First day of the new school month which means I am now teaching all kindergarten in the morning with no break, and I eat lunch with them. So from 9:15-2:30 I am with my kindy kids. Then I have my first graders. then the elementary kids. Its great but it really takes a lot of energy being with the kindy kids so long.
Juliet wept, but she has a good reason. She has a cut or something on her face, and I guess it hurt. My other kindy classes were good. I no longer do science and art with Australia and Denmark. Now I teach them both writing and grammar and our ACC (reading) classes. So I wont be the fun teacher for them any more.
I may be being hopeful, but I think I am having some breakthroughs with Erica in my afternoon Korea class. Praising her for doing better than the guys makes her happy. She is academically slower than them, but she tries a lot harder than them. Just being silly with her really helps her talk more and smile. Dylan was not at class today and he normally gives her a hard time. With him being gone she was not under that stress. But giving her positive attention is good. I know she likes the attention that the boys in the class give her (she is the only girl in the class) though she acts like she doesnt. Getting attention from an adult is something I do not think she gets much at home. At least that is what I have heard... the standard parents working way too much etc. I think a lot of teachers kind of gave up on her because she is a lot of work. It tough but I have not. I have actually made her laugh. Rob once said he did not think he ever saw her smile. We took a vocab test. The students know they do not matter. She did the first page really well, the second page, she marked the entire page with a's. I think it is because everyone else had finished and she was still working... but I think she did it like that to be a joke (so it would seem like she was being sarcastic or something). So I just played along, like you did the first page so well, doing better than everyone than you gave me all a's...ahhh, as I was smiling and joking. She was happy. Instead of her feeling 'dumb' for being slow, I praised her for the work she did and played along with the all of the answers marked A. I also did a mimic of her movements. She laughed and smiled. She kept doing funny things, moving her head, arms... she was playing along. Then the rest of the class did it too. She was getting attention, but it was positive attention and she enjoyed it. Instead of people mocking her or picking on her, she was leading the class. She opens up more, speaks more, smiles, and is happy. Now I just need to find a way for her to keep that feeling.
After school, I intended to come home and do progress reports. Well, Taylor was sitting at the GS. So I join her. The group gets bigger as more teachers come home. We went to the hardware store and I bought a frying pan. Now I can cook bacon and eggs. We then ate 부대찌개 (budae jjigae). We got home. I did some of my progress reports. It took nearly 2 hours to do one class. So I only did that one class.
Friday May 31st.
I got to school early so I could work on more progress reports. Turns out the reason my the cards for my Canada class took so long was because I was writing too much. The report cards are online. There is a teachers comment section. I was writing good comments about the students. Little paragraphs. Turns out we are only really supposed to do 2 or 3 sentences.
Sharon did a mini weep in France. She did not do any of her work on Thursday and was not happy when the other students finished and were getting to draw and she had to keep doing her work to catch up. It didnt last long because I like to think that she figured out if she got finished she would get to play, and crying would not help her finish any faster. Dont know if thats what really went through her head...
We got a new student in my afternoon Greece class. He is at the right level and seems like he will do well in class. I hope so. I had everyone introduce themselves to him... I was going to have them say which elementary school they go to, but the entire class wanted to say what their Korean name was. That is what I let them do. He will do better than Eric was in is miles ahead of Roy. So, good addition.
We went to a bar called Bunker. It was one of Ama's friends not going away party. He was going to leave Korea and come back in several months, but he got a new job that starts immediately, so he is not going away. Bunker was awesome. They had a pool table and good music. It seems to be a pretty good mix between a Korean bar and a foreigner bar. Good mixes of everyone. They also sold buckets of drinks. You could buy a bucket of jack and coke or a bucket of long island ice tea. Buckets were not really that big. They cost the same as 2 single drinks. It is more the novelty of drinking from a mini bucket than anything else. Fun night. It was located in a place called 압구정 (apgujeong) which is a neighborhood in 강남 (Gangnam). We took a cab home.
Saturday June 1st
We wake up, and all go down to the GS. We were going to go to Yongsan Electronics market, but decided it was just too beautiful of a day. We all sit out and just talk. We figure it is a good day for day drinking. We order McDonalds, and they forget to put one of the burgers in the bag. I tried calling, but not being able to speak Korean I got nowhere. Baaaaa.
We go to 여의도 (Yeouido). There was supposed to be a music festival, and sitting outside, talking and drinking just seemed like a fun thing to do. We get there... the music festival is pretty bad. Its not so much of a festival, just more like people playing music over speakers. We decide to just walk. We walk to a water park. Literally, part of the park that is water, not a place with slides. There is a fountain, and just a huge area of flowing water, water that flows into the Han river. We set up, take off our shoes, and just wade in a part of one of the pools. There is a guy with a remote controlled boat. I get him to drive it through my legs. That, drinking, talking. A great day. The day goes on, we buy water guns. They are only 1000 won each, and what better thing in life than water guns.
