Ajusshi is the essence of fun in our classes.

Monday:
So today started a new week of more learning Korean!
I really liked the lesson today because we got to learn more about each other’s culture.
Our teacher prepared a PowerPoint where we had to say:
This person is Japanese or This person is Chinese.
So basically she had all these pictures of ‘’famous people’’ and we had to say the sentences out loud.
There were some historical people from Asia who I never even have heard about before.
Blame it on the lack of learning the history of Asian countries at schools in the Netherlands.
And the teacher picked someone really interesting from the Netherlands.
So interesting that I didn’t even know who he was.

So this Van den Holken or whatever this guy is called..
(The hangul for this name was so weird I couldn’t even figure out the last bit of his surname)
is apparently some famous baseball player who plays for a team in Daegu.
His pitch is so good that he had a great influence on the team’s score.
But.. he is not famous in the Netherlands. Well.. Maybe if you are really into baseball, you would know him.
But he is famous in Korea, apparently.
I really have to research this guy.

Next up were flags.
The people from the countries of which the flag appeared on the screen had to put their hand up.
Our teacher added a cool segment to this lesson by letting everyone say ‘’Hello” in their own language which was a lot of fun!
Then came the flag of.. the United Kingdom.
Ajusshi was like: WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THIS IS YOUR FLAG.
Yes. Indeed Ajusshi still thought I was from the United Kingdom even though we spent a week together in class and everyone had to say where they were from like 10 times.
I was surprised that the teacher added my flag, actually.
A lot of the times the Netherlands are left out in Korean learning material.
Why is that Korean people? Hmmm? Why?
Didn’t we sent you Guus Hiddink!? You should add us to the list of countries in all the Korean books!
Joking.
But really. I would appreciate it if you did.

Next up was capitals.
The teacher added pictures of a famous place in the capital.
To be honest I didn’t even recognize my own capital.
Why you ask?
Because our teacher took a REALLY old picture of The Dam in Amsterdam.
So old that there was a horse with carriage in the background.
I’m sure that I wasn’t even born when this picture was taken.
My teacher was SO surprised that I didn’t recognize it.
If only she took one of the recent pictures so I didn’t have to embarrass myself in front of my class.
But hey. That’s okay.
I did well on all the other countries and managed to impress my classmates with the knowledge of Geography and Culture.

After that we learned more grammar.
I love grammar actually.
Because understanding grammar makes you able to fully understand the structure of sentences in different languages.

The teacher told us we would have a test the next day so.. STUDY HARD!
Which I did.

Roommate report: ..

Tuesday
Today I had my first test so I made sure I studied the day before.
It turned out to be 2 tests so I got 2 different scores.
When I finished my tests I felt quite good about it but half an hour later when we revised stuff that we learned on Monday I definitely thought I screwed up.
Because I realized the mistakes I made on the first test I began calculating and I thought I would have gotten 60% at most.
But when the teacher gave back the tests I saw the results: for the first one I had 80% and the second one was 100%!

Of course Ajusshi failed his tests miserably: not even 10%.

Today nothing interesting really happened.

Roommate report: ..

Wednesday
Today we had a different teacher: Kim Mi Ra.
(Oh I forgot to tell you: I have teacher Kim Jeong Uk on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and teacher Kim Mira on Wednesday and Friday)
And the lesson turned out to be very hard since today we were studying places.
She gave us a list with 25 different places like : Supermarket or Restaurant and it was a bit too much for me to memorize.
Because not only did we had to use verbs (which I still wasn’t sure about half of them) we had to use all the previous stuff we learned together in a sentence with a place.
So basically:
Wilson drinks coffee in the coffee shop.

Since Ajusshi is sitting next to me I get to hear his random comments on everything all the time.
Today he commented “This is bullshit’’, ‘’This is so bad’’ and “I want to kill myself’’.
And all of that in a Chinese accent which makes it sound way more dramatic than it actually is.
It kind of reminds me of my friend Cheng back home (Cheng is Chinese but he is able to speak English very well).
Except for the fact that Cheng’s English is so much better than Ajusshi’s.
I figured that Ajusshi learned English while watching movies like Pulp Fiction.
I guess by watching action movies he learned to say stuff like that.

