My Days in Daegu

I got another chance to get online for awhile, so I thought I'd start explaining how things have gone today, at least, while I can.

The night didn't go so well... there's no air conditioning in the dorms right now since it isn't officially open yet, so it was very hot even with the window open. I ended up closing the window partway throught the night, though, because it opens to a wooded area where there are lots of nighttime sounds. Bugs, I assume. =) I got up at around 7am here to wander around campus and see if I could find any sign of wireless internet or a phone I could use. I did manage to find the phone, so I was able to call home and James, which made me feel a lot better. Not being able to communicate is extremely frustrating.

After I walked back to the dorm - which is an adventure in itself because of how hot it is and how many steep hills there are - I finally did manage to fall asleep for awhile after just lying around for a couple hours. Su-hyun came to meet me at 1, though, so I was awake again by then to meet her downstairs in the dorm. She took us - me and a German girl staying here too - around campus to see a few main points, and then we went to the only open cafeteria, which serves only Korean food. Su-hyun knows that spicey food isn't my favorite, so she ordered me a meal which came with bulgogi, rice, kimchi, and seaweed soup and only cost W2,000.

After that, we ventured off the campus property - across the street from the school's east gate where she took us to a coffee shop that also served ice cream. There she bought us a big dish of something I don't know the name of, but which tasted good anyway. It was a mixture of crushed ice, sliced fruit (watermelon, kiwi, mango, banana...), and bean sherbet (surprisingly sweet...) topped with a tower of vanilla soft-serve and mixed with a bit of milk to make it more soupy when mixed together. It's so hot here, though, and I knew we still had a lot of walking to do, so I didn't eat much.

When we left, we went to the PC bang where I wrote my last entry. I thought it was going to cost W6,000 for the hour we spent there, but it was only W600. Much better! Our next destination was E-mart, which we got to by taxi - thank goodness. It's a huge store with several floors, each one containing a different theme of product, I guess you could say. The bottom floor was groceries, the second was like a department store - clothing and make-up counters, and the third was like a Wal-mart. I bought a few things there that I didn't bring with me - like an alarm clock - so now I feel slightly more prepared.