Happy Teacher Appreciation Day!

Tomorrow is teacher appreciation day in Korea. Now, in the U.S.A. teachers get a whole week... but I'll take what I can get. I do get the day off, so that is amazingly good. Well, today I came into work and there was a gift on my desk, all wrapped up in shiny mylar wrapping paper. It was a gift from the students' parents. I was startled to open it and find a box set of glucosamine. Now, for those of you who don't know, glucosamine is a drug that is good for your joints. It's usually taken by arthritic people. Everyone received this gift. I began to think, in America, if you were given glucosamine, you'd get offended and say "What makes you think I need this? I'm not an old man yet!" But here, it's just a normal gift. Interesting. Cultural differences at work again.

My Poor Tummy

I woke-up at 3am this morning with stomach pain. Not again. Yup, same as usual. I was up until 7am vomitting and just being in pain. I called in and was able to nap until noon-ish. I went to the doctor and got the same dosage of meds that I've always gotten. I have no idea if this medication works, but I take it anyway. They did include these 15 packets of goo that I have to drink. It's really disgusting. The frustrating thing about this is that it just attacks me whenever, and for no reason. At least it's been about 3 months since it happened last. I'll feel better in a few days.

Mr. Sandman

Tuesday I finally received my CPAP in the mail. It was a Korean miracle! On the bus ride home I fully read the instruction book (I'm like that). I was so anxious to get to sleep when I got home. The good thing is that this machine was quite easy for me to get used to. It starts with a very low level of air blowing into your nose (you get used to it) until you fall asleep, then it delivers the pressure that is needed to keep you alive. I only woke up twice during the night.

The next morning, I woke-up wihtout a headache, which was great. I was also more rested. During the day I was feeling more awake. I'm not 100% better, but after a week or so of using it and getting used to it, I'm sure I'll really see the difference.

No, I will not model any of my sleep gear for those of you who wanted to see (you know who you are). But this is what I got. You can use your imagination. By the way, the machine is only the size of two vcr tapes. Pretty small compared to the older ones.

And The Bureaucracy Rolls On

Well, my CPAP machine (for sleep apnea) arrived in only 3 days. The bad news is that it has been stuck in Korean customs since wednesday morning. First the problem was that they couldn't reach me (because my phone number is a US number given by the company). Then, they needed customs duty. Then they found out it was medical equipment and wanted the prescription. I was at school, and did not have my prescription with me. Mr. Yoo called the hostpital to get a copy, and they wouldn't fax him a copy of it. So, friday morning I brought everything in, and it was faxed immediately.

It wasn't delivered.

Today, monday, it was delivered to my apartment, and no one was there, so they didn't deliver it. Now, they were told the week before to deliver it to the school, and they simply ignored this. For some reason they couldn't get it to my school today, which is just 20 minutes away from my apartment... so, I must wait another day.

Korean bureaucracy keeps rolling on. I mean, sure, I could die in my sleep, and I wake up every morning with a severe migraine due to the apnea, and it's super hard on my heart... but the Korean customs office needs to stamp some papers. That is the problem, Koreans love rubber stamping things so much that they just make more red tape. Stamping makes them feel super powerful.

Frustration.

Korean Language Class

Saturday was my first trip to the Korean language institute. It took much longer to get there than I thought it would. It takes an hour to get to Seoul to the express bus terminal. Then, it took an additional hour on the subway to get to the institute. It was a bit exhausting, and Victoria and I were 20 minutes late. Next week we will be on time.

The institute is quite nice, with many classes running at one time. Our class has only 3 students in it, which is a blessing really. Besides Victoria and I, there is a young guy named Jimmy (I think that's his name). We are all teachers, he's been here just a couple of months, still in the honeymoon stage of his life here. Our teacher was a nice young Korean woman who spoke absolutely perfect English. The lesson was entirely over the alphabet, reading simple syllables, and pronunciation. This was all review for me, but helped to clear up some of the very close vowels.

I think this class is going to be such a great thing for me. I really can't wait until next saturday for our next class.

New Toy

This week, I ordered a new toy off of the internet. It's an iRiver D26. That is an electronic dictionary. It is the top of the line here in Korea. It is really meant for Koreans learning English and Japanese. It has the normal Korea-English, English-Korean dictionaries. It also has Korean-Korean, and English-Enlgish. There's an English usage dictionary, English idioms.

As if that isn't enough, it also serves as a PDA, keeping your calendar and address book and all of that. It also serves as an Ebook reader, and an electronic photo album. It even has an mp3 player.

