Right Here, Right Now

The jet leg caught up with me something fierce last night and though I’m awake right now, I’ll probably go back to sleep again soon.  However, in the hour or two of wakefulness that I’m going to experience before I crash again, I thought it my duty to post.  So here goes.

The Trip

My flights were uneventful, which is kind of what you’re looking for in air travel.  I’ve watched way too many episodes of Seconds From Disaster and possess an unhelpful knowledge of plane models and how often they’ve been featured on that show in a crash.  I wasn’t a fan of the Airbus 321 that I took from Toronto to San Francisco, as it was still possible to feel the turbulence, but I’ve got a new crush on the Boeing 777-300 that got me the rest of the way here.  Short of a storm or a rocket launcher attack, not much rattles that plane, and that’s just the way I like it.  But for all my dislike of the Airbus, without it I could not have gotten some of these cool shots flying out of Toronto and into San Fran.

The view from my window seat leaving Toronto.

I have no idea what those blocks of colour are--if any of you know, please post in the comments and enlighten us all. Googling "those weird pools of colour on the water near San Francisco" didn't get me anywhere. Oddly.

More disturbing colouring in the waters near San Fran.

Foster City

I had no idea that South SF was the Industrial City, but I like that they're making it known.

My 19-hour trek was not nearly as painful as I thought it would be.  I watched five movies (Thor, Limitless, Source Code, Red Riding Hood and I seriously don’t remember the last one).  On the second leg–the long 11-hour leg–of my trip, I even managed to score three seats to myself and got a couple hours of sleep.

This poor flight attendant on Singapore Airlines likely hated my guts when I asked her to mug for the camera, but I couldn't resist asking her to as I've never seen a uniform like this before.

I got ready with my camera to take pictures as we landed in Incheon and, as you can see, I didn’t get much.  It was pissing rain (apparently it’s monsoon season here) and once we were low enough that I could see anything, there just wasn’t much to see.

Raining in Incheon--apparently par for the course.

But I was glad to be welcomed into the country by a familiar face.

Pierce Brosnan making ends meet.

Being Here

Where to begin?  Let’s start with a comparison.  When I moved to Kenya 20 years ago I was fortunate in that Kenya was colonized by the British.  Even if you didn’t speak a word of Swahili, it wasn’t hard to function because everyone there, at least in the cities, pretty much spoke English.  That is not the case here.  As I walked through the Incheon Airport, I was busy about feeling all fortunate because all the signage was in Korean and English.  I thought to myself “how good it is to speak English since the world seems so quick to accommodate English speakers.”  Then I left the airport and that all changed.

Ah bilingual signage, how I love thee.

The most basic place where this comes up is right here in my own apartment.  The labels and directions on the appliances are only in Korean.  I have the impression that someone may have just tried to get in touch with me on my intercom, but I can’t really remember my 30-second tutorial from two nights ago when I moved in, on how to use the intercom.  I think it’s the top button to listen and the bottom one to buzz people in but I sincerely have no clue.

The little intercom has a wee screen in it so you can see who's buzzing you--it's kinda neat.

Yesterday morning I was stymied in my attempt to have a shower because no one told me that I have to actually turn on the hot water.  And because I can’t read the doo-dad on the wall that would tell me so, I had no idea.  I sponge-bathed it for my first day of work and then asked my neighbours how to get hot water last night.  I made one of my neighbours explain all the appliances to me again this morning so I could put Post It notes on everything!

Apologies for the blur factor on this picture--my interim camera is a piece of crap!

Speaking of my neighbours, they have been life savers!  They are two of the foreign teachers at my school and they live across the hall from me.   These two guys are Americans who happen to be Korean and who both speak Korean.  They have been immensely helpful in things like getting hot water, walking me to work, helping me get my money changed and taking me shopping to get my apartment set up.  Tasks for which my recruiters are strangely absent, but I have the impression that’s how things go around here.  My neighbours have also graciously given me the password to their wifi or I would be hard pressed to be posting or e-mailing at all.   The signal strength is weak when I try to access it from my apartment, so when I need a strong signal they let me hang out in their place and use it.  They really have been fantastic.

