Seoul: A place with everything and nothing

Hello everyone-

I'm still in Korea. I think I almost have too much to update you on, so I'll just skip to the interesting stuff. Let's get the question "How is teaching going?" out of the way. For summer classes, there are Monday/Wednesday/Friday classes and then Tues/Thurs classes. My Mon/Wed/Fri classes are meh. And by meh I mean some of the kids drive me nuts. Half the time their drawing pictures of me on the board:

Most days I feel like what the drawings look like after M/W/F classes.

Tues/Thurs classes are my busiest days, but they're the ones that seem to go by the fastest. And sure some of the kids are nice.

And some are a little odd...

But hey, it's a job right? Take the good with the bad.

Most of my days are spent hangin' with these bums:

Joel;

and Mr. Roy McKee.

We spend a lot of time on a soccer field by a public school. It's a nice place to sit and just hang out. There isn't a lot of space to just run in Korea. In fact, most of the time you're having to play a maze game while walking through people on the sidewalk. So the soccer field is a god-send if you just want some open space.

Even at 6 a.m. :

Seoul has a lot of places to shop; however, the most common places that you can shop at have nothing you would actually need. When you walk down a street, 90% of the shops are either PC Bongs (PC rooms), cell phone stores, or restaurants and bars. It took me so long to find a place where I could get a towel so I could dry off when I showered. When I did find a place, the only thing they had were hand towels that don't really dry you off. So just think about that all you Americans, so lucky to have Target, I'm drying off my body with hand towels every morning.

Anyways, other than hanging out at the field, eating a lot of Korean food, and teaching, I haven't really explored the city that much. Don't worry, I will. I just needed to settle in. I found a place, got a cell phone and internets, and I finally got a pillow and blanket (and shitty hand towels). Let the exploring begin. More pictures and a tour of the pad coming soon.

Matt Mead