My New Squad

I know that I have mentioned briefly some of my new co-workers, but I feel like I should talk about a few that have really stood out for me so far. I will be giving them nicknames just because I think it is more polite than to put them out on the internet without their permission.

First off, let me talk about my good friend Mr. Glasses (he was wearing glasses when we first met). Glasses is one of the Korean staff members that in in charge of helping the new teachers find housing and is really the go to guy in terms of living here in Junggye. I met up with him on Saturday morning and by that afternoon he had helped me find an apartment, sign the lease, and was giving me tips about the neighborhood and  a little bit about my branch. He is very nice and is always there to answer any question that I might have. Most recently it was about my stove. Because my apartment has been empty for a while, the landlady had turned off the gas for my room and for some reason it had not been turned back on for me when I got in on Wednesday. So after about an hour of trying to turn on the stove and having my Korean friend Aaron send me YouTube videos on how to turn on a Korean stove top (yes they actually exist), I messaged Glasses at about 9:30 that night letting him know that my stove was not working. Yankee (will talk about him later) had shown up by then and turned my gas back on, so by the time that Glasses got back to me about talking to the realtors in the morning, I had already  fixed the problem. Since I did not know at the time that it was ok for me to use the gas, I turned the main line back off just in case later that night before I got a chance to cook anything. I ended up using the microwave, which would have been the logical thing to do after I could not get the stove to work the first time.  

Anyway, since the following day was Glasses day off, I was not really expecting him to call in and ask about my gas. Well low and behold that morning at like 9:30 ( right before my bed arrived), I got a message form Glasses saying that he had talked to both the realtor and the landlady and confirmed that I was able to use the gas. Plus he promised me that once I got my bills, he would show me how to transfer the money via my bank account (which reminds me…need to put some money in to that soon…).

The next co-worker is actually my boss. So Mr. Bossman is suuupppeeerr nice. He is the Branch Manager and is Korean, but studied abroad in University. I felt really lucky that I got too meet him, since the other trainees have not meet their branch managers yet. When I got to meet Mr. Bossman, he was really nice and very sincere about everything he said and did. I gave me a cold vitamin drink and then had my resume pulled up on his computer screen and talked with me about some of the times that I had put on it. As it turns out, he was a rower while he was in university and so we talked about crew and that we live near the Olympic race site (need to look that up later)!  He also asked me questions about my time at Yonsei and suggested that I talked to one of the other teachers if I was interested in taking intensive Korean classes in the mornings at either Yonsei or Sogan Universities.  Aparently according to Glasses and Yankee, Mr. Bossman is one of the nicest branch managers in my company and is extreamly caring about his job and teachers (as long as you stay on his good side and actually do your job), so I think I lucked out with getting places here in Junggye!

So I have mentioned him before, but the next person I want to talk about is Yankee. His has been here at Junggye for about 5 years now and has been a major help to me since I moved in. My FM (Faculty Manager) gave me his number when I was asking about where I could find furniture and stuff for my apartment. Yankee is actually going back stateside next week, so he is going to be giving me a lot of his things that he has gotten over the years: tables, chairs, kitchen things, a full sized mirror (and hopefully his fan too!).  He lives in the same apartment building I do so he is my go to guy when I have questions about my apartment. He also gave me lots of tips about living in the area and about my branch. He is like my guardian angel while he is still here. The other night when my stove was not turning on, he came down and personally took a look at it and then showed me how to turn the gas line back on (and then told me I should turn it off after his girlfriend translated the notice that was on it saying that the gas has been turned off, lol).  The fact that he has been here for 5 years already has really made me more excited about working here at Junggye. The retention rate for teachers here in South Korea is really low, with most working about on average a year and a half, but the fact that at Junggye more than half of the staff have been around for more than 2 years since they first came on.  He also told me about living in our apartment, essentially that it is a nice place to live and that as long as you pay your bills on time that the landlady and the guard ajjusshi are really nice and friendly. The only drawback he told me about was that it is very easy to rake up a large bill on utilities.

Thankfully, I lived in a dorm with no a/c for two years and also spent time in our Mountain house during the winter time, so I have practice with dealing with weather. I may not really need to, but I have been trying to police myself with my utilities. I really only have the a/c on for a little bit (just enough to keep the room cold) and then I turn it off for most of the day and when I leave. I only have one light on at a time, and I have been making sure that I turn off the flow of gas to my appliances, so that the meter stays down. Essentially the only thing that stays on constantly is my fridge.  And for the winter, I am trying to see if I can get some space heaters from another co-teacher that I have not met yet (only talked to) and if that does not work, I have lots of blankets and comforters that I can use to snuggle up with!