My digs are small but not unbearably so.  It’s just that apparently closets are not part of the repertoire in this building (or at least in my apartment).  I have a wee dresser with four tiny, shallow drawers and the rest of my stuff is sitting in my suitcases on the floor right now.  My neighbours have had to buy extra furniture, such as a wardrobe and a small folding table to just make their space workable (and they share a space the size of mine, but they took a deal offered by the school to share the space and get more pay).  Eventually, when I actually have income, I’ll probably do the same.

If you’ve never encountered a shower here in Korea, you’ll be surprised.  Thankfully I was prepared for this.  Essentially your entire bathroom is a tub.  Why there are two sets of electrical outlets in the bathroom is beyond me.  And why only one set are covered up is an even bigger mystery.  So the shower:  the floor and walls are tiled and there’s a shower head on the wall that’s attached to the sink.  You set your water temperature and pressure at the sink and then take the shower head off the wall and voila:  shower time!  And I guess everything in the bathroom has the potential to get wet.  Since I couldn’t figure out the hot water yesterday I haven’t given it a whirl yet, but I don’t anticipate a lot of luxurious showers in my future.  And in case it wasn’t clear, there is no bath tub.  These are not common in Korea.

The upside? I can clean the toilet while I shower.

My kitchen is surprisingly big for a country where it seems to be cheaper to get take out than to cook.  I bought a small pizza and a 1.25l of Coke last night for about $6.00 (6000 won).  There’s no way I could cook a meal for less than that, especially since meat is more expensive here.  But the thing I just noticed about the kitchen last night–no oven.  Also not common in Korea.

That's just lots of storage space under the stove.

I have a love affair with the key-less entry system around here.  I don’t have keys for either the door to the building or the door to my apartment.  It’s just all pass codes.  The only thing I have keys for is my mailbox.  (I’ll post a picture of this soon–my crappy camera wouldn’t let me take a good picture this morning)

I’m just starting to get over the jet lag so I haven’t spent a lot of time outside, but the school is closed until next Wednesday, so I have a few days to explore.  I promise to post some pictures taken outside of my apartment in the very near future!  For now, back to sleepies for me.

Finally, It Has Happened to Me!

Are you detecting a theme here?  One where song titles seem to double as my blog post titles?

Well finally it has happened to me:  a really pretty 13-month visa stamp on my passport!

I’m blowing this pop stand.  Coming up, nineteen and a half hours in transit starting at 10:00am tomorrow, with a stop over in San Fran.  I insisted on taking the indirect flight just to get myself off a plane for a little while.  The longest I’ve ever sat on a plane is eight hours, when my parents and I went to Kenya 20 years ago (dear god, I’m old), and I have far less tolerance for air travel now than I did then.  I should arrive in Incheon at 6:30pm Wednesday the 27th Korean Standard Time (KST), which is 5:30am the same day, here (EST).

I’ve got my compression socks, I’m charging the batteries for my laptop and my iPod and I look forward to browsing the book stalls at the airport for something trashy and easy to read.  I have to divest my luggage of 12lbs worth of stuff tonight and change my address with a few more places and then I’m ready to go.

I won’t have a phone number or (likely) internet at home for the first month and change.  It takes about four weeks to get an identity number once you get there, and until then you can’t have any services in your name–hence no utilities.  This also includes having no bank account so I won’t get paid until September, though admittedly since I’ll only be paid once monthly, my August 5th pay cheque would have been pretty paltry.  However, internet cafes abound in Incheon (and any other Korean city) and they are open 24/7, so I will find one close to home as soon as I hit the ground and keep e-mailing and blogging.

The school I’ll be working for closes for “summer” on the 28th and 29th of July so I’ll have a couple days to get settled and figure out the lay of the land before I actually have to go to work.  I’m looking forward to that.  It eats up two of my ten vacation days as those two are mandatory for all teachers at the school, but I can’t say I mind terribly.

I’m really happy to finally be done with this visa limbo.  Having a weekend to chill when I knew nothing could happen with it was fine. But the thought of spending another week checking the consulate website three times a day, having the same conversation about the school’s preference that I arrive before the 28th with my recruiters every night, and being totally unable to make plans with anyone and thus being forced to entertain myself all day, was less than appealing.  I haven’t felt particularly excited about this move at all of late and I suspect it was because I didn’t know when in the hell I was moving!  It’s hard to get excited about continued uncertainty and lack of resolution.  Funny that.

