Chili Pepper Bridge

Chili Pepper Bridge

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Provincial Orientation and moving into my apartment

     So the time at SungWoo resort flew by, well I we only really stayed there for two night so that makes sense.  We had a few lectures that were more specific to our province, on things to do and places to go, where the hospitals are, and how to get around on the buses.  They also gave us a handy schedule of all the local festivals, I am personally looking forward to the salmon festival where you can catch salmon with your bare hands!  Also, yesterday we took a field trip to Alpensia resort where the winter olympics will be held in 2018.  Its only about  20 minutes away from where I live in Jinbu!
     Well anyway, today we had one more lecture on practical lesson planning and then our mentor teachers came to pick us up.  I was really nervous waiting for her to come because I had had no contact from her and did't know what to expect.  She was really nice though and friendly.  She is the English teacher at my school so she  can speak very well, which was good.  So peoples mentor teachers speak little to no English.  We dove past my school, she told me a little about it, and then took me to my apartment.
     So, my apartment... I had no idea what to expect.  Most people get a little one room studio, of varying levels of cleanliness.  I was much more fortunate.  First off I am going to be living with another TaLK scholar from my program.  His name is Kevin and he is from New Zealand.  He's really cool and i think we will get along very well.  Well, because we are living together, our schools and pool our rent money and get us a nicer place.  We have a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment on the 18th floor of a building.   We each have our own individual outdoor patios that go out from our rooms and the view is amazing!  Its such a nice place.  The only down side so far is that there is literally no furniture at all here.  No tables, no chairs, not even beds.  We have mats on the floor to sleep on.  So hopefully in the next week or so we can see if our schools will buy us a few things to put in our place.  But other than that life is great, the apartment is probably one of the best ones anyone will get in the entire program.   Also, my city, although small and rural is still decently sized and there are several other foreign teachers who live nearby.  Kevin and I met a girl who is currently a teacher through the EPIK program which is run by the same people as TaLK.  She took us around the city, showed us where to buy food and random apartment things and even bought us dinner!  So anyway im gonna unwind and read a little and enjoy the country air.  GOOD NIGHT!


                                      The view of Jinbu at night from my deck on the 18th floor

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