catching up

Hello. My name is Cezar Francisco and I am a teacher in South Korea. I wanted to start blogging about all my experiences from day 1, but as per my life, nothing really went according to plan. So now I am forcing myself to start logging in at least once a month to write about my journey in South Korea. I really want to do this whole thing justice. Even though I missed the first couple months, I will try to write about them now.

Let me start at my goodbye party. I think it was on the 25th of Feb. It was a bitter sweet day, it was my mom's birthday as well. This day was a private session for only my family. The last day they could really say goodbye to me. This was possibly one of the hardest days I had faced in a while. I am not an emotional man, but that day it took all my strength not to cry. The best way I did that was to tell everyone not to cry in front of me. I even instructed my mom not to cry, her punishment would be not being able to go to the airport with me. The funny thing was that my brother was the one that almost made me cry, I had to not talk to him as I left. What is even more funny is that now that I am trying to remember all of this so I can write about it, brings back all the emotions of that day. I really don't know how to capture it in words, basically bitter sweet.

So I get into South Korea. It was about a 16 hour flight. It was not too bad. I had slept for most to all of the fight. My fight had left around midnight of the 25th. I arrived in Korea on the 27th. This is where the story gets twisted and not fun at all. The first 48 hours in South Korea. The first 48 hours was filled with excitement, anger, frustration, and regret. So I get off of the plane. I find my baggage and walk out into the receiving hall. I was told that someone would have my name on a card to pick me up. I get outside the doors and there was no name that I could see. This is where I proceeded to walk around to try to find this person. After about a half hour of walking around I finally decided to go to the information booth. After trying to communicate with the woman behind the desk, the person looking for me went up to the booth to try to look for me. This was the first laugh had in Korea. So the man takes me to a ticket booth, buys my ticket to Jeonju. We are at the bus stop and he gives me a little slip that says, once you are in Jeonju please get off at the first stop. The funny thing was it was in English with no Korean Translation for anyone to read. I am not familiar with the town that I was going how the hell was I supposed to know where Jeonju was and where the hell the first stop was. So I get onto the bus and take a 4 hour bus ride to Jeonju. Of course I miss the first stop because at the first stop I asked the bus driver if this was the first stop in Jeonju, he spoke no English. I ended up getting off at the last stop that the bus had planned. Luckily the slip had 2 numbers in it and I asked the bus driver to call the numbers. Someone from the education office in Jeonju came to pick me up. This is the part of the story that made me want to turn back and go home. So I get into the cab with the person from the Education office. I start talking to him about my assignment in South Korea. I did not mention this before, but I was recruited to teach in a city called Namwon at a High school. So back to the cab ride to the education office. So I start talking to the person in the cab about my assignment in Namwon. My first question was, what is the name of the High school I will be teaching in Namwon. He turns his head towards me and says "Namwon?", your not teaching in Namwon you will be going to Buan. My first inital reaction was WHAT! I didn't raise my voice, but I kindly asked him what happened and why I was switched to Buan instead of Namwon. He answered, it was always in Buan, who promised your Namwon? I responded with "my recruiter". He said, "well I don't know, but you will be in Buan." At that point I wanted to just jump out of the cab and run back to America. I really had no choice at that point, so I stayed and went to the office with the gentleman. I stored all my stuff somewhere and followed him to the office. I met some Newzelanders that were also here on their first day. So we sat and talked and waited for our guides to pick us up and take us to our towns. I was last to go, for good reason. My guide was late about half an hour. Eventually when he picked me up he told me even more news. This news made me want to murder people. He told me that not only is the town NOT Buan it is a small village outside of Buan about 45 min. Also that I will not be teaching just one school I will be teaching five schools. On top of that two of the schools that I have to go to require me to get onto a boat for an hour. Again my reaction went something along the line of WHAT THE F**K! To add insult to injury, my room was NOT ready in the town of Gyeokpo. So I had to stay in Jeonju for about 2 days before the room was ready. The funny part about this, well it wasn't funny at the time but it is now, he wanted to take me to a spa to sleep in for the 2 days. And, as I am fresh from America, I was ok with the idea of a spa. Apparently spa meant a public bath house that naked men tend to walk around with their junk just flopping about. This is again one of those moments where I reacted with "WHAT THE F**K NO!" I informed my guide that I will sleep in a motel for 2 days, I don't care how much it costs. Those 2 days were relatively ok. I was still pissed at the situation. I sent emails to my recruiter, who decided to go on a vacation the day I came, so that was a fun fact. So Sunday comes around, I get taken to the town that I will be teaching at and what not. The town was exactly the opposite of what I wanted. I did not want to work in a town with more rice patties then people, but I kept on rolling with the changes. I still wanted to turn back and go home. This was a situation that no one wants to be in. I am not a violent man, but this is a time where I wanted to really just bust some heads in and do what I needed to do. Again, I stuck with it and the 48 hours was over, that did not mean it was the end of all the bad stuff.

The first week in Gyeokpo. I had taken some medical tests prior to coming to Gyeokpo. These tests were taken to clear me for work. of course when the medical tests come back there was a problem. They told me that I might have liver problems. And that I am technically still not employed yet if i don't pass the tests, so I had to pay out of my own pocket to get more tests done. Eventually I get retested. At this point I was already tired of South Korea. All I wanted was to go home. So on the way to go see the Doctor for my results, I was praying for something to be wrong. I wanted something that would disqualify me from working there but also something I can be cured of back in America. I was out of luck, apparently I was too fat. That was my first week in South Korea.

My first month. I was still adjusting to this whole situation. I wanted to go home. I wanted to punch someone in the face. I just didn't want to be here at all. Teaching in 5 different schools. Being in a situation that totally just sucked and what not. Who in their right mind would stay in a crappy situation like this? You know who, me. I had no choice. What am I going to do, turn back go home and tell the everyone that I failed at trying to be alone and be a big boy. I was caught between a rock and a hard place. So I stuck with it. I started to try to get a grasp on how to teach kids and how to teach English. I was really at a loss in the first month. I didn't want to be there and my teaching and attitude showed it. That is my biggest regret in the first month. My situation had nothing to do with how I was supposed to be acting as a professional. I let the situation affect how I perform, that wasn't me. So I continued in the first month. All I had was money in my pocket from America and a Couple of Korean Won. But, I managed to power through it all and make it a decent month. The most ironic thing happened to me in the first month in Korea. I started going to church. My Korean guide introduced me to a church in Jeonju that spoke English, it was a Christian Church. Now, I say ironic because for the past 10 years I have been agnostic. I had little to no faith anymore in anything. Then I come into the Christian church and all I felt was a warm embrace of something that I can't really describe. I am not saying that I have re-found my religion, but I really don't know what it means, but ever since then I have been traveling about 2 hours every week just to go to church. That is something that I would have never thought I would do in my life. I think I will end the story of the first month on that note for now. I will continue writing about the first month in a couple of days. There is much more to tell.

catching up