the eternal hunt...

IS OVER!!!!

that's right! you heard it here first! i have a PHONE!!! yay!!! the korean teacher from another school in gimhae called me today and we went to get it. she has a friend who owns a cell phone store. we met down the street from my house and we drove all the way into Busan - about 45 minutes and i picked out a phone, picked a phone number and that was that! i can still hardly believe it! i ended up spending a lot more than i wanted, but at this point... really?!?!?! it's a sweet little LG model that has an mps player, camera, tv, internet, the works... here's a picture of it:

and it slides open:

i can't believe it!!! now i can call all the new friends i've made! yay! i don't know how to repay Ellie, but i'm starting with beers on friday...

trisha, this is for you... imagine it on a 6 foot tall man:
i tried to just take a photo of him, but he would only let me do the shirt... i'm on the lookout for pucca things for you, but it's not as easy as you would think...

...the continuation of the eternal hunt for a mobile phone

well, i still don't have a phone. after my last 'phone' post i headed out to find the indian guy i had heard about. i had an idea where the store was, but wasn't 100% sure. i wandered around the area and found a few shops that had used phones, but they were all really used (read scratched) and they were also not as cheap as i was told they would be. so after going to a few stores i walked to another area of town where i was sure they had regular phone stores - one of the craziest parts about this whole thing is that there is at least two cell phone stores on every block... if not more. so i went into one, and the phones were all around $400, so i moved on.

finally i found a nice looking store with two very helpful koreans, one of whom actually spoke a bit of english. after conveying that i needed a "handypon" (mobile phone in konglish) they picked one out and showed it to me. it was $150 (pretty cheap here) - still a little high, so i managed to haggle them down to $120 !!! yay! so we filled up the contract, they needed my bank account number and alien registration card to verify...something. i picked my phone number, wrote it in my phone book, and paid. then we just had to wait for the activation. while waiting the guy picked out a hard case and a decorative "dangly" thing for my new phone - for free, of course. finally after about ten minutes the store phone rang. next thing i knew he was telling me that i couldn't have it.

from what i understood there was a problem with my bank account number because it isn't associated with my alien registration card, but my passport. remember the long wait for the ARC? well, i had to get an account, so we did it with my passport. i had my passport with me, but they wouldn't accept it... i don't know who was more disappointed, me or the sales guys (for losing the sale they had worked so hard on). but i got my money back and left the store, more frustrated than before. i was so close. i felt like they had dangled the world under my nose and then taken it away.

this whole thing is not normal. other EPIKers have walked into stores with nothing but a passport and gotten a phone... so i guess i'm just cursed. maybe it's karma for the year of free service i had from telus in canada... maybe it's just me... who knows. so i went out and had a couple of beers with some other foreigners. while at the B&G (our bar) i saw a korean english teacher i know - Ellie (she spent a year in canada and is really nice). anyway, she knows a guy who works for a cell phone company and is going to call me at school on monday or tuesday and hook me up. hopefully it all works out - i'm reallly sick of having no means of communication... i finally have some friends, but can't even call them to go out!!! hopefully that will all change soon.

i'll keep you posted...

the eternal hunt for a phone...

why do things have to be so difficult in this country? sorry, i'm having an "i hate korea" moment here. i was debating cell phone vs. home phone for the first couple of weeks i was here (i had to wait to be an alien first anyway) finally i decided on mobile so i'd always have it with me - even if it's a little more expensive... then there were a couple of things i had to wait for before getting one 1) someone told me that things are more expensive at chuseok and i should wait until after... so i did 2) i needed a korean to come with me to translate... finally today was the day, but do i have a phone? no. i feel like a second class citizen today (which i suppose i technically am...) i went to one store where they were trying to sell me phones that were marked up about 50$ more expensive than other people got them for - because i'm a foreigner and don't look korean. then the next store the guy told me that because i have an E-2 (teacher) visa that i'm not allowed to get a cell phone - which i know is a load of crap, since all the other foreigners i know have cell phones... even the ones without an alien registration card. so here i am no translator, no cell phone, no phone whatsoever. it's just so frustrating to know that you're getting ripped off...is it racism? it's definitely discrimination and there's nothing i can do about it. i'm hoping that chris (the aussie) will be able to help me... since he told me about an indian guy who has a phone shop... i'm just not 100% sure where it is. maybe i'll go hunting later on... i'm just so frustrated right now...

anyway, stay posted for the gayaland post...