A Long Time Coming

Finally the Winter Intensive part of the sh-cool year is done, and Andrea and I are entering into our fifth month of Teaching Overseas Contract, with bouts of homesickness (mostly for homemade cheeseburgers and family pets), and only occasional spurts of irrational anger. Hopefully we've navigated though the narrows of Stage 2 (months 3-5) culture shock, have shed the smothering frustration, and can look once again from our windows with a sense of bemusement. We're over the hurdle(s): Christmas, Birthdays, Anniversaries. And now there's nothing but those great white sheets of clean calendar pages, and hopefully smooth sailing. It occurs to me often that we haven't really seen too much of this country, that nearly five months have passed and we've yet to leave Busan--however, in defense, I must say that we've had a full-ass past few months, without much opportunity to play. Winter Intensive has kept me at school for twelve-hour days, six days a week, and the month before that was Christmas, and the month before that we had yet to get our bearings. Excuses, excuses, I know. As time flies I find that I've got more and more to type, or rather, I've the impulse to type more and more--although I'll try to keep discourse within reasonable limits.