Korea University - revised

The campus

On Monday I went to the Korea University campus to look for the building where the placement test will be held. Actually I am quite happy about my location of the student home.

Basically I just get out of the student house and less than 100m around the corner lies the main gate of the Korea University campus. When standing at the gate, you can see our student home (the grey building on the right with the pink sign boards).

I was thrilled to see the campus for the first time, because my stay during this first weekend - maybe it was because of the rain and wet feet and talking to myself all the time - made me feel a bit melancholic.
The campus was quite clean and the buildings were big, it reminded me a lot like the campus on Berkeley. I am not going to comment on the building style... Maybe they all have the same landscape structure... While as in Leuven, my home town in Belgium, the university's buildings were spread around in the city, except for the science campus.

Because it was at the beginning of a new quarter, there were a lot of new students. Hmmm... I really liked walking around and breathe the air of knowledge... I liked walking around and being surrounded by students with books in stead of shopping bags. It was quite a relief to me that I liked the campus and my mood changed being cheerful and happy. I was actually happy to have chosen this place to study, which was just a lucky guess and of course I did some research on the internet. The surroundings are not too crowded and if I need to I can still take the sub to Sinchon.

The building were my classes will be held is located at one of the newer buildings : the International Studies Hall, which qua architecture is more in a contemporary style. I found the secretary of the Korean Language and Culture Center to ask about the time and place of the placement test. The whole procedure took me just less than a minute :p.

After strolling around on the campus, still cheerful, I looked for the Hana Bank but got lost. A very friendly student helped me out and asked me what country I was from. He thought I look like a Korean, but had to disappoint him by being Chinese with the whole European - USA story. Sometimes I don't know what to answer when they ask me the 'question' of origin. Right now, I feel a bit 'placeless'...
Why do I need a bank account? Trust me, walking around with a stack of 10.000 KRW (about 10 US$) bank notes is everything but convenient. I still don't understand why they only give 10.000 KRW bank notes when exchanging money...
I was a bit worried about the information I got on the internet about a new law that didn't allow foreigners under a stay of 3 months in the country to open a bank account. At entering the bank, a middle aged man guided me to a table where I could fill in my application form. It was more difficult to communicate than just ordering some food at an eatery, but I managed to understand him a little bit. Luckily there were some English words on the main application form, so filling it in was not a big problem.
While I was waiting to my turn to get to the counter to get my account opened, I was surrounded by bunch of fresh 18 year young female student... Just fresh from high school I suppose. Couldn't understand everything they were saying, but a lot of the conversation was about 'boys and boyfriends' and a lot of giggling 'khekhekhe hehehehe'... You can imagine the sounds yourself ;p.
Anyway, when it was my turn, I was directed to an English speaking employer who only spoke three words of English to me : "Please press code".... So I was set !!! Having my own bank account in Korea :)).

Family eatery
After that very small adventure at the bank, I went back to my student home and passed a very small family eatery. I was hesitating to get in because it looked a bit dark inside, but the friendly 'ajumma' called me in to have lunch... and of course, I let myself get persuaded :)... The eatery was very small but clean and there was nobody there but me, the 'ajumma' and her husband. At the back there was a small kitchen and in the front on the left a small elevated room where the husband was sitting watching television. There were a lot o the household stuff in that room but also some blankets. I wonder if that's their sleeping room and the eatery their 'living room'. So I felt like I was in someone's home, which felt quite comfortable to me.

I ordered a 'doenjang jjigae' 된장찌개 and really enjoyed it while watching television as well. The funny thing was, that I didn't feel awkward at all, to be the only one eating there. The 'ajumma' gave me 6 side dishes. I felt so happy =) and blessed.
After the nice lunch I told her I liked the dish. I am sure I am going to go back again. It's better to frequent the small scale family eateries instead of going to the chain eateries of major pizza joints, because making a living here must not be easy. I know, because all Chinese - in Belgium at least - were brought up with their family Chinese restaurant.