4 weeks in

It has now been 4 weeks since Sarah and I arrived in the crazy land that is Seoul and good ol' Bristol certainly seems very far away indeed. It has taken some adjusting to the Korean way of life, but slowly we are getting there. So here goes, first ever blog entry. . . . .

We arrived a few Sundays ago after a LONG flight in which we had no sleep whatsoever. We tried to save our sleeping for the second leg of the flight to try and keep our body clocks in sync with the upcoming time difference. However, this was a massive error as the flight was rammed and we couldn't vacate our allotted seats for spare ones where we could spread out. Also, me and Sarah had the window and middle seats and we had some guy on the aisle seat. Sarah and I don't have the strongest bladders as it is and we didn't want to keep asking this guy to keep getting up all the time. So, I politely asked him if he would like to swap seats with Sarah. He declined (fair enough), but then proceeded to instantly fall asleep and remained so for the entire 10 hour flight. He may as well have just swapped if he planned to be in the Land of Nod for the whole journey! When I did need to excuse myself he motioned for me to just climb over him, rather then he get up. This resulted in me having to straddle the sleeping randomer every time (which was many) I needed to get out! Certainly not what I had in mind before the plane took off.

In fact, any excitement I should have been experiencing about the upcoming complete change of culture and lifestyle was smothered by the cramped, hot conditions of this flight. However, as we approached landing, strong feelings of terror quickly replaced our irritation as we realised that in less than an hour we would be meeting our new bosses, after no sleep and looking like shite. Not ideal.

Our bosses had arranged for a taxi pick-up from the airport, so at least we didn't have to fanny around trying to navigate our way to our new abode. The taxi driver was friendly enough, but our feelings of apprehension were not aided by the fact that he had a book open on his lap and was actually reading on the motorway! To be honest, I'm not if it was "War and Peace" or a directions to the apartment, but this freaked us out somewhat. Somehow, especially considering the complete lack of care demonstrated by the other drivers on the motorway, we eventually made it to the apartment. We got out of the taxi and were greeted by a very smiley couple in their 40s, Mr & Mrs Lee, our new Korean bosses who run the schools we were to work in. An honest, beaming smile can be so much more important than words, which was just as well, as their English skills are pretty minimal! This came as a bit of a surprise seeing as they run English academies and we were looking at them for guidance in this strange new land. Luckily, the previous teacher left us some pretty good notes to help us work out the local area and get to school on time etc. The one thing we did get from our bosses was that we had to start teaching THE NEXT DAY (by this time it's 6pm), no orientation, no training, just straight up in front of classes of Korean children. OH SHIT! Mr and Mrs Lee left us to it to let the news sink in and we tried (in vain) not to worry too much. Eventually, we managed to get some sleep. We knew that once the first day was out the way, the only way was up.

After a poor amount of sleep, nowhere near enough to offset any effects of jet-lag, we were rudely awakened in the morning by a neighbouring elementary school. There were about 100 children, marching and chanting around the school yard whilst being drilled by a teacher on a megaphone. Bizarrely, this did not force me from my bed to address my new surroundings in the light of day, but a loud tannoy inside our flat at about 10 0'clock did. A female Korean voice began booming out of the wall right next to our bedroom, we presumed it must have been some kind of public service announcement. And there was me thinking we were in democratic South Korea, not north of the border! I suppose it could have actually been something useful, like alerting us to a potentially life-threatening fire or something, but it made me think I was being indoctrinated in our own humble dwelling. With this unexpected intrusion into our private apartment and the children's boot camp outside, the feelings of apprehension were revved to the limit by now. Just what was in store for us once we actually started work?