My favorite function is something called "brain vitamin." You pick the mood you're in, and it will play the appropriate soothing elevator type music. Pretty interesting.

The machine is all in Korean, but most of it is easy to understand. The good news is that the support software for it is in English, so I had no trouble loading my music onto the device.

It may be an extravagant purchase, but it has already come in very handy.

No Smoking

This week I have taken over the role of anti-smoking police at my school. I'm currently showing some videos to my students (as a nice break from their midterm stress). I like to use the library to show the movies, because there is a big screen and projector and surround sound. All it's missing is the popcorn. The library is only accessible by going outside.

On monday and tuesday, I caught kids smoking out there, behind two outbuildings and right next to the school. Well, the kids see me, know they're busted. I grab them by the arm and take them to a Korean teacher to have them deal with the students. Now, I caught two students smoking out there twice each. One student I caught between first and second period, and then again between second and third period! I looked at him that second time and said "Could you be any stupider?" Well, my co-teacher informed the homeroom teacher about the kids. I'm really not seeing anything being done about it.

So, I've taken it upon myself, when I'm down in the library, to stand out there between classes. The students just look at me through the windows, waiting to see when I leave so they can smoke. I stay there until they're in their next class. I feel so deliciously evil when I do this to them. Also, when I see the offending students, I say "Hello smoker." The other students pick on them for this. I figure, maybe they'll stop if they get tired of being ridiculed by their peers.

Sleep Apnea

I went to the doctor this last week. I needed to talk to him about options for treating my sleep apnea. If you remember, he wanted me to have another sleep study to find out the pressure that I need for a CPAP machine. I asked him about an automatic CPAP which does not need a specific pressure setting, as it self-adjusts to what you need. He thought this was a great idea, and he wrote me the prescription that I needed.

I asked the doctor about my sleep study results. Now comes the scary information. During my sleep study I stopped breathing an average of 57 times per hour. Over the course of the night, I stopped breathing over 600 times! These are some pretty scary numbers to hear.

The next day I ordered my CPAP machine and mask from a US company, since the price is ridiculously high here in Korea. By ordering online, I was able to save a lot of money. Shipping and handling on this thing cost me $111! For that price this machine had better arrive pretty quickly. I can't wait. I'm just so happy that I'm done going to the doctor about this problem.

Drunk Is As Drunk Does

I had a very relaxing kind of weekend at home. This was my last weekend of staying in Anseong. Next weekend, my Korean language class starts, so I will have to go to Seoul each weekend. Well, I spent my weekend cleaning my apartment, doing laundry, and just hanging out around town.

Victoria and I spent some time at the Soda Star drinking our black tea lattes and eating some cake (it's our traditional way to spend time). Later, we went to the other side of town and went to a store that sells just about everything you could want, and at a cheap price. Victoria went to town and bought some wire carts for her home and for school.

Anyway, while walking back towards my apartment, we passed a drunken man who was urinating on the wall outside of a restaurant. It was not late at night, maybe 7:30. He was also not hiding what he was doing in the least. He was not around the building, at the side of the building or anything. He was just standing a few feet from the front entrance, in front of God and everyone. There's somthing that I wouldn't have seen had I stayed in Michigan.

A Light Lunch

This week is midterm exams for the students of Juksan Comprehensive High School. For three days, the students have half days. I get to spend these days doing nothing, and then co-observing the last exam. It's a very boring non-stressful kind of day. I've been spending my mornings watching videos and making questions up for the students.

On monday, the teachers were taken out to lunch by the parents' association. Unfortunately, we were going out for blowfish. If I recall correctly, isn't blowfish poisonous if it's not prepared correctly? I seem to remember that from a Simpsons episode. Well, I simply don't eat seafood or fish in Korea. And I especially wouldn't eat the raw fish that they were having for lunch. So, since there was absolutely nothing for me to eat at this restaurant, the teachers decided to compensate by giving me liquor. Nothing is better on an empty stomach then lots of scotch and soju.

Needless to say, when Mr. Yoo dropped me off at my apartment, I was a bit tipsy and in need of a nap. What a great way to start the week off.

Not Really Surprised

With the shooter at Virginia Tech being South Korean and me being in South Korea, I really feel like I should comment upon the situation. First off, the people here are so shocked and really feel so sorry for everyone. The government has really bent over backwards to send their condolences. This is a very nice thing to see.

