first week in Cheongju.

8.24.2012
the big move.

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The big move to Cheongju... turns out was a 40 minute drive from Jochiwon. So, really not much of a move. However, this was when culture shock hit me. They dropped us off at the Provincial Office of Education where our mentor teachers would be waiting to take us to our apartments. Mine was late. The bus took off and some lady from the office stayed with me as all the other TaLK scholars had been collected. Of course it was raining, when isn't it raining in Korea?

                                     That would be me waiting.. with all my belongs
                                         (as the people on the bus are driving away!)

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I finally made it to my place -- unloaded my things, found Chris and Sarah (the 2 scholars living in my same building) and was shuffled off to Home Plus (Hom-a Plus-u) to buy things for my room. My mentor teacher told me, you have 700,000 won to spend on your room ($700) - mind you the room was pretty much already fully furnished. I spent all of it but 5,000 won - pretty impressed with that really. After shopping we went to Mr. Pizza. My mentor teacher asked me 'what kind of food do you like.' I said pizza. Mind you this was after eating cafeteria Korean food for 3 weeks straight. I need something Western. We ate pizza and things off the salad bar (fresh fruit, yogurt, veggies, weird things - unidentifiable to me at this point, cold pasta, jello and more.)

Saturday was spent trying to figure out where we were. Yup you read that right. I didn't even know where I was on a map or what my address was or even how to properly say my city. This is when culture shock set in. Where were the coordinators and all the other TaLK scholars to help me through things? I felt a little alone but was so thankful to have Chris and Sarah in the same apartment! But the rest of my friends, where were they? I missed them. I spent the rest of the day hanging out trying to clean up my room and organize my life. Sunday my mentor teacher picked me up for church (about 20 minutes after he said he would be there). But I didn't care. We went to a Presbyterian church with an all English service. I met some great girls and my mentor teacher thought I knew those girls from back home. I guess they are not used to being super friendly to strangers (actually I know they aren't!) Then we went back to Home Plus to return things and buy more things. We also hit up E Mart and then went back to Home Plus. I was shopping for about 5 or 6 hours - I was spent. But I was happy with all my purchases. Ok.. let me explain Home Plus and E Mart. They are like Wal-Mart I guess and sort of mall-esk. But they are 3-5 levels high. So how do you get to each level? Well let me explain. You take one of those moving walkways, which is at an incline. Oh and what do you do with your cart you ask? Don't worry, they have magnets on them so once on the walkway - they don't move! It's rather impressive. Point for Korea.

... my 'one room'. messy. standing in the kitchen by the door to get in.

     .....the church my mentor took me to on sunday

the super cool magnetic walk-way escalator thingers in home plus...

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The beginning of the next week we had another Orientation. Rather boring really but we got to meet our Korean co-scholars so that was nice. They also ordered us Pizza one night. Oh have I mentioned I love pizza? It is different here but still delicious and maybe more so than American pizza. My favorite I have had was shrimp.. weird but soooo good. They also eat pickles and pizza here - strangely delicious as well. At another pizza joint (Sarah - from Texas and I went to this last weekend) gave us honey with our garlic bread. Honey is liquid gold here since it is so expensive. So, you better believe I drank the leftovers. Literally :)  

                                         garlic bread with honey & pickles with my pizza

The highlight of POE orientation was for sure being able to see my friends again. Going from 300 native English speakers to 2 (the number in my apartment) was a huge huge shock. So being back in a group of about 40 was fantastic. 40 people who all spoke English fabulously well, where you don't have to mime things and speak so slowly and enunciate everything. It is literally exhausting, but it will get better especially once I know some Korean.

That weekend some friends from Chungju, which when said sounds super duper similar to my city, came for a visit. 

.....side note: I am going to attempt to spell out the pronunciation difference. Cheongju.... (chunju) and Chungju... (choonju) -- but I am still working on it. I am just worried one day I'll be trying to get home and will end end up in a totally different city. 

We went to a couple 'expat' (foreigner bars), went to Home Plus and did some shopping downtown. We also went out to eat at our 'usual'. This small Korean restaurant run by a few ladies. It has a cat on the front so we also refer to it as the cat restaurant. We know how to order about 4 things there - since everything is in Korean. I either get the Gogi Mondu (meat dumpling things) or the Kimbop (a sushi looking roll with veggies and ham). I have even learned how to get the Kimbop without eggs, which is Keyran in Korean. She now remembers that I don't want eggs. I wave at them every time I walk by. Pretty sure that means we are friends. - or maybe we will have to wait till the day they start giving us extra food or free food. Then we will truly know they love us!

the home plus awesomeness... (look no hands!! It sticks to the escalator!!)  this cart even has a calorie burner counter thinger. Guess where I'll be 'working' out in the winter..... yup the grocery store! I think I burned 100 calories this trip!!