Move-in Day

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Sun. June 1st

Today was move-in day for me into my apartment in Anyang. I was tired of living out of my suitcase and was pretty excited about getting settled in. With our 10+ bags of luggage in tow, we headed south to Anyang in a taxi van. There we met my co-teacher - Yi Hyun-Hi and she showed us around the apartment. At a first glance the apartment seemed okay. I thought it was a bit small but certainly liveable. She walked us down the street towards the subway station, where there was more civilization and modern living. My co-teacher and I made plans for my first day of school, that following Wednesday, and she headed out. Matt, Laura and I grabbed a quick bite to eat and headed back to the apartment with cleaning supplies and other necessities.

After further examination of the apartment, I realized we may not have purchased enough cleaning supplies. The apartment was honestly - DISGUSTING!!!!! It was obvious the person who lived there before NEVER, EVER cleaned! I found out the previous foreign English teacher at my school was the former resident. He lived there with his lazy wife and they apparently didn’t clean the entire year they lived there. You’re probably thinking I’m exaggerating…think again. I wasn’t expecting sterile conditions but this place was bordering on toxic…

Anyway, needless to say Laura and I spent all day cleaning the place. Matt made a few runs to the store to replenish cleaning supplies and to set up my internet. I was so thankful Laura was there to help me - it made it seem less horrifying!

After a hard day’s work, we decided to check out one of the restaurants just below my apartment. It was one of those restaurants where you sat on the floor. We were spoiled over the weekend, going out with our Korean-speaking relatives so we weren’t forced to try to communicate. Well, tonight the communication was a bit rough but we managed with a lot of hand gestures and pointing at pictures! We ordered some meal which we cooked over charcoal. It was excellent! As we are eating the meal, it continued to cook in the pan and it started to burn....a lot.... We didn't realize we needed to turn the temperature down as we were eating! As always we created a huge scene and they had to replace the pan w/ new food! I'm pretty sure they were secretly cursing at us!

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