It's Déjà vu all over again

  Seoul, Korea Rep.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007

· Seoul, South Korea
· GMT +8:00 hours

Waiting, one more time
Why is it that every time I find myself in Seoul I seem to spend a lot of time doing absolutely nothing? Just waiting for something, or someone. First time I was here (January 2004) I spent time waiting between here and Busan, Korea's second city, for the flight home after my first Camp Korea assignment. Second time I was here (July - August 2004) I spent time once again between Seoul and Busan waiting for my second Camp Korea teaching assignment to begin. After both my third & forth assignments in Camp Korea (August 2005 & February 2006) I spent almost a week in the city each time waiting to sort out stuff (visas etc) ahead of trips to SE Asia (September 2005) and Eurasia (March 2006). Well, fast forward to today and once again I find myself in the city just waiting. Waiting and, above all, hoping things work out. Let me explain what we both like to call our quandary.

The Quandary
Just to recap and bring you all firmly into the loop. We're here because months ago (just after the wedding) we got offered a two and a half month teaching position, a well paid two and a half month teaching position, even by Korean standards. We decided to take the position because it, coupled with one more visit to Camp Korea in January, will see us well set financially to complete the trip we initially planned on doing way back when we decided to travel. So, we weighted up the options and decided to travel after the wedding as far as Istanbul (which we've just done), head to Korea from there and spend 4 months in Korea making some money before continuing our travels once the money has been banked. Sounds like a plan, right? Yep, we though so. Anyway, that aforementioned well paid two and a half month teaching position begins on Sunday next, September 30th, when we have to report for duty.

So now you're up to date as to why we're here. Now let me explain a bit about the logistics of a foreigner working here in Korea. First and foremost, you need a visa. A working visa. The working visa has to be acquired a a Korean embassy/consulate OUTSIDE the country, BEFORE getting to Korea (we entered the country a few days ago as 90-day tourists, something Canadian and Irish passport holders are entitled to do). Anyway, in order to get a work visa you HAVE to be from a native English speaking country and most importantly, you HAVE to prove to the consulate you're applying to that you have a valid 3rd level degree (any degree will do).. seemingly that's the criteria set by the Korean government to ensure the foreigners in their country teaching English (and there are tons of them) to Korean nationals meet a certain standard. Anyway, in the post-wedding rush we forgot to bring Meg's degree with us, leaving it behind in Canada. That, as it turned out, wasn't a big issue as we successfully got it mailed to an address in Seoul ahead of our arrival here. It was then going to be a simple matter of picking up the degree, hopping on a ferry to Japan, lodging the visa application with the Korean consulate there before heading back to Korea the next day, new working visa and all. Easy. People do it all the time over here. It's called 'The Visa Run', and we made sure to fly to Korea a week ahead of our reporting date in order to do just that. Except, as you might expect, things haven't quite gone to plan.

We did our bit
Before we arrived in Korea our biggest concern was that Meg's degree wouldn't have arrived in time. Well, we needn't have worried about that. It did. What we should have worried about was the Korean holidays presently taking place. Shortly after we arrived in Korea we checked our e-mail and a message from from Jay, the guy we got the degree mailed to, said that our documents had arrived and it was in the Camp Korea offices. Super. Jay also told us that because of Korean Holidays (Monday through Wednesday) he would be away from Seoul for a few days but we were to contact Gil, his colleague, who will help us get the degree. No problem. So, using the number Jay gave us we tried to contact Gil numerous times, finally reaching him on Sunday afternoon. He then proceeded to tell us, in woeful English, that he was also away for the holidays and that there is no way we'd get our documents until the office reopens after the holidays on Thursday, even after him telling us he'd be back in the city today (Wednesday). We tried to explain our situation to Gil, stressing the point that if we got our documents on Wednesday (even Wednesday night) we'd make it back from Japan in time, but Thursday would be too late for us (we have to get to Japan by Thursday morning at the latest to lodge our application as the consulate doesn't open on weekends and it takes a minimum of a day to process) but with his limited English we didn't think he fully understood.

