The academic year has officially ended at KCTY. Things are changing around the school (especially for me), and I have yet to see whether the changes are good or not. They have moved my teaching desk from one side of the room to the other. They have also moved me from teaching the Kindergarten students to the Pre-school students. It's going to be more of a challenge, since I'm a little clueless about teaching kids. I can teach high school students, and I can show them the meaning behind the colors yellow and green in The Great Gatsby. It's been hard teaching 7yr olds though. I forget, they don't know how to stay in their seats, they can't differentiate things like past, present, and future tense that easily. I have to constantly remind myself how young they are. Which is a difficult task considering how old these kids seem. They are young, but under so much pressure that sometimes my little kindergarteners seem more like second graders.
Anyways, my little ones graduated today. It was a cute little ceremony held in our gym/library. In many ways I felt sad, they just leave with a hand wave, and little second thoughts. You prep them, teach them, love them, and in the end they all fly away to grow up. Did I have an impact in their lives? Did I prepare them enough? Did I teach them good life lessons? I have to hope that some of my work will be remembered. How many of you remember your Kindergarten teacher though? I have vague memories of doing puzzles in a corner at play time, but beyond that I have no idea what I learned in Kindergarten. Yet, it's such a crucial time for development. My little ones did leave me with copious amounts of hugs, smiles, and little love notes. Even if they don't remember me and the lessons I've taught them, I'll remember them and the joy they have brought me here.
My elementary kids didn't particularly care that they were leaving me. To be honest, I didn't mind seeing some of them go. I did have one student come up to me, and she whispered in my ear, "Teacher, I miss you so I want to cry." It melted my heart, and I asked her to give me a hug, but she left because she didn't want to cry. Moments like that let me know, I've done something right.
Today is in-service day. We get two spankin new teachers, who have no idea what they are in for. We lose two wonderful teachers who have been very kind to me, and I'm sad to see them go. Things are changing in the office, and for better or worse I'm gonna roll with the punches (I have to). At least I have tomorrow off, so I can enjoy a nice little mid-week break. I'll post pictures of my little graduates tomorrow, since I need to get ready for work now.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Sooooo I'm moving?
Now I'm not one to get angry easily. Those of you who know me know I'm easy going, and it takes a fair amount to rattle my cage. I have been tolerating 150 word/per student monthly comments, I have been dealing with the ten hour work days, but yesterday they told me I have to move into a new apartment. At least yesterday they told me I was moving into what would be a nicer bigger apartment - one with actual counter space, a lofted bedroom, and somewhat decent kitchen space. Today they told me I can't move into that apartment because a couple who just got here a month ago gets it. Even though I have gotten numerous speeches about how seniority takes precedence, it doesn't when it is not convenient for the school. I have three apartment choices. One apartment choice is worse than mine, one is nicer but smells like incense and cat, and the other one is one town over. Now, I've gotten used to administration shenanigans at work, but I am completely LIVID about them messing around with my home life. It's the one place I can take refuge away from work. Needless to say, I thought the picture above was an accurate depiction of how I'm feeling right now.
Monday, February 6, 2012
My Apologies
Hola!
I just reread my last post - holy crapola my grammar is bad. I just wanted to say sorry for that! I type fast and I hate editing, so...... there ya go.
Here's a fun picture I took on the subway one Sunday afternoon! Enjoy this bit of bromance :)
I just reread my last post - holy crapola my grammar is bad. I just wanted to say sorry for that! I type fast and I hate editing, so...... there ya go.
Here's a fun picture I took on the subway one Sunday afternoon! Enjoy this bit of bromance :)
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
It's SO COLD!!
I'm having a hard time writing because the draft through my window is so bad. It snowed like crazy today! It was beautiful, but freezing (literally)!
I had a short vacation last weekend, I went to hot springs out in the country, in a small town called Suanbo.
