End of Month 1

It hasn't really been a month in Korea but my first round of classes have finished.

Some things I haven't mentioned before... because I'm absentminded.

My normal day-to-day expenses are usually pretty low... if I wanted to really kick it into saving mode I can spend about ₩2,000 a day during the week to cover my transportation costs and eating lunch and dinner at the office instead of a restaurant.  Right now Google is telling me that's about $1.81.

The area my hagwon (학원, the school/academy/place where theoretically learning occurs) is Gangnam (alternatively romanized as Kangnam, 강남) and includes some major financial buildings and a swanky shopping area makes me feel hugely underdressed.  Actually, I'm pretty sure I've mentioned this before but yeah... jeans and a t-shirt don't really fit in with suits.  When it warms up I'll start wearing shorts and all will be well.

Seoul is huge.  Well... with approximately 24.5 million people (thanks Wikipedia) to think Seoul would be small would be pretty silly of me.  On Sunday I went to Hongdae (홍대, romanized as Hongik University on subway maps) via car and came back to Seongnam (성남, where I happen to live) took something in the neighborhood of 1.5 hours.  Though, my wonderful iPod application, Jihachul, estimates the trip at about an hour... I don't think it calculates waiting time for transfers well.  But yeah... Seoul is big.

Anyway... I haven't posted many pictures.  I should start posting more pictures in the nearish future... hopefully, now that I have a way to take pictures of things I see in my daily life without having to carry my camera.  For special outings I'll probably stick to the camera because of the high quality pictures.

I've learned so much about English grammar from this job.  Last night two of my roommates and I discussed the use of "would," "have," and "would have."  Crazy stuff.  I've been learning more here than when I was supposed to be learning this stuff.

And with that... good night.