Settling in Korea...

We arrived in Suwon, Republic of Korea on Saturday, March 28, 2009 after a lengthy flight delay in Denver and nearly missing our plane out of San Francisco. We came expecting to find ourselves in the little town of Namyangju as per the address on John’s contract. Imagine our surprise upon finding ourselves in Suwon, instead. Imagine our even further surprise to find that instead of a 1 bedroom apartment, we were being provided with a studio. The owners said that they did not know John was bringing his family.

The apartment was a bit of a shock for me. All it contained when we first walked through the door was: a twin bed; appliances; a wok; a fork; a spoon; a pair of chopsticks; a spatula; a pair of tongs; two kitchen towels; two cans of baked beans; diswashing liquid; degreaser; bleach; a half-empty bottle of water; a mop for the bathroom; and a pair of rubber gloves. There was not a dish to be found. There was no table, no toilet paper, no can opener to go with the beans, no TV, and no means of cooking, as the gas was not on. It was finally turned on the Tuesday after we arrived. The washing machine has no accompanying dryer, so I have to hang our clothes to dry in the bathroom which, as you can imagine, takes forever. The cable, TV, and phone were finally installed on Thursday, so I finally got to talk to my parents for more than 1 minute. I hadn't even talked to my father in nearly 2 weeks! The owner’s son did take us shopping the first Monday night after our arrival to purchase many of the aforementioned missing items, though.

Now, I will tell you about our apartment. We have a view of a brick wall and, if you peer to the left, a gas station. I actually do rather like the neighborhood, as almost everything we need is within walking-distance and what isn’t is accessible via taxi (which isn’t too expensive in Korea) or subway, which is only a few blocks from our apartment. The apartment isn’t too bad for what it is, either. We have bamboo laminate flooring with ondol heating, a digital security lock, a video doorbell, a passcode protected front door, and a motion sensor light that comes on when someone comes through the door.We like it enough to try to make it work here.

Irene is doing very well. She's started rolling over on a regular basis, has sat up by herself for a few seconds, and almost said, "Daddy!" She charmed the customs agents at Incheon International Airport. She was smiling at them, attracting a crowd, and laughing at the stamp. They didn't even hassle us about having one-way tickets. She currently has a bit of a cold, but she's in good spirits. She's eating very well. We're thinking of letting her try rice cereal tomorrow. She'll be 5 months old then. I have experienced one disappointment: I can't cloth diaper here. There is no dryer and nowhere to hang CDs to dry. Even if I do a load a day, they don't dry quickly enough and end up being musty. I'm upset about that, but I will be saving them, as we're still considering having another child in a few years.