Reflections after a year in Korea.

Shocked to even think it, but it was this time one year ago that I landed in Incheon aiport and thought I'd been transported to Orwell's 1984. Being the naive girl that I was, I presumed quaint little houses and a lot of grass, so was not prepared in the slightest for what I found; a fuck lot of neon and a lot of high rises. Still, I was hopeful that my new surroundings would grow on me and, with 'Is This Love?' by the legend that is Bob Marley on repeat in my head, set my sights to my new home. I was slightly less enamoured an hour later however, after eating geumjotang (beef bone broth) being jetlagged and told that I'd still have to work the next day on top ofrealising that I couldn't understand anything anywhere.



Now it's a year on and a lot of things have changed, but my love of Korea has never waned. I adore the food, the language, the landscape (once you're out of the city, at least), and those crazy, loveable Korean people. Sure, there's many things I do hate, the pushing, the scatter-brainedness (and that's coming from me), the spitting in the streets, the teaching (I'm joking. Well, mostly.) but I never have and never will regret coming here.

Being in Korea for over a year brings its share of sadness, basically as everyone keeps disappearing, Anda, Ben, Mike, Faye, all I've said goodbye to, though luckily Korea also means a high turnover of new people to play with, therefore the sadness is always offset with meeting great new people and having more great new adventures.

I still have moments when I reflect on something I see, whether it be a beautiful scene or an ajumma cleaning herself in a jimjilbang and marvel at the fact I live in this place that is so different from everywhere else I've ever visited. I'm glad that I've had the chance to teach these kids and find out how instrinsic to life 'rock, paper, scissors' is and that kids are actually pretty cool. Who would have thought it?

The transcend into my second year has been pretty easy really, basically as I'm only going to be staying until the end of July. It involved going with Sarah to the immigration office in Suwon, about a 20 minute drive, which, adding on the extra 20 minutes she got lost for was rather pointless, seeing as the office had moved to YeongTong, a 10 minute walk from my flat. On this piece of news we left the gaining of my extended visa until the following Monday and the latest possible time we could. Still, I gave in my documents and now have a little stamp which says I can work until September, yey! I also got half of my severance pay with my last paycheck, which went to pay for the little beauty I'm now writing this blog on. I finally purchased a notebook -a TG Averatec, which is small and cute and amazing. Already I don't know what I did without the little beast. It does mean that I have less to travel with when I finally leave, but I'm hoping spending the next few months as a virtual recluse, sending half of my wage home per paycheck, will mean that I've got a bit to continue the adventure when I finally tear myself away from here. Ick, wish me luck with that, staying inside has never been my strong point...