So anyway, I get to school the next day (which is actually a pretty plush, very modern academy) and have 2 hours to prepare from the previous teachers notes, have a guided tour and meet my (all female) Korean colleagues. Fortunately, their English is much better than our employers, so with a little guidance, I was able to begin to get my head around the first lesson. However, that was just my first lesson, I had 6 others to do that afternoon and most of them were back-to-back with zero time to prepare for each one! Standing in front of my first class was actually much less daunting than I anticipated and I pulled through, relatively unscathed. Somehow, I managed to wing that first day and thankfully, it's dramatically improved since then. However, the school seems to be run on an ad hoc basis, which means every now and then I'm told to teach something completely different just before my class, when I've been preparing for something else! You just have to roll with it though, so I'm getting used to that pretty quickly.

The other teachers are really nice and friendly though and have helped me settle in. The kids themselves started out pretty tame and I thought "this is going to be a doss", but now they are a bit more used to me they have started playing up a bit, especially the younger ones. Boisterous does not even come close. I might have to start cracking the whip soon, corporal punishment isn't outlawed here (no joke) so I might start making some threats soon, haha! One kid tried to shine a laser pen in my eye today so he's definitely going to get it first. Seriously though, some of them are really sweet and give me presents and the older ones are fine. Which is ironic because I was actually looking forward to teaching the younger ones but they are a proper handful. Still, presents are nice. One of my students keeps trying to stroke my arms, body-hair is in short supply out here and she finds my arms fascinating. Another student asked if she could borrow my eyes, which would have been disturbing if she were not a child.

Still I'm not complaining though, I currently have less than 20 hours of actual teaching a week and I'm on more wonga than I was back home. (Probably says more about my job back home than the wages out here, but still!) And I don't have to pay rent. Lovely stuff. Some of my classes only have 1 or 2 students as well and classes get cancelled quite a bit. So you could say I'm leading a bit of a charmed life at the mo! Sarah has got the short straw though, she's at another school, with more classes, worse kids and unfriendly teachers. So it really is pot luck out here. Just hope mine holds out, timetable changes could happen at any time!

The culture out here's pretty intense in some ways. There are various dos and donts when it comes to drinking and eating etiquette of which I am yet to properly learn, but no-one's kicked up a stink about it yet, so all good. A great thing though is that the boss always pays, so we get quality Korean grub everyday, all paid for. Another bonus. Still have yet to eat man's best friend but have indulged in eel and silkworm larvae. Yum! Actually, the larvae just tasted like mud really. They also seem to enjoy battering things about ten times over and NOTHING goes to waste. Sarah and I ordered some chicken in our first week, which came with battered giblets and Parson's Nose. Not pleasant. Luckily, that has been our only unsavoury eating experience to date and since then we have enjoyed authentic Korean cuisine, all cooked on front of us on a barbecue at a restaurant. Fantastic. These types of eateries are ubiquitous throughout Seoul, the Koreans love to eat out, it's a real social event and is something we have embraced whole-heartedly!

Besides the teaching, all is going well. Seoul's pretty mad, polluted and hectic but the people have been on the whole friendly, helpful and patient. Which helps when we speak next to no Korean! Will have to get on that ASAP really. It's proper hot here already and starting to get sticky. And I'm told it's going to get a lot hotter. And we have no air-con on the apartment! The surrounding countryside is beautiful though and a welcome escape from the humidity and smog of the city. Actually going back to the people. . . . . . . .alot of them are really sweet but the one annoying thing is the general public have the spatial awareness of a 2 year-old child! Seriously, irrespective of age, everyone's crashing around, bumping off each other, cutting each other up, as if they are the only person around (I think this has something to do with the Confucian mindset - anyone younger than you is of a lesser status and I'm probably even lower being a foreigner - so apparently I should get out of the way). This was somewhat strange to me at first, coming of course from Britain where about 6 feet of personal space is the bare minimum. As this is my first time to Asia, I have been informed this is the norm, so now I'm just steaming on through with the rest, which is fine. Except for when it's raining, then it's proper 'brolly warfare on the streets. Seriously considering wearing a crash helmet next time it pisses it down.