Today we had to do another conversation.
I was kind of worried since he is still not able to read hangul very well and he tends to rush his Korean so he constantly stutters so I always have to hold in my laughter.
And this guy never studies.
When he talks it’s like:
Father.. ,  .. eets.. , eits.. , eats.. , rice.. , at.. , the resto.. ,  restu.. , restaurant.
So all the teams started to do their conversations and we were unfortunately last.
I heard Ajusshi gulp next to me out of fear and we both had to laugh because it felt like some comedy movie.
Then he was like : “DON’T WORRY! I WILL TAKE CARE OF THIS’’ and somehow we managed to have an actual conversation.
But in the end when we had to write everything down he still wrote down : I eat noraebang.
Ajusshi is unpredictable.

By the way.. I’m not sure if I ever explained the word Ajusshi for people who are not that into Korea.
Basically an Ajusshi is a middle aged man starting from like 30 and up.
This Chinese guy however, is 23 just like me.
When the teacher scolds him she uses Ajusshi to make fun of him.

This was an interesting lesson to say the least.

Roommate report : SHE CAME BACK HALLELUJAH. She went to Seoul for a week! And she went to a K-pop concert so she showed me all the cool stuff she bought.
And I finally learned all the members of Exo because of her.
I’m not sure if she just went and ditch school or if she actually had a week off or whatever.
Either way. I’m glad she is back so I don’t have to worry about her getting into teenage prostitution anymore.

Thursday:
We got another test, hurray.
I knew most of the answers because I actually study every single day.
Today we talked about places we were going which came in handy because Korean people always seem to ask:
"WHERE ARE YOU GOING?'' and "WHERE ARE YOU NOW?"

Ajusshi moved his table away from me today to sit next to a chinese girl.
When I came back into the classroom he waved at me saying.
''HELLO! I moved.''
"You know, I am Chinese! She is Chinese! WE ARE CHINESE!''
And I quickly realized that he probably moved because then when he is not paying attention someone can actually tell him what is going on.

Today was the day I bonded more with my roommate.
She was watching different k-idol programs on youtube and when she was watching the new Beast reality show she just nearly died laughing.
She was like: "HAVE YOU SEEN THIS?" I didn't even realize it was Beast until she asked me.
And then we ended up watching the first episode of the series together.
We laughed MANY times, it was a good day.

Friday
Today was such a hard lesson and I had quite a hard time so that means I have to study more during the weekend which I'm not looking forward to that much.
We learned how to say: This is small and That is big.
Luckily for me the teacher gave us like more than 30 different possibilities which I have to try and remember.
For some reason 2 girls in our class already seem to know this stuff but I can't figure out if they just selfstudy a lot or if they are just repeating the lessons.

Today Pyeon helped me out.
I thought I had to pay money because one of the teachers (I'm gonna call her Shinji because she reminds me of Shinji from Koyote) said something about money and she showed me an amount.
But in the end I found out that they wanted to refund me the money and therefore I needed a bank account.
So Pyeon helped me get a bank account at Daegu Bank ( O M G SO AWESOME) so I could eventually retreive the money.
So I know I have my own bankbook amd my own Daegu bank card that also works as a transportation card.

Later on I told the teacher that she reminded me of Shinji.
I'm still not sure if she was offended or not because she was laughing but she also blurted out THAT SHINJI IS FAT!
I was so suprised because I like Shinji and think she is definitely a natural beauty.

Not only is she good at singing she also did a great job on acting in High Kick 1 and when watching those series I kept thinking that she looked so pretty.
Then I started a conversation between all the teachers in the teachers office about Shinji as I walked out.

I wanted to go to Daegu station so I could see Beagles again, the duo that plays music in Donseongno but they would've played 8 or 9 and it takes more than an hour to get there.
More than an hour getting back as well and I would have to leave 22:30.
It didn't really work out.
Then I thought of going to a restaurant myself but that seemed kind of lonely for a friday evening alone.
I also considered going to noraebang to sing all the songs I wanted to but it the end I didn't go there either.
I pretty much just spent my time on the internet talking to people.

Peace event

Saturday.
On Saturday I didn’t really do a lot considering the fact that I almost had to sleep on the street the day before.
You would expect me to go out and do fun stuff on Saturday but I just didn’t feel like it.

I was walking back from the student union area to my dorm as I heard someone whistling to me.
Asian people might not know what I’m talking about unless you are an Asian living in America or Europe or whatever.
I’ll explain either way : You might have seen a movie where some builders are whistling at some pretty girl walking by.
It’s that kind of whistle that goes : Phietphew.
And I just know. This person whistling at me can NOT be Korean since Korean people (or probably Asian in general) don’t do this.
So I decided to walk some more and look back after 10 seconds.
And I saw.. some black kid who looked like he was 16.

