Monday, Dec 3

Big Day! My first trip to Korean Costco! A friend has a membership, so off we went. However, even in Korea, Costco is for people with cars and sufficient home storage. So I couldn’t get much, but I did get The Prize – a Costco Rotisserie Chicken, oh the joy. The other chicken I’ve had from here has been okay, alright, passable, but not…quite…right. This was BEAUTIFUL. And yummy as I pulled it all apart when I got home. I just barely had enough storage containers to hold it all…and the mini fridge couldn’t hold much more anyway.  So, the chicken, and this large newborn human sized bag of cheeze/caramel popcorn was all I got. But it was a nice day to be out and look out the window of the taxi going to a new unfamiliar area.

The whole Costco process was, of course, a comedy of errors…with us going up and down and up and down to get to the appropriate entrances. There’s definitely a Right and Wrong Method…and we were hell bent on The Wrong Method…to the point that The Guy followed us from one floor to another to a) make sure we weren’t running amuck in Costco, and b) to alert the woman on the next floor to WATCH FOR US and point us in the right direction.

Sigh. Day #387 of giving Americans a bad name.

I’d like to find a map app that would let me drop a pin wherever I go…so I can look back to see on the map all the places I’ve been.

Oh, and cuz I forgot to share a picture of my new haircutand flippy-doopless bangs last week…

Next time I have to have her bring the shortest layer up a bit…they never get that right the first time. The longer layers make the BOTTOM of my hair the widest point, when I want the widest point to be like ear-level, then taper in towards the bottom. I usually only get that when they’ve cut the layers TOO short, and then when they’re growing out they hit the perfect spot…but they never quite understand when I explain, even when I take in pictures…OF MY OWN HAIR. I’m like LOOK – this is what it can do, please help make that happen. But it’s certainly an improvement over the crazy old lady hair I’ve been rocking for like a year. Or more.

Tuesday, Dec 5

Went to the neighboring town to a breakfast place for fried chicken and waffles (one of my two favorite “breakfast out” meals). Yum. I don’t understand how they fry things here and keep the breading/crust so LIGHT yet flavorful. Same with a lot of the bread I’ve had, it’s so SOFT. I always want to rub my face on it. But, you know, I’m a weirdo.

We walked around the area a bit before returning home. Walked by one place with a sign I couldn’t read, it was just like a pick-up window with an ordering kiosk, and people standing around waiting to pick up their orders. But it was the most heavenly buttery baked good smell. I took a picture of the sign, I NEED to find out what it was and go back for some of whatever they’re selling cuz I don’t think anything has ever smelled that good.

We saw chickens. Don’t ask me to explain.

I was anxious because tomorrow is the first day of class and I’m getting all convinced again that even with the tutor’s help and me having learned this material 17 times now, I will still fail because I won’t be able to understand the teacher. I started thinking again about Plan B because I CANNOT take another semester of stress like last time.

Wednesday, Dec 6

OHH! MYY! GODD! The difference between this teacher and last term’s teacher is NIGHT & DAY!!! She EXPLAINED things, SLOWLY and THOROUGHLY, making sure we all understand each thing before moving on. She explained what we could expect from the class, how we were to do this and that, how to say/ask this and that, where to find assignments, etc. And she worked from PowerPoint slides on the smartboard so even if I didn’t understand every word she said, it was all right there on a giant screen in front of me.

OH, THE RELIEF WAS PALPABLE. THIS is what a beginner Korean class should be like. I have a little hope now that I might actually be able to pass. Wow.

WOW. What a good feeling.

Thursday, Dec 7

The Veranda

Today was the second teacher (one is M-W-F, and another T-Th), she was not QUITE as easy to follow as yesterday’s teacher – she seems new, like she was trying things out for the first time, gave us some exercise instructions that didn;t really work right. She reminded me of ME teaching that English as a Second Language class last year. She used the slides a little less, and talked a little more, but I was mostly able to follow along. And at least the better teacher is more days of the week. I think it’ll be okay.