In honour of this new found clarity enjoy!

You Can’t Hurry Love–or Visa Applications

So the question of the day is still “when are you leaving” and the answer is still “I don’t know.”  My visa number was issued in Korea on Friday, the 15th of July and on Monday the 18th I took my butt to the Korean consulate and submitted my application for a visa.  I have no idea why the $100 worth of documentation (notarized copy of my degree, criminal background check, sealed university transcript, signed contract, four sets of passport pictures, copy of passport, etc), couriered overnight at a cost of yet another $100 wasn’t enough to convince the Korean government that I’m visa-worthy, but it wasn’t–it was only part of the process.

The next part was to go to the consulate here in Toronto and hand over my passport, a visa application form, yet more passport photos and yet another sealed university transcript.  Then they will either approve or deny my visa after a period of “processing.” I have no clue what the processing time is about.  They used to have visa interviews but they’re no longer needed for the kind of visa I’m applying for (E-2 for teaching English).  Instead, the somewhat disinterested lady behind the “visa” window at the consulate asked me about four questions that were all answered by the documentation that I had provided and then declared that it would be “five to ten days.”  I pressed her, telling her that my contract starts on the 25th of July and so something sooner than “five to ten days” would be ideal.  She relented somewhat and said it might take just five days instead and that my passport might be available early next week.  That doesn’t really help me as “early next week” is when I’m supposed to be teaching children on the other side of the world English vocabulary and how to conjugate verbs.  Clearly unconcerned about my distress, she left the window, effectively ending the conversation.  I guess the vast majority of government employees are cold, uncaring and impersonal no matter which country they represent.

At that point I proceeded to the weirdly-not-as-pristine-as-the-rest-of-the-building-bathroom at the consulate and broke down in tears.

I’m trying to be zen about this.  I have no control over it and there’s little point in being anxious about something you can’t control.  I don’t know what the worst case scenario is at this point and frankly I don’t even want to think about it–though it’s probably not as bad as I imagine.  I’m trying my best to tamp down the anxiety that wants to bubble up and consume me at any given moment but then someone will ask me “when are you leaving” and the emotion comes spewing up like a geyser all over again.   It’s a valid question, so I can’t fault the questioner.  It’s absurd to say “That question stresses me out so I’m not going to answer it.”  Instead I grit my teeth and bear giving the answer (most of the time) or I get short with people (some of the time, sorry Mom).  However, receiving an e-mail from a contact with my recruiter this morning asking when I can depart so that he can book my flight when he should know that I have no bloody clue–now that (reasonably) chaps my ass.

I am a control freak by nature, and I while I knew that in theory a path like this would be fraught with uncertainty, I had no idea how it would manifest itself.  I’ve been listening to a great audiobook called Stumbling on Happiness and one of the most intriguing ideas that the author brings up is that when there’s a big problem before us (a major accident, a huge loss, a great injury) our bodies and minds mount a response so enormous that we are well able to cope with whatever has happened.  However, with smaller issues (stubbed toe, lost keys, slow visa applications), the event doesn’t trigger that response, so we actually may feel worse than if something more severe were to occur.  It’s a total case of death by a thousand paper cuts.  Or perhaps, growth by a thousand paper cuts.

There have been snags on every step of this journey so far.  At first it was not being sure if I would get a job, then it was having a timeline that didn’t feel realistic, then it was getting rid of all my stuff during this infernal heatwave, now it’s this visa.  I’m sure that there are going to be several more situations like this before I am settled in Korea.  And in just the same way that you can’t hurry love, you can’t control what’s going to happen to you.  Right now, I’m sitting alone in a relatively well air conditioned apartment enjoying the peace and quiet of a semi-early morning.  If I don’t enjoy the moments like these because I’m worried about the next thing that I can’t control, I might miss a  lot of  great experiences that are right in front of my face. I have no idea what’s going to happen and it freaks me out, but I’m going to do my best not to let that be the way I feel about this day.  That’s the one thing I can control.

