Seriously, who needs a dryer?

Hello again, friends and lovers...

Alright, friends and family. But lovers sounds cooler.

Actually, that was a little gross.

Ok, so I realize I'm a little spoiled. I've never had to worry about hanging clothes on the line. But now I do. I suppose I should be grateful I have a washing machine, but my pants have been hanging for over 24 hours and they're still damp. I just put some jeans out today. Hopefully they'll be dry come winter. I'll snap some pics of the porch/laundry room area so I can show it off to all of you "dryer-people" back home.

The supermarkets all have these guys in the produce section on a headset mic talking... after some recon I've deduced they're announcing our position to the rest of the store. That's right. It's all about us.

I forgot to mention earlier: on the plane somewhere in the middle of the Pacific Ocean we hit a bit of a storm. I've flown through them before, so I wasn't too concerned. You're flying in the cloud itself, so it's mostly just some turbulence and no big deal. But Jen and I are looking out the window as we go when this giant arc of lighting shoots along side the plane, from one cloud to another. That scared me, folks. It was one of those moments I was glad I couldn't see the pilots. I really don't think I could handle watching them jump out of their seats shouting "Holy shit! Did you see that? We're going to die!!"

Speaking of things I don't want to know about...

Turns out I'm not as adventures with food as I'd thought I'd be. Jen is much better about this. But we were looking for a place to eat lunch yesterday (always an adventure), when we stop too long in front of this little hole in the wall and this little old Korean woman comes out and all but pulls us inside. We sit down at the table. Everything is in Korean. The lady points repeatedly to something on the menu. It costs about $4 USD, and she seems very excited. So we go for it. I've learned how to say "no seafood". No problem, she says. Or close enough.

I don't know how to accurately describe what they brought us. It was a soup, looked like a tomato base, with what looked a little like long thin strips of onion and empty kernels of corn. Then there was this gray wrinkly... stuff... and some other types of meat I couldn't ID. It didn't smell horrible, and the taste was not so bad I lost it. It was served with rice and kimchi. Jen ate a good amount. I did what I could, in the end taking a spoonful of the rice and mixing it with the broth. Jen started to share her thoughts on what it was. I convinced her to not talk about it until after I'd eaten something else.

So, wanna know what I put in my body? So did I. I got the name from the little old lady and when I got to work, I asked one of the Korean teachers what it was. It's pronounced son-jee. It's a cow blood soup, with bean sprouts, cow intestines, and either stomach lining or heart. Most likely stomach lining. It's very good for you, and is reputed to be a great cure for hangovers.

Dinner was fried chicken.

For those wondering about my weight (and, really, who isn't?) I'm actually doing pretty well. We live on the 5th floor of the apartment complex and Jen and I are taking the stairs almost every time. I hate it.

Ok, running out of time. But before I do, I'd like to introduce a new segment: "Korean Signs!"

Here's our first:

Apparently, the Seoul Metro subway doors are equipped with small explosives should you be foolish enough to be caught in them. MWAHAHAHA!!!

Ok, that's going to do it for me. I'm off to find lunch. Today, it's cheesa-tounge-casoo, which despite the scary name, is pork with cheese in it. Yes, I'm sure.

We miss you guys!! Much love from Seoul.

-Al and Jen

We Made It!!

OH MY LORD, that is one long flight.





The weirdest thing of all was that the sun never went down. It completly fried my sense of time. We also didn't sleep much at all. All in all, though, not a bad flight. Should you ever find yourself with too much money, though, check out the first class seating on the Boeing 777. Ridiculous. If I could have physically taken one of those seats I would have. But I still have a strict policy of behaving on planes. Trying to avoid that whole "Please come with me, sir." thing. But we arrived! We were picked up at the airport, and despite going on no sleep at all, were taken directly to Plus Language School. Luckily, we got to meet some of the other English teachers. They have been incredible. They invited us over to one of their apartments where we got to meet some folks, make a few very brief phone calls, and thngs like that. Then we went home and passed out.

The next morning we came to the realization that we had forgotten one of our bags at the airport. I know, I know, it seems kind of stupid to forget a huge blue bag, but to be honest I wasn't sure I knew my name after about 48 hours with no sleep and very little food...


ANYWAY, after some more help from our wonderful friends I managed to catch a bus to the airport and get the luggage home. Which is good, since Jen seems to think she needs more than 2 outfits...



So here's what I've gathered about Korea so far.

• These folks are not as short as I was led to belive. I was expecting to tower over them... after hanging out with so many freaking people clearing 6ft I thought I was FINALLY going to be among the tallest...



• Seoul is amazingly clean. Smoking is pretty popular, and I can't find a single butt searching for one.



• Liquor is not popular. I mean, these folks drink. A LOT. But they drink Soju (a vodka-ish 40 proof drink. Not to bad) along with beer and wine. But guess who hit up the duty free shop...