I was so offended.
I might look like I’m 18 or whatever but I am 23 years old (24 Korean age) and I do not feel comfortable being whistled at by some kid who is probably more than 4 years younger than me.
It’s annoying and embarrassing.

Sunday.
I got invited to a Peace event on Sunday somewhere earlier that week.
A girl named Sarah (I think her name is Saebom cause that’s how she’s called on Kakaotalk) approached me on the street and convinced me to go.
I thought : Why not? Since I didn’t have anything to do on Sunday anyway!
I didn’t know much about the event besides that it was supposed to take place in Daegu’s Citizen’s Hall at 15:30.
Until.. I got a katok from Sarah saying they changed the place and time: Somewhere in Suseong at 15:00.
I got instructions from her on how to get there: I had to take the bus towards Yeungnam University (840) which was already a mystery to begin with.
I went to the bus stop but the sign said it went towards the wrong direction so I went to the opposite road. But when I talked to the bus driver he said it was the opposite stop. (EVEN THOUGH THE SIGN SAID DIFFERENT) I am still confused about this matter.
Is this some Sunday shift routine? If someone knows.. please tell me.
Again the rule : bus drivers words are holy.

From Yeungnam I saw supposed to take the subway towards Daegu Bank station, which I did.
On the way there I got approached by the second Jezus girl by now.
They’re the people who come to you with flyers about Jezus and God and what not.
So out of politeness I took her flyer (and because it’s in English it might be funny to read)
From Daegu Bank I was supposed to meet Sarah at 14:30 but I was late 15 minutes..
So I katok’d Sarah and she told me I had to take a bus there.
Mind the fact that it was already 15:00 and the ceremony already began.
So I walked up to the bus 403 and I had to get off at Dusan community centre.
While I was looking for the right stop on the sign, two girls asked me where I wanted to go.
I showed them my katok from Sarah and they said they were going there as well!
That was so convenient because I could just follow them to my destination.
We got off at Dusan Community Centre and I got to talking with one of the girls.
I think her name was Eunjo, but I might have gotten it wrong.
But I’m just going to call her Eunjo for the rest of this post.
We talked about all kinds of stuff.

We went towards the peace event and there were SO many people there.
On the screen was the founder of the peace association and everyone was cheering loudly.
Eunjo translated for me: He has traveled 10 times across the world in 2 years to speak to religious leaders and country’s leaders to convince them to sign a peace agreement.
Apparently he got them to sign the declaration of world peace last year the 25^th of May.
This year was the first anniversary for this event.
I’m surprised I never even heard about this, because this seems like a very big thing if you are able to convince leaders of religions to sign a declaration of world peace.
Apparently this event was broadcasted on a lot of different places in Korea.
The event itself on the screen was in Seoul but some of the commentary was being broadcasted by Busan.

Because of the Sewol ferry disaster the colors of the event were yellow.
Many people carried around the balloons saying : Cheer up Korea! And You are our leader of peace!
After the speeches of the association in Seoul they continued the speeches of speakers in Daegu:
An High school student, Followers of the association from Congo and the Philippines and an University student.
After the speakers they had a choir which was very nice.
They sang their songs loudly and with a lot of enthusiasm.

After the choir they invited everyone to do a walk around the giant lake.
Everyone carried their signs and balloons and marched behind the marching band.
People were waving around their balloons and signs while many photographers took their photos.
It was amazing to see how many joined this march around the lake.
You were able to see people with yellow balloons from all the way across the lake.
While walking I talked a lot to Eunjo about her studies and about many Korean idols and actors.
Of course we also talked about food and about the Netherlands.
Then we also talked about Deux, S.E.S and H.O.T.
She laughed and she told me : “You’re exactly like a Korean!”

After the march Eunjo took me to the bus stop since I still wanted to go to Kyobo bookstore and see if there were any interesting non-fiction books.
So I went to Kyobo and I found no interesting non-fiction books.. bummer.
Well actually I did, but they were too expensive.
So after that failure I went to Gugi since I go there at least once every year.
They’re a really good fusion restaurant in the Donseongno area and they’re not expensive.

So I went home and took the right bus!
WOO!

Roommate report: Do I even have to tell you..?

Monday to friday, not so much routine.

