Our crazy first day in Gokseong

My oh My...again where do I begin!?? This is where the true CULTURAL experience sets in. On Monday it was our last day with all of the teachers we met. It was time to meet the Korean co-teachers, visit the schools, and move into the apartment we will be staying in for a year!

Monday ended up being one of the CRAZIEST days of my life. All I can say is at least Cory and I were together! The day was spent meeting our teachers which to our relief, Cory's spoke English really well so we had a lot to talk about. My teacher on the other hand can speak English but I can't really understand her accent, so it's a little more challenging. The great thing though is that she is the sweetest thing and tries so hard! We are blessed to have the co-teachers that we do because they either make or break the experience for you. So, our day was spent with them. They introduced us to all the teachers and principal (which is like a KING in Korea). They took us shopping for a comforter which was an experience as well. When we arrived at this little shop the women were showing us neon pink, purple, green, flowers, mushroom printed comforters. We didn't like any of them! We felt so bad we so we ended up buying the most relaxed pattern we could find. Finally, it was time to see our apartment for the first time! The moment we have been waiting for!!!!

We found out we were on the 3rd floor with no elevator. I was used to that with going to North Central ;) They warned us that our apartment was very old. But when we walked in we were very happy. Our apartment has 3 bedrooms, a FULL size fridge, an oven (which is unheard of here) A huge and extremely comfortable bed, 2 verandas (porches), heated floors, and an ENORMOUS closet! They must have known we would be living here :) We love it. Of course it has it's little quirks. After rearranging a little bit though and unpacking, it's definitely starting to feel like home. I will put pictures and a video on facebook soon!

So....after seeing our apartment for the first time they asked us to go somewhere with them.We locked our apartment and went to take care of a few more things. Finally, 8:00pm rolled around it was FINALLY time to go to our apartment and settle in. Oh did I not mention that they wanted us to teach the next day?!?! We were REALLY hoping for at least one day off...

So our teachers dropped us off and said "Goodbye, see you tomorrow!" As we drag our feet up the stairs and pull out the keys to finally enter into our apartment... the key does not work!!! We are completely locked out of our apartment, we have no cell phones, and no one in our town speaks English! Luckily, Cory's Korean teacher ordered us food that was being sent to our apartment. The delivery boy was our only hope! When the 16 year old finally arrived we asked him to help us, but he didn't know English! Therefore, I had to act out what our problem was! "Key not work." Horrible English but he understood! He knew to call the Korean teacher that ordered our food and she came to our rescue!!! Thank God. We were locked out for about 2 hours and thought we were going to have to sleep in the hallway..since we had our comforter with us! She called a locksmith and they fixed our lock! So THAT was our first night in Gokseong. Absolutely insane but a story to tell for the future :)