First week

Where to begin? This week I've been "resting" at the suggestion of the Korean government--foreign teachers (that's what I and my ilk are called here) all take a week of rest before starting work, so I've been trying to keep myself occupied. Mom, you were right--I got bored real fast.

Dongtan (pronounced Doong-tahn) is about forty minutes outside of Seoul, the capital. My nearby area is quiet, except for two construction sites and a main highway two blocks away. For anyone from the Monmouth area, it's more or less like living a few blocks from 99, plus construction sounds. There is a roadside garden next to my high-rise apartment building (about eight floors), which apparently is the normal thing for any land that's not developed. Apartments are tiny in Korea, and mine is no exception--I don't even have an oven. (For pictures of EVERYthing, go to the link below--it's my Facebook page.) The school supplied what little furniture fits in my room, meaning a bed (the mattress is attached to the 10" legs), bedframe, small table, and two chairs. The combo washing machine/dryer is hilarious--it sings a little electronic song when it's all done working. The outlets are, of course, a different configuration than in the States, as is the voltage (250). Upon testing these outlets, I discovered with a bang that my power strip could not handle that many volts (applaud me for not checking the strip's voltage capabilities before switching it on), but another day or so later I was going nuts from my laptop's nearly-dead battery, and so, acting upon the information that at least one other American's computer handles the voltage just fine, I plugged mine in and--whew. No bang. It's working fine, and the husband of my school's director (a very nice man named Mr. Lee; the director is Esther, also very nice) took me to the right store to get a voltage adapter for my speakers. I'm currently bumming off some neighbor's wireless, so in case anyone was wondering, it is possible, although a little challenging, to get a fairly normal computer setup in Korea.

My first full day here, I was terrified of going out the door, but I did go down to the basement to drop off my recycling (they recycle EVERYthing here--in fact, a person is hard put to find trash cans outside the house). The second day, I made it about five blocks from my apartment when I decided that was probably enough; it was okay to go back home. Esther then drove me to do a few errands, so I saw more of Dongtan that way. The third day, I did a couple more five-block walks, but in different directions. Later that afternoon, Mr. Lee picked me up and drove me all around, showing me bus stops, doing some more errands (voltage adapter), showing me Byeongjeom (a neighboring town), etc. He pointed out Wonderland (my school), and we both decided that it's probably not far enough from my apartment to warrant a bus ride. The fourth day, I got completely fed up with it and walked all the way to downtown Dongtan in search of Wonderland. I left at 9:30, intending to be out until 3:00, when I needed to be back at my apartment for someone to install a screen on my window. Well, I got lost. Kind of. Thank God I know how to tell north from south and east from west when the sun's out, so I at least knew I was going southeast. After walking forever, stopping at a Paris Baguette for some food, and seeing a few cool things, I stumbled onto Central Park, where I intend to go again, then found a cute little boutique. The store owner came out to speak to me, and it turns out she spoke English (and German). We struck up a conversation, and upon my casually asking her if she knew where Wonderland was, she got on the phone to track down the school's phone number, and then got ahold of the school and then put me on the phone with one of the other foreign teachers and then took the phone back and told whoever was on the other end of the line at that point to send someone to pick me up. Ack! No! That's not was I was wanting! Too bad--I had to go outside and wait. After ten minutes, no one had showed up, so I went back into the store to show her my address (written in Korean) and ask her if she knew which general direction I needed to go to get there (I guessed northwest). No, she got back on the phone and asked them to come pick me up. I went back outside. Someone did, indeed, pick me up, and she (Hannah) took me to the school (three blocks east of Paris Baguette). At the school, I met Jackie, who was very smilingly paranoid about my safety (I think the rather erroneous words "I got completely lost" set her off) because I'm new and I don't have a cell phone and it's easy to get lost and hard to find anyone who can give directions in English, and politely commanded me to stay in or near my apartment--until I'm not new? She then sentenced me to a car ride back to my apartment with the apologetic Hannah, and it was on that ride that I realized I had made my very first turn about two blocks too soon. That was yesterday, and today I marched right back out my door and straight to Wonderland, this time without missing it by a mere three blocks. I also did some shopping, which proved harder than I thought it would be, because 75% of the establishments in the downtown area are food places! So many places to eat, so few menus I can read. Dressing rooms: tiny, like 3'x3', and the mirror is on the outside of the door. I had to keep going in and out to look at what I was trying on--but maybe that's just what crazy foreigners do.

I have eaten kimchi! I have a bag of pre-made kimchi dumplings (also called mundu) in my fridge, and I had a sample of something that tasted a lot better than those at E-Mart, "Number one store in Korea." A side note: the carts at E-Mart (and probably other department stores) are CRAZY: you have to pay 100 Won (about a penny) to unlock one from the next one in line, and all four of the wheels are on casters. I don't think I ever thought casters were a bad idea before, but I do after using a cart that pulled me in wide arcs around any corner I tried to turn and wouldn't go straight the rest of the time. A lot of the fruits and vegetables are familiar to me: peaches, plums, bell peppers, leeks, garlic, etc. However, there are different mushrooms, and I bought some kind of citrus fruit today which I haven't tried yet and whose identity I don't know.

Craziest fact I've learned so far about this place: Dongtan is one year old. They started building everything three years before it became a city. Hence, why all the trees are supported with poles. Ergo, there was probably nothing here half a decade ago. Here's some blank space for you to wrap your head around that:















And with that, I conclude my first-ever blog post, leaving you with only the URL to a photo album of Dongtan on my Facebook account (or the option to just click on the photo of the traditional Korean building at the top of the page, which is hyperlinked to said photo album).



http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2036352&id=1306823245&l=a6684fd38d