FAQ and What I Already Know (so you don’t have to warn me!)

Because, reasonably, the same questions come up over and over again.  And reasonably, most people will offer the same advice, here’s what you want to know and here’s what I already know.

Q:  What age group will you be teaching?
A:  Elementary and middle school aged kids but it’s not clear how much of a range that will cover.  The school is amusingly vague on this point.

Q:  Where will you be living?
A:  Incheon (see map).  It’s 45 minutes west of Seoul and if you were going to Seoul you’d land at the airport in Incheon.  It’s a city of about 2.5 million.  I will apparently be living a newer neighbourhood called Namdong-gu.

Q:  Do you know anyone there?
A:  Not really.  Another student who took the TESL course at the same time as I did will arrive in August but she’ll be in a different city (Pohang) on the east coast of the country and much further south.  Though “much” is relative in such a small country.

Q:  Have you learned the language?
A:  Not a word.  But it’s a 15 hour flight.  Just think of what I can get done!

Q:  When are you leaving?
A:  This is a valid question and the answer is I don’t know.  The visa number that was supposed to take 5-7 days for the Korean government to issue took three weeks instead.  So I just got it on the morning of Friday, July 15th and I will visit the consulate here in Toronto on Monday the 18th.  My contract ostensibly begins on the 25th so I hope they’ll approve the application right quick on this end but who knows.  Until this stuff is taken care of, you’re not really supposed to go about booking plane tickets willy, nilly.  So I’ll probably leave by the 23rd since it’s a 13 hour time difference and a 15 hour flight–I need a full day to basically get there.  But in reality, I don’t know when I’m leaving.

Q:  Are you giving up your apartment or subletting?
A:  Giving it up.  I have zero desire to be legally responsible for property when I’m so far away both physically and in time.  And I’ve come to realize that a working fireplace and proximity to a subway line doesn’t actually make up for too much noise from the street, walls that are too thin (noisy neighbours included), poor air circulation which makes for inferno temperature levels in the summer, electric heat making the apartment costly to keep warm in winter, shitty, ugly carpets, one washer and dryer for all of us to share, and no balcony.  To the no balcony argument some of you will say “but the rooftop.”  To that I simply say your own private balcony that is steps away from your living room is not the same as climbing two flights of stairs to get to a space that isn’t private.  So yeah, I’m giving up the apartment.

Q:  What are you doing with your stuff?
A:  Clearly, from the last post, I’m selling some of it.  I’m storing the rest of it.  But I’ve gotten rid of a fair bit.  And in the end it’s been a good thing.  I realized how much crap I’ve kept around out of habit rather than because I like it or want it or need it.  Whenever I do come home, it’ll be good to start fresh.  Next time around I have pledged to never bring in anything new if I’m not getting rid of something old.

Q:  How does your family feel about this?
A:  They’ve been really supportive of it.  Thank goodness.

Q:  How long will you be gone?
A:  So far I have a contract for a year.  After that it’s anyone’s guess.  The longest I think I want to do this is three years.  But I couldn’t have told you a year ago what I’d be doing today so I have no clue what I’ll be thinking a year from today.

Q:  What prompted this?
A:  The long version:  read all the blog posts from December of 2010 and you’ll at least see how I became open to making changes of any sort.  In short, by the end of a really interesting blog project called reverb10, I came to realize that I needed to take some risks to find some happiness.  I started trying to take baby steps towards change every day as a result.  One of those steps was to go to a TESL information seminar.  I did that back on March 1st and the rest is history.

Q:  Do you like Korean food?
A:  Yup!

Now, the advice I’ve already received…several times.

“Koreans can be xenophobic and people may stare at you and mothers will pull their children out of a pool that you enter and some of them are unclear on how a baby of mixed ethnicity is produced and there’s a lot of group think.”

Yup.  I get it.  And I assure you I’ve heard it all several times.  And I’m taking it all with a grain (or several thousand) of salt.  I’m sure plenty of Koreans will prove the rule and plenty of them will disprove it.

“A lot of schools are really shady and I know (fill in number) people who have cut and run in the night.”

