Day 5 in Seoul – “Blessed” is the name of the game!

All 500 South Korean English teachers were told to meet at the airport today to get a ride in a complimentary bus to the orientation site. We were planning on taking the city bus an hour and a half back to the airport to catch the orientation bus, but instead we were given a ride! This was wonderful, considering we didn’t have to wheel our luggage 3 blocks to the bus stop, rather a lovely woman pulled her new KIA sorento SUV right up to the door of the hostel so we could load everything in! ☺ We jumped in, not sure who she was, or what the connection was, but just appreciated her offering to give us a ride to the orientation site (2 hour drive!) When we arrived near the orientation site, the woman driving us told us that we were going to be meeting with someone for dinner before she dropped us off. Minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot of a darling traditional Korean restaurant.

We were greeted by an older woman, who apparently is the sister of the director of EPIK who directed us inside and into a private style dining room. Once again, we were not sure why we were getting to have dinner with her, but we were excited, none the less, to have another meal experience with Koreans! We had Bulgolgi (spelling?), which was awesome!

During the meal we brought up foods to try in Pusan. The woman who had driven us said we needed to try the live octopus, but every time she said octopus, she would pronounce it “octopussy.” It took EVERYTHING within us to not laugh out loud! At one point I had to get up to go to the restroom for fear I was going to bust out laughing!! During dinner it began to snow! This was a picture looking out the window from our table. :)

When we were finished, the woman who met us there insisted that we allow her to pay for our meal! So, let me just recap, we had a woman drive us 2 hours out of her way, and another woman take us to an expensive dinner and pay for us! We don’t know why we were chosen from the 500 other students to be given the star treatment, but we do know we felt completely blessed and taken care of today! ☺ This is a picture of all of us outside the restaurant.

When we got to the University (our orientation site) we were welcomed by Korean EPIK staff and were handed gray EPIK hoodies and giftbags with fruit, a converter, water, etc… Kevin was handed a LARGE sweatshirt, but it seriously looks like it’s a SMALL. I told him it’s a Korean LARGE! ☺ He just read in our handbook that we are going to a Korean folk village this week and are all required to wear our EPIK hoodies! Haha!! Kevin’s is going to be ssoooo tight! I can’t imagine what the bigger guys are going to look like when they try to wear their Ex. Large’s that are US mediums! I’ll take pictures, don’t worry!

I’m in my PJ’s now, laying on my bed in the awesome dorm room we were provided for the week of our orientation which happens to have a heated floor and a digital keypad for the front door! Kevin and I were told we would be in separate rooms this week, but were excited to hear that we would be able to stay together! ☺ Yeah! It’s like we’re in college, but getting to live together!

P.S. I’m wearing the MHS shirt that my coworkers signed and gave to me my last day of work… and am thinking of each of them right now! ☺ Miss you all!