To appease my mother:

So it's about time I give a hand to Fulbright. Those crazy bureaucrats did some fine work. The Korea program is probably the best around. They seriously take such good care of us, it's insane. To think about the fact that they spend 10,000 dollars on each of us just for training is absurd. Korea flew us over here, paid for us to learn Korean for 6 weeks from one of the most prestigious universities in Korea, paid for our room and board, took us on awesome adventures, and to top it off, they decided to pay us each week for just being fulbrighters.

Now, it's time for another Top 5 (a la High Fidelity):

Top Five Moments in Seogwipo Introductions:

1) I was trying to buy a bike and I asked if I could ride it to make sure I wanted it. This normal question was answered with enormous laughter. Confused, I asked my translater what exactly he was saying besides, "no". According to the man, I was so naive because if I ride it around he cannot sell it as "new" anymore, not out of principle, but because customers will see the dirt on the tires and not buy it. I told her to tell him he must be crazy, but the man obviously was ignorant of his awful salesmanship, because he then assumed that I was going to buy it. I told him, "I won't buy it, unless I can ride it". That was answered with, "if you buy it, then you can ride it". I walked out.

2) I went to the local waterfall near my house, which of course is commercialized and costs 2 bucks to get in, unless you're wicked like me and use your Fulbright ID card to pretend like you're in the military and get a 50% discount(I'm so cheap).
Anyway, I was a little disappointed with the fact that swimming is prohibited, but I understood when they said that it was a protected wildlife area... for the flesh-eating eels that inhabit the waters.

3) What do you like for breakfast? I was asked this by my homestay mom the day I arrived. My response, "I don't know, uh, eggs, toast, bacon... really whatever you want to make I suppose, just not rice please(since I would certainly get it for lunch and dinner)". What do I get the second day? Pasty-like rice, almost like a bad risotto, and in it is mixed raw mushrooms, and abalone. Mmmm. But breakfast since has been delicious.

4) So one night, I decide to check out the bar that my host-parents own downstairs. I figure, it's a sunday, I don't speak korean, I'll probably just get a beer and read my book in one of the booths. Oh, but the second I walk in, there is my host dad, who has been missing for 2 days, and 5 other koreans. I get called over to join them and they start drinking like fish. So I did the only culturally appropriate thing and joined in the fun. At some point in my drunken mind-wanderings, which happens a lot when you can't understand anything around you, I had a vision of this bar. See the place was completely empty(and always is), except for the owners and their friends. In addition to this, I still hadn't figured out what my host dad did for a living. So I was pretty convinced that his "owning a business" meant he was using the bar as a hangout for his gangster friends. My vision was simple: "Fulbrighter sent to Korea to teach English is found dead by a barrage of Russian-Mafia linked bullets.

5) I had to attend the teacher's meeting this morning to introduce myself to the teachers and staff. The Cayman Island Druglord-esque Principal grabs an uneccessary microphone and begins saying exactly what I had planned to say in Korean. I'm thinking to myself, "god dammit, here I've gone and memorized a little speech about myself and the principal is giving away all the goods before I get a chance to speak". Then he hands me the mic and I repeat everything ending with a statement that wins me great applause. The entire time, I'm trying to keep from laughing because the vice-principal is reaching for the mic like a little boy who wants what his older brother(the principal) has. Shit. That was an "I guess you had to be there story".