HOME SWEET HOME

Although I will not complain about staying at the swanky Renaissance for 5 nights, I could not wait to get moved into my apartment and get unpacked...well, that was until I went and visited Kevin's apartment, which is apparently like 100 times nicer than Allie's(a girl I met here from Crystal Lake)apartment. Uh-oh...this studio sure doesn't look like the pics I saw of my apartment!! I was prepared for small, but not smaller than my college dorm room small. Well, too late to turn back now!!

When I arrived at my apartment, after the janitors and principal had lugged my luggage up the hill b/c the road was still too bad for the car to get up it, I was pleasantly surprised!! My apartment is HUGE compared to what I was anticipating!! To be quite honest, it is about the same size, maybe even bigger, than my & Jac's little baby Lake St. apartment that we loved soooo dearly!! I have an office with a huge desk and a little balcony off of it. The kitchen is good sized, especially after I moved the fridge into the office to give the kitchen some more space(and for aesthetic reasons...obviously). And my bedroom...my gigantic bedroom, with its little balcony/screened in porch. I think this might be the biggest bedroom I have had to date, but still the same problem I have been dealing with in Chicago for the last three and a half years....CLOSET SPACE!! I guess, technically this can not even be called a closet, it is a wardrobe...and for those of you that know what my closets and drawer space and floor space for that matter usually looks like, you will know that a single wardrobe is most definitely not enough to house even 1/5 of my wardrobe....good thing I left most of it at home. This little wardrobe is the single most organized "closet" I have ever had, and I intend to keep it that way(I'm going to try my best!!)

I was all prepared to have this teeny-tiny twin bed; I even had all of my bedding with me so I could sleep comfortably!! So much for planning ahead(this is why I don't like doing it)...I have a queen bed!! So my little twin bed mattress is covering the half I sleep on, topped by my 2 bamboo(you should try it, very comfortable) twin sheets, until I have some queen bedding(thanks Mom & Dad)sent over to me. After I did a little re-arranging and brought the dresser into the bedroom from the office and moved the tv stand out on the balcony, my room was perfect...well almost, minus the pukey, yellow, linoleum floors. I hate them and love them all at the same time. I hate the sight of them, but the floors here are heated(which might be my favorite thing about Korea thus far), so no cold feet when you get out of bed at night...and if I lay my towel on the floor while I shower, it feels like it is fresh out of the dryer when I get it...awesome!! Lastly, there is the bathroom...just what I expected...the shower and the rest of the bathroom are one and there is just a drain the bathroom floor....but I have hot water...and isn't that all that really matters? Speaking of hot water...I do have a washing machine...thank goodness, b/c I still haven't lived with out one, and don't really plan on having to ever. They don't use dryers here, so I will be hanging all of my laundry inside the porch to dry...looks like I might start having to do laundry more than once a month. Oh, and the last thing...Koreans take their shoes off when entering pretty much any building...your home, a restaurant, even the school, so there is a tiled entrance that is sunken in lower than the rest of the floor where you leave your shoes....not too exciting, but will be the gateway into my next post.

Sorry, the photos uploaded out of order, but you'll just have to deal this time...

bottom half of the wardrobe

top half of the wardrobe

the full wardrobe, in all her glory

tv, and a couple pics you might recognize from home

my queenie, ready for y'all to come visit

bedroom from balcony

bedroom from kitchen

kitchen...no, Jen, my table doesn't fold out of the wall

kitchen from office

office

office again

shoe port

bathroom...see the shower head in the back corner

Snowed-in in Seoul

I woke up early on Monday morning because a car was being sent to pick me up from the Renaissance at 9am and take me to my school to meet the staff and then to move into my apartment! When I opened the window shades, I noticed it was snowing quite heavily. Nonetheless, I got ready, finished packing up my things and checked out. I waited in the lobby and about an hour later the driver arrived; the bellman packed my luggage into the car and away we went...or so I thought. The driver had called the school to let them know he had picked me up and was told the roads to Bucheon were impassable, so I should return to the hotel another night. Siiiiggghhhh...ok, I can stay in this nice hotel one more night.

It continued to snow all day, and I spent most of it watching cars trying to drive. It was quite the scene!! You see, it does not snow very much in Seoul, so to say the city is unprepared would be an understatement. In fact, headlines the next morning read,"Seoul battles heaviest snow in more than 70 years" or "Snowstorm in Seoul heaviest since 1937"; and, 1937, it just so happens, is the year they started recording snowfall, so wouldn't you know it, there are no snowplows(now I have heard, that they do exist, but I never saw one the entire day and the front-wheel drive cars were not equipped for the heaviest snowfall on record. From what I can tell, in terms of preparedness, this would be the equivalent of this kind of snow(about 10 inches in total) falling in Atlanta or Charlotte. Can y'all imagine? But, these Koreans, they do not take snow days...oh no...they simply leave their cars where ever them deem fit on the road and walk or take the subway to work. Then at the end of the day, they return to their cars. If the car is drivable now...great, if not...they leave it there until tomorrow or the next day. There are no tow trucks that come by and take your car, no policemen going around writing tickets...just a bunch of cars and trucks left where ever the driver desired. It is so strange to see. I attempted to capture the chaos, but the pictures just really don't do it justice. And the sidewalks...they are a whole other mess. There are no snowblowers, not even heavy duty shovels; the snow removal tools here consist of: handmade "shovels"(for lack of a better term),which is a flat piece of wood(plywood-like) nailed to a straight handle of the same wood; brooms, yes, your read that correctly...brooms; or the handy-dandy plastic shovel, which looks to be about the quality of the $5 Wal-mart ones.

lobby shot...boredom

fishtailing all over the place

cars just parked in the middle of the road

right after I took this, he parked with the rest of them

handy-dandy wood shovel

looks like the broom did it's job...this is the next day

Shopping has never lead me wrong....

