Korean addresses are backwards from what we Westerners are used in most countries I’m familiar with. They list the largest geographical unit first, and then “drill in” or “zoom in” to the most local unit, without using commas. So my new workplace would have a partial address as follows: 전라남도 영광군 홍농읍 상하리 홍농초등학교 (jeollanam-do yeonggwang-gun hongnong-eup sangha-ri hongnongchodeunghakgyo = South-Jeolla-Province Yeonggwang-County Hongnong-Town Sangha-Village Hongnong-Elementary-School).
The map above shows Yeonggwang County. It’s on the west coast of the peninsula, in the northwestern corner of South Jeolla Province, which is the southwestern mainland province of South Korea. So you visualize that it’s “facing” China’s Qingdao across the Yellow Sea to the west. The green-bordered blob you see is about 50 km. north-to-south and the same east-to-west, with some islands floating offshore. Maybe I’ll get to visit them sometime.
Hongnong Town is the knob at the top of the map. Yeonggwang Town (the “county seat”) is the cluster of extra roads you can see near the center of the map (but a bit off to the southeast from center).
The county is rural, but it’s not as rural as many might imagine. South Korea has a very high population density, so the number of persons-per-square-kilometer, even in an area like this, is more like New Jersey or Eastern Pennsylvania than it is like Iowa or Idaho. And Korea is crisscrossed by expressways, nowadays, too, so there’s not much left of the long, slow trips on twisting one-and-one-half-lane highways that even I remember vividly from the early 90’s.
I already like my new school. It’s just like any other Korean elementary school, a bit of a cookie cutter architecturally, with the dirt playground in front and the three-story facade of classrooms. But in a town as small as Hongnong, it has a bit of the feel of a community center, too, maybe.
I was shocked and dismayed to learn that my apartment will not be in Hongnong Town, but rather Yeonggwang Town. That seems like a long commute (about 30 km.). Also, when I saw my apartment, it was rather dirty, and definitely a bit shabby. Hmm… lots of cleaning to be done.
