My choir boys are tone-deaf. Stone-cold tone-deaf. We finally got the rhythm down for the first part of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” but it doesn’t exactly sound like anything, yet.
Also, my students are terrible at playing hangman. Why on earth would anyone use Q for their first guess? Q?
I’ve switched the Patbingsu Song punishment – now they have to dance to “When Doves Cry.”
Today’s accomplishments:
– made late students in three (3!) classes sing “The Patbingsu Song”
– instituted the Shoes-for-Pens policy, in which I lend pens to students in exchange for one of their shoes, thus ensuring that I never lose a pen again (unless I lose it myself)
– inadvertently induced fat kid in class 1J to give a solo performance of “Moon River”
– sat in classroom checking New York Times every thirty seconds until the new Dining and Wine section was posted
I know, I work hard.
There has been an absence of blog posts lately due to the fact that I have to anonymify (Program says), which is difficult when your domain name has…your name. I’ll keep you posted.
In the meantime, it’s cooled off here, and I got to judge an English play contest that was probably one of the highlights of the year so far. Imagine, if you will, a fairy tale in which every character is played by Borat, and you might have a starting point. Also recently: played near a waterfall, met a drunk man who a) quizzed me on what chickens say in America and b) turned out to be the father of one of my students, and discovered that luck is geographic. Did you know that? I’m not afraid to open my umbrella indoors anymore. Koreans aren’t. So until I fly into LAX, I will open my usan whenever I please. Once I hit American soil, of course, all former superstitions apply.
There have been a lot of mistranslations lately, and maybe I’ll blog about that later. Or not.
Filed under: ACT, life in Jeju, miscommunication, music, PCT, pipe dreams, skool, teaching
So my room is filled with decorations from last year’s ETA, including class projects, English concepts, and signs that say “Happy Times with Jullienne” (sic). Monday, after many promises of redecoration, PCT and ACT offered to take me to the stationery store for room supplies the next day. The next day (yesterday), however, it was raining, so PCT came into my room and was like, “What I mean to say is I think maybe it is bad idea to go because the rain is so heavy.” And I was like, fine, whatever, and we made plans to go today. And they went anyway, because the rain stopped, and failed to call me. Although they bought me Post-it bookmarks. Which – granted – I needed. But still. And now PCT says she is too busy to help me make new signs for the classroom, which is fine, but I would be willing to do all the work – I just need to know what to do. I already tried emailing her documents she could print out and I could laminate (again, I would do this, but I don’t have access to a computer with a printer) and she told me that they were too small, or something. I don’t even know. And now ACT just came in – apparently we ARE going to the stationery store today, and I feel really bad, because I would have gone last night had I known, and thus avoided making them trek twice. Sometimes it just feels like there is a lot of stuff that they think/say in Korean and just, you know, forget to translate.
Also: first a cappella practice this morning. Students did NOT like “Lean on Me.” Which I was going to say is positively un-American, but then I remembered I am not in America.
PS. I am debating giving busted laptop to Candace for college, since Acer will take approximately six years to fix mine, and investing in a new one. And – I hate to say this, but I was looking at Glypie’s MacBook Pro, and it is so pretty. But a Mac? Really? In my family, that is akin to buying a Chevy, making cake from a mix, or voting Democrat. In other words, it means admitting the defeat of your convictions. Never mind that I don’t really want to vote Republican or Democrat or Green or Constitution, lately.
Filed under: changes, host fam, life in Jeju, miguk fam, skool, stuff, teaching
Korean Minkus* was back in class today. I have to say that a) I really kind of love Class 1J** and b) in addition to KM, it has this really adorable fat kid, another one with these sort of weirdly cute crossed eyes, and one (non-fat) student who clearly speaks English pretty well and uses it to be an asshat. That would be the one who told me that his favorite hobby was “studying” and that I was “beautiful, very beautiful.” (Again, how sad is it that the only kids who tell me that are the ones who are blatantly sucking up?) But he’s funny, and tiny, and I like both of those things.
I’m taking my happiness where I can get it this week, so I was happy to see them, and happy to teach “weather words” today – my goal is to push them out of this semester with the ability to answer basic questions about themselves. Ex. Where are you from, and what is it like? Just to be able to get around. That’s all I’m asking.
In the meantime – I spent tonight painting. Some things about Korea still surprise me, like the fact that the dinky, junky 문방국 (stationery store) down the street sells palettes for $2. As I walked with Host Sister today to the store, I couldn’t help imagining the same goal in Tennessee; first I would have to go to Michael’s or Wal-Mart, but it would be a drive, and depending on traffic and what else was going on that day I would probably have to wait until there was another occasion to go…Here we left; we went into this store that, quite honestly, didn’t look like it should have anything worthwhile, and bought a palette with cartoon characters on it; and then we walked to the grocery store across the street and bought Popsicles. I ate a melon bar.
*My brother has a Shawn Hunter*** jacket – a leather bomber with a shearling collar – and one day my sister and I started calling him and my dad “Shawn and Chet,” which always makes me giggle when I remember it, partially because my father is the opposite of a Chet and partially because Chet is a funny name.