20-05
Today we learned more consonants and vowels.
In my current class : the beginner class, there are only 8  students (including me).
The other people that were in my class before seem to be in different classes now.
No idea why. Probably because they already have done level one before.
So now it’s me, 3 Japanese girls, 1 Mongolian girl, 1 Vietnamese girl and 2 Chinese (a boy and a girl).
The Vietnamese girl (Nok Hwa) has a backpack with.. weeds on it and they look like the weed leafs the Dutch are familiar with, if you know what I’m saying.
It kind of makes me laugh because the girl wearing the backpack is such a cute and tiny girl.

Roommate report : My roommate left and didn’t return before I went to sleep. I’m kind of worried.

21-05
The more days pass by, the faster the learning pace seems to go.
Today we finished the Korean alphabet and we now progressed to more words and little sentences.
The sentences we learned today are mainly things the teacher would say like:
‘’Look here’’ or ‘’Read this’’.

The Chinese guy is so funny.
Today he almost fell asleep during class but his arm somehow slipped on his desk and the noise woke him up.
Me and the Chinese girl were almost dying because of laughter.
This guy is so clueless but yet so macho.
I didn’t know that combination was even possible.

Roommate report: My roommate is still gone but today I found out her toothbrush was missing so she is probably on a stay-over school trip.

22-05
We learned so many things in class today.
Finally, we progressed on to grammar and that meant I finally got some answers to many questions I had regarding the difference between writing and pronunciation.
In Korean some things you write a certain way are not pronounced the way they are written.
That got me to thinking “If you do not pronounce a word the way it is written, why would you even bother to write it that way!?’’
And then a sense of reality got through to me : ‘’In Dutch.. you will witness even more difficulties regarding this subject’’.
I shouldn’t complain.
In fact.. I should be thankful that Korean easier than Dutch.

Today we also learned classroom words like: desk and chair.
Oh, I forgot to mention the fact that the teacher made us all pick cards.
Each card had a different number on them: 1 to 8.
We had to sit in the order of the numbers (probably so we will be triggered to talk to different people)
But there was no number 8 present: (Guess who was late for class today?)
Right..
Ajusshi from China.
He came at 11 because apparently he drank too much the day before.
Our Chinese girl replied the teacher : Sha Hwi Hau (his name looks like this in hangul) meori apayo.
Yes. In fact our Chinese Ajusshi was dealing with a severe hang-over.
When he came in he was scolded by our teacher.. but that didn’t stop him from playing around with his cellphone.
The teacher took his phone.
Luckily for him the teacher was putting the word descriptions (if that makes sense) on objects in the classroom.
And maybe you can guess what one of the words was..
Yes, it was indeed: PHONE!
This led to Ajusshi’s phone being taped to the school board and was turned into a learning material.
Convenient for us, but not so much for him.

Then the word air conditioner showed up and for your information: our aircon is located on the ceiling.
Luckily we had a man in our class : Ajusshi.
So he got onto the chair and… was still too short to reach it.
So we laughed at him.
Then, he tried jumping up to the ceiling.
Which worked.. for a while, that is.
Then Ajusshi figured it was too much work for him to put it back and transformed himself to:
AIRCON AJUSSHI.
It was a fun class.

Roommate report: WHY IS SHE STILL GONE? Where could she have gone to?

23-05
These days I’m wearing my high heels more often.
I want to be pro in walking in them like a lot of other Korean girls.
Wearing high heels to school: SKIT!

Today to my surprise Ajusshi showed up in time.
And he had to sit next to me (number one) since there were no other seats because there were a few teachers in training joining us for class today.
We repeated the stuff we learned the days before and learned useful phrases like:
Is this a chair? Yes, it’s a chair.
And Is this a desk? No it’s not a desk. It’s a chair.

Then it was time to team up with the classmate next to us and ask each other questions to work out which object we were talking about.
We got a paper with pictures of different objects but mine had half of the description and the classmate would get a paper with the other half of the descriptions.
That’s why you had to ask which item it was.
I had to team up with Ajusshi, but he didn’t know the hangul for many objects so I had to check his paper many time to know what the guy was trying to tell me.
The teachers in training were watching us and laughing.
(In the end, I got a compliment from Ajusshi: Te told me that I’m smart because I can read all the hangul!)

