Hello Daegu... I miss my Ninjas!

Wow. I’m finally here. Sitting in my OWN apartment. My little, studio apartment.

I arrived in Korea just a short 2 weeks ago. Since, I’ve seen sights, eaten street food, had booze in a bag and met some awesome friends.  I’ve done 8 days of training with the EPIK program, performed a lesson plan demonstration, and received my official certificate of employment. Today alone, I loaded my bags in Daejeon on one of the two luggage trucks, rode a 2.5 hour bus ride to Daegu, met my co-teacher, Olivia, met my Principal and Vice Principal, toured part of my school (only the first floor, not the fourth where my room will be), met my landlord who helped me move into my apartment, went to lunch at a phenomenal noodle restaurant, shopped for the essentials at Home Plus, took a nap, figured out how to wash laundry (and washed my sheets), wandered the neighborhood, ran into a coffee shop with free WiFi (Barista B, a coffee shop the ex-English teacher told me about), figured out how to cook with my gas stove without blowing up the apartment (there was an actual threat of this) and unpacked (for the most part).  What I haven’t done is figure out how high to turn on my water (you choose the temperature for the floor and the running hot water), so I may or may not have hot enough water in the morning for a shower.

Buses from Daejeon to Daegu (plus 2 more trucks for luggage- they were huge!)

First sight of Daegu

Where we met our co-teachers

Front of my apartment building (I'm on the 3rd floor)

Door to my apartment

My apartment!

Kitchen

Washer (for clothes), shelf, microwave and fridge

Kitchen on the left, bathroom on the right 

Batroom

Essentials purchased at Homeplus run #1: laundry detergent, fabric softener, "slippers" (for school), water, milk, orange juice, cereal, choco pies, and COFFEE

The unpacking process- CHEERS to my new apartment!

Unpacked

They have shoe cabinets next to the doors here... because you take your shoes off when you walk in

I will write more about my apartment, neighborhood, school and life in Daegu soon, but I need to get caught up. So back to where I left off.

My time in Seoul went wonderfully. I got to meet some really awesome people. I’m not sure if I’ve explain before but I do believe I’ve referenced the “ninjas” before. The “ninjas” began when we all started posting things on the EPIK Facebook group a few months back and realized that some posts were being taken down (that regarded drinking or buying flights early) by the EPIK coordinators, so we (and by we I mean one girl that we have now dubbed “Mama Ninja”) decided to create a Facebook page of our own so we could talk about things openly, get to know each other a little better and discuss plans for our future without the worry of being judged by our new employer. Yes, we still use the main EPIK page for things that are “legal” to talk about, but we use the ninja page more… thus the ninjas. After getting to chit chat with one another, a few of us decided to arrive in Seoul early in order to get over jet lag and get to know one another, so the ninjas took over the Hong Guesthouse. So, there are ninjas and guesthouse ninjas.

Guesthouse Ninjas

The guesthouse ninja group eventually grew to be quite a large party, so it was difficult to get to have in depth conversations with everyone (especially since I was a wimp and didn’t go out every night like some of my fellow ninjas), but I got to at least get acquainted with everyone, and those that I really got to talk to quite a bit have already turned out to be quite good friends.

There’s Adam. May as well be called Papa Ninja. Poor guy, one of the only ones that knew where he was going or what he was doing (he has lived in Korea prior to this, and can speak some Korean), so he kept trying to get everyone going in the right direction. But have you ever tried to keep a group of 15-20 people that have never been in the country, much less city, that they are in together? Not that easy. I’m sure he got frustrated a few times, but he really did help us all get acquainted and get pointed in the right direction.

Adam (aka Papa Ninja)

There’s HaylieRae, who was my roomie during our stay at the guesthouse, along with Jordan, who is the Apple Genius from Chicago who I have gotten to know pretty well because he was the most active in the Facebook group and was in my class at orientation. Our other roomie, Justin from South Africa, was the guy who maybe slept 10 hours in his entire 4 day stay. Don’t know how he did it, or how he survived it, but he was funny as hell.

Justin and Haylie(Rae)

Jordan and Kaleena

There is also Kaleena who I hung out with quite a bit at orientation and am located fairly close to in Daegu, so I’ll probably be talking about her in the coming year as well… and Katherine from South Africa who I’ve been reading her blog since before I knew it was hers… and Jeff who is placed in Daejeon, who only showed up on the last day, but climbed the mountain with us and spent a lot of time with us at orientation.

Johanna, Katherine, Nina, me, Kerri and Haylie

Jeff, Abby and myself

There’s Sarah from Ireland who has taught with EPIK before, Nina who can speak Korean fairly well seeing as she has been to SK several times before, Johanna who is Korean American and is fluent, but has never been to SK before, and Kerri from England who had a Korean flatmate before coming here, so she knows the ins and outs of Korea and can at least get around. There's Katie from Ireland (another blonde who, in the first day or so, I kept getting mixed up with Abby). Michael and Lizzie, a couple that are placed in Chungbuk and are super awesome.

Myself, Lizzie, Michael, Katherine, Adam, Sarah, and Katie eating Korean BBQ

Then there’s Abby- or should I say the other half of “Alby”. She is blonde and her initials are AB, just like me, so people kept getting us confused, calling me Abby, calling her Allie, so we just had to go with it. She has taught with the TaLK program before, so she too can get around fairly well, speaks a little Korean, and knows the ins and outs as well. We also ended up being roomies at orientation, so I ended up getting to know here the most probably. She is placed in Seoul, so I’ll definitely be visiting.

  

There are tons more guesthouse ninjas, too many to talk about, but I’m so glad that I got a few extra days to get to know these wonderful people… I have to admit I cried just a little when I said “goodbye” to them this morning in Daejeon… even though I know I’ll bee seeing them all soon…