Annyeong

Annyeong (hello) though a cell phone.  Cell phone? in Korea?  Yes we bought a cell phone in Korea today.  It took about a half an hour and Glen came with us as our translator.  We didn't buy the basic phone or plan which was 40 bucks for the phone and about $10.50 a month for the plan.  But the 10.50 is just to own a plan and then you pay for each minute you use and for each text message.  This may seem expensive but the rates here in Korea are MUCH cheaper than the US.  A text message is less than 1 cent and a minute is about 2.8 cents.  Though this would have been the cheapest route, I really didn't like the old style phone that it came with.  It was similar to my first phone I had back when I as 16.  So we asked about the next cheapest phone - one with a better way to text than pressing the number 6 four times to get one letter.  We came to the phone on the left.  It was free with our 2 year contract and we have to pay about 31 dollars a month, but it comes with 160 mins of free talking and 500 messages.  And we also had to pay a 39,000 Won foriengers fee - non refundable. 

You may be wondering about the 2 year contract.  Our plan is to either sign it over to the next pair of teachers or cancel it.  We've been told both are free.  As a gift the cell phone company gave us a free HOT PINK "leather" cell phone case to put it in.  The picture below is very similar and just doesn't do it justice.  When Glen asked me if I liked it I asked if it came in black.  Andrew said the pink will prevent me from losing it - he had a good point.

After about an hour of owning our brand new toy it rang.  I was very suprised, thinking who know's our number already?  Glen answered it for us and the conversation went something like this - in Korean.

Glen: Hello

Creepy guy in a weird voice:  Hello lady are you working today?

Glen: What?

Creepy guy:  where are you at?

Glen:  Um, where did you get this number from, it's a new number?

Creeper:  I had this number before...

Glen: I think you have the wrong number...

Creeper:  Oh okay,  good bye then.

Glen:  hmm bye

She then explained this may have been a number of a prostitue. The way he was talking to her and didn't recognize her voice, and by the questions he was asking, she said was all very wierd. 

Needless to say, in about 5 hours we obtained 5 calls from people we didn't know.  Andrew would pick up the phone and in his stern mannly voice say "who is this.. you have the wrong number.." (end of call).

So our friend Kang took me back to the phone store and we got a new number! One that hasn't rang yet!  They asked me to pick out a number but I couldn't seem to find one that wasn't in use, so they created one for us and I was told it's "cool" and "is a good one" becasue it is very easy to remember.  I won't share it all because I don't want random people to call it but a little preview is 010.*6*6.3939.

The coolest thing is writing with the stylus on the cell phone.  Instead of typing anything I can write it out in a white box and then the phone will type it for me.  It's pretty good - it can do whole words, but messes up on capitals and h's.

That's all for now, hopefully we will have better luck with this number!