On The Second Day

I suppose I'll start this tale with the night prior, starting with a 5 and a half hour bus ride from Seoul to Changwon.

Trying to make small talk with the few white men I saw who were bound to speak English, I met a guy from South Africa teaching English in Masan. He we pretty cool, so we exchanged info and agreed to keep in touch. We really only talked at the bus stop (which looked strangely like a boardwalk pier) because bus time was time for sleeping. I tried resting, but realized that I should have bought something at the bus station because I was starving. A Korean man must have noticed this because he shoved a paper bag under my nose and said "try. try. try." I attempted to refuse, but he wouldn't have it. I took the contents of his bag and fished a small fried ball out of it and handed the bag back to the man dutifully. Again he would not accept, so I took "try" to mean "go ahead and eat the rest of them," so I popped the little fried ball into my mouth. It turned out to be some sort of red bean paste coated in fried batter, and it was pretty delicious. I shot the guy a smile and thumbs up and said "good" which made him very pleased.

As insignificant a gesture as that probably seemed, it turned my whole mood around and I started feeling like good things were coming while i was munching on the fried goodies. The teacher I was replacing would later inform me what an important gesture that actually was. He told me that food is a very significant part of Korean culture. Instead of asking you "How are you?" they ask "Have you eaten?" which I kind of prefer because no one really cares how you're doing when they ask anyway, so they might as well check and make sure you're well fed.

I arrived in Changwon with my South African friend, Enrique a few minutes early and we stood at the bus station baffled abotu what to do next. His director showed up shortly after and she was able to call my director for me and help her locate me. My director drove me to the apartment to drop off my luggage but the guy I was taking over for was still sleeping there, so I was to spend the night in a hotel room.

For all of your porn watching needs...

This is the headboard...

Let me just tell you...this hotel room was something else. I climb the stairs to my room and notice cards with scantily clad girls at the foot of one flight, but don't think anything of it. I walk in to the room and notice very nice decor with a box of tissues next to the bed and mirrored surfaces everywhere. I even had a desktop computer to log onto for brief internet access. After a little time online, I switch on the big screen TV and it goes straight to Korean porn. Suddenly this all begins adding up and I realize I'm in an escort motel. This makes me a little unnerved to lie down in the bed, but when I do lie down I realize the mattress is hard as a rock.

This is the ceiling...

I also didn't have my phone, so I barely slept that night. I kept dozing off for what felt like hours then freaking out that I'd oversleep so I'd jolt awake and realize only 10 minutes had past. This happened quite a few times over the course of the night.

The next morning, my director picks me up and drives me to the school to meet another teacher named Patrick. We bonded pretty quickly realizing we had similar backgrounds, goals and interests. We took Des (the prior instructor) to the bus terminal but ended up getting lost walking back and when we hailed a cab, the cabby couldn't understand where we wanted to go. We asked some very nice Korean couple for directions to where we wanted to go, but they offered to drive us over there instead. I honestly can never get used to Korean driving. It's some sort of crazy, every man for himself, vehicular brawl where a lot of money seems to be wasted on traffic lights that no one obeys.

The couple take us to Pat's GnB campus and it turns out to be the original one I interviewed for. Min and Mrs.Park spoke terrific English and were a great help to me. Min helped me prepare for teaching a lesson on  Monday even though I didn't work for her campus. We talked about taking a trip to Busan and going surfing soon.

It made me really happy that I'd found a new friend, but immediately upon return to my apartment became a source of melancholy. Pat had gotten lucky to be a part of an involved campus that works with him to make sure everything is smooth. My director hasn't even told me what days I'll be working what classes or what curriculum I'm teaching Monday. This all mounted exponentially as I realized my bathroom has no sink, the bed here is also hard as a rock, I can't work the A/C, and apparently WiFi exists everywhere in Korea but in my apartment. The real killer though is how fucking lonely it is to come back to an empty apartment alone in a foreign country.

Homesickness hit me really hard and suddenly I can't imagine living in this place for an entire year. I start tearing up like a bitch and missing all the things I really took for granted. I can't even read the goddamn buttons on my TV remote. Everything just feels futile. After Skyping Alexis and ranting on here, I feel a bit better, but the loneliness still permeates my apartment. Hopefully things will get better.
I wish I could rent out the bedroom since I'm not even using it. Koreans must either have terrible back problems, or the most perfect posture ever with how stiff that bed is.

Oh well, tomorrow is another day! See you then!