Then after that inconvenience, we had to ask our other classmates these questions.
We could pick the classmate we wanted to ask the question ourselves.
Everyone did well.
Of course Ajusshi had to perform one of his clueless creative tricks.
He tried to ask Li Soo rin (The Chinese girl) a question but he couldn’t remember a certain word for what he was pointing at. I can’t remember which object he was holding but this is how it went:
Ajussi (Looking as confused as ever) stuttering:
 Is..This… THIS… T H I S.. and then he blurted out: LI SOO RIN?
He held his object in the air while asking : Is this Li Soo rin?
Li Soo rin looked at him and was like NO, YOUR NOT SUPPOSED TO ASK LIKE THAT!
The whole class was dying of laughter.
And the teacher was like : Yes.. Sha Hwi Hau, VERY creative.
So Li Soo rin just went a long with it saying: No, that is not Li Soo rin. That is a ..

When class ended I quickly went to eat something and I also had a shower.
I wanted to go to Daegu station (aka Donseongro!) for shopping.
It was a good idea to explore the Donseongro area because I got to see many sides of that area:
The traditional, the mixed cuisine, the trendy and the expensive
I bought a few CD’s(2 new : BTS and 4Minute and 2 second hand : Super Junior M and Mika Nakashima as Nana) and some more stationery.
I had some ddeokbeokki which was absolutely DELICIOUS, but so damn spicy.

When walking back to Daegu station I came across a large group of people and in front of the large group of people were about 6 people and 2 policemen.
I didn’t understand much about was going on but while watching the lady I understood this:
“HE HIT ME, LIKE THIS LIKE THIS’’ while hitting the policeman.
It crossed my mind : If this happened in the Netherlands, police would not just stand there while someone hits them.. I think.
The large group of people were such sensatie zoekers.
My mom always uses this word when she describes people who like drama and stand around to see what happens.
If you translate it directly to English it would be : sensation seekers.
In Korea the number of sensatie zoekers is quite big and it surprises me every time.

I took the wrong bus home (well it was the right bus.. but it had the wrong destination)
Then we got to the end of the route and I told the bus driver in Korean : This is not Daegu University?
THANK GOD FOR KOREAN CLASS.
He told me to sit down and dropped me of at Hanyang street and told me the bus I had to take.

Unfortunately. I didn’t listen.
This is a very important thing I will tell you : Busdriver’s Advice is HOLY.
Atleast.. maybe only in Korea. BUT DON’T EVER FORGET THIS.
I learned the hard way:
I took another wrong bus (on the stop it said Daegu University but it was probably the LONG route) and instead of sitting it through I got off at the middle of nowhere since it was the last stop.
I can’t even remember where but it was close to Ulseong.
Which is like more than 30 min north of Daegu University.
I panicked.
I was in the middle of NOWHERE and it was after 11 and I didn’t know when the last bus would come because I didn’t see stops with information on them anywhere.
And.. The dorm closes at 00:00.
I walked about for 10 minutes and the only thing that came to my mind was to wait for a taxi to pass by ( I saw one earlier, so there were definitely a few driving by)
So I waited for a taxi and waved my hands like an idiot.
I got in and told the taxi driver my destination.
It was hard but I managed to talk to him with the few Korean I could speak.

In the end I didn’t have enough money (5000 won short) so I asked the driver to stop at the main gate so I could get some money from the ATM.
Unfortunately that didn’t take any foreign cards.
Luckily on my way there I already figured out what I would do if my plan didn’t work.
I had some money in my room, in my dorm.
I explained to the driver : My card doesn’t work! BUT! I have money in my dorm and I got him to drive to my dorm.
I told him to wait and left my bag in the car so he wouldn’t think I was running away.
I quickly grabbed 10.000 won and returned to the car quickly.
I apologized for the inconvenience  and gave him the money.
He didn’t seem to care that much as he probably doesn’t really get customers in such a quiet place at that time.
I made it to the dorm just in time at 23:40.

Long story short : Perfect way to HAVE TO speak in Korean and Bad way to have to spend money.

Roommate report : Yep, she's still gone.

First schoolday

Because it was my first schoolday I woke up early, not intentionally though.

I was quite nervous because I was supposed to take a placement test.
The security guy told me we would meet at 8:40 so the new students could go there together to prevent people from getting lost.

So this lady came and she was speaking Japanese because all the other people there were Japanese.
And I went up to the security guy and said: "Should I go with them?" because I didn't want to stand there in complete confusion while the lady kept calling out Japanese names.
He told me to go with them and so I did.

