Welcome to Suji, South Korea!

It was all worth it! The 4am wake up, 5am friends at the airport, tears of sadness leaving my parents, lugging way too heavy carry-ons around international airports, and the combined 16 hours of air time. When I arrive in South Korea with my wonderful friend Shauna from Gustavus, I instantly KNEW I had made the right decision to travel and teach after graduation!

Both flights were on time. Our first flight from Minneapolis to San Fransisco left at 6:50am and was four hours. We arrived in California at 9:00am. With a four hour lay over, my aunt and uncle (Steve and Katia Petersen) who I hardly get to see, treated Shauna and I to breakfast at the airport Subway....delicious! It was SO wonderful to see them and helped pass the time between flights. When they left, Shauna and I must have walked the entire San Fransisco airport before we were able to go through the correct security a second time, get a new boarding pass, and arrive at our gate to find the plane boarding! There was no time to browse the Coach purses, use the restroom, or get an iced coffee for the plane...all of which we wanted to do during our long layover.

Our second flight was 12 hours long and departed CA at 1:15pm. Too bad I didn't realize wine is free in international flights or I'm sure I would have slept more than three of those hours! I watch two movies, met the Indian natives next to me (who had another 10 hour flight and 7 hour drive to follow!), and read my Glamour magazine, compliments of my good friend Kacy. I had my first Korean meals on the plane. It felt like we were being served food or drinks the entire 12 hours! My first meal was beef steak, potatoes, shrimp pasta salad, lettuce salad, a mixed bean salad, and a bun and butter. By the second meal, I quickly found out that they serve at LEAST two side dishes with everything. Sadly, I couldn't really understand the flight attendant, so I ended up with the Korean meal verses the fish. It wasn't until we got to Korea when I saw my meal served as a side dish everywhere that I realized I had eaten the traditional Kimche and rice. So far, I'm not too fond of it, but I will keep on trying!

We flew into the Incheon International Airport, which is an island on west coast of South Korea, near Seoul. We arrived around 5:30pm on Saturday evening. With a sign that read Mr. Christine Grotjohn (yes, Mr.) just as you see in the movies, we were picked up by Mr. Min who spoke not one word of English. He shouted at us in Korean, hoping we might understand him the louder he spoke (ummm, nope)! All we could do was nod our heads, smile, and laugh. We think he was laughing back at us due to the amount of luggage we were dragging along in addition to our complete lack of Korean knowledge. He dropped us off at the Metro 21 motel in Suji (about 4 miles from Suwon and an hour by subway from Seoul, on the map) where we will stay for the next week until the teachers who are leaving move out of the apartments. Scotty, a representative of the school met us at the hotel, got us into our rooms, and left us with London and Britney, two other girls from MN who are teaching at our same school and are both from MN. They have been the MOST WONDERFUL help you can imagine and have helped us feel completely "at home" already!

The city was HUGE! Shauna and I felt like we were in a wonder land of lights. The girls took us to dinner at a little Korean restaurant where we both had cheesy ramen noodles for dinner (they're big here too!). They showed us our school where we will be teaching and the best places for coffee, the internet cafe open 24 hours, and got us acclimated to our surroundings. With plans to meet for lunch at 2pm on Sunday, Shauna and I made our way back to our hotel and headed to bed after our first evening in SOUTH KOREA!

Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and prayers for safe travels and my year ahead. I am blessed to have this wonderful opportunity, my extremely supportive parents, new friends in Korea already, and my incredible classmate Shauna who I look forward to teaching with!