When we first arrived we decided to walk around and get to know the area a bit. We ended up walking down this street of venders. Old ahjimas (old ladies) sat in their booths waiting for someone to buy something. It's interesting, they sell the same thing in their booths. You would think to get better business you would go away from your competitors, not set up camp next to them. We were looking at some rather odd dried fruit, trying to figure out what it was, when the ahjima came out and handed us a sample. It tasted like a pumpkin and has seeds similar to a pumpkin, but it was definitely not a pumpkin. We're still not sure what kind of fruit it was. After we bought a bag of the fruit from her, another ahjima came out of a "restaurant". I put restaurant in quotes because it was a tent with tables in it. She had giant spoon full of white liquid and she just made us drink it. Not wanting to offend her, I drank some and turns out it was makali. It's a rice liquor that's lightly fizzy and milky in texture. Normally, I'm not it's biggest fan, but this was the best makali I've ever had. It was incredibly smooth and had an early, but sweet taste. Yum. Then she made us eat what I was pretty sure was acorn jelly, but it was slimy and a little sour and didn't leave a good taste in your mouth. After she spoon fed us more makali she asked us to come in her restaurant to try more. We weren't hungry then, but we told her (in body language since we didn't know Korean and she didn't know English) we would go back later. We didn't actually go back, the others were afraid the food wouldn't be clean enough for our constitutions. They might have been right, but I felt bad for not going back. We tried to pay her for the food she gave us, but she wouldn't take our money.
When you think hot springs, you think of natural pools of bubbling water set in the middle of a quiet picturesque natural scene - that's what I thought, too! Not in Korea. Here, they take water from natural hot springs and feed it into the saunas. My friends and me didn't want to go all that way to not sit in spring water, so we went anyways. The saunas here are interesting, they're separated by men and women, you strip down till you standing proud in what the good Lord gave ya. You strut around, wash your hair and go from warm pool, to burning hot pool, to hot steam room, to cold pool, to standing hot shower, to standing cold shower, back to the steam room with a cold towel, to sitting down shower, and back to the hot shower to once again wash your hair. Not everyone does it in that order, but I wanted to give you an idea of how many ways you can bath and relax naked in these places. My favorite pool was extremely hot, and almost too hot to sit in. However, it was outside which made the temperature much more tolerable. We were up on a hill and it was nighttime, so we got to see the city lights below while we were....yes, stark naked. I never thought seeing a beautiful view naked is just as nice (if not better) as seeing it clothed.
Later that night, we had my most favorite dinning experience I've had yet. We didn't know where to eat, but the boys wanted western style seating; we went into the closest one. It also had a picture of pheasant on the outside which is something we all wanted to try. Frank, Max, and I ordered a 50, 000 won (50$) pheasant special. First they brought out all the side dishes. There was maybe three kinds of kimchi (of course), radishes, some dried fish, some stringy mushroom type food that tasted like fish, and other odd dishes we tried, but were happy not to eat more of. Then they brought out pheasant shabu shabu. Shabu Shabu is delicious, it's a broth that you cook vegetables and meat in, right on the table. When you eat it with meat you let the meat sit in the broth for a bit so it cooks all the way through. I thought the same principle applied to pheasant - it didn't. The woman who helped run the restaurant came over and grabbed a piece of pheasant, swooshed in in the broth and said, "1,2,3..." dipped it in the sauce and fed it to me. It was cooked to medium rare perfection. The meat was so tender, and the dipping sauce (made of wasabi, sesame oil, onion, and soy sauce) created a combination of magic you can only taste yourself to understand. While we were finishing up the pheasant, they brought out a mystery meat (We couldn't determine what it was. It was a tiny ball, and had a cartilage-y texture and kind of purple gray in color.) that was cooked with garlic, carrots, and a few different types of peas. It wasn't my favorite, but it was pretty good. Then they brought out sweet and sour chicken and sashimi. The sashimi was delicious, it was cold and served with pears in a sweet, yet vinegary dressing on it. Then they brought out these horseradish noodles, that had chicken and cucumber mixed in. I'm not the biggest fan of horseradish, but I really enjoyed this dish. I think if I liked horseradish more, I would have loved it. Then they took away our Shabu Shabu and replaced with with red bulgogi. I got nervous, because even though my spice tolerance has gone up, food that is red almost always means certain pain and misery for my mouth. This bulgogi was almost sweet, I'm not sure where the red color was coming from, but that was possibly the best bulgogi I've ever had (sorry mom!). When we thought we were done, they brought out one more dish, soup. It had vegetables and what looked like the bone of our pheasant in it. It was spicy, but delicious. However, we were all so full we could only manage a small bowlful each. Kirsten didn't join in our mean because she has dietary restrictions (she only eats chicken and some fish out of the meats) had bean soup. When we ordered it the guy said, "No, very..." and he made the universal hand gesture for stinky. You know, when you plug your nose and wave your hand around. We said it would be fine, but he was not kidding. We dubbed the soup, stinky feet soup. Kirsten wasn't crazy about the taste, (and neither was I) but all of the soup managed to get eaten. It was an interesting food experience. We left very happy campers, and would have happily paid more for the meal. We waddled home we were so full of food.