I woke up on Saturday with plenty of energy and ready to do some exploring of Seoul. With the snow coming down lightly, I set off on my journey. After walking a couple of blocks, I realized this journey of spontaneity may be harder that I thought…I still haven’t figured out what sort of layout system is used for roads here and most of them aren’t labeled, so random turns off of main streets were out of the question. Just then I saw a sign for COEX…a mall I remembered reading about in the hotel. Knowing that shopping has never lead me in the wrong direction, I decided to follow the signs to the COEX. My theory was yet again proven true when right across the street from the largest mall(yes, by far is larger than Woodfield)I have ever been to was a large Buddhist temple grounds. I went into the mall hoping that the snow would die down by the time I got out. After wandering around the mall for a few hrs. and seeing every designer store you could ever imagine and some medium bottles of Aveda shampoo priced at roughly $82, I decided it was time to leave the mall. I crossed the street and entered the Boguensa temple grounds. Boguensa was originally built in 794!! There have been additions through they years, and some re-models, but the core structures have remained the same. It was pretty awesome!!

SoKo Bound & Down

After Jac helped me check in my perfectly packed bags(50.2 and 49.6lbs respectively), we exchanged some traveler’s checks into won(₩) before saying our goodbyes. The largest bill I received was the 10,000₩, a little less than the $10 bill in the U.S. “I could totally make it rain,” I said after being handed the wad of cash. With that we said a slightly teary goodbye and I headed to my gate. My flight boarded and left just in time, as it was starting to snow in Chicago.

The flight over was uneventful; I watched about 4 movies and slept for about 2 hrs. in total. It is a LONG flight to say the least. As we were approaching Seoul, I spotted a bridge that looks identical to the Ravenel bridge and felt like I was coming home to Charleston! Just as we were about to land(1,000 ft. from the ground according to the in-seat monitor), we abruptly went back up into the sky. Luckily, were were just getting in about and hour early so we had to do a huge loop around.

After deplaning, and going through can only be described as the easiest, fastest and most hassle-free customs I have ever been through, I found another thing that I love about the ICN(Seoul airport)...the bag carts are free!! This was great news for me and my about 150lbs. of luggage. I grabbed a cart, waited a couple of minutes for our "baggage delays", which trust me if you have ever flown into O'Hare or Atlanta or any other major US airport for that matter is not a delay, and was on my way. On the plane I had read about a shuttle bus of sorts that had several different routes and stopped at several major hotels, so in true Megan fashion, I decided that naturally this was a much better option than taking a taxi. I wheeled my bag cart over to the counter, found the route that I needed and purchased a ticket. The lady told me the bus was to depart in 10 minutes...PERFECT!! I wheeled my cart outside and found my line.

When the bus arrived and I stepped on to the Rolls Royce of coach buses(much nicer than the ones we took on long-ass soccer road trips), I was pleasantly surprised. I took my seat and hoped to be to the hotel in an hour or so...wrong thinking!! I thought rush hour in Chicago was crazy...it is nothing compared to Seoul!! Finally, 2 and half hours later about 20 hrs. after beginning my journey, I checked into the Renaissance. After a quick shower, wardrobe change and some speedy getting ready, it was time for Kevin(my one American friend here...thanks, Don!) and me to head out to celebrate NYE!! We took a cab over to a part of town called Itaewon(which was filled with Americans due to it's proximity to the Army base) to meet up with one of his friends from high school, Sean, and his fiancee Se-eun...they had just gotten engaged earlier that night!! When we got out of the cab, we heard Empire State of Mind playing, and to my liking, it was coming from the bar Gecko's that we were headed to!! Upon entering Gecko's, SMACK!, it hit me....the repugnant smell of smoke!! Smoking in public places is still allowed and even encouraged here in Korea!! Bye, bye days of not washing your hair after going out or double-wearing between washes!! :( Anyways, we met up with Sean and Se-eun and immediately started taking shots!! The night started with me taking shots of vodka and ended with us at the norebang(karaoke room) until 6am(thanks addie), with a another bar and some drinking games and dancing mixed in! It was a fun night and a great way to start 2010!! Friday, I was completely out of commission due to jet-lag and being hung over!!

So...where is South Korea?

Unfortunately, as Americans(at least those of us educated in CUSD#300), we do not do a great job of learning about Asian geography. So you are probably wondering, where exactly in the world in South Korea...right?? Well, these maps should give a a good start.

In the map to the right, you will see South Korea highlighted in green, to the east is the group of islands forming Japan and to the west and north of N.Korea, you will find China.

Or, to see where South Korea is in comparison to Chicago, click on the Google Maps link below:

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=104141239891582477035.00047c50b999f162b5f40&ll=49.15297,-147.304687&spn=81.288183,360&t=h&z=