The Dreaded Medical Exam

So, I had my first day of training yesterday, which went very well. Nothing too exciting to report, except that all of us trainees get along really well. However, afterwards, we had to get our medical exam. It was in this extremely extremely fancy building. Everything was spotless and beautiful in the clinic and they were extremely efficient. They basically just shuffled us around with various clipboards to the different tests. First, we had to do blood pressure, but the machine was way out of wack and everyone had super high blood pressure (including me...it said 146/90 but then they redid it and it was fine). Most of us had our blood pressure taken at least twice, if not three or four times. We then had other tests like vision, hearing, height, weight, blood, urine, dental (where they basically told everyone to brush their teeth better. If you are female, I will explain the horrifying horribleness of the EKG in private email. Seriously, the EKG was horrifying.

After it, a big group of us went to eat lunch and just ate and talked for about 3 hours. Everyone's really nice and we had a good time. The meal was interesting. they cooked the meat on the table and then we ate it with lettuce and whatever else you wanted to put on it. I took pictures so you can understand, which I'll post in the next blog.

Also, today I saw the first squatting toilet, which I immediately avoided. Luckily, we have normal ones in the hotel, except that the seats are heated.

Day 1 in Seoul

I just discovered (after a very cold shower last night) that you have to press a button and turn on the hot water before you shower. Good to know.

So Day 1 in Seoul went very well. I have a roommate now. Her name is Elaine and we get along well. I was expecting to meet people from all over, but she definitely went to UW and now lives in Seattle. I thought that was kind of weird slash funny. We'll just be in the same hotel for this week, then move once training is done. We're getting another roommate this evening, but she hasn't shown up yet.

We explored Seoul a bit. We got up at like 7AM and hung around, then wandered around Seoul for a few hours. We went to a cafe, which was very nice. They sold pastries, sandwiches and various coffee and tea drinks. There was this strange looking hot-dog croissant that was interesting and sugar in a jar.

That's a mirror on the ceiling reflecting everything.



We managed to figure out the subway system, went to a mall because Elaine needed a purse and notebooks/pens, then wandered around for quite a while. We found a bookstore that had an enormous English book section, if I ever need anything to read. We had our first Korean meal for lunch and it was delicious. pork dumplings and this interesting rice/meet/vegetable concoction that was very good. Then I found a straightener which was definitely a necessary purchase, so I can look presentable for my first day of work.

Then we got super exhausted and came back to the hotel. It was nice to have someone to explore with. We didn't even get lost once! We studied for our exams a bit and will probably go to bed relatively soon, even though it's only 9PM. But it's 5 AM at home, so that's kind of throwing off all my sleeping. I woke up last night about about 3:45AM and was extremely awake, but eventually made myself fall asleep.








One of the first things I saw getting off the plane was a huge sign of Pierce Brosnan. Then soon after one of Jennifer Aniston.
Touch screen map to the mall.
First meal
The smoking room in our hotel room...




the lovely view from our original room. The new room we were moved to is really nice and has a good view. we're on the 12th floor now.
Baskin robbins. There are also many Starbucks, Coldstone Creamery's, Dunkin Doughnuts and Tully's.

I have arrived safely!

After a very long flight, during which I was trapped in the window seat and couldn't get out for much of the ride. I did wander the plane a bit to make sure I didn't get deep vein thrombosis during the 12 hour flight. I conked out for about 30 minutes at the beginning of the flight, which meant that I missed the beginning of "Conviction," which I'd actually really wanted to see. However, it also meant that I completely lost track of time and thought a couple hours had passed, so quite a while later when I asked the guy sitting in the aisle what time it was, I was shocked that I'd only been on the plane for an hour and a half. However, he is also coming to Korea to teach English for Chungdahm and we're staying at the same hotel, so we were able to find everything together, which was good. (I knew he'd be sitting there. My travel agent told me).

