11 AM: Good day!
Last night, the beautiful and effervescent KBR took me to a phone store to get the latest model--an LG-G3. I had been making do with an older-model phone (read: it was released in 2011, and therefore unspeakably outdated by South Korean standards. We're pretty sharp about our technology.)
I had bought the phone from an online American company because Korean cellphone rules are confusing. So I was paying too much for a not-very-good smartphone, and yet I was happy with it because it was available to me the second I arrived in the airport in Korea. Instead of waiting 2-3 weeks for a phone in my new, unknown country, I had one right away and was able to call my mom from the orientation facilities.
Anyhoodle, I'd wanted to change my phone for quite a while, and then when I accidentally dropped it in a bag where my water bottle had opened, that roughed up my existing phone enough that it could no longer make voice calls, which worried my Mom. Technically, it should have worried me, too, but I communicate with my friends entirely by Kakao, so I didn't feel the loss of audio-calls immediately.
Another reason I put off getting a new phone for so long is that I'd heard the process for getting a Korean phone is nuts.
It is.
It so is. It took me and KBR 3 hours to get my phone, since they had to import my old info into my new phone and I had to sign a whole armada of paperwork, and the "servers" were "processing" or something. I picked the phone because it's brand-new, released this month, and if my cellphone contract is for 2 years I want to have something that will still be a decent phone in the future.
Just hit me that this phone will expire when I'm 30, y'all. 30.
And KBR was so amazing. I took her out to eat, then for coffee, then we came back to pick up the phone, so I semipaid her back for her time, but really nothing can ever say how grateful I am for her help. Getting a phone in my small town is a flat-out impossibility if you don't have a Korean friend or co-worker to translate for you, so she did something for me I could not have done for myself. I shall never stop appreciating her thoughtfulness.
She actually said she envied me the ability to live in a new place and meet different people, learn a new language, etc. For her, work is just work. For me, it's an adventure and a challenge and a life experience. I forget how, even though my compatriots don't have the same outsider-who-doesn't-know-what's-going-on status, they also don't get the fun and wonder of it. I'm really blessed.
In 3rd grade class, Seongmo was speaking Korean and I understood him. He told Seohyung that Messi's style of play for Barcelona was very different from his style while playing for Argentina. I told him that I agreed, from what I had seen. It's little moments like that which are so special--when I can continue a conversation because there are words I suddenly know.
Morning 2nd grade class went fine. They sorta-kinda got their speaking done, and they were precious. Yeonghan answered every question in the Geography section, rapid-fire naming identifying the flags of Argentina, Serbia, Portugal and Algeria. Duuuude.
SG2 is worried that little Hyunseop is getting bullied. Hyunseop was fine yesterday, but today he has a soft cast on one arm and cuts on one hand. And he fell out of his chair hard in class, and it looked like Donggu did it. She later said that she thinks Smart-Soonwoo is angry at the little guy and that she saw Soonwoo push Hyunseop. Another thing to pray about.
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