Busan!

Where do I begin? I have about 4 days of good stuff to catch everyone up on so there will be several posts over the next few days. Let's start with the 5 hour bus ride from our orientation site in Cheonan City to Busan. Pretty standard drive, cramped bus filled with hoards of nervous English teachers. I slept the vast majority of the way but tried not too so I could see as much of the Korean countryside as I could. This country is crawling with mountains from the top to the bottom. I heard that if they could flatten Korea's mountains that the land area it would create would be as big as China! After we finally arrived in Busan we were shuttled to the Provincial office of education where all of our co-teachers were waiting for us. We hadn't so much as unloaded the last of the suitcases before people in our group were being scooped up by their co-teachers and taken away. It was quite a scene with the native English speakers anxiously waiting for their co-teachers to recognize the name on their name tags and take them away. Once I finally found my co-teacher, most of my group had already been whisked away. I realized later that I wasn't wearing my name tag which would have been helpful. Kim Hoeun (she wants me to call her Judy) and I took a taxi to Bumin Elementary where my Principal and Vice-Principal were waiting to meet me. Our taxi driver tried to get us as close to the front door as possible since I had a lot of luggage but he got a little too close and rammed into a guard rail that protects the front of the school. The cab driver apparently was in no mood to wait for the police so he bolted as soon as my luggage was out of his car. I was introduced to my Vice-Principal and Principal as well as my other co-teacher, Kim Eunyoung and some more administrators. After the intros were over I was informed that my apartment would not be ready until Monday but that they would pay for me to stay in a hotel until that time as well as reimburse all expenses I incurred doing those three days. My initial impressions of everyone I had met so far were very positive and they would go out of their way to make sure I was happy. I received a personal escort from my principal, Judy, and one other administrator to the hotel to unload my bags. I was then informed that we were all going to be going out for dinner, which was perfectly fine with me since I was starving. The restaurant was very traditional. We all sat on the floor and were served around 40 different side dishes consisting of veggies, seafood (cooked and raw), meat, soups, rice, and some things that I was not familiar with. My personal favorite was the fiddler crabs that were deep fried and eaten whole, shell and all. During dinner, I was informed that my principal was very impressed with me and that she wanted me to stay an extra year on top of my original contracted year. Keep in mind that I had only known this lady for about an hour and we couldn't understand a word each other says since she doesn't speak English and I don't speak Korean. I told her I was flattered and that I would seriously consider staying longer as long as this year went smoothly. I also learned during dinner that Judy had just spent 5 months living in New Jersey as part of a teacher exchange program and had landed back in Korea that day. That pretty much sums up my first day in Busan. I spent the next two days wandering around the city and checked out the Jagalchi Fish Market and went to the Beomeosa Temple. More on these two places will be available shortly as well as pictures of my apartment which I moved into today and of my school.