Heard it.  And I can assure you I’m in no need of any further horror stories.  I can conjure up plenty of unsavory scenarios all on my own.  I pretty much live in terror of getting there and hating my job or my living conditions or my colleagues or all three.  So seriously, if you’ve got a horror story–tell it to someone else.  And having said all that, if it’s that bad, I’ll come home.  That really is the worst case scenario.  It’s not the outcome I’m hoping for, but it’s an option.

“If you don’t know the language you’ll get ripped off.”

Of course I will.  I get ripped off when I go the US because I’m tourist.  And I speak the language (ostensibly–it’s debatable in some parts of the US.)

“The accommodations will be tiny and there may be bugs.”

I can live with small.  I will have a hard time living with bugs, but I’ve done it before right here in Toronto.  I’ll survive.

“You will not be able to get clothes there.”

Planned for it.  You should see my Old Navy receipts in the last month.

I’m sure there are other things I’ve missed but these were the things that I seem to remember coming up most often.  So don’t ask, and don’t tell.

The Pitfalls of Selling Your Worldly Possessions

This e-mail exchange is so good that I’ll let it speak for itself; buyer is blue, I’m in pink:

Hi, interested in buying vacuum, vcr, and stereo, Logitech subwoofers, guitar perhaps.

Hi, I’m so sorry I can’t buy your vacuum because I decided to buy brand new because of higene reasons.

Thanks

You’re ridiculous

Breaking Up is Hard…and Easy To Do

I am shaking right now.  Shaking with rage at a customer who was rude, dismissive and condescending to me.

My last day of work will be next Friday, July 15th.  You’d think these slings and arrows from customers would be like water off a duck’s back at this point.  You’d think that no customer could get to me, that I’d be feeling no pain.  And yet I sit here in a sweaty rage.  Because breaking up with this job is hard to do.

As of today, I have been employed with this company for 13 years, one month and five days.  A lot of starter marriages don’t last that long.  But like a lot of starter marriages, my relationship with this job has been a rocky one.  I still remember nearly hyperventilating with happiness when I got the offer and I realized I had finally made the leap from all my crappy retail jobs to this–a job with a desk and a computer–zowee!  I remember nearly peeing my pants at the thought of making $22000 a year.  It was a king’s ransom to me then.  And for the first few years I really didn’t mind my job.  But I also never thought it was going to last so damn long.  I knew I was destined for greatness and that there was no way I could do this forever.  It was a given that I’d move on to bigger and better within a few years.  But somehow that never happened.

For the first few years it was understandable that I stuck around.  I was getting 8-10% raises every year, I had a fair amount of autonomy, I was learning new skills, and I got along with my co-workers.  What wasn’t to like?  But after a point, there were plenty of negatives:  co-workers with whom I clashed more often, a customer base that got a hell of a lot less friendly as the economy suffered, increasing conflict with management on how things were run–a real problem in a company that’s never boasted more than ten employees, and more and more actual job duties being piled on without a correlating increase in pay.  The honeymoon has been over for at least seven or eight years now but I’m still here.  I won’t even get into the reasons why that is–that’s another really long blog post–but what I can tell you is that despite this love/hate relationship with my job and this organization, I can’t seem to stop caring yet.

I still care about being a good employee even though there’s no longer any consequence if I’m not.  When a supplier shipped our product ground rather than air last week, I was pissed.  I was pissed off about all the calls I was going to have to make to our clients about their held up shipments.  I have a feeling that other people would have thought to themselves “I’m not going to be here by the time this shipment arrives” and subsequently gone back to playing solitaire.  But I stewed for ten minutes and then started making the calls.  Thirteen years has turned me into that woman who resents the hell out of her husband but still faithfully irons his shirts until the divorce papers are finalized, because she can’t step out of that role.  I would guess that she worries about him eating hotdogs for dinner every night after she’s gone.  I would guess that it takes a while for her to stop having an emotional investment in his well being.  I have a feeling I’ll still care past the 15th.  Luckily I’ll have plenty to worry about on the other side of all this and I don’t think I’ll care for too long.