What Next?

01 Dinner

So we've basically spent the past two days (Monday and yesterday, Tuesday) trying to figure this one out and as I type, 2pm on Wednesday, we're no nearer to our documents. We've e-mailed all we know, called all the numbers we have (people rarely answer) and we even had a Korean friend call Gil to explain, in Korean, the situation to him. But even after all that tomorrow, Thursday, still seems like it'll be the soonest well be able to get our hands on our documents, meaning there will be no way we'll make it to Japan in time. Our recruiter, based in Sydney, is no doubt livid... we're still awaiting her response as to what she suggests. Will they hire us, at this late stage, under-the-table and without a visa? Do they even have other options beyond us? Will we have to look for work elsewhere? Questions, questions. Watch this space.

02 Eco-friendly Seoul

Day 42 & 43 Observations (September 24th & 25th 2007)

· Counting sheep doesn't even work
Our sleeping pattern is messed up and, for people like us who have never had issues sleeping, it's annoying. Very annoying. Meg thinks it's because of jet lag but I dunno... I've flown further, and longer, than the Istanbul - Seoul flight before and I've never experienced an inability to sleep, especially 4 days after landing. As we've already mentioned, we arrived Saturday night and managed to sleep right through until 3:30pm on Sunday afternoon. Because of that we sort of assumed we'd have problems sleeping Sunday night/Monday morning and we were right. We passed quite a bit of time staring at the ceiling, periodically querying each other if either of us was tired yet.

03 Hey, Hairy!

The answer was always no. We eventually got only a few hours sleep, expecting to be tired the whole of Monday. But no, not a bit of it. We were bright as buttons. We seemed to sleep okay Monday night, but again last night we both had issues dropping off. Weird, and as I said, annoying.

· Samson
I need a haircut. Meg doesn't agree. She says I look younger with longer hair. I told her I hate having longer hair and that I just look scruffy, but she knows that anyway. I might just stick it out until it's almost unbearable, and then see what she says.

· Laundry
We need to do laundry again. We have needed to do so for a while. The laundry bag is getting bigger as our backpacks get smaller. Holding off on doing laundry for as long as possible is one way to ensure you do actually wear ALL the clothes you bring travelling. But that only works for about as long as you have clean underwear (right about now). Ummm... it's just one quandary after another, eh?

· Facebook
With not much else to do Meg has spent quite a bit of time over the past few days uploading pictures of our trip to her Facebook account. If you have access to that you'll be treated to some pictures from our time in Macedonia, Bulgaria and Turkey. It's worth a look, at least until I get my act together and get the entries for those aforementioned locals created here.

· Laptop
Meg wants to buy a laptop. Yep, her own one. One isn't sufficient for both of us I guess. We'll pick one up sometime before leaving Korea, so I guess we have four months to figure out how to afford one, but with laptops being so cheap over here we should be able to sort something out, even considering the non-visa issue we're presently trying to resolve. It has to be small, and preferably pink.. of course.

· Cass Red - 6.9%
If Korea ever launch rockets into space I've no doubt they will be fuelled by Cass Red. Cass, a Korean beer label, has a new brew, called 'Red'. Nice bottle, wicked strength and one of the reasons I actually slept right through Monday night. The 6.9% label is bold enough to warn you of the consequences of having too much of it in one sitting. Proceed with caution or just dive right in. Your choice; just don't say I didn't warn you.

· We moved
I forgot to say in the last entry that we moved. We're in another motel in the same Insadong area of the city but it's sadly not a so-called 'Love Motel'. Nope, it's a more mainstream, 'your-parents-would-rather-you-stayed-here' sort of place, one that doesn't give us access to 'suspect' TV channels, red lights and dodgy grooming products. This is where you'll find us these days, room 306 of the Jongnowon Motel, should you be in the area of course? Oh, and if you're coming over would you mind swinging by the Camp Korea offices and picking up our mail? Cheers.