The day has finally arrived.

Actually, it hasn't, but today is Thursday evening and I am flying Sunday Afternoon. Pretty darn close if you ask me.

I will be off to South Korea and working in a city called Icheon. It is officially a city, but I'm not sure. Sounds more like a big town to me. 190 000 people? Is that a city? I'll have to look that up. By the end of this post I'll let you know when a town becomes a city.

I thought about renaming my Blog to Pap & Kim Chi, but I don't think I can rename it without removing all the other posts. I will try thought. If any of you sorry lot figure out how before I change it, please let me know. I will reward you. Just ask, MAYBE I'll say yes to whatever strange request you make.

What is Pap & Kim Chi, you might ask? I'll tell you in my first post from Korea.

A few details about what I'll be doing. I'll have been tasked with killing middle school children. They will let me start with the 13 year old pupils, but I am not sure about this. See it as an educated guess.

My co-teacher emailed and she gave me info like my address and telephone number. Sorry everyone. I know all my adoring fans want to know where I live so that they can take photographs of me out of the bushes, but you will NOT get it. Well, not here anyway ;-) Do note that this will be the smallest place I ever lived in. New experiences on altogether, I say.

Folks, for now this will be my post. Next time, Pap & Kim Chi, where I live, what I found, who I killed, what I ate, and anything else I feel like writing about, or not. I should be able to add photographs as well

Go well
Otto

p.s.

I found this Chinese definition of a city and I suspect Korea might be something similar:

There is a formal definition of city in China provided by the Chinese government. For an urban area that can be defined as a city, there should be at least 100,000 non-agricultural populations. City with less than 200,000 non-agricultural population refers to a Small city, 200,000-500,000 non-agricultural population is a Medium city, 500,000-1,000,000 non-agricultural population is a Large city and >1,000,000 non-agricultural population is an Extra-large city. Also, there is an administrative definition based on the city boundary too and a city has its legal city limits. In 1998, there were 668 cities in China - China has the largest urban population in the world.

Almost done.

Everything is done from that side!

Now I am finally sure that i am going. My letter of appointment was couriered today, so I should get it Friday at the latest. As soon as I have that I will take it to the Consulate, ask for the visa and while they are doing that I'll go book my ticket.

It looks like I can get a ticket just about any time from the 28th on Cathay Pacific. Everyone was trying to get me on to Qatar Airways, but I will not fly with them if I can avoid it. I know how crap they treat their crew and I do not want to support them. Also, Cathay will be a much quickest trip, by far.

This was a short one, but it was just an update. I'll write again when I know when I'm flying.

At last.

All my paperwork has arrived in Korea. Now the agent just has to send the last bit that she had and then they will send me a letter of appointment.

The new rules say that this letter is to be used for a visa. The old rules said that I needed some kind of number to get the visa, so even before they send my letter, I'll have to go to the embassy and tell them to find out about this, otherwise I'll have to wait even longer.

Back to the real story though...

I was supposed to go to a school called Jo Jong Middle School in some small town. I have no idea where it is, but it is suppose to be quite nice, surrounded by a national forest and one hour from Seoul by bus. I was also supposed to share an apartment with a girl from the USA, strange as that seems, and that was the basic story.

The girl, though, said they were sure that I would move in to this empty apartment next to them, on my own. When I told a Korean friend of mine I'll be sharing with a girl she didn't want to believe it. I know I didn't think it right. Not even in South Africa will we do that, and Korea is way more conservative than we are.

In the mean time though, the agent informed me that I will now be going to Incheon. I am not sure if I would prefer the city or the town. I have never lived in a town. Even thought Doha was a shit hole, it was still a city in a manner of speaking.

The interesting about the Incheon change is that then other school still thinks I am going to them. Basically, until I get my appointment letter, hopefully middle next week, I'll not be sure where I'm going. The city has much more to do with easy access to the sea and island as well as Seoul and other parts of the country.

Other news is that I have made a friend in Korea through Friendster. They say it is VERY important to have a good network over there, so I thought I would see what I can do even before I arrive.

Now, my adoring fans of this silly and short Blog, maybe I'll start writing more often about the weird and wonderful things over there before the end of this month. Maybe I'll write it while eating my rice, kim, kimchi and soup.

Go well.
Otto