안녕 한국! (Hello Korea!)

I'm in KOREA!Where do I begin? So many thoughts, so many excitements! There is no way to write everything that I've thought and experienced over the last few days, so I thought it would be easier to write a few random initial thoughts below and include a few photos to show you about my life here.

Clara, Susanna, Stephanie and I (all from UNC) at the Incheon Airport in Seoul, Korea.

Coming into my dorm room at 9 pm Monday with keys and a nametag in hand. Excited! :)

• Our orientation leader is about as TCK as someone can get. He shared "where he was from" today for us and it probably took about 2 minutes for him to explain every country he has lived in and where he grew up. He did 8th through 11th grade in Ankara, Turkey, so that is exciting! We have spoken some Turkish together. It is nice to have a TCK friend around who also doesn't know quite where they are from, and who has ended up in Korea over the years.
  
• Laughing and smiling (which are the same word in Turkish) is a universal language. My roommates and I haven't talked much, but we have definitely smiled at each other. One is shy in her English and my conversational Korean is close to zero, but smiling is one thing we are both good at! The other one and I have laughed together a lot and talked more. I'm so excited to get to know them both over the next few months!

With my roommate Se Young at the International Student Welcome Dinner (It was freezing, but the food was delicious!)

• You know you're in Asia when you buy a men's foot brace and it's barely large enough, and when taking showers is a knee work-out. ;)

• My Korean reading skills are quickly getting better and better. I've been learning random Korean words every hour it seems. I remember about half of them 10 minutes after I learn them, and half of that half I remember the next day. Lots of repetition, repetition, repetition! I've been coming up with helpful little hints to remember each word. For example, it is really cold here, so I learned the word for cold - 추위 - which sounds like "chew, woah!" because when you're shivering, your teeth chatter (like chewing?) Haha. It's silly, but it helps!
  
• Signs on campus are in Korean. Signs around town are in Korean. Staff speak Korean. Restaurant and store owners speak Korean. Most students here only speak Korean. It seems as though I will be learning Korean, and learning it quickly.

A typical restaurant menu. I will be learning how to read Korean foods VERY quickly

• The food is amazing here, but the hardest thing is ordering, as you can see in the photo above. Some things haven't set well with my stomach, but almost everything tastes wonderful. (I'm not so sure about liking the Kimchi yet..) I'm so glad to be living in a rice-eating country! I will be getting very good at chopsticks ASAP. :)

My first meal in Korea (Bulgogi) at the airport.

Eating Kimbap on campus on the first day. :)

• Last but not least, end every sentence with "ah-sim-nee-dah" or "hess-so-yo" and you've basically got Korean down. :)

More blog posts to come! School begins Monday and I am so excited for the adventures to continue! Thank you for your continued prayers as I adjust to a new country, culture, food and friends. :)

Farewell Feelings

In less than 4 hours, I leave a place I've called home for so many years, and begin an adventure elsewhere. It's a strange feeling, departing a place that has become known and comfortable in the last two months, to be welcomed as a foreigner in a place unknown.

My feelings are all over the place. Nervous. Excited. Joyful. Overwhelmed. Freaked out. Ready. Lost. Anxious. Can't wait. Curious. 

Yet with all the excitement and new things about to come my way, leaving home is what seems the hardest. Overseas flight by myself? Done that. Give me a new country to travel to on my own? Check. Throw me into a place I don't speak the language? Been there. Have me make a million cultural blunders and travel mistakes? Yup. But have me leave home again..? Yup. Check. Been there. Done that. But it never gets easier.

Honestly, I am SO excited for my new home. I look forward to making new friends, moving into a dorm, not living out of a suitcase for a while, finding new pockets of town to explore and new cultural things to discover. (And for finally being there!) Creating a new home can be exhilarating and I can't wait! I'm excited for new tastes, new sounds, new culture to participate in, new friends, new sights, new school, new country...

I grew up learning the transition model "RAFT" - Reconciliation, Affirmation, Farewell, Think Destination. This past week I completed R and A, and last night I did F at a goodbye party with close friends. Now it's time for T: Think Destination. It's time to leave behind what's holding me back, and look straight ahead into the unknown future in a new place. I may not know what's coming, but I'm excited and ready to take it on with open hands and a heart eager to love and learn. 

Korea, here I come! Time to leave for the airport. :)

Discoveries

"For many, darkness means silence. But for the blind, darkness means listen."*

Last week I went to a museum here in Istanbul called Dialogue in the Dark. It is an interactive museum where a blind person leads you around in the dark to help you experience what life is like without sight. 

You ride trams, walk on sand, find park benches and trees, listen for nearby streams, order tea, read signs.. All in complete darkness. 

This past semester I had the chance to meet and become close friends with two blind students. Unfortunately, our relationship bonded mostly through a terrible accident they were affected in, but by God's hand they both survived and through it a relationship was developed. 

The experience at the museum taught me many things, but it mainly gave me a glimpse of understanding what daily life is like for my friends and for others who are blind. An hour and a half is barely a fraction of the time a blind person spends without access to light, but it is quite a while for someone who is used to getting around by sight and can still have a life-long impact.

Lots of time is spent fumbling around looking for things and trying to figure out where you are, but one thing I noticed it this: the blind must constantly live in a state of discovery. Each moment of their lives are spent finding new things and figuring out where they are and what their surroundings are. 

Can you imagine the joy of completing a 1000 piece puzzle by yourself when you finally put the last piece in? It is difficult and the process can be frustrating, but in the end you have created a marvelous masterpiece. In the same way, the blind live each moment putting puzzle pieces together, finding precious discoveries in every thing they do. 

I take many things for granted. It was a complete eye-opening experience to have my eyes taken from me. There is so much more in life to be enjoyed and discovered that is beyond what we experience everyday. Who knew that finding a bike on a sidewalk and spending a few minutes searching for a bell on it would be so gratifying once you finally heard the precious sound? Or that discovering a park bench and spending a few moments in silence would teach you that the touch of a friend's hand or the faint sound of a calling bird could mean so much more without eyes than with them?

I hope that I may too be able to live my life this way, making each moment I live a joyous discovery.



*Quote said by our guide at Dialogue in the Dark