Team Crazy aka My Students

So I finally had my first trip outside of Daejeon!  Last weekend, a few friends and I went to the beautiful island of Namhae to stay at a pension and enjoy life in a small village next to the beach.  We took a two hour bus on Saturday morning from Daejeon to Jinju, and then we took an hour long cab ride to the Namhae Island.  The island is the third largest island in Korea, so most of the cab ride was just driving through the island.  Along the way, we saw an America town with the gaudiest Statue of Liberty and a bald eagle flying into the sky.  AMURICA.

Part of the beautiful island of Namhae.  The village we stayed in was full of garlic fields.

It was pouring buckets of rain, so you could imagine how hectic it was since we were lost in the village for 45 minutes.  I idiotically only packed one pair of flats, so I immediately had to take my shoes off since water was ankle deep as we walked down the steep slope to the village.  It was actually pretty fun to run around barefoot in the rain though!  After getting help from an ahjumma, we finally found the pension.  The pension had a mini kitchen, bathroom, folding floor table, then multiple blankets and pillows (I was finally going to sleep the traditional Korean style!), and a porch with a gorgeous view of the ocean.  Luckily for us, the rain slowed to a sprinkle so we could all go out to the beach.

This picture doesn't even give it justice with how hard it was raining!

One of our pension rooms.

The pension had a little stove and dishes, so we were able to cook our own food!

Our porch and the gorgeous view outside.  I believe it was overlooking a garlic field.

At some point near sunset, the girls decided we’d go to the pebble beach.  It was about a 20 minute walk up and downhill to get there, but seeing the sunset on the beach was worth the work.  Along the walk down, we saw a few empty barracks from where the Korean army would spy on Japan (which I heard you can see on a sunny day).  There was also this sketch huge (portable room sized) rectangular thing sitting on the beach with a black tarp over it.  Part of me was a little worried someone was going to come running out of the menacing box to come attack us while we were walking back up in the dark.  Right before we left, I was standing in the water and dipping my toes when my sandal came off!  We frantically looked in the water for it, but it was too dark and the waves were too rough for us to find it.  Fantastic.  I ended up walking back up the muddy hill with only one sandal.  My saving grace was that the ground was muddy from the rain, so the long walk wasn’t too brutal.

The coffee shop right next to our pension.

Everyone enjoying a game of Frisbee before setting out for the beach.

The phone number for our pension.  I feel like I'll need that in the future!

Namhae is so hilly and green!

I wish we could have stayed in Namhae for more than a day!  The next day was absolutely gorgeous, but we weren’t able to fully enjoy it because we had to leave to get a train back to Daejeon.  While exploring the village, I met the most adorable and friendly guard dog.  He was so excited to see me!  I really wanted to knock on the door and ask the ahjumma if I could take him for a walk.  Obviously, I did not because that would have been creepy.  I definitely want to go back to Namhae again.  There will be an Octoberfest in their Germantown on Namhae this year, so maybe we can go back for that.

What a beautiful view!

This hill was crazy steep.  Most of us had sore calves the next two days.

A view of the entire village.

This week, I got my alien registration card, so I was finally able to set up a bank account and get a phone!  I decided to use Shinhwa bank because everyone spoke English there and they’re very close to my apartment (right next to the gym I work out at, so across the street).  I walked into Kb bank before I went to Shinhwa, but I was very overwhelmed.  There were too many people there, and I needed to get a ticket, but I had no idea where to get one, so I just decided to peace out of there.  When I was in Shinhwa, I was able to get my bank card right while I was there!  Afterwards, I met Yeji at one of the many phone stores on my block so I could finally get a phone.  I really didn’t want a Samsung because everyone has them (hipster alert), so I got a Vega instead.  It’s so pretty!

What my beautiful new phone looks like.

As for school, I love being able to start at 2.30!  It feels strange to basically start my work day at 4 (when my first class is), but I think I’m more energized and happy now that I’m starting later.  I’m finally getting the hang of things, but also simultaneously realizing there are many things I should have been doing with each class that I haven’t been doing.  Apparently, the students should have been doing rewrites of all their summaries (even though it’s assigned every week in their online homework).  My director informed me one of my classes had none of theirs done, so I had to frantically assign the kids to do all their semester’s rewrites the last week of class.  That move earned me my first complaint from a parent (I assigned too much homework).  I felt horrible that the kids felt overloaded, so that’s something I’ll definitely remember to be on top of in the future.

