First Day of Classes

This morning we had the orientation for the new KU/GT MSCS program. A lot of the presentations were in Korean, so I couldn't really follow along, although this was mostly for the students, not for the faculty. After the orientation, they showed us around the science building. No pictures today, but I'll post some of the campus pictures tomorrow. The facilities are quite nice. The faculty offices aren't ready for us to move into yet, but they are larger than what we have in the states, and each one comes equipped with a sink!

The dean took us out to lunch at a traditional Korean restaurant. You had to take off your shoes and sit on cushions on the floor. My long legs don't like to sit cross-legged for long periods of time, so my legs and feet were getting sore by the end of the meal; they'll probably get more used to it over time. The food was very good, and it was culturally very interesting to experience a meal like this.

In the afternoon, I gave my first lecture. The class has about 19 students, which is smaller than the average class I've had in Atlanta (I can't say "in GT", because I am in fact at GT, just at our new Korea campus!). I was a little worried about possible language problems, but it seems like most of the students are not having any problems following along.

We tried to get cell phones later that afternoon. We decided that getting one with pre-paid minutes seemed to be the easiest thing to do. However, they require your passport or some other official/internationally-recognized form of ID (i.e., my GA driver's license doesn't count - not that I would expect it to). We'll go back tomorrow and try again.