Then I studied my training packets, then I listened to my ipod, then I studied some more, then watched the episode of "Friends" that was on the tv, then an awesome show about the ice sculpting world championships in Alaska, where the people who won made an aquarium, which included an enormous Lion Fish. Then I slept some more, then I studied some more and listened to my ipod. At that point about 4 hours had passed. Twas a slow flight.

So after I got off the plane, I immediately lost the guy I meant to go around with to find the bus to the station we needed to get to the taxi. Why? Due to the enormous crowds that went surging on the train and pushing people into the train and then dragging them in to make sure the doors didn't close on them. Then the surging crowd that all tried to get on the escalator all at once. I went through immigration, which took about 12 hours, then collected my baggage. Thank heavens they had carts and that they were free, otherwise I'd never have managed to get my stuff anywhere. The rolling suitcase plus the much shorter suitcase that gets pulled by a flimsy rope that kept tipping over as I tried to move an inch meant that I would never have made it to the bus. I stumbled upon the bus counter, bought my ticket and dragged my stuff to the bus, where guy from plane showed up right before the bus came.

So we rode the bus together past many very cool looking bridges and buildings. For some reason, I didn't realize Seoul was on the water. I'm not sure what I was doing with the map I was looking at. Then, we got off and found the cab (with the help of another cart) and went on quite the hectic drive throughout the city, which involved more cars than I've ever seen in my life, no stop signs on the side streets, even though there are 4 way stops and almost hitting many pedestrians. Also, there were several motorcycles that crossed multiple lanes of traffic without looking. On the drive I saw more cool buildings as I was attempting not to think about the multiple near death experiences I was having, but also noticed there are several Dunkin Doughnuts, Starbucks and 7-11's.

It is now 7PM in Seoul (3AM at home) and I will explore a bit tomorrow (and take some pictures to add to the blog). But for now, I'm exhausted and will study a bit more, then lie down and probably fall asleep pretty soon.

Leaving for South Korea.

As most of you know, I'm moving to South Korea today for a year.

So, I procrastinated getting all my packing done before going to Korea, which resulted in lots of panicking, for various reasons. Why was I panicking? Due to all the things that went wrong the day before I left for Korea for one year. We caused a ruckus at Starbucks, by accident of course, because mother kept grabbing the wrong drinks. I accidentally left my ATM card in the ATM, which luckily I was able to get back after much panicking and near tears, since I was leaving the next day and it was my backup emergency plan. Then my suitcase broke and I had to cut it open. Then father was fixing the pipes under our sink and our entire kitchen flooded when a pipe burst, which resulted in lots of running around and flinging of the towels as there was water literally waterfalling out of the cupboards. (Kellie joked that the sink was weeping because I was leaving. Then I couldn't fit things into my suitcase, then my second suitcase broke, which I ended up using anyway and just strapping everything down very tightly. Then, couldn't find my order form to order my phone and comforter to be sent to me in Korea. Then, I couldn't close my suitcase at 3:15 AM. So it was all quite the disaster. I definitely should have begun packing on Monday!

We arrived at the airport and I weighed my suitcases. One was 61 pounds and one was 55, which was obviously a problem. I then had to go through them and purge things that I would just have mom and dad send to me once I'm there, but could live without for now (including several pairs of shoes, which was upsetting). After about 20 minutes, I managed to get my suitcases down to 50.0 pounds (yes, exactly) and 49.6 pounds. It was quite the feat. But, I put a ton of stuff into my backpack and laptop case and am carrying both of my jackets, which is tiring and awkward. Use for jacket: Use as pillow on the plane.

After checking in, which took forever, due to the woman ignoring us for a good 20 minutes, I went to security to say goodbye to the fam. Lots of sobbing ensued, which continued through security and people were asking me if I was ok. Actually, just the guy who took my ID. But still.

I slept the whole plane ride to SFO and now have about 2 hours til my next flight. Very exciting! and terrifying, but mostly exciting.