On the other hand, this week was the last week of their semester.  I’ve been able to get control (for the most part) of all my classes but one.  I honestly don’t mind when the kids are noisy and messing around during class, as long as they do their work.  They’re at school for so long in the first place, they should at least have a little fun with their friends while doing it!  We got our new schedules for the September semester and all my classes are new, except for one.  I’m going to be teaching the class that I’ve been having the most difficulties with AGAIN, which really makes me want to bang my head against the wall.  I really don’t have any idea what to do with that class.  The kids that are the most frustrating are three boys who always talk during class and are RUDE.  There’s also two other boys who don’t do their work and are really rude when they sit together.  I think I’m going to have to do assigned seating of boy-girl to cut down the chatter.  As for my other classes, I hear nothing but amazing things from the other teachers about their classes being their favorite class of the semester.  I’m also teaching my favorite class from intensives –they’re the ones that love learning and learned over 40 American states!

For the last few days of classes, I bought croissants for everyone in each class (maybe 90 kids?), then we played Pictionary with the categories: animals, foods, places, and verbs.  In one of my classes, some kids decided they wanted their team name to be Team Crazy.  I wanted to tell them "you all are on team crazy".  The kids really loved playing the cards, and it was hilarious seeing some of their drawings.  When Nadia and I made the Pictionary set together, we threw in some tough words like “tyrannosaurus rex” and “kimchi”.  It was amusing seeing the kids’ reactions when they would pick the cards and have no idea how to draw it.  The only class I couldn’t play games with was my difficult class because we still had work to do.  I really think I made a mistake spending the rest of my money to bring them croissants because after I passed them out, one of the kids said, “Bread.  That’s it?”  It honestly hurt my feelings that I can’t even be nice to that class without half the class (aka the boys of the class) taking advantage of it and crushing my soul.  If they don’t cut it out, they’re about to see the scary soul-crushing side of me next semester.

Essentially my response when the kids in my trouble class complain about actually having to do work.

Friday morning, Yeji and I met at the train station at 8.00 so we could get tickets for Chuseok (three weeks away).  The line opened at 2.00, but we heard about the long lines and how some of the trains were already sold out.  We were a little freaked out, so we wanted to be first in line!  We got there and literally nobody else was there until three hours later.  Once the line had started, the guy told Yeji “you’re first!” since we had been there for a thousand years already (we’re overachievers).  I had to leave for work before they actually opened ticket sales, but Yeji stayed and got us seats (yay no standing) on the train we wanted to go on.  We were so lucky!  I was really appreciative of Yeji for staying there the entire time as well, since I was only there half of that time.

Waiting at the train station!  Old Korean men kept coming up to me to ask me where I was from and why I was sitting there.

After work, I went with some people to this Italian restaurant called Dino’s.  They were having a joint welcoming party with a bar called Brick House aka awesome food and drink deals.  We paid 20,000 for dinner, and in return we got dinner there and unlimited drinks at the bar!  I met a few girls from the EPIK program at the bar (yay new friends!) and we danced the night away.  At one point all the expats dancing and some Korean guys came together and had a big dance circle.  Some of the guys did crazy breakdancing moves, which blew all of our minds.  I feel like generally the expats and Koreans don’t interact too much due to the language barrier or nerves, so I was really happy that we all came together despite our lack of common language ground.

Us at Brick House.  They obviously don't care about the new smoking laws because it was a wall of grey when we first walked in!!

Today I finally did the microteaching that I had been dreading.  I actually really enjoyed it!  Basically, most of the foreign teachers sat in a classroom while four of us went up and either did a mock lesson, or just discussed what we do.  The newest teacher (which isn’t me!) went first and we all got a big kick out of pretending to be like our students.  Basically it was full of us saying all the ridiculous things our students would normally say and seeing how she handled the situation (“Teacher! Teacher! He said bad word!!  He said bad word! Teacher detention!!”).  The rest of the microteachings were just discussions on how each teacher did their lesson and their ideas to improve lessons.  It was extremely helpful to have essentially a two hour long discussion about everyone’s teaching philosophy or how to overcome the common problems we face while teaching our lessons.  I had my laptop with me, so I was able to take two pages of notes that I think will really help me improve the students’ understanding next semester.  Since the microteaching was so productive, I didn’t really mind coming in for a few hours on a Saturday.

