Getting into Lab Mode

Today i made some concrete progress on my project. By concrete progress I mean I downloaded the program (Robotics Lab) I will be using to simulate robot motion. and by I installed the program i mean Inho installed the program. But regardless progress is progress. Inho spent the morning with me setting up the computer (we tried to set it up on my mac but it doesn't work on macs, i'm sure the guys from DASL would feel pretty smug in an "i told you so" fashion if they knew) and teaching me how to use the program because the manual was in korean. The computer i am using is also in korean. This could be helpful in learning the language but i am pretty sure it will be more devastating than useful because i just click buttons when windows pop up and god knows what i am telling it to do.
I made a three degrees of freedom robot this morning as a tutorial with Inho. He is great and so helpful. He also seems like a fun guy to be around so I am looking forward to working with him on my project and getting to know his personality better.

For lunch today, Lauren, Sara and i met up with a guy named Bill. Bill is getting us tickets to a kpop concert and he is going to take me out in Seoul while lauren and sara go to a musical he got them tickets for. This is all happening this weekend so I am really excited. Bill has been taking us out around KAIST for the past few days and we have had such a great time. He is hilarious. He loves girls and is really funny so it's impossible to not have fun around him.
I wonder if seoul will be anything like daejeon. I still dont really feel like an outsider. We have met all of the kids in the KISS program and nearly all of them are from Singapore, which means they all speak english as their first language. All of the girls live on the same floor and what ever time i am not in the lab i am spending with them. I am mad that our korean classes are split up by gender. there are two sections of korean 1 with the girls in one class and the boys in another. Also girls and boys are not allowed in each others dorms. It is like we aren't even in the same program as them because we never see them. Luckily we have facebook so we can connect and make plans to go out so we can still meet lots of people and have a good time but it would be infinitely better if we had a space where we regularly interacted. I don't know if such gender separation is a cultural thing but i will ask my teacher why at the next class and get back to you.

I was worried i was not going to get my act together to travel around korea but all of a sudden i am going on a lot of trips. This weekend i am going to seoul to hang out with bill. Then there is a KISS field trip to gyeongju. We will go on tours of all of the historical stuff and museums and make some pottery, which i am most excited about because i love ceramics and took it all through high school. Also I am planning on going to jeju, kind of like the hawaii of korea, for the last days i am here with some people from the lab. Maybe even squeeze in a beach trip, a hot springs trip, a hiking trip on the other weekends and definitely the concert Bill got us tickets for. This is going to be a great, packed 6 weeks. Thank goodness I am the energizer bunny and can move from one activity to the next seamlessly without rest. Although i may not be able to compete with the guys from the lab who i have been told stay till 5 in the morning and come in at 8. There is a room here with 2 sets of bunk beds that they nap in periodically but wow, they work hard. I learned that in korea you can either have mandatory military service or get a PhD. if i had the government on my tail like that maybe i would work as hard also. But i am keeping my perspective, i am here for the summer for just as much a cultural experience as work experience so i don't need to measure up to them all of the time, just some of the time.
: )

well i am sweaty and gross from the gym with danielle tonight and it is time to leave the lab and hit the shower. Tomorrow im coming in at 8 (and by 8 i mean 8 ish) to continue learning Robotics Lab from Inho. what an awesome life i have right now.