New Digs

This morning at 8am my director came over with a mover to load up my gear and bring it to my new apartment about 6 blocks away. As I mentioned before, said new apartment is ridiculous. As in, freakin awesome.

They moved in all my stuff while I was at school so other than having to get up early to pack everything I didn't have to do anything, which is awesome, considering moving is a huge pain, even in Korea.

So now I am sitting on my couch in my living room, with the veranda screen doors/windows wide open, letting in the night air of Kimpo. Only thing that sucks about this is that without curtains, everyone in the office building across from me can see directly into my apartment. This includes my school and taekwondo studio. Curtains are going up ASAP. I already MacGyvered something in my bedroom with a bed sheet and bandana. Kind of like building a fort back in the day.

Anyway, like I said this place is unbelievable. I took a few pictures today while it was still empty, so I think I will wait until tomorrow, when I can take photos with some things in it for scale. But know that I have a private veranda, a walk-in closet, a private rear veranda/storage space, and a master bathroom. With a real shower...none of this over-the-toilet- crap. A real tile shower. And the kitchen has an oven that's never been used. and the other bathroom contains a bathtub which I will be utilizing before the new teacher arrives. Too bad for me, the bottle of wine I packed seems to have disappeared after the movers handled it. Funny, huh?

Now for the daily Taekwondo update.
Today Hannah was really sick and went home at 3. This left me wondering what I should do about Taekwondo class? Of course I still wanted to go. But I knew that if I went at 8:30 and it was just me and Cutie it could be really awkward since the language gap is obviously really huge. But if I went earlier with the middle schcool kids, there was a chance I would have to jump rope again, because I was watching the class before that from my living room, and saw that they jumped rope most of the time. Also I knew I had to figure out some way to explain why I was there early and alone. But I decided that this was the better option. Because some of the kids know a little english, and if there are other people I can more easily figure out what he wants me to do, if his explanation didn't work. So I watched for the class to end (living across the street is fun) and headed over. When I got there I said, in Korean, kind of...Hello. Hannah Teacher is sick. Can I come here now? lol. I guess it worked because he said yes and welcomed me in. Then he told me he had my uniform and brought it out. Oh my gosh, so exciting!
It's not the same style that the kids have, with the studio logo on it, which is kind of cartoonish, but it's the style he has, with a black collar, and a Korean flag patch over the heart, and on mine it says "KOREA" across the back. And then he gave me my belt...Green! I was expecting white but no, I am so awesome that I jumped ahead to green. nice.
So anyway the class went pretty well. Except the roundhouse kicks. I'm not very good at those yet. But I did ok on the blocks. Better, in fact, than the kids with a higher rank than me. Between that and my new ability to count to 10 in Korean, I have again managed to impress the instructor. Nice.

So tomorrow is finally Friday, thank god. And Monday is just going to be a game/activity day because Chusok is next week and Monday is our only day of class. This has been a really really long week. Thanks to all those who sent me suggestions for the Kindy kids. At least I have managed to win the affection of the kids. that is step one. On Monday Kevin told his grandma that he was really excited to come to school because he really likes it and has fun. And this morning when I was leaving my new apartment I heard a little voice yell, TRACY TEACHER!!!!! And I turned and found the girl who up until Monday was the brat in my class. So she and her mom came over to me and her mom gave me the girl's hand and said 'together' and ran back to the people she was talking to. So we walked to school together. It was cute.
It was the second time I've seen one of my students in the community and again it really made me feel good to know that they like me and are excited to see me, and to feel a part of the community.

So even though things are stressful with the Kindy, overall life is still going well. It's almost the weekend and then one day of work and then a week-long break, so I'm looking forward to it. Not sure what I'll do over Chusok though. I had thought of going to the DMZ but I'm not sure that is going to happen now. Someday though, for sure.

I'm piggy-backing off a wireless internet signal now and it's kind of late, and I'm tired, so forgive the lack of pictures. Soon I'll post pics of the apartment and of my badass Taekwondo uniform.

Enjoy your Thursday, suckas! It's already Friday for me...