The next day we went on a "hike". There was a national park nearby, and it's one of the least visited parks in the country. Since it was a national holiday no one was working at the parks, nor could we read the signs for trails. Finally, some hikers pointed up a hill and said, "That way, to the right." We followed their directions and ended up just walking in a straight line through thorns and sticky dead-ish flowers. It wasn't a trail, but we prevailed (though three of us were grumbling and complaining, myself included). Once we had enough of the thorns we walked back down the hill, found a traditional burial mound, took pictures of a lovely farm country view, and tried as best we could not to get scratched by the thorns.
After the hike we decided to go sledding since we still had a lot of the day left. We knew there was a ski resort nearby, and they usually have sledding there. We had a lot of fun, and after many races (in which I won) we went into a small snack shop for some warm drinks. There was a family there and they wanted their kids to practice English. They had cups of silkworms which they offered to us to try. I had always wanted to try one. I decided I couldn't leave Asia without having at least ingested a few insects. It's not the complete insect, it's just the pupa of it, but it was gross. You take a bite and juice squirts in your mouth. Overall, it's not pleasant in either texture or taste. After we spoke for a little while we raced the kids down the hill (I still won most of the races haha!) and took a picture with the family.
After being cold for those few hours, we decided to warm up in the sauna in our hotel. They have these ahjimas there that (for a small fee) will scrub all the dead skin off your body. I heard good things about it, so Kirsten and I gave it a try. The women that scrub you are very intimidating, they are very strong from scrubbing using their muscles all day and they're also pretty much naked, too. Kirsten's ahjima had on a sheer bra and wrap around her waist. My ahjima had no bra and a sheer wrap around her waist. Then they take a small rough towel, put some soap on it and go to town. They scrub everywhere (minus the important crevices). You would think it's invasive or uncomfortable, but it's actually very relaxing. At first it was a but unsettling, not because a half-naked middle-aged woman was scrubbing me from head to toe, but because I had so much dead skin- I was embarrassed. The dead skin was coming off in little gray balls, but I didn't feel as bad about it when I realized Kirsten had just as much dead skin coming off as me. After they scrub your body with a towel, they rinse you off with warm water, and clean you with some soap. The soap is on this big luscious luffa and feels so soothing after having dead skin scrapped off you. When she put the soap on she gave me two slaps on each thigh, and two soft punches to the arches of my feet. Turned me over put the soap on gave me two slaps right under the butt cheeks and again lightly punched my foot. She rinsed me off, said thank you and that was that. I have no idea what the slaps were for, they did it to Kirsten, too. My skin has never felt better. It's been a week and my skin is still baby soft. If you ever go to Korea, it's definitely worth the experience.
That night we had a basic dinner (bibimbop and bulgogi) and decided to rest and play some cards. After the sauna I wasn't feeling great, and towards the end of our game of hearts I threw up. Kirsten said I was the most graceful puker she's ever seen. I quietly got up, didn't make noise other than the sound of water hitting water, and came back out to finish the card game. I felt better after getting it out, but still didn't feel great - so I didn't stay for a second game. The next morning we went home. I sat in my apartment for about one hour before my friend asked if I wanted to go out. Knowing I still had one more day of freedom, I couldn't decline. We went for a few drinks, and then enjoyed some norebong (korean style karaoke). I stayed at her house because the subways were down and taxi's were expensive. They had some left over holiday food, which I loved eating. We has rice cake soup, korean pancake, bulgogi, kimchi, stir-fry, and chopche. It was the perfect ending to the most interesting Korean experience filled weekend.
