Final Days at School

The last few days at work have been really great to say the least. It really has been a very good ending to a wild ride in Korea. I couldn't ask for a better send off. I will miss the kids and the people I worked with dearly. 

Minji (my co-teacher's daughter) and Chloe.

My girls! Stacey, Olivia, and Celine.

My director Sunny.

Dustin, he is cutting a rice cake which I will miss immensely in the states! Yum!

Hajun. The most annoying child ever, but look at that face. Hard to be mad long. 

Stacey and Dustin laughing. Too cute. 

Last day teaching. We did a little photo shoot of 'emotions'. This was supposed to be 'funny'.

Both of these little gems fit in my belt. Sad, sad, day. 

The love-birds of my class. Andy and Olivia. 

Love is in the air!

They're seriously going to get married. 

Rachel and me on our final good-bye.

Stacey and me. 

Here is the devil child himself, Nathan. It may look like I'm choking him, I swear I'm not. Just holding his head still for the camera. ;)

My co-teacher Monica! I will miss her a lot!

Here is a little video of Nathan, the devil child. Although he has extreme behavior and social problems, he is extremely smart. Go figure, eh? We were doing a worksheet on the letter 'H' and identifying the pictures that start with 'H'. It was actually pretty cute because he was saying 'hangaber' instead of 'hamburger', and my mom used to say 'hangaber's' when we were little. He also said 'hippopie' instead of 'hippopotamus'. It's extremely loud, so I apologize for the sound quality, but it is a typical day in the Fish Class. We even have some rock, paper, scissors going on in the background.

Teacher Monica

I have mentioned my co-teacher a few times in earlier posts, but now I think it's time to dedicate an entire blog post about her. She is truly, one of a kind.

First of all, she's Chinese. She speaks English okay, and she speaks Korean okay. But the point is, she's CHINESE. In a typical day in my class, the kids have no idea what I'm saying in English, Monica has no idea what the kids are saying in Korean, and nobody in the entire school has any idea what Monica is saying in her half English, half Korean, half Chinese abilities. (Three halves make a whole right???)

Even though nobody can understand her, she is extremely prepared when it comes to teaching materials. However, she hoards paper even worse than my dad. I'll come into the copy room to see her standing there with a giant stack of paper to her left, a giant stack to her right, and look down at the copier machine only to see it says '499 copies to go'. It's ridiculous. I think she just like to copies things to copy. Half of the time it has nothing to do with our kids, or what we are talking about in class that month. But her excessive copying does pay off. At the end of the day I'll be planning for the next day, and ponder aloud "I wonder what we should do for our science plant theme tomorrow?". And BOOM. There it is. She'll pull out five different worksheets on plants for me to chose from.

She is also extremely terrifying. Only in that 'good teacher, yelling' kinda way. She can silence a room in 2 seconds flag with a loud but effective, "QUIET!". But more than terrifying, she is also  really sweet and has a hard time saying 'no', especially to her daughter who is in the class next to us. I think I've learned a little something about Asian mother's since living here. They simply do not say no, and their child can do no wrong. Minji, who is teacher Monica's daughter, can and will eat whatever she likes at any point in the day. They come to school early to eat breakfast, and I'll come into class coffee in hand, only to find them chowing down on some fried chicken. At 8:30 a.m mind you! If Minji wants coffee, her mom will give her coffee. If Minji wants wine, her mom will give her wine. She's 4! The parents of our children often send donuts or treats for the staff, and you can usually find us all towering over a table of treats in the afternoon discussing the events of the day. On Thursday we had some fancy smancy donuts delivered, and Minji ate THREE of them! Three ooey-gooey, frosting covered, sugar-loaded, saturated fat outta this roof, donuts!

Aaahhhh teacher Monica. I will miss her dearly when I am gone. I will miss her loud roar of a voice from down the hall. I will miss her making coffee in the morning. I will miss her laughing as her 4 year old eats a double quarter-pounder with cheese. I will miss her three language jibberish. I will miss her standing in the middle of the hallway, sweater up around her neck, while she tries to hike her pants back up to her boobs. I will miss so many things about that woman, she's a riot.

