Got up to an alarm for the first time in a while, dragged myself to the kitchen to cook my toast to have pb toast for breakfast (the peanut butter was like $8 for a small jar, uugh!) and hyped myself up for going to class. I decided to wear jeans and just a flannel overshirt, with sweats and a tshirt in my bag in case we actually played today in basketball. I got to the room, and like I always do the first day of class, I start freaking out that I was in the wrong room. After about 10 minutes of waffling on what to do (I always arrive entirely too early to things) I ended up typing "Is this basketball" in my translation app and showing it to the girl behind me, awkward.
Well, class started and it was in all Korean, as I assumed it would be. It's just such a weird and exhausting feeling to be in a room with people who all speak a language you don't when you're desperately trying to understand it but have absolutely no idea. This was even worse than when I was in Belgium, because at least quite a few Dutch words sound similar to English ones, so you can pick up a word here and there. The teacher handed out a sheet of paper for us to fill out and turn back in. I pulled out my phone and started translating, but after I had only finished translating the basics (name, age, major), everyone else was done. Someone collected all the papers, though not mine after I made it evident I was working on it still, turned it in, and everyone left. EVEN THE TEACHER.
So I'm just sitting in an empty classroom at 930 (class began at 9), and I decided to just head back home and translate it there. Worked on translating the syllabus before heading back to campus. I had to look up where the basketball teacher's office was, which took me quite a long time to find. I turned in the paper much to his surprise, and he started to talk to me in Korean again. I just shook my head and said that I don't speak it yet, and he's like "Oh, I can't speak English." So at least we're on the same page now that we'll just have to play charades to communicate :P He explained to me via broken English and pantamimes that class is only 940-1130 actually (instead of 9-1145 as the schedule says) and we start in the gym up by my dorm on Monday. Score!
Went to the international student's office and had them phone up my yoga teacher so I could learn where the class was going to be held. So that's going to be interesting, because I'm just hoping the right person was contacted and the office lady who told me the room is good enough at English that the room number she told me is correct. Went to my game theory class which seems really lax, though his grasp of English was pretty spotty so we'll see how that goes. Home again, relaxed, and went to my Korean class. It was essentially show up, get a paper with the syllabus, and her saying "see you next week" even though classes are supposed to be Monday - Thursday. Super lax week this week!
Went back to my dorm, cleaned it up, ate more (I've been snacking and eating like every time I've come home, I'll need to restock my dorm foods again soon...) and just chilled out in general. I got my first piece of mail from home which was wonderful and made my night. Just going to bed and hoping tomorrow will be just as relaxed!
Last "First Day of School" photo I'll ever have!
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