The lady took us to the placement test but a teacher came (She turned out to be MY teacher) and said NO!
You are Sadea right? No you won't take a test.. just come with me!
So we headed out to a different room.. a classroom.
About 10 people were already in class.
Vietnamese, Chinese, Mongolian and.. me.
Just kidding. I didn't tell you about the one American guy who got to class quite late.
More than half of our class apparently failed their course and they had to start over with level one again.

We started with.. hangul, of course.
Which I already knew.
Luckily for me I actually did learn some new stuff and my class is pretty funny.

The American guy (Jess) who sat next to me started to communicate with me writing messages on his hangul sheet.
As if in a movie he wrote : "Have you eaten already" and I shook my head.
To which he erased his message and wrote: "Wanna join us for lunch?".
So I said yes(because I aint no party pooper, okay!)

After class we went from some lunch.
I ordered the same as Jess: some Japanese style chicken katsu.
I got to talk to my classmates some more which was really nice.

A classmate asked me : Do you have a boyfriend?
I said: I don't have one.
Then he called out : WHY!?
And I said: haha.. why? I don't know.
(You might think: HEY, WHAT ABOUT THAT GUY IN LONDON HUH?)
Yes. It's true.
I like him, wel actually more than just like him.. butttt..
Because we can't be together like we used to, we broke up.

ANYWAYS. My blog is about Korea, okay.
Let me continue:

After class I went to the study hall.
You would think that the main activity in the study hall is studying, BUT YOU ARE WRONG!
Because I experienced that Korean people seem to do everything there but studying.
Well maybe. 1/3 of the time. but they spent their other 2/3 doing other stuff:
Sleeping, Texting, Being with their boyfriend or girlfriend and more.
So I studied for a while but in the end I didn't remember a lot of the sentences I was stuyding.
I definitely have to change my way of studying.

The stuff in the school shop is pretty expensive.
I wasn't gonna pay more than 10.000 won for a huge bottle of shampoo so I decided I would go to the street near Daegu Catholic University:
Hayang-ro, which is the nearest place with a lot of shops and restaurants.
I went to Daisoo and got my stuff there : Large bottle of shampoo, showergel and a little bottle of conditioner, everything for under 8000 won.
Even though I had to spend 2400 won on the bus in the end I definitely saved money.
Effort over convenience.

By the way : on my way to the bus I saw Pyeon.
He was with like 3 foreign girls so I kind of ignored him.
I thought: "This guy.. looking like a player, definitely not gonna talk to him".
It might not have been like that at all but I dont like it when someone "collects" foreigners.
And you know.. the fact that it was all girls made a difference as well.

Overall : My first schoolday was a success.

Birthday

Today was my birthday and I was supposed to celebrate it with my friends Jinjoo and Eunji which meant: Back to Daegu station!
My roommate got back at about 12 and I overslept, kind of.
So I quickly packed my stuff and rushed to the bus station.
Yes. It took another hour.
Luckily for me Korea charges 1200 won for bus trips and it doesn’t matter where you get off.
You still pay 1200 won.
Exactly the same system as in London, besides.. cheaper.

Before I met up with my friends I went to Kyopo book stores and bought some Korean books for self-study.
I also went to the second hand book/cd store and found 2 2AM CD’s for really cheap.
I paid about 13.000 won and normally you pay that amount for new CD’s.
Really cheap!
I also got a new phone case since I really needed a new one.

Then I met up with Jinjoo and Eunji.
We ate chicken and we talked loads about the Netherlands and about their upcoming trip.
To be honest it looked like a pizza but instead of on top all the ingredients were underneath the cheese.
It was really good.
I even got some presents: Hair mist and a bracelet!

I asked them why Korean girls never really wear sleeveless shirts or tops.
Apparently it’s because Korean girls worry about arm fat.
Which I found really surprising.

Then we went for Noraebang and it turned out that I forgot a lot of lyrics to a lot of songs.
BLAME LONDON.
After that we went to UNIQLO for Eunji and she bought some t-shirts.
Then we went and made some photo stickers and after that we went to Hottracks so I could buy some Letter paper.
I still can’t believe they have a whole wall dedicated to writing letters.
It’s a good thing.

Then I had to head home.
Which took me just an hour this time since I didn’t get off at the wrong stop.
I got home quite late (around 10) and I was so tired so I just went to bed ‘’early’’ while my roommate was watching her Chinese series in the background.

