This time in english so al international friends and friends in Korea can read this too. (Sorry for all Dutch).
So we went into the appartment on monday. It is on the 3rd(Korean 4th) floor of an building belonging to the Daemyung campus of the Keimyung University. Very nice and big(The whole house is about 15 x 10 meters, excluding the balcony. It is more or less in the middle of the city of Daegu and has a nice view on the Duryo park and the mountains surrounding Daegu. For the time being I live mostly in one room waiting for my stuff to arrive in Korea. The ship will be in Busan 10th of march so in the weekend of my birthday we can expect to do a lot of work bringing up the 186 boxes and the grand piano. Hyojung and i will have a birthday party on the 14th, her birthday is on the 13th and mine on the 18th. So slowly everything is building up, we got the cable TV, the internet is installed, we had a nice shopping at a big second hand furniture shop and bought some nice things. Wednesday 20th februari we went to Seoul by car, 4/5 hours one way, to pick up my new 2 new suits from Itaewon(Yep, Jeroen I had the idea from you) and to pick up 3 boxes from the airport that I send from Holland with things need for teaching, like many books on music and my digital piano. We found a nice church in the neighborhood, the priest was also in the Korean church in Amstelveen, we went to several times when Hyojung was in Holland. We are now deciding if we want to attend it regularly. Yes the fridge is full of Gimchi now and we eat a lot together in my home. The Janitor on the first floor is their because I am in the building and during the night there is no one else, I am the only inhabitant for the moment. Last week I got my citizenships ID from the immigration office and now i am officially living in Korea. So we opened a bank account, another action involving 12 papers to be filled with again your name and personal data. We did that last friday at the university bank. It was very busy because all the new students came in for this weeks start of the semester. I had my first lesson yesterday, the Jazz piano class, a choice class, for 16 students, but their were over 25, so I have to make two classes. Maybe I can split them up into an advanced and a beginners class. The students are very nice and I have to be very slowly in my english to make them understand. I have 16 brand new Yamaha digital piano's specially bought for my class in the room, I cannot imagine this happening in the Netherlands. My office is at the 4th(Korean 5th floor) and is also big with my own piano, table, desk computer and shelves. It is very nice to work in except for the "new" smell" (paint like) that still hangs in the room, so i have the window open for the time being. I didn't tell you, that when I had my first meeting with Esther Lee the head of the Music production department, she told me we had a problem: I couldn't reach her for some time, she was to busy because the planned moving of the school next autumn from the Daemyung campus to the new campus in the west city already happened, so now i have to travel 25 minutes with the subway to get to school. But.................... now Hyojung and I work in the same place and the new build school of music, Wow........ is very, very, very nice!!!! A new concert hall(in fact their are two in the hall) with over 1500 seats and a fully equipped building. Our department has many rooms and studio's and all mean teachers have their own office, with nice few over the campus. It feels like another heaven in a heaven. Every day Hyojung and I realize we are blessed the way things go now. When we applied for the job(From May last year we started) she treated the new building like Jericho and walked around the new building(It takes 15 minutes to do it once) 7 times, with the idea to tumble the walls down, and like Joshua, she succeeded. I do a little running now and then and walked all over the city hours and hours and feel very good physical. No more Jetleg. etc.....
Last weekend first official house visit for the whole family at Hyojung's parents place, with full regards and formal bowing to the parents. We had a nice meal coocked by Hyojungs mom and I met all the sisters, husbands and grand children. In the afternoon the man wanted to check me out and they took Hyojung and me out for the boat ride on lake Susungo(Yeye, Dekoor, the duck boats), a ride in the roller coaster and the traditional get a little drunken, diner and meeting to see who I really am, so we had some Soju and Heineken, but you know me, it was them ending up a little tipsy, not me, and they all liked me very much, I was much nicer in real than from the stage, Tv, or photo's, Haha. So now you know...........I think everything is going well.... I am waiting for my furniture to come and let you now more soon. Please mail me now and then I really would like to know how things are going on in the Netherlands and please give my new address to everyone you think I forgot. You can find it at the end of the second message of www.johanrooze.nl. If you want to reach me at school(Keimyung University) + 82 53 580 6624.
Bye bye for now.....
Johan and Hyojung
