I finally have internet. Now that's a relief. Life is about to be a little easier now that I don't have to go down and sit in a cold room in order to write my blog or otherwise use the internet. The timing is extremely lucky too because the weather just got a lot colder, and apparently this is just the beginning of the winter weather.
In other, and much more important news, classes started today!
Yesterday evening I must have been pretty worried because although I really tried, I didn't fall asleep until 4am, so it would be safe to assume that I was pretty tired today. I really was, and still am... Still, I very much enjoy class.
We're thirteen people in my class. My classmates come from a variety of countries; Japan, China, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, USA, and while there are a lot of caucasians in school, I'm the only one in my class.
I immediatly bonded with the girl seated next to me. She is from China and has a pretty high level of Korean so we could talk comfortably. It's nice to be on a high enough level that conversation is easy regardless of different backgrounds.
Oh and out teacher is awesome! He makes class seem like a fun trip to the amusement park. I laughed so much during class while still learning new things.
What we learnt today wasn't exactly difficult. It was a grammar rule that I have heard often and am therefore familiar with, but I can see that it will take a few days to get used to the class format, and I wonder how tomorrow will look.
I also got a lot of praise in class while practicing with the teacher. I told him that I hadn't spoken or written Korean in six years, so when we were practicing he was surprised that I had good speaking skills and when I wrote, he looked carefully at what I was writing and praised me that I barely had any faults. He was good at explaining things too.
Today it was a little slower since it was all about easing us into learning and there was a lot of information that needed to be passed onto us so I lot of time was spent with the teacher handing out papers and explaining things (like the wifi access, and information about clubs and culture trips).
Talking about clubs, the school has quite a few options, and I've already chosen one, because even before leaving for Korea, I wondered how I could get involved in something like this.
The club options are: dance club, sports club, Korean food club, pilates club, and volunteering club.
I am quite keen to join the volunteering club, which seems to be a new addition. The application date is on Wednesday, and that is also when I have a cultural outing where we will make traditional Korean masks. Usually cultural outings are done later in the semester, but because there aren't a lot of things for students with a high level of Korean to do over winter, the cultural outing for the winter semester is pretty early on.
Although I now have internet, I still need to wait before I get my student card. In order to get a student card, I had to send a photo to my teacher. So when I came home from classes I took a photo and wrote a short message à la: "Hello teacher, I am sending you the photo for the student cards." and I got the sweetest e-mail back.
It takes two weeks for us to get our student cards, and I can't wait until we do because then I can finally use the awesome study rooms at ECC that I have missed so much while my time away from Ewha.
Another thing that I have missed is the cafe up along the mountain the university is built on, called "Ewha Sarang", which translated to Ewha Love. The café acts both as a café, a bakery and a kimbap shop, and it is precisely the kimbaps that I have missed.
They didn't have my favorites, egg rolled kimbap, but back then they rarely had them, and I've heard that they've stopped making them because they take too much time.
Even so, just there regular one, shown here with mayo on top, is pretty great and sells at the decent price of 2500 won (2€).
All in all, I am thankful that my first teacher (we usually have two) is fun, and my classmates seem to be very nice too. Tomorrow will be another adventure.
