Thursday, August 20th
So today was a fun day. We started by going to the National Medical Center. We saw that it was going to be a rainy day so thinking ahead I grabbed my raincoat and umbrella. We made it to the center in a decent rainstorm and finally found th
e right building after several people gestured and told us round-about ways to go. Once there I received my hospital card and was informed to go to several different areas in a large room for quite a variety of tests. They first got my blood pressure, weight, and height (all automated and entered into a computer that held all my personal data...very efficient) I then had my "dentist" check and "physical exam" both of which mostly involved a series of questions. Then I had to give two urine samples and they then took 3 vials of blood. Lastly they sent me back to the main building for chest x-rays. All of this only took about a half and hour. It was extremely efficient.
Once we got outside there was a full on monsoon going on. It was insane...we were drenched within seconds of being outside. It seems that most people just find shelter until the i
ntense downpour stops and only a light rain is left...we did not discover this until after we were dripping with water inside the metro station.
Once back we took a bit of a break and found some dry clothes. We ate some good kim bab (kind of like california rolls) and went to a PC Bang (PC Room = Internet cafe) We did some emailing and web surfing due to the fact that our internet we mooch off of in the hotel is pretty slow.
All the PC bangs are set up for gamers...it is only 1000W for an hour and they all have computer games pre-loaded. I think Korea is the only country that has computer games as a spectator sport. There is seriously a channel that just show people having contests playing Star Craft (some computer game) with a huge audience watching and cheering them on. Occasionally they also play wii games or some other game but mostly star craft. 9The picture is of the giant tv screen in our hotel room)
This evening we took a walk up to the Seoul Performing Arts Center which is just up the street from me. It was a beautiful complex with great views of the city. We found a Lotte Super on the way back (multi-level shopping store) which I was pretty excited to find.
Tomorrow is my last day of training at my school and Ian will be visiting the DMZ which I'm sure he will have pictures to post and information to write.
So today was a fun day. We started by going to the National Medical Center. We saw that it was going to be a rainy day so thinking ahead I grabbed my raincoat and umbrella. We made it to the center in a decent rainstorm and finally found th
e right building after several people gestured and told us round-about ways to go. Once there I received my hospital card and was informed to go to several different areas in a large room for quite a variety of tests. They first got my blood pressure, weight, and height (all automated and entered into a computer that held all my personal data...very efficient) I then had my "dentist" check and "physical exam" both of which mostly involved a series of questions. Then I had to give two urine samples and they then took 3 vials of blood. Lastly they sent me back to the main building for chest x-rays. All of this only took about a half and hour. It was extremely efficient.Once we got outside there was a full on monsoon going on. It was insane...we were drenched within seconds of being outside. It seems that most people just find shelter until the i
ntense downpour stops and only a light rain is left...we did not discover this until after we were dripping with water inside the metro station.Once back we took a bit of a break and found some dry clothes. We ate some good kim bab (kind of like california rolls) and went to a PC Bang (PC Room = Internet cafe) We did some emailing and web surfing due to the fact that our internet we mooch off of in the hotel is pretty slow.
All the PC bangs are set up for gamers...it is only 1000W for an hour and they all have computer games pre-loaded. I think Korea is the only country that has computer games as a spectator sport. There is seriously a channel that just show people having contests playing Star Craft (some computer game) with a huge audience watching and cheering them on. Occasionally they also play wii games or some other game but mostly star craft. 9The picture is of the giant tv screen in our hotel room)
This evening we took a walk up to the Seoul Performing Arts Center which is just up the street from me. It was a beautiful complex with great views of the city. We found a Lotte Super on the way back (multi-level shopping store) which I was pretty excited to find.
Tomorrow is my last day of training at my school and Ian will be visiting the DMZ which I'm sure he will have pictures to post and information to write.
Did you post a video? Not sure it is working. I am excited for you to start school so that when you start teaching students English you can start teaching your faithful blogsters Korean.
ReplyDeleteIan, I am expecting some good fish-tank-building ideas out of you after going to the aquarium earlier this week.