EPTThe general overview, basically the experience has been amazing, I love everything about Korea so far. Although I will say, I understand why now A LOT of foreigners do not want to endure this kind of lifestyle and/or run from it after a short period of time. Basically, depending on which room you get, you can be sleeping with anywhere from 4-8 people in a room, which basically means no privacy. Additionally, sometimes players stay awake longer (and there are computers in rooms too) so the noise could keep you up if you don't enjoy always watching sc2 or whatever. Another thing is the food/eating, is MUCH different from western culture. Everyone eats together always, and learning to use chopsticks 100% was fun. Although I've talked to many previous-foreigners or visitors to Korea, and they all didn't seem to enjoy the "Indian-style" sitting and eating of food, although I find it new/fun, I miss being surrounded by everyone when having meals, since in America, at least my life, it has always been isolated/alone after around age 9. I'm sure a lot of people know about just going downstairs to the kitchen, getting your plate, and heading back up to your room, I knew that too for many years, but now it's fun to have everyone surrounding you. Ultimately, I love the lack of privacy, and the fact that everyone surrounds each other. It's much better than the isolation/severe periods of being alone that I'm sure many foreigners experience in other parts of the world.
Moving past that, the communication has been absolutely great. Everyone, and I mean literally everyone keeps Google translate open on computers to talk with me at any point. I feel like I've really connected with at least six or seven people on a very-friendly/good relationship so far, to the point where I'm constantly talking with them or them to me. Sure the language barrier gets in the way sometimes but rarely ever as Galaxy and Coach Nim can speak English and translate if Google translate fails.
The practice has been great, in the house games I'm the only "mechanic" Terran (I use only mech TvT/TvZ) so I often get asked to practice or for games, on top of having some of the T's watch my mech and trying to discuss strategy of it in broken English/translator. Currently I'm 59-37 on Korea at the time of writing this, having started with a high masters account (600(?)). It's so fun though. If a medivac comes into vision on their screen, their scvs are moving instantly. If your hellions run by idle maurauders, those maurauders are stiming instantly and chasing your hellions. P's are MUCH harder to bait forcefields, and their army control is superior to anything out of the very top Foreigners that I've experienced. Additionally, I've gotten to play many Code A/S players (outside of the ones in the house) and it's a really enjoyable experience. The only annoying stuff has been that my hardware has been acting up (not just computer, but also mouse moving slow on the mousepad -____-; because of chaffing on the feet)
Before coming here, my best match-up was TvT, however after spending time here and learning a lot/discussing alot, I'd have to say my TvZ/TvT are basically on even ground, with my TvP falling really far behind (It has improved greatly, but still just no where near the level of understanding I have in the other two match-up's.. sigh.. TvZ broodwar all over again for me.)
Anyway, tomorrow I'm going with Galaxy to GSTL to meet up w/ the GosuGamers.net manager who is temporarily visiting Korea, as well as the handsome Artosis. Going to be watching maybe some GSL matches prior to GSTL and then having dinner afterwards :D.
Hmm, fun highlights in the past week would be:
-There is a Terran in the house called "BK" (short for Byung-Kwan) however I coined him BurgarKingPrime, and now everyone else does too. So I have sometimes randomly bought him a burgar to bring back to him at the house and troll him.
-As a joke, one of the very first few things one of the Koreans said to me to "break the ice" was pointing at hAnbinZenith and calling him gay, where all the other koreans nodded in argreement and now it is the common knowledge of the house for everyone to call things gay, and then refer to hAnbin.
-We all sometimes play Tekken Tag Tournament during downtime, and even having ranking matches for it lol.
-I know very basic Korean phrases/statements in reference to gestures like "Thank you", "Hi", "I love you." "Goodbye." "Want to go to the store?" "Fuck" "Fucking son of a bitch" (BK/MVPAvenge taught me these last two -___-; such trolls) and how to ask for games(aside from "Game go?". However, I'm still learning/asking/etc about Korean literally daily/etc.
-I often times overhear a lot of the Koreans speaking to eachother in English, whether it be conversation or "Shut the fuck up chobo." trolling each other, trying to improve their English or using it more ^_^;
-I got some of the Koreans into degrassi(ROFL).
-Out of the many foreigners that attempted to join this house, I was the only one picked (this made me feel VERY good/confident after finding it out about two days ago.
-/Self brag: I managed to beat MarineKingPrime with everyone watching (replay here: http://gosugamers.net/starcraft2/replays/49697 )
So that's it
. I'll post a video-blog/update tomorrow night after GSTL with Artosis/Galaxy/etc, and then a team-house video Sunday night :D.Thanks for reading it all if you made it this far ^_^~, if you want to follow more updates:
http://www.twitter.com/lastshadow9
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ls/114187058679099
Also, I got replay admin access at http://www.gosugamers.net so start checking out the replays there, as I'll be uploading any replays I can from people in this house vs progamers/etc.
