Oh HELL no! I did NOT leave the South Side for this!

Please pretend there is a screencap of Tim Meadows in Mean Girls pulling a fire alarm and saying "Oh HELL no! I did not leave the southside for this!" here.

Last Tuesday was...a day. I don't know if there was something in the Coco Puffs (or rather, kimchi and rice) that the kids ate for breakfast, but they were actin' like they had lost their damn minds yesterday! At first I thought it was just me...I was a little grumpy, over tired, feeling sick, and generally having one of those "But I'm not even supposed to BE here!" mornings. According to many of my other teacher friends, though, it wasn't just me...it seemed to be a Korea-wide phenomenon. Perhaps there is something significant about October 14th that I'm missing.

The morning started off like most crazy mornings, with me trying to teach students who CLEARLY do not want to learn. Which, btw, is just the greatest feeling ever. I officially apologize to every teacher I ever had in the past for being a jerk in class. It is NOT fun from the other end. There was shouting and playing and general dicking around going on in most of the lessons, but it was the period of time before my 4th period class was to start that really made me just give up on the day.

A couple of boys were roughhousing, as they do, and generally seemed to be walking that line between fun and actual fighting that I've managed to tune out over the last seven months. Because that's just how it is here. Then all of a sudden, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that one of the boys was really struggling and that the noise coming from the two of them had been cut in half. I looked over and one of the boys had the other boy (who, incidentally, is my favorite student, Goatcheese) in a headlock. Fairly standard practice. But then I saw that Goatcheese was flailing his hands, trying to get out of the head lock. His eyes were bugged out, and he was CLEARLY NOT BREATHING. I was like oh HELL no and took the agressor kid over to my coteacher and told her what was happening. She said something in Korean, the kid nodded, and went to take his seat, and we started class.

And that was it. If I hadn't looked over, or if they were in the hallway or on the playground, this kid could have DIED (or at least passed out), and no one would have said a thing. I don't understand it...this is exactly why you have to watch children! I get it, boys rough house. It's a thing. BUT STRANGLING IS NOT OKAY. PEOPLE. TEACH YOUR CHILDREN NOT TO MURDER OTHER CHILDREN. Good lord!

Two things

Two very important things happened to me today. I shall tell you about them...now:

THING THE FIRST

I should have brought in my video camera today. This was too great not to be seen. After the child labor cleaning crew had come through and done their standard mediocre job, about 5 of them decided to hang behind and play with some of the toys in the short bookcases near my desk. While they were playing, one of the pieces fell behind the bookcase, and through amazing teamwork, the four of them (one of the kids was supervising) managed to pull out the bookcase and retrieve the wayward piece. Getting it back would prove to be a more difficult challenge.

"Hana, dul, set!" shouted the supervisor. The four laborers strained to push the case back.

"Hana, dul, set!" came the command again. More straining. No movement.

This continued on for about 10 more minutes, with pauses to conference about the best way to move the bookcase back. Meanwhile, Teacher Nolen sat at his desk snickering.

Finally, I got up, and used my Super Waygook Strength to push the bookcase back. It had gotten stuck on something on the floor. The children were duly impressed (because I am a very impressive individual).

That is one thing! Now on to...

THING THE SECOND

Today I learned that Teri Hatcher got her start on The Love Boat.





Welcome to my blog. Come for the stories, stay for the Teri Hatcher factoids.

I need to blog about this RIGHT NOW

This morning, I was walking to school, listening to my iPod as is my wont. As I was climbing the hill to get to my school, a police car drives past me and pulls over up ahead. I don't really think too much about this, because...it's a car pulling over. Who even notices that? Well the policeman gets out of his car, and starts walking toward me.

ME (bowing): Annyeong haseyo
ME (in my head): ohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrap whatdoidowhatdoidowhatdoidowhatdoido
OFFICER: Are you very busy?
ME: Oh, I am walking to school right now
ME (in my head): oh god no now he's talking to me

So then the officer beckons me into the backseat of his car. His POLICE car. Now I don't know about you, but the backseat of police cars is neither a place I have spent much time, nor a place I WANT to spend much time. So mentally I'm FLIPPING OUT at this point.

Anyway he starts talking to me, asking the standard Korean questions for when you first meet a person: "What do you do?" "How old are you?" "Are you single?" "How's your sex life?" (I'm only kidding a little about the last one, very few people have asked me that). Of course the natural American response is "Are you coming on to me??" but here in Korea these questions are just a way of putting you in the social hierarchy.

As we're talking, two things happen: first, it comes out that he just wants to practice his English. Which, great. I know I'm here to be an English teacher, and I don't mind talking to you, but I'm seriously on my way to my job for which I do NOT want to be late, thank you very much!

The second, and more distressing, thing that happens is that we drive past my school. JESUS TAKE THE WHEEL. Turns out that he misunderstood me and thought I was teaching at Osan University. Wonderful. After much negotiation, and my one post-it note with the address of my school on it, he understands that I am an elementary school teacher and drops me off at school. Late*. Wonderful.

I gave him my email address, and I think he wants to email me to have a conversation time, so I guess I made a new friend...yay?

*I was only five minutes late, and we are supposed to be at school 20 minutes before class starts, so this only really cut into my prep time before class. Still sucky, but not the worst thing in the world.