But all laughs aside, she has probably been the most honest, truthful, and accepting person I have met in Korea. And I can bet that I will never again meet anyone like her.

Confusing Korea : Apartment Edition

So I live in a tiny, tiny, tiny little studio apartment in Bundang Korea. While living in Korea the past 11 months has caused me to be very confused on many occasions, this is a special post dedicated to the confusion that my tiny, tiny, tiny apartment brings.

                                                     Exhibit A :

This is on the middle of my living/bed/dining room wall. The small black square is actually a video camera, so when the doorbell rings (which is does to the tune of Fur Elise) you can see who is outside your door. However, you have to know exactly which of these buttons to push to get the song and the video to stop. In my case it usually leads to frantic button pushing, accompanied by yelling "Hello! Don't go away! I see you! I'm coming!!!!"

Exhibit B:

This lovely picture is attached to something that opens (I can only assume this because there is a button to push there on the bottom). But alas, it does not open. It seems to be jammed or glued shut. I'm afraid if I try to open it I'll come face to face with the peeping Tom I'm convinced is living next door, so needless to say it stays shut. 

Exhibit C:

Again, assuming that anything remotely makes sense in this country, I would have to guess this big red arrow is probably telling me where the fire extinguisher is....or is supposed to be. 

Exhibit D:

Ahhh....the space saver/kitchen counter top washer combo. Nothing like fryin' eggs while throwin' in my whites. Don't even get me started on the insanity of these buttons. Trial and error is what's gotten me through this year. Although there have been numerous times where I have opened the washer door, to find my clothes soaking wet in two inches of water. And no dryer to boot!

Exhibit E:

And this little gem is in my bathroom, directly to the right if you were to be sitting on the toilet. I can't even begin to tell you what this does or what it's for. I only know that it brings me a lot of anxiety when I'm trying to do my business, in fear of hitting the damn thing with my elbow and thus setting off some sort of alarm signaling the fire department to come. 

I have managed to figure everything out in my apartment to successfully live in it for a year. But I'm not gonna lie about how much I miss my dryer at home! 

Baby It's Cold Outside

It's like -500 billion degrees outside today. Literally. I can't take this weather anymore! I am sitting here in my freezing apartment with a hat, gloves, a sweatshirt, and a blanket while I wait ever so patiently for my apartment to warm up. That will take approximately 4 hours.

When I'm walking to and from work, up hill both ways, I seem to be the only person fazed by the insanity of how cold it is. I think Koreans have a different kind of skin, that allows them to not sweat when it's 1000% humidity outside, or get cold when it feels like Antarctica. They just simply do not get cold. The women are still wearing mini-skirts for Pete’s sake! I don't think I'll ever get over the fashion here in Korea. The women are still sporting the good ol' fashion mini-skirt and some tights. They don't wear hats, they don't wear gloves, and they STILL wear high heels!

My co-worker told me that this weekend was supposed to be warmer than usual. Warmer? Warmer than cold as shit? Cold is cold. I don't care what the temperature says, it's COLD. It is actually kind of sad how the novelty of winter and cold weather wears off in a matter of 2.5 days. At first everyone is ecstatic that it's snowing, we get to wear scarves, we get to walk around with hot chocolate mugs in our hands. Then everyone realizes how much it sucks when you're risking your life walking to work on black ice, or freezing your tush off while waiting for the bus. 

The only thing that makes winter a little better here, is my South African friend. Who has seen snow once in her life before coming to Korea. She still gets ubber excited about snow, and tries to convince the rest of us how awesome it is. The response to her excitement is usually met with groans like "yea yea yea, you’ll get it over it come mid February". But I have to admit the other night it started snowing, and we decided to run around our neighborhood trying to catch snowflakes on our tongues. It was fun. It reminded me of how fun winter and snow can be. 

