I have an office at Sogang now with new furniture. They moved the old furniture, nice solid wood standard academic office furniture, out and moved in a new set of brand spanking new pressboard and veneer furniture. This is nice looking stuff, and the desk chair is a nice one. It is striking though that standards here in terms of the furniture are the same as in the US: new is better than old, inherent quality aside.

I am supposed to get a computer today. What I won't be getting is a printer, these are not provided to faculty members. I can buy one, however, and the school will pay the electricity for me to use it. The same goes for an office AC. My American colleagues will be surprised to hear that there is also no access to a copy machine. You can have copies made, but it is done by a little privately run business located in the building and the department is charged per copy. The rates seem high: 20 copies of my syllabus cost about 3 bucks.

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