Music During the Day

Luckily, the Koreans really like their stretch breaks and music. In the morning, there is often music on for a full hour. Mostly classical music, but this morning it was something that sounded more like the Wiggles, or Giggles or whatever that popular kids group is. Lunch today I actually heard "It's raining men". Too funny. It is heard over the speakers in the office and outside.

Anyhow, if you have watched Discovery Channel, you're already in the loop on this, but during the musical stretch breaks, all of the workers stand and do their stretches. Unfortunately, this is all I can see out of my window, but I believe (based on my t.v. knowledge) that in the fab shops, they are many many people stretching to the chants on the loud speaker.

Speaking of music, when the little trucks in the yard go in reverse, a song plays instead of an annoying beep.

And, when my washing machine is done running, it plays me a little song, instead of buzzing at me. It kind of keeps you cheery...for a little while at least.

Don't look if you're easily disgusted.

"The Bathroom"

I have emailed this experience to some, but I guess I'll actually post it. Do not view the pictures if you are easily disgusted.

So, I went with the guys (the only 2 other people on our team here) to eat indian food last night. It was actually very good! We went by a bar afterwards to meet with a Chevron Project Manager who is in town from yet another country. Well, while there, I have to tinkle. Soooo, I go to the back of the bar, where it says "toilet". I walk out the back door and it's an open space full of junk, see picture below.

Then, I see the open door to the bathroom, surrounded by more junk, of course.

I go in there and find two doors to actual potty areas.

And then I see the potty (picture below). My first non-Western style toilet. I think i might have a heart attack, but I really have to pee. So I squat over the potty....errrr..porcelain hole and go. Luckily there is toilet paper because I have heard that there is not always toilet paper. I finish and am happy to have the experience behind me....until I walk out and realize that the cuff of my jeans is wet. Now I'm disgusted for the rest of the evening because I have no clue if it's wet from me or others on the floor....yuck, yuck, yuck.... I went home and washed the jeans all by themselves so that they would not taint any other clothes!!!!! And, no, that is not my urine in the picture below. Yuck yuck yuck yuck yuck.

Now, I know that these toilets exist, but this place was disgusting.

Driving in Korea

Okay, okay, so I haven't been blogging much. I've been working late every night and the last thing I've wanted to do is go home to get back on a computer. Anyhow, I thought I'd put this blurb out there.

Driving in Korea is quite the adventure. First of all, they had my car (a Hyundai Sonata) ready the day I arrived. I haven't even had an orientation.... So, I did have to clear that up and ensure they don't hand out cars to anyone else until they take a driving course. Anyhow, without my formal driving course and only a brief orientation, we are driving now. The first thing to know about driving here:

RED LIGHTS MEAN NOTHING

I can actually tell you that I have probably run 5 red lights in the 2 days I have been driving. It is unreal. If no one is coming, you had better go, or else you are holding up all traffic. And if you decide to actually stop at a red light, you had better check your rear view mirror to make sure the people behind you are going to stop.

I have not yet seen a single police car. There are speeding cameras which everyone slows down for and then speeds back up. I'm only going 10km over the speed limit (since I'm still new) and everyone still zips right on by me. It's hilarious. But you will get a ticket in the mail if the speed camera catches you.
The worst part is that I can't read a single sign except for the speed limit and major roads (if they are numbered). Oh well....

Now, onto GAS PRICES.

I filled the tank of my mid-size Sonata yesterday for $97 !!!!!! This is after someone else had just put in about $9.20, so it truly cost me over $100 to fill the tank of a mid-size car!

OUCH !!!!

