So this is Christmas...Last night I went to a Christmas potluck dinner with some friends. I brought sweet potatoes. Typically for me, I obsessed about the potatoes for like a week, then did (I have to admit) a half-assed job with them, then got my feelings hurt when no one touched them at the party. Luckily, some people were there who talked me off of that ledge. It was interesting talking to people at the party. I was feeling a little bit of social anxiety at the party (the soldiers freak me out for some reason), but I soon realized all four of the little group I was talking to were feeling the same way. So we had a little shared neuroses.
Today I did pretty well close to nothing. I loved it. In the morning I layed around watching tv and stuff, then in the afternoon I watched a Korean movie i got recently (*cough*bittorrent*cough). The film is called Attack the Gas Station. In Korean: 주유소 섭격사건. I heard about this film a few years ago in fact, but never had the chance to see it until now. It came out in 1999, and is considered one of the first movies of the "Korean wave." Gas Station is a comedy/action flick that's a fun ride, but also provides a brilliant satire of power/social/economic structures in modern Korea. It can be viewed as a sort of Korean Fight Club. Being familiar with Korea probably helps, but it isn't strictly necessary. Here's a review of the film that also provides some interesting information about the rise of the Korean film industry.
Tonight I chatted with Chris on MSN, and we ended up having an inpromptu Korean lesson. I really can learn Korean, and in fact I already do know a lot of the basics. It just is going to take a lot more practice for me to be able to use it. 그래죠?
The other thing I'm learing is I care about Chris a lot more than I originally imagined. If you put it all on paper he and I look completely wrong for each other, but damnit all, I just really like him. This was not at all what I had planned. And in fact I'm breaking my heretofore unwritten rule about not writing about other people on my blog, but I needed to sort of put that out there.
Elves, and other creepy guys
As I said earlier, my classes are not going too badly this week. I worked up a little Christmas themed lesson including a game I call memory, but people from other places apparently know it as concentration, and a crossword puzzle. Two surprising things have come out of this exercise. The students all think eggnog is the most disgusting thing they've ever heard of (My opinion is that people who eat silkworm larvae don't get to criticize another culture's food. Anytime. Ever. But I don't tell them that of course), and I've had the hardest time trying to explain what elves are. In the beginning I even left elf off my list of words to pre-teach because well, who doesn't know what an elf is? Lots of people it turns out. In trying to understand this concept, they invariably cite either Tinkerbell or Snow White. They seem to think elves are handicapped men who aren't very nice. I explain that the elves live at the North Pole and they help Santa, and they are playfully mischevious but not mean. This tidbit serves only to further confuse them. I flip through a mental rolodex of elf images trying to come up with an example that will clear the whole thing up. In rapid succession I consider, then discard the Keebler elves, Snap, Crackle and Pop, and the weird marionette like elves from that old Rudolph TV program. Perhaps only Americans know about the last one. Nothing feels satisfactory until finally I remember Dobby from Harry Potter. Even that doesn't feel right because Dobby looks about as much like an elf in the Santa's Workshop sense as E.T. would, but I'm willing to overlook it if it gets me past this lexical hurdle.
I'm delighted to see their eyes light up with understanding, but I'm crushed once again when they start asking if Gollum is also an elf. At this point I pretty much just drop it and move on. Elves help Santa. What else do they really need to know? But it has gotten me thinking what a really weird idea this whole elf thing is. I mean, little men with pointy ears who work for a flamboyant, isolationist, compulsive overeater who prefers cold climates. Seriously? Who came up with this?
Two different Korean/English dictionaries translated "elf" as something like, male fairy. Wellll, I suppose you could say that. I mean, the Orlando Bloom type of elf could be fairy related sure, but not the North Pole elves. So the dictionary won't be helpful in this case.
If you'd like to know more, here is way the Hell too much information about elves.
And for no reason whatsoever, here's a picture of me from last year, dressed as the Russian Ded Moroz.
As I said earlier, my classes are not going too badly this week. I worked up a little Christmas themed lesson including a game I call memory, but people from other places apparently know it as concentration, and a crossword puzzle. Two surprising things have come out of this exercise. The students all think eggnog is the most disgusting thing they've ever heard of (My opinion is that people who eat silkworm larvae don't get to criticize another culture's food. Anytime. Ever. But I don't tell them that of course), and I've had the hardest time trying to explain what elves are. In the beginning I even left elf off my list of words to pre-teach because well, who doesn't know what an elf is? Lots of people it turns out. In trying to understand this concept, they invariably cite either Tinkerbell or Snow White. They seem to think elves are handicapped men who aren't very nice. I explain that the elves live at the North Pole and they help Santa, and they are playfully mischevious but not mean. This tidbit serves only to further confuse them. I flip through a mental rolodex of elf images trying to come up with an example that will clear the whole thing up. In rapid succession I consider, then discard the Keebler elves, Snap, Crackle and Pop, and the weird marionette like elves from that old Rudolph TV program. Perhaps only Americans know about the last one. Nothing feels satisfactory until finally I remember Dobby from Harry Potter. Even that doesn't feel right because Dobby looks about as much like an elf in the Santa's Workshop sense as E.T. would, but I'm willing to overlook it if it gets me past this lexical hurdle.
