Rough Week

We have been having a tough week! Eric came home sick last Friday with a fever over 100 F. He took some ibuprofen, went to bed, and woke up feeling fine (he said). Sunday morning he got up and got dressed for church and then decided to stay home. Here it is Thursday night: Eric is still coughing up a lung and Cade now has a cold and has had loads of snot dripping out of his nose all day. I think that Kennedy is the only one who has managed to sleep all night for the past week. Cade has gotten into a bad habit of waking up in the middle of the night and coming into our room, so that combined with Eric's coughing and snoring, have resulted in sleepless nights for us. We've been in bed by 8:00 every night, but I've been lucky to get 6 hours of sleep, and I know Eric has gotten much less. Eric finally went to the doctor yesterday where she told him that he had the flu but there's a chance he might have pneumonia. She prescribed Tamiflu and scheduled an appointment for Monday to take another x-ray of his lungs to find out if there's really a spot there. Either way, the meds he started this afternoon (he was finally willing to take half a day off), haven't started to make too much of a difference and it's going to be another long night!
To top it all off, we're having an issue with school and our nanny. Suffice it to say, we can use your prayers this week!

Happy Anniversary!

I have to admit, one of the things that I was most worried about in moving across the world from our support systems was losing all of the people that were so willing to watch our kids so that we could go out. As it turns out, I didn’t have anything to worry about! We moved into a neighborhood where there are several teenage staff kids willing to watch our kids as often as we’re willing to pay them! They’re all great and the kids love them already!

So, tonight we took advantage of that and went out for anniversary. We went to a new part of town which we’d been hearing about. We didn’t know anything about it except that there would be a lot of people and street vendors. We heard that we could get in a taxi and tell them Myeondong, so we thought we’d try it tonight without kids. They were right…there were a lot of people and a lot of street vendors! It was a large shopping district with malls, shops, and even an underground shopping area…overwhelming! A little bit of everything! I went into the Forever 21 to find a couple of shirts and it was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen! If you’ve ever been in a Forever 21, you know that they are always packed with people and clothes and nothing seems to have any order. This store was 4 stories of the same. Crazy! I did manage to get a couple of shirts in the largest size they had available and without any shape around the bust...everything is so much smaller here! 

We went to dinner at a place called School Food where we had mari and topokki. Topokki is basically rolled rice flour in a dough form (kind of like perogghi). However, this particular topokki we ordered (because we couldn’t read the menu) was the spiciest food I have ever eaten! I had about 2 bites of it, and I think it was the first time Eric has ever left food on his plate in a restaurant! Thankfully, I had ordered garlic and bacon mari (basically sushi). It was an interesting combination, but it was good and we were glad we’d ordered something that wasn’t spicy! After all that, we even managed to get back in a reasonable amount of time…success!

  

Your Questions Answered

We have been asked many of the same questions by many different people, so I thought I would take a few minutes to answer the most common questions. If you have a different one, comment below, and I will get to you when I can!

1. What on earth possessed you to move to Korea?

     We had always wanted to teach overseas, but when Kennedy came along, we thought we were going to have to wait until the kids were out of school. Then we realized that it would be a good experience for them, so we decided to look into it. We interviewed with several schools this year, and YISS was the best fit for our family.

2. Do you speak Korean?

     No. We know a few words, but we're hoping to learn more while we're there.

3. Are you going to be teaching English?

     No. We will be teaching at in international Christian school. All of our students speak English at various levels. We do not need to speak Korean in order to teach them, but we hope to learn some from them!

4. Where will you live?

     We will live in an apartment in Itaewon. It is about a 10 minute walk from school, but the school will send a bus for us, so we can take that if we don't want to walk.

5. What did you do with all of your things?

     We rented out our house on the 15th of June. My dad built a wall in our third garage to create a storage unit for us in our own house. That is where the majority of our things are being stored.

6. Will you have a car? How will you get around?

     We do not plan to get a car in Korea. We plan to do a lot of walking and use the subway and bus systems. The public transportation in Seoul is supposed to be great!

7. What are you bringing with you?

     We are primarily bringing clothes with us. We packed some of the kids' favorite toys, some of our favorite foods, and a waffle maker. Our apartment will be furnished by the school, so we don't have to bring anything of that sort. We can get most of the necessities that we need in Seoul. It's just hard to find clothes in our sizes! 

8. What will you be teaching?

     Eric will be teaching middle school math (pre-algebra and algebra), and I will be the middle school substitute part time (normally a full time position where I would go to school every day regardless of whether a teacher is out, but they found someone to split the position with me, so that I can stay home with the kids part time).

9. Where will your kids be while you are at work?

     We hired a Filipino nanny who has been living in Seoul for the past 8 years. She is almost 50 and has raised 5 of her own kids. She came with great references from the American military families that she has nannied for the past several years. So, our kids will be with her in our apartment on the days that I am at work.

10. When will you come back home to visit?

     We plan to come home to visit early next June. We have about a 7 week window that we have off next summer, so we should be here about 6 weeks. We'll spend most of that time in WA, but we'll also have about a week on the east coast for Evan's wedding!

11. Where will you shop?

     Korea has a little bit of everything for shopping. There is a Lotte Mart which is similar to Target and has everything we might need. There are also grocery stores and open markets for bartering. In addition, our school has a bus that goes to Costco every Thursday after school. So, we should be set!

12. How long will you be there?

    We signed a two year contract with YISS, but we don't know for sure how long we'll be there! Two years minimum. :)

13. How will you communicate with everyone back home?

     Obviously we will communicate through this blog. We will also use Facebook because it's easy! Our primary means of (two way) communication will be through Skype and Facetime. So, send us an email if you want our contact information!

I hope you got some new information. If there's something else you want to know, leave a comment for me!

Found a Nanny!

Hallelujah! Praise the Lord! We found a nanny!! We felt like the woman that we interviewed last month would work, but she was not our best option. So we left the ad on Craigslist and let her know that we were keeping our options open. Last week a woman replied to my ad and even supplied several email addresses for references. I emailed her references early this week, and all three of them had raves for her! We were so excited, we wanted to offer her the job without even speaking to her! Tonight we talked with her on Skype, and she is so sweet and so excited to take care of our kids! She has raised five kids of her own in addition to the children that she has nannied for the past several years in Seoul. She and her family have been in Seoul for the past eight years and plan to be there for the next four years before returning to the Philippines. She had to quit her last full time job (12 hour days) because of the high stress level, so we're hoping that part-time work is exactly what she's looking for!

Success through Craigslist

We are feeling blessed today! We've had some awesome responses to our Craigslist ad (which I was a little nervous about at first!). So far, we've had responses from a military wife, a Filipino housekeeper, a 24 year old woman from Arizona, and a woman from Seattle who just wanted us to have her name and email in case we have any questions about childcare and preschool in Seoul (I can't wait to be part of the expatriate community-they're so supportive!). The woman from Arizona is actually pursuing her early elementary education degree and has a lot of experience working with kids of all ages, so she sounds perfect! She also plans to be there until August of 2012, giving us a year to get Cade into a preschool over there.  Thank you, Lord!
On top of it all, I had a hot shower tonight! A great day to be me!