For everything else, there's Mastercard

I mailed my Visa application to South Korea today, and goodness gracious. It only took me three weeks to get my documents. Really, to get a document. I needed my police records, which were going to take me three to five weeks if I waited for them in the mail. So I decided to get them myself. Left work early, went downtown, waited in line, paid a fee and them mailed them to Jefferson City to receive an Apostille stamp (Google it), only to have them mailed back to me because they weren't notarized properly. Of course, Jeff City doesn't call to tell me that nor do they get the document back in the mail quickly so I can take care of it. Instead, I am now waiting on two criminal records to come in the mail. When the original finally does come, I take a whole day off work, go with my Dad to his work so a co-worker can notarize it for, then go way downtown to the wrong building because I was given the wrong address, then go to the right building so they can tell me that this document isn't notarized properly either. With every piece of identification I have and my check book, I ask for any kind of help I can get. I might have traded my first born child in the process, but I finally received my flippin' Apostille stamp and sent my envelope FedEx. Before you criticize me, calling people on the phone and checking websites didn't do me hardly any good. But here is the picture:



Actually, FedEx put it in a fancier envelope so this isn't the actual package but its symbolic. Whatever. I'm almost over it.

Pop the Cork

So this is it. The start of 14 months of fascinating blog entries. If I had a champagne bottle I would crack it open right here...well, maybe safely away from my laptop. I suppose it will be longer than 14 months, but really this journal is to document my overseas adventure of teaching English in South Korea. Hopefully, this will not only be a service to myself but to those wishing to keep up with my life while I am living it up:) The plan is to leave in the middle of September and live in Seoul for entire year. More to come with the whole process.