Grocery Store

Well, I made my first trip to the grocery store "Home Plus". It's about 15 minutes down the road, and is a larger store with more common western foods, so we made the trip there. This is a multi-level palace of items. clothes, dishes, make-up, bedding, and after about 10 minutes and 3 floors, we actually found the grocery store. First of all, the place was a complete zoo. Lesson learned #1 - do not go on the weekend. The grocery carts were so cool...you could steer them in any direction, completely sideways, diagonal, etc. They just flew in any direction and were actually quite hard to control wearing flip flops without much traction. Must wear tennis shoes to the grocery from now on. I did actually hit someone with my cart because I accidentally sent it spinning. I'm lucky it wasn't a child!! The only things I can't recall seeing at the grocery store were deoderant, peanut butter, jelly, mayo, ketchup....probably other items, but in general I found what I needed. spaghetti sauce, noodles, diet coke, meat, etc. They do take credit card, so that was great. I spent $100 and bagged my own groceries. I had to beg the lady for bags, she didn't want to give me any more than 1...I couldn't understand it. So, we wheeled our carts up the flat escalator (picture attached of Neil) and then found the self-packing station, where you are supposed to box your groceries and then carry to your car. Ah-ha...now I know why the lady thought I was crazy to keep asking for bags. The only problem with the self-packing is that Neil and I had bought loads of stuff on our first trip and there's no way we could've carried a box, it would've weighed too much. And we had to take an elevator (grocery carts not allowed) to our parking level, where we had obviously parked at the furthest end from the elevator. I was dying laughing and Neil was cursing. He took the first load of bags to the car while I watched the groceries. Then he came back and we grabbed all of the remaining groceries and got out of there. It was hilarious. Other lessons learned were #2 - park near the elevator so you do not have to carry the groceries far and #3 - don't buy more than you can carry, especially if you are alone! I'm still laughing at the entire awkward experience.

Here's Neil on the flat escalator with his cart.

Everytime I've had a meal with seafood, there are little octopus (octopi?) in them, so I snapped them in the seafood section, next to some nice large shrimp.

One level of Home Plus....It's basically a minature mall with a grocery store.

Allison's Arrival

It was a 12.5 hour flight from Houston to Japan, and then a 2.5 hour flight to Pusan, Korea. A van picked us (one of my managers and I) from the airport and it was another 2 hours to Okpo. I slept for most of the travel, whether by plane or car. I arrived in Okpo around 11pm and received an orientation to my apartment, including review of a book which shows all of the applicances and translates the buttons to English so that you may actually use them! I went back to bed around 1am and it was off to work on Tuesday. The DSME yard is huge and I will send pictures from the office soon. Right out the window is the back corner of the yard and some gorgeous mountains, so the view is very nice. The buildings in Korea (offices, hotels, etc.) do not turn on the air conditioning until a certain day of the year (same for heating later in the year). So the windows at the office are open to get a little breeze, but we were definitely sweating yesterday. I am at home today (Thursday) as it is a Buddhist holiday here. This is good because I am very tired and need to do some laundry. It feels like I've I have already been here for a week. We have only worked two days, but both nights have been other Chevron project dinners / parties while some big-wigs were in town to check out the projects. Today is a nice day of rest after the non-stop action.

I will have to take more pictures soon (especially of the live sea creatures on the curbs in buckets). For the time being, here are some pictures of our apartment and the "sea view" - which includes a portion of DSME's yard. I'm thinking I may get sick of looking at the yard after working there and seeing it from home!!! Below is our living room (42" flat screen not shown). In the corner is a tall object which happens to be the free standing air conditioning unit.

Here is some of the food from my welcome package.

This is the rooftop pool at our apartment building. There is a huge patio up there, too. So lots of BBQs on the weekends. I think this will be a regular hangout.

And, finally, the "sea view" from our apartment. It is a very pretty place and also very stinky when walking down the streets!!! I will post more soon, as I have already had some interesting cultural experiences in the last day or two.

Rob gets here on June 3rd!!!!

Much love to everyone!

Korean Encoding

So, I just logged into the blog to update it and after I signed in, all of the text was in Korean!!! I finally deciphered the text and found the link to "language", where I was able to get back to English. Thank goodness for the compact english/korean dictionary!!! And I feel so proud of figuring it out (not that it was too hard). Just a minor bump along the highway of communication.