Day two

There are fewer interesting things to talk about today than yesterday. No toilets threatened to attack me, though apparently not all bathrooms come equipped with ways to dry your hands.

Today started out rather poorly, as I decided to go for a walk around Samsung's campus. I ended up taking a wrong turn, and couldn't get back the way I came. So eventually (about a mile later) I made my way to one of the entrances, and it took three guards to figure out where I came from. His ability to give directions in English was rather lacking, as was my ability to understand his rather rapid Korean (though honestly, I don't understand slow Korean, so I suppose it doesn't matter). Finally another guard took pity on me and gave me a ride back to where I was supposed to be, since apparently it's too far to walk from the entrance to SAIT. He came to that conclusion after finding out I'd walked from SAIT to the entrance, oddly enough. I ended up being only fifteen minutes late for work, which wasn't too bad all in all. I think I need to wear a tag that says in Korean, “Lost American. If found, please promptly return to SAIT.”

The moral of that story is to never, ever believe the people who tell you that Koreans speak English.

Oh yeah, SAIT is only one of a few divisions of Samsung on the campus where I live. There's also Samsung electronics, Samsung Engineering and Samsung Semiconductors. Judging by the shear size of this place, I’d guess there are at least fifty, and maybe closer to a hundred thousand people working here. There are a few other campuses scattered about Seoul, though most of the divisions work independently.

Work wasn't exactly thrilling, since I read papers most of the day. Getting wireless access on my laptop is turning into an ordeal, but I figure if I nag enough it'll get done somehow. Soo, one of the women who works in my lab, introduced me to her friend Ji Min. Ji Min is the first Korean I've met who can almost pass for a native English speaker, so I talked to her for a couple of hours. She gave me all sorts of advice, and since she lives in the next dorm over she's agreed to eat breakfast with me so I don't have to eat alone.

After work was a party to celebrate getting a new director in the lab. We ate at a restaurant in Suwon, the next city over. The food was quite good. It was based around pieces of pork that were cooked on grills set into the tables. Sang Il seems to think that I'm not getting enough to eat, so every time I set my chopsticks down another couple of pieces of meat made their way into my bowl. It took a while, but I finally figured out that I needed to leave food in my bowl in order to make it known that I was quite full.

I've never seen so many one-drink wonders gathered in one room. In less than an hour most of the folks were roasted, and their love or toasting anything and everything with shots of soju couldn't have helped. Since I'm new I had to do a speech...I got an impressive round of applause just by saying hello in Korean. Too bad all speeches can't be that easy.

I asked today about bowing, because I see an awful lot of it. Essentially, Koreans bow under the same circumstances where we would smile and say hello. I think I’ll stick with waving, since walking and bowing and me don’t mix, at least not without me doing a face plant.