This week marks a month and a half for us in Korea and we hope that our friends and family (those who still read this blog) can tell from our posts that we are happy, healthy and settling in nicely. We really feel like we have hit the lottery with our jobs and with the life we lead, but we would be remiss to say that there is not a whole lot about our lives here that we also find aggravating, perplexing, frustrating, exasperating and just plain backward. The following post is a bit long and no one should feel pressured to read it word for word. Mostly it has just helped me work out some of my confusion and frustration and understand that many of the problems I have come across in these two months are bigger than myself and thus beyond my control.

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Cut

Like many other humans, my hair tends to get longer over time and needs cutting every once in a while; I knew this time would come sooner or later, though I put it off as long as I could. Yesterday I finally bit the bullet and headed down to Lotte Mart (our local mega-store that offers a wide, but somehow not wide enough array of products and services—groceries: yes, appliances: yes, hair salon: yes, chairs: no) to give it a whirl. My fear was that, like so many men I see on the street, I would leave looking like either Kim Jong-Il or Rain. (There’s one guy at work who’s sidestepping the issue and taking this opportunity to grow out his hair. I think most of you know that’s not a very good look for me…)

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