Teaching English is a lot of work. I'm not sure how rewarding it is, yet. Haha. But I love interacting with the kids outside of class. They're adorable when I don't have to force them to sit in desks.
Lunch is always fun. (And, it was super delicious today: a huge bowl of noodles with egg and carrots, kimchi, honeydew melon, and a corn dog!) Today, I sat with the 1st graders. One of the girls kept watching me eat. I'd catch her looking and she'd smile at me. We did that a few times, haha. Also at lunch, one of my 2nd graders came up and high-fived me loudly. The faculty sitting next to me laughed. (I may have found a high-fiver replacement for Josh. Only temporary, of course.)
Yesterday, some of my 4th grade girls stayed a little bit longer after class. I let them show me a Korean TV show on YouTube. It was a "scary" reality show about ghosts. Like a lot of Korean shows, though, it had the feel of a cheesy game show. Haha. But I humored my students and watched for a little bit anyway--bonding time, you know.
Oh! My 5th grade girls visited me in my classroom one day last week and had me play a K-pop music video. They made me wait 'til it got to the part where the main singer rips off his shirt. They didn't know the English for it, but they mimed that he had really good abs. Haha. And then they all screamed when it got to that part. I was cracking up.
I wore my hair down the other day (usually it's in a ponytail) and the 5th and 6th grade girls went crazy, "Whaaa! Whoa!" Well, I'm assuming their reaction was because of my straight hair...maybe I just had something on my shirt or forgot to put on pants that day.
I've been rewarding my classes this week with small prizes because they reached their 10 sticker mark. My treasure box is full of pencils, erasers, candies, and a handful of US pennies. They got excited when they saw them. "Money?!" And then they found out how much they were worth...haha...
Some of my students' artwork:
And I get to draw, too!
Yesterday, I had to show up for a parent meeting thing at school. I was introduced to the parents who came (only about 10 or so), along with the new vice principal and another new teacher. While I had been waiting for it to start, though, one of the moms came up to me and asked if I had eaten "lunchee" and then gave me this rice cake snack/dessert:
Haha...sometimes Koreans are too nice. I saved it and tried it today. I took one tiny bite and decided, eh, I'd rather have a choco pie. I've had similar rice cake things before. They're edible, but not great.
But that mom was so nice. I've run into her a couple times before. Her son's in 1st grade. She's so proud of him. He's a cutie, too.
A different mom visiting yesterday saw me in the cafeteria and exclaimed something in Korean. One of the lunch ladies translated, "beautiful." Haha. The mom returned her tray and then came back and stood in front of my table and just stared at me and smiled while I was eating. Awkward...and flattering, I think?
Oh, so I realized today that my grocery store only carries individually wrapped rubber cheese. So I had a rubber cheese sandwich for dinner. Blegh. And then a little package of Ritz-like crackers called Zec and...wait for it...a choco pie.
I'll leave you with this picture I took on the subway the other day...I have to laugh at some of the fashion I see here...
The shoes say "MORE IS MORE"... the socks, though...
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