Cummings and Goings

One of the 4,372 things I was worried about when we moved to Korea wasn’t necessarily flooding. I mean, I knew it rained here. What I didn’t anticipate was experiencing flooding that Geoje hadn’t seen in decades. Close to 100 years, to be exact.

Because apparently, if there’s a once-in-a-lifetime weather event to be had, Cummings luck will find it.

We’ve officially survived two “once-in-a-lifetime” events: Hurricane Harvey in Houston and historic flooding in Geoje. And honestly, this weekend brought back a lot of flashbacks of hurricane season in Texas.

We’ve been in Korea for two weeks and were slowly starting to settle into a routine. We had somewhat figured out grocery shopping, laundry, and even the dishwasher. We were starting to feel like we had this whole “living in another country” thing somewhat under control.

And then…bam.

Torrential downpours. Flooding. Public safety announcements. And a whole new level of “What the heck are we supposed to do?”

The boys’ school was incredibly kind and proactive, trying to check on us. Except they had our phone number written down incorrectly and couldn’t get ahold of us. Apparently, the police here have access to your phone number, so they ended up calling us instead. After a slight miscommunication/translation issue, the school administration was finally able to reach us and make sure we were okay.

We were up most of the night Saturday into Sunday listening to the public safety announcements and watching the rain.

The only problem?

They were all in Korean.

A natural disaster is scary enough. A natural disaster when you don’t understand the language is a whole different level of terrifying.

We couldn’t figure out how to change the alerts to English, so we resorted to taking screenshots and using Google Translate—the MVP I mentioned earlier.

We haven’t been back downtown since the flooding, but we’ve heard several places were destroyed, including some that we had already visited and eaten at during the short two weeks we’ve been here. That part has really hit me.

This weekend, there will be cleanup efforts to help rebuild and restore some of what was destroyed. And I’m already surprised by how attached I’ve become to our new hometown. We’ve only been here two weeks, but I’m already sad seeing a place that is becoming home to us go through something like this.

So, anyway… I wanted to share a little weather update.

Even though we are halfway around the world in Korea, for a few days it honestly felt like we were right back in Texas dealing with Hurricane Harvey.

Only this time, the hurricane alerts were in Korean.

Because apparently, Cummings & Goings needed that extra challenge.

We’re safe. We’re okay. The boys are okay. The dogs are okay. And we’re slowly getting back to normal.

Two weeks into this adventure, and Korea is already making sure we don’t get too comfortable.