(Sorry, can't figure out how to adjust pics here yet.)

• They are not ready to hitchhike the galaxy. We had to search EVERYWHERE to find a freaking full sized towel. Apparently, they manage to do just fine with a tiny dishtowel and some can-do attitude. Not my fat ass.

I'm not feeling particularly witty at the moment. So to make this blog worth reading I'm just going to go with some pictures...

This is the view from our front porch/balcony/laundry room...

And this is my beautiful wife with no sleep and dishes to do. I'm such a great husband.

And here we have our first meal in our new home. FYI: the hot dogs and milk taste funny. But the Coke tastes fine.

There's a ton more to share, but that'll have to wait. Tomorrow we start our actual job, so wish us luck.

And I promise, the next blog will be funnier.

So what do you do an hour before you leave?

Well, that depends on who you are.

If you're Jen then you are showering, double checking stuff, and generally making positive that everything is as it should be.

If you're Al you actually smell pretty bad and you're wasting time blogging.

Emotionally, I'm pretty well entrenched in sheer terror. I'm fairly calm on the outside, even managing to sit still. Of course, if you know me you realize how unnerving that is.

So let me tell you something about my friends and family. They know how to say good bye. We've had at least 17 parties, and if I haven't drank my weight in Southern Comfort I'd be shocked. Ugh.

FYI, the excuse "I'm not going to be able to find this in South Korea," works, even if you're using it for like 4 or 5 months. Am I fatter? Yes. Was it worth it? Obviously.

Ok, I've got to go. I'm sure Jen's going to want me to find my passport or something. SUCH a pain. I've included pics from us saying good bye, and the parties, and all that. You guys seriously rock. It's really hard to leave, but I can start to feel the wanderlust taking over.

It's time.

The Prologue: Leave Taking

So this is mostly Al seeing if he can figure out how this thing works. The pictures have nothing to do with anything, other than to see if I can figure out how it all works. Jen and I will both be posting here as time goes on, but I'm hoping I can figure this out before we're playing hunt-and-peck on a Korean keyboard.

To be honest, I'm all over the place. I swing wildly from being absolutely terrified by the whole idea to being beyond ready to get the hell out of here to getting this overwhelming feeling of wanderlust that I haven't felt since before I left for Canada. Here's hoping I last longer in South Korea.

At this point we're just wrapping things up on this side of the planet. Here's a few things I've deduced for any of you who may be considering doing some globetrotting of your own:

• You don't actually own your time. It belongs to all of the wonderful folks who love you, and will miss you, and will hurt you if they don't get enough time with you before you leave.
  
• 5 grown adults, plus a dog, is just about the maximum occupancy for a 3 bedroom house. It may actually be over the max if the stay is much longer than a month.
• On a completely unrelated note, my shoes no longer go right next to the front door.
  

One oddly refreshing part of this endeavor was getting rid of all our stuff. Jen and I, until very recently, were living in a very nice 2 bedroom apartment. It had about 1200 square feet of our stuff in it. Now everything we own is in a small bedroom, with some overflow occupying half of a 5X5 storage unit. As I threw out over 25 full sized trash bags (we're talking the 30 gallon bad boys) of our stuff, not to mention what was sold or given away, it was oddly refreshing. It really made me stop and think about why I had what I had. I was really shocked at just how much of what I had taking up space in my apartment was just crap. Not literally though. That'd be disgusting. Not to mention almost certainly against the apartment complex's policies.

In other news, saying good bye sucks. Jen and I wrapped things up with the kids this past Sunday, and I said my final good byes to the majority of my co-workers today. There's a small pool forming on when I'll finally break down and cry like a 5 year old girl. My bet is in about a month after not being able to find a real can of Coke, I think Eli called three weeks and unable to find a pizza. Though to be fair, I'm pretty sure I'd cry over a lack of pizza for three weeks even if I was still in Orlando. My mom called 3 weeks as well, but she's betting it'll be a result of craving something from home. Jen said something about a pipe to the crotch. I don't know, I should listen better.

Speaking of the brains... and good looks... of this duo, I have to confess something. I really wish I could be as strong as she is. She's been having a tough time with this every now and then, granted. Sometimes she gets upset because we don't have our airfare info and we're just over a week out. Or because I still hadn't turned off the power to the apartment a week and a half after we moved out. Ya know, like girls do. Anyhoo, the point is that through this all I just kinda force the part of me that's screaming in terror to the back of my head with all the other voices. I mean, why should it get special treatment? But not Jen. Jen's staring this thing right in the eyes and still moving forward. I just don't know if I could do that at this point. So there.

Welp, that'll wrap it up for me. I promise, this thing will be better later.

Who am I kidding? This is probably as good as it gets.