Moving, Phase 1

Well, yesterday we emptied and cleaned the entire apartment. Fallon, Wim and Nina were on hand to help us, with Zach stopping by as well to help Ty at the post office. I truly felt blessed to have these people around us, helping us with the heavy lifting and the emotional stress of the move.

We're having to ship more and more of our things because we can only carry 20kg each on the plane. Is this not the most ridiculous thing ever? Twenty kilos is NOTHING.

It's going well so far, we're living in Fallon's un-used apartment. The cats are either hiding under the bed (Sonagi) or lurking at the top of the wall unit like a Mountain Lion (Jakob). On Monday, we will pack them (and ourselves) up and head up to Seoul and then to the UAE.

Tomorrow we've got to sort more things out - what to ship, what to pack. Then Friday is the last day for things like closing bank accounts and such.

My school, in true inefficient Korean fashion, is paying me the money they owe me for my severance pay TWO WEEKS after I leave Korea. This money should have been in my account on Dec 24th, but since they are apparently unfamiliar with Korean labour laws, and/or can't read hangeul, they appeared to have messed up the final steps here. This is not money that only comes to ESL teachers, by the way, but every single employee in Korea is entitled to it.... just saying that it's not like a special process that only the waygook gets. As it's almost a holiday, you can imagine that nobody is answering their phones - add to this that the supervisor is currently on vacation, so she isn't necessarily checking her e-mails every day...

I guess it's the final confusing, miscommunicated, non-sensical Korean mess-up that I will have to deal with for a while (bring on the Emirati miscommunications from now on... woohoo!), and it will hopefully all work out in the end.

Tonight, yes, it is New Year's Eve. Nina and I are too tired to party with everyone else, so we're heading back to the apartment to relax and hang out together.

Best wishes for the new year, and may 2009 be one of happiness, health, prosperity and joy for you.