My new employer has a wireless LAN and that’s how I’m posting this. I’m just waiting for the secretaries’ lunch break to be over so that I can maybe get a look at my new apartment and my new office — they’re in buildings right beside one another, which is fine by me.
I got to Korea late Monday night, and when I checked my email, the next morning, I discovered there was a general Faculty Meeting here in Bucheon today, 10:30am Wednesday. So I busted my butt to get here and arrived only ten minutes late. I was introduced, sat and tried to look attentive through long speeches I couldn’t really understand — I heard a lot about stress, and something bewildering about credit cards, but I couldn’t make out much past that — and finally, the morning meeting ended and we all went for lunch. I couldn’t find the only two people I knew, Profs Lee and Kim, in the cafeteria, but anyway, I had an alright chat with some of the other foreign professors working in other language-departments (as well as, briefly, one guy in economics).
Anyway, after I see my office and apartment, I’ll be going to see Lime, who’s interning at a Catholic University-run hospital which is only one subway stop away from my place. This is very cool. Then, I’ll need to go to Jeonju and finish packing all my worldly possessions (except the ones I trash, give away, or leave for the next inmate of my old Jeonju apartment). There are some technical problems with my new work visa, and tons of people are trying to sort that out. We’ll see how it turns out. I hope it goes more easily than the worst case scenario might be.
In any case, I’m back in Korea, and mostly (aside from waking at 4am) adjusted back. Gotta go, the battery’s dying.
UPDATE (a few hours later, in Jeonju): I should also mentioned I met Lime after sorting out some things; the cab ride was about W3000, which means we’re going to be not far apart for at least a semester. This is great news. It was good to see her. She’s doing well, and pleased about her very smooth transition into hospital work. Her first department for internship is radiology, and from what she says it’s a comparatively smooth department to start with. A lot of her scheduled departments look quite reasonable, aside from heavy ER shifts during one month. When I saw her off, she was carrying a binder of patient records that she’s organizing because a professor in radiology had commenced a research project today, and the paperwork became her responsibility.