I am participating in a rather in-depth, week-long orientation and training program related to my new job. This is very disorienting – because I never had so much as an hour of orientation or training at any of my three previous jobs in Korea.
Some of the “cultural content” it is a bit redundant or boring, for someone who’s already been here a few years. But other bits are amazingly useful, and I find myself thinking, “gee, it would have been nice to have known that, say, 3 years ago.”
Overall, I think this will be good. Plus, the hotel where this is taking place is the poshest place I’ve stayed at in a long time – possibly since I had the Oracle 8i/9i certification at that resort in Pennsylvania in 2004.
Here’s a picture from my hotel balcony, looking west-southwest over Gwangju, as the sun is coming up behind the mountain behind me.