When I heard that the shooter was Korean, I thought that it made perfect sense. Having lived here for one year (it's officially one year today) I feel like I have some kind of grip on Korean culture, or at least on the Korean way of life. Why I was not surprised by the incident is the glaring fact that Koreans do not acknowledge mental illness or depression. As a result, the suicide rate is quite high in Korea. This ignoring of mental problems stems from the number one rule in Korea... you have to save face. By acknowledging mental illness, you would be admitting that someone has a problem and that things are not all perfect. This would bring shame upon the family, so it simply doesn't exist here. People don't get diagnosed or helped for these problems, and if you follow this train all the way to it's obsurd ending... you will always end in some kind of tragedy.

A student yesterday told me that the Korean news is reporting that Cho Seung Hui (which Good Morning America gets wrong constantly... Cho is not his first name but his last) went on his rampage due to a girl breaking up with him. I let my student know that wasn't exactly true, and that Seung Hui clearly had mental problems. Even the news here won't admit that the guy had mental problems. My co-teacher told me that Seung Hui was very lonely. Another watered down excuse that doesn't point towards the actual cause. Here it's just better to live in denial then it is to acknowledge the problem and treat it.

This is just my opinion. There are people out there who will tell me that I'm 100% wrong, but living here in this culture, and reading about the lack of treatment for mental illness... well, if you were in my shoes you'd be thinking the same thing too.

Oh My!

You can never predict how things are going to go with any particular class. Now, my school has two types of classes, vocational and general. Generally speaking, the vocational classes are the very lowest level kids with very poor English skills and bad behavior is always the norm. The reverse is true for the general education kids.

Yesterday I started a little class project. I had the kids make clocks out of cardstock and brads. They got to decorate them. The best 3 clocks in class received a chocolate bar as a prize. I did this with a vocational class and it went super. They understood immediately what they had to do, and they did it with no trouble. The designs on the clocks were really good. One of the girls even drew me on her clock (she did not get a chocolate bar because beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I don't behold myself that way!).

I just repeated this class activity with a general education class. First of all... they didn't get it. Now, I passed out card stock with a clock face and hands printed on them. I handed out scissors... this is pretty clear even if you don't understand the language. They didn't get it. I had to mime with my fingers acting as scissors what needed to be done. There were still questions. Then, only a couple of the kids spent time coloring their clocks and making them nice. Then the students that finished first thought that they won the chocolate. So, for about 20 minutes I had mobs of children around me begging for chocolate. It was like being in the middle of a giant sale at a store, when you're not sure if you'll get out alive or not. These kids were like vultures. When I gave out my 3 chocolate bars, the rest of the kids were pissed off! They threw their clocks on the floor.

Why did they turn a simple enjoyable leisurely activity into such a nightmare? Well, I'm sure it helped that my co-teacher decided not to show up to help me. I hate when they do that.

So Tough

My co-teacher needed to use my English period to "give hints" for the upcoming midterm exmas. This means basically that the test will be read to them. Now, none of the kids will pay attention, but you can't say the teachers aren't giving them the opportunity for an A. I went along because this was one of the worst behaved classes, and I was on love stick sleep patrol. When a student was dozing off, I'd poke them or gently rap them on the arm to wake them up. It's effective.

Well, this class it was mainly the boys in the back (just like in America) that were being the bad kids. There were 4 or so that I continually had to whack to wake up. I just made the rounds in the room, when I'd finished, they'd be dozing again, round two.

These boys are all real tough, and they want you to know that. So, when I poke at them to wake up, they try to grab the stick from me. They try to grab it to break it. One of them flexed his muscles at me, yup, I got a ticket to the gun show. It's so laughable. These kids think they're so freaking tough when in reality they're about as troublesome as a cloudy day to me. I have to stop myself from laughing at them.

Another Temple

After the cheery blossom festival, the bus took us to antoher city about 40 miles away, to visit a temple. The great thing about this temple was that it was not on a giant mountain! Instead, it was just on a bit of a gentle slope.

Funny story here. Victoria and I were going up the walk to the temple, when Victoria needed to use the bathroom. There were no signs around. There was an information booth. We asked the woman inside where the bathroom was. She asked Victoria "is it an emergency?" To which Victoria replied "Well, I could pee my pants." It was the funniest thing that a Korean has ever asked any of us, and the best response from Victoria ever.

Well, later the information woman took us on a tour of the temple. She was from Vietnam and spoke perfect English. It was a great little tour. The woman also on the way down from the temple was telling us how much she doesnt' like her co-workers and the character flaws of Koreans. It was funny to hear it from someone else!

So, here are some pics of the temple. I was not allowed to photograph the big Buddha statues, so you'll have to imagine a giant gold Buddha on your own.

This is one of the numerous gates that are at every temple.

