Day One

After one of the most hectic weeks of my life, I'm finally here in Korea, specifically in Seoul. Here's an awesome expat tip for you:

Expat Negro Tip

Everyone you've ever known will want to see you before you leave. Prioritize people and schedule your time or you'll end up with nothing accomplished.

I got to see almost everyone who's been important in my life (save one extremely busy doctor of psychology) and I manged to do it in about two weeks time. I also managed to get my visa paperwork turned in, get all of the stuff I didn't want gone (I sold my XBox360 for $30. You read that right kids) and the stuff I wanted packed. I learned some interesting stuff. What's that? Am I going to share it? Course I am.

One thing I definitely learned is when you're packing, be sure to pack like you'll have to carry it. I say that because the odds are that you will have to carry your luggage. And I'm talking long haul here. Getting into the city from Incheon isn't easy, and unless you want to drop $100 on a cab, I suggest you have luggage you can transport through either a subway, or at the very least from a bus to where you're staying. I have about 150 lbs of luggage, maybe more, and I pack horsed it through the airport, and into the hotel. Fortunately the hotel staff tried to help, but in the battle of 120 pound bellhop versus the seventy pound army surplus duffel bag, the duffel bag wins. Side note: have you ever seen a small guy attempt to manhandle a heavy duffel bag? No? You really should. It was the highlight of my night.

Even though the taxi drivers speak some English, there's a gap in communication, caused mainly by accents. Namely, my American accent is confusing. Which makes sense because it is.

Last thing, you can beat jet lag. I've managed it both trips to Seoul. The way I've done it isn't pleasant but it's doable.  Do not sleep on the plane ride over. Do anything else. Watch movies, listen to music, stand in line for the bathroom when you get sleepy, anything, but do not sleep on the ride over. When you touch down, it's probably not going to be bedtime. You'll have to stay up a bit until it is, and the only way you'll sleep at the time you should is by literally exhausting yourself, i.e. don't sleep on the plane. Then when it's time for sleep, you will and your body will wake up the next morning feeling like a champion. Or hungover. Either or.

I'm out.

To the Consulate!

The more salacious title for today would be tornadoes, paperwork and influenza. 

To catch everyone up, I drove to Atlanta Tuesday instead of Wednesday to avoid what was being termed "horrendous weather" by most of the weathermen in my area. Personally, I don't care about weather, since I will drive and have driven in tornadic weather before and for FAR less important reasons than getting my visa paperwork filled out. In fact the reason was a concert. For three bands I didn't even really like. That's my level of dedication to making ill-advised decisions. 

Since I write this mainly for people hoping to follow in my expat footsteps, here's a few things that I learned from my visa paperwork experience.

Expat Negro Tips:

1) Each consulate has a jurisdictional area. You can't turn in your paperwork if your home address is outside of your consulate's jurisdiction. Take the time to check, just in case.

2) There are several forms necessary for your visa paperwork. Your consulate's website may have a list of what you need, but they may not have links to download them. In my situation, I had to email a request for the forms. The response was fairly quick (within 24 hours) but if you're like me, I asked at the last minute and the response wasn't quite quick enough.

3) Having all your paperwork filled out makes the turn-in process go by faster, however it doesn't speed up the return process. Neither does turning in your paper by hand. Same three to four business day response time either way. Though you do cut out half of the mailing time and half of the chances for failure. That's always a win right?

I also got a flu shot. Intradermal flu shots hurt a bit more than a normal one. Pharmacies are not awesome places to hang out. But a little bit of patience and small piece of courage and now I have an immunity to this seasons strains of H1N1 as well as H3N2.

One other thing. I got a call from The Arrival Store, which is essentially a business which procures cellphones, towels, pots and other amenities for expats. Their approach to customer service is best described as compassionate hand holding (?). The first twenty minutes of their courtesy call to me was a conversation. End of sentence. And it was extremely disarming. I went to college for communication arts and marketing. I pride myself on being able to recognize manipulation and subtle forms of marketing. Completely caught me off guard. And each interaction is in line with that. I hate to admit it but I would recommend using the Arrival Store just for the customer service experience. Seriously. I was able to bounce ideas off of someone that had been to Korea before and listened to and had an answer for quite a few of my concerns. In fact, I think I steered the conversation towards what the Arrival Store could do for me, not the other way around. I'm a charming dude, but I'm not THAT charming. That's either an amazing customer service rep (which is entirely possible) or (and this is my guess) an amazingly well though out customer service experience. Either way, get out there and experience it.

Stay classy.

...my flu shot hurts.

Time Left...

Can't hardly wait...

Visa Code Secured (Less Than 2 Weeks Away)

I got my visa code! Headed to Atlanta (my nearest Korean embassy) next week. So, now all I gotta do is turn in my two weeks notice at my current job (gleefully I might add) grab a sealed transcript and a prepaid envelope. Most of my packing is done already, I've two boxes that I'll be shipping to my new apartment in Daejeon, one is clothes the other is DVDs and personal effects.

Here's where I'll say this for anyone thinking of going overseas: GET RID OF AS MUCH STUFF AS POSSIBLE. I mean it. I sold my bass and amp, gave away my first guitar (which, side note, I was really attached to. I mean REALLY attached to. I named her and everything) I'm selling my xbox, and anything else video game related. If you can't sell it, give it away, especially if you're going to be gone for several years. Unless you have amazing friends/parents who will hold your stuff indefinitely, don't bother keeping anything. It's usually the stuff that you feel the most sentimental about that need to be tossed. I've given numerous amounts of clothing to charity and to the trash, gave away all my fishing gear and the fact that I was able to shred my personal effects down to one box is nothing short of a miracle.

Expat Negro Rule: You can't be attached to anything. Everything is an asset, and assets are meant to be liquidated.

I'm taking some stuff to ease the transition (thus the "personal effects"). As a former FedEx employee I can also give you this tip: read the import rules for whatever country you're expatriating to. Some stuff can't be shipped in. While there are ways around some of this, ultimately, you don't want your first expat experience to be explaining why you're a terrible smuggler.

Oh and I'm taking DVDs because I don't speak Korean, and to avoid going crazy while I'm in my apartment with nothing to watch (that I can understand) and no Netflix (Korean censoring) I'm taking my DVD collection to maintain my sanity.

Cross your fingers. I gotta score my sealed transcript. Hopefully it won't take two envelopes.

The Waiting...

It seems like this entire process (landing a job, securing a contract, getting a visa, moving overseas) has been brief activity punctuated with LONG periods of waiting. I'm a patient man (sorta) but every week the waiting gets harder. I had to wait to get paperwork notarized and apostilled. Then I had to wait for a contract (though that was really my fault) and now, I'm waiting for my visa code.

I should get notification through my email that my visa code has came through. Which means every time my phone even twitches slightly...wait...no, that's just a Gamestop email...where was I? Oh yeah, I'm tied to my phone. It's literally driving me crazy. I might break something. Seriously.

In other news, I may have been overzealous in packing so early. This morning I realized that all my gym shorts are somewhere within the confines of the giant army canvas bag which currently holds forty pounds of my clothing. Ten minutes later I realized how far and how deep I would have to dig to find anything. I'd need a team of archaeologists at this point.

Anyone else bored? I know I...wait...sigh...nope, not my visa code.