During the weeks I’m constantly going so lately I’ve been keeping it mellow on the weekends. This weekend was no exception! It’s the end of Saturday and after skyping the folks, to let them know I’m still alive and Seoul hasn’t been nuked by the North Koreans yet, I met up with a friend and went to Costco.

Costco is great and yes … I’m over Korean food for the most part … I believe I’m well enough justified, I’ve been cooking since I was a kid! I almost even entered the culinary arts, but that’s a completely different story.

Well, let’s just say that Costco in Korea although typically “Costco-like” you will be rudely awaken to the fact that you’re still in Korea. When you’re moving along through the isles with your Costco cart and someone rams into you with their wide-arsed Costco cart or tries squeeze themselves and their carts in front of you. OR, and yes I have literally had someone do this to me, keep walking into you with their cart… the illusion is broken and yes you’re still in Korea!  But never-the-less it’s Costco and being able to get certain things that are familiar so it’s always worth the venture.

The other odd thing about this trip to Costco was after continually seeing this other two foreigners I finally said something to them at the frozen food section. You see they were debating whether or not to get the frozen tortilla shells. For the most part if I make eye contact with anyone I tend to smile. These two strangers looked awkward and uncomfortable … hmm, I never got this reaction as a child! Some how in adulthood we become shocked and aloof at any communication outside of our own nucleus… why is that?

After Costco I decided to skip the subway and take a cab instead. What should have been less than a 15 minute cab ride turned out to be over 45 minutes. Even though the cab driver had used his handy dandy little navigation gremlin thing we managed to get onto the freeway and found ourselves in Incheon! And no it wasn’t my lack of clear directions or the fact that I showed him the exact subway station which was all written in Korean!

As the meter ran up to ₩30,000 we were finally heading in the right direction! Finally at the traffic light the driver turns to me and says “oh, so solly!” and I kinda smiled and looked over at the meter. He says “oh no no! man won, man won!” Which is ₩10,000 which is roughly what the cost of my ride should have been.

The poor man then tries to explain this is his 30th day on the job and he’s very embarrassed. I reassured him that it was ok… and frankly although slightly inconvenient it wasn’t the end of the world! My frozen foods were still pretty solidly frozen.

The nice thing about the whole experience was that I’d been shown the scenic route and part of the countryside … it’s very easy to forget how nice Spring is in Korea when all you see is concrete! My first year in Korea I lived in Incheon and often went out to Kanghwa-do (Kanghwa Island) to my friend and her hubby’s tea house. The drive reminded me how much I missed those weekends in Kanghwa-do!

It’s so easy to get stuck in the daily grind never venturing past the concrete jungle and under ground labyrinths of subway terminals and catacombs to the world that exists above ground.

It’s the end of May and I’m a quarter of the way through and already with over half my classes I have reached the “oh well whatever” phase.

Please, don’t get me wrong… it’s not the students or their poor lack of understanding or even the fact that they have no interest what-so-ever to learn a  language which is already so different from their own. No, that’s not the problem …in fact, that’s more like a challenge. The kind that makes me want to get up every morning and to see their smiling faces. I love challenges, what I abhor is conflict due to lack of communication or better yet the ridged closed mindedness that I face almost every time I come to teach.

Mind you, it’s not the students I get that from – it’s the co-teachers. Mind you, it’s not all of them just the two out of three. SO yes, I have decided to not give a crap… I shall be that “English speaking robot” just tell me what to say and when I should say it. But for heaven sakes don’t expect me to be happy or stay awake as your suffocate the life out of my mother tongue. And as far as planning goes… er, I have better things to do and dying of stomach cancer pushing to make everything rosy is not in the cards for me, thanks!

And yes, I have been there … the whole learning how to be a teacher! But you must understand teaching children is different than standing in a lecture hall and being monotonously boring, or even droning on from a pulpit! And yes, I did just go there! These are kids, dammit, not machines.

Who knew a few weeks could take so long!!
It’s Sunday morning and although I have miles of things to do this countdown seems to be in slow mo.

Only 12 more days though.

After that I will land in Korea and taken to the Hyundai center  for a week of S.M.O.E orientation. From there all the teachers will be sent off to their various schools while my group will head off to SEEC for another 2 weeks of orientation… WOW that’s a lot of orientation compared to the one day that I had at my previous school! Well, it should be a lot of fun and hopefully a good time to make new friends

Speaking of waiting I am still waiting for my TEFL certificate to arrive. They sent me a pdf copy but I will need my original certificate for Korea. I hope that arrives soon.

The clock is ticking … 26 days in total, 18 business days, 7 weekend!

So yeah, not a lot of time!!!!

It’s not easy to condense your life into 2 suitcases… especially when you need to take so much stuff with you.

I’m not a ginormous girl but compared to Asian girls… yikes!! Last time I was able to “put” clothes on but they didn’t quite fit right – girls if you have a figure with more shape than a pencil, you’ll know what I mean.