So we play with the water guns. Its not long until kids see us playing and they want to also. We are all still somewhat of a mystery to them. There are just so few white people, we are an attraction. Well, we get into one of the pools that has a lot of kids. We instantly become jungle gyms for these kids. They just flock to us. All of us are teachers, so we are used to being with and playing with kids. There were kids that spoke no English, some that spoke a few words, and some that could speak simple sentences. It was just so awesome. At one point, I had 4 kids wrapped around my legs, and I was walking with them holding on, and every step I took, I made a monster like noise. Picking them up and holding them high. Splashing with them. Pretending that they are super strong when they push you.
There is a genuine innocence/beauty of it. I can not imagine that anywhere in the US would it be socially acceptable for complete and random strangers to pick up children and play with them in a pool. There is so much of a state of fear that all adult men are out to hurt children. Some airlines have policies against men sitting with children that are not their own. It does not seem to really exist here. The parents were perfectly content with us playing with their children. It made them happy. It might be because the parents assume that we are all English teachers, so they know we have had background checks and these schools do not see us as a threat. Korea definitely has a culture of fear (google fan death), but for whatever reason, the playing with kids just doesn't seem to be. There are playgrounds in NYC that say if you do not have a kid in the park, you cannot be there.
There was one cute little girl... we filled a water gun with soju (cause when is shooting alcohol in you mouth a bad idea). She was so concerned. She did not know what it was, but she knew it smelled bad. She looked and pointed to the gun. She pinched her nose and made the no sign (making an X with your arms) and shook her head. She was so concerned. She tried to unscrew the tank and throw it out. I would have let her, but one of our members did not want to. It was just so funny how concerned she was. Anytime one of us touched it, she warned us.
We decided to go to Hongdae for dinner. On the way to the subway stop, we got some 번데기 (Beondegi). It is a traditional Korean snack. It is silkworm pupae. Not delicious, not bad. It would have been much better if it had been spicy or if I had ranch dressing with it. Probably not something I'd get again (Corndogs are the same price) but I would not reject an offer to eat them.
I love the perspective on this shot.
Photo taken by Taylor. This pic is of my splashing Hudson. I am including this pic so you can see what this water place was like.
We at BBQ in Hongdae and there was drama. Words were said. More than half of the group left. It was just some dumb drunken argument. I was at the other end of the table so I am not sure what exactly was going on. Anyway, I told the people that were leaving that I was not taking sides, I just wanted to keep eating. This was completely acceptable, and they thought it was funny. Needless to say I got my fill of food. Those of us that stayed, finished eating. We headed to the park because that is where everybody was. The offending party apologized and took each person aside to personally apologize. Needless to say we were all back hanging together quickly. Our group has a couple of people with very strong opinions and personalities. Sometimes drinking together and spending a day in the sun... well it can make for heated debates. Luckily I am never in the middle. I am far more confrontational (not in a mean sense) sober (anybody that has debated me regarding politics knows this). There are very few people that I will get into heated debates with when drinking, but when we do, it is always a mutually respectful debate, we never resort to name calling. Some people just do not operate that way.
We eat Monster Pizza (actually good pizza) and all head home.
Sunday June 2nd.
Woke up early. The sun shining in my window I think did not want me to sleep much. I skyped with my family for a while. Met up with the crew. We ate a little, talked, and we played settlers. I won the first game, Rob won the second. It was good to finally be able to play that. We orderd McDonalds. I got the 1955 Burger (Bacon, onions, BBQ, Cheese, Tomato, Lettuce. It was a very chill day. Rob Sarah and I decide that we want to go watch the new Star Trek movie in 4D. Fantastic. Iron Man 3 was okay... this completely blew it out of the water. I would go see it again. I love Star Trek, and the moving chairs, the smells, the sounds gust make it great. 4D is cheesy but a lot of fun. Its like being in the movie. When Enterprise is flying the chairs move with it, explosions cause the chairs to jump, running through plants makes the theatre smell like plants, bursts of are when people shoot.
We walk home and run into Sam and his girlfriend. We get ice cream at the GS and all head our separate ways. I showered and decided to finish this continuing update. I used a dull blade to shave my head. I make that mistake more frequently than I would like... I am always like "I can get one more shave out of you" and then the blade says "lol, just try it."
I did not do laundry nor did I take my shirts to the dry cleaner to be cleaned. I will try...
This week is going to be a short one. It is a 3 day week (yay)! I am going to an FC Seoul (Soccer) game on Tuesday. Rob leaves Wednesday to fly back to the states for 2 weeks. Thursday and Friday we have off (I think Korean Memorial day is Thursday, so they are just making it a 4 day weekend at the school). I talked to Rob as we were walking home from the movie and I said something about making Erica in my Korea class laugh. He said he walked by on Thursday and saw her smiling. He said he had to do a double take when he saw it. That made me smile a little. Its those little things... Small victories... it may not seem like much, but it just makes me so happy.
Now it is time for bed...
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