Dorm Life

I took the KTX to Dongdaegu station and I got picked up by a taxi driver holing a Daegu University sign.
He took me to the university which still took about 30 minutes from Dongdaegu station.
I got there and I was already surprised about how big the campus was.
When I got out I was greeted by a guy named Cheon.
I Think his full name was Cheon Taekyung or something but I can’t really remember because I was jetlagged and everything went so fast.
We went together to the reception and I met the security guy who is a really jolly happy go lucky guy.
I got room 1416 and they said I will be sharing the room with a Chinese girl.
But she wasn’t there.
He has to open the door manually because she wasn’t there and she was the only one who knew the password.
I dropped of my stuff and Cheon began the tour.

He took me to so many places.
Laundry, Cafeteria, Fitness Centre (WAIT WHAT?), Doctors post, more Cafeterias, Stationery shop and a lot more I can’t even remember.
After all the basic stuff he took me to Jongchan’s office.
And I got to meet the guy behind the Uhm’s and Yeah’s.
Of course it had to be a really good looking Bilingual guy who’s English sounds like it’s been taught by some university in the US.
Not to mention the office looked exactly similar to the teacher office of Korean high school dramas.

After that I was off into the campus alone and hoped I would still know the way back.
Which I did, eventually.
I made my way back and asked the security guy to open the door for me since my roommate was still away.
Me and the security guy went up and we heard from other girls that my roommate is actually in China right now.
LOL.
So the security guy reset the password and told me to tell my roommate the new password when she comes back.
The only thing I know about my roommate is : She’s Chinese and she likes kpop.
And there is a giant bag of nuts in our room so I reckon she really likes nuts.

After that I just went to sleep because I was awake for more than 24 hours.
So I quickly just unpacked my stuff.
I didn’t even bother to shower because I just wanted to sleep even though it was like 17:30
So I slept for a long time.

I woke up quite early on Saturday but I just went back to sleep until like 10:00.
I was still amazed that I’m basically living in Daegu now.
Due to jetlag I woke up many times during the night, but overall I feel very happy.
I prepared my backpack and got ready to go to the cafeteria.
I ordered one of my favorite dishes which is Kimchi jjigae (Kimchi stew)
First you have to purchase a ticket  through a mysterious ticket machine.
I swear I have never seen such a thing in a cafeteria before.
And you are supposed to give your ticket to one of the kitchen ajummas and they will prepare it for you.
Luckily the cafeteria food isn’t that expensive.
Because I was too tired and hungry I was not able to eat properly and I had trouble holding my chopsticks.

I found out how big the campus actually is.
I explored the campus for a bit and I’m kind of finding my way around now.
Without getting lost all that much.

Because I had literally nothing to do I went to Donseongro.
This is THE street to go to for shopping.
I katok’d my friend Junhwan and asked him when he is gonna play music again.
He said : Today! Please come, 5 o’clock!
This was another good reason to go to Daegu central.
Because I was at Daegu university I had to take a bus to Daegu station, which takes about 1 hour!
I went shopping at Daisoo (which is a Japanese chain store) for some school supplies and things I might need for my room.
After that I waited until 5 o’clock and I met my friend Junhwan.
He is in a group called Beagles and I met him last year when I saw him playing guitar on the street.

I was so surprised : When people were walking past me I could hear them talking:
‘’Wow, It’s Beagles!’’ and some girl even called her friends saying: ‘’Come quickly! Beagles are here!’’
I guess Beagles got much more famous since last year.
They played loads of new songs and many requests from the audience.
Jihoon didn’t have his usual instruments this time.
Instead he used buckets and other stuff to play his music which worked out fine!

At 7 o’clock I went back home and took the bus back.
Unfortunately I got out at the wrong stop : Daegu Catholic University.
On the sign it said I had to walk 5 stops and I thought : ‘’How long could that actually take?’’
It took one hour, walking, in the dark, alone.
But as always, I managed and didn’t even get lost.

On my way to the dorm :
I saw Pyeon, who is btw not named Cheon who just got back from the swimming pool.
I got mistaken for some random Korean girl. (See.. quarter Korean right there)

Flight to Korea, 2014 edition.

So at 6 o’clock on the 15th I woke up, because obviously I had to get ready form my flight.
Travelled to Schiphol, blocked a couple of people with my giant suitcase along the way and got there about 3 hours before my flight actually even left.
I still can’t believe it : I could already check in my baggage at the Lufthansa counter ( The time went I went with Finnair in 2012 it wasn’t even open yet and there was a giant cue already to begin with ).
It was so peaceful at the item check thing that I didn’t even had to wait for more than 5 minutes.
So long story short : I just got there and I was in the airport maybe 30 minutes later.
Which meant: I had to wait for 2,5 more hours.
That turned out to be fun though because they changed the gate about 3 times.
I found out about the second change late, so I had to rush to my gate and when I got there they started boarding.
My timing was on point.

