my first day as a teacher is oficially over!

Well the first real day of teaching is over, and it was a long one! on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday i have 7 classes that are split up by a 2 hour lunch break. the really good news is that on Tuesday and Thursday i only have 4 classes! teaching is actually pretty fun! the kids have a crazy addiction to playing "hangman" and i get pestered by the to "teacher teacher play game! game! game!" which is totally fine with me! the kids were very nice to me considering how clueless i was today, oh and i also need to brush up on my spelling quickly!

a quick recap of my weekend:

Saturday: met up with Karien, Warwick, and adrie at AK plaza (a train station) took the train about 30 mins north then got on a bus for a LOOONG time to everland! which is like the korean version of disneyland. it was an awesome time, even though i'm still not able to bend my knee enough to go on rides. on the way home we grabbed beers for the long bus ride, and went out to a few bars when we got back into Pyongteak, which i can now pronounce properly.

sunday: sleep, sleep, sleep, M-Mart, Sleep, sleep. (M mart is like a nice walmart)

i promise my blogs will have more pictures soon! so far everything just feels like a blur!

T minus 3 hours

So I've successfully fit my life into two checked bags and one carry on per the airlines request, and it's all starting to seem real. I'm moving to Korea. And pardon my french but FUCK YES, it's about time!




See you on the flip side

acl tear postpones my trip

i have been dying to get to Korea and start my next adventure as an english teacher, but i managed to blow my knee out just in time. I hurt my knee on Monday august 3rd, 2009. i was able to have surgery to replace my ACL using a section of my hamstring on August 6th. at this point i am still on crutches with a full immobile leg brace. i have my first post operation meeting with my surgeon Monday and will start physical therapy soon after.
as you can imagine i have quite a bit of free time and i have been using it to learn the korean alphabet, hangul. The most useful web site i have found so far for this has been this tutorial. I also "purchased" some Korean language learning but have yet to take a serious crack at them.

I've already used facebook to connect with several people living in the city of pyeongtaek, where i will be living, and in a few other cities as well. Everyone i talk to seems to have travel and adventure in mind, and i can't wait to meet them!

my only concern about moving to korea right now is the lack of road bikes over there. my knee rehabilitation will require quite a bit of biking, so i have pretty much decided that i am going to disassemble my bike and pack the frame in one of my suitcases and just buy new rims when i get to SK.

anyway this is a picture of me using my knee flex device that just moves my knee back and forth so that i regain flexibility. at present i am able to move my knee to a 70 degree flex.