Here's a link to some of the pictures from the weekend. There are also some pictures of friends and my students. No sauna pictures! I know you're all sad I didn't take any.
Click HERE
I had a short vacation last weekend, I went to hot springs out in the country, in a small town called Suanbo.
When we first arrived we decided to walk around and get to know the area a bit. We ended up walking down this street of venders. Old ahjimas (old ladies) sat in their booths waiting for someone to buy something. It's interesting, they sell the same thing in their booths. You would think to get better business you would go away from your competitors, not set up camp next to them. We were looking at some rather odd dried fruit, trying to figure out what it was, when the ahjima came out and handed us a sample. It tasted like a pumpkin and has seeds similar to a pumpkin, but it was definitely not a pumpkin. We're still not sure what kind of fruit it was. After we bought a bag of the fruit from her, another ahjima came out of a "restaurant". I put restaurant in quotes because it was a tent with tables in it. She had giant spoon full of white liquid and she just made us drink it. Not wanting to offend her, I drank some and turns out it was makali. It's a rice liquor that's lightly fizzy and milky in texture. Normally, I'm not it's biggest fan, but this was the best makali I've ever had. It was incredibly smooth and had an early, but sweet taste. Yum. Then she made us eat what I was pretty sure was acorn jelly, but it was slimy and a little sour and didn't leave a good taste in your mouth. After she spoon fed us more makali she asked us to come in her restaurant to try more. We weren't hungry then, but we told her (in body language since we didn't know Korean and she didn't know English) we would go back later. We didn't actually go back, the others were afraid the food wouldn't be clean enough for our constitutions. They might have been right, but I felt bad for not going back. We tried to pay her for the food she gave us, but she wouldn't take our money.
When you think hot springs, you think of natural pools of bubbling water set in the middle of a quiet picturesque natural scene - that's what I thought, too! Not in Korea. Here, they take water from natural hot springs and feed it into the saunas. My friends and me didn't want to go all that way to not sit in spring water, so we went anyways. The saunas here are interesting, they're separated by men and women, you strip down till you standing proud in what the good Lord gave ya. You strut around, wash your hair and go from warm pool, to burning hot pool, to hot steam room, to cold pool, to standing hot shower, to standing cold shower, back to the steam room with a cold towel, to sitting down shower, and back to the hot shower to once again wash your hair. Not everyone does it in that order, but I wanted to give you an idea of how many ways you can bath and relax naked in these places. My favorite pool was extremely hot, and almost too hot to sit in. However, it was outside which made the temperature much more tolerable. We were up on a hill and it was nighttime, so we got to see the city lights below while we were....yes, stark naked. I never thought seeing a beautiful view naked is just as nice (if not better) as seeing it clothed.
