Daegu? Daewoo? Day WHO?

Okay, so I had intended on posting more last week, but I was so frustrated with the computer in my motel room that I decided just to wait until I got to the apartment in Daegu and could use my super duper MacBook. In any case, I'll try to cover as much as I can while keeping it somewhat entertaining (shouldn't be too difficult considering how awesome I am.)

First of all, I think it's worth mentioning that my first real meal in the great city of Seoul, South Korea, came from this place: 

It is EXACTLY like it is in the States. My only complaint was the price--definitely more expensive than back home. I think it's the same for Outback, TGIFriday's--it seems like the American chains are way overpriced here. Any ideas as to why?

Oh, I wanted to show you a picture of the amenity pouch from Korean Air that I mentioned in the last post:

Isn't it cute? I thought so. I didn't actually use anything though, because I actually brought my own toothbrush, toothpaste, and slipper socks in my carry-on bag. However, if I didn't have those things--DEFINITELY would have used them!

(I would just like to let you all know, by the way, that I just spent the last 30 minutes trying to figure out how to get these pictures to go where I want. Apparently you can't just insert a picture wherever you want--when you upload it, it automatically goes to the top of the page, and from there you drag and drop it. Not so hard once I figured it out, but geez, it was a pain the ass!)

All in all, Seoul was pretty nice. Here are some of my favorite moments:

This one, I think, for obvious reasons. I have an amazing camera that I bought myself right after Marc left (hey, he got an iMac!) and the display screen flips out so you can actually see yourself when you take self-portraits *gasp*. 

This is Motel Touch, across the alley from my motel. I'm assuming it is what Koreans call a "love motel"--a cheap place for Koreans who still live with their parents to get it on. Dirty? yes. Necessary? Apparently--they're all over the place.

Starbucks! There was seriously one on every corner in Seoul. This one, however, is unique because the sign is actually in Korean (I was told that it actually says "Starbucks Coffee"--it's just written in the Korean script [hanguel]) and Starbucks, no matter where in the world, is always "Starbucks". Marc says it was a big to-do because Seoul had to really fight with Starbucks on this one; everything on this particular street is in Korean--I've been told this is the only Starbucks in the WORLD that does not have the traditional sign in English!

I just like this bathroom sign, especially the artwork. Okay, so I'm not really sure why the girl has whiskers, or why the handicapped person is pooing in their chair, but it's funny! You can't NOT laugh at this.

 

On Thursday night I went out with the other trainees to a "foreigner bar" called Mike's Cabin (even though Mike has since returned to Canada). We found this neat-o alien mask in the corner by our table.

Ooh! We also met the Korean rep for Jagermeister. He bought us all Jager bombs (a shot of Jager with Red Bull--ugh), so I took his picture.

I figure I don't really need to go into detail about our apartment since Marc already did that. I will tell you that for my Christmas/Valentine's Day gifts, Marc bought me a bed, vanity table, dresser, and stand-up mirror. How awesome is that? The beds here are as hard as a rock; seriously, they're about as comfy as sleeping on the floor--but at least with the bed frame, it's like an elevated floor :) 

The cats are getting along well--Mewster likes to clean Elliot's hard-to-reach areas, like the top of his head, back of his neck, and inside his ears.

Here they are doing what they do best:

Oh, what's that? You only see one cat? Well, let's take a closer look, shall we?

See? You just have to know where to look.

Oh, one more thing to add to my incredibly long post--we have a washer, but no dryer, so we have to hang up all of our clothes to dry. Unfortunately it's been a little humid here, so it's taken TWO DAYS for my pants to dry! TWO! DAYS! And the waistbands were still damp! That's my only real complaint so far. All in all, I'm enjoying it--just trying to learn my way around. Since they don't really use street names, it's a little difficult--especially when you try to tell a taxi driver where you want to go. 

That's all I've got for now. I'll hopefully post more often now that I have my computer and the wireless internet's all set up, and my future posts will not be 9384a934 lines long :)

Day 1: SLEEP!

So I finally made it to my destination in Seoul, South Korea. Here's how the story unfolds... My sister and dad drove me and Elliot to Atlanta on Friday morning (see them at the airport? It only took 3 tries to get that picture); we left Birmingham around 5am CST and arrived in Atlanta right around 9am EST. My plane left Atlanta at 11:55am Friday the 13th (cue eerie music) and arrived in Seoul at 5pm Saturday (Korea time). Korean Air, by the way, is freaking AMAZING. Aside from the snacks, beverages, and meals, there were screens in the back of every headrest with a variety of television, movies, games, etc. to choose from. I watched "The Secret Life of Bees", "Babylon A.D.", and "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist" when I wasn't sleeping. The headphones were free (!) and they handed out little pouches containing socks, an eye mask, a toothbrush and toothpaste, and a little lanyard-type thing to go around your neck (I'm not sure exactly what this was supposed to hold). Since I actually did sleep for the majority of the flight, I only recall two incidents worth mentioning. There was an Army family on the plane, and just after the "Fasten Seat Belt" sign came on and the plane was taxi-ing down the runway, the father decides to get up from his seat and dig around in the overhead bin for his luggage. As I observed this, I thought to myself, "Hmm, this guy is either slightly stupid, or just isn't used to actually having to stay seated during this part of a flight (being military and all)." All of a sudden, 2 flight attendants--1 male and 1 female--tackle him from either side and haul him back to his seat. Now when I say tackle, I literally mean TACKLE. The male attendant ran and grabbed him around the waist while the female attendant grabbed his arms. It was pretty awesome, I must say--even more so considering the 2 Koreans were significantly smaller than the Army guy. The second incident wasn't so much an "incident" as it was an observation. I was sitting in the aisle seat of a 3-seat section and a Korean man had the window seat (no one between us). I am certain that some questionable activities were going on because every few hours another Korean man from 1st Class would come get the man next to me along with his bag and they would both go back to 1st Class. My neighbor would return sans bag maybe 5-10 minutes later. Maybe it's just me looking for some drama, but that seemed awfully suspicious. So anyway, after the plane FINALLY landed and I picked up Elliot and my luggage (all 9845745 bags that I brought), we found Marc--yay! We then proceeded to take a bus from the airport to Shinchon, where we were meeting Andy from the school who would show us to the motel and where I needed to go for training. We sat near 3 very nice Koreans who were in love with Elliot, although one girl jumped back every time he yawned--I guess she thought he was going to bite her. When we made it to the motel around 7pm, I crashed--Marc woke me up around 11 (I think) because he was going to go to McDonald's and get dinner, and then I promptly fell asleep again after I finished eating and woke up around 9:30 the next morning... EDIT: I planned on posting more pictures with this post, but for some reason this computer in my room will not let me upload any more pictures. The system is all in Korean so I can't read the error message :( I'll try again later on when I can get internet on my MacBook.