AM IN KOREA!

[beccatoria]

So, I am on the other side of the globe! Also I am currently nicking someone else's wireless on the sly (there are like a BILLION wireless networks floating around here!) so I don't want to stay on too long/use much bandwidth, plus it's...very unreliable and disconnects every couple of minutes. So I'm going to make this brief(ish), and hopefully I'll get to replying to all the fabulous comments and posts I've missed while I was gone later on.

So yeah. I'm here. Our apartment is pretty neat and the school looks very nice and professional which, to be honest, is causing me as much anxiety as if it were crappy, because now I'm afraid I'll screw it up instead of being afraid they will. But that is the way I am inclined toward panicky, paranoid thinking.

Basically I'm just panicking at the moment because I actually start WORK tomorrow (after getting a blood test to make sure I have neither AIDS nor a drug problem, yippee!) and I pretty much have no idea what I'm doing and I'm MASSIVELY jetlagged, so I'm worried I'll be exhausted as well. OH WELL. I'll let you all know how it goes.

People here are uber, uber nice. I mean, we knew to expect a lot of hospitality and such, but the principal decided that he was going to take us to Tesco (YES, TESCO, I HOPE ALL YOU BRITS READING THIS FIND THIS AS HILARIOUS AS I DO - I don't think it would have phased me if it was a Wall-Mart or something, but a TESCO?!) and buy us some groceries, which we didn't really get a say in, he just kept putting stuff in the trolley. So now we have, like, 30 eggs, an insane number of facial tissues and a bunch of meat of indeterminate origin (we think it's hamburger) among other things.

So, I better go, but yeah. I'm doing okay. Just...panicking along the expected lines. ;)

Hope you are all doing well too!

Comments

[madenglishbloke.livejournal.com]

have fun...
and it could be worse, it could have been aldi ;)

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

I like Aldi! You never know what you're going to find or where it's going to be from!

[spiralsheep.livejournal.com]

YES, TESCO, I HOPE ALL YOU BRITS READING THIS FIND THIS AS HILARIOUS AS I DO

YES!

The Co of EVIL have spies everywhere! EVERYWHERE!

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

My Dad hates them.

Srsly, people think Starbuck's are taking over? HA!

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

South Korea have a TESCO?!?

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

I KNOW! BUT THEY DO! IT'S CALLED "HOME PLUS TESCO" AND EVERYONE CALLS IT "HOME PLUS" BUT WE KNOW THE TRUTH.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

I bet you there are Tesco doctors within 5 years...

[pirateygoodness.livejournal.com]

*waves* HAIIII. You are in Korea, congratulations!

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

HAIII! I am in Korea. AS ARE YOU. I still don't know how to catch a train anywhere nor do I have ANY sort of telephone, but I'm hoping to have at least the train issue under my belt by next week once I've survived a week and not exploded. The phone issue I'm less hopeful about since my Foreign Teacher Wrangler is only slightly more organised than the school, which is to say, not at all.

[pirateygoodness.livejournal.com]

Heee, HURRY FASTER PLZ, I only have a few weekends left in Korea! (Keep the 15th open. We can meet up that day, if you have mastered trains.)

As for the phone thing, well. You can't without an ARC, unless a Korean person gets one in their name for you. If you have one, though - this sounds awful, but the passive-aggressive "look how scared and white I am" guilt trip works shockingly well at this stage in the relationship. Like, "Um, I'm sorry, I know you're busy, but if you have time, is it possible for me to get a cell phone soon? I understand if I can't, it's just, I want to call my mother, she's very nervous, blah blah. . ."

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

The 15th sounds great! I'm sure we can have mastered trains by then!

I'm not in a huge hurry to get a cell phone, to be honest, I'm more paranoid about getting a proper net connection, because then I can use Skype. There's nearly no one in Korea I need to call at this point and we do have a landline set up in the apartment, it's just the physical phone is broken.

Though that might make things complex re: meeting up. Although even if I did try to guilt-trip my wrangler, I don't want to count on having a cell phone by the 15th. I'm reasonably confident we can get to whichever subway station in Seoul you suggest, so perhaps we could name a time/location in the station to meet?

Feel free to either email me or reply here?

[pirateygoodness.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah yeah. Closer to, send me an email to let me know if you think you can make it, and I'll give you a subway stop, line number, and exit to meet at. Directions to anything else are typically too complicated anyway.

If your physical phone is broken, you can probably just buy a new handset at your local big mart (Emart, Lotte Mart, HomEver, HomePlus/Tesco) in the electronics section.

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

Awesome, I'll email closer to the 15th!

Yeah, buying a phone's the option we'll exercise eventually but since the school did say they were going to replace it we'll probably bug them a bit first.

[pellucid.livejournal.com]

Woot!!! Good luck with everything!!!!!!!

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I really think I'm gonna need it!

[asta77.livejournal.com]

YAY! I'm glad you arrived safely and are settling in. I owe you an email response. ;) I didn't count you stealing internet so soon!

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

Yay! Thanks again for those emails - they really cheered me up. :)

[projectcyborg.livejournal.com]

YAY YOU'RE ALIVE!

just look at your moodtheme and ponder how much less scary a room full of small children is than a Centurion firing squad. and pretend you're Maya!

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

I AM ALIVE! IT DIDN'T EVEN TAKE A LIGHTNING STRIKE!

Honestly, having now taught a room full of small children, I'M NOT SO SURE. But I will try to post about that experience tomorrow or something.

Also, if I were Maya I would be teaching a room full of small children with LAURA and OF COURSE nothing would phase me. Damn...Laura Roslin would be useful right now. I mean, more so than usual.

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

You are going to have a grand time. Mark my words.

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

I really hope so! :D

[nomoreanonymous.livejournal.com]

I hope life in korea is as much like living in the near future as you always hear it is.

Best of luck with your teaching. My gals a secondary school teacher (least onces shes finished her PGC) and shes in her element. Fingers crossed you get a class full of little angels and Einsteins.

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

So far I'm a little disappointed I haven't seen any robots, but I figure I'll give it time...

Good luck to your gal in her career!

[girlshy.livejournal.com]

CAT!! I'm so glad you guys arrived safely.

I'm not envious at all....much. (^_^)

[beccatoria.livejournal.com]

Yay!

Also don't be envious until you know the details. It's MANIC here! I will try to post about it soon. Meantime, Kev's got a post up about it, which you've probably already seen. ;)

[girlshy.livejournal.com]

I have indeed seen and replied...and I'm still envious. I too want to 'pee all I can pee'. *cries*