Tonight I’ll be going with some friends to a few teacher welcoming parties put on by the two expat bars in Daejeon.  I’m hoping that I’ll meet lots of fun people tonight!

Birthday Orphanage Fun

I think that half the classes that are totally nutso are my favorite to teach.  I generally don’t care that much if the students joke around and talk a bit, as long as they are doing their work.  They also tend to be pretty respectful when I tell them to stop talking or focus.  There are some classes though where the kids are chatty and rude. 

Among some of my fun school stories, one of my classes keeps asking me if I have had a boyfriend, so I told them never ever.  The other day, one of the girls found out I have had a boyfriend before, and she said, "Teacher! I thought you said you didn't have boyfriend!" so I told her "Yeah, because I have five thousand.  It's hard keeping track of them all."

She looked at me very sternly and said, "Teacher, you're a bad person."  Good thing I have a great poker face with kids because I was dying with laughter on the inside.  I’m not quite sure if she believed me or not, since the Korean culture isn’t centered around sarcasm like the US is.

My newly arranged room.  It looks like I use the space more this way!

Friday night my friend Hogun came from Daegu for my birthday festivities.  Saturday morning, we headed out with Lauren to pick up a blender, get a new purse for me, get my ear pierced, and then volunteer at an orphanage with some other people.

The underground shopping center.

One of the things I love about shopping here is the underground shopping mall.  It’s basically hundreds of small stores for anything like makeup, shoes, clothes, or accessories.  I was able to get a smallish cute purse there for only 10,000 won (about $10).  I tried to buy some earrings at a shop too.  I put them in only to realize later that despite it being allergy-free, it was not so (or at least not enough for my ears).  The old town Daejeon is right above the shopping mall, so we didn’t have to go far to get my ear pierced.  The piercing process went really quickly.  I thought the woman was just cleaning my ear, but then suddenly there was a pinch in my ear.  I’m pretty sure I let out a noise that sounded a little like “HURMHPGLGH”.  I was very surprised because she pierced my ear using a needle instead of a needle gun like I’ve always had before.  I feel like it was much less painful than the other time I’ve had it done though.

Gettin my ear pierced!

Afterwards we went to an awesome Japanese restaurant.  The pay machine was very intriguing as well!  It reminded me of my occasional late night Jack in the Box runs in college.  I loved the menus because they had pictures of exactly what was in each dish.  It made it much easier for me as a pescatarian –I wish more restaurants did that!

The awesome menu layout.

The cool machine for paying.  Maybe I'll encounter these a lot in Japan too!

We met up with the group of volunteers in Daedang station, then set out for the orphanage.  The sight of the orphanage baffled me.  Not because it was rundown or anything, but because I had a dream about it maybe five or six years ago.  The only difference was it was a senior center that I was singing at in my dream.  Either way, it had my heart racing before I even stepped through the door. 

The orphanage from the outside.

Playing with the kids was so much fun.  There are around 40 kids that live there and their ages spanned from 6 months to 18.  Some of the kids don’t have parents and others have parents that are unable to support their kids due to sickness or financial reasons.  At the orphanage, kids are allowed to live their through university, which is really nice.  You can’t adopt kids at this orphanage, but you can donate money to financially support the kids in general or one specific child.  Maybe have some more money in a few months I’ll be able to donate some money.

Lauren and I did coloring with a few of the younger girls and boys in their library room while Hogun played outside with some of the kids.  It was very difficult because I couldn’t even ask them simple questions like “What’s your favorite color?” in Korean.  Nothing has inspired me to learn Korean quite like these kids have.  I want to go back every month with the group, so I hope I can talk more with them next time!  One of the Korean volunteers translated some things for me.  When she asked the boy what his favorite color was, he told her “I don’t have a favorite color because I love them all!   I don’t know which color to choose.”