Later that night, we had my most favorite dinning experience I've had yet. We didn't know where to eat, but the boys wanted western style seating; we went into the closest one. It also had a picture of pheasant on the outside which is something we all wanted to try. Frank, Max, and I ordered a 50, 000 won (50$) pheasant special. First they brought out all the side dishes. There was maybe three kinds of kimchi (of course), radishes, some dried fish, some stringy mushroom type food that tasted like fish, and other odd dishes we tried, but were happy not to eat more of. Then they brought out pheasant shabu shabu. Shabu Shabu is delicious, it's a broth that you cook vegetables and meat in, right on the table. When you eat it with meat you let the meat sit in the broth for a bit so it cooks all the way through. I thought the same principle applied to pheasant - it didn't. The woman who helped run the restaurant came over and grabbed a piece of pheasant, swooshed in in the broth and said, "1,2,3..." dipped it in the sauce and fed it to me. It was cooked to medium rare perfection. The meat was so tender, and the dipping sauce (made of wasabi, sesame oil, onion, and soy sauce) created a combination of magic you can only taste yourself to understand. While we were finishing up the pheasant, they brought out a mystery meat (We couldn't determine what it was. It was a tiny ball, and had a cartilage-y texture and kind of purple gray in color.) that was cooked with garlic, carrots, and a few different types of peas. It wasn't my favorite, but it was pretty good. Then they brought out sweet and sour chicken and sashimi. The sashimi was delicious, it was cold and served with pears in a sweet, yet vinegary dressing on it. Then they brought out these horseradish noodles, that had chicken and cucumber mixed in. I'm not the biggest fan of horseradish, but I really enjoyed this dish. I think if I liked horseradish more, I would have loved it. Then they took away our Shabu Shabu and replaced with with red bulgogi. I got nervous, because even though my spice tolerance has gone up, food that is red almost always means certain pain and misery for my mouth. This bulgogi was almost sweet, I'm not sure where the red color was coming from, but that was possibly the best bulgogi I've ever had (sorry mom!). When we thought we were done, they brought out one more dish, soup. It had vegetables and what looked like the bone of our pheasant in it. It was spicy, but delicious. However, we were all so full we could only manage a small bowlful each. Kirsten didn't join in our mean because she has dietary restrictions (she only eats chicken and some fish out of the meats) had bean soup. When we ordered it the guy said, "No, very..." and he made the universal hand gesture for stinky. You know, when you plug your nose and wave your hand around. We said it would be fine, but he was not kidding. We dubbed the soup, stinky feet soup. Kirsten wasn't crazy about the taste, (and neither was I) but all of the soup managed to get eaten. It was an interesting food experience. We left very happy campers, and would have happily paid more for the meal. We waddled home we were so full of food.
The next day we went on a "hike". There was a national park nearby, and it's one of the least visited parks in the country. Since it was a national holiday no one was working at the parks, nor could we read the signs for trails. Finally, some hikers pointed up a hill and said, "That way, to the right." We followed their directions and ended up just walking in a straight line through thorns and sticky dead-ish flowers. It wasn't a trail, but we prevailed (though three of us were grumbling and complaining, myself included). Once we had enough of the thorns we walked back down the hill, found a traditional burial mound, took pictures of a lovely farm country view, and tried as best we could not to get scratched by the thorns.
After the hike we decided to go sledding since we still had a lot of the day left. We knew there was a ski resort nearby, and they usually have sledding there. We had a lot of fun, and after many races (in which I won) we went into a small snack shop for some warm drinks. There was a family there and they wanted their kids to practice English. They had cups of silkworms which they offered to us to try. I had always wanted to try one. I decided I couldn't leave Asia without having at least ingested a few insects. It's not the complete insect, it's just the pupa of it, but it was gross. You take a bite and juice squirts in your mouth. Overall, it's not pleasant in either texture or taste. After we spoke for a little while we raced the kids down the hill (I still won most of the races haha!) and took a picture with the family.
After being cold for those few hours, we decided to warm up in the sauna in our hotel. They have these ahjimas there that (for a small fee) will scrub all the dead skin off your body. I heard good things about it, so Kirsten and I gave it a try. The women that scrub you are very intimidating, they are very strong from scrubbing using their muscles all day and they're also pretty much naked, too. Kirsten's ahjima had on a sheer bra and wrap around her waist. My ahjima had no bra and a sheer wrap around her waist. Then they take a small rough towel, put some soap on it and go to town. They scrub everywhere (minus the important crevices). You would think it's invasive or uncomfortable, but it's actually very relaxing. At first it was a but unsettling, not because a half-naked middle-aged woman was scrubbing me from head to toe, but because I had so much dead skin- I was embarrassed. The dead skin was coming off in little gray balls, but I didn't feel as bad about it when I realized Kirsten had just as much dead skin coming off as me. After they scrub your body with a towel, they rinse you off with warm water, and clean you with some soap. The soap is on this big luscious luffa and feels so soothing after having dead skin scrapped off you. When she put the soap on she gave me two slaps on each thigh, and two soft punches to the arches of my feet. Turned me over put the soap on gave me two slaps right under the butt cheeks and again lightly punched my foot. She rinsed me off, said thank you and that was that. I have no idea what the slaps were for, they did it to Kirsten, too. My skin has never felt better. It's been a week and my skin is still baby soft. If you ever go to Korea, it's definitely worth the experience.
