"Words have no wings, but they can travel a thousand miles" (Korean Proverb)

Welcome to Flying Words, Jon and Aileen's blog of our adventures in South Korea! We will be in South Korea for a year, starting in mid-July, teaching English in a private school. We just graduated from college this past May, and are looking forward to having some adventures before continuing our education. 
We started this blog to keep all our family and friends updated and to share our photos and stories. We hope this is entertaining for you! We will miss you all, and are very thankful to have the internet to keep us in touch. 


Monday, July 28, 2008

Finally Leaving!

So, we're finally leaving the United States on Wednesday morning, two weeks later than we were supposed to leave. That's a long story, but basically it was a long and complicated visa process. But we have the visas, and the plane tickets, now. All's well that ends well. We've definitely had a good time in Vermont, spending time with my family and some of my friends, relaxing and enjoying the great outdoors! 

Just so everyone's on the same page, this is what we are doing: Jon and I are going to be in Jeonju (also called Cheonju or Chonju, like it's labelled on the map) South Korea for one year, teaching English as a Foreign Language at the Reading Town English School branch in Jeonju. We will be teaching mostly elementary and middle-school aged children, but could have students of all ages. Reading Town is a private school that provides English classes outside of the normal school day. Our hours will be 1pm-9pm, which I 
think is good because it gives us time to explore the city and do other things in the morning. 

Jeonju is a city of about 650,000 people, surrounded by mountains and known for its qu
ality produce. It is about 2 hours south of Seoul by train, and seems to be very close to the coast. It also has many historical sites and parks, including a full-size model historical village. It is also an important center for traditional paper-making arts and hosts many festivals throughout the year. All in all, it sounds like a great city for Jon and me to live in!!  

So we leave Wednesday morning, July 30. We fly from Burlington,
 Vermont to New York City (LaGuardia), then from there to Seoul. We should get to Seoul around 5:30 pm Thursday (local time-- they are 13 hours ahead of Eastern time), then get picked up by someone from our school. 

Thanks for tuning in to the first, and kind of boring, installment of our blog, which I promise will be much more exciting once we get there. 

Hope everyone is having a great summer! I look forward to hearing from you all...feel free to leave comments, even if they're unrelated!! 

8 comments:

Charles Xavier said...

girl with dog....Good luck Jon and Aileen Bueno Suerte!!!

Anonymous said...

I'm so excited for yall! Safe traveling!

Mom/Mama Bear said...

I'm so glad you both were here for a month! What a treat! You helped out a lot and we enjoyed our time with you. I am excited to read your blogs! Safe travels/safe year abroad....we love you lots!!

Keith said...

Best of luck in Korea, and thank you for putting up the blog. I look forward to reading about your adventures!

k said...

hope you guys have some great adventures :) i can't wait to hear about them!

Lyn said...

Well, I'm hoping that by this point, you have arrived. :) I miss you guys! I'm already counting down to March! It's about 219 days until I'll see you guys! :)

Jon and Aileen said...

hey katharsis...who are you? :)

Unknown said...

Jon and Aileen,
I've enjoyed reading your blog entries and am so proud of both of you recent Catawba grads! I would like to request that you shoot me an e-mail back. I want to ask you to do something for your alma mater. Be safe!
TBG