Later, the boy gave me his picture as a gift.  I was so happy!  Lauren mainly spent time with the two year old in the group.  He was the cutest and happiest toddler I’ve ever seen.  He’d run around happily screaming as the kids played with him.  Everyone seems like such a close-knit family there.  I was happy to see how well everyone got along.  Age did not make a difference for the kids!

The boy's coloring picture for me.

My coloring picture. I couldn't get rid of it after spending so much time coloring it!

At one point, one of the eighteen year olds came over to me to watch me color and talk.  He didn’t speak any English, so I had my Korean phrasebook out and was frantically flipping through it to try to make sentences.  After a few hours of hanging out, everyone went outside to have hot dogs and hamburgers.  Everyone sat together on a few big blankets that were laid out and hungout.  Lauren and I joined the teenage guy we talked to earlier.  Sometimes I could understand what he was saying.  He asked me if I got surgery to get a double lid.  It was pretty amusing, so I asked him if he got the double lidded surgery (he hasn’t).

Some of the volunteers grilling it up.

Everyone eating all the food in the world.

The tall guy was my non-English speaking friend.  I hope I can learn Korean so I can talk to him and understand him next time!

After cleaning up, Lauren, Hogun and I headed back to the Itel to get ready for the night.  Hogun and I met up with Yeji for dinner at an Italian restaurant called BonBon.  Yeji thought I was drunk because I kept pronouncing it with a French accent… maybe I’ll never escape my French mindset!  The food and wine was quite delicious, although I realized halfway through the pizza that the crust reminded me of eating a croissant –buttery and flaky! After dinner, we went to the Cantina (expat bar) where we were meeting our friends for the birthday celebration.  They were having the Beer Olympics for charity which I got roped into it because there weren’t enough people.  The proceeds were also going to the orphanage, so I was psyched about that.  I was on a team of three people and we decided our name should be as American as possible (since we were representing America in the Olympics), so we chose Red, White and Beer.  The first game we played was beer pong, which we won!!  After that we played flip cup (we lost).  We ultimately ended up losing and Hogun’s team won the tournament.

Lookin cute!

Enjoying some dinner and wine at BonBon.

Enjoying a brief victory in beer pong.

Some of my friends enjoying the night.

Soon after the tournament ended, one of Yeji and Su-hyun’s friends Daniel performed for a few hours.  He is Korean, but he lived in England for five years so his English is impeccable!  I had “Blackbird” dedicated to me, which was very sweet.  I’ve never had someone performing dedicate a song to me, so I was very flattered (especially since he was such a good singer!).  It was my first birthday in Korea and I loved it.  I was a little sad that I wasn’t with my family though; it was the first time I didn’t have someone decorate my room with streamers and balloons while I slept!

The great band.  It was so fun to dance the night away!

My Sunday has been pretty uneventful, aside from seeing a movie tonight with my coworker and next door neighbor Lynne.  Snowpiercer is the coolest movie ever!  It’s by a Korean director, but all the cast except for two characters are English speaking.  It takes place in a train in a post-apocalyptic world.  Due to a global warming experiment, the world has become a snowy disaster.  On the train, there are big distinctions between social classes, which cause the lower class to riot for control.  It has a pretty sad, but hopeful ending.  It’s a definite must see for everyone!

Tomorrow I have my first day of regular classes, meaning I get to start at 2.30!  I haven’t decided what I should do yet with all my free time.  Maybe hit the gym?  Either way, I’m excited to get this shindig started!

Hello Kitty Adventures

So last weekend, my friend Changjoon came to visit me in Daejeon.  We set out to do some sightseeing, but it turns out there really isn’t much to do for sightseeing here.  Especially because it’s so hot in the summertime!  We tried going to EXPO Park, which is essentially an abandoned theme park that was built when the FIFA tournament was held in Daejeon.  There was a water park that was still open inside of EXPO Park, but that was really about it.  It was still fun to walk through the huge empty park.  Next, we went to a famous bakery in old downtown Daejeon.  We took a 15 minute cab ride over there, which was only about 9,000 won (very cheap)!  On our way to the bakery, I was convinced I left my camera in the taxi and promptly started freaking out.  About a minute later, I remembered it was in my dress pocket…how embarrassing.  We got to the bakery and it was a little overwhelming how many people were crammed into one bakery!  They had all the bread pastries throughout the shop, and you were able to fill up a box of goodies to take with you.  We ended up getting a few sweets and went back out to look for a café where we could have some drinks.  The Hello Kitty café came into sight and I immediately became wide eyed with excitement over the pinkness and loveliness that Hello Kitty embodies.  Changjoon asked me if I wanted to go there for drinks, and I said “oh no, we don’t have to. I’m sure you don’t want to”, which really meant “damn straight we’re going in there for drinks”.

