Crazed Koreans!

My teachers are all in a tizzy! For two weeks they've been running around like chickens with their heads cut off. They are preparing for an inspection/audit from the province office. As a result they have completely ignored their classes for two weeks. I haven't seen some of my co-teachers for two weeks (they're supposed to be in every class I teach) as they have been busy making documents all pretty. It's crazy. They have prepared the largest pile of the most anal retentive binders of documents that I have ever seen! Everything has been gussied up and printed on the color laser printer for the inspectors. The students have spent at least an hour each day scrubbing up the school. Usually it is cleaned in 20 minutes by the students. The school was powerwashed, windows cleaned, floor scrubbed, everything. It's pretty crazy.

I think it's so crazy that they seem to care more about appearances than actual content. I guess this is the Korean way. I get so turned off by the blatant superficiality of everything here sometimes. Usually I dismiss it as something frivilous and ignorable. These two weeks have really kicked the superficiality into hyperdrive! I'm just tired of it. I can't wait until this evaluation is over with so they can go back to being normal.

I do have to say that many of the teachers do not like this kind of activity. They all realise that it's frivilous. They know that what they're teaching and the students should be the most important thing and not these damned documents. They are exhausted, staying up until midnight to three in the morning to work on documents. You can see it in everyone. They're all tense, stressed, and tired. I am very thankful that I don't have to do things like this. Maybe one day the schools will revolt and just hand the province their regular old documents and not these extra shiny and special pretty documents. Guerilla education!