First Look

Finally got into Korea yesterday and this is the first post from

the other side. LONG trip on the plain but it was really pretty good. All the Asiana stewardesses were young and beautiful and would be a discrimination suit waiting to happen if it were in American. But hey...I'm not complaining. After a day or so here it's finally starting to sink in that I'm not at home any more. After arriving, we sat around at the airport for a couple hours waiting for a bus to take the ETAs to Jungwon University where we're having our orientation and language instruction (see picture).

Jungwon is this mysterious castle-complex-monstrosity in the middle of Korea run by "the Foundation ," but really just a bunch of empty rooms and highly polished marble outside of Goesan. Around the outside of the building they have a golf course, statues of godzilla (yes, actually) and strange rock fountains--I'll post some pictures on flickr of the place. Since we got here though we've been going to a bunch of lectures and organizational meetings.

I had my Korean placement test today...and by that I mean I wrote my name on the piece of paper and handed it in, which is not surprising because I didn't expect to reach "intermediate" korean level after two weeks with a grammar book. Finally this evening we got to hit up the nearby town and wonder around. I picked up some dried squid (salty, impossible to chew, but not bad really) and practiced Tae-kwon-do with the locals....after that we played some Korean drinking games with the few Jungwon students still on campus and, yes, I actually went to a karaoke bar (noraebang).