Sung Sim Dang Bakery in old downtown Daejeon.

Only one of the islands of food in the bakery.  So many foods! :O

As I expected it was entirely pink and cutesy.  I don’t like coffee, so I couldn’t get any of the cool drinks where they draw Hello Kitty in the foam.  It was still a fun experience to go to either way! Afterwards, we went to a hoff in Dunsan (aka party central) for some beers and hung out there for most the night.  At one point, we went to another foreigner bar to play pool and promptly was destroyed in pool.  I need to just get a pool table in my apartment so I can practice I guess!  Maybe my favorite food/drinks place is called Wara Wara.  They have delicious dokkbokki and for their soju mixed drinks, they blend fruit and soju together.  So scrumptious!

My much needed fan fo' free!

The best soju blend I've ever had.  Pineapple and mago soju at Wara Wara is the best!

The next day, we went to a vegetarian buffet called the Machera Wellbeing Buffet.  It was actually not my idea to go, so it felt like a real treat!  I was a little anxious because some vegetarian restaurants give you the most disgusting things, which I think puts a bad name to vegetarian food. This place was very awesome though!  I definitely want to go back sometime soon.

The most delicious vegetarian restaurant.  Hopefully someone will want to go back with me soon?

Enjoying a ridiculously hot and humid day at the Prehistoric Park area.  Didn't turn out to be much, but still pretty!

Saturday night, I signed up for a gym right next to my work/apartment that’s right above the Burger King.  I like it for the most part, but they don’t have air conditioning!  I don’t know if I’ve ever sweat that much in my life.  I keep imagining how perfect this gym will be in the wintertime.

I had my long anticipated moment of moving into my new apartment on Sunday night.  It’s so nice and big!  I needed at least a couch to fill up some of the space, so I’m very thankful I got Debbie’s futon for free when she moved out this week.  I have everything put away for the most part, but my apartment still feels very bare. I’ve been to the grocery store twice, and have been living off instant rice with stir-fry veggies/tofu, noodles, and mushroom grilled cheese sandwiches.  Vegetables are pretty inexpensive for the most part, but fruit is crazy expensive!  A box of twelve peaches was 13,500 won.  Guess who’s not eating peaches?  Hint: it’s this girl right here.

A shot of my lovely apartment/my bold blinds.

My "new" lovely futon.  It's so lumpy to sit on!  If only I could restuff it

Can't complain about having lots of closet space.

My bathroom is a pretty nice size with a big shower!!  I love it.

Tuesday night I went out with Yeji and Su-hyun for some beers.  We stopped by a salon first so Su-hyun could get her hair cut first (at 10.30) and I was surprised that such a nice salon only charged 15,000 won!  Yeji and I talked a bit about our trip to Japan that’s quickly approaching.  I really want to take some tours in Osaka, Tokyo, and Kyoto, but they all seem very expensive.  Anyone know of some fun and cheap things to do in any of those places?

School is getting better and better, bit by bit.  I think most of the kids respect me, but there’s one class in particular that is so frustrating!  I want to have fun with them, but it’s impossible when half the boys in the class just act incredibly rude.  Unfortunately that class has turned into one of the boring ones where I’m stuck between a battle of wills with half the guys in the class, or dully going through the notes.

My response when the troublemaker kids sit together.

The week seems to go by so quickly though!  Already it was Thursday Girl’s Night, where some of the foreign teachers at my school bonded over wine in pizza (the best of bonding).  I was under the impression it was some sort of Pinterest night, so I came with my laptop completely loaded up with all the things I’ve been dying to make.  Guess that’ll just be saved for another time!  We ended up going to the Noraebang (karaoke room) around 2.30, then sang our hearts out till 4.00.  How is it so easy to waste so much time in there???

