First Impressions

It’s funny how fast things can change. A year ago I had my heart set on packing up my things in January of 2013 and moving to Italy to teach and live there. I dreamed about sipping cappuccinos at cafes in piazzas while I brushed up on my Italian and chatted with shop keepers. What actually happened couldn't be further from that picture. Instead of taking me across the pond to country of pasta, Michelangelo and Fiats, life took me in a very different direction. Life took me to a country of rice paddies, Buddhas and Hyundai…to Korea. Before, I had no interest in moving to Asia to teach. It just didn't seem like me. However, a series of events led me to a small town in South Korea to start a journey that I can’t even begin to understand right now. And, did I mention I’m not alone. In what can only be described as the most amazing gift in the world, my boyfriend Mike has decided to come with me. Together, we are starting a crazy journey of discovery and adventure. We came into this fairly blind – we don’t speak Korean, we don’t eat Korean food, we don’t know much about Korean culture – but, part of the fun is figuring this all out along the way. We are so excited to see what Korea has to offer and are willing to just let life take its course.

We landed in Korea a little less than a week ago, although with everything we have gone through it seems like it’s been longer. To start, we moved into our apartment. Then we moved out and then moved in again. I packed and repacked our suitcases twice already (and this is in Korea) and finally unpacked them today. It’s a long story, but the short version of it is this: we moved into our apartment, found a better one, sweet-talked the woman at the university and a couple days later, we moved into our cleaner, nicer, fully-stocked apartment.

The town we live in is called Nonsan. It is about 30 minutes from Daejeon and two hours from Seoul. Koreans would categorize it as a small town or village even. I would describe it as being similar to downtown Toronto, but with shorter buildings, far less people and surrounded by farmland. Nonsan is known in Korea for two things: it is the location of Korea’s military training and it is its largest producer of strawberries! In one direction of our apartment is a small mountain with a Buddhist temple and hiking trails hidden by a bamboo forest and in the other direction are narrow streets lined with restaurants, electronic stores, textile shops and alleyways hiding a treasure trove of exotic and somewhat disturbing treasures. The character of this town is something that brings a smile to your face just watching the people go about their daily business. There are the taxi drivers that line the street below our balcony, the cars that barely escape collisions as they pass through intersections completely devoid of any kind of traffic markers, the children that stare and giggle at every foreigner that walks by (which, at this point has pretty much been just us). At times it is easy to forget that we are living here and not watching this on TV. It will be interesting to see how this all feels in a few months or weeks even. Until then, we will keep exploring and updating you all along the way.