EPIK Orientation

So... I'm finally here! Just got done with the medical check a little while ago. Very expedient... very Korean.

It was weird yesterday leaving the dorms and arriving back at the airport. I knew I wouldn't be returning again, but at the same time, didn't feel like I was really leaving. But still, I felt a bit sad. I also said good-bye to my classes over the past week, and that was really hard.

One of my favorite classes were sooooo sweet. They prepared going away presents for me... *tear* There were little handmade flowers and a "card". I can't say it was really a card, it was more of a card/book in the shape of a heart with a heart-shaped page from each child in it. It was soooo cute. They each handed me their handmade flower and I gave them a hug. One girl.... OMG. She was soooo sad. I didn't realize it really until later, but she was REALLY upset I was leaving. We were playing Simon Says (they love it) and she is very smart and always does the actions right... However that day she was somber and wouldn't do any of the actions... :( I thought she was just upset about something else, but then when it was time to go she started crying!!! :****(  It was really hard for me not to cry then. That was weird to me, I don't normally cry at things like this but... they were sooo sweet! Can I keep them? LOL. But I promised the little girl and my co-teacher I would return for a visit and that seemed to help... a bit.

I'll post some pictures and videos of my students later. I've got a bunch of really cute ones now :D

Anyway, yesterday I moved out of the dorms. That was interesting. After giving 4 bags (1 large suitcase, a small suitcase and 2 small bags) to oppa, I had a suitcase, my backpack and 1 shopping bag left to pack around. Not too bad. I planned on calling a taxi and getting it to take me to the airport, but evidentally when I called there weren't any taxis around. So I went downstairs planning to leave my luggage with the convenience store ajumma and see if I could flag a taxi down. When the ajumma learned what I planned to do, she just about freaked... LOL. In Korean, she basically told me that taking a taxi was too expensive and that I should take a bus. When I looked like I had no idea, she hailed a taxi (herself... I just stood inside because I didn't know what she was doing... LOL) and told him to take me to Cheongnyangni and help me take the bus to Incheon International Airport. She's really super nice :D. The taxi cab driver did just that... I think it only cost about W5,000 to get there, but he still made sure I got on the right bus. :D The bus ride itself was W10,000. So the sweet ajumma saved me about W70,000 or about $70.00US.

We got there at almost exactly 11am. Ironically there were 3 blonde girls who also got on the bus and made me wonder why I was there and wish I had just spent $70 extra dollars to avoid listening to them. They had to be just out of college, were very loud and through listening to their conversation (even with my earbuds in...) they were also on their way to the EPIK orientation. The first 15+ minutes of their conversation centered on who made out with who and who was with who and more such nonsense... When I got off the bus, I went the opposite way... LOL. Even though we were going to the same place, I kind of wanted to stay a good distance away...

Once I made it to the EPIK registration, I should have been brave and talked to more people, but I'm a wuss... :(  I did end up talking to a really nice girl from California, and we talked for quite a while on the bus over too. Of course, the bus ride itself was painful... Three hours of sitting... LOL. Since everyone else didn't have anywhere to store their stuff and most of them had basically just gotten off an airplane, they had lots of luggage. So much so, that the entire cargo hold of the bus was filled and then the rest of the luggage was put in the front half of the bus... The people riding were in the back half... LOL. One of the EPIK staff got on the bus and said, "Can I just ask you guys one question? What in the world did you guys bring? Most of you aren't staying for more than a year, right?" LOL.

After getting here we were ushered to the lobby and through the registration process. They were well prepared and very organized. They had little stations for everything. First, find your nametag, next get your room number, then get a bag of snacks, then get your room key, LAN cable, and bag of orientation stuff, and finally get an EPIK hoodie. Then we went to our rooms (pictures to be added later), which is a tiny bit smaller than the dorm, no shelves or drawers (so we're living out of our bags), but there is a small closet (with 2 hangers)... So... I put a few things in there, hung my nice outfit for meeting my supervisor in (will need to iron it later), but other than that, it's very nice. There's isn't any ondol heating, the heating is through a fan located in front of the window. It was REALLY warm when I walked in... I turned off the heat right away...

My roommate is really nice. She's from South Africa and she's been placed (with her boyfriend) in Daegu. So far, I've met other teachers from California, Colorado, New York, South Africa, New Zealand, England, and Ireland. There are more places, but I can't remember them at the moment.

The medical check was a breeze. I was a bit worried, but it was okay. I was in the first group going in, and it was scheduled to begin at 7:30am. Except at 6:45am they made an announcement over the intercom that the people in Class 1 were to meet in the lobby at 7am... I was ready and had planned to be there early, so I was fine, but everyone else were surprised. My roommate (who was in a much later group, 11am) was still sleeping when they made the announcement. I felt bad because no one could have slept through that announcement. It was also a bit confusing since it sounded like EVERYONE was to meet in the lobby at 7am, but it was only people from class 1. So a bunch of people from the other classes showed up and were told to go back and sleep some more.... LOL.

As I said before, the medical check itself was very expedient. There were probably 40-60 people in the first group (I'm bad at estimating though...) and they had a gym set up to accomodate the medical check with a counter-clockwise rotating stations. So when you entered, you went to the first station and "registered", gave them your money, they put a chart number on your sheet and handed you 2 plastic vials for your blood. Next up was time to pee in a cup! You put your own urine in a different vial they gave you. Let's see... then height, weight and chest measurements, sight, hearing and color testing, an "interview", blood pressure, blood draw, and finally the chest x-ray. In total, there were 9 stations including registration. Your height, weight and chest measurements were all in one station, as was the hearing and color stations. The blood pressure and blood draw were two separate stations though. Literally I sat down for just about 5 seconds at each station minus the blood draw. It was kind of crazy to think of how quickly it was all taken care of. I was at the back of the first group, so it took me a bit longer to get done, but from probably 7:30am when we started until when I received my snack in the classroom at about 8:15am, it took about 45 minutes in total. And again, that's including a bunch of standing around. I laughed at the hearing, sight and color stations since I was asked to read about 6 letters, then moved to the next station, asked to listen to 3 quick beeps, and asked to read 3 numbers in colored dots. I also laughed at the "interview" station. I sat down, handed my medical form to the doctor there, he took it, DIDN'T look at it, signed the bottom and handed it back to me. Done. Hm... LOL. Also, there has been a camera-man every step of the way during this orientation, from the airport to the medical check. DUDE. The guy looked SOOOO happy when he was taking pictures of us getting our blood drawn. His face was hilarious. I SOOOO wish I had thought to take a picture of him since I had my phone with me. Oh well.

Well... That's a pretty big update to write. I think I'll end it here. Until next time, cyas! :D