Day 1- May 15, 2011 (Arrival)

I arrived at the airport around 9:20 am and was greeted by Bill Grissett, Jennie Blandenburg, and Brittany Hailey. Not too soon after that David Dockery and Kate Bennett arrived. We then waited for almost 45 minutes while we waited for Andrew Headley due to what I believe was a communication error. So we went on ahead and Andrew caught up with us along the way to the gate. What a fun way tostart, right? :P the first flight to Minnesota was quick and good. The second flight to Tokyo was long as expected, bus still good. They fed us so much on the way and most of us were feeling kinda gross because we kept eating and had not moved much for 12+ hours.

Tokyo Security Line

Landing in Tokyo was refreshing nice we got to stretch our legs a little bit and encounter our first little bit of Asian culture. The security line to get through customs in Tokyo took a long time, but at least during the wait I was able to pick up some free literature in Japanese so I can practice on it later this summer. While in the line one of our teammates made friends with a girl named Zip. She was a college aged, Filipino looking girl who studies at the University of Huston and was going to South Korea to visit her parents. Her mom is Filipino too, but her dad is English. She was fun to talk to.

On the flight from Tokyo to Busan many of us made friends with the nationals we sat next to. I sat next to a Korean named Won-Gyn Lee. Just by talking to him I learned a great deal about Korean culture. For example, his Korean age is 31, but his American age is 29. Koreans count the year in the womb as well as soon as the new year comes around as a year. I am 21 American, but 23 Korean. Won was a professional seller/ economist who was coming home from a business trip in New Mexico. It was unbelievable how much that guy works weekly, but the crazy thing is that it is typical of many Koreans. As we chatted, I found out that his girlfriend was English and that her sister lives in Whales. We began to talk about languages and he taught me some phrases to say like "my name is" and "I am from". We talked about all kinds of cultural differences and we ended up swapping information. As a gift, the lady Brittany had befriended gave her a black sun hat.

We landed and I had my first experience unloading from a plane onto a Tarmac. That was oh so exciting! We then hopped on a bus to the main building and with anxiousness, we all got through customs. We were greeted by Joon, Amy, Michele, Honey, and Claire after the baggage claim. Is was awesome, Amy had made a cool poster with all of our faces on it. Me, Bill, Jennie, Andrew, Joon, Michele, and Claire got into the first van and we all headed towards the apartment. On the way we got a little sample of Joon's personality. Before we knew we were going to end up in a very nice apartment, he was telling us we were going to be camping on the beach for the 2 weeks. Since we did not know him all that well and he sounded serious, we believed him. Then after a short pause, he said he was just messing with us. This was the beginning of what became known as Joon's famous JKs. He told us to try it on the other van when we got to the apartment.

Ladies at the apartment!

View of the Pacific from our apartment.

View of the Pacific from our apartment.

View of the Pacific from our apartment. (I got artsy)

Once we got into the apartment (shoes at the door) Joon pick me out as the group leader and showed me around the place and then had me explain everything to the team. I essentially became the group liaison. We were very well accommodated and taken care of. Joon and the Busan BSU have done so much for us already. Joon and I hit it off great and began what I hope is a life long bond.

D-Rice