There has been one part of breaking up that has been surprisingly easy though and that was actually resigning.  During the really low points of my employment I’ve dreamed of telling all my customers exactly how I feel about them (not love) and tendering my resignation with a sort of grim satisfaction.  That didn’t turn out to be the reality.  I was nervous about it and walked around with a knot in my belly the entire day prior.  And when I first told my bosses that I was resigning they both looked horrified.  When I blurted out that I was moving to Korea to teach English though, they were suddenly very happy for me.  I suspect that the fact that I wasn’t going off to work for the competition in the midst of what has been a very difficult time in the company tempered their disappointment at losing me.  It always sucks to be left behind but it’s easier when it seems like someone is going away to do something vastly different–rather than the same thing but somewhere better.  I worried that they would be angry, resentful or even try to lay a guilt trip on me on about the timing.  But instead they were supportive and happy for for me and really haven’t been anything but kind since I broke the news two weeks ago.  I guess after 13 years together, I’ve earned that much.

I’m looking forward to making the final break with this place and this job.  It’s long overdue and I need to make this change for all kinds of reasons (a post on that to come).  I just never imagined it would be so easy…or so hard.

Sitting In a Pile of My Own Sh*t

I only mean that figuratively.  I am not, in fact, sitting in a pile of my own feces.  I am, however, surrounded by a mass of my belongings because I’m prepping for the yard sale to end all yard sales.  In two and a half weeks this apartment has to be emptied of all that I own–because on July 25th I will start a year long contract, teaching in Incheon, South Korea.

That 2:30am interview finally took place on June 19th (well technically June 20th), I was offered a contract on June 21st, and on June 24th I accepted the position.   And then spent most of the week after that down with a terrible cold.  When I was in high school this always used to happen to me; I’d begin every vacation sick as a dog.  It was like that flight home from boarding school signaled to my body that it was okay to relax and immediately all of my defenses would come down and I’d fall ill.  I imagine that’s what happened on Sunday this past week.  As soon as I’d agreed to take the job and sent off my visa documents, my body said “Well it’s about bloody time!” and gave my immune system the cue to take a break.  My overdeveloped martyr muscle limited me to taking only a half day off from work, but it was enough to get me back in the saddle pretty quickly.  I managed to have some dangerous liaisons last night, so in my books I’m back to health.

In fine consumerist tradition I have done some power shopping in the past week.  I’ve purchased not one, not two, nay, not even three, but four books to help me get accustomed to Korean culture and language.  I’ve purchased luggage.  I’ve purchased clothes because I need scant excuse to do that.  I’ve purchased a camera but that’s only because my trusty one crapped out a month ago–really, terrible timing.  And the piece de resistance of purchases–the thing that I believe now makes me a true globetrotter–a laptop.  It’s gorgeous in that it’s the most functional laptop I’ve ever placed my hands on.  The shift key is where you expect it to be.  I’m typing on it right now with ease.  This is not something that generally happens to me with laptops.  If nothing else comes from this year of adventure, I will have counted myself lucky to own this bad boy despite middling reviews.

Apart from buying lots of crap (when I’m ostensibly supposed to be getting rid of stuff), I have been making lists.  Lists upon lists upon lists.   Lists of what I need to do before I leave, lists of all that I own, lists of what I want to store with friends and family and what I want to sell or give away.  I have cut off my utilities (easier than I thought), I have posted things on Craigslist to sell (check it out if you’re looking for things on the cheap) and I’ve begun this dastardly task of prepping for a yard sale.

It’s a funny thing, trying to get rid of your stuff.  You find out that you are irrationally attached to things that surprise you.  For example, I have come to realize that I am wildly attached to my crappy, cheap Ikea dishes and the cases for my DVDs–not the DVDs themselves–which I’m taking with me, but their decorative cases, which I’m storing.   But my books–something you’d think an avid reader and writer would want to hang on to–not so much.  As I continue to cross things off my many, many lists I imagine I’ll find out I’m attached and not so attached to a lot of other really weird stuff.

In my next couple posts I’ll let you know what it’s like to give your notice at a job that’s lasted longer than most marriages (surprising),  how I’m hedging my bets (kinda sneaky) and all the things I know about Korea so far (not much of value).

Stay tuned.