That night we had a basic dinner (bibimbop and bulgogi) and decided to rest and play some cards. After the sauna I wasn't feeling great, and towards the end of our game of hearts I threw up. Kirsten said I was the most graceful puker she's ever seen. I quietly got up, didn't make noise other than the sound of water hitting water, and came back out to finish the card game. I felt better after getting it out, but still didn't feel great - so I didn't stay for a second game. The next morning we went home. I sat in my apartment for about one hour before my friend asked if I wanted to go out. Knowing I still had one more day of freedom, I couldn't decline. We went for a few drinks, and then enjoyed some norebong (korean style karaoke). I stayed at her house because the subways were down and taxi's were expensive. They had some left over holiday food, which I loved eating. We has rice cake soup, korean pancake, bulgogi, kimchi, stir-fry, and chopche. It was the perfect ending to the most interesting Korean experience filled weekend.
Here's a link to some of the pictures from the weekend. There are also some pictures of friends and my students. No sauna pictures! I know you're all sad I didn't take any.
Click HERE
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Video post
This is my first attempt at a video post. Also, I forgot at the end of the video that I mentioned my new years resolution thing, so forgive me on the repetition. Okay, let's see if this works...
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
The Countdown
The countdown has begun! About 38 more hours till I get to see my Dad, a week and a half till I get to see my family, and 9 more months till my contract ends. I'm mostly excited about the first two, although with all the drama going on at work it's hard not to be excited about the prospect of this job being over.
I had a co-worker trying to leave our job because she found one with better hours with about the same amount of pay. After she gave them her 30 day notice, for about three weeks our school was very elusive about letting her leave. They finally told her they wouldn't give her a letter of release to work for another school. They had no trouble letting another teacher go, but because my friend does her job very well they can't let her leave easily. After a long battle, they told her no matter what she does, they will not give her a release letter, so now her only option is to go back home to find a new job. She even decided to stay and travel for a bit, but because she needs to get a visa to go to Thailand from our Embassy she would need to take a day off work. My school wouldn't even let her do that. She's leaving two days early now. All of this could have been resolved peacefully if they just gave her a letter of release and treated her with some respect. Alas working at a hagwon is like working at a factory. We're machines designed to produce English speaking robots of children. We're a business, not a school.
There are somethings about this country and the people here that I love. There are things I recognize here as being in my own blood. Things like, the tenaciousness of the people. You will rarely see beggars here because people will do anything to make ends meet. Old women will sit on the streets and sell vegetables and hand stitched purses for such a low price just so they can survive. This country is made of survivors, and so is my family. Even if you see a beggar, they will cover their faces because it's a shameful thing. People here can be extremely prideful, generous, and stubborn. Life here moves lightning quick, everything is done quickly and efficiently (not unlike a few family members I know). I love those things about myself, about my family, and about this country. However, when you work in a place like I do, it's easy to see the negatives about where I am.
My school treats us kind of like horses. They ride us really hard, they give us a place to sleep, they pay us so we can eat our hay, but in the end we're animals. We're not respected for the hard work we do, and when we're tired they give us more work. We're expected to be good workers. We can be the best worker, but when we ask for some freedom, or wonder why they operate a certain way we're punished. I work at a factory, not a school.
That's not to say I don't love my students. They're the best part of my job, if I wasn't working with them, I have no idea how I would get through my day. I love that I get to be in a new place, and experience this new culture. I just didn't realize it would be so hard. I know my mom warned me about the hagwon life, and I probably should have listened a little more carefully. Even still, I feel like I'm supposed to be here. A lot of these students are worked to the bone. I try to give them a break by playing games with them, showing them that I care about them, and letting them know that it's okay to rest. Yeah, I let my students nap in class (sometimes I nap, too). My employers don't know about that one, so hopefully I won't get in trouble for that. The Korean life is hard.
