nothing important to say

Just switched our blog design a little bit because our previous layout was a bit rubbish. Now it's much better, but we still need to figure out how to do all the little things. Like get rid of the weird picture thing in the blog header up there. What the hell is it anyway? Hm. Anyway. Oh and also something about layout of the posts, cos in my previous post something weird happened with the pictures and they look stupid.

On a side note, Dan Le Sac and Scroobius Pip are a bit rubbish, and I'm now seriously doubting whether I can live with Becky for a whole year if she has them on her iTunes thing. I may be able to get over it, as she has announced that she will be doing all the cleaning of our apartment, making my life a lot easier. Also, while she's cleaning, I can be skipping the occasional slightly dubious songs on iTunes. I mean, there's things like Matt Costa, Bob Dylan, Elliott Smith etc, so that makes up for the Ronan Keating album... ick.

getting things done

Ok, so firstly I want to clarify, the domestic violence Becky mentioned in her last post was her hitting me. I am a calm and peaceful boyfriend.

Anyway. We went back to London on Sunday, to sort our apostilles. What's an apostille I hear you ask? It's when you pay a faceless bureaucrat an awful lot of money to pretend he's done some work. And all he does is get a minion to stick a photocopied sheet onto the back of your police check. Hohum. But if thats what it takes to get to Korea... So, we drove (Becky drove) to London and stayed with Becky's uncle and family, which was cool. Then Becky made me get up early to head to the Foreign Office legalisation department near Trafalgar Square. Which, despite my whinging, was a very good idea, as it took a good couple of hours to sort out the aforementioned paper pushing, and probably would've taken much longer if we'd got there much later. We did get semi-lost, not helped by the 'helpful' chap who directed us in completely the wrong direction before demanding money from us. To lying beggar man - I'm glad I didn't pay you for your directions, you're rubbish.

Uh, so yes. Once we'd got the seal of approval on our police checks (I don't mean to go on about this stuff, but I do find it very annoying that we had to pay for a police check when we've never committed - or at least never been caught - a crime, then to have to pay further to get it officially recognised. What did we pay for in the first place? Can't the police get the money they need by fining people for dropping litter or something?) it meant we could finally send off all our documents to Korea. This includes degree certificates, passport photos, signed contracts, the police checks and a self certificated health form ('Do you have, or have you ever had Aids or HIV?' um... yes, yes, I had Aids but now I'm all better...). So hopefully that means all we have to do now is do an interview at the Korean Embassy and we're all set! Exciting. And scary.

We then went for a little wander about in London, accidentally ending up back at the little Korean shop that scared us so much last time. This time we were more brave and decided to buy some kimchi to try. We were nearly put off when we saw the strange snacks on sale... But we stuck to our guns and found a jar of kimchi in the fridge. More of that later.

On the drive home we had 2 life threatening experiences - firstly Becky was so sleepy she thought she was gonna fall asleep at the wheel until we managed to find some services and get some coke and something for me to read to her to keep us both awake. Secondly, and frankly more scary, we nearly ran out of fuel while driving through Nechells past Stab City and other such friendly areas. Car doors locked. Luckily we're still alive. Yay! 

Today we decided to try the kimchi. It's not as vile tasting as people have suggested, luckily. But it was very hot. I think I may have enjoyed it slightly more than Becky did...

       

finally a job!

Oh dear, I think this blog is leading to domestic violence...

Right, um. There have been many many changes since we last wrote. We decided not to go for the Jeonju job in the end because the hours of work kept changing and we were worried that we might end up working very different hours from each other. It was an extremely difficult, one day we were saying "let's go for it" and the next "let's just say no" and we went on like this for quite a while before being forced into making a decision.

I have to admit that after that I went into extreme panic mode and started emailing about 20 jobs and recruiters a day leading to much confusion on Alan's (and even my) part, as we never really knew who we were talking to and which job they were offering us. I realised that things had got a bit out of control when I answered the phone "Hi Kim" to Sam, our recruiter. It also didn't help that I had already accidentally emailed him a message meant for Alan, wishing that I was still in bed with him, a few days earlier (come to think of it, maybe that's why he was still keen to work with us).

We answered more and more bizarre questions; do we do drugs? Do we have aids? Why aren't we married? "never", "of course not", "very soon" (cough cough). We had just about reached a point when we couldn't face another interview at 7.30 am with a person we couldn't understand, who wished that we were American, when we heard from Jason. The job seemed good (3-9, Gwangju, couple apartment) and after one email he called us for an interview and we decided to take it straight away... phew! Everything seems pretty much perfect (I'll be getting paid a bit more than Alan which is fine by me) and although we're really sad not to be going through Dan, our original recruiter, we are really really excited about Gwangju! 

Ooh and the school is called "You and I", which I like.