Day 259 in South Korea: Noraebang and a few other tidbits.

First, the bad news. I found out a little over a month ago that my school has lost the funding it receives from the government to pay me. It's very frustrating because I've been really happy at my school: the teachers are amazing and friendly, the location is absolutely fantastic, and I've really enjoyed the students. However, I have to keep telling myself that God does everything for a reason. I don't understand the reasoning behind this right now, but I know that I will eventually find where I'm supposed to be. Right now, I'm working with my recruiter again and talking to a lot of different friends, trying to find out what jobs they know about. I have several leads, so hopefully something works out!


Second, the slightly better (now) news: right before leaving for the United States on January 20th, I discovered that my passport had gone missing. That's where the nightmare began...My friend and I completely tore up my apartment to absolutely no avail, then the next day was spent talking to the embassy, trying to figure out how to proceed. That Wednesday, I went to the embassy in the morning, filled out the proper paperwork, and an hour later, I had an "emergency passport:" one that was issued that day, but expired in 8 months instead of the usual 10 years. I had some funny looks from security on the journey home, but once I told them it was an emergency passport, all was well. Then two weeks ago, I went back to the embassy, filled out more paperwork, filled out a delivery slip, and left. They told me it would take two weeks, but of course, I'm paranoid about the new of the impending government shutdown. I knew that passport processing would be one of the areas that would cease operations. Fortunately, it arrived on Tuesday! I got a phone call Thursday afternoon from an unknown number saying that he had a delivery for me and asking when I would be home. We made arrangements to meet, and Thursday evening at 8:30 pm, I had a new passport in my hands! It was a long, frustrating and stressful process. Morale of the story: guard your passport with your life!!!

Third, I've decided to take the Korean proficiency test (TOPIK) in April! For now, it's just the beginner level, but I'm thinking about possibly taking the intermediate test in July or September, depending on how the move goes and how I feel after I take the beginner test. I'm still meeting with a friend once a week to study and I'm still going to class once a week. Plus I study a lot on my own. I'm not sure why I enjoy doing this so much, but I do know that learning Korean has led to me understanding so much more about this country. It's also given me several advantages: I use it to get discounts when I go shopping! When I go shopping for fabric, a lot of times I can talk to the merchants and get a discount from them. Not always, but even we I don't get a discount, I've made a new friend.

I've been on the look out for quite a while for a nice, quiet, and calm coffee shop that I can study in. I get easily distracted in my house (mostly because of Maestro) and it's not always easy to study at school. Most of the coffee shops around here are large chains, and they are usually quite crowded and noisy. The ones that are smaller often don't have separate smoking areas, which is fine for short periods of time, but if I'm around it for too long I tend to get sinus infections. Last Wednesday, my friend Erin and I were on the way back from lunch and we decided to stop at this little coffee shop a hop, skip and a jump away from our school. Best. Decision. Ever. First, their prices are fantastic. I ordered a caramel macchiato-easily the best coffee I've had in Korea. They also have a "Today's Coffee" featuring different coffees from different parts of the world. After talking to the barista for a bit, she let us sample Wednesday's coffee of the day: a wonderful brew from India. We ended up going back two more times that day and then again on Friday. Each time we went in we were greeted with an amused chuckle and a big smile, as well as a friendly "Welcome!" And yes, she really did say welcome!! So I'm planning on going back to that coffee shop quite often. It's just the right size, but most importantly the service can't be beat! PLUS, it has free wi-fi!!! Doesn't get much better than that!!!

Now for the fun part of the post!

Several different times this year, I've gone to a noraebang (literally "song room") but every single time, I've forgotten my camera! It's disappointed me every single time, because noraebangs are amazing little places. They're basically private karaoke rooms that you can rent for any desired amount of time. Each room has a TV screen, fancy lights, and a HUGE book full of possible songs to sing! Don't speak Korean? It's okay! They have several hundred English songs! They also have Japanese songs and Chinese songs, as well as a few Spanish songs. In the noraebang that we go to, there are two microphones attached to the sound system in the front of the room. You make your selection by typing in the number that corresponds to the song you want to sing on this HUGE remote. And then, you sing! At the end of the song, the computer will give you a "rating" between 1-100 (I assume, we've only ever seen between 80-100) and most of the time, it will tell you to become a singer. Stupidly, I did not take a picture of the remote and the books. However, I did get videos of my friends singing!

I chose this video to film for a very special reason: The group's name is Miss A! They were hugely popular last summer and last fall and you still hear their music all over the place.

I almost forgot to mention: one of my favorite parts about going to the noraebang is the incredibly random music videos playing in the background. You could be singing the sweetest, sappiest love song ever written and the TV will be showing a car chase scene with two evil looking men behind the wheel. Cracks me up every time!!!

Anyway, here's a noraebang!