I'm delighted to see their eyes light up with understanding, but I'm crushed once again when they start asking if Gollum is also an elf. At this point I pretty much just drop it and move on. Elves help Santa. What else do they really need to know? But it has gotten me thinking what a really weird idea this whole elf thing is. I mean, little men with pointy ears who work for a flamboyant, isolationist, compulsive overeater who prefers cold climates. Seriously? Who came up with this?Two different Korean/English dictionaries translated "elf" as something like, male fairy. Wellll, I suppose you could say that. I mean, the Orlando Bloom type of elf could be fairy related sure, but not the North Pole elves. So the dictionary won't be helpful in this case.
If you'd like to know more, here is way the Hell too much information about elves.
And for no reason whatsoever, here's a picture of me from last year, dressed as the Russian Ded Moroz.
Surprisingly, to me anyway, I now have two regular readers of my blog and at least one semi-regular one (Hi Greg. Hi Ray. Hi Masha.)
I wish I had more positive things to report, but unfortunately I had another crappy day.
A bunch of things have gone wrong today. Nothing too major, just little, stupid, annoying things that add up to a heaping, steaming pile of you know what.
To start with I woke up at 7:40. I have to meet my ride at 8:00. I wasn't late at least, but I didn't have time to eat or do the morning routine I've been working on (I'll elaborate more on that another time).
At school someone locked my classroom last night so we had to go scrounging around for the extra key.
They were out of coffee so I couldn't get my fix. They didn't even have green tea. This I'm sure contributed more to my foul mood than any other single thing.
In class I have this microphone thingy I use, and the batteries died during second period. There was a schedule change so I had four classes in a row, and by fourth period my voice was giving out from shouting.
No one talked to me at lunch. No one talked to me in the teachers' office. I know other foreign teachers in this program have reported similar phenomena. The honeymoon is over and they are tired of dealing with us.
In the afternoon I was scheduled to have the last session of my after-school class. Again, only one student showed up. This time I taught the class anyway. Gi-tae was the one who came. Gi-tae is a good kid. I like him. We covered past tense and time expressions (last week, two years ago, three days from now etc.), and had a nice chat. He told me about his favorite video games and even taught me a few new Korean words. I'm normally very strict about the English Only, but in this case I think explaining the Korean translation actually helped reinforce the English phrases I was trying to teach. So basically he got a private lesson subsidized by the other kids' parents. See what happens when you show up for stuff?
So that was good actually. But one more sucky thing happened just now. I remembered I had this photo of Gi-tae I took one day when I was messing around with my camera phone during class. I wanted to include the photo in my post, so I tried e-mailing it to myself, but it looked like it didn't go through. In the mean time I finally found a program I could download so I can transfer photos from my phone to my comptuer without having to go through the photo e-mail rigamarole. That seemed like somewhat of a victory, but not so fast. The program is all in Korean and when I clicked the button I thought would transfer the photos, they all suddenly disappeared. Poof. No confirmation dialog box. Nothing. So almost 100 photos saved on my phone are gone. The only saving grace is that the e-mail with this one photo came through after all. At least something went my way today.
I don't believe in astrology, but even I would have to say my stars were crossed today. At this point I'm afraid to leave my apartment because I just know there's a Seoul city bus with my name on it.
I wish I had more positive things to report, but unfortunately I had another crappy day.
A bunch of things have gone wrong today. Nothing too major, just little, stupid, annoying things that add up to a heaping, steaming pile of you know what.
To start with I woke up at 7:40. I have to meet my ride at 8:00. I wasn't late at least, but I didn't have time to eat or do the morning routine I've been working on (I'll elaborate more on that another time).
At school someone locked my classroom last night so we had to go scrounging around for the extra key.
They were out of coffee so I couldn't get my fix. They didn't even have green tea. This I'm sure contributed more to my foul mood than any other single thing.
In class I have this microphone thingy I use, and the batteries died during second period. There was a schedule change so I had four classes in a row, and by fourth period my voice was giving out from shouting.
No one talked to me at lunch. No one talked to me in the teachers' office. I know other foreign teachers in this program have reported similar phenomena. The honeymoon is over and they are tired of dealing with us.
In the afternoon I was scheduled to have the last session of my after-school class. Again, only one student showed up. This time I taught the class anyway. Gi-tae was the one who came. Gi-tae is a good kid. I like him. We covered past tense and time expressions (last week, two years ago, three days from now etc.), and had a nice chat. He told me about his favorite video games and even taught me a few new Korean words. I'm normally very strict about the English Only, but in this case I think explaining the Korean translation actually helped reinforce the English phrases I was trying to teach. So basically he got a private lesson subsidized by the other kids' parents. See what happens when you show up for stuff?
