finally happening

I'm going through a few rounds of text messages and phone conversations in Korean about leaving the Golden Goose and making my own private rental contract with my building. I texted with the building's real-estate office and spoke with my company's HR guy (bastard speaks English but chose to speak exclusively in Korean, having called me late this evening*) about what to do. So I've texted the real-estate office about visiting them tomorrow at 2 p.m. to get this over with. Losing W10 million (plus rent and other fees) will be painful, but I'll get that deposit back when I finally move out, hopefully later this year. 

The boss is having a get-together at the end of February so we three team members can all discuss the future; perhaps I'll learn more about moving dates and such at the meet-up. As I said before, I have to wait for my passport, renew my drivers license, and renew my F4 visa, and I want to do all that first before I have to worry about the address-change nonsense that comes with moving. So I'll be in my current digs at least until the summer. At the earliest, I'll move in June or July. If not the summer, then... sometime later, I guess—this year or next year or never, depending on how things turn out. More updates as things happen.

NB: I have to wonder, though, why the real-estate office had initially told me to talk with my company's HR people before coming back to make the contract and fork over the deposit. This whole back-and-forth between A and B and C has felt like a waste of time. HR isn't going to physically come and help me hammer out the rental contract; I'm going to be doing everything myself. The only thing the real-estate office got out of involving HR was a verbal confirmation that I was going to be making a private rental contract with Tower Real Estate, the real-estate office (one of several on our building's lobby level) that holds my current contract.

__________

*More seriously, though, I prefer people to try Korean with me before giving up and resorting to English. How else can I practice if I'm not forced into situations where I have to use the target language? I could do what other expats do and craft a life that narrows my interactions only to those who speak English, but then why the fuck did I move out of my home country if all I want is English, English, English all around me? I had no such desire in France or Switzerland, either. By the same token, I don't like to shield myself from my surroundings by slapping on earbuds and listening to my culture's music while I'm outside. I take seriously the idea that the world is always trying to teach you if only you'd listen, and how can you do that when you're always doing the equivalent of sticking fingers in your ears and going "La-la-la"?

There's a side discussion to be had about how introverts and extraverts learn language. I think extraverts have the obvious advantage since they love to jabber with just about everyone, and you can't learn a language without interacting in it. We introverts tend to have much smaller circles of friends, so I guess the nature of introverted and extraverted interactions is different: extraverts go broad, talking superficially to many people, while introverts go deep, engaging more profoundly with those they like for extended periods. I realize that that's an overgeneralization, but I think it's "overgenerally" true, at least in my experience.