We've met some interesting characters in the first few weeks too. We actually met an English guy, Henry, who would be staying in Seoul, before we even got there, which was a result! We got chatting to him in during the stop over in Dubai and he seemed proper sound, into similar pursuits as us and better still, he had teacher friends in Seoul we could meet up with whilst he was staying with them. It seemed we might be able to get some kind of teacher network going and we hadn't even set foot on Korean soil yet! We met up with our new chum next weekend, got rather drunk on Soju, the extremely popular Korean drink of choice. Very similar to vodka, but about half the percentage. However, it still does the trick after putting enough down you. His teacher friends didn't make it out on this occasion but we did end up in a gay bar, where Henry proceeded to faux come-on to a geeky Korean, it was hilarious! The Korean didn't know what to do, went to his chums for advice and they launched him back at Henry who couldn't shake the guy for the rest of the night, haha! We arranged to meet up the next week as it was Henry's last night and we would have the opportunity to meet his mates.

The next week we all met up for drinks. Henry's uni mate, Tom was okay (although he strangely had an American accent, even though he's from Sheffield - bizarre. This had best not happen to me!) and another teacher, an American guy was out with us too. However, he was pretty condescending and it was apparent he couldn't really be arsed with us 'newbies' and was more into the 'culture' aspect. Although he still hadn't been to Jeju Island after 2 years and had no idea it was Buddha's birthday celebrations and the Lantern Festival that weekend (not that these are the 'be all and end all' of Korea but come on) After going to an interesting hookah bar called Rainbow (no, not another gay bar), Sarah, Henry and myself split off from the rest of the group to continue our drinking at a club, whilst the others probably went off to do something more 'highbrow.' It was fairly clear that neither party would initiate contact in the future, so Sarah and I would have to resume our quest for permanent friends in Seoul another time. So, onto the club where we had a good time, the club was pumping out house, not quite dirty enough but still good for a bit of stomp. We then had to say our goodbyes to Henry, it was shame, as he was a funny, crazy guy who drank too much soju, much to our enjoyment.

We've been out with two of the Korean teachers from my school a couple of times. They are both really sweet, friendly girls, who also love a piss-up. They took us to a 'booking club' the other day. A booking club is where girls will be taken off one by one by the attendants to a group of guys and the guys will attempt to woo them. This is the way singles meet in Korea. Very different to the English way, haha! The club itself was strange, it looked like a huge Moroccan cavern, with literally about a hundred booths in a vast space with a small dancefloor near the front. Singles were getting paired off by the attendants, whilst the more inexperienced girls danced nervously, hoping to get called over. The whole place reminded me of a bingo hall somewhere in North Africa with the hormonal qualities of a school disco. Brilliant.

We were also taken out for (more overly-battered) chicken and beer by a merry 62 year old businessman who started talking to us on the Metro. Random. Although apparently, not so random here, Koreans will often take an interest in us although this is the first time we were actually taken out. And of course, him being our senior, he picked up the bill. Nice. He was a sweet man who was genuinely interested in us. However, over the course of the evening he became very drunk and it almost became a monologue at times of his attitudes towards everything from religion to relationships. At one point it almost felt like we were at a counselling session, our friend Kim lecturing us on the mysteries of a good relationship! Still, it was good to talk to a South Korean on the subject of North Korea. Turns out he blames America for everything and thinks that suicide bombers are in many ways justified. Yikes!

Anyways, last weekend we met some really nice people (mainly North-Americans, there are tons of them out here!) who are teachers as well, so we are going to a house party at one of theirs and then onto Hongdae which is party central out here. Will be wicked if we all get on well again, I feel sorry for poor Sarah having only having me to talk to all the time!

So that, finally just about sums it up for the first month! Although I've written rather alot, this is really only scratching the surface of everything that has happened so far and all the different thoughts and emotions we've had over the first four weeks. I haven't even discussed the cultural and outdoor things we've done, such as the palaces and the mountain hiking (please see pictures on facebook - they say it all really), but you would probably get even more bored if I wrote down absolutely everything!