A new blog, a new job, a new city, a new life really. It just turned Thursday in Seoul. I've been here five days and this is the first chance I've had to breathe. It's all been a complete blur. I took off from JFK friday morning and landed in Seoul at 5pm on Saturday (13 hours later here). I got the sense of the fascination Koreans have with Americans even before the plane took off. I booked my ticket three days earlier so when the ticket agent said sorry, we dont have anymore aisle or windows seats, i was thinking sure that sounds about right. An hour later at the terminal gate, i hear my name called from the gate desk, i get up there and with about 300 Koreans with their gazes fixed square on me, the guy up there says here sir, we found an aisle seat for you. Okkk, thank you. The flight was 15 hours long, but the food was good, couldn't fall asleep but well, let's just say thank god for xanax. When the plane landed, I wondered out into the airport looking for my name and yeah, it was not there. Some guy kept asking me if I was Joey Miller. After an hour, I checked my passport just to make sure I wasn't Joey Miller. My boss, who had been drinking all day, eventually had me paged over the PA and we took off on a bus headed for Seoul. Hmm, I think as a new advanced feature in the new blog, I actually space things out instead of making it all one giant paragraph so here...

Arrived at my apartment, dropped off my stuff. I could have passed out cold right then, but hey first night, might as well get silly. A half hour into dinner with my boss and a couple coworkers, I had already experienced plenty of the Korean version of really cheap liver-destroying juice, soju. It's basically vodka that Koreans drink as if it were a bottle of poland spring. Afterwards Erika (one of the two other foreign teachers at my school)and I went to bar just around the block from the apartment. I think I went to bed at 4am, just about 30 hours after the plane took off from JFK. You know how sometimes you wake up after a night of drinking and need to do a couple double takes to figure out where you are. Well, I did about a hundred.

On Sunday I took my first trip on the subway, which is really easy to use and all the stops are listed in Korean and English. Met up with Bender in Itaweon, which is basically the place where the few thousand white people and military guys in Seoul hang out. It wasn't nearly as Western as I expected though. You go Chinatown in NYC and you have a tough time telling what continent you're on. Sure, Itaweon has a few white people walking around, but it's still swarming with Koreans. The English signs around the city are all hilarious. One outside a clothing store said "All Most Free". After grabbing a bite, Bender and I explored a few other parts in the city. And let me clear up a flatout lie in Bender's blog, http://mbender1230.squarespace.com/, right now. Yes, this American girl started talking to us on the subway and yes, she did ask us to come with her to this ultimate fighting there. BUT, and here is where Bender tosses out the truth. Bender did ask me if I wanted to go, however, my response was not a blank stare as he claims, but instead I said "I don't care" meaning he was free to make the decision. So he turned it down. Deep down I really did want to go to that fight. Thanks a lot, Bender. Who's terrible now?

I need to speed this up. I haven't even got to the work stuff yet. Bender and I ended up in the Perky Cat, gayest experience of my life. No one else there, white leather couches, black and white strings hanging everywhere. The only thing that could make it gayer (actually I'm not going to finish that sentence since this blog link is going to my family, just use your imagination.)

Work, well, it's been work really. A bit harder than I expected, but's the first week and I haven't quit yet so I think I'm in this for the long haul. I have about 6 classes a day, all different levels. The best class at the school, a group of middle school girls, know more English than me. When a girl in that class asks me what a word means, one of the other girls usually has a much better answer than I can offer. Most of the kids are great and the whole teaching thing is pretty exciting. Tiring, sure, but exciting definitely. At the end of each class, I give the best student a shiny penny. The best really just means the quiestest one who did their homework. Then I tell the loud annoying ones to not to be so loud and annoying next time and they can get their own penny. It's pretty weird, in a good way I guess, to be a white guy over here. On the subway, Koreans were coming and sitting next to me even though there were plenty of seats open. When me and Erika were walking home last night, a young girl saw us from her bike and her eyes, I can't even describe the look. Sheer amazement. Also, this girl should not have been riding her bike down an alley at midnight, but that's another story.

Most of the food here is either deathly spicy or involves something really gross. I've managed to get by only because Erica has been pointing me to the few things that my body can tolerate. But today, I only ate a few slices of pizza and some ice cream. That arrangement may need to change.

When I got back from work last night after grabbing some food after work at 11:30pm, I was so ready to crash. But alas, I managed to leave the heat on all day. And heat in Korean is not just heat from the vent, it's heat everywhere. The floor, the bed. Yeah, the bed thing killed me. Even after I turned the heat off, the bed was hot for the next three hours. Not cool. At all. That mistake will not be made again. And yes, the shower is just a drain in the middle of the bathroom floor and yes, the living room got soaked the first couple days when I forgot to close the bathroom floor. But hey, I'm learning.

Man, I could write for a few hours just about my first few days here, but I'll save some of the excitement for later. Everything isn't great here and I've already had my share of annoying experiences. But you know what, I feel really alive for the first time in a long time. And that, I think, is a good thing.

(Photos: Bender and I at the Cat and a shot of my living room.)