Korea, The First Day

So here I am in Korea the land of Adventure and Surprise, at least for me. Had a very easy flight from NZ to Korea - after much agonising about what to squeeze into the suitcase and what to leave behind I arrived at the airport in time to be upgraded from economy to business class. Imagine my joy as I tipped the seat back to horizontal, stretched out the foot rest and luxuriated in an hour or two of sleep. And ate my meal off of real china with metal cutlery and was served fine food that is so much better than those little plastic box meals in economy. I think I may be spoiled for economy class forever. Seeing as I was flying Korean Air I think it is safe to say my first impressions of Korea was an excellent one!!

Flying in to Korea was interesting, there are some exceedingly long bridges, 

lots of blue roofs (and green ones and red ones, but I liked the blue ones), 

odd shaped fields with lines of white closely packed in them - upon landing I discovered that each line of white was a long long field house. (Plastic over hoops stretched the entire length of the field, but big enough to stand up in probably 3 meters wide.) 

The airport most reminded me of the Denver airport in Colorado, long corridors with those flat escalator things. (Why do people get on those things and then stop? What's the point of that? I thought the idea was to walk on them to get where you’re going faster!) Had to catch a subway from the terminal where we disembarked the plane to another terminal where we reclaimed our luggage and were processed. However, unlike Colorado I have yet to see a statue of a giant blue horse with flaming red eyes! 

Was met by about a dozen people at the airport - the two official people from the Language Institute holding a very large sign (about 4 times bigger than any other sign, and there were lots of other sign holders) and 9 or so other people they had collected off various planes. One of the official people commandeered my luggage and added it to the van load of luggage from all the other people. So much luggage that none of us could fit in the van. So the luggage was driven to the Institute, the humans had to catch a bus and then the subway finishing with a quick walk. Was grateful for the walk, after sitting for 12 hours on the plane and another hour and a half on the bus and subway it was heaven to stretch my legs. 

Driving through Seoul I was amazed with the amount of shops, an hour on the bus and we didn't get out of the shopping zone. Finally collapsed into bed with just enough time to make one more first impression before closing my eyes - the bed is very hard, but wobbles from side to side with gay abandon, rather like a rock with a bad case of the shivers.

Woke up for my first day of adventuring rather early, so at 7:30 with still an hour and a half to kill before breakfast my room mate and I decided to go exploring. Here is a picture of me about to begin exploring in front of the apartment where I'll be living for the next 2 weeks. 

Exploring was interesting, bumped into a stereotype I didn't know I had. I had only ever really pictured Asian men as business men or scientists/doctors, walking round in suits with brief cases or white coats, and suddenly I was seeing them digging ditches and setting up stalls and all sorts of other things which logically they must do seeing as someone has to do it and there aren't many non-Koreans around to do these things.

This is a picture of the Language Institute buildings. The Language Institute is on a compound that includes the Adventist Hospital, a Church, an ABC book shop (going to explore the insides of that today) and a bunch of other SDA stuff.

Something I noticed is that apart from the main thoroughfares the distinction between footpath and road seems to be more of a suggestion than a command, with cars, pedestrians, scooters and bikes seeming to move at random.

And the overhead tangle of electrical wires is rather frightening in places – wouldn’t want to be under them in an earthquake!

  

After breakfast and worship we were all taken to the Bank to open accounts, amazingly fast. Had an interview with the bank teller and half an hour later received an eftpos card and a bankbook. Very pretty – the bank is called the Rainbow bank on the card – but not on the door. Another interesting thing, from the outside you have no idea that this building is a bank. At home banks have ‘presence,’ here it looked like just another shop until you went inside.

Walking home from the bank we went past a street stall selling all sorts of fruit and veggies, among them little tiny oranges about the size of a cherry tomato. Had to buy some just to see what they were like. You eat the skin and all and they are delicious!!! Sweet and sharp at the same time.

In the afternoon we were all taken to the hospital for a barrage of tests, blood, urine, eyes (they tested me with my glasses on??) hearing, teeth, chest x-rays, blood pressure, height, weight. These were for our Alien Registration card that we have to get to be allowed to stay. They mixed all our names up and mislabelled the blood and urine. I was at the front of the queue which unfortunately meant that I had to give more blood once the error was discovered and pee in another cup – this was problematic seeing as I’d just exhausted my supply in the last cup. However it lead to another discovery. The cups at the public drinking fountains are little paper bags. I guess they are cheaper than real cups and store in much less space.

My first blog in America waxed lyrical on the plumbing so I thought I would do the same here. Korean plumbing is not so amazing as American. First you’re not allowed to put loo paper down the toilet, have to put it in a rubbish bin next to the toilet, which leads to an interesting smell... Second, the shower, it’s a handheld thingee – has a holder it can be placed in but the holder has only one direction – straight across the shower at a height that causes it to lightly glance over the top of my head – about 8 inches taller and I’d get a face full. Am going to buy some string today and see if I can rig something up so that I can actually have a shower where both hands are free. On the other hand the water seems to lurch between scalding hot and freezing cold without an intermediate setting so maybe there is a reason for holding shower head in hand – quicker reflexes.

When I was a kid I used to have a re-occurring dream of a big old house with lots of nooks and crannies, priest holes, secret staircases and hidden rooms, Now I’ve found a city like that. I think I’m really really going to enjoy my time here in Korea (contrast showers and all).