So I finally got to Seoul last night. The flight here was interesting. My first flight from State College to D.C. was not so great. We had to wait for the plane in front of us to be de-iced, then we had to have our plane de-iced as well. So my 6:00 am flight turned into a 7:00 am flight instead. It normally would have been okay except I had to catch my plane in D.C. at 7:45 or something like that so I sprinted across Dulles to get to my flight in time. The flight from D.C. to Seattle wasn’t bad. It went quickly all things considered. But the flight from Seattle to Seoul took foreverrrr. First of all, I had a window seat. It was nice to have something to sleep against on the way there, but the lady who sat next to me was very old, and I felt bad asking her to get up. So I sat in my seat for the entire 12 hour flight. The lady who sat next to me was also very generous. For the first meal, she didn’t like what she asked for, so the flight attendant changed her meal for the only other thing they were offering (which was some sort of Korean dish). Her tray had a bowl with meat and vegetables in it, a cup of broth, a package of rice, and some other small side dishes. Anyway, she looked at me and said something in Chinese (she wasn’t able to talk to any of the Korean flight attendants and didn’t know any English), and then sorta shoved her bowl of meat and veggies into my hands. Then she just sorta sat there and ate all the other things on her plate. So I sat there holding this woman’s food for like 15 minutes and finally I tried to ask her if she wanted to eat it, and she just shook her head and pushed it back at me. So I made room for it on my plate.
Then I started eating my food, and she started offering me her food from her tray to eat. She only offered me the food she didn’t like because I would see her try it and make a weird face then offer it to me. She tried offering me kimchi, and I told her I didn’t need to take hers because I had my own on my tray. Apparently she thought hers was better or something because she kept trying to give it to me and I kept trying to politely say no. I shook my head and said no thanks, then I tried telling her I couldn’t eat it because it was spicy, then she just decided she would feed it to me. So she literally put a piece of food in my mouth while I was trying to tell her no. She offered me everything she ate the rest of the flight. And every single time I finally fell asleep on the plane, she would hit me and wake me up to let me know the flight attendant was walking by. I guess it was thoughtful, but by the time I got to the airport in Seoul, I was exhausted.
After I went through customs, which was surprisingly quick, I got my luggage and met my “buddies” from the university. They rode the subway with me to the hotel, and dropped me off there. The guy who worked there was very nice, and he helped me carry all my bags upstairs to my room. I slept really well for a couple of hours then woke up every few hours, but the worst time waking up was when the fire alarm at the hotel went off. It woke me up and freaked me out because I didn’t know if I should grab my stuff or not so I threw my computer into my backpack with my passport and my camera and things and ran out of the hotel, to find that it was the guy cooking breakfast who set the alarm off. So I went back upstairs and tried to fall back asleep but the alarm went off again. I didn’t even bother going out for this one since I just assumed it was probably the cook again. Once I finally woke up I got ready and went downstairs because they said they had an “American style breakfast” and I hadn’t really eaten anything after I held my friend from the airplane’s food forever. So I went downstairs and I was the only person there. The table they sat me at was right by a giant glass wall and I felt like every single person who walked by was sorta watching me eat and just amazed that I had blonde hair or something. It made me a little self conscious but oh well. They made me a huge breakfast. It was way more food than I needed.
After breakfast, two girls from the school picked me up at my hotel and took me to the dorms. Luckily, they had a place to buy bedding outside the front of the dorms so I bought a comforter and pillow for about 70,000 won (probably too expensive but the girls I was with didn’t have any idea of where else to buy it). Anyway, I got into my dorm and unpacked and didn’t have a roommate until just a little bit ago. Her name is Jessica (she’s from China. She told me how to pronounce her name in Chinese and I tried… she’s like “just call me Jessica”). So she seems pretty nice. She’s quiet, but I feel like I’m the loudest person here anyway. So far everyone has been nice and everyone has known English, which is helpful to me. But there aren’t many exchange students here yet. So far, I feel like I’m the only person here with blonde hair or anything like that. I’m hoping as the weekend goes on there will be more people coming who are trying to make friends quickly like I am.
Anyway, everything is good so far and my dorm is nice. I even have my own bathroom in my dorm! (way better than PSU dorms…) Tonight is “club night” or something like that. You pay something like 15 dollars and get into all the clubs in this one area. But I don’t really think that I’ll go. I don’t want to go alone, and I haven’t heard anything from the people I’ve met so far. So maybe I’ll take today to continue to catch up on sleep and start to get my body adjusted to the time difference. I’m going to go to one of the palaces tomorrow and hopefully get some sort of cell phone set up so I can actually contact people I want to do things with.
I’ll post again later! Here are a couple pictures from today:
Bathroom at the dorms. Small kind of but its clean.
Shower room in my room. Its actually a room. But I don’t really think I’m going to fit under the shower head. I was too tall for the last shower.
My bed and desk. Luckily I think its going to be tall enough for me. The hanging stuff above my bed is the only space I have to hang things so far. Luckily there is lots of space on my desk. Even have a phone to call other people in the dorm.
Location: Sogang University, Seoul, South Korea
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Glad to hear you made it safely and are making friends with all ages! Can’t imagine having a bathroom in a dorm! What a luxury. Sure beats sharing with others. Enjoy your time!
You’ve got Seoul, Lindsay. Great to hear you had something memorable on Day 1. International flights are always a dilemma between aisle and window. Get your body synced quickly by walking around outside during the day even if you are tired. Sunlight is your best friend, but alas can never be found on Club Night.