It has been an interesting few weeks since our last update. We have packed all of our goods, moved them to a new apartment, unpacked the essentials, picked up my parents at the airport, spent a week on vacation with them, and sent them off to Japan for the rest of their vacation.
Let's back up and take things one at a time. First, we finished teaching at DICS and said goodbye to everyone. We had a party on the last day and the principal handed out summer vacation homework packs to all of the children. They are supposed to come to school from 9am to noon everyday to read books and watch movies in English. They are supposed to do like 20 book reports over their reading during the summer also. I asked one of the older boys if the principal understood that they were supposed to have some fun over their summer break. He said he didn't think so. Second, on Wednesday the 16th, we finished packing up everything in our apartment only to find that the movers would have packed most everything for us. We then rode a bus from Ochang to Nambu bus station and took a subway to Bundang where my new school is located. We then went to our new apartment to meet the movers. We told them where to put all of the boxes and set up for our first night there. The school owners took us out to eat that evening and we purchased a few things we needed to survive in the new apartment such as food and cleaners. The apartment is much smaller than the one we had in Ochang and is much older. The bathroom tile grout was black, but was supposed to be white. The kitchen didn't even have a range to cook on. There was a lower cabinet it was supposed to be on, but there wasn't one there. The new school purchased one for us and had it installed the next day. Pamela spent most of Thursday and Friday cleaning and unpacking. I helped with what I could. Friday evening my parents arrived from Oklahoma. The director of my school was supposed to help me drive my parents from the subway to our apartment, but his phone malfunctioned and didn't work for the next several days. I had to put them on a public bus and then missed my stop. We had to catch a cab to my apartment, but I couldn't give him the address. (Remember I only have been here for two days.) I remembered the name of my apartments and wrote the name out in Korean so he put it in his GPS and it gave him directions right to them. Thank God for being able to read and write in Korean. We had a great vacation time visiting a few places with my parents and this morning we put them on the bus to the airport. I start teaching on Monday and still have to do some things to update my visa. Please continue to keep us in prayer as we transition to our new apartment and location. Our apartment is small, but it is now clean. Pamela took hours cleaning the bathroom and the kitchen. We still have to unpack many things. The positive side is that we now have air conditioning where we didn't in Ochang. We also have walking access to large shopping centers that we didn't have in Ochang. We had to have someone drive us or ride a bus a half hour to shop there. I am very impressed with my new school and the management I will be working with. Pray for Pamela and the children as we try to figure out where to put all of our things and how they are going to homeschool here in this small apartment.
Last Sunday, we attended a church near my school called Global Mission Church. This is a large church that has an English service. They also have a family service within walking distance of our new apartment. We will probably attend it this Sunday. This church has an outreach to two different orphanages teaching English and also goes once a week to help teach North Korean refugees. Orphans have been on Pamela's heart for quite some time. Most Koreans don't like to talk about orphanages and the children in them. I have a burden for the North Koreans. At our previous school, I talked with the teenagers about the North Koreans and they said they didn't really think about the North Koreans much at all. These fellow brothers and sisters in Christ are severely persecuted for their faith while just miles south the South Koreans enjoy freedom to worship. It is good to find a church that wants to reach out to these forgotten people.
