Health Check

Tuesdays and Thursdays are my days to TCoB as I am done teaching at 2:30, but I have to stay at school until it ends at 6:55p so I'm not out teaching illegally... just policy, y'know. And it's fine, I like my co-workers, we laugh together about school/office shenanigans -- like how yesterday a slightly intoxicated mother came in and started screaming in Korean (obviously) about how the curriculum here is whack (no comment), it was a major yell fest, my heart was racing, there was serious tension in the air and let's just say there was almost a throw-down - it came real close, like reaaaal close. (Angry Koreans are something you don't want to experience - ps.) The kid wasn't my student, and the teacher who taught her wasn't doing anything wrong... poor kid's apparently been through 8 hagwons in the past year or so - mothers! Oh, yeah, and after I went back to class (this happened during the elementary break time), the police came - 6 of 'em!! And then today we had a birthday party, so there were party hats and cake, and I emailed and blogged and tried to figure out why my computer wasn't working right (Skype and Firefox aren't friends, but everything is fixed now)... but, ahhhhh, yes, last Thursday I didn't have time to do any of these things because I had to have my health check so I can get my Alien Registration Card and then get a Korean bank account and set-up the interweb in my home, and other fun things that I don't even know about yet (woot!).

So, yes. The health check. Mr. C (the director man) came to get me after class on Thursday and said, "Alright, Kaserine. It's time to go to the hospitar for your heas check." (ayi! that's it, no more Korean di-rect writing [after that one] anymore) I hop in his car, and we have to drive to Home Plus (um - did I write about this yet?! Target + Wal-Mart + Bed, Bath and Beyond + your local grocery store on speed, all together, holding hands... YES!! YES. yes. New fave.) to get my pictures from the day before - for the card, y'know? So, we did that and then drove through Suwon to get to St. Vincent's hospital.

We went through some doors, up some stairs, down some stairs, through a hallway. Mr. C talked to the women at the reception desk and I smiled, bowed and said, "Annyong haseyo!" There was some sitting and waiting and then a nurse pulled me (yes, because I don't understand anything besides "hello" and "thank you") into a room where I changed out of my top half clothing and into a hospital shirt. Then I sat and waited some more; had my blood pressure taken, peed in a [dixie] cup, had blood drawn, maybe had a mammogram? - I don't know, I had to open up the hospital shirt and stand very still, "No breathing!" up against this machine, shoulders pushed against it and all. Then I was measured and weighed in the waiting room, took a sight test and then a hearing test, and pulled into another room to have my chest measured... yeah? Um, are the Koreans going to welcome me with new bras? I don't know. It's standard...? One more room to have a psych evaluation. Okay? All finished, I think because I'm lead into the changing room to return to my teacher top, but then Mr. C leads me through the hallway, up some stairs, down some stairs, through the doors, outside for a bit and over to the ear, nose and throat area to be poked at a little more. Then it's down the hall to the dentist. Now we're done, but it's one last go down the hallway, outside, inside, up some stairs, down some stairs and through the hallway to the initial place to hand in the paperwork. Phew! That was fun. I had heard such horrible things about the experience... being in a crowded waiting room - no one was there, peeing in a dixie cup and bringing it out into the waiting room - I didn't spill and was able to fill it to the line even though I wasn't allowed to eat or drink after 8am, and just the general confusion of, "Wait. Why do you need to do this?" It was more fun then when I went to the hospital down the street, Samsung Women's Hospital, to figure out if I had swine flu or the common cold (it was the common cold, fyi) and I was sitting there talking to the doctor, through my Korean co-teacher, and the nurse just yanked up my button shirt to let the doctor have a listen to my lungs - it was a little violent, y'know, yanked. So, yeah. It was kind of like an amusement park, sort of. Oh, and Mr. C and I also talked to a doctor about general health history.

Another thing was that I got a chance to get a better feel for my surrounding area, Suwon, which is much bigger than I thought. Living in Youngtong is seemingly like a Wicker Park of Chicago... but it's the suburbs... I'm not familiar enough with Evanston to continue the former analogy. Also, I had time to talk to Mr. C... he's a Buddhist, has older brothers and sisters, wanted to know the correct way to use "to be" verbs - and we allll know that I'm not the best person to ask about that!, was curious about race relations (specifically black-white) in America, and I told him that Obama is definitely helping bridge that gap along with making progress in world relations after G-Dub burned most-if not all our bridges in the last eight years. It was fun to talk (and be able to understand) a Korean and get a better feel for them and the culture.

Good times, good times. Alright, spell check and then I'm out to go to Seoul for Andrea's (co-teacher) birthday. We're going to this place called, "Dr. Fish" (if they're still open) to have fish eat the dead skin off our feet and then eat ice cream (us, not the fish). YES! Both those fish and I will probably leave the experience in food comas... awesome and disgusting all at once. I'll let you know how that goes, and also to come: run/hiking in the hills (um - mountains) around here, Korean Man Love, my first weekend out in the area, the food!! (the delicious food), and of course, the funny things the CUTE AS A BUTTON chir-ren (sorry!) do. :)