**The people who are sponsoring this yearlong vacation have politely requested that we all dissociate our blogs from: the organization, our schools, our families. So from now on, following Laura‘s lead, my organization is now The Program, the people who run my organization are now The People Who Run The Program or possibly The Powers That Be, my school is now My School, my host family is now made of Host Brother (HB), Host Sister (HS), Omoni (Mom), Aboji (Dad). And Class 1J is obviously not named Class 1J. As of right now my friends’ names are staying in, but that might change. If you actually know me and you want more specific information, feel free to comment.
***Did you know that Rider Strong graduated Magna Cum Laude from Columbia? (I accidentally typed in Manga. That must be why I didn’t.)
Last night I ended up in a club. “Ended up” is, of course, the only phrase that can accurately explain my presence in a club, given my tendencies to a) hate crowds of people, b) get really gross and sweaty, and c) dance like Elaine Benes. The night, however, turned out to be almost exactly the kind of night I love: I ate dinner with some Korean and Program friends, came back, got some things done (it turned out that the camp instructor with whose class I’m working had actually already DONE my lesson plan, last week. Oops), went to a hof (pub/bar) with some of the girls here, ran into a few other Program peeps, and decided to stay with them. We watched the rest of the soccer game that was on and ended up at this hip-hop club, a club that was decorated with weird graffiti and chunks of chain-link fence in an attempt to look “street.” What it looked like, actually, was that there were a a bunch of Americans there (us) and some fifteen-year-old Korean girls, one of whom was wearing a dress that said “More dash than cash.” I want it really badly. My friend David tried to teach us this sort of b-boy dance move. Naturally, I looked like I was trying to do the hora. Shortly after we departed, the police arrived.
So here are some more details about life here: We’re teaching at an English-immersion camp run by The Program. It’s the only camp of its kind in the country in that the learning is not textbook-based (which doesn’t feel that novel to me, but I think that’s a result of my American conditioning), so it’s really neat, although it’s apparently also really expensive for the students. Last week I worked with a big group to teach a movie-making class (during which some girls came up to my friend Andy, who’s 6’8″, and exclaimed, “You are very tall! How many centimeters?”), and then I taught a lesson with Brian, one of my fellow Kentuckians, on adjectives through music review. The lesson was actually a thinly veiled ruse to allow us to listen to music and watch a clip of Almost Famous. Here are some of the students’ comments on the music we chose:
- on “Sweet Child of Mine”: “His voice is very strange and unique…This song makes us feel excited.”
- on “Wagon Wheel”: “His voice is very Kentucky-ful…We think he is a farmer or maybe a cowboy.”
- on “What Goes Around”: “This song is too long. But he is very sexy.”
- on “All You Need is Love”: “Listening to this song feels like Christmas.”
Two interesting points are raised by the above anecdote.
1: Kentuck
I have mentioned in passing before that, having come to Korea, my goal was naturally to make friends with people I could have driven an hour to see at home, which is why two of my favorite people here are from my lovely home state. They’re not, of course, from Lexington or Louisville or anything like that – one is from Owen County, and one is from Owensboro (which is in Daviess County, naturally). The point being that they are what I like to describe as RIL Kentucky, that is, they are not any of those city imposters, unlike myself. One of them even went to Transy. Why didn’t I just bring a few Centre alums along for the ride?
For serious (yes), though, I have managed to get past the fact that I crossed the international dateline to talk about tobacco and the Kentucky State Fair. We’ve all been assigned to Jeju-do. Brian (Transy) theorizes that they want to keep all the country accents as far from the mainland as possible. Interestingly, I’ve sort of bonded with the Iowans present, all of whom have a similar complex regarding how people treat their state (badly).
2. Treatment by Koreans
Not all small children have stared at me, and those who have have mostly been really young, young enough that I can assume that they stare at everyone, Korean or not. The taller among us, however, keep having people ask to take pictures of them. I think I’m helped by the fact that, even though I’m pretty obviously American, my coloring allows me to slip by mostly unnoticed. I was out with Glypie (the other Kentuckian) and our RA Gwi Ohk a few nights ago, though, and this female street vendor kept telling me that I was “very beautiful. Very high nose! Not Korean nose!” Which was sweet and all, but a little weird, since nose height isn’t something I spend a lot of time thinking about.
Conversely, the way we treat Koreans is also sometimes questionable at best. There’s a guy here who is going to Jeju with me who is, basically, Glenn Quagmire. Last night at dinner he was sitting at this table next to us with some of the Korean girls with whom I’d gone shopping, and we would pause our conversation at various intervals to observe him spitting game. Fortunately, his poor facility with ladies appeared to be acceptable due to his targets’ sometimes weak grasp of the English language, which made lines like the following okay:
- “So, do you really want to be accountants?”
- “These traditional mats are very comfortable. Do you have chairs in your house?”
- “Are you planning to stay in Korea, or are you hoping to move somewhere else? …Like the US? Let me tell you about where I’m from. It’s called Scranton, Pennsylvania.”
We are loath to imagine what his host family is going to believe about Scranton.
Yesterday Gwi Ohk asked me if I knew “KFC grandpa.” Which I think explains more about my position here than any of my pontifications ever could.
Intrepid Girl Reporter 
