Last weekend, we made plans to head out to Jeju Island after class on Saturday, and then get back to Daegu Monday at 12:00pm (I work at 3:30). Everything worked out totally fine, and the island was awesome and weirdly dead because it was the off-season. I like trips during the off-season (look through my pictures in Nova Scotia), so it was awesome for me. Everything was really cheap and readily available with no lines or screaming children. We saw all the sights that we wanted to see (photos at this link: My Facebook), and we got to stay in a nice hotel for cheap. The next day we woke up totally refreshed and ate a huge breakfast. When we arrived at the airport, we suddenly realized the exhausting day that we were about to embark on.
We walked up to the Korean Airlines counter and their was NO one in line. It didn't really dawn on us why until the counter lady had a terrified look on her face when we asked her to check into our flight to Daegu. This was at 10:15, and our flight was to be at 11:10. She couldn't tell us that our flight was cancelled, so she typed a bunch of stuff and called her colleague over to break the news. Chuck ran to the bathroom when we heard this news. We all had to be at work at 3:30pm. We needed to get off of the island and to our town in the middle of the country in 4 hours. We checked flights to Busan (one hour train ride to Daegu)... cancelled. The next flight to Seoul (Gimpo) with Korean Air was at 12:49. That wouldn't be enough time to get to Daegu. We frantically started to check other airlines. We found one plane that was leaving for Seoul in 30 minutes (it was 10:30 now). They sold us tickets and we had to run to the gate. The departure time for the flight from the southern most part of South Korea to the northern most part of the country was at 11:00. The ticket said the arrival time was at 12:05 (this must be some kind of miracle right? No, its just that the Korean airlines don't take an hour to leave the gate and they don't take an hour taxiing to the next gate). We landed at 12:05 and we were in a taxi by 12:15 heading to the KTX train station. So far so good.
At the KTX train station they had the next two trains, 13:00 and 13:30, listed as sold out. We NEEDED to get on that 13:00 train. We were contemplating getting on and just playing dumb but Chuck talked to the ticket counter. It was 12:51 at this time. They sold us standing room tickets (we had to sit between the coach cars [inside of course]). We ran and hopped on the train. The arrival time for Daegu was 14:49 (2:49pm). "We'll make it!" At 1:00pm I called Young and asked him to grab a work shirt for me out of my apartment and bring it to work with him (we were all clean and pampered because of the fancy hotel that we stayed at the night before). We got to Dongdaegu KTX station. I ran to the subway. It was a straight shot to work on that subway line. I said "bye" to the other three. They were going to make it, too. I showed up to work at 3:30. Perfect. I was on time, and had time to make my print-outs. Except something went horribly wrong.
I showed up to a flustered mess at work. They had been stressing about me and trying to get a hold of me. "Why didn't you call?!?!" They had cancelled my class. Someone had caught wind that the Daegu Airport closed and assumed that I wasn't going to make it. My phone was dead, so they called and called. I called Young using Emma's phone at 1 to ask him to grab a shirt, but didn't think to call anyone else. Why didn't I call anyone else? Because I had spent my whole day ensuring that I was going to get there in time, and I did. If I was stuck up at the airport in Jeju, I would have had time to find a phone charger, charge it up and let them know that I was going to miss class. I didn't call because I was going to make it. I'm not going to call work to let them know that I am going to make it on time today... That leads me to the next development this week:
I ruptured the tendon that leads to my big toe on Wednesday morning. I was cooking breakfast and I dropped the bowl that I was mixing the eggs in. Somehow the bowl landed and broke into 4 pieces on my foot. One of the pieces sliced my foot, deep. I hopped to the bathroom and spent 30 minutes trying to stop the bleeding. I called Brent. He was at the hospital, so I asked him to bring me some gauze and tape. He showed up to what looked like a murder scene in my apartment. We got the bleeding stopped and cleaned the wound with alcohol. He suggested that I go to the hospital, so I did. I hobbled down to the hospital (about a 20 minute hobbling distance). When I showed up, they were closed for lunch. I had to go back at 2:00. So I staggered back home and made it back at 2:00, dressed for work (again, I had to work at 3:30). The doctor was nice and speaks decent English. He immediately said that my wound needed to be sutured. When he started the surgery, he noticed that my tendon was ruptured. After making me look at it (::shudder::), he sutured the tendon up with 13 stitches, then 26 stitches on the top of my foot. They got me in a splint and a boot and I am now on crutches.
It's been an interesting week.
