wallpaper. But the typical thing that is drawn is some kind of floral pattern. Well I don't know nothing about flowers, so I thought what can I do? I thought about Dante and then Trains and "Uncle Kevin play trains?" And so I drew a train station with train tracks that perfectly intersect and repeat. I was told I had to add more to it for more detail, so I thought, 'what else does Dante like?' Coal cars and trucks. So I added that. And the teacher was incredibly impressed by my design hahaha. So I thanks to Dante, I designed wall paper for a baby boy. We'll see if I actually keep the class though. It's not really appealing to me other than the fact that it's a chance to learn something I won't otherwise try learning and all the other students are native Koreans. So it might help me with the networking thing I want to do.

Well I hope that was a good enough update. Hopefully it'll appease you guys for now hahah. I'm loving it here and doing well. My main concern is forcing myself to get over my insecurity of speaking Korean wrong. But the way things are going, I'm pretty darn certain I'll be improving by leaps and bounds. Oh, I have some videos, but I'll post those later. Peace