Somehow I was not dying on the classroom floor of exhaustion when I slid into class on Friday.  One of my favorite classes of the day is listening with one of our Flint 3 level classes.  It’s a class of 4 (2 guys and 2 girls), and they’re always such a joy to have!  Since they’re so studious, we always finish our work with plenty of time to spare.  The last few times we’ve played an ice cream game (if they can do the task, they all get ice cream) where they named states in America.  The first time we played, they couldn’t name twenty states, so I told them they might want to study up in case I choose states again.  Next time I came into class, they had all made state study guides and were excitedly shouting the states together.  In 15 minutes, they named thirty states!  This most recent time, they named forty-two states in fifteen minutes!!  I feel like many kids their age (grade 5) would not be able to do that in the US.  I love how eager they are to learn, and I hope they don’t lose that through the monotony that school can be here.

Friday night was another night of social and fun things.

One of my student's drawings of what animal she wants to be.

I had a girls’ night with Yeji, so we went to a few of the bars/restaurants in Dunsan.  I met some of her Korean friends, then a ton of new expats as well.  I knew Korea was a popular place to teach, but I never really had imagined I would see this many teachers without going to some kind of official event.  I really love the Korean nightlife because it’s timeless.  Before I came here, I had a definite hour of 2.00 where I needed to be home or I’d want to fall asleep wherever I was.  In Korea, it is no big deal if you stay out till 6.00 or 7.00.  It’s actually very easy to do because you’re always meeting new people, going to new areas, and (naturally) having lots of fun.  It definitely helps that I don’t have to be to class till 12.30 (soon to be 2.00 after this last week of intensives!)

Some of my coworkers at a hoff.

I’ve got one more week of going to work at 12.30, then I’ll have a lot more freedom with my day!  I heard there is a really nice farmer’s market where everyone buys their vegetables, so I’m hoping to go there sometime next week.  Today, I just got a futon for free from one of my coworkers who just left, but it is potentially the lumpiest thing to sit on.  I’m wondering if I could open it at the seams and add a lot of fluff to make it better…  Either way, I’m just happy because my apartment looks more lived in now, and definitely more colorful!

New Teacher Madness

Sunday was a pretty fun day.  I had worked up the courage to knock on Ben and his wife’s door to ask them if they wanted to go to Home Plus with me for a steamer, hairdryer, memory foam pillow, and the fattest mattress pad I could find.  It turns out in Daejeon the huge chain stores close down on the first and fourth Sunday to let smaller stores have some business, so it didn’t quite work according to plan.  We checked out a few bedding stores, but they were CRAZY expensive so I concluded it’d be best if I just order my bedding off G Market for cheaper.  I didn’t really find what I needed to find, but it was fun to walk around Time World (the main shopping area) to see all the cool stores.  On the bright side, I was able to find a cute rhino toothbrush holder and some cool Korean thank you postcards.  I actually have no idea what the postcards say, but they look cool and nobody I’m sending them to reads Korean anyways so it doesn’t really matter, does it?

The escalators in HomePlus are a little daunting when you're wearing heels!

Home Plus has everything!  This is just the level for food.  It's like a mega-SuperTargeet!

We went to one of the Indian restaurants in the downtown area, and it was an interesting experience.  The food was good, but I was very thrown off because I had never had a sweet Indian curry before.  This curry was a cheese log stuffed with nuts and spices, which sat in a sweet curry sauce.  Unfortunately, I feel like there’s no way of making that sound appetizing, but I promise it was pretty good.  I’m told the other restaurants in the area are different and even better, so I’m not quite sure what to make of the taste of Indian food in Korea yet.

It was really awesome having an outing with two experienced teachers who had worked in multiple schools.  I always hear so many positive things about Topia from the teachers, and I know they’re true because the hagwon has such a nice and positive environment!  It also sounds like the director (who I haven’t really talked to that much) is a very nice and hardworking man who does above and beyond for his job.  I got a lot of advice on how to run my classroom from the start, which definitely has already come in handy.  I think the most helpful advice was to be stricter than you want to be on the first month of school.  Kids really do try to test your limits when you’re starting out, which can be extremely frustrating!

A super cool looking entrance to a club in downtown.

