The First Three Weeks

We (Winter, Jae and myself) departed Saturday 2 January 2010 from Honolulu and arrived on Sunday 3 January at Incheon International airport on the heels of the biggest snowstorm to hit the Korean peninsula in 108 years.

I chose a hotel I found on the internet because it was a five minute walk to work, but I didn't realize we had booked ourselves into a hotel that are generally used by "lovers." So it had a really great bathroom, and mood lighting, and it was overheated, but it didn't have anything that a family of three would call a kitchenette. Our stay there was short but quite pleasant: the hotel staff were helpful and attentive.

In any case, Jae found a nice two room villa within a couple of days of our arrival that has a great view, a kitchen, washer, two great bathrooms (no mood lighting) but the house is located  only a few blocks from the subway stop that takes me two stations away to work and back, Winter's school bus stop is only a short five minute walk from the house. (More about finding a school later).

We live in an area called Hannam-Dong which is southeast of Itaewon, a district that is an international ghetto created by the South Korean government to contain "foreigners." Itaewon is the place to go for everything from an "authentic"  Armani to an equally authentic "Rolex."  Itaewon's peak (it is one of several hills around the city) is crowned with the largest mosque in this part of asia which has added to my "situational awareness."

Jae assures me that the government is vigilant about foreigners.