The First Few Days

The first few days...

Well it probably would have been a better idea to post more regularly over the first few days but hey times have been ridiculously, yet enjoyably busy. I'll start at the beginning; after travelling from 11:30am local time on Tuesday the 16th of October in England to arriving at the school at about 8pm Korean local time on the Wednesday we had been travelling for about 23 hours. Thankfully this was with Emirates so the food and movies kept us comfortably entertained. Getting picked up by Mr. Joe (no I dont think that's his real name either) in his fancy car with a leather roof was a nice end to the journey, even if he did insist on using two mobile phones simultaneously while driving. Now bearing in mind we had no idea what to expect when we arrived at the head office we were greeted very kindly and led in our dazed state to some staff accommodation and given some food. I thought it best to save questions until after a night's sleep when words might come more coherently out of my mouth  and so said goodnight.

Korean packed lunch food....

On day one orientation began. Have a look at the picture of our schedule and you will see that we have a busy couple of weeks planned. This schedule we found on the fridge and was the answer to the question of what will be to happening to us. It's a good thing that we are such laid back people to find out our first two weeks of employment the other side of the world from a fridge!

So we met the other teachers over breakfast and had a chat, all very nice people from America and one from Hawaii (I have had to brush up on my American geography as I have no idea where any of their states are). After breakfast everyday is "worship", which leads on to some explaining I have to do. We are employed by a language institute called SDA, Seventh Day Adventists. Now we knew this when we accepted the position and were told that it's fine that we don't follow the religion, only thing is apparently we are two of the few people who do not so we have had to excuse ourselves from  a couple of worships and prayers. A little bit awkward to start off with but things have fallen into place since.

For the past few days we have generally been sorting things out like bank accounts, and otherwise getting to know the area and what's expected of us. A few classroom observations have set my mind at ease regarding teaching, and the Korean people I have met so far have generally been very chatty and enquisitive in order to improve their conversational skills. The eight hour time difference had messed up sleeping patterns so I have found myself wide awake at about 5:30, and then crashing at random times but since we are so busy we just power through.

Today involves a health check at the hospital and some more training. If anyone has questions or comments then feel free to leave them. Otherwise, until next time.