Thankfully for sites like Sierra Trading Post, Lands End, and Victoria’s Secret I have some new found friends. The hard part is dealing with the stuff you do have… oh and shoes!

According to the UPS tracking number my documents have arrived last night during their day time.

Now all I have to do is be patient … sit and wait, wait and sit!

Oh and complete my TEFL course so that I arrive with a TEFL certificate. That’s the plan at least!

So, I had my interview  with S.M.O.E. and it seemed to go very well. Two days later I received an offer through the recruiter to work at the Seoul English Education Center in Gapyeong city.

During the interview I was told this was 1 hour away from Seoul. I’m thinking I should have asked specific questions about that!! Since the interview I read somewhere it’s more like 1.5hrs away. The plus side out about being “outside” of Seoul is 300,000 won more per month. The downside is that it will take a little longer to get to certain places and that means having to plan a little more getting places and meeting up with old friends.

Anyone mind if I couch surf on the weekends?

On another note I really hope that this mean less smog!?!?!

Then a few days later I receive an email letting me know that positions are filling up fast … whoever gets their information (below x several copies of each) to S.M.O.E. first – and it’s alright with no mistakes, legit, with all i’s dotted & t’s crossed – gets the job!

* Criminal Record Check & Copy of Authentic Degree – both with apostille
* completed application form
* sealed transcripts
* sealed & signed letters of Recommendation
* copy of passport page
* copy of Contract & Addenda
* resume & cover letter
* passport photos
* and any certificates you might have

PANIC!!! several small heart attacks later…  and finally I get it done! Now it’s somewhere between here and South Korea.

Ok, so I’ve been reading a lot lately and more and more people are talking about their lists and how to start crossing off what they accomplish. In Nik Halik’s book, Thrillionaire, he talks about the 10 things that he wanted to do as a small child and how he’s accomplish over 3/4’s of his list.

Internet guru Yanik Silver of Maverick Business Adventures® posted his list of goals recently on his blog and you can see him cross them off.

Then recently I got a hold of James Ray’s book, Harmonic Wealth, he’s from the Secret and read it through and did all the exercises (amazingly enough!!) And one of the major things I realize is that the frustration I have in certain areas of my life stem from not being clear about what I want and not putting a plan into action to get to where I wanna go.

So this is the start of it … I’ve started a list that I’m gonna work towards achieving and since it’s kinda publicly displayed it makes it a little difficult to ignore

√Get my degree
√Teach ESL for 1 yr
AWAI: -TW – UTW Workshop – Bootcamp
√ Canon XSi SLR Camera
Publish a travel article with photos
Obtain financial independence
Travel – anywhere, everywhere!
Take a year to RTW
Work, live, play in London/UK for 1 yr
Egypt -  pyramids – camel ride, Bedouins
S.Africa – visit people, safari – Durban South Africa  -  swim with great whites
Namibia – safari
Greece – xplore ancient + modern, islands
South America – modern + ancient -Galapagos islands -Amazon -Peru, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, etc, etc -ok, pretty much the entire continent
Thailand – elephant trek – Tibet
Australia – visit family -Alice to Ocean!! -Great Barrier Reef
New Zealand

Well I think that’s a good start when I think of some more I shall add those too!

After a year of sitting here in Korea I open this blog and realize that no matter how good my intention is to blog about my year in Korea that I have failed… er, well!  I was never good at faithfully keeping a dairy, so it’s not that surprising to see I have lapsed with this blog.

Just as well as since it was the best of times but it was the worst of times but mainly due to having a death in the family and not being with my family during the grieving not that I was good at that either … but then again no one needs to remember that sort of thing.

So… to make this a fresh start at the anniversary of it’s creation I have decided to post this comic strip like picture of me.
I had way too much fun with the comic life application on my mac this morning… way too much

It’s been a long void without creativity and I’m standing on the abyss that will come into an overload of creativity.

The year of 2008 has a lot of hope and promise attached to it… it can only go up from here. Good bye to 2007, you’re misery I live no more!

Finally… I have arrived!

Two planes and one stop over at San Francisco for what was suppose to be a 2 hr stop that turned into a 3 hr stop. Thankfully, I am here now.

It’s all very interesting. It’s nothing I expected and yet very real and here.

I have been blessed to meet many people…great people who have shown me various things, places and meals. I keep meeting interesting people and that’s just in the expat community.

Life is exciting and I am a grinning like an idiot all the time so much so that my cheeks have perma-blush!

So, this is what the great wait is like…

Well, it’s been later than expected, but soon I shall arrive in the Land of the Morning Calm.

First, it was waiting for my visa confirmation, then my actual visa and now… I shall arrive in Korea at the end of Lunar New Year’s celebration.

This is when Seoul is mostly deserted due to the fact that Koreans return to their ancestral roots … or at least that is what I was told and hence my arrival date moved back yet another week. Guess I’ll soon find out!