Eng.V - Week 2

Hello one and all,

So one more week has gone by and I'm getting into the groove of things. I've got some nice little 'Leita experiences' I'd like to share.

Though I may not be lucky in love or money, I can say that I'm very lucky when it comes to meeting people and finding kindred spirits. People have warned me of the general sense of feeling pushed around and having your sensibilities stretched to the limit with what Westerners would call rudeness. I must have a lucky star because I have had really good experiences since my arrival.

Let's start with the apartment. Okay, so the only problem with it is that the water vacillates between scalding and freezing and I only get about 1 1/2 minutes of nice hot water before one extreme hits me. My boss is trying to find a solution for this, but I think I'm just going to have to deal with this for the next year. I think that the heating tank is just really small and therefore the hot water runs out really fast. Bref... on to the great aspect. Okay, so you know how some people's trash is another's treasure? Well, read on...

I've been a little worried about all the furniture I would have to buy and considering the fact that I'm currently broke (no real surprise!) , it's been on my mind. Well, the building super is just plain super! His name is Son and he has to be around 65, and he is the sweetest man you can find. He speaks about as many words in English as I speak in Korean but he and I communicate quite well if you can imagine that.

I came down to make a phone call from his office last week and he and I had a conversation about how old I am, where I come from, and what my name is. He then explained to me (though it took about 10 minutes of searching through my little lonely planet phrasebook to understand) that his mother's younger sister lives in the states. You should have seen us! Here are two people, separated not only by age and culture, but also by language, grinning from ear to ear because we've managed to exchange basic information! It was great.

Dear Mr. Son, or Son-shi as you would say in Korean, has since found little pearls in his storage room to give to me. I have received this portable hanging apparatus where I can hang up my skirts, jackets and pants for work. And it's on wheels! A couple days ago he asked me in our Korean/English/sign language whether I could use a shelving unit. Of course! So now I have a shelving unit! My boss came to my apartment to see about the water problem and I told him that I had seen a low table at a store between work and home and asked him if he would go with me to ask about the price. So we went and the tables were lying upside down outside. I found out that it was just a frame and that there was no table top but the man working there found a table top that I could just place over the rectangular frame and guess what?! He gave it to me for free! What can I say? Life is not often easy, but every once in a while, you just get lucky.

This is my little blurb to tell you, grab those rare moments and cherish them. It makes life that much more amazing.

So, now all I need is a dresser drawer and I'm basically set. With the boxes coming sometime in October from France, I will then have my own little home in Seoul.

Some preliminary observations on Seoul and its people:

1. The people here are very generous and it comes naturally; the Korean teachers at work offer us breakfast foods daily and the building supervisor, Son-shi (at my apartment) has given me coffee and fruit since we've became acquaintances; students have offered me drinks and cookies and the receptionists have offered me sweets and fruit for no reason at all!
2. Koreans are very nice people once you start to talk to them; I went to E-mart (a Walmart equivalent located a few blocks from work) and I stopped a woman working there and asked her to tell me where to find the rice. Rice = Sal . She took me by the arm, smiling, and took me right to that section; later, when trying to figure out what laundry detergent to buy (there is one washing machine per floor in my building and it is free), the saleswoman there was trying to have me understand something that I was just not getting; she spoke to another saleswoman who disappeared and came back with yet another saleswoman who spoke English and then explained everything to me. I then proceeded to receive a free laundry basket (on wheels!) and two free samples of fabric softener! All of this with smiles and a warmth that you just can't fake.
3. Koreans are very health conscious. They will often drink bitter things because it is good for the health. Everywhere you go, you will see the term 'well-being' written in English. The Korean phrase for that, if I've understood correctly is Annyong Haseyo , which incidentally is what you say to people when you say hello. The culture is rife with the concept of well-being and most people are very fit and do some form of exercise (I've noticed this from my students and there are lots of saunas and gyms around too).
4. The recycling world. Trash is separated in a very interesting fashion here. I read in Lonely Planet before arriving that Koreans have embraced the concept of recycling and do so diligently. One must buy a specific type of trash bag for general waste, another specific trash bag for organic waste and can put any recyclables in random bags but separated by material. Each neighborhood has different colors, for example for regulare waste my trash bags are white and my organic trash bags are yellow. I wondered why we would have to buy bags for regular trash and not for the recyclabes but it makes sense. All people throw out trash, but not all recycle; make them pay for what they can't avoid. If someone throws general waste in any type of bag, they can be fined. In addition, if someone wants to get rid of furniture, they have to buy a special sticker at the store and stick it on the furniture for it to be picked up. Again, if not, they will be fined. This place is wonderfully organized
5. The Metro (Subway) is wonderfully clean and well thought out. I was a little confused at first because the signs when entering the stations do not indicate the last destination of that line, but rather 3 or 4 major stops on that line so you need to look a bit more on your map before getting used to the idea. The trains are quite wide and there are specific seats for elderly, handicapped and pregnant women. I can promise you that not a soul who does not qualify as one of those types of people sits there. The train could be full and there may be 20 people standing up but those seats are empty. I respect that.
6. Protection from the sun. This is an interesting concept as women in the other Asian countries that I have been to seemed excessively obsessed with remaining as white as possible. Here you will see a few women using umbrellas on sunny days and the occasional woman wearing a tinted plastic visor stretching from the forhead to the chin, but otherwise, they are exposed.

This is all for now. I hope you have gotten a bit of a feel for Seoul!

Annyonghi Kyeseyo!