This site is not an official Fulbright Program site and the views expressed on the site are entirely mine and do not represent the views of the Fulbright Program, the US Department of State or any of its partner organizations.

Friday, July 6, 2012

Hello from Korea!

I've been here a day and a half so far and it has been really fun but very interesting. After a 14 hour flight I arrived at Incheon Airport and met many other ETAs as we waited for everyone to arrive. We then departed for Jungwon University in Gosean (http://eng.jwu.ac.kr), which was a two hour drive. The University is beautiful but very remote and not indicative of any other University in Korea- it's all one building!
The town we are living in.

Yesterday we just listened to a lot of talks about the program and what to expect for the summer. I also was able to sign up for Taekwando lessons, which start on Monday. The lessons will be Monday through Thursday until the end of August so hopefully I will get pretty good. I also signed up for a Korean Cooking Class, which should be really interesting since the food here is quite different. Yesterday for lunch we had small anchovies as a side and there's generally spicy unidentifiable meat at every meal. Luckily, there's always rice and a soup and most of the time the food isn't too spicy for me as long as I have lots of water!
Some anchovies from dinner.

Today we reviewed Hangeul, the Korean alphabet, and then took our Korean Language Test. The test for me consisted of writing I don't know any Korean and walking out. Luckily, there are LOTS of other beginners. Tonight we have a GLEE Club mixer, which is a party with Korean students from the University and us. I plan on joining the GLEE Club, which meets twice a week for an hour and is a chance to practice your Korean. 

Oh, I've also been learning how to greet people in Korean and most of the Koreans I tried it out on just giggle at my attempts but it is very fun. All of the Koreans have been so helpful and bow back to me but I think they still find me pretty funny.

No comments:

Post a Comment