I had a co-worker trying to leave our job because she found one with better hours with about the same amount of pay. After she gave them her 30 day notice, for about three weeks our school was very elusive about letting her leave. They finally told her they wouldn't give her a letter of release to work for another school. They had no trouble letting another teacher go, but because my friend does her job very well they can't let her leave easily. After a long battle, they told her no matter what she does, they will not give her a release letter, so now her only option is to go back home to find a new job. She even decided to stay and travel for a bit, but because she needs to get a visa to go to Thailand from our Embassy she would need to take a day off work. My school wouldn't even let her do that. She's leaving two days early now. All of this could have been resolved peacefully if they just gave her a letter of release and treated her with some respect. Alas working at a hagwon is like working at a factory. We're machines designed to produce English speaking robots of children. We're a business, not a school.
There are somethings about this country and the people here that I love. There are things I recognize here as being in my own blood. Things like, the tenaciousness of the people. You will rarely see beggars here because people will do anything to make ends meet. Old women will sit on the streets and sell vegetables and hand stitched purses for such a low price just so they can survive. This country is made of survivors, and so is my family. Even if you see a beggar, they will cover their faces because it's a shameful thing. People here can be extremely prideful, generous, and stubborn. Life here moves lightning quick, everything is done quickly and efficiently (not unlike a few family members I know). I love those things about myself, about my family, and about this country. However, when you work in a place like I do, it's easy to see the negatives about where I am.
My school treats us kind of like horses. They ride us really hard, they give us a place to sleep, they pay us so we can eat our hay, but in the end we're animals. We're not respected for the hard work we do, and when we're tired they give us more work. We're expected to be good workers. We can be the best worker, but when we ask for some freedom, or wonder why they operate a certain way we're punished. I work at a factory, not a school.
That's not to say I don't love my students. They're the best part of my job, if I wasn't working with them, I have no idea how I would get through my day. I love that I get to be in a new place, and experience this new culture. I just didn't realize it would be so hard. I know my mom warned me about the hagwon life, and I probably should have listened a little more carefully. Even still, I feel like I'm supposed to be here. A lot of these students are worked to the bone. I try to give them a break by playing games with them, showing them that I care about them, and letting them know that it's okay to rest. Yeah, I let my students nap in class (sometimes I nap, too). My employers don't know about that one, so hopefully I won't get in trouble for that. The Korean life is hard.
Friday, December 2, 2011
Christmas is almost here!
Sorry for the delay in an update! My computer sorta crashed and isn't working quite right. Plus not much has changed since I got my wallet back. I still work the same hours, I teach the same children, and I hang out with the same people. I've fallen into a steady routine, which isn't a bad thing, but I'm getting bored. I need to go somewhere haven't been, and do something I haven't done! It's hard when you don't have the time. I'm so excited to go home and see everyone. It was nice to see everyone via Skype on Thanksgiving, but it made me miss home more.
Our school went on a field trip to this children's learning center. It was pretty neat; they had a room dedicated to water and the Han River, a room dedicated to the body, and a room dedicated to Korean culture. I think I was having more fun than my students. I took a lot of pictures, and I would love to show you guys, but sadly I can't upload pictures to my computer right now :(
I'm planning to get a new computer soon, so hopefully I can load more picture up here for you all. I'll try to be more vigilant with my posts, but no promises. Maybe my new year's resolution will be to write more on here.
Our school went on a field trip to this children's learning center. It was pretty neat; they had a room dedicated to water and the Han River, a room dedicated to the body, and a room dedicated to Korean culture. I think I was having more fun than my students. I took a lot of pictures, and I would love to show you guys, but sadly I can't upload pictures to my computer right now :(
I'm planning to get a new computer soon, so hopefully I can load more picture up here for you all. I'll try to be more vigilant with my posts, but no promises. Maybe my new year's resolution will be to write more on here.
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