Pics and Vids

Here's a video my friend Marisol put together from when we went to eat some octopus. We eat a couple tentacles while they're still squirming. My favorite part is before Mike puts a piece in his mouth the Korean lady is talking a lot and I say, "listen to the lady, Mike- she knows what she's talking about" and he replies, "what's she saying?!" and we all laugh cause it's not like any of us have any idea what she's talking about.

Here's me talking to my students in my youngest Kindergarten class. I love how John smells his pit.

I'm afraid one of my students might turn out to be a serial killer. He drew this when we were drawing pictures of our community:

It appears to be a building on fire and men in red helmets with guns. The student's name? Angel. As in Angel of Death.

Today we went to a park and the kindergartners learned about traffic safety. Then we had a picnic. It was a beautiful spring day and all around a nice day to be in Korea.

They got to drive cool go-carts and I was jealous. 

Me and my co-teacher Sonny with our Lily Class. 

My Daisy Class running out their energy. 

It was a good week :)

Teaching Tidings

It's been a month. Look, I have nothing to say. The job is the same. Kids come, kids go, kids say the occasional silly thing. I was pointing to one girls paper trying to get her to correct a mistake and she was just staring at my hair and started touching it till I slapped her hand and said "LOOK HERE!" while desperately tapping her paper. Kindergarten has it's ups and downs. When they're acting like maniacs it seems the class will never end and when they say, "hello Teacher how are you?" it makes my day brighter. I no longer have to yell in one of my elementary classes because when I start giving the evil eye they start to cover their ears and someone says, "uh-oh, Kimberly Teacher is going to yell..." So I now I only have to threaten to yell. Sometimes a class will be really great and the kids will learn a lot and it'll be fun. Then there are the classes where the kids are bored to tears and I can't seem to get through to them at all and they learn nothing. Today when I was explaining "is" and "are" there would be a sentence and Joyce would start reading, "Sheila and I" and I would say, "okay, how many people are there?" blank stares. "Sheila," I hold up one finger, "and I" I bring up another finger and look questioningly and Irene says, "...one?" This is while I'm holding two fingers practically in front of her face. This is not a cry for teaching advice, it's just a taste of what I have to work with sometimes.

This is Agato from one of my kindergarten classes. He's equally adorable and destructive.

Teaching is hard. It's the hardest job I've ever had. It's also the best job I've ever had. Time goes by quickly, some of my students call me "beautiful teacher," it has some perks. I work longer hours than most other foreign teachers (more than any I know, in fact) but my school has some good points to counter-balance that. My school pays me on time, the director knows who I am and has taken me out to dinner, we have pretty good resources and syllabi, and other good stuff. Other people are not so lucky where they work. My best friend here may be getting fired this week for doing nothing wrong, which royally screws him over since the country changed the law about working here so he can't just get a new job. I've met a lot of people who have issues getting paid or just being heard and I'm glad I don't have the same troubles. The longer hours are a drag but I tell myself it's worth it. Eh, it kind of is.

I visited some friends in Masan last weekend and we spent a day in Busan, which is a pretty harbor city. We explored the biggest mall in the world (saw the Guinness plaque and everything) and saw some art before going to the beach and eating "Mexican" food for dinner. The burrito was delicious.

Me and Nicole panarama in Busan

That's all I have for now. Plans? On Thursday I have dinner plans with my friend Marisol and on Friday I'm having drinks with my friend Steven before heading out to the city. Maybe a bowling league game on Saturday... who knows. Same old stuff here in Korea! All that's important is that I am still happy and healthy. Hooray!