The next morning, Ben ended up taking me to the hospital for my medical checks.  He speaks a bit of Korean, and he had just taken it himself, so it really sped up the process at the hospital.  It was a lot of waiting, and the paperwork would have been very daunting if I was alone because it was entirely in Korean.  I think the tests told me one thing though –I need a new pair of glasses!  I’ve known it for a while, but not being able to see every number on the sight test was new for me, and a bit daunting!  Luckily for me, in Korea I can go to the glasses store and have a test done for free if I buy some frames.

My only miserable, yet totally familiar problem was when the doctor tried to draw blood from my veins for the AIDS etc. test.  Apparently I was frustratingly tiny veins, because in the past few years every doctor has succumbed to slapping the shit out of my arm to try to coax a vein out.  The first doctor tried once in my arm, then once on my wrist (which sadly is bruised now), before she had to get another doctor.  All the while, I’m sitting there with my head bent away and my hand clutching my hair.  Not a fan of giving blood.  Fortunately for me, the second doctor was able to get the blood on the first try.  All in all, the hospital visit took about two hours, so I was glad I got there early at nine!

The sky is finally blue! It hasn't rained yet, but the sky has been gray all day every day.

It was my first day of starting to take on classes at Topia right after the doctor’s office.  I made a few notes in my lesson plan, and then taught the second class of the day which was debate class.  The twelve students in that class are all around fourth grade.  They’re all so high energy and fun!  I thought class went really well with the kids.  They really seemed to enjoy me as a teacher, which was a great relief.  I used popcorn reading in class, so I could better learn the kids’ names as well.  I think it worked really well because not only did they have fun with it, but it gave everyone the chance to read aloud.  I think my handwriting was the only big problem for the class.  I’d like to think I have nice handwriting, but I think it can be confusing because my S’s tend to look cursive.  It seemed like whenever I wrote I heard, “Teacher! Teacher! What does that say?”

I felt so happy and successful that I happily took on teaching another class for the day.  Unfortunately this class of sixth graders didn’t go so well.  Despite coming with a cheery attitude to the classroom, I feel like all I got were blank or sultry stares this time.  It was frustrating because I attempted to ask the kids about the comprehension answers for the homework, but nobody responded.  I don’t think I would have been frustrated if they had answered when I called on them, but they wouldn’t even do that.  They obviously wrote something down because I had checked their homework, so I wish they would have at least made an effort.  In the end, I had to direct them to the areas of the passage that we had previously highlighted and discussed.  On top of that, some of the kids were disruptive (trying to test my limits), so I already had to lay down the threat of separating them or giving them detentions.  I was really disappointed because I want to make class fun for them by adding games and fun activities.  I can’t really do that though if they continue resisting getting through the required material.  Some of the teachers gave me advice afterwards on how to deal with an entire class of kids with that attitude.  It seems like you really just have to push on through, don’t let them get you down, and continue encouraging them.  I really hope I will grow as a better teacher so the class will come to like me more in the future.  It’s a long stressful day for them, and they’re at an age where being right in front of your peers is everything –I guess I can’t say I blame them.

Some pics of the adorable postcards I got.  No idea what they say, but I love how cute they are!

Aside from those two main classes, I took on two listening classes.  These are extra courses on my schedule since we are following an intensive course for the next few weeks.  Pressing start and stop on the boombox, then going over the answers is really all I do in this class, so it’s actually a nice little break.  We were listening to some dialogue about using the internet, when one of the students said, “Teacher! Teacher! Can you imagine life without the internet?”

I explained to them that I had grown up in a time when a lot of people had just started using the internet, so I didn’t use it very much until I was a teenager.  I think they were surprised and a little impressed.  They told me, “I can imagine life without internet!  If no internet, then I don’t have to check for homework online.  No homework! I would watch many funny movies instead!”

I didn’t really have the heart to tell them that when I was young, teachers gave you homework by paper or in class instead, so there actually is no way escaping it.  We all had a good laugh with each other though while we talked about what they’d do without the internet.  Embracing moments of connection with the students like those are really important.  I think through my experiences like that, I was able to bond with the classes as a whole and better understand my students.