So I boarded a half empty plane because there were so many seats still available and I sat down on the place I was supposed to next to a really good looking German business guy.
YES, just my luck (:
It took about 1 hour to get to Munich.
I got off and I walked around in completely confused for a while.
This didn’t matter because My flight was at 16:05 and I was already there around 13:10.
Then I went through passport control just to get it over with.. and then I got to my gate thinking.. “Hey, these people don’t look Korean”.
But it turned out there was a flight to Croatia at the same gate an hour before the one to Incheon.
So I walked around aimlessly for 1,5 hours looking for Starbucks and what not.
Which in the end I never found because apparently if you go through passport control, there is no more Starbucks.
Great.

So I manipulated the Wi-Fi a few times.
Basically you can only go on the internet for 30 minutes with one certain e-mail and you didn’t even have to log in.
So I changed my e-mail a few times and ended up getting 2 hours of free Wi-Fi anyway.
Then it was time to board.. a half empty plane again.
So that caused people to sit everywhere and the stewardess told me I could sit at different places because the plane was so empty anyway.
So the couple next to me got their precious ‘’alone’’ time.
Whatever.
I’m just bitter because the guy I like is still in London.
So what?

This ajumma got to lay down on 2 seats which was fine because I wasn’t able to sleep anyway.
Maybe drinking Red Bull wasn’t the best choice after all.
And loads of the Korean people already slept after the first hour which I still think is pretty amazing.
These people are able to sleep almost instantly anywhere, it seems.
I really didn’t like that Lufthansa didn’t even have 1 Korean movie in there which was a damn shame.
Finnair had a couple of Korean movies which was sooooo nice.
This will definitely be a reason to choose Finnair or Korean Air instead in the future.
So I ended up just watching the Lego movie instead.
Everything about that is indeed awesome.
SPACESHIP!
After that I watched 12 years as a slave which gave me goose bumps even after the first time the word “Nigger’’ was said.
Luckily for me they repeat this word throughout the whole movie.
I absolutely dislike this word and that kind of approach on black people to begin with.
So this storyline was pretty heavy on me.
Then I looked at pictures on my laptop for another hour.. somehow and watched some Community.
After that I somewhat slept and then it was time to get up for breakfast.
We landed at Incheon at about 9:25 and from there things went quickly.

I was greeted by a very happy man of border control.
He’s like : ‘’Ah! You always go to Korea every year since 2012 and always around the same time!’’
‘’Do you have Korean friends or relatives?’’
I loved how he instantly thought I might even have Korean relatives.
I guess I do kind of consider myself to be a quarter Korean anyway.. Haha.
You would think this is a joke, but I swear my mom even says this.
Anyway.
The man looked so happy that he didn’t even bother to look at my other document that much.
I just had to take fingerprint scans and I swear this time they didn’t even take a picture.
Maybe they still have the ones from previous years.

I walked out to the luggage place and they already started releasing luggage before I even arrived there.
Yes I swear Incheon airport has the fastest luggage service EVER.
I got my luggage put some stuff from my backpack to my suitcase and I went off.
I quickly took out some money at the nearest ATM trying to avoid ALL taxi drivers (which I did).
And quickly went towards the high express train to Seoul station.
Actually my first time ever even taking this.

I got to Seoul station in about 45 minutes and I bought KTX tickets to Dongdaegu right after.
Luckily for me the train from 12:15 still had seats.
Then after I had to call Yun Jongchan which is basically the guy responsible for the language program.
I try to call with payphone (Hint: Look for a giant group of military guys)
But I didn’t have more than 500 won change and there were like 10 military guys in line for 4 different phones already.
So I decided to just call Jongchan from my mobile.
Skit!
This word you guys just have to get used to, it’s a word I use went I want to say that I don’t care AT ALL.
I loved how Jongchan used words like : Uhm and Yeah like he was just a friend.
I guess people here are way less formal when it comes to foreigners.
Which I really like.

After that I bought some food and went to my KTX train.
I WASN’T ABLE TO GO FOR KIMCHI JJIGAE AT SEOUL STATION AND ITS MY ABSOLUTE FAVORITE ARGH.