After class I went to meet my language exchange friend. This time I went to his town rather than him coming here to me. Me traveling alone is always a little anxiety-inducing because of my uncooperative cell phone/data connection. Anyway, I made it there easily and we had a nice (if slow with a lot of silent pauses ha ha) conversation (if you can even really call it that ha ha). But he’s just kind of fun to hang with even if there’s not a lot “langauge exchanging” going on.

Then…THEN…at the end of the evening, I did such a weird, awkward thing…there had been some miscommunication with the Uber driver coming to get me so there was some back and forth, where is he, where are you, etc…he finally got to us, we walked up to the car, we were both saying goodbye, I was saying thank you for helping me get the car, he raised his hand to wave (that’s a thing here, all ages, both sexes, WAVE goodbye, even when they’re standing right in front of you), so he had his hand sort of up like at head level and I…HELD IT. What?? I don’t even know what my hand was thinking…was it high-fiving and grabbed on for balance? Was it doing a handshake in the air? What? What? As soon as I realized what Hand was doing, I let go and mumbled thankyougoodbye and jumped in the taxi.

What?? What WAS that?? Was I trying to “thank you” pat him on the arm and missed?? I don’t understand. I don’t. And like, as much as there is like way more physical contact here between same sex friends (like girls walking arm in arm down the street, or a guy with an arm draped over his friend’s shoulder), there’s not much physical contact like hugging, or Men/Women having contact out in public. So…not only was it weird, period, an unidentified action (was it a hand hug??), it was inappropriate for HERE. Especially for someone I don’t even really KNOW.

I don’t know. My one friend is like…if he says anything, just pretend it’s an American thing, but…it ISN’T! I’m just mortified and thinking he’s texting the tutor (they’re friends) “get me out of meeting with that weird American lady, cuz she’s WEIRD.” Ugh.

So. We shall see if we ever meet again 🙁

Friday, Dec 8

The big shock of the day was finally seeing some of the students from my first class last term and learning that others also didn’t pass the course and are doing Level 1 again like I am. I’m up to 6 students out of 15 from my first class, did not pass…and I haven’t seen everybody, there could be more. That’s almost half! The dean did say something like that awhile back, but it’s still shocking, that having such a low pass percentage, you wouldn’t switch up the curriculum a bit.

Anyway, I was happy to see them, I miss those people. The new class students doesn’t feel the same.

After class, my friend and I went to a lake that was supposed to be “holiday luminous,” ha ha, but it was really just a couple light things around a 2.5mile path around the lake. We’d walked so much to get there that I could only do like a quarter of the way around, so we sat on a bench overlooking the lake and amusement park on the other side. Surprising that in Decemeber the park is still open but…whatever. By the sounds of the screams there were a lot of people riding the rides. Still it was just such a nice night (50 degrees even in the evening) to be walking and sitting outside, that I was okay with it not being what we expected.

Saturday, Dec 9

The anxiety of the week leading up to class, and the exhaustion of returning to normal routine after break, caught up with me, and while I woke up before 7am, I stayed in bed til almost 2pm cuz I was just TIRED. When I finally dragged myself out of bed, my friend and I went to the nearby mall, got Taco Bell for dinner, then went to the big market. It was PACKED. I keep ending up there on Saturdays when I KNOW that’s the worst time to go. I really need to get up early one day during the week and go when it first opens before it’s so crowded. That’s definitely the move.

Sunday, Dec 10

Had breakfast at that nice little brunch restaurant that’s nearby I’ve been to several times and it never disappoints. It’s very small, only 5 small tables, and the menu is quite limited, but everything I’ve had has been So Good – and everytime I say their fruit is the best I’ve ever had.

I planned to go back out somewhere after homework/studying, but that went on til 4pm and sunset’s at 5:15 and I am now rationalizing not leaving my room…

The End.