I pay my water bill directly to my landlady, and once a month she comes to collect. When that happens I answer the door, say hello, give her cash, and say good-bye. She says thank you, bows, and walks away.
Tonight she came and we did all that, then she took her shoes off and walked inside. She said a whole bunch of stuff but the only word I caught was "internet" so I showed her where my internet was and thought that would be the end of it. Wrong. She pulls out her cell phone and has a fairly long Korean conversation while I stand there awkwardly, trying to figure out how to make this stop. Normally I'd just walk away, but this is where I live.
She finally hangs up and I think the uncomfortable-ness is over, then calls somebody else and hands me the phone. Her daughter-in-law is babbling on about paying extra to get another internet line, and when I tell her I don't want another line she confesses that she doesn't actually know what landlady wants translated. This is going so well. So I pass the phone back, landlady speaks in Korean, and gives it back to me...about 3 more times. Her poor daughter-in-law doesn't speak English that well, and doesn't seem to have any idea what's going on. I'm in my pajamas and just want to get back to my TV show, and landlady seems to be having a grand old time hanging out in the foreigner's apartment.
Eventually I convinced them to call my school tomorrow and tell someone there what's going on. I can't wait to see how this all turns out.
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