Cheonan Love . . . Motel!

Sunday morning I was off to my next job teaching English at Sangmyung University in Cheonan, South Korea. My former boss and friend, Mi-Suk, was the one that put me in touch with this job, and yet again she was going to be my supervisor. My role was to substitute for another teacher who had to do a last minute visa run to Japan. There was a small chance that his paperwork would not be ready and that I would be expected to teach for the whole semester. I wasn't sure how I felt about that, though!

Initially, I was to stay at the other teacher's flat for the whole week, but due to a communication gap and a pit stop by him to his apartment, I only crashed there one night. The place was nice, quaint, and above a noodle shop, though I didn't snap any pictures of the interior (I thought I'd have a whole week to). This was also my first introduction to the keypad entrance of residences. You don't need a key to enter, just enter the code on the keypad and voila, you are in your unit!

Once I discovered the schedule of this job, I quickly began to think to myself how I could certainly get used to this. First class was either 10 or 11 depending on the day, lunch at noon, and the last class ended at 5. Sometimes, no students would show up and no class had to be taught. Friday was just one class. However, I really enjoyed teaching the classes when students came. Since these were optional classes, the only students that showed up were the ones that were motivated to learn.

My new lodging had a much better location in downtown Cheonan, but was, um, a bit seedier to say the least. It was a "love motel" (very common in Korea, ask me about them sometime) complete with mood lighting.