The adventure continues.

I have been in Korea for 2 and a half weeks. 17 days. So far I spent the first 9 at orientation, 4 days at Mr. Lee's house, and tonight is my 6th night in my own apartment. Wow. It definitely doesn't feel like my 6th day here. I moved in Tuesday night though so it is. Monday night Oeja took me to Pohang to get my ARC. Tuesday was moving day. Wednesday was broken computer at work day. Thursday I just lesson planned then hung out at home. Got a little more settled. Friday I had plans to go out to Pohang to meet a friend I met at orientation. I talked to my mom on facebook for a while, then caught the bus to Pohang. That was an experience. I bought the ticket and everything fine and then had to wait about 30 minutes or so since after 5 the buses only run every 30 minutes or so. But I didn't know where I was supposed to be getting off. I mean, I had an idea, it was basically the stop after where I normally got off and on in Pohang. So with the help of some friendly Koreans, I figured out when to get off and made it in one piece. He was waiting for me at the bus terminal so that was good. Then we went out to a bar called Whistlers where all the westerners hang out. Really great place. They have all the best American drinks there, they play American music, they have pool tables, and a hookah area, and the bartenders all speak English really well. Plus all the people in there speak English. Which is a nice change :] There is a marine base in Pohang too so a lot of military guys hang out there. :] Only, they won't admit to being military, apparently they have some kind of reputation, who'da thought haha. So they always say they are English teachers - except no one looks like they look and isn't in the military when there's a military base close. So that was funny. Hung out with everyone. There were only 3 girls in the bar, and I was the only American so I was a little popular but it was a good time :]
So I missed the last bus, which ran at 11:30 - really gotta pay more attention to the time when there's a bus to catch :/ but it was okay because I just slept on the guy's couch. Then I caught the bus at 7 the next morning and well, that could've gone a little smoother. I got off one stop too early and then got really confused as to where the bus terminal was. (From his apartment I had to take a bus to get to the bus terminal, then take the main bus to get back to Yeongdeok. I got off before the bus terminal.) So after walking around a bit with no luck, I started asking Koreans how to get to the "bus tuhminall" (because that's how they say it and if you say "bus terminal" they won't understand). So I finally found my way there, came in the back of the terminal, had a little trouble finding the ticket counter since I cam in from the back, followed a Korean and found it, bought my ticket, asked a bus driver which bus was going to Yeongdeok, was told "ii" (good thing I know my Korean numbers so I knew that was 2) and got on the bus about 5 minutes before it left. I had to be home early because the internet guy was coming between 9-10 am Saturday morning. So the bus pulls into the terminal in Yeongdeok at 9:05, I hurry home and am in by 9:10 hoping desperately that he didn't already come and with nothing to do now but wait. I watched the rest of Soul Surfer, very good fyi, while I waited and he ended up showing up at 9:50, and took 45 minutes to set everything up but left without me having working internet. He did however call Oeja (she's my contact number for everything) and explain the situation so I talked to her on his cell phone and she said Mr Lee would come over after he finished classes about 12:40 and fix it for me. So he came over, brought a router, because apparently the internet company doesn't supply those :/, and spent 45 minutes fixing it for me :] Which is why I have internet at home now. YAY Mr. Lee!!
So the rest of Saturday I spent sleeping. I was supposed to meet up with some people in Pohang for an open mic night and general festivities but I was too tired from the night before so I just stayed in and slept. Talk to mom on skype some and then slept more.

