Today… was just frustrating. I felt like nothing got done. I woke up late for my 10/1030 meeting, (got there right on the cusp of 10:30, luckily after waking up at 9:40 am and needing to shower). It was a good meeting but then I went all the way back to the hotel and (after a family discussion via skype – woohoo Steph for finally downloading it!) I had to go back to the exact same area I just was without realizing it. Koreans are so hesitant to speak English and even to just understand what you are saying – I got nothing from the two places that I needed to go. It sucked. I spent FOREVER looking for a cab in apparently the wrong place and finally managed 10 minutes to go re-ask for permission to survey the grocery store at the other Home Plus (30 minutes from where I just was) which I was granted for tomorrow.
I went to dinner with the girl that helped me out significantly with phone calls, and it was … pretty good, OK. She was very hard to read, she seemed happy to invite me out but she didn’t seem that happy to actually be out with me, if that makes any sense at all. I think she was just really shy, as I have come to realize the Korean personality just is. It was difficult to make conversation, and I even fell asleep on the car ride home (though I totally blame this on the butt-warmers on the seat). Her name is Ms. Bea – I can’t remember her Korean first name, she studied in England for a bit and she told me that she asked everyone to call her Lisa because that was easier for Westerners. So this is what I called her. She did try to teach me how to use chopsticks the right way (and I failed miserably as usual). We went to a nice buffet restaurant, and she explained to me what everything was. On the way out a Korean girl (probably just a little younger than myself) was waving profusely at me through a glass window; at first I thought she was waving at someone else (and I was a bit embarrassed) but I turned to look and there was no one there. Strange. When I got home, I fell asleep almost immediately; I was exhausted and I was forced to get up 11 hours later for a realtor meeting. But, I felt very refreshed the whole remainder of the day and even had trouble sleeping that night.
Yesterday I had a pointless realtor meeting at 10 am on a Sunday. He was a source we had met for years but I think he was getting old and his brain was getting slow. He was having a difficult time interpreting any of my questions; his young assistant was explaining things to him after I would try twice. Ugh it was frustrating. I got to practice the art of handing over your business card with two hands though. One of the other realtors I had met with (the first one from the UK) had mentioned this to me and it kicked in after I handed over the first one; I was rude (without even thinking) and didn’t give one of my cards to the assistant, but when I did I made up for it by getting this rule right. Everyone has the same last name here. There are millions of Oh’s, Kim’s, which especially stand out. I met 3 people with the last name of Oh just during my short trip in Ulsan.
I went back to the RIGHT Homeplus and did the survey there; the people were very friendly and were nice about saying sure. There were very few people who bothered me though I did have a lot of stares and someone asked me just “where are you from?” and I said “America.” They said ohhh and that was it. The little kids are so cute. They see someone who doesn’t look like them and immediately try speaking English. I have gotten many “hi’s!” and “hello’s!” from children learning English in elementary school. One even said to me “my name is ….” So I said, my name is Lauren. Then he got shy, said bye and ran away to go tell mom he spoke English with a foreign girl.
After having a similar meal to the one I had the night before (at the buffet restaurant at the hotel this night), Ms. Bea had made a ton of phonecalls for me – (even though a bit boring, she’s still pretty awesome!) so I checked these and headed down to the bar downstairs where I got a drink and did hours and hours of work writing up all my housing reports and clearing up all the C&S stuff. Two Phillipino girls were on stage in sexy little outfits trying to appeal to the foreign men with their sultry voices. Ms. Bea (Lisa) had told me that the Phillipino girls come up to make a living this way normally, and many times doing immoral things with foreigners.
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