Travel Bug

September 22, 2009

Month 1- Seoul

Arriving in Korea:

Auckland to Seoul:


Gaz and I flew out on Aug 1st at some ungodly hour of the morning, with epic hangovers thanks to enthusiastic celebrations! The flight to Korea was 12 hours of straight pain, and we failed to get our moneys worth from the inflight alcohol. The TaLK crew were waiting at Incheon airport, and took us to our home for the month of Orientation- Kyung Hee University, Suwon.

Orientation:

learning how to 'survive', 'teach', and build 'desirable' relationships with co-teachers. Lectures (foolishly thought i'd left those behind)
were a failure in every way. Especially the amount of singing.

Example of 'popular' song:
"I can, I can, I can I can I can, I'm a can-do kid, yes I am"

Other lectures were entirely useless, but a little less painful- making paper fans, pottery class and a tae kwon do lesson- a month of childsplay. Evenings and weekends were devoted to sampling all the alcohol Korea had to offer, with a select group of non-Americans.

A bond was formed with a local bar (NOW BAR- Suwon), and the local FAMILY MART- essentially a dairy stocking alcohol, and providing tables and chairs on a piece of footpath Beer-around $3 for 1.5 ltr, soju (like vodka) for $1.50 for 700ml, wineade $2.50 for a can....

Far too much to catch up on to fill in the gaps, but I will borrow from Matt L's blog and share with you the utter stupidity from many an American's mouth:

On New Zealand...
“Ah New Zealand… that’s in Europe right?”
“Planes don’t fly to New Zealand do they?”

On the U.K...
“Manchester Utd –YEAH WOO! HI -5!!! – I don’t even like soccer”
After hearing a Scotsman finish talking to me – “Yo was that guy talking English?”

“Oh my God I can’t even listen to you, I feel like I’m in a Harry Potter movie”

Misc...
Teacher: “You can get a native Korean to help you’ American: ‘Where do I find one of those?” Coming from a 5ft tall guy – “I grew up in K-Town, anyone came up and gave me shit I’d just have em man”
and the all time favourite- "I miss my gun...
"


After 3 weeks at the uni, multiple field trips- Nanta, Lotte World, Cooking classes (much too hung), school visits, shopping in Seoul, clubbing in Itaewon.... the group was split up into our provincial classes and headed off around Korea for another week's orientation (this time in hotels :) ).


Some pics...
Kyung Hee TaeKwonDo team at the TaLK Opening Ceremony

Downtown Suwon- ripe with love motels and DVD bangs

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