Currently, I’m trying to come up with some different versions of the ice cream game Connor has invented.  In his games, he’ll name a category (eg countries, animals under the sea, countries/foods, birds) and have a certain number (meaning they need to name that many of whatever is in the category).  The games are generally pretty hard for the kids since he’ll have a high number, but they really love them.  In the past, the kids in the class have won ice cream by naming fifty states, and damn they were good!  I was really blown away with how smart these kids are.  I don’t think even most Americans could name fifty states honestly.  I’ve come up with a few variations for that game that may (or may not) be fun.  The first one I came up with was maybe 20 of the most common English words (eg a, to, too, at).  I got the idea from the quiz site sporkle.com, so I think maybe I’ll look on there a bit to come up with some more ideas.  I would really love doing something like naming some Harry Potter characters (my favorite sporkle quiz), but I’m pretty sure they would not appreciate that one.  Any ideas?

My teaching day on Wednesday (my first day teaching all seven classes) went very well in my opinion.  I felt like sometimes, class was frightfully dull though.  I really need to work on making this stuff more entertaining for the kids and myself.  My classes were pretty well behaved for the most part, aside from two different kids who were undoubtedly trying to be as rude as possible.  They swiftly got detentions from Connor though.  I keep forgetting that I have the power of detentions, but I really do admit -there are times where they are unavoidable.

My room at the motel.  In a fit of annoyance, I replaced their old quilt with my new comforter and pillow.  No regrets there!

I have so much stuff!  good thing it's a big room.

Roomy bathroom with a sometimes warm shower.

Motel room's entryway for the shoes.

Wednesday night, a few people from work went to a hoff (beer hall) to celebrate Connor's leaving.  If you don't like beer before coming to Korea, I'll guarantee you'll get used to drinking it in Korea.  It's still not my favorite drink though, but it's much better than taking shots of soju!  I challenged one of the guys to a game of pool, thinking it would be fun and non-stressful.  Of course, I wound up in a bet -if I lost, I had to stay out with him until he went home (which would be undoubtedly late).  That was a fat FAT mistake.  For someone who hates to play pool, he sure did destroy me!  Luckily, I only had to stay out till four.

One of the really fun games all over the streets.  It seems like every time we go out, everyone pitches in so we can win something!

The next day, I met Connor, his girlfriend Su-hyun and her friend Yeji.  They showed me around the underground shopping center at the 중강로 (Jungang-no) station.  It was so huge!  In the underground shopping center, it's another extremely long path that has all types of small shops on either side. Most of them are clothes shops, but they also have bag shops, accessory shops, cellphone stores, food stands, and smaller specialty shops.  One of the things I love is whenever you shop at stores, they'll often give you freebies.  I can't even count how many makeup/body care freebies I've gotten!  I got a new pair of glasses for ￦ 30,000, which is crazy cheap!  They also had prescription color contacts lenses for anywhere from ￦ 5,000 -30,000, which Yeji and Su-hyun both got.

 Yeji, me, Su-hyun, and Connor in old downtown Daejeon

After the glasses store, we walked through a traditional market nearby, then went to old downtown Daejeon.  We went to an Italian restaurant called robosomething.  I decided to try a butternut squash spoon pizza, which ended up actually being a ginormous dish of melted cheese with chunks of cooked butternut squash.  I think I would have really enjoyed it if it had some crust or something.  It was a lot of cheese, even for me.  The food was all really delicious though!  Yeji told me she's wanted to go to Japan for a really long time, so we decided we should go to Japan together for our five day weekend in September during Korea's largest holiday -Chuseok.  Since it's such a big holiday, we have to book our tickets to get to the airport as soon as possible!  I'm so excited that I have plans to travel with someone.  I think it's going to be a lot of fun!  I think we want to go to Kyoto and Tokyo.  Any ideas what we should do in Japan?

 Some really cool electronic awning over downtown Daejeon.

My first Korean pizza and salad since being in Korea.

As for life outside of school, we’re having a four day weekend this week. Everyone is using this opportunity to travel to places like Hong Kong, Japan, or Jeju Island, which sounds super awesome. Nevertheless, I think I can have a lot of fun this weekend in Daejeon though.  My friend will be arriving from Seoul soon, so I think we can have a lot of fun exploring Daejeon together.  I just need to do some research, put my mind to it, and get out there!