I think about all my friends on the East Coast, and how bad the weather and storms have been this winter. Especially since I'll be moving there next year, it makes me kind of cringe. When I lived in Boston before, I came straight from Honolulu to Boston on January 1st, and it was quite the change. But I loved it. Sometimes you gotta just roll with the punches, get your boots on and go make a snow angel, open your mouth wide and catch some snowflakes. 

....Because baby it's cold outside. 


And because I love Christmas, I love Glee, and I heart my gays...here's a treat. :)

Ahhhh Reflection

Summer is here my friends. Summer's here, and he ain't messin' around. I find it's always good to reflect on the things we're thankful for in the evening time when it's cooler.  Because when I'm walking to school in 90 degree weather (and what feels like 1000% humidity) and there is so much sweat cumulating in my ass crack that I could collect it and live off of it for an entire year if I were stranded in the desert.....I'm not feelin' so thankful. 

Most of my days lately have been going a little something like this:

I wake up spread eagle style, drenched in sweat with my covers strewed about the room.  I get in the shower, revel at how amazing life seems under a shower, and fix myself a cup of coffee. Then I think to myself, " why in GODS name am I having HOT coffee right now?!" I spit my coffee out, and proceed to stand with my head halfway in the fridge for the next 40 minutes. I somehow manage to get myself ready without fainting, and make my way to school. On the 15-minute walk from the subway to the school, I'm cursing every non-sweaty, no-body hair Korean in sight. I'm also cursing every Korean woman in her mid-20's wearing what seems to be a very well put together clubbing outfit. Really ladies? It's Monday, and it's a million degrees. WHY are you wearing heels, tights, a mini-skirt, a t-shirt and a blazer?? It's rather absurd. 

I get to school and realize the gate is locked. AGAIN. "Oh Kasserin...press bell, press bell".  I press the "bell" for about 20 minutes because no one is near the office to hear the bell to buzz me in. Then inevitably a Korean teacher realizes that I'm not there.... you know teaching...and shuffles outside to let me in. "Kasserin! Kasserin! Late late! Teach teach!".  I usually smile and say sorry, but what I'm really thinking is no shit Sherlock. I've been standing outside for lord knows how long pushing that damn bell that none of you can hear. Sometimes I say things like "Oh! I'm so sorry! I was across the way, having myself an iced cafe latte, reading the morning newspaper. I completely lost track of time!" The teachers give me a strange look during these times of sarcasm, and just push me through to their classroom where the kids are waiting impatiently. 

I teach for 4 hours. But I'm convinced they've put me into some kind of time warp because it feels like I teach for about 10. I can just picture my Wongja (principal) sitting in her little office, turning back the time hour by hour, giggling to herself "He he he stupid American.... you think it's 5 o'clock somewhere? It's never 5 o'clock in Korea!"

During my teaching hours I consider two things. First, I think why in the hell haven't they turned on the air-conditioning. And secondly, I think how much damage I would really do if I just totally judo'd this kid and drop kicked him a good one to his face. Yeah, my students and I have a great relationship. But then there's Jin Bae. Who, no matter what has happened in class that day, says "Kasserin! I luuub you!" as I'm leaving. 

So the end of the teaching day is always a little better than the beginning. But then I leave again and come out into the vortex of heat hell. I walk down to the subway and hang around for an extra half hour trying to stay cool under-ground. I get back up to my apartment and gorge myself on pp & honeys, and usually pass out on my bed for an hour or two. Then I'll meet up with a friend for dinner or coffee, and we'll stroll down to Jeongja to walk along the river. 

When I arrive back at my apartment I realize this is exactly where I want to be right now. I realize when I meet a new friend that I know will be an asset to my life, it makes me appreciate the choices I've made to be here. And when I'm feeling anxious about waking up and doing it all over again, I think about these few moments of serenity I have before bed each night. I think about how calm it is, and how calm I am. I realize the kids are too cute to boot, the sun is shining, I have food in my fridge, coffee ready in the morning, and a paycheck coming soon. 

I realize I'm not waiting. I'm not waiting on anyone or anything. And that's a wonderful thing.