This morning my plan for the day was to get up, get lost in Yeongdeok, find my way to the open market which is open the 4, and 9 of every month (so 4, 9, 14, 19, 24, and 29), then find the bike shop, possibly buy a bike if they weren't too expensive, go grocery shopping, and then just hang out. Instead I slept, got up about 12, got on the computer for a little while, got homesick and sad, slept, slept some more, and then about 6 finally got up and decided I had to go grocery shopping because I had no food and I was hungry. So I got dressed and did it. I spent 36, 940 won and got the following,
2 microfiber hand towels (all they sell here) - 1000 each = 2000
6 bananas - 2300
half a loaf of bread - 2000
18 little peach yogurt drinks (delicious!!) - 1800
smoked ham (that's really a cross between ham and spam but still very good) - 5650
1.5L grape juice - 3000
1.5L milk - 3500
qtips - 1000
a box of almond flakes cereal - 3450
strawberry jelly - 3200
2 packs of 5 hangers - 1300 each = 2600
a plastic bag to carry it all in - 40
and the most expensive thing I bought - a jar of peanut butter -6400
31491 taxable goods
+3149 tax
+2300 duty free goods
equals 36940 -> about 34.75 USD
Overall not too bad. Got a lot of stuff so I should be good for the week. I was going to buy some chicken and have chicken breast all the time but the only chicken I could find was chicken legs and whole chicken so... Yeah. I'll have to talk to Oeja and see if they sell it somewhere else. Or maybe I'll look at the other grocery store in town. There's one about five minutes from my house but it's more expensive so I go to the one 10 minutes away, right by the school, to save money. I definitely need to get a bike though. That walk with that bag was awful. The drinks made it so heavy. I was going to buy another bottle of water too but thought about having to carry that too and decided I would just grab it on the way home from school tomorrow.

Speaking of which - tomorrow is my first day of teaching! Eek! I have first period, 9:20-10:10 off, which is awesome, then my first general teacher class 10:20-11:10, then my other general teacher class 11:20-12:10, then my first student class, 1-1 (grade 1 class one, which is actually 10th grade class 1, but they do elementary school grades 1 through 6, middle school grade 1 through 3, (7, 8, 9) and high school grade 1 through 3 (10, 11, 12)). Anyway, I have that from 12:20-13:10 and that's my only student class for the day, which is nice. I have lunch 13:10-14:00 and then planning until my first english teacher class 16:00-16:50. Then I get my stuff and go home. I'm nervous but glad that I don't have all my classes on the same day. Tuesday I have 2 student classes and and my two general teacher classes again. Then Wednesday, my last two student classes for high school and my Club Activity class, which is just 6 girls, Oeja, and me, and we're going to do Cinderella and put on a play for the school at the school festival in November. :] Then Thursday and Friday I have middle school which is just 6 student classes, and hopefully no teacher classes :/. And then just my second english teacher class Friday afternoon and then I'm done for the week. Every other Saturday my school has classes but I won't be teaching any of those, per my contract :]. Overall it's a nice schedule. I get about 4 hours every day to plan, 5 on Wednesday, not sure about Thursday and Friday, with classes interspersed to break it up so I'm not sitting at my desk all day. I'm excited. And nervous of course.

Anyway, all in all things are going well. I've been having mood swings a little bit. I'm going to just bring my lesson planning so that way if I start getting down I can just keep busy. It's great here, it's just super hard being away from all of you. I miss everyone so much. And I think part of the hardest bit is knowing how long it will be before I get to see everyone again. Anyway, I'm just going to embrace it while I'm here because there's so much to enjoy, I just need to get out of my apartment and do it.

Love you all and miss you like crazy.
♥

Ps - pictures of my apartment!! Finally! :]

My bedroom! The thing on the right is to hang my clothes on. These were taken the first night so there's nothing hung up, but there is now :]

My little dresser on the left. I have a mirror above it. And my (I think) queen bed on the right :] (Also, soooo glad I brought my blankets! Best idea ever!!) :]

My living room and old TV. Good thing I don't watch it that much. Just the english channel on KPop stars in the morning so I can try to learn a little bit before I go to school every morning :] Oh, and on the right you can just see the edge of my two sliding doors to the balcony.

My front door and window.

From the other side of my living room. That's the TV and front door on the right, the closed door is the bathroom, and the kitchen is on the left. The open door on the far left is my bedroom.

My kitchen. Which now has a big new refrigerator in it, I moved the table into the living room so I could watch TV.

My tiny bathroom. Which now has a washing machine on the left side of the toilet.

Sorry the pictures aren't the best. I had to take them with my laptop. I'm going to take better ones as soon as I get my camera (hopefully tomorrow) and then I'll post those on facebook. :]