Friday=mostly awesome

The first week back at school was a declared success. I only taught 1/4th of the classes I was scheduled to teach, which meant a pretty smooth transition from doing no work to doing some work. I use the word 'work' loosely.

The first day of school included an assembly of sorts. All the students and teachers had to go to the gymnasium for a presentation, which I think was supposed to be mainly for the parents of the new students. I'm pretty sure only 30 parents showed up (for over 600 kids). It also involved some kind of pledge from the students and them singing two songs. And when I say sing, I mean they just kind of mumbled and it was really awkward. The student who was leading the music was really fun to watch though.

All the teachers were presented to the room as well. In groups of about 10 teachers, we walked onto the stage, our name was called, and we stepped forward and did a little bow. I was hoping for some louder claps, but I tried not tying my self esteem to Korean boys cheering for me in front of their parents and school officials. Still, I was maybe a little disappointed.

All in all, it was extremely boring. And freezing. They do not turn on heaters in Korea.

Throughout the week I kept thinking I would be teaching, but then the classes never came, so it turned into this kind of guessing game for me. Until I just stopped checking my classroom.

I'm really excited though, because some of the classes I did teach were super interactive and smart. I liked those classes.

A couple of the other classes, however, were the most boring group of students ever. They're going to be tough to work with.

Friday was by far the best day of the week. You see, on Thursday COT and I were talking to a student about something, and somehow the fact that he played the guitar was brought up. COT mentioned that he could bring it in sometime and play something for us. I kept this up and told him we could start a band and I could sing while he played. He didn't seem too receptive.

Until the next day, when he brought his little amp and electric guitar to school and played for me during lunch.

Yeah, it was awesome. He just sat there and played for awhile. After a few minutes, some other students came in and Guitar Master (i don't remember his real name...) started jamming out.


These are the things that I love most about teaching here. So random.

Later on that afternoon, a couple students walked into my office. I try to get students to like me, so I just nonchalantly said "Want some candy?"

Bad idea.

The students were all about the candy, but COT was not happy. She then explained that these two students were not good students, and that they were there to be punished.

Oops.

She took her bamboo stick out and walked towards them, and they just kept saying "candy candy candy!". What a predicament.

So then COT smacked them around for a couple minutes, lecturing them at the same time. Then she was finished with them.

And then she said they could get some candy from me.

Oh Korea.

Welcome to the new school year!