So that was good actually. But one more sucky thing happened just now. I remembered I had this photo of Gi-tae I took one day when I was messing around with my camera phone during class. I wanted to include the photo in my post, so I tried e-mailing it to myself, but it looked like it didn't go through. In the mean time I finally found a program I could download so I can transfer photos from my phone to my comptuer without having to go through the photo e-mail rigamarole. That seemed like somewhat of a victory, but not so fast. The program is all in Korean and when I clicked the button I thought would transfer the photos, they all suddenly disappeared. Poof. No confirmation dialog box. Nothing. So almost 100 photos saved on my phone are gone. The only saving grace is that the e-mail with this one photo came through after all. At least something went my way today.
I don't believe in astrology, but even I would have to say my stars were crossed today. At this point I'm afraid to leave my apartment because I just know there's a Seoul city bus with my name on it.
Today when I went to teach my after-school class, only one student was there, and even she said she would have to leave early, so I just let her go. On the one hand, I can't say I blame them. They had exams this week and it's the end of the semester and it's Friday, so they're all burned out. On the other hand though, it's disappointing that they don't take this more seriously. I was really looking forward to this class in the beginning, and now that it's almost finished, I all but hate it. Out of fifteen students registered, I'm lucky if seven show up for any given class.
After the student left I stayed in my classroom and attempted to clean up a little bit. The room is filthy. Cleaning it is a futile cause, but I try to do it anyway. So much of what I try to do here feels like pushing against the ocean, an analogy I've used before but it's so appropriate.
So, not my most positive teacher attitude day.
Then again, today I sent in my application for USQ's Masters in Applied Linguistics program, so there's that. I have no idea when they'll get back to me with their answer, but hopefully soon.
After the student left I stayed in my classroom and attempted to clean up a little bit. The room is filthy. Cleaning it is a futile cause, but I try to do it anyway. So much of what I try to do here feels like pushing against the ocean, an analogy I've used before but it's so appropriate.
So, not my most positive teacher attitude day.
Then again, today I sent in my application for USQ's Masters in Applied Linguistics program, so there's that. I have no idea when they'll get back to me with their answer, but hopefully soon.
Test week.
My first and second grade students have exams this week, and the third graders are doing some other thing I don't understand, so what that means to me is I don't have any classes from today through Thursday. I still have to come to school however, but I can stay in the office and work on other things. I'm planning to use the time to pre-plan some lessons for winter camp, get my desk organized and update the lesson portfolio I'm supposed to keep, and use whatever time is left to work on my novel. This week I'm editing chapters 3 and 4. The first two chapters will require a major re-write so I'm not even going to touch them at this stage.
My first and second grade students have exams this week, and the third graders are doing some other thing I don't understand, so what that means to me is I don't have any classes from today through Thursday. I still have to come to school however, but I can stay in the office and work on other things. I'm planning to use the time to pre-plan some lessons for winter camp, get my desk organized and update the lesson portfolio I'm supposed to keep, and use whatever time is left to work on my novel. This week I'm editing chapters 3 and 4. The first two chapters will require a major re-write so I'm not even going to touch them at this stage.
The semester is most definitely winding down. The third graders took their exams a few weeks ago and they have already mentally checked out for the duration. First and second grade have their exams next week. I had assumed I would teach only third grad next week, but I've just found out I won't actually have any classes at all from Monday through Thursday. I'll still have to come into the office however. Luckily I have enough catch-up work to do so I won't be totally bored. I have to update the portfolio I've been keeping of my lesson plans and materials, and I can also use the time to prepare for winter camp. If I can get a big chunk of that planned beforehand, my life will be considerably easier during January. If there's any time leftover I can do some editing work on my novel. On top of that, I also have stepwork to do, but I hope to be finished with that by this weekend.
January. Vacation is coming. I'm still planning on going to Moscow for my winter vacation, but I won't know for a couple more weeks if I can buy a ticket. It's all very complicated. I still think I'm crazy for wanting to go to Moscow in January, but I do miss it, more than I thought I would. But I also love what I'm doing here, so there's all kinds of trade-offs.
I have no special plans for Christmas, but I really want to be somewhere cool on New Year's Eve. Last year I was in Red Square. I'll never top that, in my whole life probably, but I want to be somewhere sort of special, to sort of put a nice bookend on this year.
2005. Oh my god, what a year. More on that another time.
January. Vacation is coming. I'm still planning on going to Moscow for my winter vacation, but I won't know for a couple more weeks if I can buy a ticket. It's all very complicated. I still think I'm crazy for wanting to go to Moscow in January, but I do miss it, more than I thought I would. But I also love what I'm doing here, so there's all kinds of trade-offs.
I have no special plans for Christmas, but I really want to be somewhere cool on New Year's Eve. Last year I was in Red Square. I'll never top that, in my whole life probably, but I want to be somewhere sort of special, to sort of put a nice bookend on this year.
2005. Oh my god, what a year. More on that another time.
