Arrived in South Korea and Already SO BUSY

On the way to Korea, I realized that most of what I knew about Korea was from Squid Game (the show), Train to Busan (the movie), and a book called Pachinko... And an assortment of outdated blogs when I did a little research. We're now gradually figuring things out but there is so much to do!

It has now been 48 hours since we arrived. So far we have spent our mornings getting organized, making lists of things to buy for the apartment (eg. pillows for the bed and clothes hangers), shopping for essentials, figuring out the subway system, researching how things work here, and walking to new destinations. Our afternoons are spent at the school. We spend the first 3 hours learning from other teachers who are making their lesson plans, and learning where things are. The next 3.5 hours we are assigned classes to shadow a teacher. I’ve attended the grade 4 and 5 classes. Cam has attended the grade 3 and 2 classes. I’m very impressed with the kids so far. They’re very well behaved and most of them speak and understand English quite well already.

After our first day at school, we got back to our neighborhood at 8:45 and went out for Korean barbecue. We sat at a counter with the cooks in the middle and were served tons of vegetables and barbecue lamb. We were given pickled veg, broth, a sweet sauce, jalapeños, and salt on the side. It was all delicious and probably one of the fancier restaurants we’ll go to. It's also right next to our apartment so I imagine we will be back.

After our third subway ride, we finally figured out that the exits at each stop are all numbered and the numbers are all on their version of google maps. So we have figured out how to stay underground out of the hot sun for as long as possible when taking the subway (or even just walking somewhere close by). I find the whole underground system very impressive as well. The signage is in Korean but the stops are announced in Korean and English. They have two types of subway cards that you can load up and they work in almost every city in Korea. One of the subway cards can also be used for taxis and convenience stores as well.

Everyone we've met so far is soooo nice. We took a cab once and after paying, the driver made every effort to stop us walking away from the cab and look in the backseat - Cam's phone was lying there cause it slipped out of his pocket. One of the Korean teachers overheard us asking the English teachers if they had any dishes and brought a bunch of dishes that she didn't need to school the next to give to us without being asked. And our first time taking the subway, one of the staff helped us for like 10 minutes as we tried to figure out how to get cash and go the right direction.

Tomorrow our goal is to figure out how the garbage pickup system works. There are these little red bins that I think have microchips that you have per household. We see them all over on the streets but haven't figured out where to buy one yet. Oh and we really need a clothes drying rack. And towels. We bought some Korean "bath" towels but they're tinyyyyy. I call them water scratchers... they sort of swipe the water off of you but you don't feel dry after.