It took me hundreds of dollars and 14 hours to leave Sweden,

only to arrive in South Korea to the distinctive sound of Abba on the radio. Abba. The Swedish pop band whose manager lived in my Stockholm neighborhood. The radio playing Abba was inside the 7-11 across from my new apartment in Paju. The 7-11 next to the Dunkin' Donuts. Abba+7-11+Dunkin' Donuts ≠ rural Korean experience...

I leave for Korea on Tuesday, and have been packing

since Friday (yesterday). I have never, ever started packing so early, unless you count our family moves when packers emptied our house a few weeks before we actually left, leaving us to wander in huge, echoey spaces. Who knew that our house was so big and unfamiliar when stripped of our junk? Still, my personal...