Cherry Blossoms

Yesterday, Victoria and I met up with our former military friends who are now English teachers, James and Dini. We went on a air force tour down to Kunsan in the south, by the ocean, to see the cherry blossom festival there. Here are some nice pics from the festival.

Fine Dining

On wednesday, I met with my friend Brandon for dinner. We were seduced into trying a new restaurant after smelling something delicious coming from the place. Unlike most restaurants, there were no pictures on the walls and no menus with pictures, so we weren't terribly sure what they served. There was a man there, eating and drinking with his friend who spoke some English and he told us they serve samgyeopsal (pork belly), so he ordered for us. He also bought us some raspberry wine, which was very nice of him.

Dinner was really the same ole' barbecue that everyother restaurant serves. After we finished eating we ordered some kind of wine which is served in a big bamboo pitcher thing (should have taken a picture). I invited the guy who ordered for us and his friend to join us for some drinks.

The guy who spoke English very very poorly informed us that he was an English teacher at a private academy. This is quite coommon since native English teachers are not allowed to moonlight. He and his friend were quite drunk, we were having some fun. Then the man looked at Brandon and said "you have ugly face." Then turning to me, he said "and you are fat." Brandon made him realize that this was not very nice and actually quite offensive, so the guy bought our dinner.

The best part of the evening was his drunken friend. The man was smashed. He spoke no English, and apparently he is some kind of petty thug/semi-gangster. He and his friend made this clear several times. This gangster sat by Brandon and kept touching Brandon's leg and thigh. It was uncomfortable for Brandon, but quite enjoyable for me to watch. They wanted us to follow them to the karaoke bar, but we ended our night after this dinner. So, maybe in the future we will see them again. Maybe not.

Ganada

While surfing the net today after finishing my classes I stumbled across a saturday only Korean language class in Seoul. I signed up for it and will start next month. I'm so excited. I need a teacher, that's all that I need. And, once a week is something that I can easily handle. The class is only $120, including the materials, and each class is two and a half hours long. I'm hoping that I can learn a lot from this class. Victoria is also going to take the course. So, next month I will become a student again. Wish me luck.

Mega Ink

I ordered a new continuous ink system for my printer. Basically, it's four big containers of ink that attach via tubes to the ink cartridges, constantly feeding a fresh supply of ink. It looks like my printer is on an I.V. The benefit is that I can print to my heart's content without worrying too much about the cost of ink. I've already printed up about 2 reams worth of paper for school. Lots of stuff to go into a book for my own future use. I'm becoming so organized. Here is a pic of the system.

Zippity Do-Dah

Well, it's finally done. My new contract is finished. After getting a letter faxed from the U.S. stating my previous work experience, I have been given my raise. Also, they have made this raise retroactive from January, because that was when I received my TEFL certificate. I can't tell you how incredibly happy I am that it's all done. It has been a very stressful 2 weeks here in Korea. Nothing like your pay and apartment hanging over you to make you feel uneasy. I've still heard no word on my apartment, but I believe it is a dead issue now.

Daniel: Destroyer Of Dreams

I have a new student, a freshman, who simply should not be at our school. As I've stated before, my school is for students who do poorly on their placement exams. Good students go to the city schools, the bad students gets shipped out to the country where they encounter me. Well, this girl is the number one student in her class. She is the ONLY student to have scored 100% on her English exam. Her English is pretty perfect. Her accent is excellent. She should really be at a better school. I foresee her being very bored and possibly becoming problematic.

Well, on Friday, I saw her in the classroom during lunchtime. I went in and talked to her. I asked her if English class was too easy for her. She said that it was. I offered to work with her one-on-one to give her more challenging English work. She said ok. Later that day, she came up to me to talk to me more formally. We talked a bit about what we would do and started to arrainge it.

Later, during the 20 minute cleaning period (right before the last period of the day when the students clean the school) she came up to my desk to talk. In class we had been working with emotions. I've been asking the students "How are you feeling today?" Well, when I'd asked her that week she's responded "confused." When I asked why she said "it's a secret." Well, she told me the secret. "I'm in love with my math teacher." Awwww... she has a crush. She told me who her math teacher is and I looked on the teacher seating chart for the office (since Mr. Lee is the name of half of the teachers here) and saw who it was. "Oh, he just got married in the fall." To which she replied "WHAT????" Ok, I've apprently killed her on the inside. She was crushed. She kept talking about how when he smiles his eyes get small, and how he's so handsome, and how he looks "oriental" (don't they all?). Anyway, I've apparently injured her for life. Next time we meet I'll tell her about Santa and the Easter Bunny.