[Part 1] 016. 17 August 2010 Tuesday

The thing about leaving your alarm on everyday when you don't need it is that you get so used to switching it off when it rings and going back to sleep that you do the same on a day that you need to wake up early for.
I woke up at 7am today and nearly jumped out of my bed because Zechy was due to arrive in Seoul at 7.20am and I was supposed to wake up at 5am to get ready before waking Jeannie up later. When I opened our room door and rushed to the toilet to get ready, Youngjin's father came out of his room and asked, "Oh, you girls haven't left?" I told him that my alarm didn't ring.
But in truth, after some recollection, my alarm did ring in reality and not in my dream as I thought when Youngjin's father asked me. But out of habit, I switched it off and went back to sleep.
The next few minutes went past in a flurry and we were out of the apartment in a record time of 15 minutes, running all the way to the bus stop near the apartment and dropping my pendant along the way. That's what you get when you pay 9,000KRW for a handmade necklace. The pendant flies out when you run but we were in a hurry so I just left it behind. 어머님 told us to take the airport limousine bus but we didn't know how the bus looked like :( So when bus 302 arrived at the bus stop and we saw that it goes to Incheon International Airport, we took it, not knowing whether it really is the airport limousine bus or not.  Basically, it stopped at many many many stops and if it was indeed the airport limousine bus, shouldn't there be minimal stops? Anyway, we finally reached the airport at 8.30am, 30 minutes after Zechy had cleared immigration and collected his luggage. Sorry Zechy for making you wait for so long!
Jeannie and I were hungry so the 3 of us went to Macdonalds where Jeannie and I had a Big Breakfast set each for 4,600KRW BUT the standard's nowhere near Singapore's. The not-so-sleek packaging is one thing but my gripe is that the scrambled egg was of the wrong colour. I miss Singapore's Big Breakfast! There's no milo in Korea either :(

After breakfast, we took an airport limousine bus to the front of Korea University for a pricey 14,000KRW.

It's the most expensive bus ride I've taken so far but our seats were like business class seats...spacious and so comfortable that the 3 of us slept for the greater part of the nearly 2 hours journey to the school.

From there, we took a cab to Zechy's accommodation for the next 4 months, Isak Livingtel where Jeannie and I had selected as our first choice initially. Isak Livingtel's supposedly on the 2nd floor of a building and you know what? There is no elevator and Isak Livingtel occupies the 4th and 5th floors (I think) :( So I helped Zechy carry his luggage up all the way while Jeannie carried our bags. After making it up, there was no one to be found at the information desk but thank goodness, I had been smart enough to save the number of the Livingtel in my Korean phone the night before so we could call the person-in-charge. Zechy's staying in Room 18 which doesn't come with a toilet; instead there is a communal toilet. The one we saw on Isak's website comes with a private toilet, but then again, I think Zechy paid a lower price. However...his room is really really really small!

wearing my new 5,000KRW tank dress bought from Ewha area yesterday with a topshop shrug

waiting for the Isak Livingtel personnel to assign Zechy his room

Zechy in his room

his room mirror affixed to the door

at least he has a flat screen TV (ok Jeannie says it's not a TV but a monitor) and quite a number of shelves

Jeannie's shocked about the size of the toilet

Zechy's shoe locker

After he had settled in and put his stuff down, we decided to check out Co-m Livingtel which is just 2 blocks away and lo and behold...we'll have to climb this hill everyday. I just pray that I won't roll down the hill one day!

But at least, there's an elevator in the building and the nice lady at the information counter showed us the 2 different types of rooms available because she didn't know that we already had rooms reserved there. Jeannie and I have reserved the rooms with windows but I also know that different rooms have different designs and I want a room with many shelves. Unfortunately, the one she showed us didn't have any shelves, except for the cupboard! So I told her that we have already made reservations under KUBS and I showed her a picture of Zechy's room which actually has quite a number of shelves to let her know what I want. She brought us to another room with windows that had more shelves but not as many as Zechy's. That room's available so I guess that when Jeannie and I check in this Sunday, it'll be either hers or mine.

entering the room without windows

this is the room without windows...after seeing this, I was too shellshocked about the sheer size of the room that I had no mood to take anymore photos of the other rooms after this

at least there's an iron and ironing board so we don't have to borrow 어머님's iron

and a nice and bright kitchen

But then again, the rooms are really small and after seeing small rooms one after another, we got quite upset about being rejected for CJ housing that we needed to have ice cream at Baskin Robbins to cool down. It was there that we came up with the idea of walking allllll the way up to CJ International House, climbing the much steeper hill under the scorching sun and pleading shamelessly for a room there, only to be rejected. I really, really, really, really, really want to stay in CJ House and I'm in need of a gym in the same building so that I can work out.

To any female who's reading this and has secured a place in CJ International House for this coming semester, be it a single or double room, I'm willing to pay you 500,000KRW on top of the cost of your room if you can give me your room. CJ House is on a top of a very dangerous hill and if you don't like climbing up hills, please give me your room!!! I like climbing hills!
Dejected, we left for Yongsan in a very bad mood. Everything's not going our way...Zechy got a scholarship from NIIED but we didn't and we think it's random and not by merit because Jeannie's CAP is rocket high (higher than Zechy's) and she didn't get it. So basically, no scholarship, NO CJ HOUSE, a puny room and what not...I look forward to a great exchange this semester, seriously. I miss my room at Mu-ak Dormitory in Yonsei...it's nicer than my new room-to-be. Maybe we should have chosen Yonsei afterall...but it's too late for regrets now. God's teaching me a lesson. But all along, I've associated this suite in CJ International House with my KU exchange. What a huge disappointment.

At Yongsan's I Park mall, we went to the Chinese eatery Jeannie and I had gone to last year for 자장면  for 5,000KRW (price increased by 500KRW from last year's).

After lunch, we went shopping for Zechy's 2nd handphone which he found at a shop on 8F of I Park mall for 40,000KRW. And Jeannie did something really funny today. Both of us wanted to use the toilet and in Korea, there are some places whereby you have to press a button so that the sliding doors will open. So when we were outside the toilet and the door was closed, she saw some switches and thought that it was the "press" type of toilet so she pressed the switch but nothing happened. The door didn't slide open and the both of us suddenly saw the door handle. Seconds later, Jeannie realised that she had switched off the toilet light by mistake and she hurriedly switched it on again. When we entered the toilet, there was a Korean lady inside but we were too embarrassed so we rushed into the cubicles immediately. After accompanying Zechy as he made his phone purchase, we parted ways as we were all tired from a lack of sleep the night. The subway ride back to Songnae Station was a long one and we only managed to sit through 2 stops before we realised that we took the train headed in the wrong direction. While the line we were on goes straight to Songnae, it splits at Guro and we were on the one heading to the other direction instead of Incheon :( As a result, we had to get out of the train and change to the correct one which entailed giving up our seats :(:(:(
We missed the train and the next train took forever to arrive so we started taking photos at the expense of incurring more stares from everyone. It certainly didn't help that the floor of the train carriage we got on was burning hot and it was just so stuffy in the train. I can't stand the heat!!! If it's cold, we can put on more layers; but if it's hot, what can I do?

Dinner for the night was cold noodles cooked by 어머님 and for supper, Youngjin cycled out to buy chicken for us. 어머님 gave us plastic gloves to wear to eat the chicken...interesting way of eating the chicken with our hands. I should do this from now onwards!